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1. I got my new sweatshirt in the mail today! It's the same one Carla got a week or so ago, but in olive green instead of navy blue. I love it so! My old sweatshirt was...not exactly something I would choose myself (had a big picture of wolves on it and said Alaska; I think it was given to us by Carla's aunt when they went on a trip there), plus it was worn thin in many places and the cuffs were pretty much shredded. Also it was a pullover, which is fine for in the house, but as a jacket to wear out, I'd rather have a zip-up sweatshirt.

2. We bought a new sofa! Earlier in the week we got a flier from Easy Life, which had an advertisement for a $599 sofa with free loveseat or recliner and we both liked the idea. The sofa reclines on both ends, plus the centre folds down to be a little table with built-in cup holders!

At first we'd been thinking about getting the recliner to go with it, since that's what would fit better in our living room, but the recliner turned out to be a rocker recliner, which I do not like, plus the hand pull on the side felt really cheap. So we're now not sure exactly where the loveseat will go, but we'll find a place for it somewhere, either in the living room or maybe here in the computer room.

I am all O_o over the fact that we have bought furniture. It's so grown up! We did buy a bed years ago when we got married, but that is the only furniture we've bought, new or used. Everything else was already in the house or hand-me-down from relatives. (Oh, and we got a coffee table from Carla's folks for Christmas a couple years ago.) Well, we did buy the three computer desks we have, and the CD shelves, but those don't feel like real furniture in quite the same way, you know? They're not a sofa!

Anyway, they were out of stock at that location, so it has to be ordered and will be delivered around the 8th.

3. They had Tim Tams at the grocery store! FINALLY! I have been hearing now for a year or more that Pepperidge Farm sells Tim Tams here, but I never saw them anywhere. I was kind of disappointed in the price, though. On sale for $3.50, regular price $3.99. I'm not sure how much they are at Cost Plus, but it's not that much more expensive. I was hoping these would be a little cheaper. I did buy a pack, but even the sale price is out of my price range except for very special occasions (like finding them for the first time ever).

How come the One Ring doesn't turn Sauron invisible?

Really, I want to know.

Am embarked on the process of en-Sevening the HP laptop. At the point where it asks you to stop and uninstall iTunes (and some other things that there doesn't appear to be an uninstall path for) it decided the driver for the DVD drive was corrupt, and a reboot didn't fix it. I tried a system restore, which claimed to have failed, but the drive came back to life. So now we are at 94% on Copying Windows files, and we'll see how it goes.

Also, I grabbed an ethernet cable to connect it to the router, in case the wireless went down during the process, and now it seems to be inextricably stuck in the port.

Sigh.

Also, I probably need new glasses again, but I was too stressed and sleep-deprived earlier in the week to do anything about it. Last year I did it early in my November break, on too little sleep, and flunked the visual field test, which ended up costing me an uncomfortable morning and my insurer several hundred dollars for a glaucoma exam. Not risking that again; I'll probably leave it until after the February trip (if it happens) is over.

Also available at http://ellarien.dreamwidth.org/510372.html, where there are comments.

• 00:13 [nice! will be blipping when I wake up] RT @thesmyrk: We're changing Black Friday to Black Rock Friday. Get acquainted. #blackrockfriday #
• 18:37 watching Shaw Brothers movies with my brother. #
• 18:41 Kidrobot has mini #Munny models out in new shapes including giraffes: bit.ly/7yBI9o #
• 20:44 @firinel buy nothing day always struck me as classist, too. #
• 22:07 A telling case of whiteness-as-unmarked in US society: tinyurl.com/ycwqv5h (via @sasha_feather) #

LT.

Why is it so creepy when a guy says he can't wait till women rule the world? Is it the condescension? But that should just be intensely annoying; what pushes it over into creepy?

ETA: Also he called me "princess" all evening but I know exactly why that was creepy. How's your family holiday going?

Well, that was probably the oddest book I've read this year. It's set in a world where there's an East-West gradient of ability to use magic, and also of the speed at which time passes. In the east there are gods -- whose nature we eventually find out -- and also an increased difficulty to hang on to personal identity, and conversely to the magicless west. Travelers to the East also age more slowly; it's a bit like Vinge's zones on a small, fantasy-world scale. To the mostly peaceful village of Applegarth, about halfway between the extremese, there come two travelers; Hanethe, an ancestor who went east a few generations back and has come home with a vengeful goddess after her, and Jankin, a tourist^H^H^H traveling scholar from the west. Hanethe has a vengeful goddess after her; Jankin has more charm than is good for him. Their arrival causes a series of events that seriously disrupt the cozy, polyamorous domesticity of life at the manor.

The whole thing is told in a peculiar sort of continuous present tense; one of the viewpoint characters has the ability to see people's past and future selves, but the juxtaposition of events from different epochs isn't confined to her narration. It's all done skilfully enough that it isn't hard to follow, which is quite a feat; there are echoes of Le Guin and McKinley in the style and the setting, not in a bad way.

Also available at http://ellarien.dreamwidth.org/510116.html, where there are comments.

- Kotatsu in a box, about $250 at Mitsuwa. I think a kotatsu would be perfect in the Bay Area's climate--there are plenty of days when it's pretty chilly here, but not really cold enough to turn on the central heating (and a fair number of apartments don't even have central heating). A kotatsu would be perfect. Unfortunately, assaultdoor doesn't like sitting on the floor, so even if we had extra money, I don't think we'd get one... Maybe someday, though! I really enjoyed sitting at them when we stayed at ryokan in Japan.

- The official Maru book at Kinokuniya, as in Maru the hilariously cute Japanese cat. GAH SO CUTE. The book is partly bilingual. SUUUUUUPER CUTE. Like paper Prozac, y'all, seriously.

(EDIT: Also it has a DVD. XD XD XD So you can have Maru on demand, no waiting!)

I've already mentioned that One Piece has the habit of breaking my heart between the booger jokes and epic fight scenes. The end of the Enies Lobby Arc is a perfect example of One Piece at it's heart-wrenching best.

The crew's ship, the Merry Go, has been slowly falling apart for several arcs. The thought of leaving Merry behind for a new ship has created a rift between Usopp and the rest of the crew. Finally, Merry gets swept away during a massive storm. Except she (he?) comes to the crew's rescue when they need her the most. . . and finally, irreparably falls to pieces, having carried her crew to safety.

Chapter 430/episode 312 is a really touching love letter to a loyal ship. Both the manga and anime make me bawl every. single. time.

(All of this to say: I uploaded episode 312, and omg, you should so totally watch it!)

This entry was originally posted at http://anenko.dreamwidth.org/352135.html.

I hope everyone who celebrates it had a good Thanksgiving. Yesterday morning here was foggy and dewy, so I went out with my camera for a pre-dinner walk.

( Pictures! )

I cannot bear to think that the what, three? of you who don't read glvalentine 's journal might miss this video: Fred Astaire, Ginger Rogers, Cake's "Love You Madly."

Thing. Of. Beauty.

(Also, I had forgotten how much I adore Cake and those ridiculous horns. I am a total sucker for ridiculous horns.)

I just traded in a couple more surplus bags of books at the local used bookstore and "entertainment exchange," and picked up from the classical music rack something entitled (as copy-pasted from iTunes)


彩なす島の伝説 沖縄島唄

which Google translates as "Legend of the Island of Okinawa Shima Uto eggplant" and Babelfish as "彩 The legendary Okinawa island of the island which is formed 唄" which I guess wildly might actually be something like "The legend of the formation of the island of Okinawa."

It sounds like a variable number of voices singing, presumably in Japanese, with a jaunty accompaniment of clicky percussion and plucked strings. Not my usual sort of thing, but not unpleasant.

Also, my copy of Win7 for the HP laptop arrived today -- closely followed by an email announcing that it had been dispatched and please to allow 5-7 days for delivery.

Talking of Win7, I wonder if there's a way to stop it randomly switching on the Canon printer. I suppose I could disable the software power-up in the printer driver, but it's sometimes handy to be able to send something to it from the other room, without going in to press the button first.

Also available at http://ellarien.dreamwidth.org/509734.html, where there are comments.

So. Off tomorrow morning for London (again) and Dragonmeet. Do I catch the 6.10 train or the 7.00 train? Neither is exactly heartwarming. This will definitely be a "sleep on the train" journey.

7.00, I think. Let's be reasonable.

Back Sunday night. Sunday day -- shopping. Christmas shopping. Really.

Anyone who'll be at Dragonmeet, see you there.

---

Iago says "What's your title again? Cherub? Let me speak to your angel. No? Well, Archangel, Creator, whatever works -- I need to escalate to someone who can smite you."

Courtesy of falulatonks, I found a cool site, The Sixty One that's like a combination of Last.fm and Pandora. Basically you listen to music, most of it from new artists and you can save or heart music you like (you only get a certain number of hearts per day). The stuff that the most people like gets featured so it's easier to find. It's a great way to discover new music. I've already found The Orange Peels who I love, they sound like Owl City with more rock. There's also fun quests that are kind of addicting to do in order to gain more hearts and reputation points. If you sign up, if you could say that Anoel referred you, that'd be great :)

I had a good Thanksgiving. Went to a nice restaurant here with some students who stayed over break and one of our Trustees paid for a meal for all of us so that was nice. Also watched some TV including a two parter Will and Grace Thanksgiving episode that gave up nicely in my queue since I'm watching the show right now. I'm on S4 and I love that for this show I love all the main characters equally. I probably love Karen the most though, she cracks me up so much especially when she does her "I feel so bad for you/I'll be nice... *laugh NOT* It is entertaining, funny and delightfully gay. I like it.

After the December 9th episode of Glee, it's not coming back til April 13th. FOUR FUCKING MONTHS!!! *sobs* I don't even know what I'm going to do. Rewatch my DVDs, vid and hang around in fandom a lot I suppose. I don't know what I'm going to do without my usual happiness bringer. Like this week's episode with so much amazing music and character love. Oh and I was thinking of my dream Adam Lambert guest star appearances and I have two. Either he's a rival school's glee club's director who leads a group of kids like him who dress glam rockery and sing great songs and are all edgy and fun. But then it'd be hard to get him to have solos with the kids. So then my second scenario would be to have him be the vocal coach that they invite in so he gets to sing songs and have interaction with Kurt, Rachel and everyone else. It would so be the best thing ever.

The Internet seems dead during holidays, but for me it's the time when I check LJ/etc. the most.

Let's come up with ideas for WisCon panels and then submit them!

Here's a link to where you submit panel ideas.

Last year I was disappointed by the proliferation of negatively-worded anti-religious panels. I mean, I can understand a couple, but the panel-wording came off to me as hostile, and unnecessarily large in number. At the very least, we should be able to put a lot of thought into the way we word our panel descriptions, right?

I would also really like to see some anime/manga panels, as in, more than one, and have them actually be on the schedule, instead of shunted off to the Spontaneous Programming Room for the third year in a row.

I think that in sasha_feather's journal a while ago, we were talking about a "Studio Ghibli: Feminist Alternative to Disney?" panel, in which Studio Ghibli movies could be discussed, particularly as an alternative to ultra-thin and often selfish Disney heroines.
In a Ghibli panel, though I would also want to look at how larger bodies are used as a marker for corruption/evil/greed (Porco Rosso, Howl's Moving Castle).

Last year the spontaneous panel was about Monstrous Bodies in shounen manga, and the year before that we talked about the representation of bodies in shoujo manga, so we should not do those exact topics, perhaps.

And, you know, non-anime/manga related panels, too. Ideas:
--Do you need to read the source material to enjoy the fanfiction?
--Why do people insist that those with negative opinions of a fandom (ie, Glee, Dollhouse) haven't read/seen "enough" of it for their critique to have any validity?

So!

--Leave comments about what kinds of panels you'd like to see/ideas you've already submitted.
--Take it back to your journal in order to get more ideas.
--Submit them appropriately at the WisCon website.

Wah, it's over!

( Spoilers )

Crossposted from rilina @ Dreamwidth.
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Guess what I stumbled on while browsing voice actors on animenewsnetwork!!

http://www.animenewsnetwork.com/encyclopedia/anime.php?id=10561

March '10!!