shot from the dallas airport

Okay, so I’ve been unable to blog for various reasons, the largest of which were exhaustion, jet lag, and general feeling-sick. I spent the majority of yesterday – er, well, yesterday was quite long for me, actually. Technically days ended and began, and sleep was involved, but it’s all kind of hazy and hard-to-define. So let’s begin with my time in LAX.

Due to my canceled flight causing major delays, I was unable to see Caitlin at all. It was bummy, but I was so grumpy anyway that I doubt I’d have been much fun, and it would have been so much driving in traffic for her that it wasn’t worth it for the hourish we could have spent together. I did meet a friend, though, a girl from Massachusetts who lives in Sydney. We kept running into each other in the airport (she was going to Sydney, and I to Auckland), and eventually actually introduced ourselves and got some dinner together. We had a lovely chat, and it was a great way to spend some time. We exchanged contact info, and I’m really hoping we can hang out at some point when I’m in Sydney.

I was also lucky enough to meet a very friendly woman and her family, who live in LA but are originally from Christchurch. We talked for ages while waiting for the Auckland flight (which departed at midnight, local time, aka 2am body-clock time), and she was quite charming with her nice Kiwi accent, and her family was sweet too. Finally, we boarded the plane.

I had been dreading this flight for ages. 13-14 hours is a long time, even when you haven’t been in airports or on flights for the 18

my pre-boarding parfait!

hours prior. I’d brought my laptop with 7 seasons of QI, The Lord of the Rings anthology in book form, along with my iPod and knitting and numerous other pasttimes. My Sydney friend was kind enough to offer me some of the sleeping aid pills she’d bought, so I had those as well.

I’d turn out to barely need any of those. I had a window seat, and the seat beside me was empty (edge rows are two seats only). That meant I got two pillows, two blankets, and plenty of extra space for my legs. I was in heaven. The in-flight entertainment was fairly comprehensive (I watched a bit of the Nutcracker before I got mad at it for not being Barischnikov’s). Takeoff was smooth, as was the flight itself. I was right in front of the bathroom, so I didn’t have to go far if I had to pee. They gave out eye masks and toothbrushes! I was absolutely tickled.

I was having difficulty deciding on my dinner (honey-mustard chicken or BBQ salmon), and the rather charming Maori flight attendant gave me BOTH. “Can you do that?” “Of course I can! I’m the chef!” He also offered me extra marshmallows in the after-dinner hot chocolate, which I politely declined.

I then slept like a baby until there were only four hours left until arrival. It was heaven. I spent the remaining four hours intermittently sleeping, reading, and eating a delightful breakfast. All in all, the only thing I can complain about at all was the fact that my arms were killing me. Dragging my luggage about so much (especially in LAX – I got SO lost) had overextended the nerves in my arms, as well as taking a toll on my muscles. That was part of the reason I didn’t update at all yesterday – I could barely type.

rachel in her new thinkgeek shirt

Eventually, I arrived in Auckland. After making it through customs and having my bags x-rayed, I came out and met Rachel! We chatted while waiting for the shuttle back to the hotel she’d stayed at the night before (my flight came in at 7:45am, and she lives 4 hours from the airport), and what for all appearances seemed to be a band of Maori musicians chortled heartily and took photos of my cleavage from afar.

We shuttled back to the hotel, driven by a man who called us “youse” and who was quite friendly and helpful, and I took the loveliest shower ever. We then packed up immediately and shuttled back to Domestics to catch out grabaseat flights to Christchurch.

Why yes, I HAVE had enough of airplanes for a while, how did you guess? XD The flight to CC had trivia for the inflight video, though, which was such a clever idea, and Rachel and I had a ball answering them (and getting them right, for the most part – I was particularly proud of guessing/knowing that your semicircular canals control balance). We also got the business card of a woman who owns a homemade yarn business!

The taxi we got from the Christchurch airport to the hotel we’d booked was horribly overpriced (by at least $10), but it got us there,

bartleby the hotel cat

and Rachel’s mom was kind enough to give us money for taxis anyway. We pulled into the parking lot of our charming motel – Argyle on the Park – and were immediately greeted by a loud, fussy “Meooooow.” We looked down, and espied a black and white tomcat, who looked at us and meowed again. I leapt out of the taxi (“KITTY!”) and he was all too happy to be petted, he was quite nuzzly and affectionate. It was definitely the best greeter I’ve ever experienced. Once we got our bags out of the car, he walked back towards the check-in office like he was leading us there.

The manager/proprietor/probably owner of the motel is a very friendly, grey-haired Aussie, who sympathised with our taxi plight, and gave us free milk and a charming welcome basket filled with coupons for local restaurants and attractions, some cookies, some press coffee, and various teas. He led us to our studio suite, showed us around, and bade us goodbye. The room is nice! It’s got enough space despite being quite cozy, has a nice shower, mini fridge, microwave, and a king-sized bed that Rachel and I are sharing. The bed has an electric blanket under the fitted sheets, in addition to the wall heater in the room. There’s also a TV/DVD player, but we haven’t really done much with those. We opted to pay the $10/day for wifi, and it’s quite a good connection, unlimited bandwidth as well, it seems. All this for less than $60 a night, to boot. The motel is also right next to Hagley park, and very close to both downtown CC and the botanical gardens! Highly recommend it.

I was about ready to fall asleep, though it was only 5pm, so we decided to walk downtown and get dinner at Blue Fish Sushi Train. I brought my camera, whose battery died in the first 10 minutes of the walk (I’d neglected to bring my second battery, and the first

i got this before the battery died

hadn’t been charged in a while). We got to see a lot of the downtown area, which is full of interesting shops (which were mostly closed at that time of night) and has lovely architecture. I say we got to see a lot of it because we ended up being quite lost. We were following walking directions from Google maps. It disclaims that walking directions are in beta stage…but yeah, it told us to turn on a street that didn’t exist. We did eventually find our way to the restaurant. I’d mentioned to Rachel earlier, though, that I felt intimidated going into places if I was one of the only people in there, because I don’t like to be the focus of attention, etc. Well, the restaurant was nearly empty, and it was getting late, and we were exhausted, so we ended up deciding to just taxi back

i didn't photograph the pizza, have some trees instead

to the room and order delivery.

We did, and it was fantastic. I got a pizza that had pulled chicken, cream cheese, corn, and herbs on it…it. is. delicious. Rachel and I each ordered a pizza for ourselves, and I am SO glad I don’t have to share the rest of mine. XD Then, finally, at about 8pm (or nearly 3am according to my body clock), I called it a night, and fell asleep.

Well, I have taken the first step on my great journey to the opposite side of the world. I’ll have a few archived posts on the background of my trip up when I can access my laptop, so watch this spot!

I’ve had a hell of a morning. Last night I was presented with the horrible realisation that I had gotten my departure time wrong. It wasn’t 5pm, it was 10am. That meant instead of leaving at noon, I had to leave at 6.

I had awful Field-Trip syndrome last night, and couldn’t sleep until after 1am. I kept thinking of more and more things not to forget. At least I didn’t forget any of them! I think.

My mom drove Gashi, Nathan, and I to O’Hare, which is a good 2ish hours from where I live. I am always amazed by travel. Somehow we made it to O’Hare all right, and miraculously we found the right terminal, and then I manage against all odds to stand in the right lines and my baggage fits the restrictions and I make it in.

My flight was cancelled. You can’t win ‘em all. I now leave Chicago at 12pm, and have a layover in Dallas (funny, I had a dream I was flying to Texas…), and I won’t get to LAX until 6:20pm. I might not get to see Caitlin depending on the status of my flight out of LAX. I’m hopeful though. I was looking forward to that.

I made it through the rigourous screening process just fine. Admittedly, the man with the xray machine looked quite perturbed by Fawn, my BJD, who is all folded up in my carryon. I called out “It’s a doll!” He let it pass, though whether the events are related is uncertain.

It suddenly occurred to me that I neglected to pull out my bag of liquids. Well, all’s well that ends well, right?

And now we get to the present. I am sitting in an airport cafe, about to enjoy the shit out of some $8.50 French toast, and blogging from my phone. I should have some pictures for you later, or at least some more rambling.

You know what’s not fair?

Japan. Japan isn’t fair. Japan is like 2% of the world, and that means that there is another 98% of the world that ISN’T Japan and that’s just mean and unkind. I mean, China and Germany are kind of close seconds in certain ways, but they lack that certain Japanniness that Japan has.

Like emotes. Here in America when we smile, we say this:

And that’s bullshit. First off, you can’t use it within parentheses because it makes you look like you have a double chin (see what I mean? ). Plus, it makes that side of the parenthesis text look heavy and imbalanced. It also sucks because it’s got a colon in it, and a colon doubles as a body part, and that’s just gross. And my final argument about the smiley emote is that you have to turn your head sideways to see it, and then when you do, it’s just a creepy soulless smile, and totally not worth the crick you now have in your neck.

When the Japanese smile? They do crazy right-side-up emotes that I apparently can’t copy and paste because they’re SO AWESOME that Wordpress can’t even HANDLE them. That’s how awesome they are.

Secondly, cats.

i googled "american cat" and got this

This is a cat from not-Japan. America, if the caption is to be believed. I take issue with that, because rarely is the caption on a cat macro accurate. The i-has-a-flavour cat does not care what he tastes like. The i-can-has-cheeseburger-cat probably only wants a very specific part of a cheeseburger (and that’s probably the mayonnaise, if I know cats). So this cat is probably from Australia or some non-American place, but because it is overweight and my country is known for being fattycakes, it is associated with my regional ethnicity.

But I digress. My point is that other countries have cats like that. And Japan has cats like THIS:

And even when their cat videos aren’t amazing, they have amazing comments. Like so:

@iiichigoo -san?o(=?o?=)oo(^O^)o ?????????? Thank you for your wonderful comment? She enjoys doze of night now in this strawberry bed.-??Probably your country is really morning now. I hope you? have very wonderful and awesome happy time all the time? ^O^/* Thank you so much?

Awesome happy time. ALL THE TIME. Just for commenting! It’s like MAGIC.

Coincidentally, I do an excellent job of reading those comments aloud. I should really go into voice acting.

note the presence of laziness and lack of boxes

I remember the day I realised I was never going to own Maru the cat. I tried to get my cat, Blaster, to “get into” the box thing. I put catnip in a box, and he knocked it over and pulled all the catnip out. And then he ate it. The catnip, not the box. Blaster’s just kind of a jerkass sometimes, though.

I’ve thought about sending Blaster off to Japan to further his education. Hopefully they could teach him how to be a pro weightlifter or how to run his own train station. At the very least, maybe they could put a cute outfit on him and send him back. That would be okay, too.

And that brings me to my final point. It’s not electronics, because that’s obvious (do we have sex robots, or video games with peripheral controllers shaped like a butt? NO). It’s gameshows.

Really, it’s TV in general, but Japanese gameshows are like the cream of the crop. They have a gameshow that forces people to contort themselves into crazy shapes or risk being thrown into a pool of what looks suspiciously like pee. They have a gameshow where you have to enjoy tea and biscuits while running increasingly fast on a trademill/conveyor belt thing. Hell, most of their gameshows don’t even seem to have rules, you just get hit in the nuts with a stick,* get a man’s ass stuck to your face, or get ejected out of a public toilet and forced to waterski.

*Okay, apparently that’s if you fail a tongue twister…the first time I saw it, there was no explanation.

Yeah. I was going to end the post here, but while I was searching for that last link, I found this:

1-2-PANTSU

I just thought you all should know that after posting that glowing imitation of Hyperbole and a Half, my hit count dropped. I see I’m just as funny as I always was.

On a related note, I had a dream last night that I got Allie’s name wrong and she got really mad at me. I just checked, though. I got it right.

Your regularly-scheduled perfume-and-photos blogging will resume later today.

So for the past day or so, I’ve been reading Hyperbole and a Half, which you probably know from that one livejournal icon about going to the bank like an adult. It’s hilarious, and I recommend it.

Now, for some background: I used to draw comics. They were in pencil on looseleaf printer paper, and they’re all gone, and that’s okay. I blatantly appropriated the drawing style from Sluggy Freelance (only without the effort and goodness), and most of my comics were “guest strips.” Which is to say, they featured characters from other webcomics. Like Indie Rock Pete from Diesel Sweeties. Or that guy from SomethingPositive whose name I don’t remember anymore. The other characters in the comics? Were me and my fellow 13-year-old friends. Hijinx would ensue.

Needless to say, you now understand why I don’t mind that years’ worth of work is utterly lost to the ages.

What I do mind is the fact that I read stuff like Hyperbole and a Half, and end up laughing so hard that I cry, and then feel really inadequate. I don’t have a cool comiblog. I don’t even have a cool regular-type blog. I just post perfume stuff and pictures of dolls. Which has its place, mind you, but man.

So I was thinking up this post, and was like “I should totally draw something in paint and then I can be cool like Allie.” But as with most of my attempts to imitate people cooler than me, the motivation was there, but the content was sadly lacking.

Then, it was like an act of God. I was walking back to my computer and I passed my boyfriend on the couch. My boyfriend, who was sitting next to the box of Dunkin Donuts.

“Delicious donut holes!” I thought, and bent to acquire some. Upon opening the package, I saw the following:

It was empty. EMPTY. He had eaten ALL the donut holes and then CLOSED THE PACKAGE BACK UP.

“What the hell?!” I asked, “Why the hell would you close it back up?”

Of course, the downside is that Gashi didn’t respond in kind, so I was left hanging without any hilarious way to end my donuts story. And without donuts. I then went to try my hand at some MS Paint and in doing so gained a lot of respect for Allie, and lost a lot for MC Escher. The first donut hole container I drew had even more questionable physics and optical illusions than Escher could dream of. Take THAT!

Anyway, don’t expect more ripoffy illustrations. If you want more Hyperbole and a Half, just go read that instead. Who knows, maybe I’ll take the time to do something creative of my own instead of just riding on the backs of giants.

Although riding on the backs of giants sounds pretty awesome.

ETA: But then this happened!

Me: Why are you thrusting at my head?

Gashi: Why not?

Me: Because you could get my head pregnant.

Gashi: …

Me: What?! That’d be terrible! My head would get all heavy and swollen…and I’d have to have the baby out my nose or something. Where are you going? Come back!

Gashi: No.

That’s funny, right? Right?

In light of new camera celebration, I visited my mother. My mother has four cats, down from five. The first of the four is named, wholly, God Love Lucky Sid. That’s what you get for letting every one of your kids name the cat. Sid was found mewling in our sandbox during a rainstorm a long time ago. We suspect he’s about 19 years old now, give or take a few years, since he came to us as an adult. He’s the first cat I’ve ever seen “go grey.”

He’s almost certainly part Maine Coon, and possibly part Ragdoll. He’s tall enough to reach my waist with his front paws if he stands up, and he’s skinny as a rail. He loves to go outside on his leash, and has a piteous and undignified meow.

Then we have Timber, who was so named when we thought she was a boy. She was found with her siblings, tied into a bag that was inside the engine of an abandoned car. After that, we had to keep her.

She’s nicknamed “Squeaky” because her meow is high-pitched and kittenish, and she is quite talkative when she wants something. She’s also not above climbing you if you aren’t stooping to pick her up. She’s an incredibly affectionate little girl, she adores my boyfriend and melts into chirpy purrings when he scritches her ears.

I haven’t posted in a while. Not because I don’t wear BPAL anymore, but because with allergy season reigning at the moment, I’ve been unable to pick out notes very well, and have mostly just been wearing my new favourite: Lilith vs the Giant Crab. Review to follow eventually.

I attended the Dairyland BJD Forum’s summer Meetup on the 17th, which was a lot of fun, but sadly I didn’t get many good pictures. The ones I did, however, I will post shortly.

I’ve been a busy bee lately. The meat of this post, however, is to show off my new camera. It’s a Fujifilm Finepix S200EXR, and it is glorious. I’ve been playing with it essentially nonstop since I picked the package up last night. I do still need to finish reading the manual though – SO MANY SETTINGS. It’s just a point-and-shoot, but it’s got so many options and little doodads that I’m suddenly really grateful I didn’t buy a DSLR. I’d drown in settings!

Why a new camera, you might ask? Well, the primary reason is my upcoming trip. It would be almost criminal if I went to New Zealand with a cheap camera. My trip to Australia last year was accompanied by a Nikon Coolpix S220, which is a great camera for the price – but you really do get what you pay for. Not everyone is a big fan of my new camera (my stepfather said “Well, it’s no Nikon…”), but I am quite pleased already, and I think once I learn my way around it a bit more, I’ll like it even better.

I took the liberty of purchasing an extra battery for it, an 8GB SD card (holds 2.5k JPG pictures on the highest setting), and a lens accessory pack. The pack included a lens hood (which in my very limited experience doesn’t do much), and UV, Circular Polarizing, and Fluorescent lens filters. I haven’t gotten to play with them much yet, but I’m looking forward to it!

But enough ramble about my camera, let me just show you some pictures!

I keep intending to try Love’s Philosophy, but I keep getting distracted. I was recently introduced to the idea of testing more than one scent at a time, using different arms/different parts of the same arm. I’m feeling kind of purist for the moment, though, so I haven’t tried it yet. I’m worried I’ll end up with too much overlap and it’ll skew my opinion. In other news, I got some Saw-Scaled Viper on my nose/upper lip, and whew. That burned a bit. But I’m being tangential.

One thing that I always find fun and frustrating is deciding, in some case, what the scent is named after; in other cases, deciding whether I like the intended namesake or my own impression better. For example, as I don’t have any flavour text to go with “Clemence,” I don’t know whether they mean forgiveness, Clemense Poesy, or Ms. Louise Michel, the French anarchist (depicted below). I, myself, kept picturing Elizabeth Swann’s father from the first Pirates of the Caribbean movie. Classy, that.

louise michel, the red virgin of montmartre

Website Description:

CLÉMENCE
Patchouli, Kashmiri tea, cardamom, black pepper, carnation, and clove.

In the vial: Ooh, spicy and delicious.

On my skin: Clove, clove, clove! You can smell a hint of the cardamom, as well, but the clove is really overpowering. It’s also kind of got a medicinal scent to it, somehow.

Drydown: Oh! I caught a hint of the carnation! I wouldn’t have expected it, but these smells blend really quite well.

Dry: Okay, there’s the tea! This has really calmed down a lot, and while it’s really faint, it’s really calming and comforting. I’m thoroughly enjoying this.

Things I Would Do While Wearing This Scent: This makes me think of dimly-lit old-fashioned libraries. I’ve always wanted to climb one of those rolling ladders, so I think I’d like to do that. Alternately, I would definitely go to high tea with my friends wearing this.

Overall: It’s distinct, but subtle, with a dash of spice and a lot of sweet clove scent. It’s not something I could really wear on a regular basis, though, sadly.

Rating:

Ha-Yarn Cho

I have basically been in love with Dollmore’s gorgeous Ha-Yarn Cho since the moment I saw her. The Dollmore website offers the following description of her:

There is a slender and beautiful Model doll Ha-Yarn with oriental eyes.

Her name “Ha-Yarn” in Korean stems from her look that is as white as snow.

15-year-old Korean Model girl Ha-Yarn without double eyelid

makes a good impression like the soft sunlight

besides, Her smile flickers in her face with white teeth~

She is so attractive to have a perfect slender body lines and Model poses as well.^^

Is it sad that part of the reason I love this hobby is the Engrish?

I waffled over buying her for a long time…I wasn’t sure that I was actually into Ball Joint Dolls as a hobby, because Lawds, I thought yarn was expensive! And even if I was certain that I was willing to make this sort ofcommitment, I still balked at spending $500-odd on a doll. I had decided that I was going to wait until Christmas to order her, for a few reasons.

The first of which was to be sure that I wanted her. The second, to see if they would have any holiday-related deals. And lastly, being a waitress, I make a decent amount more money during the summer and again during the holidays, so I could be certain to have a surplus of funds. All in all, it was a tremendously wise decision, with lots of sensible reason backing it.

her default eyes

I, uh, bought Ha-Yarn on 4-27-10. The fact that I could afford her eventually overrode all of my common sense, and I bought her and a small fortune worth of items to go with her. I must admit, though. It was quite the bargain. Dollmore has a deal wherein you spend $700 and get free shipping. Considering that shipping is $90, it seemed more than reasonable to just splurge on some accessories for her.

Ha-Yarn Cho is the name of her sculpt, but my girl is named Fawn. Her name came to me while I was chatting with some friends over AIM, and to be completely honest, was the deciding moment for me. As soon as she had a name, I knew she was right for me. She doesn’t have a surname yet, if she ever does, and I’m reserving judgment on her personality.

I admit that I don’t seem to be able to think of Fawn as a real person, which doesn’t seem to be an issue for many people in this hobby. It’s possibly because I don’t have her, yet, but I don’t have a story for her, or an age, or a personality. I might not ever have a great epic tale behind her – the most “fantastic” idea I’ve had for her is that she uses a wheelchair – but not everyone can have a fire elemental lost on the material plane without their powers, I suppose.

Speaking of wheelchairs, that might have to wait some time, in any case. The only one I can find that looks like it would fit her 26″ frame is for the MyTwinn doll, which is discontinued until at least Christmastime. I suppose Icould make my own, but I’m not quite that ambitious, yet. I suppose we’ll see!

Anyway, on to the accessories I bought for her. I paid a grand total of $706 for all of this:

Continue reading »

As I waited for my rough draft for my Composition class to print out, I rifled through my imps to pick out a scent for today. I hovered over French Love, but I took a sniff of Danube before uncorking FL, and fell in love. It was the perfect scent for today. It’s gorgeous out, warm and wet and summery (despite it only being spring). Danube, so far, blends perfectly with the smell of fresh green grass and dandelions. It’s orchestrated perfectly. Ahahaha, get it, “orchestrated?” Like, the Blue Danube Waltz by Johann Strauss? Oh, I just slay me.

credit: drp @ flickr

Website Description:

DANUBE
Rhododendron and bellflower petals swirl through deep, cool, dark aquatic notes.

In the vial: Very springtimey, very aquatic.

On my skin: Oh, this is lovely. It’s gentle, cool, and definitely gives the impression of a slow-flowing stream dotted with blossoms. The Rhododendron is very strong, but not overwhelming.

Drydown: This is the first scent I’ve tested that’s remained basically the same since application  – which is brilliant!

Dry: It’s definitely faded a lot, though I did apply sparingly this morning, which might explain it. It’s less of an aura of scent now; instead I get a whiff of watery sweetness occasionally as I move.

Things I Would Do While Wearing This Scent: Cosplay a river spirit. In seriousness, though, this is a scent that makes me think of floating, fluid motions, and restful warmth with a cool breeze.

Overall: I love this scent. It probably wouldn’t be a great one for winter or fall, but during the spring and summer, when all the outside smells blend and complement it so nicely, it’s fantastic.

Rating: