Currents of Time

Man, I still had good pain killers last Saturday. MY LIFE. SUCH TRAGEDY.

squeemu wants to hear about my best convention experience!

( Straightforward Answer evasion! )

So yeah. I can't pick a single best convention experience. It'd probably come down to a cointoss or something. But I could do that, if you want.

So does post-travel disease. I'm home sick today with vertigo, nausea, and a fever. Super exciting. I blame the small child I spent my Sunday night red eye sitting next to. The one who kept trying to sleep and slobber all over me. ... Well, that and the sleep deprivation.


Or maybe it was my relatives. Two thirds of them were sick, and I did spend a fair amount of time around them.


I need an icon of someone faceplanting for days when I am exhausted or unwell.


ANYWAY, I went to BotCon again this year! It was in California (again), but not Pasadena. It will almost assuredly be in Pasadena next year, though. Kinda sick of Pasadena, though I like the number of friends it brings in.

Before we really get typing, though, I promised to link to both the 2011 (pt2) and 2012 entries. There ya go!

( Trip write up, go! )

Oh, oh, right, one last thing before I go: I was given a copy of the Puggle Print for free (possibly for spending too much money?), but I do not want it. I did not realise they had given it to me until later because it was hidden in my bag. Does anyone want it? It looks like this. You'll just have to cover the shipping.

Also, I present to you the most bewildering comment thread on all of my Facebook. Cookies to anyone who can make sense of it.

Okay, here's the actual photo-spam post from BotCon. (Please note that due to pictures of Real People and me not knowing how they feel about it, the first half - posted second - is under friends lock.)

( Do I really need to warn for excess images? )

OH MY GOD SO MUCH IMG SRC.

I need to just bite the bullet and start crossposting.

I meant to put these up here, but now I don't have the energy for it, but! I did write (excessively) about my trip to Florida/Disney/BotCon! I will at least link to them.

Tuesday (travel) and Wednesday (Animal Kingdom)

Thursday (Epcot) and Friday night (Magic Kingdom)

BotCon and Sunday evening


HOORAY.

Here are some things from the weekend I wanted to mention but forgot, in my sleep-deprived haze:

( Yes, more on this. )

Anyway, my new field placement started today! AT 8:30 AND BY THE WAY I HAD TO DRIVE FORTY MINUTES TO GET THERE so I had to crawl out of bed at 7 am and I'm still recovering from the flight home, but I made it. IT IS SO AWESOME.

We went out on a boat and drove around and I got to do stuff already! No standing around stupidly this time, they put me right to work putting things in the lake and taking them back out, and dropping them in the lake, and hauling them back out, and tossing things in the lake and heaving them out again and THROWING THEM IN THE LAKE AND THEN PULLING THEM UP AND TAKING THE SAMPLE AND we saw some great blue herons in their nests at the top of some dead trees, and a bunch of fish clearly not adapting well to living in the lake-proper instead of the hatchery they must have been from, and also there were spiders all over the boat augh, and oh man, I am so excited and grateful, but I am seriously going to have blisters the size of China growing on my hands in a week's time ow.

I GO BACK AT 9:30 TOMORROW. Not nearly as far, though. I had to go to Waterbury to do some paperwork and stuff, but they'll be picking me up from a much closer location from now on.

SOEXCITED. (Too excited for the space key, evidently.)



And, while we're on the subject, SQUEENIX I HATE YOU.


WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY


THE ONLY GOOD THING HERE IS THAT I DIDN'T SEE ANY TARUTARU IN THE TRAILER AND I COULD LIVE WITH NO TARUTARU BUT AAGERHJKTLGEMNH


(And that's all beyond that they're promoting XIV before XIII is out...)

BotCon is next weekend. At this time, one week from now, I will be in a plane going there.

exciiiiteeeed


Still wish it wasn't California, but they can't always be close/ish to home.

LJ FRIENDING BOTS. SOMEONE EXPLAIN THE PURPOSE OF THEM TO ME. Other than annoying people. Surely there has to be a reason beyond that. It makes no sense.

... "Eighth" always looks wrong to me.



Tomorrow is the beginning of the end of Transformers: Animated (woe!), the seventh anniversary of Final Fantasy XI (that's one-third my brother's age and god that is weird), and also when my mother's church does one of its fund-raising things. Somehow she has roped both me and my father into helping.



BotCon is in two weeks and I am excited! yee! I have purchased a pay-as-you-go / disposable phone, mostly for the trip, but if it amuses me enough, maybe I'll end up hanging onto it. If anyone wants to be able to reach me while I'm in California (or, heck, when I'm not. It came with a couple hundred minutes on it and given how often I talk on the phone, it'll probably expire before I even begin to use them all), I'll gladly supply the number for it.



Edit:
Parents have set me to work sorting things (oh i am home for the weekend by the way THIS MATTERS TO YOU) for getting rid of. Here are half a million little cats and other animals (but mostly cats) figurines, a lot of Pokémon figures, several Lion King toys, McDonalds Barbies, and several bead-critters ("bead critters"? Like these. Slightly closer look).

... anyone want any of 'em, or should I just toss them in the "donate to tagsale" pile?

..... no, I don't really know why I always offer these things.

I'm having a ridiculously hard time coming up with enough reasons not to go to actually not go to BotCon. Yeah, it is a bit of money, but since I can afford it (it... it's like finding the wad of money you tucked away when you were, like, ten, I swear, I am so ridiculously pleased)... Yeah, California is a bit far, but I've been there plenty. I've flown alone before. I did this all last year by myself.

My therapist thought it was a good experience for me, since it got me out of the house and interacting with people. I am sure she would not actually give me an opinion on whether or not I should go, of course but I really want to.

So mostly it's the inner two-year-old screaming BUT I WANT TO GOOOO versus the FEAR. I think the rational portion is hiding in the corner wishing they'd both shut up, and I'm torn between wanting to join it and cheering for the two-year-old.


I guess I will call the hotel and see about booking a room. uugh, I don't want to room solo again hatehatehate ... Are any either of the, er, what, two people in the fandom^* on my friends list reading this going and do either of you need a room/mate? I HAVE NO SHAME OKAY. Or know anyone who needs someone to pay for the Primus package so they can go as a Minicon? (I've not really any interest in the toys this year, but I could sell them or something...)



.....CHRIST.

I'M SHUTTING UP ABOUT THIS. I'M SURE YOU'RE ALL SICK OF SCROLLING PAST THESE ENTRIES BY NOW.


WRITING THINGS OUT HELPS ME THINK ABOUT THEM ANYWAY. There. That is my justification.



I was going to ramble on about something FFXI-related, but - is that the time? crud - maybe I will write a letter, instead. It'll be better with terrible illustrations, anyway.

ALSO I have written this entire entry and only NOW, in the last line, does the cursor bother to show up.


^* I spend a ridiculous amount of time talking about fandoms half, if not all (hi, FFXI!) of you aren't interested in. This bewilders me somewhat if I think about it a bit. Then I think a little more and it makes sense in a doesn't-actually-make-sense kind of way again. Then I hate myself.


... edit! Yee! I was just reminded that TF:A restarts tomorrow! Supernatural yesterday and robots tomorrow! Yay for this week.

Sea Monks.

I don't know. Maybe it's my shampoo (hidden effect: +Sea Monk Notorious Monster emnity?).

WHY DO YOU ALWAYS SPAWN WHENEVER I GET ON A BOAT. I am sick of hiding in the cabin!


(UTSUSEMI: NI IS MIIIIIIIIIIIINE. LOOK AT THIS: THIS IS ME BEING DONE WITH NINJA FOR EVERRRRRRR. omg. finally. Our very last BCNM run was kind enough to grant us a third scroll, so my brother and I each got what we needed, as well as a... teeeeny little bit of gil, at least.)



Finally went and poked around on the BotCon page, possibly because I wanted to rub salt into my own wounds. $175 for non-toys package seems a bit steep (assuming you want to register with the club, but seeing as it saves you 25 dollars, why wouldn't you, if you can?), but I WANT TO GO SO BAD.

UGH!


I HATE NOT HAVING A JOB/ANYONE TO GO WITH! (If I had a job, I could afford to go alone. As it is, I can only pay for two of the three necessities - those being air fare, hotel, registration.) I'd go register on some forum somewhere and beg for a roommate, but we all remember what happened last time I signed up at a forum BY WE ALL I MEAN ME. And also rooming with complete strangers is kind of not something I'd be comfortable with. And also they'd probably feel the same way.

*goes to sulk in the corner*


Also, I dislike Daylight Savings Time. Whyyy do you do this to me?


And, just so you know, despite the apparent general tone of this entry and the fact that my ankle still freaking hurts (you know what would be lovely? HEALTH CARE, so I could go see a doctor), today was pretty good and I'm actually fairly content. Aside from whenever I check the forums and see all the BotCon talk, which prompts the QQ.

... QQ

Oh, and, uh, probably obviously, I'm back from visiting my brother.

AND. I am having a bizarre bout of NEED TO WRITE NEED TO WRITE RIGHT NOW, which mostly prompts me to wonder what I'm forgetting about doing, because this is usually a sign of subconscious procrastination. Oh, well~

I swear I don't listen to this song as often as the [music] field would lead you to believe.

I registered for classes this morning! IT WILL BE A FUN SEMESTER. Yaaay! And, at this moment in time, anyway, I will be going to Mexico in January. I speak very little Spanish, but the guy in charge does speak it, so.

( Moments of conversation amusement because I feel like sharing. )

Oh! Otakon was this weekend! I miss anime conventions and cosplaying(/making an idiot of myself). Anyway, I decided to go browsing around and see how the con went, and - me being the link-clicky happy person that I am - I ended up going through some archives of previous Otakons.

AND AAAAUGH WHAT IS THAT. WHAT. WHAT. I found a picture of myself in my Quistis costume! It weirded me out. (The thing is, shortly after that convention, it occurred to me that we hadn't really taken any photos of any of us in our costumes, so I actually went looking for some. I didn't find any and I was sad. BUT THERE IS ONE. I HAVE ONE NOW. YAY!)

It's not the final version, so the belt is hanging a bit funny, and the chains aren't as nice as the current ones, but it really doesn't look awful. But I've always been very proud of it. (And the Yuna one. I found a picture - well, several - of our Yuna, too.) I had someone tell me once I had the best Quistis costume they'd ever seen and for once I actually believed a compliment given to me.

(I don't think I have any of the current version! mysticeden, did you get one at Anime Boston? I don't know/remember.)

I saved the photo but I'm not going to post it unless anyone actually wants to see it, 'cause I'm a wuss.

Possibly I want to get some people together and go to Otakon again next year. IT WOULD BE AWESOME.

... WHO IS WITH ME?