Currents of Time

I was rummaging through a storage box - looking for the proper place to put something away. I found it! Anyway, while I was in there, I decided to dig out my extra hair-ties, and while I was there I decided to play the nostalgia game or something and pulled out my convention photo albums, and, anyway, it turns out, thanks to mysticeden having a camera and then sending me copies of what she took, I actually do have pictures from after the modifications we made! Yay! I am very pleased.

I did comparisons of the before and after pics and, okay, it's kind of subtle, but it definitely looks better. Looked? Well, it still looks the same, but I haven't worn it since AB '06. Still, photos! I was so sure I didn't have any! Instead, there is, indeed, eternal evidence of the fact that I am, in fact, a complete loser by some standards. (Not that this is anything new. I like to pick on myself, and most of the time it is harmless, and if you haven't caught on to the fact that I mock or complain about everything I like incessantly, then, well, for one you've never read my interests section, and for two, you've never actually read any other entries or spoken to me, either, have you?) EXCELLENT.


It is Summerfe IT HASN'T BEEN CALLED THAT SINCE THE ONE TIME IN 2004, SELF the Sunbreeze Festival in Vana'diel. I really need to log in and check it out before that ends. Squeenix, look what you've done. Half of your player base is too afraid of you to log in.


Bit disheartened at the moment. Been trying to both reconnect with older friends and also make new ones, and I'm failing pretty amazingly on both counts. I never really learned the art of "how to make new friends" (pretty much every friend I've ever had, I've had because they approached me, or someone else introduced us) and everyone I've reconnected with doesn't seem to want much of anything to do with me (judging by actions and not words, here). Right now I really want to just talk to someone (voice, not text, I mean, I talk with my brother and usually one other random person almost daily), but am feeling too bummed about my success rate at the moment to try anything. (It took me seven rounds of picking up the phone and putting it back down after listening to the tone for a few seconds before I figured this out. Who would I dial, anyway? I've exhausted my very short list of phone numbers.) Maybe tomorrow.


I went through my old memory cards and deleted a bunch of old files (I think at least half of them were doubles on the memory card I brought with me to Maine, because the times on some of the files were too close). I cleared up over a full memory card's worth of space! So now I have plenty of room to play through more games! I'm going to get back to / probably just restart Xenogears (rented it ages ago, obviously didn't have time to beat it in the, you know, five day rental period, store closed, finally found a copy selling new-as-used when the game shops phased out Playstation games, never got around to picking it up again), and continuing working my way through FFVI again. Let's see if I can handle game multi-tasking.

"Fits of boredom" isn't really the way to describe it, but sometimes for no reason that is readily apparent to anyone, I will go poking around in the stuff in my closet. It seems like something a person would do when bored, but I can be in the middle of writing, or homework, or playing a video game, or... any sort of thing (so long as I am in my bedroom at the time) when this happens!

Today I pulled out the suit-hanger thing (we got it from our old neighbor when he moved. It's a special... cover-thing you can put a nice suit in to keep it protected or something. I know nothing of the hows and whys of clothing maintenance) and opened it.

But this one does not have a real suit in it! It's actually got a costume. For a couple years, my brother and I, and some friends of ours, would go down to Baltimore for Otakon, and we would, yes, cosplay. You may defriend me in shame now.

Anyway, first year we went, my mother and I spent a lot of the summer leading up to the convention making a Yuna costume (from Final Fantasy X, not X-2) for a friend. This was harder than it should have been for two reasons, the first being that I was absolutely adamant we find the perfect fabric. We hit every fabric store in the state twice, but it was worth it because we did find everything. The second was that the person we were making it for was, you know... in Texas until mid-July, so we were making what we could from memory and guesses and some year-old measurements we'd taken for a sewing project in Girl Scouts. Anyway, the Yuna outfit turned out beautifully, though we ran out of time to finish it all the way. The flowers on the skirt were added after the convention. Still - it all looked great.

Second year, we hit every fabric shop in the state, a few in Maine and New Hampshire (I was at school in Maine and, of course, NH is between Vermont and Maine, so), and eventually resorted to going to the "fabric district" in Montreal because I was no less adamant about perfect fabrics than I'd been the year before. This one was for me, though!

Also, we bought something like twelve different patterns because, of course, no one had one to match what we needed and we had to mix and match and improvise. (Yuna was remarkably easy to make - just some altered sleeves and a pleated skirt and a strip of white for the top and a fake obi. It was the decorating that was a pain.) BUT WE SUCCEEDED! (And we made a simple Moogle-outfit for the guy who is not my brother. My brother was Kyo, from Fruits Basket, because they dress the same, anyway. IT WAS AWESOME.)

So I now have a (very nice, if I do say so. Several other people - people I do not know! - have said the same, so I am inclined to believe it is, in fact, nice!) Quistis Trepe outfit. The "casual" one, not the SeeD one. Even though we only see her wearing her glasses in the SeeD uniform. She's nearsighted! Maybe they just didn't feel like adding glasses to her world map model! (Maybe they are there and I have managed not to notice them!)

I got it out because I had to put the legging-things - which I'd had in with my socks until I got rid of nearly all of my socks a week ago - away, and I thought putting them in with the shirt and skirt would be the best place.


I have no idea what to do with it, now, though. I probably won't go to an anime convention again, because they're no fun by yourself and I don't have anyone to go with anymore.


...Man, I love Final Fantasy VIII. Mentioning characters from that game always makes me remember that. I should replay it!