Got sent home from work due to (my super attractive) loud sniffling and coughing. Also, I don't have any classes to prepare for until Wednesday. I think I would've been able to stick it out for the rest of the day (they tried to send me home an hour and a half into the day, so I said I'd stay till lunch) but I'm relieved to not have to. Feel like crap!

Have some chocolate!

In Japan, Valentine's Day is traditionally when women give chocolate the guy they like (the equivalent of our elementary school tradition of giving Valentines to everyone is called 'giri-choco' or obligation chocolate - for co-workers and such). March 14th is White Day, when the guys return the favor for the girls they like. The grocery store was well-stocked with adorable chocolates (and chocolate-making material). On February 15th, I bought some. :P


PENGLE&PHINKLE & POKEMON CHOCOLATE

Yes, I have a chocolate penguin, turtle, and dolphin. :DDD The Pokemon tin contains these, little cookies covered in chocolate. I mostly bought those for the tin, though.

This mood icon perfectly fits my brain right now. Go me.

...also, let's make this my first not-locked post since last April. Just cos. Hi, world!

Oops. I forgot to mention this in my last post, but rabies's comment reminded me of it: I made yet another blog for my adventures in Japan, since I certainly don't want my family members following my LJ. XD

It can be found here:

--> http://tobitatsu.tumblr.com/

As you can see, it will probably/hopefully mostly be a photoblog with anecdotes, and perhaps the occassional longer post as things progress. This is for two main reasons: as a government employee, I have to be pretty careful about what I say, especially on a public forum, and also, I didn't really want to end up neglecting this journal in favor of another blog. So, apologies to people who like everything to just be in one place! But that's where my JET adventures will be for the most part. I'm sure some stories will end up here, of course.

So. Big news first: I heard back from JET* and I'm in! Basically! I'm on the short-list, which, if I am interpreting their little glossary correctly means that I will be going to Japan pending my acceptance of their 'job offer' and all of my follow-up paperwork checking out. :DDDDD

[* They said they'd notify people in mid-April instead of early April due to the disaster, and I got their e-mail literally in the middle of the day on the middlest day of the month - amused, yes I am]

I am really more excited than it looks, but I'm also tired after working six days in a row, so I can't summon the proper flail and I haven't really been able to talk about it at work, so I haven't been able to keep the mood up. XD

I also used fail!Korean and fail!Japanese at work a few times this week. I surprised a Korean girl by thanking her as she left in Korean, and used bits of Japanese with an unexpectedly high number of Japanese customers over the last few days. I made one adorable okaasan's day and she came over to tell me I'd made her very happy. Socute. ♥

And I've been crocheting things (or learning to). I've made K8 (minus Maru, as I do not have orange yarn) duckies, but I don't have eyes or stuffing for them yet. >.> In typical overly-ambitious fashion, I've only just started trying to make amigurumi and I've already designed my own onigiri penguin (some of you may have received a holiday card a couple years ago with Gary the Onigiri Penguin on it - this is his navy blue cousin).

So this has been a long week, but had some definite highlights. To say the least. XDDD

P.S. Holy crap, less than a month left to my cousin's wedding! And only a little over a month till Fanime! Oh, time.

This is a compilation of the listings at help_japan that mention J-Rock and/or visual kei bands.

( help_japan )

I'm auctioning off a thousand origami cranes right over here~ I'm so pleased to already have a few bids, since I always wonder about my little comment getting lost in the sea of offers. XD

So far, this is the cutest thing I have seen: self-portraits drawn by Japanese kindergarteners who wanted to help after their teacher told them about the auction.

From my flist, musikologie is offering up a box of fun from Honolulu which I may have to bid on. >.> Because ooh, Hawaii.

I was also thinking of auctioning off prints (either as a set of four, or one larger landscape poster-ish thing) of the world peace project I did last year. I can't quite bear to part with the original - and thinking about mailing it gives me a headache - but I think the whole crane + world + hope aspect is pretty appropriate, and it would be nice to use it for something again. I'm encountering a few logistical hitches though: getting good enough photos of each board to print them and not have them look like, well, photos of a board (i.e. with glare and tilting), and then figuring out what size to shrink them to. I would like the cranes to still be visible, but I don't really want to reprint this life-sized... hmm.

So the common unanimous consensus is to keep the boots. \O/ Done. XD

Coupla Shiny Things, now that YouTube/Firefox has stopped being obnoxious by freezing everytime I try to watch something:

1) Park Jungmin - Not Alone
Honest first reaction? I think his face looks longer than usual here. Neigh~ Moving on! *____* I love SS501's use of strings. I love that the string players actually get to be in the MVs, too. More than that (and the obvious pretty), lyrically and message-ly, this song is such a breath of fresh air in light of things like KARA's implosion, JYJ's... everything, Heechul snapping at antis (not that bitchy!Chul isn't awesome in its own way, but ugh drama), and groups/management companies sniping at each other left and right.

2) Jason Mraz & Tristan Prettyman - Lucky
This couple, so cute! I love their older duet, Shy That Way and I was sad when I'd heard they'd broken up - but now they're engaged. ♥ This isn't the best example of her singing, but they're clearly having fun and it is cute. :D

Werk tomorrow, then to San Jose on Thursday to visit people and hopefully get a major haircut.

It's Pocky Day~! I'd like to go by J-Town and get some in celebration, but I have work from 12:30-8:30 tomorrow. -.- I may have to bite the bullet and just pay more (probably) for it if they have it at Bristol Farms.

I went to see Akanishi Jin again tonight, and here is a bulleted recap because I should've been asleep a couple hours ago.

( But the good parts can best be summed up as: Friends + YARAYARAYARAYARAFJDSL YARACCHI WAS THERE. XD )

Okay, I may think of more later, but I really need to sleep now. Unrelatedly, ugh, I hope I get all of the documents I need for this application I am doing! Time is running out!

Oh, Kagrra, you've had a good run, but still, it seems sudden (though perhaps not, in light of Isshi's recent health issues). I wonder if phrasing it as a "demise" is Isshi's kanji otaku-ing (since I haven't seen the original Japanese), a way of technically not disbanding so they can do things in the future without 're-banding' or if it really is as dramatic as it sounds.

In better news, vistlip's FC is stirring again, so more signs that they are going to come back soon and aren't just sending out feelers of hope for no reason.

And in news that made me squee, Sungmin's been cast (as a guy named Sungmin, no less) in an upcoming drama, playing the president's son (or... well, presidential candidate's son). I'm not sure how applicable this will be to the drama version, but even the more vague reports say his character is a sort of well-meaning-but-a-bit-ethically-wrong type. Which is yay, so much better than sappy love story type guy. XD

P.S. SuJu as aminals so cute.

LAJkdf time to go!

Because sometimes (every day XD) I need a reminder that even though I dwell on the bad little things until they become big things, little things can be happy things, too.

Things That Made Me Happy Today
1) Food from Chinatown - jook, chow mein, cha siu, kimbap, saengsun and hobak jun, and melon cookies! Mmm. And there is cake.
2) Taking a hot bath.
3) Re-reading pieces of Kafka on the Shore and realizing that a) I still don't fully understand it (this does make me happy; every time I read it, I discover new things) and b) Oshima is still win. :P
4) Terry Pratchett. 'Nuff said.
5) Finally doing the banking stuff I said I would do last week. >.>
6) The Giants beating the Phillies. I'm not even a baseball fan. It's just nice that not all the major Bay Area teams are sucking this season. XDD Also, it was actually interesting at the end.
7) Friends. My friends, that is, not the TV show. Though that would probably have made me happy, too.
8) Happy Together on TV, which was funny even though I only knew who one of the guests was.
9) Hansen's Mandarin Lime soda. Also, coffee milk.
10) Subbed super Junior clips. Especially that Fantasy Couple one, because there is a gif from it that I have been quite curious about. And the one from Family Outing 2 with Taecyeon/Yoona vs. Soheechul.
11) Chicktionary. >.> Between that and Angry Birds, I feel I have a theme going with my iTouch games.
12) On a related app note, finding the SM TOWN LIVE '10 app, albeit way late. Still, I can have lightsticks or balloons or obnoxious flashing colors on my screen in the appropriate colors for all the groups! And they have little greeting audio clips, and funnily-written bios and pictures.
13) Catching up on some of the WTFery of the X-men. Absorbing babies! Wolf-demon mutant-human pregnancies! Oh, and Rictor and Shatterstar apparently kissed last year! On-screenpage, even! Go them. Poor Jean-Paul tries so hard, but only gets AIDS-retconned-into-a-Faerie-Disease (ya rly), off-screen romance (followed by paralysis) and snark. Well, snark's fun.
14) Not having writer's block!

P.S. U-KISS's Eli, breaking one's hand does not call for a 'lol.'. :P

Time to make more Heechul Twittgrish icons! Tomorrow. >.>