Does anyone who is more lj savvy than me (which would be just about everyone) know if there is a way to get lj to send new posts to an e-mail address? I really want to keep up with what's going on with everyone, and it's just been impossible lately. Dial up at home sometimes won't even load lj, and I'll get in trouble if I spend much time on it at work... so I don't know what to do... *sniff* But if I could get it to send entries to my e-mail... then I could probably get away with checking it at work as long as my boss wasn't standing over my shoulder. If anyone has any suggestions, please let me know! I miss hearing about what everyone is up to!!

Current Mood: hopeful

Yeah, so, I know I've said this before, BUT... I'm really, really terrible at keeping up with journal-y things. (-_-)

Things have been kind of crazy for me, especially lately, and I really miss hearing from all of my friends! I wish I had more time to spend online. I'm hardly ever on at all anymore. *sniff* Luckily at work, we're not stuck with dial-up, so since I'm caught up on everything I need to do except for a couple of phone calls and I'm the only one here this morning, I'm going to take a few minutes for this. (^_^)

Let's see... new things in my life... bleh. Missouri is so terribly exciting. Work is going well. I'm now helping out as an administrative assistant in the mornings in addition to my ACT teaching in the afternoons, which is quite nice for me (at least paycheck-wise... maybe not free-time-wise). We're also getting lots of new ACT students, which is good. Toward the end of last year, it had really dropped off, and I was only getting a few hours a week. It's definitely the opposite now; I'm working from 10am-7pm today.

As far as other things in life go, they're not quite as positive. My family is having some major issues right now, which I'm not going to go into detail about right now. If you want to hear about it, it'd probably be good for me to share it with someone... just not here and now. I really hope I start making enough money to get my own place soon. I love my family, but they're causing me lots of stress right now.

Another thing that's both positive and negative at the same time, I got a new kitten! She's adorable and very sweet. She had been abandoned in an empty apartment next door to where my friend Jenelle lives, and I didn't want her to get sent to the pound by the landlady and put to sleep, so I brought her home. Unfortunately, both my dad and my cat of 7 years are quite unhappy about a second cat running around the house. My older cat, Gabby, has always had a hard time adjusting to new things. It took her almost a month when my parents moved into their new house for her to get used to the house and to quit hiding underneath things. I'm hoping if I give her some time, she'll adjust to the new kitten, too. Right now though, there is a lot of growling and hissing when they run into each other. (>.<) Needless to say, the new kitten is keeping me quite busy when I'm at home. I have to keep a close eye on her so that she and Gabby don't fight, so I don't have much time to sit down and do anything for more than a few minutes at a time while I'm at home. I really wish they'd get used to each other! If anyone has any advice, I'd be glad to hear it!

Anyway, I love you all and I miss talking to you, and I'm sorry I'm so very, very bad at keeping up with things online!

Current Mood: busy

Internet at home has been giving me lots of problems, so here is a very brief rundown of what is up with me:

*Finally got a job as an ACT teacher at Huntington Learning Center (Hooray!)
*Car is having major break problems, but will probably fixed today
*Internet at home doesn't work at ALL on my Dad's computer, and while he is trying to fix it, our passowords keep getting changed and other things go wrong, and I spend lots of time not being able to get online

I'll expand on the important stuff next time I'm not borrowing a friend's computer to check e-mail and important things.

Current Mood: drained

I'm kind of discouraged about things right now. It's really strange to not be going back to school, and since I'm stuck at home for now, I'm really starting to miss all of my friends. I've been trying to find a job for about 2 months, and nothing seems to be working out. Everything that I want to do with myself depends on me being able to go on to grad school, and without getting a job and saving as much money as I can, I just can't afford to go. Unfortunately, my fancy degree in Anthropology/Asian Studies doesn't really seem to be a whole lot of help to me with the job searching in Springfield, MO. (-_-)

This about sums up how I feel about things right now:



I know I'm smart and a quick learner and that I could be a successful employee for just about anyone that would hire me... I just don't seem to be able to convince anyone else of that since I don't have the amount of work experience everyone seems to be looking for. Anyone have any job-searching advice? I could use some.

Current Mood: frustrated

Sorry it's been so long since I posted anything. I've always been bad at keeping up with journal-y things. (>o<) Summer was busy with helping with lots of wedding stuff for my friend Shannon's wedding (I was her maid of honor), and then with trying to figure out what in the hell I want to do with myself now that I've graduated from Tulane. My family has also been going through some difficult times, and that's kept me distracted and unmotivated to fight dial up internet to do the things online that I want/should be doing. Currently I'm in the middle of trying to find a job with decent pay that I can keep for about a year before I can hopefully go off to grad school. I have an interview with AT&T this afternoon, which will hopefully be helpful. At this point, I really can't be all that picky about where I want to work. My Tulane Anthropology/Asian Studies degree really isn't all that helpful in Springfield, MO (^_^;;).

Anyway, I love and miss all my far away friends and I'm sorry I've neglected lj so terribly!!! I'll try to do better. Maybe later on this afternoon after my interview I'll have some more time to sit down and make a more detailed entry. <333333333333333333

Current Mood: sorry for not being around

This is just a quick post to let everyone know that I'm alive and safely back home in Missouri. I have all of my stuff from Tulane in addition to two or three boxes of stuff from Japan that I need to go through and try to find space for in my room... so I'll be busy with that for a while. As of right now I don't even have space to set up my own computer on my desk. (>.<)

My family is throwing me a graduation party, which is exciting and makes me happy. (^_^) It also means I get to help set things up and cook for it, which is also fine, but it means less time to go through my many, many boxes until after this next weekend.

Hmmm... in other important news, I'll be pretty busy helping my friend Shannon get things in order for her wedding this summer (I have my bridesmaid dress and it fits! Yay!!). Her wedding is July 7th. I also need to plan a time to get together with Chandra so we can look at grad school stuff, hopefully get some visits from out-of-town friends in the next month or so, and hopefully find a decent paying job in the near future. Anyone have any brillant ideas for what an Anthropology/Asian Studies degree from Tulane will help me do in rural MO? Probably not much...

That's pretty much it for now, not too terribly exciting. Once I get a job, I'll be able to save up some money for fun things and perhaps visiting awesome friends that live in more exciting places. (^_^)v

Current Mood: hating the dial-up

I'm FINALLY done with finals and my grades are posted and I managed to uphold my ridiculously high standards for myself, which makes me happy.

Now all that's left to do is graduation stuff:

May 17th: Phi Beta Kappa initiation ceremony

May 18th: Under the Oaks Ceremony for Newcomb graduates, Newcomb-Tulane Awards Ceremony, and Wave Goodbye party (with free food!)

May 19th: GRADUATION!

Although I'm really happy to be done with the semester, thinking about graduating leaves me a little bittersweet. I'm really glad I've accomplished so much, but at the same time I'm not really ready for more goodbyes. I already had so many goodbyes last semester to Japan and all of my friends there, and now it's New Orleans's turn. At least I'll probably be too busy over the next week with packing and hanging out with people and graduation events to think too much about it.

<33333 to everyone. I miss all of you and I'm sorry I'm so crappy about posting stuff!

Current Mood: meh

Things to do before the end of the semester:

Final Native Arts of North America Book Report - 4 pages, due 4/30 (done)
Writing Intensive Archaeology of Gender Paper - at least 20 pages, due 5/1 (maybe done)
Paper for Japanese History - 6 pages, due 5/1
Paper for Anthropology Proseminar - 10 pages, due 5/4
Paper for Dialectology - 7-12 pages, due 5/6
Archaeology of Gender Final Exam - 5/7
History of Japan Final Exam - 5/8
Native Arts of North America Final Exam - 5/12

Graduation! - 5/19

And then it's over...

So if I'm not around much between now and the 13th or so... this is why. (>.<)

Current Mood: rushed

Yes... so I got sucked into playing about a MILLION hours of Final Fantasy X over the long weekend. I started playing it a couple of years ago and never got around to finish it because of other things, and after making Nissa finish KH2, she decided that I needed to finish FFX... which led to me probably playing more video games this weekend that I have in the entire past month... and I'm still not done! (^_^;) But that just gives me more distractions later this week, right??

The semester is nearing the end, which is exciting and scary all at once. I have a 20 page paper due on Thursday, which is at about 17ish pages now, and I haven't even LOOKED at what else is due this week. >.< I'm really excited for the semester to end... but at the same time, I'm really not ready to be done with being an undergraduate. Everything just seems to be over so quickly... first Japan... now my entire undergraduate experience. It sucks to have to say so many goodbyes in a year. Meh. I guess I'm kind of in a melancholy mood from having to read about the rape of Nanking for my Japanese history class. Not the happiest topic in the world...

ANYWAY... for anyone who reads this and still cares, I WILL post pictures and fun stuff about spring break in Florida (hopefully soon... I'm so bad at keeping up with this). I'm just too tired to try right now.

Current Mood: drained

But I has ROXAS shoes!!! *squee*

I don't have time for a long post, but this warranted sharing (and I wouldn't have gotten any work done ANYWAY if I didn't squee about them a bit). (^_^)







I <3 Payless and Airwalk.
They also have:

Axel
http://www.payless.com/Catalog/productdetail.aspx?ItemCode=56138&ProductColor=White&Width=Regular&TLC=Mens&SLC=MensAthletics&BLC=MensAthleticsSneakers

Demyx
http://www.payless.com/Catalog/productdetail.aspx?ItemCode=55631&ProductColor=Black&Width=Regular&TLC=Womens&SLC=WomensAthletics&BLC=WomensAthleticsSneakers

and Diz
http://www.payless.com/Catalog/productdetail.aspx?ItemCode=56155&ProductColor=Blue&Width=Regular&TLC=Boys&SLC=BoysCasual&BLC=BoysCasualsCasuals

That's all for now! If anyone is interested, I'll try to get some spring break pictures up over the long weekend.

Current Mood: squee-ful

Alas... But Spring Break was awesome!!!

Disney World was wonderful.
Tara-chan is amazing (as usual).
Busch Gardens was super cool.
I am exhausted, but quite happy (except for the whole going to class tomorrow thing.)

I have lots to share about the past week, but it will have to wait. I'll try to post some pictures and fun things when I get time this week!

Current Mood: sleepy

Things have been hectic-ly busy lately, BUT tomorrow my friend Nissa and I are leaving on our Spring Break trip to Florida! I'm so excited!! I get to have fun at Disney World and see Tara!11 *happy dance* I will probably not have much access to computer-y stuff at all for the next week, so lj will be even more neglected than usual. Gomen!!

And now, it's off to bed for me. The shuttle taking us to the airport tomorrow leaves at 7am... which means I ought to get myself up and out of bed around 6ish. (>.

Current Mood: excited

This is one of those silly little chain-letter-type games... but this one actually amused me and made me giggle, so I thought I'd share in case anyone else wanted to waste about 3 minutes of their time. (^_^)v

( Sure, I've got time to waste, let me at it! )

Current Mood: avoiding homework

Why is everybody getting sick?? I finally got caught up reading everyone's livejournals and messages and stuff, even though it took me FOREVER. I made it safely back home after 3 horrible flights (don't wanna fly anymore for a long, long time)... but on the other hand, I got to see Hawaii and I did make it home with all my luggage and in one piece. My cold that I had the whole last week or two in Japan refuses to leave, and has instead gotten worse, although I'm sure I'm not nearly as close to dying as my poor Tara-chan. *snuggles for the Tara* Maybe I should have listened to the Japanese people and gone to the hospital with my cold before I left Japan. (^_~) Christmas was good, it's good to see family and friends again, and dial-up internet continues to suck majorly. If you wanna know more about anything in particular, let me know, and I'll post more. I'm not usually online so much when I'm at home because I get frustrated with the uber-slowness of my connection. Feel better everyone who's under the weather!!! At least there are more legal drugs here in America than there were in Japan. *clutches her sudafed* Much love to everyone!!!

Current Mood: congested

This looked like fun. ^_^

( my xmas stocking )

Current Mood: busy

I set today aside forever ago for my speaking partners. We always eat lunch together on Tuesdays, but other than that, we really don't get to do a whole lot together because of our busy schedules. We sat down a few weeks ago to scour our schedules for a day that would work for all of us, and we found one!!

Originally, we talked about going to Osaka Castle, but Yuki did some research about places to go on the internet and decided it would be more fun to go to the big aquarium in Osaka. Harumi couldn't come because she had a fever today *sniff*, but Yuki, Tsukasa and I had sooooooo much fun!!

This was the first time I'd EVER been to an aquarium. I mean, when I was a kid, we always had an "aquarium" in our house with little tiny goldfish... and I always knew there were big exciting aquariums out there SOMEWHERE... but it was just never somewhere I had a chance to go. We went to the Osaka Aquarium Kaiyukan which is HUUUUUUGE. It has 8 stories. I didn't realize how big it was while I was there because the way it is set up, it is all ramps that circle around the huge aquariums. It is split up into different sections for different parts of the world: Japan Forest, Aleutian Islands, Monterey Bay, Gulf of Panama, Ecuador Rain Forrest, Antarctica, Tasman Sea, Great Barrier Reef, Pacific Ocean, Seto Inland Sea, Kelp Forrest, Coast of Chile, Cook Straight, Japan Deeps, and Floating Jelly Fish. All of it was simply amazing. I think my speaking partners and I spent most of our time gaping, making surprised sounds, and going "oh....sugooooooooiii!"

It's late now, so here's the top ten things I learned while at the aquarium today (there shall be pictures, and perhaps more gushing in the future):

10. What I see as a beautiful, exotic fish, Japanese people see as dinner. I can't tell you how many times I heard "Ah! Oishisou!" (Ah! Looks delicious!) while at the aquarium today.
9. Most things in an aquarium won't hold still long enouigh for you to get a good picture...
8. HOWEVER, penguins are complete and total camera whores.
7. Dude there are fish that could EAT me! (Not that I didn't know this before... but being up close to one really drives that point home.)
6. Nemo is a lot smaller in person than he seemed in that movie.
5. Otters are one of the most adorable creatures ever.
4. Japanese crabs are DEFINITELY aliens from another planet plotting our demise.
3. Santa lives in Japan, not the North Pole, and on his vacation days, he goes swimming with the fishes in the Osaka Kaiyukan.
2. Japanese boys are not too cool to have staring contests with fish.
1. MY SPEAKING PARTNERS ARE THE AWESOMEST EVER!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Current Mood: giddy

I promised some pictures of Pot doujinshi, so here they are! *totally did not spend her time taking pictures of doujinshi covers instead of studying for exams next week* (^o^;) ehehehe

( mmmmm...I could use some of that PoT about now... )

Current Mood: bouncy

Me in a doujinshi store is a bad, bad thing (I am slowly running out of room for new stuff on the shelf above my desk that holds my magazines and manga and doujinshi ^^;) ... BUT...

... guess what I found today?? ^_____^


E-Plus PoT doujinshi!!!! =^.^= I seem to remember SOMEONE mentioning them forever ago... hmm... wonder who that was. XD

Look at the pretty:




I have no clue which djs a certain someone might NEED... but I picked up a couple, so I'm sure we could work something out. XDDDD

I'd take more pictures to share, but 'tis late, and sleep is calling me.

Current Mood: content and sleepy

Crystal and I went to Den Den town today to look for electronic dictionaries. She is part Korean and is planning on going to visit family in Korea over the vacation this weekend, so she was hoping to find one that would translate from English to both Japanese and Korean, but we didn't have much luck. I managed to find a pretty good deal on one for myself though. I got a student discount, and it came with a deal for a case for it for half-price. It doesn't have a way to draw in kanji, which is kinda sad, but it was a lot cheaper and doesn't have a bunch of extra stuff on it I don't need, like a huge Chinese dictionary. After we gave up on the dictionary search, we went to McDonalds and had lunch and then ended up at an Ani-mate. I should never be allowed in one of those stores when I have money. They have all sorts of wonderful stuff for a million different anime/manga series. It's insane. Crystal and I bonded over PoT though. She is in love with it, and we had a fangirl moment in the middle of the store, and I'm pretty sure we probably scared some Japanese people. ^^;; ehehehe

After the fangirling and me managing to drag myself out of the Animate having spent less than 2000 yen, which, believe me, is an accomplishment, I headed off to meet Kiki, Tara, and two Japanese girls at Yodoyabashi station in Osaka so we could all go to Hard Rock Cafe for dinner. I was the first one there, and then Kiki showed up with her awesome speaking partner Yurie. She went kimono shopping! For about $300 she's getting a custom made kimono!!! I'm so jealous, but really excited for her. I think it will be awesome! I made her promise to send me pictures when she gets it, 'cause she won't get it until near Christmas time and I'll already be back in the States. When Tara showed up she had presents for me!!! Tara found me a beautiful FF7:AC Reunion Files Character Book!!! *squee* I had seen it a long time ago, but didn't have the money to get it, and then when I went back to look for it, it was gone, so I was really afraid I'd never find one! Tara found one for herself, and then she managed to locate one for me too!!! *much love for the Tara-chan* Through Tara, I also got to meet Markio and Sayo, who are awesomely fun and the only Japanese otaku I've met while I've been here. They went doujinshi shopping with Tara and they love Kingdom Hearts!!! *much excitement* They're so adorable, and they don't want anyone to know that they like things like video games and anime because they're embarassed. I think it's kinda sad that "otaku" has such a bad connotation over here, because as long as you're not overboard, I think it's fun. ^_^ Together, we all went to Hard Rock Cafe Osaka to eat dinner. It was mecha takai (about $15-$25 a plate plus $5 for a drink), but soooooo yummy!!!!

All of us at dinner. The poor waitress had to take this picture with 4 cameras. ^^;;

And they had DAD'S root beer. DAD'S!!!!! I used to drink that when I was a kid, but then for some reason it disappeared off the face of the planet, and now I found it, here in Japan. Sometimes the world is a strange place.

OMG DAD'S Root Beer!

After dinner, Kiki came back to Sem House 1 to hang out with me and Tara, and we got to share fun things. Kiki loves CLAMP and Kaori Yuki like I do, so we got to fangirl over that for awhile, which was nice, because there's so much pretty stuff here, and I don't know that many people here to share it with!! Heli also shared music with Kiki and me, which was fun. I have soooo much music on my computer after this semester. Used CDs in Japan are wonderful. ^_^

Anyway, in short, Den Den town was fun, Dinner was amazing, the company was awesome, and all in all everyone had a great time. Every Saturday should be as fun. ^_^

Next up... Kouyou at Arashiyama... but first I have to live through a Japanese skit tomorrow.

Current Mood: ecstatic

Yeah, so it's been forever AGAIN since I've posted anything on my lj. Lots of stuff has been going on. Been busy worrying about my Tara, who had a family crisis and had to go back home from Kansai Gaidai to the US, and school stuffs. Luckily, things seem to be going better for Tara! I <3 her, so it makes me feel much better to know that. I'm afraid from here on out, the semester is only going to get busier school-wise... which sucks, because I've hit that point in the semester where I really don't wanna do anything anymore, PLUS, I'm in JAPAN, an I only have about a month left here, and I really just wanna be on vacation here and not do school stuff. ^^;; Oh well, I must "ganbatte" some more and make it through without screwing up my grades. This weekend was packed with stuff though! I got to go to Nara on Saturday to see "kouyou" and deer and Todaiji temple. Nara was beautiful, but it was rainy and cold all day. The deer in Nara are amazing. They're so used to people that you can pet them. Japanese deer are smaller than American deer, and the ones in Nara walk right up to you in hopes of getting food. They sell special crackers there, called "senbei" that the deer love. If you have the crackers, the deer kind of flock around you and won't leave you alone. They do this cute bowing type movement with their heads when they want food. It's really neat. I got to pet some of the deer and take some pictures. The Japanese believe that the deer are divine messengers, so they are protected and well-taken care of in Nara. One of the most amusing deer-related things that happened while I was there is the deer that decided to cross the cross-walk while we were waiting for the light to change. It paused to look at all of the people waiting for the light to change, and then it decided it didn't want to wait and proceeded to cross the road at a leisurely pace stopping traffic.


But I wanna cross the road NOW!

After making our way through the park with the deer, we went to Todaji temple. Todaji temple is a very famous temple in Nara and it houses a huge "daibutsu." The temple building is the largest wooden structure in the world. Because it is made entirely of wood, it has caught on fire twice, and it is now 1/3 the size that it was originally. There were small scale models in the temple of what it originally looked like. It was truly an amazing structure.


Me and Amanda with Todaji temple in the background.

After Todaji, we headed to this beautiful floating pavillion to see the changing leaves. It was really beautiful, and I have lots of pretty pictures, some of which are up on my photobucket account. (If anyone doesn't have the link and wants it, let me know.)

Today, I got up early to meet Amanda and Crystal and some of their friends at Hirakata Station to head to Osaka. (After I freaked out about phone cards. Never buy Sprint phone cards! They suck!! I got 9 min out of a 300 min phone card once all of the extra stuff was taken out because I'm calling from Japan. And this was after I spent most of my morning trying to get acces numbers for the damned card to begin with! Grrrr... Thank you sooooo much for the access numbers Chandra!!! I don't know what I'd do without you. ^_^ Ai shiteru!!) Today in Osaka they were having a big demo-show for the Nintendo Wii, and Amanda and Crystal talked me into going. I don't get to play very many games because I don't have the time to, and new game systems are always too expensive for me, but the Wii actually looks really awesome. I hadn't heard so much about it since I don't go out of my way to keep up with new stuff since it makes me sad if I can't afford it...but I learned a lot about it today, and it really does look like a lot of fun. It's so different from all of the systems before it. We had to wait in a huge line for about 30-45 min to even get into the big convention center where they were having all the demos, but we got a free bag out of it (and to see demos and try it out of course... but that I can't take home with me). ^_^





After that, we headed back to Shinsaibashi to do some shopping, which was fun, but we didn't have as much time as I would have liked because I needed to be back here to write a paper. We ate at Mos Burger, which was AMAZING! Best fast food burger I've ever had. I'm going to have to try to go back again before I leave. Sooooo yummy. I wish we had them in America. I also found some cute arm warmers, which besides being extremely popular and stylish in Japan right now, will let me wear some of my tank tops a little longer. ^_^ One of the brands was "Pure Vanilla" and this was the label:


This is really amusing... at least to me... maybe I've been listening to too much Gackt. ^^;;

(Ooooh!! In addition to the arm warmers, I also found some sweaters at the nearby fashion mall that fit me, but that has nothing to do with my weekend, that was randomly last week on my way home from class. ^_^) On the way back to the station to head home, Amanda and I decided to hit up Starbucks since it has been cold outside. They have seasonal lattes now! I got a Mint Chocolate Mocha latte, and it was really good. Just what I needed to fuel me to get back home and work on that paper.

And now... here I am staying up later than I meant to updating this loverly journal. =^.^= I think it's definitely bed-time now. Leave me some love!!! I stayed up extra late for you. ^_^

Oyasumi!!!!

Current Mood: toohypertobegood...ineedsleep!