Thank you hamsterwoman for your Secret Santa 2015 gift!
*Adele voice* Hello, it's me.
I know I haven't written anything here for the past year basically, but really, I haven't been online much this year except to post pictures and sign off, so yeah. But, today yesterday I received a wonderful Secret Santa parcel from the benevolent Tyrell overlord hamsterwoman in the yearly gift exchange hosted by Santamaster ikel89, so I figured I should pop in and do a real nice thank you with pictures 'n' everything :D
My Santas always catch me at the best time to comfort me, and this one was no different. I was coming home thoroughly out-of-sorts from having been called in to work unexpectedly on my holidays, and what do I get handed right as I walk in through the door but a parcel! I immediately knew it had to be the Secret Santa parcel, because the rest of my expected deliveries for the year had already been done, and imagine my joy when I saw it a cute parcel from none other than Anna! :D
The parcel came in a cardboard box, but when I ripped it open I immediately started grinning because inside was a package-inna-package, and I was greeted by my cheerful old friend, the Manic Pixie Dream Santa giftwrap :DDD
(Russian Santa! I've read about Ded Moroz on Anna's LJ, and it was awesome seeing that signed on the card)
Moving on to the contents of the parcel, the first thing I noticed was that, somehow, Anna had managed to buy out all the candy in San Francisco and fit it all into one box.
Also, it was really cool how Anna mentioned she'd tried to keep some of the candy as local to San Francisco, ex: the Ghirardelli Chocolate below is an SF staple ( I didn't know that, despite having had Ghirardelli chocolates before!)
RIP My Post-workout Body.
This is the Creamy Almond chocolate opened! Much fancy very chocolate.
# the flesh is weak
Also this BEAUTIFULLY WRAPPED chocolate below is See's, which Anna tells me is another California chocolate company.
I opened it and this was inside!
*alexander hamilton voice* i don't know how to say no to this
But this following was my favourite candy out of the lot!
Gourmet jelly beans are apparently a thing!! I could tell these were high-class when I tasted them, because you can actually test legitimate flavours like lime, green apple etc, rather than just the sweet mess that jelly beans usually are. But the aesthete in me just reaaally loved the packaging and the open/close latch.
Cuuuute!!!
Oh and this part of the package made me laugh out loud, because holy Avatar reference, Batman :D Anna got me an AtLA-inspired T-Shirt!!!!
(This is a stock photo from the store because me in holiday mode is too gross to be taking photos of, cute shirt or not). The medium size fits me perfectly Anna, no need to worry about the size. Here is a close up of the T-shirt text that I photographed. (Excuse the weird red lighting that happens to all my photos because of the pink walls of my room reflecting off the lightbulb or something.)
Too cool, and I'm pretty sure that's my first AtLA fandom swag! And Anna's kids helped picked this out, so thank you to them too, and a shoutout to the Rodent family's collective good taste ;)
And if that wasn't spoiling me enough!!! There was more fandom merch to squeal over:
An ASoIaF coin purse! And honestly, I was really suprised by how cute and stylish it looks, because most of the ASoIaF merch I see online looks so rushed and "plop-a-logo-on-a-cloth-and-call-it-a-day"-ish. So this was a really cute and well-designed suprise. Also, Anna must have sekrit mind-reading powers, because I actually have been in the market for a small purse to put my spare coins and cards in, so this came in at exactly the right time.
Also, inside the purse was this super cute Chrestomanci button, which is my first DWJ fandom swag ever!!!
(As do I in my heart-of-hearts, dear button. As do I.)
ETA: Wait, I almost forgot about the books. Anna also sent me these two awesome books!
Both of them look really interesting, and I've already started on the Tam Lin one during my commute today. It's just the tone I like. I'm looking forward to the other one too. Anna had picked out both because she thought them to be similar to DWJ's style of plot/writing, so I'm doubly excited to read both of them, as well as touched that Anna would go to the effort of finding the kind of book I would like :D
And I have, as always, save the best for last: a looong letter from Anna full of kindness and warmth, which made me glow to read it, and then reread it two more times. (Blurred the letter contents, because I'm not sure if Anna would like me sharing that.)
And also, she signed it Grandma Olenna! Aw yiss, Tyrell family shenanigans <3
Thank you so much, Anna, for this wonderful book end to the holiday period! I enjoyed unconvering every part of it. I hope you and your family have a fantastic rest-of-the-holidays! And thank you as well to the great Kay/ikel89 for organizing this!
[Some navel-gazey thoughts on the impending New Year]So that's my 2015 coming to an end. I can't say I'm unhappy to see it end. One can't expect a year to be completely good, but 2015 has been, overall, rather egregiously bad, on a personal front, as well as from the PoV of my close RL friends. Maybe 2016 will be better, I don't know. But 2015 almost went to a point of no return, so I guess it can't get worse, haha. (Famous last words, I know.)
Well, at least I finally managed to quit my second job very recently, so that's a lot of free time I got back into my life in the past month, and it did help to improve my overall mood Also, it gave me a lot more free time to plan out my life, and more time to draw. Emotions are still on a weird rollercoaster ride, where I seem to get weepy over everything, which is still a weird experience, because pre-2014 me was a stolid potato who was very secure about being an emotionally stable person. (But then, pre-2014 me was also a happy-go-lucky-potato who thought things like depression and anger happened to other people, so, uh, famous last words indeed, haha.) Still, here's to a 2016 that will be spent in grinding patiently towards a better and more hopeful situation in life. So, all in all, come at me, New Year. I'm ready for ya.
Hope you all had a happy holidays, and that you enjoyed the short break between work/school, and that you're looking forward to 2016!
I know I haven't written anything here for the past year basically, but really, I haven't been online much this year except to post pictures and sign off, so yeah. But, today yesterday I received a wonderful Secret Santa parcel from the benevolent Tyrell overlord hamsterwoman in the yearly gift exchange hosted by Santamaster ikel89, so I figured I should pop in and do a real nice thank you with pictures 'n' everything :D
My Santas always catch me at the best time to comfort me, and this one was no different. I was coming home thoroughly out-of-sorts from having been called in to work unexpectedly on my holidays, and what do I get handed right as I walk in through the door but a parcel! I immediately knew it had to be the Secret Santa parcel, because the rest of my expected deliveries for the year had already been done, and imagine my joy when I saw it a cute parcel from none other than Anna! :D
The parcel came in a cardboard box, but when I ripped it open I immediately started grinning because inside was a package-inna-package, and I was greeted by my cheerful old friend, the Manic Pixie Dream Santa giftwrap :DDD
(Russian Santa! I've read about Ded Moroz on Anna's LJ, and it was awesome seeing that signed on the card)
Moving on to the contents of the parcel, the first thing I noticed was that, somehow, Anna had managed to buy out all the candy in San Francisco and fit it all into one box.
Also, it was really cool how Anna mentioned she'd tried to keep some of the candy as local to San Francisco, ex: the Ghirardelli Chocolate below is an SF staple ( I didn't know that, despite having had Ghirardelli chocolates before!)
RIP My Post-workout Body.
This is the Creamy Almond chocolate opened! Much fancy very chocolate.
# the flesh is weak
Also this BEAUTIFULLY WRAPPED chocolate below is See's, which Anna tells me is another California chocolate company.
I opened it and this was inside!
*alexander hamilton voice* i don't know how to say no to this
But this following was my favourite candy out of the lot!
Gourmet jelly beans are apparently a thing!! I could tell these were high-class when I tasted them, because you can actually test legitimate flavours like lime, green apple etc, rather than just the sweet mess that jelly beans usually are. But the aesthete in me just reaaally loved the packaging and the open/close latch.
Cuuuute!!!
Oh and this part of the package made me laugh out loud, because holy Avatar reference, Batman :D Anna got me an AtLA-inspired T-Shirt!!!!
(This is a stock photo from the store because me in holiday mode is too gross to be taking photos of, cute shirt or not). The medium size fits me perfectly Anna, no need to worry about the size. Here is a close up of the T-shirt text that I photographed. (Excuse the weird red lighting that happens to all my photos because of the pink walls of my room reflecting off the lightbulb or something.)
Too cool, and I'm pretty sure that's my first AtLA fandom swag! And Anna's kids helped picked this out, so thank you to them too, and a shoutout to the Rodent family's collective good taste ;)
And if that wasn't spoiling me enough!!! There was more fandom merch to squeal over:
An ASoIaF coin purse! And honestly, I was really suprised by how cute and stylish it looks, because most of the ASoIaF merch I see online looks so rushed and "plop-a-logo-on-a-cloth-and-call-it-a-day"-ish. So this was a really cute and well-designed suprise. Also, Anna must have sekrit mind-reading powers, because I actually have been in the market for a small purse to put my spare coins and cards in, so this came in at exactly the right time.
Also, inside the purse was this super cute Chrestomanci button, which is my first DWJ fandom swag ever!!!
(As do I in my heart-of-hearts, dear button. As do I.)
ETA: Wait, I almost forgot about the books. Anna also sent me these two awesome books!
Both of them look really interesting, and I've already started on the Tam Lin one during my commute today. It's just the tone I like. I'm looking forward to the other one too. Anna had picked out both because she thought them to be similar to DWJ's style of plot/writing, so I'm doubly excited to read both of them, as well as touched that Anna would go to the effort of finding the kind of book I would like :D
And I have, as always, save the best for last: a looong letter from Anna full of kindness and warmth, which made me glow to read it, and then reread it two more times. (Blurred the letter contents, because I'm not sure if Anna would like me sharing that.)
And also, she signed it Grandma Olenna! Aw yiss, Tyrell family shenanigans <3
Thank you so much, Anna, for this wonderful book end to the holiday period! I enjoyed unconvering every part of it. I hope you and your family have a fantastic rest-of-the-holidays! And thank you as well to the great Kay/ikel89 for organizing this!
[Some navel-gazey thoughts on the impending New Year]So that's my 2015 coming to an end. I can't say I'm unhappy to see it end. One can't expect a year to be completely good, but 2015 has been, overall, rather egregiously bad, on a personal front, as well as from the PoV of my close RL friends. Maybe 2016 will be better, I don't know. But 2015 almost went to a point of no return, so I guess it can't get worse, haha. (Famous last words, I know.)
Well, at least I finally managed to quit my second job very recently, so that's a lot of free time I got back into my life in the past month, and it did help to improve my overall mood Also, it gave me a lot more free time to plan out my life, and more time to draw. Emotions are still on a weird rollercoaster ride, where I seem to get weepy over everything, which is still a weird experience, because pre-2014 me was a stolid potato who was very secure about being an emotionally stable person. (But then, pre-2014 me was also a happy-go-lucky-potato who thought things like depression and anger happened to other people, so, uh, famous last words indeed, haha.) Still, here's to a 2016 that will be spent in grinding patiently towards a better and more hopeful situation in life. So, all in all, come at me, New Year. I'm ready for ya.
Hope you all had a happy holidays, and that you enjoyed the short break between work/school, and that you're looking forward to 2016!