2013 Overview
January/February Zach and I went to Japan where he proposed to me at Tokyo Disneyland by Snow White’s Wishing Well, saw the best concert of my life of Miyano Mamoru, experienced a Japanese Inn, many foods, met Shaina for the first time, spent far too much time in electronic stores and standing around in awe.
March/April was spent preparing for the wedding, our parents meeting, tons and tons of emotional trauma, engagement photos, a very lovely Bachelorette Party with my girls, corrupting Melissa with UtaPri, Color Festival, Bridal Shower.
May was the wedding in glorious sunny California and the ceremony was great and the dinner was delicious and I tried my best to not be stressed and we spent our wedding night watching Iron Man 3 after feelings of much liberation. We got to see our favorite podcast perform and were star-struck by the cast and guest Clark Gregg, went to Universal Studios and spent two days in Disneyland and a day in Little Tokyo in LA. A week later we had our Open House and lots of people were very generous and my BFF Jen came! The rest of the month was spent training a person for to replace me at Cedar Fort and that was very frustrating and stressful and in the end I had to train someone over the internet, which worked out since I didn’t have a job in Texas lined up yet. Oh and lots of packing.
June we finished packing, had a going away party with our Utah peeps and selected an apartment and took a two and a half days journey to Texas. We planned to stay at Jen’s for a day or two, but apparently the apartment we selected was not ready for us, so for two weeks we bummed around her house while I worked/trained for CFI. We found a place and moved in on a Saturday afternoon in June heat.
July was spent exploring, unpacking, training new person, looking for employment, watching all the anime and Netflix, researching things to legally change my name and do all the necessary things to change our residency. Had a very quiet birthday with my husband and BFF. Used some of my birthday monies to go see Goo Goo Dolls and Matchbox 21 with Jen.
August was the month of interviews, phone calls and emails and it was an odd sensation being wanted for my skills. Even after almost two months of searching and getting the job at Lennar and I’m still to this day getting messages on my phone for job offers. I’m also not used to the temp agency/independent contractor thing, either. My training was longer than it should have been because my manager went on vacation. At the end of the month and beginning of September I got to go to Anime Fest and hang with Jamie and Amanda!
September/October there was lots of working and trying to not be tired. Zach went back to Utah for Preston’s Farewell and drove my car back so he could stop having to take me to work in the mornings and I could have my freedom. Then a few weeks later his mom and stepdad and half-sister visited us for a weekend and approved of our home and area and decision to move. Saw The Lion King Musical and went to the State Fair for a work field trip. Went to a few haunted houses and had a fairly disappointing trick or treat turn out on Halloween.
November/December I participated in NaNoWriMo and barely got my word counts each day. Saw lots of movies in theaters. Officially got employed by Lennar and am making $4 more than I was at Cedar Fort. Thanksgiving was nice and quiet, did Black Friday later in the day and still managed to be successful. Not much else happened other than Christmas, which I’ve already talked about.
New Years was spent going to the Chinese Lantern Festival at Fair Park (photos will probably be thrown on Facebook because it's easy) an IHOP with Jen and Josh. Came home and watched the ball drop in New York and Dallas on TV, then watched War Games.
As far as my resolutions of last year? Considering with all that went down this year, I guess I did okay. While I did not reach my reading goal, I went outside my norm and read several non-fiction self-help books in preparation for my marriage and how to get rid of the pain my parents have caused. My sporadic emotions made it hard to write, but with NaNo I made some great headway in Book Three. I told Tammy I’m going to try and at least write SOMETHING once a week - a paragraph, half a chapter, 1k, etc. I got myself to doodle a little and those things I did follow through to completion didn’t give me as much satisfaction as I wanted, so I’m in a weird art slump. It doesn’t help that my paper of choice to do prismas on is discontinued :|
I put “Try something new” on my list and I think I went overboard with that with going to another country and eating all the food and getting married and moving to another state! But in our marriage, I’ve been making all sorts of food - going through each cookbook and marking ones I’d like to eventually try and those to make within the week. Zach hasn’t died yet, so I guess I’m decent at it.
Weight loss? Meh, I’ve gotten to the point that I’ve given up losing by way of numbers on a scale. I like food too much and the more I exercise the more muscle and tone I gain. So, I like how I look and that should be good enough.
This year I want to:
-ePublish
-Write every week
-Sketch every week
-Play the piano once a week
-Read two books a month
-Get Music Theory savvy again
-Be more involved/improve on the blog site. Think of new content and ways to get interaction with fans. Make Zach advertise.
-Keep up exercise routine (2-4 times a week)
-Get caught up on One Piece
-Progress on Mamo anime
-Get rid of this awful corner somehow.
Places to go:
-Visit Jamie/Rammy in February (flying maybe?)
-Austin or San Antonio trip for Anniversary?
-Utah trip for Camron’s homecoming
-Anime Banzai?
-Anime Fest
-A-Kon
-Anime North Texas
-San Diego Comic Con?
-Dallas Comic Con?
Animation Celebration
Last, but not least, I made a 2013 mix for y'all!
1. "JUST ONE LIFE" - SPYAIR - Opening to Samurai Flamenco. The series is only halfway through, but it keeps throwing things at you to make it interesting!
2. "Kiss You" - Miwa - Opening for Silver Spoon. One of my favorite series of the year.
3. "Rage on" - OLDCODEX - Opening for Free!. Another of my favorite's of the year. I really miss those swimming boys.
4. "Do or Die" - 30 Seconds to Mars. New release!
5. "Guren no Yumiya" - Linked Horizon - 1st Opening for Attack on Titan. Probably the biggest anime title of the year, here's the song that was put to everything on the internet. Evil German chants included.
6. "MajiLOVE2000%" - STARISH - Closing to Uta no Prince Sama Maji 2000% Love! Catchy catchy, shake that booty~
7. "Caught in the Storm" - Goo Goo Dolls. Lovely track from their newest album that ended up being my favorite.
8. "Brave" - Josh Groban. Probably like my theme of this year.
9. "Hello Especially" - スキマスイッチ - Silver Spoon Closing. Country still isn't my cup of tea, but I really love the sweet twang of this one.
10. "SPLASH FREE" - STYLE FIVE - Free! Closing. This show is so dumb, but I love it so much.
11. "World's End" - MUCC - Meganebu Opening. This show is also dumb, but dumb in the sense of being one of the worst animes I've ever seen. BUT. I has an awesome song.
12. "The Fox" - Ylvis. Of course this was going to be here. Why wouldn't it?
13. "Compass of Your Heart" - Junichi Suwabe. This is the song of the ride from Disney Sea, Sindbad's Storybook Voyage. Alan Menkin wrote the song and it really shows. While Junichi is not the singer for the ride, a 30th Anniversary of Tokyo Disneyland was released this year and I'm glad because it's a good song.
14. "City Electric" - Anberlin. Off their re-release of Vital with bonus tracks, comes this one with a more electronica sound from them.
15. "Pacific Rim" - Ramin Djawadi - Theme of Pacific Rim. I don't know about you, but that movie was stupid fun.
16. "Atlas" - Coldplay - Theme from Hunger Games: Catching Fire. Coldplay + one of my favorite book series? Yes.
17. "STAR" - 99RadioService - Chihayafuru 2 Opening. This shojo slice of life series about a Japanese card game plays with my emotions so hard!
18. "Identity" - Miyano Mamoru. I actually have another song I considered, but since I spammed way too much with caps from the music video, I ended up choosing this one XD
19. "Higher Than the Sun" - Keane. From their Best Of album, they did two new songs and a full CD of unheard B-sides. It's all wonderful. And I forced it on my family as a Christmas gift.
20. "Let it Go" - Idina Menzel - Elsa's song from Frozen. One of the most beautiful solo musical numbers of Disney history.
21. "This Love" - Shimwa. I blame the Attack on Titan fandom for this one. Parody fanvideo makes me go seek out more of their music.
22. "Forever Lullaby" - Miyano Mamoru. Yes he gets two (could have been three because UtaPri2 opening, but I cut it out), because he sung this at his concert and it was unheard at the time and I was a sobbing mess because it was so beautiful.
23. "The Magic Kingdom" - Thomas Newman - Saving Mr. Banks. Speaking of sobbing messes... throughout this movie I had this heavy tug in my heart of its magic. I loved it so much. And we went on our Honeymoon.
24. "Wings of Freedom" - Linked Horizon - 2nd Attack on Titan Opening. I actually think I love the second opening a little more than the first and I know that is blasphemy.
It's probably too long for a CD, but who does that anymore? PLAYLIST!
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