My Whole Family Loves "Three's Company"
That subject line is sadly all too true in my case. Sigh. I guess I should just count myself thankful that my parents weren't watching "Maude" that night.
With Otakon over, it's time for a State of the Crissy (SotC) update. Going by tags:
Anime: We're currently trying to finish up the second season of Magic Knight Rayearth on Monday nights. I had hoped to be done before Otakon, but it wasn't a big deal as I have read the entire manga, and what with the car accident and ten thousand little other things that like to pop up, we only finished the episode where Fuu defeats Lady Aska in archery last night. We're liking it, although of course Marvel's having to deal with me saying, "THAT'S not in the manga!" eleventy-billion times. After the second season, we'll watch the OVA (which...I think we have? Why do I think that? When did we get it? Where is it?), and then it'll be Marvel's turn to pick which anime we watch next. I don't know if he's going to go with one of the ones we just bought (either Ouran Host Club or Gurren Lagann) or one he already had.
Art: I haven't drawn in FOREVER. Partly it's due to those ten thousand little pop up things, but I know that's not the full reason behind it. The FULL reason is that my coworker's (who I will hereby name NANA because I'm sure I talk about her often enough for her to rate a code name) daughter asked me to draw for her a girl in front of a house with a tree and flowers and a table and a birthday cake on the table, all in one drawing, and my subconscious is just BALKING. I even kind of know how I want it to look (helped because NANA's daughter drew a sample for me), and what references I'm going to use, but it sounds so involved (seriously, who does backgrounds anymore?) that I think I'm procrastinating. I'm going to force myself to work on something of my own first that I've had in mind for over a year now, and hopefully that'll get the creative juices jump started and I can go on from there. I hope.
Babies: Are good, as far as I can tell. oshidori baked up a beautiful one, as we all knew she would, and now all I'm waiting for is myshella's. (Carp, when is she due? Must remember to ask Carol Danvers--Marvel probably won't remember.)
Bad Movies: We haven't seen any new ones lately, we watched The Crazies Sunday night expecting it to be kind of bad slasher, but it ended up being REALLY good. It's your basic zombie/plague type of story, so it's not groundbreaking or anything, but the acting, and the unexpected occurrences of what you WOULD expect to happen, definitely make the movie. We're still planning bad movies, though. I want to get a group together (comment here if interested!) to go see Piranha 3D when it comes out, but in the meantime, we're going to watch...I can't even bring myself to type the title here, so just click on this link, to tide us over.
Birthday List: Sort of related, I have no idea what to do for my 30th birthday. The answer is probably going to be "nothing" for three reasons--one, Dad kind of soured me on the birthday party I had last year, so I'm feeling sullen and spiteful (not like me, I know, but everyone's allowed their moments from time to time), two, I used to have costume parties for my birthday in the basement when I was a kid, so it would make sense to do something similar, only with 80s costumes, for my 30th, but that's exactly what jenybean did and I don't want to completely copy her party because that's all kinds of lame, and three, we always go see Rocky Horror live the weekend before Halloween, and the weekend before Halloween is always my birthday, so, that's that. If anyone has any ideas, I'd love to hear them. Maybe I'll just wait until I'm 32 and have a Sweet Sixteen Times Two or something.
(Other People's) Birthdays: I haven't recognized a single one since January, and for that, I'm sorry. I could potentially get back into it, as I have someone posting for me (thank you, ssfseiyakou!) and I could theoretically just add all of the birthdays back to my PDA so I'd know when they are, make a graphic at work, and then upload it to my server instead of my LJ Scrapbook. What's really stopping me, apart from the fact that I don't have the birthdays listed in my PDA anymore, is that I'd have to use Photoshop at work instead of Paint Shop Pro, and I'm not very comfortable with Photoshop yet. We'll see. Maybe next year. It IS on my mind.
Blood, Sweat, and Glitter: Has been pretty consistently updated this year, I think. I hope to have the con report done by this weekend; or, failing that, my new costume pages up. I have things with which to update, now all I need is time.
Books: I'm currently rereading the Magic Kingdom of Landover series--which reminds me I need to get the recently released sixth book!--at home, and David Copperfield when I'm not at home, nothing new there. I'm still annoyed I didn't get to meet Terry Brooks at New York Comic Con 2008.
Computers: I still haven't really fixed up Hideki to my specifications; I've still got all of my old files in a "Chii" folder, and most of my new files (mostly pictures) in folders on my desktop. This is not conducive to good organization. In addition, especially when I'm working with Paint Shop Pro, my computer seems to have a sustained lag every three seconds or so. It's not the BIGGEST deal in the world, and I'm guessing it's because it seems to CONSTANTLY run some sort of HP Check (which I really should turn off, but I don't want to until I know what it's doing, and whether what it's doing is necessary or even at all beneficial), but it is distracting, especially when we're trying to watch something, or when I'm trying to process a bunch of photos at once. Still, it's a working computer, so I'm not going to complain. I assume Sumomo's fine, I haven't used her, beyond watching the old Transformer's cartoons while I take my beauty baths, in months.
Cosplay: I think I've talked about this enough lately ::grins:: but that doesn't mean it's not on my mind every day, costumes I'd like to do, photos I'd like to re-do, etc. Practically speaking, my next event will be NDK in Colorado in September, and all my costumes are set for that: ssfseiyakou and moradoshinigami are fixing up my Sera Myu Super Sailor Mars costume, charmedseed is making a new Neo Princess Mars gown for me as my old one is not big enough to accommodate my, hurm, adequate assets, and Silver Millennium Princess Mars and some civilian version of Rei might be in the cards as well. All more or less re-wears for me (and no wigs! Yay!)
Crimson Sky Creations : has been suffering due to the art drought lately, but I have been updating it monthly. I forgot to include a fairly good pen doodle I did of Sailor Venus in the margins of my notepad within the past month, I should probably go scan that now...but hopefully I'll have the aforementioned drawing idea to upload for September. In addition, I contacted s0nified about collaborating with me for next year's 10th Anniversary layout, but I know how busy she is so here's hoping we can make that work.
Crissy Vs The Man: I haven't had any good fights lately. ::laughs:: Although I will use this opportunity to tell a funny, semi-related story now; there's one guy at work I vent my spleen on, let's call him Doug Funny (because seriously, he looks like one.) Doug Funny picks on my boss, so I amuse my coworkers by pretending to be a big scary bouncer whenever I deal with him, cracking my knuckles and asking, "Is there a problem, sir" as menacingly as I'm capable of. Well, we caught an episode of Glee the other night (and Marvel was instantly hooked, he torrented the first season already) where the teacher was trying to sing his feelings to these two girls by making a medley of "Don't Stand So Close To Me"\ and "Young Girl", and I guess that was in my mind, because the other day I was making copies when Doug Funny came down to harass someone, I forget who, and he caught my eye and tried to start with me, so I sang, "Don't stand. Don't stand. Don't stand so close to me," and he said, "Ah, yes, The Police," and I said, "Yeah, and you're gonna NEED the police if you don't do what the song says," and my boss thought that was funny, so...win?
Deep Thoughts: Oh Christ, can you imagine how much longer this entry would be if I got into these? But here's one I had on Friday morning: it was a beautiful day, and I was in a good mood, so logically, I got to thinking about suicide. Because, in a way, it's so tempting to dream about ending it on your own terms, when it IS a beautiful day, and you're not in pain, and you're not upset, and nothing is currently bothering you. To kill yourself before you get old, and sick, and ugly, and decrepit, and before you watch everyone you love get old and sick and decrepit and die. I never would, because I care about my loved ones too much to cause them pain, and because I'm terrified of the finality of death anyway, but this is the way my thoughts run so I figured I'd document them here.
Delerious Ramblings: I haven't been sick in a while, knock on wood, so I haven't had any to share lately. It's a good thing, too, summer colds are the worst.
Family Drama: I don't really want to get into now, but while Pops and Grandpa still aren't talking, now Marvel and my father aren't getting along. I'm really beginning to think there is something wrong with the Y chromosome. Both brothers are present and accounted for. My uncle (Dad's brother) was in the hospital over the weekend, but he's out now, and hopefully it wasn't anything too serious (abdominal pains).
Guestbook Woes: Want to hear something funny? I can't read my guestbooks at work. I can get to the main page of the host of my guestbooks, I can log in and manage my entries, I just can't view the actual page. Retarded. But, whatever. Guestbooks have kind of gone the way of the dodo in the past few years anyway, my most recent entry was, as far as I could tell, Russian spam. That probably shouldn't make me as paranoid as it does, but, what can I say, I grew up in the Cold War 80s.
Horse Memories: Carol Danvers ended up on some mailing list (God knows how, although I assume either my mother or I were some way involved) for some horse-related clothing and chotchkies catalog, and oh my God, just flipping through it made me miss horseback riding so much. I don't know when I'm going to get to go again, sometimes I still can't believe that used to be such a HUGE part of my life, and now it's entirely absent and has been for over a decade. =/
LJ Layout: I mentioned wanting a new one, and I've gotten two nibbles. If anyone wants to take a crack at it, I want it to look more or less like this, with that picture on the left (and, if possible, a list of links like I have to the right of my current layout beneath it) and all of the content on the right.
Manga: I'm still really behind, but thanks to Marvel's help, I believe I'm up to date with Negima, Tsubasa, and of course, NANA. There's still so much more I have to pick up...but honestly, as long as I'm current on NANA, I'm good. =) Oh! Side note: when I've been bored at work lately, I've been researching manga at work, looking for new titles to get into. My current standards: it must be released in America, it must be 18 volumes or less (nothing will EVER be longer than Sailor Moon again, my devotion will not allow it), it must be finished already (I don't want to get into an ongoing series that either then gets canceled, or it goes past 18 volumes), and then it has to sound like something I'd be interested in. Even with those standards, I've already added Absolute Boyfriend, Aishiteruze Baby, Alice 19th, Alone In My King's Harem, Angelic Layer, Backstage Prince, Beautiful People, and Crying Freeman to my wishlist. Oy. On the plus side, I just finished reading through the "C"s, so, it could have been a lot worse.
Meme: I haven't done one in a while. I don't think I've been tagged for one in a while? But with not being able to do more than skim my Friend's page, it's hard to tell. I have been trying to ask questions for the general audience lately, though. Those are always fun.
Mom's Stroke: Mom's doing really well lately, actually. She wishes she were better, naturally, and she wishes it would happen faster, but there's no denying how much she's already improved. She barely uses the cane when she's in the house, and did I tell the story of how I made her get me a glass of water the last time I was there? We're actually going to see her this weekend (first time in over a month, I took all of July off from visitng family so Marvel and I could really do a lot of "summer" activities) and I'm thinking about giving her this test to see how she compares...if she lets me. (She tends not to enjoy being treated like a guinea pg.) Also, I'm going to buy a bottle of champagne and see if I can convince her to have some with me, because I read on Wiki that "the Journal of Agricultural and Food Chemistry published the results of a recent joint study by the University of Reading and University of Cagliari that showed moderate consumptions of Champagne may help the brain cope with the trauma of stroke, Alzheimer's, and Parkinson's disease." If not...what the hell, more for me. (I love champagne.)
My Wedding: Is over. Have I mentioned how grateful I am for that? =D Seriously, there are times when I think about what I'd like to have done differently, but really, I wouldn't do it again for all the money in the world. Now I'm looking forward to going to other people's weddings--I'm guessing the next one is going to be oatmeal_queen's Victorian and Steampunk themed one. (Speaking of, does anyone have a Victorian or Steampunk outfit I can borrow? I'll buy one if I have to, but considering I'll probably only wear it the once, it makes more sense to borrow one if I can. If not, I already took a business card at Otakon from a lady whose fashions caught my eye, so I have options.)
My Workpace: There are still so many things here I'm not crazy about, the location, the hours, the high school level of gossip, but I will mention the things that keep me here (other than my own fear of change): I really like my boss an awful lot, I love that people bring their dogs to work (OMG PUPPEHS!), carpooling has me getting home in record time so I can enjoy large portions of the evening, at least I can get some overtime pay, and the "mean girls" clique seems to have accepted me into itself, which I'm dubious about but is a vast improvement over being their target (and who knows? Maybe I can influence them with my Pollyanna ways.)
Ohtori Avatars: Hit a speed bump a while ago, but I think I worked through it. I saw a good number of really good Utena cosplayers over the weekend, although I unfortunately didn't get to approach all of them. Really, OA is having the same growing pains that Sailor Moon Avatars did when I first started it, it's just more noticeable (and longer lasting) because the Utena fandom is not as big as the Sailor Moon fandom. But I'll keep plugging away at it!
Photos: I've been trying to be good about taking pictures at every event we go to this summer, I just end up taking so many that I'm then too daunted to really share them on here. Plus, as I'm usually the one taking the pictures, that means I don't get into a lot of them, or I get into them after I'm already sweaty/tired/drunk and not looking my best. It's interesting, considering how many pictures you see of me by really good photographers, but in my group, I've kind of turned into the photographer myself. This is not a bad thing.
Photoshoots: Despite the fact that I've done three that are on the website already and two more that are coming down the pipe, you'd think I'd be content--but I'm not. There are SO MANY MORE that I want to do that it could (should) get its own post! But off the top of my head, I want to do the White Rose Dress shoot with ngmaster, the Zatanna shoot with docthestampede, the beach shoot with madmistersmiley, the Tifa shoot with tyrus, the pink outfit shoot with thehoodwatch...
Quotes: Heard any good ones lately?
Rant: Wow, I haven't gone on a rant lately, either. I guess things have been going fairly well? (Or maybe I just stopped caring. That would be depressing.)
Sailor Moon Avatars: Hit(s) TEN YEARS this month! (I don't remember what day I launched the site, I didn't think to pay attention to that until Crimson Sky Creations--remember, SMA was supposed to be my "practice site"!) I haven't been updating it as much lately (believe it or not, mostly due to that OA bump I mentioned above), but not for lack of submissions, I'm swimming in them. SMA has taken off beyond my wildest dreams; it's no Cosplay.com, but I'm still very, very proud of it.
Schedule: I'll have to update this at some point, but I have at least a pattern in mind for my life these days, even if I haven't been entirely successful at keeping up with it.
That's My Dad: Even though we're living in the same house as he is, I meant what I said about us not crossing paths much; I try to remember to say hi and/or goodnight at least once a day, but that's about it, so there isn't as much hilarity to report as there used to be. I will mention one thing, though: Dad's been fighting "the good fight" at his job against uncaring bosses and downright illegal business practices recently. He asked me to proofread a complaint letter he was writing last night...that led off with his complaining about his boss using "vulgar language" in front of "mixed company". Really, Dad? Really? Your heart's in the right place, but...dude, pick your battles. Seriously. (Instead, I think I convinced him to tell his superiors that this same boss bragged about never reading the requirements for any meeting he attends, and finding it hilarious how grossly unprepared he is. I think that might hit a little closer to home. One hopes.)
The Crew: We're good. I already told you about agent0033's award, next up is him and jenybean moving back to Greenpoint, and then The Goalie's 30th birthday. After that we'll probably do something on Veteran's Day to mark both his dad's life and the end of what has been a really pretty awesome summer thus far.
The Past: I haven't really been referencing it THAT much recently, although in helping The Goalie and Beanie pack, we had the following funny exchange:
BEANIE: No, seriously, I needed to get rid of clothes. I still have clothes from when The Goalie and I were dating!
CRISSY: Bean, I still have clothes from when The Goalie and I were dating!
This is why our group rocks. =D
Video Games: I'm still playing Wii Fit every night (well, every night that I have time, I missed a good two weeks due to Otakon preparation and then cleanup), but aside from that, Marvel and I are working on the Star World of Super Mario Brothers Wii, and last night I was inspired to play Space Channel 5 Part 2 after watching Marvel play a level of Moonwalker on emulator. The few times I have the house to myself, I've been working on unlocking everything in Rock Band that we lost in the Great Playstation 3 Death of 2009. And, sadly, I haven't been obsessed with The Sims 3 lately, I've been zoning out to playing Heroes of Might and Magic III Complete on weekend mornings when I'm up way too early.
Weddings: I really mentioned this above, my next wedding is going to be oatmeal_queen's in March of next year and I cannot WAIT. She is going to be a BEAUTIFUL bride and I've already fallen in love with the pictures of the venue that she showed me when we met for lunch at Otakon. SO PRETTY! You people, get married, so I can go to more weddings, they're an awful lot of fun when I'm not the bride!
Weight: I've been holding steady at my PRE-breakup weight (sadly) since Christmas; our honeymoon last July and then the holidays last December put all my post-breakup pounds back on. I'm hoping to get back to post-breakup weight by way of dieting and exercise, but if not, I'll deal, because I really don't want to go through anything that heartbreaking again even if it does make me look awesome. Here's hoping, but at least I'm still at my post-diet weight, so that's something.
With Otakon over, it's time for a State of the Crissy (SotC) update. Going by tags:
Anime: We're currently trying to finish up the second season of Magic Knight Rayearth on Monday nights. I had hoped to be done before Otakon, but it wasn't a big deal as I have read the entire manga, and what with the car accident and ten thousand little other things that like to pop up, we only finished the episode where Fuu defeats Lady Aska in archery last night. We're liking it, although of course Marvel's having to deal with me saying, "THAT'S not in the manga!" eleventy-billion times. After the second season, we'll watch the OVA (which...I think we have? Why do I think that? When did we get it? Where is it?), and then it'll be Marvel's turn to pick which anime we watch next. I don't know if he's going to go with one of the ones we just bought (either Ouran Host Club or Gurren Lagann) or one he already had.
Art: I haven't drawn in FOREVER. Partly it's due to those ten thousand little pop up things, but I know that's not the full reason behind it. The FULL reason is that my coworker's (who I will hereby name NANA because I'm sure I talk about her often enough for her to rate a code name) daughter asked me to draw for her a girl in front of a house with a tree and flowers and a table and a birthday cake on the table, all in one drawing, and my subconscious is just BALKING. I even kind of know how I want it to look (helped because NANA's daughter drew a sample for me), and what references I'm going to use, but it sounds so involved (seriously, who does backgrounds anymore?) that I think I'm procrastinating. I'm going to force myself to work on something of my own first that I've had in mind for over a year now, and hopefully that'll get the creative juices jump started and I can go on from there. I hope.
Babies: Are good, as far as I can tell. oshidori baked up a beautiful one, as we all knew she would, and now all I'm waiting for is myshella's. (Carp, when is she due? Must remember to ask Carol Danvers--Marvel probably won't remember.)
Bad Movies: We haven't seen any new ones lately, we watched The Crazies Sunday night expecting it to be kind of bad slasher, but it ended up being REALLY good. It's your basic zombie/plague type of story, so it's not groundbreaking or anything, but the acting, and the unexpected occurrences of what you WOULD expect to happen, definitely make the movie. We're still planning bad movies, though. I want to get a group together (comment here if interested!) to go see Piranha 3D when it comes out, but in the meantime, we're going to watch...I can't even bring myself to type the title here, so just click on this link, to tide us over.
Birthday List: Sort of related, I have no idea what to do for my 30th birthday. The answer is probably going to be "nothing" for three reasons--one, Dad kind of soured me on the birthday party I had last year, so I'm feeling sullen and spiteful (not like me, I know, but everyone's allowed their moments from time to time), two, I used to have costume parties for my birthday in the basement when I was a kid, so it would make sense to do something similar, only with 80s costumes, for my 30th, but that's exactly what jenybean did and I don't want to completely copy her party because that's all kinds of lame, and three, we always go see Rocky Horror live the weekend before Halloween, and the weekend before Halloween is always my birthday, so, that's that. If anyone has any ideas, I'd love to hear them. Maybe I'll just wait until I'm 32 and have a Sweet Sixteen Times Two or something.
(Other People's) Birthdays: I haven't recognized a single one since January, and for that, I'm sorry. I could potentially get back into it, as I have someone posting for me (thank you, ssfseiyakou!) and I could theoretically just add all of the birthdays back to my PDA so I'd know when they are, make a graphic at work, and then upload it to my server instead of my LJ Scrapbook. What's really stopping me, apart from the fact that I don't have the birthdays listed in my PDA anymore, is that I'd have to use Photoshop at work instead of Paint Shop Pro, and I'm not very comfortable with Photoshop yet. We'll see. Maybe next year. It IS on my mind.
Blood, Sweat, and Glitter: Has been pretty consistently updated this year, I think. I hope to have the con report done by this weekend; or, failing that, my new costume pages up. I have things with which to update, now all I need is time.
Books: I'm currently rereading the Magic Kingdom of Landover series--which reminds me I need to get the recently released sixth book!--at home, and David Copperfield when I'm not at home, nothing new there. I'm still annoyed I didn't get to meet Terry Brooks at New York Comic Con 2008.
Computers: I still haven't really fixed up Hideki to my specifications; I've still got all of my old files in a "Chii" folder, and most of my new files (mostly pictures) in folders on my desktop. This is not conducive to good organization. In addition, especially when I'm working with Paint Shop Pro, my computer seems to have a sustained lag every three seconds or so. It's not the BIGGEST deal in the world, and I'm guessing it's because it seems to CONSTANTLY run some sort of HP Check (which I really should turn off, but I don't want to until I know what it's doing, and whether what it's doing is necessary or even at all beneficial), but it is distracting, especially when we're trying to watch something, or when I'm trying to process a bunch of photos at once. Still, it's a working computer, so I'm not going to complain. I assume Sumomo's fine, I haven't used her, beyond watching the old Transformer's cartoons while I take my beauty baths, in months.
Cosplay: I think I've talked about this enough lately ::grins:: but that doesn't mean it's not on my mind every day, costumes I'd like to do, photos I'd like to re-do, etc. Practically speaking, my next event will be NDK in Colorado in September, and all my costumes are set for that: ssfseiyakou and moradoshinigami are fixing up my Sera Myu Super Sailor Mars costume, charmedseed is making a new Neo Princess Mars gown for me as my old one is not big enough to accommodate my, hurm, adequate assets, and Silver Millennium Princess Mars and some civilian version of Rei might be in the cards as well. All more or less re-wears for me (and no wigs! Yay!)
Crimson Sky Creations : has been suffering due to the art drought lately, but I have been updating it monthly. I forgot to include a fairly good pen doodle I did of Sailor Venus in the margins of my notepad within the past month, I should probably go scan that now...but hopefully I'll have the aforementioned drawing idea to upload for September. In addition, I contacted s0nified about collaborating with me for next year's 10th Anniversary layout, but I know how busy she is so here's hoping we can make that work.
Crissy Vs The Man: I haven't had any good fights lately. ::laughs:: Although I will use this opportunity to tell a funny, semi-related story now; there's one guy at work I vent my spleen on, let's call him Doug Funny (because seriously, he looks like one.) Doug Funny picks on my boss, so I amuse my coworkers by pretending to be a big scary bouncer whenever I deal with him, cracking my knuckles and asking, "Is there a problem, sir" as menacingly as I'm capable of. Well, we caught an episode of Glee the other night (and Marvel was instantly hooked, he torrented the first season already) where the teacher was trying to sing his feelings to these two girls by making a medley of "Don't Stand So Close To Me"\ and "Young Girl", and I guess that was in my mind, because the other day I was making copies when Doug Funny came down to harass someone, I forget who, and he caught my eye and tried to start with me, so I sang, "Don't stand. Don't stand. Don't stand so close to me," and he said, "Ah, yes, The Police," and I said, "Yeah, and you're gonna NEED the police if you don't do what the song says," and my boss thought that was funny, so...win?
Deep Thoughts: Oh Christ, can you imagine how much longer this entry would be if I got into these? But here's one I had on Friday morning: it was a beautiful day, and I was in a good mood, so logically, I got to thinking about suicide. Because, in a way, it's so tempting to dream about ending it on your own terms, when it IS a beautiful day, and you're not in pain, and you're not upset, and nothing is currently bothering you. To kill yourself before you get old, and sick, and ugly, and decrepit, and before you watch everyone you love get old and sick and decrepit and die. I never would, because I care about my loved ones too much to cause them pain, and because I'm terrified of the finality of death anyway, but this is the way my thoughts run so I figured I'd document them here.
Delerious Ramblings: I haven't been sick in a while, knock on wood, so I haven't had any to share lately. It's a good thing, too, summer colds are the worst.
Family Drama: I don't really want to get into now, but while Pops and Grandpa still aren't talking, now Marvel and my father aren't getting along. I'm really beginning to think there is something wrong with the Y chromosome. Both brothers are present and accounted for. My uncle (Dad's brother) was in the hospital over the weekend, but he's out now, and hopefully it wasn't anything too serious (abdominal pains).
Guestbook Woes: Want to hear something funny? I can't read my guestbooks at work. I can get to the main page of the host of my guestbooks, I can log in and manage my entries, I just can't view the actual page. Retarded. But, whatever. Guestbooks have kind of gone the way of the dodo in the past few years anyway, my most recent entry was, as far as I could tell, Russian spam. That probably shouldn't make me as paranoid as it does, but, what can I say, I grew up in the Cold War 80s.
Horse Memories: Carol Danvers ended up on some mailing list (God knows how, although I assume either my mother or I were some way involved) for some horse-related clothing and chotchkies catalog, and oh my God, just flipping through it made me miss horseback riding so much. I don't know when I'm going to get to go again, sometimes I still can't believe that used to be such a HUGE part of my life, and now it's entirely absent and has been for over a decade. =/
LJ Layout: I mentioned wanting a new one, and I've gotten two nibbles. If anyone wants to take a crack at it, I want it to look more or less like this, with that picture on the left (and, if possible, a list of links like I have to the right of my current layout beneath it) and all of the content on the right.
Manga: I'm still really behind, but thanks to Marvel's help, I believe I'm up to date with Negima, Tsubasa, and of course, NANA. There's still so much more I have to pick up...but honestly, as long as I'm current on NANA, I'm good. =) Oh! Side note: when I've been bored at work lately, I've been researching manga at work, looking for new titles to get into. My current standards: it must be released in America, it must be 18 volumes or less (nothing will EVER be longer than Sailor Moon again, my devotion will not allow it), it must be finished already (I don't want to get into an ongoing series that either then gets canceled, or it goes past 18 volumes), and then it has to sound like something I'd be interested in. Even with those standards, I've already added Absolute Boyfriend, Aishiteruze Baby, Alice 19th, Alone In My King's Harem, Angelic Layer, Backstage Prince, Beautiful People, and Crying Freeman to my wishlist. Oy. On the plus side, I just finished reading through the "C"s, so, it could have been a lot worse.
Meme: I haven't done one in a while. I don't think I've been tagged for one in a while? But with not being able to do more than skim my Friend's page, it's hard to tell. I have been trying to ask questions for the general audience lately, though. Those are always fun.
Mom's Stroke: Mom's doing really well lately, actually. She wishes she were better, naturally, and she wishes it would happen faster, but there's no denying how much she's already improved. She barely uses the cane when she's in the house, and did I tell the story of how I made her get me a glass of water the last time I was there? We're actually going to see her this weekend (first time in over a month, I took all of July off from visitng family so Marvel and I could really do a lot of "summer" activities) and I'm thinking about giving her this test to see how she compares...if she lets me. (She tends not to enjoy being treated like a guinea pg.) Also, I'm going to buy a bottle of champagne and see if I can convince her to have some with me, because I read on Wiki that "the Journal of Agricultural and Food Chemistry published the results of a recent joint study by the University of Reading and University of Cagliari that showed moderate consumptions of Champagne may help the brain cope with the trauma of stroke, Alzheimer's, and Parkinson's disease." If not...what the hell, more for me. (I love champagne.)
My Wedding: Is over. Have I mentioned how grateful I am for that? =D Seriously, there are times when I think about what I'd like to have done differently, but really, I wouldn't do it again for all the money in the world. Now I'm looking forward to going to other people's weddings--I'm guessing the next one is going to be oatmeal_queen's Victorian and Steampunk themed one. (Speaking of, does anyone have a Victorian or Steampunk outfit I can borrow? I'll buy one if I have to, but considering I'll probably only wear it the once, it makes more sense to borrow one if I can. If not, I already took a business card at Otakon from a lady whose fashions caught my eye, so I have options.)
My Workpace: There are still so many things here I'm not crazy about, the location, the hours, the high school level of gossip, but I will mention the things that keep me here (other than my own fear of change): I really like my boss an awful lot, I love that people bring their dogs to work (OMG PUPPEHS!), carpooling has me getting home in record time so I can enjoy large portions of the evening, at least I can get some overtime pay, and the "mean girls" clique seems to have accepted me into itself, which I'm dubious about but is a vast improvement over being their target (and who knows? Maybe I can influence them with my Pollyanna ways.)
Ohtori Avatars: Hit a speed bump a while ago, but I think I worked through it. I saw a good number of really good Utena cosplayers over the weekend, although I unfortunately didn't get to approach all of them. Really, OA is having the same growing pains that Sailor Moon Avatars did when I first started it, it's just more noticeable (and longer lasting) because the Utena fandom is not as big as the Sailor Moon fandom. But I'll keep plugging away at it!
Photos: I've been trying to be good about taking pictures at every event we go to this summer, I just end up taking so many that I'm then too daunted to really share them on here. Plus, as I'm usually the one taking the pictures, that means I don't get into a lot of them, or I get into them after I'm already sweaty/tired/drunk and not looking my best. It's interesting, considering how many pictures you see of me by really good photographers, but in my group, I've kind of turned into the photographer myself. This is not a bad thing.
Photoshoots: Despite the fact that I've done three that are on the website already and two more that are coming down the pipe, you'd think I'd be content--but I'm not. There are SO MANY MORE that I want to do that it could (should) get its own post! But off the top of my head, I want to do the White Rose Dress shoot with ngmaster, the Zatanna shoot with docthestampede, the beach shoot with madmistersmiley, the Tifa shoot with tyrus, the pink outfit shoot with thehoodwatch...
Quotes: Heard any good ones lately?
Rant: Wow, I haven't gone on a rant lately, either. I guess things have been going fairly well? (Or maybe I just stopped caring. That would be depressing.)
Sailor Moon Avatars: Hit(s) TEN YEARS this month! (I don't remember what day I launched the site, I didn't think to pay attention to that until Crimson Sky Creations--remember, SMA was supposed to be my "practice site"!) I haven't been updating it as much lately (believe it or not, mostly due to that OA bump I mentioned above), but not for lack of submissions, I'm swimming in them. SMA has taken off beyond my wildest dreams; it's no Cosplay.com, but I'm still very, very proud of it.
Schedule: I'll have to update this at some point, but I have at least a pattern in mind for my life these days, even if I haven't been entirely successful at keeping up with it.
That's My Dad: Even though we're living in the same house as he is, I meant what I said about us not crossing paths much; I try to remember to say hi and/or goodnight at least once a day, but that's about it, so there isn't as much hilarity to report as there used to be. I will mention one thing, though: Dad's been fighting "the good fight" at his job against uncaring bosses and downright illegal business practices recently. He asked me to proofread a complaint letter he was writing last night...that led off with his complaining about his boss using "vulgar language" in front of "mixed company". Really, Dad? Really? Your heart's in the right place, but...dude, pick your battles. Seriously. (Instead, I think I convinced him to tell his superiors that this same boss bragged about never reading the requirements for any meeting he attends, and finding it hilarious how grossly unprepared he is. I think that might hit a little closer to home. One hopes.)
The Crew: We're good. I already told you about agent0033's award, next up is him and jenybean moving back to Greenpoint, and then The Goalie's 30th birthday. After that we'll probably do something on Veteran's Day to mark both his dad's life and the end of what has been a really pretty awesome summer thus far.
The Past: I haven't really been referencing it THAT much recently, although in helping The Goalie and Beanie pack, we had the following funny exchange:
BEANIE: No, seriously, I needed to get rid of clothes. I still have clothes from when The Goalie and I were dating!
CRISSY: Bean, I still have clothes from when The Goalie and I were dating!
This is why our group rocks. =D
Video Games: I'm still playing Wii Fit every night (well, every night that I have time, I missed a good two weeks due to Otakon preparation and then cleanup), but aside from that, Marvel and I are working on the Star World of Super Mario Brothers Wii, and last night I was inspired to play Space Channel 5 Part 2 after watching Marvel play a level of Moonwalker on emulator. The few times I have the house to myself, I've been working on unlocking everything in Rock Band that we lost in the Great Playstation 3 Death of 2009. And, sadly, I haven't been obsessed with The Sims 3 lately, I've been zoning out to playing Heroes of Might and Magic III Complete on weekend mornings when I'm up way too early.
Weddings: I really mentioned this above, my next wedding is going to be oatmeal_queen's in March of next year and I cannot WAIT. She is going to be a BEAUTIFUL bride and I've already fallen in love with the pictures of the venue that she showed me when we met for lunch at Otakon. SO PRETTY! You people, get married, so I can go to more weddings, they're an awful lot of fun when I'm not the bride!
Weight: I've been holding steady at my PRE-breakup weight (sadly) since Christmas; our honeymoon last July and then the holidays last December put all my post-breakup pounds back on. I'm hoping to get back to post-breakup weight by way of dieting and exercise, but if not, I'll deal, because I really don't want to go through anything that heartbreaking again even if it does make me look awesome. Here's hoping, but at least I'm still at my post-diet weight, so that's something.