Woke up at eight this morning for no discernible reason (having gone to bed at one), and immediately started panicking about everything and nothing. It was like being back on the 300mg Wellbutrin again, ugh.
So I got up and Did Shit, and this is what I did:
So I had two dreams I can remember with any clarity last night. In the first, I was bawwwing because someone was trying to convince me to get a race change for Alixia so I could faction swap or something and no you guys, Alixia will be a gnome forever :|
In the second, at one point I shouted 'Take that, CBS!' at an abandoned gas station security camera while waving a flash drive I stole back from a bunch of velociraptors in the air. Yeah it was pretty epic. I think I'm going to blame my Children's Lit final and the fact I wrote a nice big essay on heroic tropes in classic boys' adventure fiction for it.
And now I must make my house presentable for normal human beings, as in my infinite foolishness I agreed to host an end-of-exams party at my place (the great irony being that I'm the only one not actually done with exams yet, sigh). And, well. My living room hasn't quite recovered from the last con yet.
So this thread over at Shapely Prose is pretty much the most goddamn awesome thing I have read all week. So awesome that to the best of my limited internet popularity, I am going to make this shit a meme. We will call it the I am Fucking Awesome meme. Your mission: go forth and post telling us how fucking awesome you are, and all the fucking awesome shit you can do. And we in turn will look at it and not think of it as rampant narcissism or egotism of any of that shit. We will look at it and go 'wow, my friends are some pretty fucking awesome people.' And you will go, and tell them that they, too, should tell the internet how fucking awesome they are. And you can copy and paste this or whatever.
So. I'll start. I am Ruth-fucking-H., otherwise known as Cocoa, and I can, in fact do some awesome shit. I can build furniture from scratch, reupholster an armchair, sew a vest in a single afternoon, and make the best goddamn apple pie you have ever had (the secret's in the crust). I am a fucking fantastic cosplayer, I can run things from the commandline in Linux, and I can BS a paper like it's going out of style. I can do anything, given a set of instructions. I am an angry, blunt bitch, and I don't care who knows it. I am also a fantastic mage and awesome at farming fish in WoW, and I full embrace how incredibly nerdy that is. I am also damn sexy.
I have flipped my sleep schedule yet again! Sigh, my life. I have gotten Important Boring Stuff done, or in some cases, at least started, so I do not actually feel very guilty about this at all right now. It's exam period, I'm allowed to do stupid shit like this for a week or two.
I've been looking at lots of photos of kimono and shibori dyeing and stuff, and it makes me want to make something beautiful. I know I'm a good seamstress, but somewhat ironically, I don't actually enjoy sewing that much. I enjoy seeing the finished product all put together, but the actual process usually just ends up as tedious and occasionally frustrating (it's not a project until I've put at least one sleeve on upside down or inside out). The stuff I actually really enjoy doing is what I think of as the 'crafty' bits - painting, beading, building props. I had a ton of fun with Yuna because a huge portion of the outfit is like that - the skirt and obi are all painting, the sleeves are gradient-dye (and I actually had a ton of fun doing that, and love how they turned out), the earrings were beading and painting my own beads and occasionally building my own beads. I wish I was better at the 'crafty' things - I've gotten better about being able to copy designs, and /way/ better about not smudging my paint everywhere (no smudges on either of the haori! It was like a miracle), but it's still all very basic.
Maybe when I am in Richmond next week acquiring a hot water dispenser and a new tower fan, I will drop by Michaels and go on a shopping spree or something. Not quite sure what to make, although I did rescue my knitting needles from languishing in my old bedroom closet back in the US.
Also, I realized the other day that I may have to edit some of what I'm writing for Jyuushiko's backstory, because I am thinking in fashion terms that are at least a thousand years too late for the setting of this story - realized when I was discussing how Sougyo no Kotowari basically wears a variation of Heian-era courtier's robes (now mostly known as Shinto priests' robes, but I think given the age of the zanpakuto, the historical connection is the more relevant one). I am thinking in other terms (mostly medical) that are probably closer to two thousand years too late, but I may give in and let some anachronisms lay.
Because the rest of my life can be summed up as Book-Off is awesome, and I have spent way too much time playing Pokemon Diamond this week. So, first off, stuff I want to do I forgot to mention in my last post -
Pokemon Diamond/Pearl - Dawn: Because she's adorable and sometimes my inner twelve-year-old girly-girl needs to get out sometimes. I am not sure if I'm cute enough for this, but damnit, I will try anyway. This may involve Jon doing like...Empoleon gijinka, because I love my giant death penguin.
Tales of the Abyss: Jade Curtiss for me, Dist for Jon, because he does the creepy smile really well and is all gangly. Sadly, there is no good way to tote around a giant armchair at a con, but it'd be fun to be snarky all day.
I have also wound up volunteering to help other people with cosplay, some of it in return for favors. So I've got Toboe pants and wig to make, in return for a cute Elena and Sougyo no Kotowari (yesssssss I have teeny adorable zanpakuto. ONLY ONE, but one is cute enough). I'm also helping Yana and Charlene with their Loveless cosplay - Ritsuka and Soubi - because I like helping my friends be awesome.
And entirely unrelated to cosplay, but totally nerdy anyway - I am going to make myself a Minazuki backpack. It will be the epitome of ugly-cute, and it will be very fuzzy. I'm still trying to decide if it should be messanger bag style, or like...one of those single-shoulder strap backpacks, with the wings as straps. I may have to do a muslin mock-up and decide. My one requirement is that it be big enough to hold my laptop.
Finally! For those interested in browsing on their own, the main gallery starts here, Turks photoshoot stuff starts here, and Bleach stuff starts here.
Going to go ahead and embed some of my favs, too - just a warning that it'll be image-heavy. I know some of the resized versions are a little artifact-y, but the page links have the big version too.
I've edited like 90% of my Sakuracon photos, but the internet is being fussy again (and I think 'fussy' is the best word here, really) so they won't go up until this weekend. I also prep-weeded most of my garden today, hooray!
Near-Future Stuff
(Don't want to say 'AE stuff' because I have more plans than there are days of the con)
-Shinra spruce-up - no shoe-failure, Elena wig that does not look like Lady Gaga reject, bonus Papa Shinra and Scarlet outfits. May need emergency Seattle day trip planning to engage in Dark Nation rescue mission (as it appears he did not make it all the way home with me, cry)
-Summoner Yuna spruce-up - Some little things on various pieces, making a new head for the staff, boots that don't pinch my toes, trim the wig down
-Bleach - ZANPAKUTO, making peasant shoes that don't destroy feet (and can survive damp - I made the mistake of putting the damp waraji in a plastic bag to pack and then forgetting about them and I discovered today that they were fuzzy :<). Possibly include new people in our mad Bleach cosplay adventures, but that's up in the air.
-Wonder Chef and Dark Chef - All new! I have Wonder Chef fabric and may go ahead and cut out the pants and vest this weekend. I look forward to building six foot tall forks
-Advent Children Rufus - Needs suit fabric so I can actually make the suit, Jellova
Far-Future Stuff/Brainstorming
-Integra - have fabric! Have no desire to try to make it for AE though because I'm a little burnt out on suits
-Braska and Auron - have been tossing the idea around with Jon for a while, because he'd make a cute young!Auron. Really intricate, though, so I'm not sure when I'll have the time for it.
-Nanoha something or other - Maybeeee? I love the character designs - would probably go for Hayate or Signum myself, but again, intricate.
You know your unemployed gaming buddy needs a new job when, after not getting a response to his /first/ planning email after two days (look, two of us have finals right now, we're kind of busy), then proceeds to write up a four page (SINGLE SPACED) 'Goals and Action Plans' document for the party. With lists. And sublists. I love this game, and he's a good guy, but seriously.
Attempt to reset sleep schedule did not go as smoothly as planned, but I made it to the class I had a presentation to give in, and I will be able to sleep at a reasonable hour tonight.
So guess who inverted their sleep cycle again! I predict whoever has to process my sleep diary and questionnare at the sleep clinic will probably facepalm forever when they see 'bedtime: 8:30 am' for like four days in a row. I did however get two of my three term papers done. They are kind of terribad and way too short, but they are /done/. I think I'm hitting a university-level senior slump, where at this point I just want to pass and be done with it all. Who's not going to grad school? Yeah, that'd be me.
I also read a bunch of manga, oh yay. And uh. May have made another Ukitake RP account. He is small and adorkable and already has a partner-in-crime (who is currently hitting on Jyuushiko because Kyouraku is incorrigible like that). Hollow!Orihime has also been creeping on little!Ukitake, which is...both creepy and awesome. Basically, tl;dr, I love Bleach Dressing Room.
Con photos will be up....eventually. I want to process them in Lightroom to get some more practice, but constant internet failures (even with a new modem, ugh) and the fact that I can't find my 4GB flash drive have been thwarting me.
(assorted notes to self - US taxes, doujin credits on icons, cosplay lists)
In lieu of actually doing stuff, I will blather more about my media PC! Mostly because internet access means I actually working on it some more. I know have external video player support, running Media Player Classic because it supports offloading to the GPU and thus can play high-def MKVs without my CPU usage spiking to 100% and horrible graphics stuttering.
I also reinstalled Stepmania and got it to auto-maximize on opening to the tv. Unfortunately there is a small kink in my 'play DDR, regain cardiovascular fitness' (my resting heartrate is like 110 bpm, I am aware that this is really bad) plan - I think my cheapo ebay pads that I bought something like six years ago now are finally giving up the ghost. One works except for the down button, and the other is kind of flaking in and out all over. I'll lay them flat for a few days and see if that helps - if not, I guess I'll buy some more on ebay and ship them to my mom and get her to bring them out at grad. All the dealers are in the US and want $50 shipping to Canada, so noooo.
And a random observation, but I feel like WinXP goes out of it's way to make itself difficult to make un-ugly. I spent about two hours fiddling with themes and icons and going 'ARGH FUCK YOU ATI WHY WON'T YOU SUPPORT THIS CARD BETTER SO I COULD DO THIS IN GNOME' The desktop at least looks good now, although I still need to figure out how Rainmeter works so I can configure it better. I settled for just hiding everything else so the ugly unmatching icon-sets don't show.
I have internet! I have WoW! I can run high graphics settings and get more than 10 FPS in Dalaran! I have a port of the last version of Amarok that was awesome before 2.0 killed it! I have everything but my term papers and finals done! I have adorable zanpakuto icons!
I also think I have some variety of upper respiratory tract infection, because I'm getting sinus headaches and waking up in the morning with the inside of my mouth tasting like mucousy death (and I slept fifteen hours Sunday night and another ten last night), but given the madness of the last two weeks, I am utterly unsurprised. It is only a minor bleh, but it is a minor bleh on top of term papers which means I will probably have a rather cranky week. Oh well. TWO MORE TO GO.
-Damage for the day: two more bottles of BPAL (Crowley and Black Forest, mmmm), and a book on cosplay make-up from Kinokuniya
-Discovered playing DDR again uses muscles I haven't used in a long time, ow.
-Had an epic moment of panic after l accidently left my camera bag in the washroom, but all was well - someone had turned it in to lost and found.
-Managed to not get lost driving around Seattle!
-Awesome cosplay of the day - fursuit Kyuubi, that guy from Durarara!! that throws vending machines (complete with vending machine)
-Technically Sunday, as it was in the early hours - Rufus-Aizen fistbump of evil.
Overall con impressions: lots of fun, despite epic amounts of organization-fail on the part of the con itself. Also, a lot of sleep deprivation.
I was hoping to come home, get all my photos up, and then make icons for the Sougyo no Kotowari journal I made last night, but I came home to find that the new modem was still not here, and as tomorrow is a stat holiday, it'll probably be Tuesday at the earliest, ugh. So that plus the sleep dep kind of put a damper on those plans. I did get the small shoots we did for the costumes I made for the con off Ced, so those will probably be edited and go up tomorrow, but in the meantime, have a shot from each of them.
-Bought X Infinity (finally) and the Bleach SOULs because I am weak and they took credit card. We'll see what damage I do tomorrow
-Reno + Rude and Ukitake + Kyouraku wandering the con together. Person: "Can I get a photo of you two?" Us: "Uhhh. Which two?"
-Informal survey says more people want hugs from Ukitake than from Rufus - but not by much
-Contrary to what canon tells us, Hitsugaya loves getting candy from Ukitake. It may have helped that I had both chocolate mini eggs and wintergreen Lifesavers.
-In keeping a little more with canon, Hitsugaya appears to enjoy wintergreen Lifesavers more than chocolate
-Early in the afternoon, I was hanging around outside talking about Aizen being a troll with some other Bleach cosplayers (and admiring Nanao's hollowed-out-book carrying case), when some random people came up behind me and startled me by tapping me on the shoulder. I thought this was just random con lulz, until cut to the Bleach photoshoot, and the same random people go over to the other good Ukitake cosplayer and startle her (she actually shrieked), and then say "We snuck up on someone we thought was you earlier, but it was like, an actual dude." I think this counts as a win?
-Other me gave me bubblegum! I'm almost tempted to just keep it forever as a memento
-OMG A KAIEN SHOWED UP. I WAS SO HAPPY. Other me was happy too (like all of our interactions were very BDR, where I enjoy playing with doubles)
-Bleach photoshoot was otherwise kind of fail, because organization, what organization.
-Awesome cosplay of the day: Queen of Blades, Artemisia, KATEN KYOKOTSU.
-Delicious Cheesecake Factory dinner :3
-At aforementioned dinner, there were two guys at the table next to us. When one went to the washroom, the other slid over to tell us that it was his friend's birthday, and that he really liked our cosplay, and would we do a little something for him? So we got a napkin, wrote 'Happy Birthday!' on it and signed it as the Turks and Rufus, and then, as the two of them left the restaurant, Reno ran out, slung an arm around his shoulder, said 'Yo!' and dropped the napkin in his hand. Apparently the look on his face was priceless.
-Turks cosplay semi-saved by mad dash to Dressew to pick up cheap blond wig. It's rather Lady Gaga, but...better than nothing?
-We had an epic shoe failure - Jon forgot his dress shoes and only had his black hiking boots, and then I left my nice boots for Rufus and my boots for Sailor Uranus sitting in my kitchen.
-Luckily I failed so much that I actually left the house in my old scrubby Rufus shoes, which I wear when I'm just going out really quickly (such as back and forth trips to load luggage), instead of changing into my sneakers. Unfortunately this means I have no comfy shoes here.
-FOUR HOURS OF SLEEP LAST NIGHT YAY only not really yay at all
-Missed the FF photoshoot (AGAIN) because the line up for people who had pre-regged was two and a half hours long
-"Wow, I think those are the best Turks I've ever seen!" "Nah, it's cheating because they're Asian." (3/4 of my Turks are Chinese)
-Many mad props for the group in general which filled me with glee
-Bought pretty Jade doujin! And BPAL. And I will probably buy more BPAL tomorrow and...maybe some doujin from the Annoying Yaoi Guy (although the really annoying one isn't here - some other slightly less shouty dudes are manning the booth this year it seems)
-The amount of eBay Bleach cosplay at this con depresses me. Particularly the people who bought captain's haori and look nothing like the captains they're supposedly cosplaying. Like...not even trying to look like them.
-Awesome cosplay of Friday, though: big Tales of the Abyss group, Sode no Shirayuki with an amazing wig, MASTER CHIEF, Izanagi
-Using and abusing the power of eight seatbelts in one car. The abuse mostly because my car rides looooooow.
-Went here for dinner. Ate two dozen eggs between four people (another nine eggs were eaten by three people - almost three dozen eggs total)
-"So, the cure for homosexuality is to suck a whole carton of dicks."
-The answer to life, the universe and everything: 42. The question: What stall did I park my car in?
So, because life hates me and Canada Post is terrible, we have no wig for Elena or Scarlet. Scarlet was sort of a bonus anyway, so it's not a big deal, but Elena kind of throws over the entire group and essentially my last four months of work, as our Elena has shoulder-length red and black streaked hair right now.
I have also succeeded in pissing my landlord off by texting him at four am to ask if he was going to be home when the mail came, because he is apparently one of those people who will actually get up to check text in the middle of the night.
Ugh ugh ugh at least the Bleach cosplay will look good. Time to write more genderswap fic while I wait for the benzos to kick in enough I can actually sleep.
