Oh hello. I kind of vanished there for a bit, didn't I? August was pure madness - new job, new game, two cons for which I did WAY TOO MUCH OF THE SEWING WORK FOR. Flakefriends are not getting free labor from me again after this year. I wasn't posting much because I think it would have just been like the work 'fuck' in h1 like three hundred times. It was rough going but the end result was pretty awesome.

Anime Evolution 2010
Kumoricon 2010

Kumoricon photos will be on my own gallery eventually - still trying to figure out a Gallery2 upload module for Linux that works, as the F-Spot one just....crashes F-Spot with no errors. AE was way too hot and I didn't do much con stuff, but I got in for free for helping with an event so it was fine anyway. Kumoricon was loads of fun, even if the drive was waaaay too long. But it was really awesome to meet some net people IRL.

Bought stuff at both the cons (of course) - two Bleach doujin and the Color Bleach English release at AE, and then at Kumoricon I bought a pile of Peacemaker Kurogane manga and....a sexy anime lady bodypillow. Mostly because it was the Major and she is awesome. Also she doesn't have the 'no means yes' face that most of those pillows have, though she does have Masamune Shirow's strange boob drawing habits.

Since getting home, I have mostly been getting caught up on gaming stuff and getting used to more hours at work, and trying to get the house cleaned up so it looks like humans live here. This involved a $180 ~IKEA adventure~ today, but I finally have space for all my books and don't have to store costumes in plastic bags on the floor. Still a long way to go, but it's a start!

-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?

Media Center: I ended up having to ditch Mythbuntu because ATI is annoyingly lazy and decided to stop updating their legacy Linux drivers (the legacy Windows drivers? Updated last month), and this graphics card was awesome in 2005. So it's WinXP pro with XMBC, which I still have to configure to use an external player because the built-in XBMC runs all the decoding off the processor, and this processor was pretty good in 2005, which means MKV files are freezing after two minutes. I did get the TV-out configured, and set up file sharing within the network, at least. I have to talk the landlord unblocking router ports if I want remote file access, but I need to make the set-up way more secure first because this isn't Linux any more and Windows Firewall is a steaming pile of shit. Unfortunately the modem for the house network is possibly in the slow process of dying - it's started randomly not letting computers connect, regardless if it's a wired or wireless connection, so...lol :< The new tower and my roommate's laptop seem to be the worst victims.

-Whenever I have internet again: patch WoW!
-Whenever I have internet again: accquire this week's Bleach filler crack
-????: Get caught up on tags :(

Cosplay:
Turks - Three suits are at over 95% done, which is to say they need undercollars, pants cuffs, belt loops, and a metric ton of ironing. Elena is lagging behind, but I'm bringing it in to work on during lecture tomorrow so it should be caught up by tomorrow night.

-Friday: Acquire cardstock for ID badges and business cards at Staples
-Friday: Dressew for extra buttons
-Friday: FINISH HANDSEWING OMG
-Saturday: Attempt to style Reno wig
-Sunday: Final fitting to make sure I didn't destroy anything
-????: Start Scarlet
-Whenever the other wigs come: Elena and Scarlet wig styling

Bleach - Haori are mostly done - still need to do the collar handsewing on the 8th division one. I did get the collars done on the white kimono, but not the black ones, and I still need to do the sleeve openings on both. I did however get my Ukitake wig cut and styled - first attempt at bangs was so-so, so I brushed them out and am letting the slightly more gravity defying ones dry right now.

-Thursday: Sew down black kimono collars. Maaaaybe haori too if I have time.
-Friday: Raid dollar store for something appropriate for hakama backboards. Also possibly rope.
-Friday: Dressew to get fabric for pink haori
-Friday: Hakama time /o/ One whole one, and then mine needs ties and finishing
-Saturday: Pink haori! Inbetween letting Reno's spikes dry, of course.
-????: Acquire tabi and hat somewhere. (Richmond?)
-????: Make waraji (I have a tutorial!)

School Stuff: Good marks on my two papers I got back, which only sort of makes up for how shit my participation marks are going to be. They did finally give me my minor, though. Other than that - school, don't talk to me about school :<

-Thursday: Study like made for midterm on Friday
-Friday: Ace midterm!
-Friday: Term topic and tentative bibilography for children's lit class (AAAAAH IDK WHAT TO DO), submit by 4pm
-Monday: Bioethics paper for Tuesday

Because let's face it, I am a lazy bitch and am totally not going to write a real con report. So! Full photos gallery is here - it's compiled from five different cameras so it is massive and, unfortunately not in chronological order because each camera had a different naming scheme and I didn't get around to figuring out how to give them a consistant naming scheme. Highlights below!

Read More?