A New Year's Story

Now is the time to be pensive. New Year’s is a time for remembering the past and thinking about the future. I spent all of my New Year’s Day looking through my old pictures from 2007 – the first picture of the year, my birthday, Anna’s and Bryan’s and Julia’s sixteenth birthdays, my trip to China, my first marching band adventures, fencing. Before I got to the China part, awful memories came flooding back, filling my mind. My sixteenth birthday marked the beginning of the rapid decline of one of my best, truest, and most comfortable friendships, and after that date, things only got worse. I found myself thrown into an inescapable depression, despite the best efforts of other, wonderful friends, and I was never able to trust or love anyone so fully in the years that followed. During that time, all I can remember is unbelievable pain and confusion. My grades were slipping and my other friends were drifting away because I could not hold on to them; all of my energy was wasted trying to imagine what I had done wrong and what I could do to at least have her talk to me again, to smile at me when she walked by, or to at least stop pretending that I was just another object in the room. Sophomore year remains a black hole for me – I can recall very little of my academics, and though I made new friends, few of them stuck. This was the year that Oh! Gravity., the sixth Switchfoot album, came out, and after this dramatic turn of events, I fell to sitting by myself and finding refuge in lines like “All of my world hanging on your lies”. I became increasingly pessimistic about everything, and I lost any value I had had for myself. My way of thinking was that, if she couldn’t like me, how could anyone else? How could I? I think I’ve made my point very clearly: to say this was the low point of my high school career would be an extreme understatement. This person broke my heart, but also my trust, self-esteem, and self-worth.

But, as I was gathering photos from my past to compile for my scrapbook, I took a trip down memory lane. I was surprised to see how many photographs were filled with friends and smiling faces, and I realise that I let everyone around me down. It’s not my job to allow silly drama get to my head; no, I am the one who helps pull those around me out of its sticky claws. Friends, some who hadn’t even known me for more than a few months, tried their hardest to cheer me up, to remind me that life goes on, but I ignored them, and I stagnated in my own cesspool of self-pity and worthlessness. There has never been another time in my life during which I had been so self-centred and blind to the kindness of those who still remained by my side. I was actually surrounded by people who cared about me, but I was too wrapped up in the insignificant opinions of one girl to even notice.

That summer, though, everything changed. I needed it to. I changed my appearance dramatically, cutting and styling my hair in a way that was so different from anything I’d ever attempted before, and I bought new, thick-rimmed glasses that made me look like an entirely different person. I didn’t feel different, though. I went to China and made amazing friends and memories. It was truly the trip of a lifetime. I joined marching band, too, and even devoted my entire summer to learning a new instrument, and I became closer with many band geeks with whom I’d already been friendly, and met even more fantastic people. I got a job and started ballroom dancing! I remembered that I had a life to live, and that I didn’t need that one person to live it – I’d survived the first thirteen years of my life without her, after all. Grades, self-esteem, and social vitality all rose from the deepest depths, when I never thought they could.

I guess what I’m trying to say is that 2007 was not as awful a year as I’ve always remembered it to be. Instead, I learned how to fight for my self-worth, how to adapt, and that I didn’t need people who were going to hurt and belittle me in my life. Three of my best friendships, Dan, Jesson, and Andrew, were all kindled during that heart-wrenching year, and it is truly a blessing and an honour to be able to have them in my life, as cheesey as that may sound. Perhaps, if the dreadful things that passed in those early months of the year hadn’t, I would never have created these three strong, life-saving bonds. And I don't hate her. Maybe I need to be thankful. Maybe I need to say, “*********, thank you for breaking my heart, because, in your attempt to hurt, confuse, belittle, and destroy me, I learned some things about myself. I learned that I have power beyond your control, and I learned how to love other people and myself, and I learned that I can survive. And that is the best gift you ever have – or ever could have – given me. Thank you.”

I know that it’s a cheesey song, but it really is a confidence booster for me when these little self-esteem nightmares, rooted in this incident, start to set in. I always remember Gloria Gaynor’s immortal I Will Survive, sung with all the gutsy confidence in the world.

First I was afraid, I was petrified / Kept thinking I could never live without you by my side / But I spent so many nights thinking how you did me wrong / and I grew strong, and I learned how to carry on.

It took all the strength I had not to fall apart / kept trying hard to mend the pieces of my broken heart / and I spent oh so many nights just feeling sorry for myself / I used to cry, but now I hold my head up high / and you see me, somebody new / I'm not that chained up little person, still in love with you

Go on now go, walk out the door / just turn around now, 'cause you're not welcome anymore / weren't you the one who tried to hurt me with goodbye / you think I'd crumble, you think I'd lay down and die / Oh no, not I / I will survive/ as long as i know how to love I know I’ll stay alive / I've got all my life to live / I've got all my love to give / And I'll survive, I will survive.

But it is 2010 now. They say that it takes at least ten years for historians to really start being able to analyse an event that would make history, because until that point, they are not removed enough from all that’s transpired. And yet, it’s almost surprising that it took me this long to really come to terms with what had happened then, which is now almost three years ago. I don’t know what to say about 2009, because it is still fresh in my memory – after all, it only ended three days ago. It was another year of great change: I turned eighteen, I dyed my hair purple, I started reading for fun consistently again, and I went to college. I made friends, I lost friends, and I grew closer to other friends, and I stopped having trouble being one hundred percent, completely me.

As for my future, I can’t say. My hopes are that I remain close with the people I’ve met this year and the people whom I’ve had to leave in this last year. I want to be able to be a best friend again. I want to continue to record my life in writing and in photographs, and I want to continue to educate myself on anything and everything. I finally feel like I have a fair balance, for the most part, and I want to keep that, and make it stronger. Those are all my hopes; of course, there are little things, like get good grades, etc., but these are the things that I consider the most important because they have been a part of my life, a part of me, in the past, and they really feel right, so I need to work hard to keep them a part of me in the future.

I hope the new year brings you peace of mind, and that you can resolve the be optimistic and try to salvage any bad situation fate may throw your way. Take it from someone who has been there, it’s better that way.

Uncle Yo, Learning Express, enV-ous

**All links open in a new window, click on pictures to enlarge, etc**


First of all, I'd just like to call attention to my first post. I finally embedded a video from the cosplay picnic that I meant to include earlier but forgot. It's nothing special, don't expect it to make your day... I just wanted to let you know it was there.

Second, this post is dedicated to Ying because I miss her so much and she's missing so much [lol].

So let's get started, shall we?

My Saturday morning and afternoon was uneventful, mostly because I was asleep all day. All that to-do with drawing on Dan's back and watching Hostel: Part II really wiped me out. Also, I'm a lazy fatass. So when I finally showered and decided to leave the house, it was three-ish. We were having a block party! It was fun and I got to talk to Ying's little brother [who doesn't remember me =( oh well, I didn't expect him to, haha, but her dad did and he said hi to me before I even realised who he was (weird seeing people out of context, i.e. Ying's dad without Ying)].

Around 4:30 I went to pick up Viggi, but that took a lot longer than it should have. First, getting into my car, I realised I'd forgotten my glasses - hold up number one. Then, when I drove down to the end of the street, I realised that they blocked the street off with cones, so I had to park, get out, move the cones, drive four feet, park, run back, replace the cones, and continue driving. Then there was usual Saturday S. Liv. Ave. traffic. And then, up by McClellan, I saw the adorable Jenny Wang [from band!] and we chatted for a while, during which I was stopped illegally, blocking a driveway, halfway in the road, no flashers, talking to a girl three years my junior who is standing in the street... hmm... so naturally, when the cop drove up behind me I cut off our conversation with an, "Oh shit," and a "Goodbye!" and drove away. So I picked up the Vigg, and we headed back to my house. After waiting a few minutes for Mum to get ready, we were OFF TO NYC!!

The journey there was fun. We listened to the Watchmen soundtrack, which, if any of you have ever had the extreme pleasure of riding in my car while listening to this album, you should know, include a fairly epic moment at the end of the disc. That moment, of course, is blasting Wagner's The Ride of the Valkyries at max volume and rolling down all the windows. We got to do it at a tollbooth! Awesome! We also listened to some Sinatra while trying to find a parking spot.

However, in NYC, we got held up by a GIANT BIKER PARADE WITH A POLICE ESCORT. Not even joking, we were there for like fifteen minutes just waiting to turn left. Vigg estimated a good 3 miles of bikers. Check out these photos:


The venue itself was in a basement, under some other store or restaurant. The place was called Drom, and the photos on the website made it look a lot bigger than it really was. Not a problem though. The food is really cheap, but kind of strange in taste. I don't know. We got a fantastic table front and centre - okay there was one table between us and the stage, but it was still right there and perfect. And better than standing. The pink-haired rock star [or something? you can find him in some of my photos of the cosplay picnic! he's the guy dressed as Shu from Gravitation] opened for Uncle Yo, and he was alright. He seemed nervous and his special effect video thing didn't work [:(]. Suddenly, Uncle Yo appeared behind him and everyone was very happy [and relieved, eh].

Here's a photo of the menu, of Vigg, and of both comedians together on stage:


UNCLE YO WAS GREAT. Let me just say that. A lot of things made this performance awesome. This was a non-con performance, so he had liberty to speak about non-anime / non-gaming things. Of course, it was mostly geek things, but still, when he wanted to talk about his life in the restaurant business, or gripe about New Yorkers with strollers, he could. It didn't seem out of place. Second, he knew his jokes better. At AnimeNEXT, I got the feeling that he'd written many of them quite recently. This time, he seemed much more confident, and though he kept checking his paper, it didn't hinder anything. Third, he did use some of his older material, but he used the good ones - like the Safety Sanity Box!! Ah!! - and didn't rely on as many old jokes as other times. This 'review' style thing makes me sound like an unsympathetic 'ho, but, well I'm sorry >_<;; My point is, he was fantastic. I don't remember many jokes because, well my brain is useless for that sort of thing. Some good ones, however, included his Tetris / Birds & Bees thing, but using the mic stand to demonstrate, and his shock at what one might find in a girls' [home] bathroom - "This is the one that makes her hair smell nice! And this is the one that makes her skin feel so soft! OH! Where's the one that makes her go CRAZY once a month!?!?" [general lolz] "I'm going to THROW IT INTO THE SUN." Standing ovation. Oh, also, he had more time than at ANext. I did, however, miss the singing =(

Enjoy some photos of the performance [they're blurry because "not blinding the comedian" was one of the rules]. He heard music, so he danced, he got a plastic bag on his head, I discovered he has a lot of blurry body parts, but mostly I just like his funny faces and poses. He was also mad about getting upstaged by a woman with a dog on her belly, and he spoke about his hopes for the apocalypse [if you're wondering, he hopes there will be zombies]. And at the end, some other guy put a weird blue hat on his head and [I don't get the reference] Uncle Yo just says, "Oh my God it's from Geass." Here you go, enjoy!


After the show was over, I got to speak to him very briefly and, yeah you guessed it, get another picture to add to my collection. I've got three now. In your face, Ying ;D Vigg wouldn't be in it though. And, I forgot to mention, I brought the Cube along! Sorry guys, I tried to get some action shots, but it just didn't work out. But when I brought the Cube with me to speak with Uncle Yo, his face lit up and he shouted, "CUBE!" and I laughed. Hence, photo. [Well this sucks - I really thought the "In your face, Ying," bit was the perfect ending to this part of the entry, but it doesn't fit anywhere besides where it already is, so now you get this awkward aside instead.]


Oh, a funny little anecdote. As we were leaving, Mum noticed a basket as Vigg and I were half way out the door. She turns back to get a mint, and is greatly surprised when she realised the basket is not full of mints. It's full of condoms. Yup.



So today was a totally new day.

It was my last day working at The Learning Express. And it was busy. WTH? It's never that busy on a Sunday, but I was on my feet for hours straight. Charlie came to visit! As a result, I never got to finish my book, but eh, Charlie > Dorian Gray. I also discovered that the breaking part of my phone is now the broken part of my phone. Ex-phone. I gave up, couldn't last that one more week... I bought an enV Touch. I'm too used to the enV, so the keyboard is a little awkward, but that's the same reason why I absolutely couldn't imagine getting a 'normal' phone. Eh. I'm happy, but I don't think this warrants a photo. Oh yeah! You'll be glad to know that I got a case for this one. Especially after how the last one turned out -____-;; Other than that, I had dinner, did my laundry, read some manga, and did this. My poor dog, Tilly, she's getting so old. She was so excited over the prospect of food that she completely misjudged the edge of the porch! She fell off three times, but luckily she's okay. I don't want her to be old :( Oh, also, I got that unlimited texting rumour cleared up. I do have unlimited texting, so please, text away!! ;D

Dancing, Bowling, Stoners, Funny People, and Geeky Plushies

"And now, a nice little song for those with metaphorical toes!" -Pa Grape, Veggie Tales
**All links open in a new window, click on pictures to enlarge, etc**


Well, here's my weekly stalker report. Or something. I've been thinking what to write, but I didn't think anything was eventful enough. Now that I've written it all, though, I realise it was a lot more than I thought. So here's my week from Thursday to this moment. [[Happy Will?? ;D]]



When I showed up for my dance lesson on Thursday, Victor told me that another kid from my school started taking lessons, and he asked me whether or not I knew a "Noah." Totally shocked, I cried "Mink!?" and he explained how this kid and his girlfriend ["Phoebe?!" "Yeah! Wow you really know them?" "Yeah they're my friends..."] wanted to learn to tango. Impressive. He told Francine that I was friends with them, and she insisted that I come in for the 10:45 class on Saturday morning so that I could see them when they came to their 11:30 lesson. Fine Francine... I'll wake up early for you~ lol. That night, I went bowling with Bryan, Arianna, Ben Leung, Ava, and Maria [who I'd met at the mall!], even though I'd already accepted an invitation to go the next day with Pascal. I won the second game - 131, and the only person to break 100 - and then we went to McDonald's where we talked to some porn-selling stoners from Georgia. Eh.


Friday was a lot of fun. I managed to wake up at noon [lol] and shower before eating a bowl of Crispix, watching Jeopardy!, and picking up Jesson and Dan to go to Pascal's house. There, we waited around for Kat and her friend Ariella to show up an hour and a half later, at which point we all went to the bowling alley. Pascal insisted that we park in the cinema lot and walk over to the bowling alley to avoid the U-turn higher up Rt. 10, but of course, as soon as we parked and got out of the cars, it began to rain. We played a game and a half - I won! well, I was winning until Jesson got a turkey [XXX] in the last two frames -_-;; and I tied with Eric for second - before we had to bring Eric home for his concert. Before we left, I made Eric win me a Pokémon doll from a claw machine in the alley. Eighteen years old, going to college in less than a month, and makes her friends win her plushie Turtwigs....




We went to Wendy's and got various snacks, dropped Eric off, and went back to Pascal's house. We had a silly-string fight there, and then Oli showed up and Kat had to leave. We wanted to see Funny People but went to the mall instead.


Shortly after all that, though, I had to go to a dance practise party. That was a lot of fun and I got in a lot of good dancing. At home, it was early to sleep because I had to wake up early at Francine's request!


Saturday morning, 10 am rolled by way early! But I showered, dressed, and got to dance without incident. I attended a Bronze II swing class taught by my own teacher, so it wasn't a wasted experience. When I got out of the class, I saw Phoebe and Noah sitting on a bench and I hit Phoebe on the head. She freaked out seeing me there and I explained that I'd been taking lessons there for almost two years. When their lesson began, Victor and I danced a demo tango. My apparent "skill" surprised Phoebe so much that she even began crying. Then I went home and did various shopping around with Mum, including looking at laptops at Best Buy and buying almost every toiletry ever for college [already!? ack!] from Harmon's. Except soap. That night, we saw The Tempest [Shakespeare] which was fantastic. Really, it was very incredible! After that, though, it was another early night.



Today [Sunday] was a pretty epic day, weather-wise. When my alarm sounded this morning, I looked up through the small part between my two curtains and past my window, and I almost fell back asleep, the sky was so dark. Rainy days are the hardest to wake up for because you see the black sky and nothing motivates you to leave the bed. Well I finally dragged myself out of bed and over to work. We had a pretty slow day. It wasn't as busy in the morning as usual, except very early [like before 11:30]. I got a lot of time to sit and read my book, The Picture of Dorian Gray by Oscar Wilde. [I read over 50 pages in work alone today!] At one point, I looked up from where I was seated on the floor, hearing the wind roaring past our building, and I saw the rain falling quite slantedly and I could hear thunder sounding for at least twice as long as what we're used to hearing. I stood up and watched awnings across the street flying every which way, the rain coming down sideways, and worried drivers squinting out of their cars with their wipers on max. It was actually a little frightening. A firetruck also barreled through. After, when I went back to my book, I noticed, out of the corner of my eye, a few flashes of lightning. But almost as fast as this tempest had come on, it subsided and I could see the sun shining weekly through.


As for customers! There was a cute little boy who kept staring at me when his mother was trying to talk to him. There was an older boy learning to spend his own money [and going over his $35 gift card, begging his mother for the extra $4.55]. There was a flamboyant gay [appearing] guy and a tough girl I assumed to be his sister. He was dressed in a highlighter yellow sweater and skinny jeans. I taught him how to put Jibbitz in Crocs - the idea seemed so novel to him, it was quite amusing. He bought two mini tape measures. There was also a woman with a beautiful French accent - the sort that Marion Cotillard has. I couldn't help her find her puzzle box thing [actually, I had no idea what she was talking about, and it wasn't the language barrier].


At the end of the day, I grabbed my paycheck [yes!] and met my mother at CVS where we bought soap and some cow shaped paper clips.




Well I received a frantic text from Viggi, who was BORED OUT OF HIS MIND, like I've been lately. So we resolved to see Funny People at 7:30 with David Li. I put some of Mum's fresh-baked chocolate chip cookies into a baggie and grabbed some potato chips and cash and headed to pick them up. When I saw Vigg, he said, "Here's the part of your graduation present that was in the mail!" I was so shocked when he handed me a COMPANION CUBE PLUSHIE!!! *cuddle* :3 I'd really wanted one, and he made an empty-sounding promise to get me one, but that was a long time ago, before I'd even played Portal. I was super excited and equally as touched. After a quick hug and many thanks, we headed to pick up David Li and then to the cinema.




At the cinema, we found Dolapo and Melanie and Federman! we chatted for a while but didn't end up sitting with them. The movie was decent. The plot was okay, but parts seemed quite superfluous, but the jokes were great. I mean, look at the title. Some were a little out there. Somehow, after the movie, we found the other trio again and waved at Steve Cruz. And some how, I ended up driving Federman home. The trip was pretty fun, you know, for a car ride [lol]. Then I drove Vigg and David home, complete with some shifting into Neutral and searching for the cookies that David lost somewhere in the car. After all that, though, I pretty much just came home and did nothing besides finish up to Chapter 50 in Hana Kimi.



The duo, together, and the Cube playing its favourite 360 game!