Vancouver day tour! XD

After getting Lisa's phone call and a quick shower, I set out for the skytrain station with excitement and the prospect of getting some books from the Downtown library. The day started out well, with amiable sunshine and a warm breeze, and we quickly finished Lisa's mission #1 around Main. I never thought I would see so many black-haired people walking on the street outside China Town. They looked so young. I wondered how they perceived us? XP

Next stop is Waterfront, where we had lunch at a nice little Japanese restaurant Matsu near the famed steam clock. The clock rings every 15 min with the very familiar bell tune from Taiwanese elementary school. Nice food. Nice view. Nice bell.

We set out with a full stomach and visited Lisa's friend living in one of those grand townhouse/apartment combo places. It's right next to the Coal Harbour, so very nice view of the inner bay. One of the boats in the parking lot was most cute, designed like a small cozy green cottage, and another one had an owl on the post.

Then came our longest walk of the day as we proceeded to China Town. After completing Lisa's mission #2, we had a bowl of hot tofu pudding. It's been a long time since I had any! Though, we would had have some ice cream when we were in Downtown if the circumstance had permitted it. Zannen. :(

And of course, we were both excited about the final destination, the Downtown library! Incidentally, both of us headed straight to the manga section, and I soon wandered to the Japanese section. Unfortunately, there weren't any Animage or good ones. But I managed to find a few decent ones for the moment. The biggest surprise of the day was the Korean section. I never ventured there because I don't recognise a word of it, but I decided to see the manga selection there for the heck of it today. Guess what I found? 1 Saint Seiya, 2 Shiroi Senshi Yamato (!!), and a whole bunch of old school stuff! My final loot?

Genji Monogatari (Chinese)
Narutaru vol.1 (Chinese)
New Vampire Princess Miyu vol.3 (Chinese)
Doubutsu no Oisha-san vol.8 (Japanese)
Gundam Wing vol.1 & 3 (Japanese)
Super Robot War Final Strategy Guide (Japanese)
Saint Seiya vol.15 (Korean)
Shiroi Senshi Yamato vol.2 & 3 (Korean)

Of course, we had very pleasant and engaging conversation throughout the day and greatly enjoyed the day. We talked about everything from our school life in Taiwan, high school life here, friends, work, hobbies, habits, future, etc. It's also very nice of Lisa to pay for the transit fare and the lunch. Must get her something special for her birthday coming up next week!

When it comes to comedy, I have to hand it to Full Metal Panic Fumoffu.

Full Metal Panic is already funny enough, but Fumoffu, without the grimmer line of Sousuke's duel with Gauron and the capture of the whisper's ability, is much much much much more superior in laughs.

And I had to repeat the scene several times today when Kazama went into SEED mode. ~>▽<~

I now declare Full Metal Panic Fumoffu the funniest anime of all time!! XD

吁~ slacking off and then trying to catch up on over a week of posts is not fun. But I did it. T__T

Brother is coming back from the States after almost one month of absence. Frankly, I don't miss him at all, except when I need to take out the garbage and vacuum the house. I suppose he'll immediately start an argument about the usage of the new computer system once he learns of it.

New item added to the DVD To Buy list: Wolf's Rain

Ohh, hayai ne, onii-san! $1900 after tax, huh? Sounds good! You've done your part, and I'll do mine to persuade Mum.

It's decided! The new system (name pending) will join Shao-Hei (Little Black) shortly!

Pentium 4 2.8Ghz
512MB DDR
120G HD, 8mb cache
ATI Radeon 9200SE 128MB DDR 8XAGP
Creative 4.1 SBS-450 4 Speakers w/subwoofer
Windows XP Pro
17" Acer LCD


Tanoshimi dayo~^O^

Gate Keepers 完食。

Ii series da. No dramatic or heart-wrenching scenes, but I couldn't help but 會心一笑 :)

Princess Nine 完食。

Nothing special at all, and the storyline turned into something like soap opera at one point. But the series is ok. Baseball has always been, after all, a source of my hot-blooded-ism. :P

But the automated recording from Shaw worried me. Yabari, I'm downloading too much, huh? (see? I said I can't afford to download everything and see how they turn out...) Sono tami ni, I dropped Kono Minikuku mo Utsukushii Sekai after 3 episodes and will drop Ragnarok after 3 episodes as well. We'll see what happens afterwards...

This is what being a student is all about. The 修羅場 of papers and assignments.

Stupid stupid stupid assignments. And seeing your submissions made me realise how childish and lacking mine was. -__-
Though I really would have taken a course in GPS if there was one. o__o

The long awaited farewell dinner with Tim!

Even though we don't talk or hang out very much, after all, he's been my cell leader for, what, five years now? I've always respected him greatly and admired his walk with the Holy Spirit. Sure, it's not a permanent separation, but I'll miss him. Who's there to chat about computers now? Oh well, maybe I'll meet him again in Vana'diel someday. XP

Having said the above, we haven't really felt the separation that's to take place in a few days. The 12 of us sure had a good time together and shared a few more laughs!

The cheesecake wasn't much to my liking, but the hot water with lemon and honey was good. XP

U...Uso deshou? Why is my throat hurting when I swallow? Why is my head hurting by itself now and then? Why do my eyes feel so heavy? Masaka.... Kaze?! >__<

And I was just thinking how I've been the only healthy one in the whole department and hadn't called in sick... :(

Very interesting message. Useful, too. Though I'm not planning to walk down that path, I'm sure the series will come in handy.

3 myths about love:
1) Love conquers all
- love alone isn't enough; "If I keep loving him/her more, it's ok if he/she drinks"
2) Love at first sight
- it's just excitement; no connection and knowing at all, usually outward attraction
3)....... wasuredeta :P

8 scenarios where the relationship would never work out:
1) When you love your partner more
- no balance and always 'chasing' the other side
2) When you idolise your partner or mentor
- difference in attitudes (boss vs. secretary, etc.)
3) When you are on a rescue mission
- sympathy isn't the same as love; you're always treating the partner as the weaker
4) When you are attracted by physical/outer aspects
- superficial, doesn't hold once the partner changes outwardly
5) When you love the potential of your partner
- you need to be able to love the partner as of now, not treating the partner as a project
6) When it happens during a short yet exciting period
- meet someone during a trip, etc.; no real connection and knowing, lose feeling when parted
7) When you choose your partner to be rebellious
- it's out of spite, not love; relationship needs to be blessed by family of both sides
8) When you and your partner are available

Huh, who would have thought the place to be more troublesome than ours.

Due to many reasons and demands, the lawn mower was pushed all the way to the "Little House" to clean up the grassy jungle. One could never have guessed the state of the backyard by looking at the front lawn. It's a totally different world. The front was annoying because of the extremely weird shape and the extra portion that extended to the mailbox and the poll, but the back was much worse despite its simple rectangular shape.

After much toil and trouble, the wild jungle was reduced to a manageable mini prairie. Good enough. Ato wa tanomu yoroshiku ne, new owner.

Left Behind 完食。

As expected, the novel version is indeed better and a lot more detailed than the movie version, though being able to see it makes an impact as well. I'm still seeing Buck and Nicolae as portrayed in the film. The Left Behind series definitely captures some essentials of the End Time, and I was constantly asking the question while reading: Will I be left behind when Jesus come for His people? Will you be left behind?

I sincerely hope and pray that the answer to my question is "No, for I will be taken to my heavenly home and be with Him and all my friends and families."

Time to get the second book...

Collab 報告終於交出去了! （°∀°）
歷經汗與血及好幾個無眠夜 （つД`）
...再三交代要把顏色改回黑色、段落要排版、要做單字跟文法檢查、你怎麼都沒做啊～～～～～(*｀Д´)╯

剛才查了一下 schedule、這科還有一個 collab 要做... ＿|￣|O

It's official now, I'm gonna get a new computer within a few months.

I won't deny that some of the driving factors include FF XI, anime, MP3, but it's also for legitimate reasons such as school and diverting usage from Mum and Jugi, especially seeing how I'll have to run the heavy software within six months, and we're ALWAYS fighting over who gets to use the computer.

So here's the specs I'm thinking of right now:
Pentium 4 2.5Ghz+ or AMD Athlon 3000+
512 MB DDR RAM
120 GB HD
CD-RW
Windows XP Pro
128 MB+ video card
3-piece speakers w/ subwoofer
decent sound card

Main applications will be:
Mozilla & Firefox
Windows Media Player 6.4
FF XI (XP)
FirstClass
ArcView
ArcInfo
Access
Word
Winamp
ICQ
Xnews
emulators (GBA, SNES)

Now if the next staff shopping day can just come around sooner...

Rurounin Kenshin yomu kanryo. Gotta admit, I wasn't too keen at first and wasn't buying all the hype the series was getting, but after finishing the whole thing, I gotta say I was impressed. No, I'm still not a fan of the series, but I did find quite a few chapters worthy of saving, namely the ones where Yahiko fought against the whale guy to protect the town, and the last few chapters depicting the afterwards for the characters. I also like the ink paintings. Very full of feelings.

Overall, RK is a nice series. I probably wouldn't want to read it through again in a few years though.

Heh, how long has it been since I last worked on any paper? Two years? Can't say I miss those time, but it seems I still like to play around with words, after all.

Anyway, finally got that letter to students posted. We'll see what the others think of it. We'll also have to synch the content of the two letters as well. They're not consistent at all right now. Sore wa komarun deshou? ^__^;;

On another note, Gate Keepers isn't bad at all. Very interesting and nicely done for a plot line that's been used countless of times. I look forward to its development.

The guys on Ha-dono's board seem to detest Tenjou Tenge, and I don't blame them. I stopped reading the manga after a few chapters myself. As expected, the anime version is full of fan service and more fan service. If it's not for the seiyuu cast, I wouldn't even grab the 1st episode. The OP, however, is *very* nice. I really like it. Just like how I liked Himikoden's OP. I suppose I'll watch a few more episodes before deciding whether to chuck it into the disco pile.

Even though I went to bed at around 2am, woke up at 7am, started working at 8am, got home at around 5pm, and I was tired as anything, I decided to go to the prayer meeting.

On one hand, I was throwing away everything because of the exhaustion, on the other, I was hoping to get recharged at the prayer meet. And I did.

I'm glad I went. I miss the time immensely. Yabari, inori no jikan ga saigo ne. :)

你們是想怎麼樣?? =___=###

都已經在 outline 裡寫說不同等級的差別、你還問要怎麼加入 quasi-quantitative 分析??

所以我討厭 group project... -__-

How could I be this tired?

True, I did stay up last night to discuss the collab until quarter to 1am, went to bed at around 2:45am, got up at 7am, started working at 8am, had an absolutely insanely crazy morning and throughout the whole shift, got home at around 4:45pm, cleaned a few files off the hard drive, tried to catch up on the reading.....

...I guess I do have a reason to be tired. Sorry, guys. I simply can't make it tonight. I'll definitely make up the lost time and effort tomorrow!! m(__)m

Oh, the long missed Japanese food at Tokachi!

The combo thing wasn't as fulfilling and satisfying as the lunch bento, but it was better than none. What I missed the most, though, was the green tea ice cream. Yabari, are umaizo! ^Q^

So this is the so-called Monday Syndrome, huh? Never thought I'd experience it.
Tsukareta na...

I take my words back. It's not like the End of Evangelion. It's worse. -__-###
Though Hoshimaru is still very very very cute. XD

Ohhhhh! Is that "Gundam SEED" I see there? They finally made a separate category for it? Sweet! Now I can really set my mind into writing SEED fanfics. XP

I also have more to read now! Nice! Though, it'll take me even longer to get back on track with the Slayers fanfics. I intend to finish the SEED ones while it's still small and manageable. Over a month away from ff.net is NOT a good idea, I've come to realise. Oh well. *goes off to read Gundam SEED fanfics*

EDIT: Whoa, they have "Samurai Deeper Kyo", "Full Metal Alchemist", "Peacemaker Kurogane" (not that I'm gonna read them), "Last Exile" (same with this), "Twelve Kingdoms" (!) now as well? I just see a huge chunk of my time gone in the near future...

Spring cleaning of New Type day 1

Burnt out 3 CDs worth of MP3 and watched all the not-burning-worthy episodes. New Type now stands a little above the 2G mark. If all goes well, I should be able to get it to around 4G by the end of the weekend.

PS. Athrun is most cute in the drama HARO. Ka-Wa-Ii~XD Same in Kluzt: Senpai~XP

PS2. Haven't watched the new series yet, but Kuwashima Houko seems to play a role in many of them. Lucky~:D

*twitch* ...What's with all the singing and idol thing??

While trying to free up some space, I came across a Nadesico episode where an idol contest for a new captain is held (Oh, so that's where those songs I heard before come from). Then I watched an episode of Blue Seed where Momiji is entered into an idol contest. Then I tried Full Moon wo Sagashite, which is about a 12-year-old girl with one year to live wanting to become a singer (I totally hate myco's acting, btw. She has a nice deep voice for singing, but it's completely unsuitable for a little girl. Plus, her acting is plain and unexciting. -__-##)

Kidou Senkan Nadesico is really good, though. The plot is different from the manga (which came after the anime anyway?) and is full of drama. The integration between Nadesico and Gekiganger is great, and the whole thing is funny as anything~ A youthful hot-blooded series! I'm glad I got to watch it. ^__^

On another note, Samurai Deeper Kyo is good, too. I especially like the music, the camera angles, the flow of actions, and, of course, the cast. The biggest failure, however, is that even though it has nice character design and art, the proportion of people is just way off most of the time! -__-# I'm not even half way though, so we'll see how the story turns out (I heard that Kyoshiro prevails in the end. 'tis a shame. I like Kyo x Yuya better XP).

Now I've really done it.

I'm not an impulsive buyer because I am poor 99% of the time. So what shall I call it this time? My bank account is mourning its lost, my mind and logic are struggling, but my heart is singing.

Final Fantasy XI, the only computer game I've ever planned to buy, now sits on the desk shelf with GPM DVDs, Mononoke Hime DVD, The Three Musketeers, and The Divine Comedy.

Now all that's left is to get a graphic card (gotta go look up the card model again), apply for a Master Card ($12.95US/month for 1 char, $13.95 for 2), clean up the disk space (6 out of 20G required... a big chunk, I'd say), read up on the game, and the installation.

My heart is going doki doki, but I don't know when I'll actually get to see the real action. Ah, all the complications~

It's official now. New Type is out of space and stands at 0 kb. -____-

Why is it that people are posting all these interesting looking series now?? These waves are just like those waves of customers. You can have half an hour go by without talking to one single customer, and you can be overwhelmed by several in the same minute!

Anyway, time to do another spring cleaning. Gotta burn those OPs & EDs out. Gotta watch those episodes. Gotta read those manga. Gotta finish those roms. Gotta burn those pictures out. Gotta...

Yabari, classics are made classics for a reason.

Even though the plot doesn't hold up very much now, even though a lot of the scenes still look outdated, even though the design are clearly from that time, even though I've watched it many times and know what's going to happen next, even though...

But Star Wars Trilogy live up its name after all those years. 1977. I wasn't even born then.

Granted, I'm not very much a Star Wars fan. The three movies and one novel are all I have under my belt. For some unexplainable reason, I didn't feel like watching Episode I at all. (Was there an Episode II as well?) Somewhere deep down, I felt that the new movie wouldn't do the original justice. It'd just be another Sci-fi movie with lots of great effects that carries the name. I'm quite the conservative, as you can see.

My thought turned to Gundam. I've been hearing the name for ages, but I never got the chance to see it or the many flavours of it. SD Gundam models and manga were all that I knew.

Came 2000, Gundam Wing entered my life. I was so thrilled to finally be able to get a glimpse of this great franchise that I immediately became a fan. Of course, as I slowly got more familiar with anime, I realised that Wing is AU and is nothing like the original or the other ones. To me, Wing didn't deliver enough of its promises. Nonetheless, I was happy to have watched it.

Then Gundam SEED entered the picture. It's said to be 'the First Gundam of the 21st century', and I fell for it instantly. The plot, the characters, the relationship between people, the interactions, the emotions, the... (and the cast, which is one of the best around)! Everything draws me in more, and I started posting on Gundam.com and discussing SEED with other people. I was sad to find out that most old timers see SEED as a rip-off and kiddy version of the original Gundam, and that most of them don't like SEED at all.

Strange, isn't it? There seems to be an odd relationship between the classics and their offspring, at least from my POV. Fans of the classics love and worship it, and the new ones are deemed inferior than the original. Fans of the new ones see the original as outdated and, in many cases, boring.

It could be a change of target audience, as the new series are typically created to recruit new blood to the aging fan base. It could just be the way our memory serves us, making what we held dear even more special. It could be.....

Whatever the reason, one thing is for sure, though. Classics or not, effects or not, bishounen or not, as long as the plot and the characters can move me, I'll be a fan. It was like this with Wing, it is like this with SEED, it is like this with many other great series, and it shall always be like this.

Heh, this has somehow become yet another disorganised post, hasn't it? *shrug* All I wanted to say is that I respect the classics and do find some of them to be great (Saint Seiya comes to mind), and enjoy the new ones for their fresh ideas and ways of execution. (I'm not even making sense to myself now. -__-)

Oh, and I still intend to watch the original Gundam and all the other Gundam series, UC and AU. I don't care if some people say they're ugly. Bad art isn't enough to deter me. XP

え？！あの人たちは本物？！

真田幸村、徳川秀忠(紅虎)、猿飛佐助、霧隠才蔵、穴山小助、出雲の阿国、織田信長
->「SAMURAI DEEPER KYO」から
沖田総司、土方歳三、山崎烝、近藤勇、山南敬助、永倉新八、原田左之助、藤堂平助、斉藤一、坂本竜馬
->「PEACE MAKER 鐵」と「るろうに剣心」

面白いね、日本の歴史は！

なるたる 第 7-8 話

なにこれ？まるで THE END OF EVANGLION みたい。-__-

しかし、星丸はすごくすごくカ・ワ・イ・イよ～～～XD

でも、ちょっとわかる、これからのストーリは。

Peace Maker Kurogane ep.24

I stopped watching it at ep.12 and decided to pick the last episode up to see if it's as promising as the OP..... I missed the real fight, didn't I? ＿|￣|O

Though, I can't not admit that it's a beautifully drawn series. Neko-kun was right. Since it's the last episode that wraps everything up, I was able to focus more on the art, flow, pace, etc. Action manten! Sasuga GONZO! I was almost tempted to save the episode just for these. I suppose I'll be getting the missing episodes when I free up enough space.

Ep.24 is basically a summary of the aftermath of the climax raid. Viewing of previous episodes not required. It'd definitely help with more knowledge of the happenings, however.

First lawn mow of the season!

Man, I didn't realise that the whole backyard lawn has been taken over by the moss army corps. It's starting to look like the forest floor, minus the trees and ferns and stuff. Gotta start some massacre, I suppose. The thick mat of moss is keeping the whole place moist, making it difficult for me to mow. *twitch*

Finally got my car washed!

But it was rather disastrous. To start it off, the nuzzle wasn't working so I had to use my finger instead. Then the water didn't come out properly; apparently the hose was clogged somewhere. And did I say the water was COLD? No, make it FREEZING. It's got to a point where I was worrying whether it was sufficient to rinse off the liquid car wash properly. The worst of it all? I missed two spots. Right on the engine cover. It's so obvious ~>__<~

And last but not least, I crashed Mozilla in the evening. It's not Mozilla's fault, though. I simply ran out of disk space (< 5MB) in the middle of setting up an email account with Mozilla Mail. Everything worked fine after some frenzy hunting (to search for things I could delete) and a reboot. Yokatta desu.

At least the day ended well.

Uwah, I missed the date! I meant to challenge myself to post something everyday starting from April, but I'm failing on the very first day. How resolved am I? -__-

This past week's been hectic. I have no idea why, but I just seem to have very little time to do whatever, even though I only work three days a week now. Hopefully, I'll be able to sort out a schedule and free up more time. I really DO need to study, after all.

Man, this post is just as disorganised as my current life... That should change in the future, I hope!

I've been eating pasta whenever I eat out lately. That baked shrimp and feta penne was all right, a bit on the salty side, though, especially near the bottom.

Now that I think of it, I've been eating irregularly and rather badly ever since I worked. The McDonald's consumption rate is even reaching a dangerous level (can you say McChicken?? -__-*). I'll have to come up with a battle plan to counter this soon, or I'll surely die early like Andy said...

Anyhow~ Time to go back to the translation. I'm almost there! Ganbatte, sanopup!! Fight! Oh! (I guess I'm lacking sleep...)

Hm, I knew there's a feature on Blogger to change the date of entries. *smirk* Now we'll see if I can keep up with the posting. XP