Thursday, April 28, 2011

State of the Neko address: week 62

song+ Penny & Me
book+ nothing presently
quest+ cleaning the apartment
upper+ noticeable progress has been made
downer+ there's still plenty to go
attire+ shorts and a tee shirt
drink+ water


so i'm fully aware that this is much later than my usual Monday post, but stuff's been going on here, so i've been busy. xD

we've been continuing to work on the cleaning (and eventual rearranging) of our apartment all week, but Sunday i took a break while Kyu had to go up to the tattoo parlor and joined Moose for a trip to Jenni's, which was lots of fun. less fun was getting home (after Kyu) and discovering our door was stuck closed. over the last year it had been acting up with increasing frequency. the tumblers in the knob would stick. usually it'd stick inside the door and one Fonz-punch would pop it back out, but a few times it stuck in the out position and the door wouldn't close until we'd banged at it enough. Sunday it happened to stick in the out position after the door was closed, where we couldn't reach to bang at it. we spent a few minutes pointlessly wiggling at it before Kyu unlocked the sliding patio door and i did a surprisingly graceful leap (in my heels too) across the two foot wide four foot long puddle below that door into the apartment. after i was in Kyu spent the next hour or two trying to get the thing open, he even drafted Wolfie's help. we couldn't tell what the problem was so we put in an emergency maintenance request Monday morning and i let Kyu out through the patio door and stayed awake to wait for the guy to come fix it. it was finally fixed by 4:30 and he'd explained to me that the interior tumblers in our door were just crazy old, so he replaced the insidey bits and it works perfectly now for the first time possibly ever. yay working door!

Tuesday and Wednesday were (for me) a continuing effort in the apartment cleanup because Harley manages to undo progress every night. it's kinda three steps forward, one back thanks to her. Wednesday evening though Kyu discovered that this Friday the complex is fumigating so we'll need to be mostly done cleaning by then AND we'll have to clear out four specific closets. i also have to think of something i can do out of the apartment for four hours that day, and i'll have to take Harley with me. i'm not thrilled about having to take the dog somewhere to play for four hours, but i also don't wanna poison her, so i'm trying to think of SOMETHING.

while i'm trying to think of what i'll do i'm also trying desperately to get more cleaning done so we can comply with the written notice and avoid a fee. there's still a good bit to get done today and tonight, but i'm reasonably confident i can get it all. i'm gonna be putting my foot down tonight though and insisting Kyu help, there's just too much to do it entirely by myself. X.x there's some upstairs clutter i'll take care of today no problem, but the living room mess (even after all the progress we've already made) is definitely a two person job. after we've cleaned up more Kyu wants to move things around so he's been asking me to design a new floor plan. he works best when i can show him visually what i want without excessive gesturing and "you know, that thing there, and this one here and so on" isn't likely to get agreement. xD

Sunday, April 24, 2011

State of the Neko address: week 61, part 2

song+ the Harold Song- Kesha- Cannibal
book+ nothing presently
quest+ cleaning the apartment
upper+ noticeable progress has been made
downer+ there's still plenty to go
attire+ shorts and a teal tank
drink+ milk!


my ears are healing nicely. we bought more peroxide so cleaning the is going quicker too. Kyu's complaining that traffic to the shop is light, but things are going well for him when people do come in. he's starting to build a decent portfolio of his work.

we're finally working on clearing out the upstairs closet so we can put some of the random stuff from the living room in it and get things out of Harley's chewing range. most of the stuff we'll be moving up there is Kyu's multiple (incomplete) Warhammer armies for both Fantasy and 40K. he has a full Vampire list, an Ogre battalion, FOUR of the Skaven half of Island of Blood plus extras he bought before that (though he's selling it for parts for his 40k list), and he's decided to start up Tomb Kings. on the 40k end of things he's got 2700 points of Necrons, and oodles of Chaos Marines. it NEEDS to be moved somewhere other than lining the front hall or piled behind his easy chair. my 2/3 of a Dark Elf list (i ran out of money and other things are higher priority) fits in a single shoebox, so my stuff has been kept out of dog-chewing range and i haven't had to replace things like he has. when i do have money again though i'll be ordering a second Cauldron of Blood, another (Reaper) hydra (since i don't like the GW sculpt), and another four boxes of (non-command) witch elves. i need another sorceress too, but the only model available is the Supreme one and i already have one of them, i want a little variety. those purchases will put me squarely at 2500 points which is the standard Fantasy value we play at the comic shop.

anyhow, other than the hobby-ing tangent, we're making progress sorting our things out. i found my five still-packed boxes of books and put them in the same place. i found another three boxes of art supplies i KNEW i owned but couldn't remember where they were put. in those boxes i saw a few yards of various cottons, unused canvases and sealed paint tubes, some yarn from my aborted scarf-making attempt from like 5 years ago, some blank sketchbooks, and my 96-pack of crayons. i'm looking forward to using it all up. xD i've only managed to unearth two paint brushes in all this searching and that's frustrating me to no end. i KNOW i had a decent selection of brushes before. nothing professional quality, but some good moderate quality beginner/student brushes in the sizes i saw myself potentially needing and now they're nowhere to be seen at all. it's frustrating because paint brushes (good ones) can be kinda pricey and i don't want to buy them AGAIN when i can't figure out why i don't have the ones i used to love. ugh.

basically after the moving of things this weekend to make space, i'll be going through the boxes one at a time to sort out the contents. the craft supplies will be added to my current stores and organized so i can find things when i need them. the books will (finally) get unpacked and put in a book case. lots of old stuff will be thrown out, and other things will be sold or given away. i'm ready to own less stuff, so i'm planning to sell lots of my comics. i mean the single issues since the long boxes are just taking up space currently and i have most of it in trade format already. other stuff is just sitting around not being played with (or even looked at in some cases) and i'm ready to get rid of lots of it. i compulsively collect cute little things that are useless, and designed to lay around and get dusty.. i'm working on that though. i have three or four collection of figurines all around the 2x2x3inch range. i need a way to display them all without using the front edges of shelves filled with other things. my idea of maximizing my display space is having the 12inch statues (Cover Girls of the DC Universe) behind the 6inch ones (Women of the DCU), with the tiny ones as a front layer. it looks kinda chaotic though, since i have my CLAMP No Kiseki chess set, my FF chibi figurines, assorted Heroclix, Mario & Luigi vinyl figurines, and various Mini Mates (basically superhero lego people) in that tiny range of display height.. plus probably more that i've forgotten about too. all of that is leaving out that i have tons of action figures in the 6-9inch range in their boxes, or jumbled in a plastic bag in a closet upstairs not being displayed in any way. i love toys, and for a few years i could afford to buy whatever looked like fun, so i did. there's also some that were given to me by people that knew of my love of toys, i have a decent collection of Luigi figurines and Final Fantasy monster plushes, mostly given to me as gifts. i have a lot of stuff.. xD

Tuesday, April 19, 2011

State of the Neko address: week 61

song+ Hollywood- Michael Buble- Crazy Love
book+ Night Shadows/Night Smoke
quest+ finding my paintbrushes
upper+ just deciding on what do do has me feeling better
downer+ i'm sore from working out more lately
attire+ pants and a Supergirl tee
drink+ milk!


i've felt like painting lately, so the things i bought for projects a year ago when i still worked at the comic shop and i had money have been pulled from the closet and i'm deciding which one i wanna start with. my only problem with it now is i can only find the detail brushes i bought for painting my Warhammer models, so i'm gonna need to look more or go buy new brushes. i have a few ideas beyond the ones i sketched out a year ago for some mixed media projects that could come out awesomely if i approach them right.. we'll see what happens with them. xD

Saturday hanging out at the tattoo shop my ears were pierced to a larger gauge by Kyu since there was nothing else going on. xD from a standard 22 to a noticeably larger (but not grotesquely so) 14. they're healing fine so far, but since we have no peroxide (how? i swear we had it) i'm having to clean my ears with hot water, antibacterial soap, and q-tips. peroxide is way easier in case anyone wondered. they're a bit sensitive to pressure still, so i've been sleeping with creatively scrunched pillows so my head is supported without anything touching my ears. a few times i've rolled over and the jolt of pain has woken me, but it's nothing that lasts past the pressure itself.

not much in the way of progress has been made on the Puki clothing front. i go to start and i get distracted by how insanely CUTE little Chutzpah and Vanille are and nothing gets done except i wiggle their teeny tiny hands and feet and giggle like a lunatic. X.x eventually though progress will be made, i think i just have to get past the distracted-by-the-adorable phase of Puki ownership. xD i do have all kinds of plans for things to make, but the pattern-drafting is taking longer on such an absurdly tiny scale, so i know once i have that part done it'll be way easier to get stuff actually made. i have a feeling that anything i do sew at Puki scale will be done by hand. trying anything that tiny on a machine would be Beyond the Impossible difficulty-wise.

otherwise not much is up. i filed my first quarter state taxes. since there were no sales it was pretty simple. i hope to do better for the second quarter, but i'm not holding myself to it as an absolute end goal. having a name for my shop would help motivate me.. so if you're feeling better mom i'd love feedback on the ideas i sent you a few weeks ago. xD

this totally would have been a Monday post, but i didn't realize it was Monday yesterday. xD my bad.

Friday, April 15, 2011

State of the Neko address: week 60, part 2

song+ Breakeven- the Script- the Script
book+ nothing presently
quest+ figuring out details for Project 2012
upper+ this feels like the right thing to do
downer+ it's terrifying!
attire+ pajamas
drink+ milk


i'm unhappy, and i'm tired of being unhappy, so in talking to Kyu we've come up with a plan that will (hopefully) allow us to be happy- Project 2012. it's not a terribly complicated plan, or even a brilliant one, it's pretty much this: leave this place and start over somewhere new. we've given ourselves the rest of 2011 to save and figure out the details of where we'll go and how we'll support ourselves when we get there.

i love my family, both the one i was born into and the one i've found through shared experience, but i need space to breathe. i need to be somewhere that no one knows me, so no one will expect anything of me and i can learn on my own. going somewhere else that's still local won't work, the safety net of family will still be there. we need to go somewhere entirely different and see who we are independent of the circumstances that built us. i love it here in Texas, and i always have, but it's become more apparent that until i leave i'll not manage to shake the spectre that's followed me for 11 years. everything here serves as a reminder of the one experience that threw my entire life off the path i'd worked out for it. i feel shackled by affection, expectation, and memory. i need to get away from it all.

we narrowed down the search field of where to look for our own place rather democratically i think. i want to live where i can see or hear water when the mood strikes, Kyu wants out of Texas. i want the South since i hate to be cold, Kyu loathes the West coast arbitrarily and would prefer to avoid it. i need a certain amount of metropolitan noise, Kyu doesn't want the capital city stress level. basically we've more or less decided on something like coastal Georgia. Savannah or a similar area, most likely, whatever is available and has what we're looking for when the time comes to move.

this year we'll be saving every penny we can, and at the end looking for jobs in whichever city we decide on. we need to learn to drive for sure, since we can't exactly teleport all our things to another state with the powers of our minds. i'll be going through the boxes of possessions that have yet to be unpacked (a year and a half after moving), and getting rid of things we legitimately have no need for. there are some things that i'm holding onto for specific reasons, i don't need them yet but i will at some point so i'm keeping them. there's plenty though that i only held on to out of nostalgia, so getting rid of it could only be a good thing. there's a part of me that wonders if i'll find a decent comic shop after we move, and a good art store with friendly employees, or if i'll end up ordering whatever supplies i need online.

i'm nervous, borderline terrified of the possibility of such drastic change, but i need it. WE need it, me and Kyu, i'm certain it's what we're meant to be doing in fact. as terrified as i am thinking about it, it still feels like the right thing to be doing, so i know that it'll work out as it's meant to.

home for me has always been about people and affection more than any place. i want that to change, i want a place that's my own. i want to live somewhere that people walk in and can see my hand prints all over it. i want to walk inside and feel safe and whole, without calling out first to see if anyone else is there. i'm okay with renting in a city that feels right until we can find the building that feels right. i'm not ready to buy a house yet, and neither is Kyu, but i want to be. that means i need to find me, and i need to find the right city, then we can find the right house and make it the perfect Home. i'm ready to have one of those.

Tuesday, April 12, 2011

State of the Neko address: week 60

song+ Gasoline- Britney Spears- Femme Fatale
book+ DQ4 guide
quest+ making clothes for Vanille & Creme
upper+ my wrist is healing quickly
downer+ my legs and back are sore from dancing
attire+ pajamas
drink+ Sun Drop


i had a good post drafted yesterday, then my anti-virus decided to lock anything interactive on the internet and it took me forever to get things working again. X.x so instead: Tuesday post with mostly Monday content, since it was salvageable.

i've made incremental progress drafting Puki patterns. they're so small it's incredibly frustrating, so i keep walking away from it. i THINK i have a workable starting point for panties.. i'm working on a sundress now. there's a master list of ideas, so i'm building the blocks for those things off and on.

to keep from making myself crazy focusing on it, i've taken numerous breaks to do other things. i was gonna play Dragon Quest 8, but my PS2 stopped working AGAIN. it's frustrating enough that i started researching which PS3 models are backwards compatible. the answer? only three of the initial four types. which is lame, so i priced a used 60gb version on eBay and when i have 500 bucks to spare i may follow through. ugh. i hate that they took away backwards compatibility on the new models so they could be all "oh, just buy that again in our online store, then you can play it!" if i already own it, WHY would i want to pay for it again? for now i'm hoping Kyu can get the PS2 to work again so i can play.. he managed it last time. it won't recognize when i put a disc in, any disc at all. the spinny part isn't spinning, and the reading thingy is staying still. guh. stupid machine not working. it's only a year or so older than my Wii and that thing still works phenomenally.. of course Nintendo builds their things to survive apocalypse, you have to try to break a Nintendo.

it's just super frustrating. i really really wanna play DQ8. the next closest thing i have on a functional system would be Blue Dragon on the 360 and i'm not in the mood for the squeaky noises that accompany combat in that game. i want some classic Silent Protagonist adventure and monster slaughter with Invisible Armor and weapons that get replaced every time i hit a new town. xD there's a certain comfort in the classic aspects, and a recent delight in a 3D world holding it all. i love Dragon Quest as a series to an irrational degree, FAR more than mom hates it (which is quite a bit), playing any DQ game for me is like going home and getting a hug from long-lost family. i wanna play 8 because i recently beat 4, 5, 6, and 9 on my DS, and 8 is the only other one i have!

..except i totally started up another save file on DQ4 and spent close to 6 hours yesterday betting on monster death matches in the Endor casino to earn awesome armor for my fragile girly characters so they'd survive long enough to use their good skills. i can't bring myself to betting enough to earn the better weapons, but the armor seemed worth it since there's only a handful of things in the late-game that can beat it. whee! monster death match betting! xD especially with saving after a win and resetting to negate any losses. i remember dad using the monster arena's calculated odds to teach me about math, with the token payouts as multiplication lessons and even explaining the odds themselves and how to interpret them. i sat in his lap and helped choose his monsters when he played the original translation of the game. good times.

in any case, i need to get back to productivity today. Kyu wants me to work on cleaning up the apartment some, he specifically requested i focus on the kitchen. we'll see what i get done, i guess..

Sunday, April 10, 2011

State of the Neko address: week 59, part 2

song+ Seal It With A Kiss- Britney Spears- Femme Fatale
book+ X-23
quest+ making clothes for Vanille & Creme
upper+ Vanille is painted and adorable!
downer+ my wrist is a smidgen sensitive to pressure as it heals
attire+ skirt and a Wonder Woman tee
drink+ Dr Pepper


ah the elusive Sunday blog post, a skittish creature it's not often seen around these parts. xD this is pretty much just photos. Chutzpah has spent most of the last week with little Vanille, they're very good friends already.

okay then, i have Vanille pre-faceup and parts-painting
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comparing her kitty parts to her human parts. the grey keeps her from washing out with flash on, but i think i prefer the scale of her human hands and feet to the gloves and booties. it's not super obvious, but i made her kitty parts grey with silver tabby stripes scattered on them.
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the box Pukis ship in is SO cute! it's like a fairy tale storybook, and it opens to space for a two-puki sleepover.
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some of Chutzpah with the kitty ears.. mom, you managed to fluff her hair enough that it can overpower the magnets. xD
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this one great shot of the PHENOMENALLY awesome shoes i ordered for Eve. she can't wear them since her ankle hook snapped, as you can see in the photo. that flat part should be a loop for catching the S-hook for her leg elastic. they're awesome shoes though, i can't wait until her ankles are fixed. xD
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there's also the day's two reject shots. one has too much flash and one is too dark, i'm such a great photographer. xD the little ones spent a great day pestering Chloe. she's kneeling in the dark shot so they could fit in the frame together. she handled them remarkably well.
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otherwise not too much is happening. last night Kyu did the first half of my Wonder Woman logo tattoo. it's not ready to share yet, but it's gonna be fantastic when it's done. currently we're letting it heal since it's on my wrist and we're doing our best to avoid scarring. it turns out my wrist skin is more prone to bleeding than my foot, which would be problematic if we were less cautious.

i love the new Britney album. i just felt the need to announce it, i adore it. it's all dance music, and i've listened to it all week as i try to focus on more than the cute overload staring me down and get something done. after my first listen to it my review was "hallelujah, no sappy ballads to drag the whole thing down!" it's better (in my opinion) when an artist realizes what their strength is and they play to it. i like lots of different artists, but the ones i like most are the ones that are comfortable within their genre, whatever that happens to be.

for now i'm off to see if i can find any small Puki patterns to start building Vanille's (and Creme's too though Roro hasn't ordered him yet) wardrobe.i think i wanna start with frilly panties for her. tiny lacey ruffle-butt little girl panties. xD then i'll work on the rest.

Monday, April 4, 2011

State of the Neko address: week 59

song+ Till the World Ends- Britney Spears- Femme Fatale
book+ Mysterious anthology
quest+ making clothes for Vanille
upper+ Vanille is home!
downer+ the weather is too damp to finish her
attire+ pajamas! xD
drink+ milk (obviously)


today my darling Vanille made it home to me! i never got a shipping notice on her at all, the post lady just knocked on the door at 11 and asked me to sign the little slip. xD she is so so SO adorable! (i wanted to ass more SOs, but didn't out of courtesy for you, the readers) quite possibly the cutest thing in the history of EVER! xD no pictures yet, i keep taking them with my phone, but can't get those onto the computer. currently she's still blank, and all she has to wear are cast-off barbie clothes which are pretty huge on her, but i adore her already. the magnets that hold on her kitty parts are pretty strong and i'm pleased with that, my only issue is that the pigtails on her wig are separate pieces sewn on, and they happen to each be centered precisely over the magnets that need to hold her kitty ears on. this means that before i do her faceup and blushing (the weather's still too wet) I'll fix her hair properly and more than likely take some incomplete-but-adorable photos of her. i tried drafting this earlier when she first arrived and i was ecstatic and sleep deprived, but all that came out then was unintelligible gibberish. xD i'm doing substantially better this time.

let's see, what else happened since last Monday? i finished th first draft of the Rosette dress (in black pinstripes) and it's not sellable. i know where i went wrong with it though and the pattern pieces have been corrected. i haven't gotten to sewing the second draft just yet, but it'll happen soon. i emailed mom some of my ideas for shop names, but she hasn't gotten back to me just yet.. *nudge nudge* i understand though since she's been feeling lousy.

i've been going through the special features on everything i own while i work, and i'm almost out of things with interesting special features. xD my favorite things are obviously costuming features, but if all that's there is multiple commentaries i'll watch a movie with each of them droning on in the BG while i'm fussing with things. i've actually gotten to the point that i'm kinda out of features and i'm borrowing other people's movies, or working my way through TV shows i've seen enough times there's no need to actually watch the screen to get whats happening. xD

Saturday was girl day, and it was fun. Moose had to work at both her jobs, and mom was still pretty under-the-weather, so it was me Jenni and Bonnie, but we had fun. Jenni and i did come kid-wrangling for a while when Bonnie and Tyson were finishing up other things, but since Bonnie's kids are utterly delightful it was fun. there were board games, and movies and two small children informing me the only game on my phone "isn't very fun" ..since it's brick break i'm inclined to agree. xD i played Candy Land for the first time, and learned what Doodle Dice is. i helped with a craft project and sang along to a musical i ADORE but realize isn't to everyone else's taste. really the only thing missing from my Saturday was getting to see James (i usually go up to the shop for the Warhammer group on Saturday), but i texted him and he replied and it was fine. xD Sunday was boring, i pretty much just slept.

today was phenomenal though! i woke up Sunday night (because yeah, that's how i roll) and worked on finding something new to watch/listen to while i work, read a few books. i listened to a storm and did some research. after Kyu had left for work, he called and said he and James were on the way home. the storm knocked out power at the office and they were told to leave and they'd be called when things were back on, so i got a surprise hour with my love and his brother (whom i also love, though differently) this morning before they had to head back into work. we laughed and talked, and ran to the grocery store to buy milk and breakfast, two things i'm remarkably fond of. xD it was awesome. then about an hour later the other awesome happened and Vanille was home. so yeah, that's all of it, you're caught up now.