Ugly life

Oh my goodness, Ugly Betty was all over the place tonight! o_o Trying to keep their audience … very cruel.

But I’m not really one to talk about primetime television on my blog … except Monk, of course.

My cell phone keeps “failing” calls today, I don’t know why. I had to call my voicemail four times to hear a message, write down the number, and save the message. Or did I save the message? I may have just given up the last time. It’s interesting that the message was available every time though, and not deleted. That’s nice. *pats voicemail company on the head* Then a group member called me and all I got was “Hello.” *phone ring* *some people talking* *dead air*

Oh yeah! I remember, yesterday I tried calling my voicemail and somehow I ended up getting the last person I called. In between me (what’s the cell phone equivalent of “dialing”?) going to voicemail and having someone say “Hello?” I heard some girl talking, she was saying something like “I know how to do it!” and some guy was saying “Get [something], address, [other stuff].” … Right. At first I thought it was the person whose car I whacked in the parking lot at school. (Trying not to hit a car on the other side whose driver was still in the car, both cars I guess were parked too close on each side.) But no, I ended up saying to someone else entirely, “I think I hit the wrong button… bye.”

After that I got a call from a phone in the 925 area code. I picked up ’cause I couldn’t remember if I had a group member in some class with that area code. *blink* Some guy asked for me, I thought, then the sound cut out for a bit, and I said “Hello?” and ended up hearing some lady speak Spanish to me. Riiight … She was asking for Eddie, which in a male sort of Mexican accent can sound like my name … right? My hearing isn’t that bad … right?

But I think I’m sort of rambling. I meant to say that I just hope I don’t forget something tomorrow or next week.

I can’t think, my left elbow hurts. Er, right above the elbow, on the outside. My posture probably isn’t helping. *sitting crooked* And the keyboard is pushed all the way to the right to make for the mousepad on the left so my left arm is sorta reaching to hit the keys … I hate keyboard/mouse positioning. It seems like they’re both in the way of each other. Ideally the mouse should be right in front of your hand/arm, not off to the side, but then ideally the keyboard should be smack dab centered in front of you, not off to the side. I think I need to buy a keyboard with no arrow keys or number pad. XD; Do they even make those in regular sizes? ie, not travel size?

I’m such a bad blogger. I can’t write coherent, topical entries like some bloggers. Can’t keep a personal blog that’s all nicely written and such. None of which (whom? I switched nouns somewhere) I’m going to mention here because I don’t want them to notice me talking about them. XD; I’m all rambly and blalala just like I used to be four years ago. Huh. Wait. Six years, in just a month and some days. o.o!! Wow. I might need to get a life.

Anyway! I need to finish reading chapter 15 for typography, which I find personally a waste of time because I don’t plan to set tables but then of course eventually I will but I don’t want to read the chapter because it isn’t a manual for my program of choice, InDesign, it just says what to do, and possibly ways to go about doing just that, if “your layout program allows it/has that feature.” *twitchtwitch*

Don’t get me wrong, I like the book and plan to keep it and use it for reference (in life … for life … they both sound like I’m going to make life choices based on the book O_o). It’s just that the author tries to be general and applicable to what you do, and it’s very helpful in that sense, but it gets sort of annoying when he says, “a good typographer does such and such, and I don’t know how to do it in your program specifically but you really should do it because I’ve modeled you into a typography snob and you’re going to feel guilty if you don’t.” Augh!

Right. Tables. I don’t think InDesign does tables. I know it does tabs! I like tabs. Not sucky, ugly tabs in Word, or fat tabs that take up a lot of my typing space in Notepad. Nice tabs, that you can set the way you like.

Anyway. Typing for 30 minutes. Wow. Maybe this is why I stopped writing in here. XD; Takes up so much of my time! Other things I’ve dropped this quarter: going on aim; reading (except for my typography book); any extra work on my appearance (but who am I kidding? I don’t do much more than bare minimum that often when I do have the time); tidying up apparently, there are piles of stuff everywhere that I keep thinking harbor spiders or fleas. But things I’ve picked up: behind-the-scenes site maintenance; keeping to a somewhat reasonable sleep schedule during the week (except tonight :x); nursing my right elbow >_< to keep it from hurting; making school-related supply runs alone.

Now I should get to bed.

’til we find our place

Bah, I’m tired of spring quarter already. Bring on summer vacation!

And I still get no enjoyment out of writing here. Funny.

Um. I got a full schedule. It’s actually 14 units. Woo. Haven’t done that since I had chem and pre-calc, but that was a semester system…

So far I have one art project although I haven’t had lab yet so technically I don’t have to work on it! >b Also a project for 218. Then I have to switch from one lab to another in 203. Fun stuff. But maybe I’ll get my computer way in the back this time. XD;

Uh. I went to bed at 9 last night. Woke up around 12ish, again around 1 or so, again around 4, and again a little while after that, then woke up at 6:30 because my radio volume was too low. Well at least it actually went off this time. Monday I forgot to turn it on. I forget what happened Tuesday. Maybe I still didn’t have it turned on.

Now I’m tired, and my side/back hurts because I guess I slept funny, but I can’t sleep because my mind won’t slow down, even though I didn’t have any caffeine this morning. !! I thought, hey I could stay up for a couple hours, then come back and nap for a little, and I didn’t want caffeine to ruin that, but I can’t sleep. o_o

I’m gettin’ into my groove here!

Monday and Tuesday I read Postcards from the Edge by Carrie Fisher, and I thought it was funny how the parts where the two characters were talking to their therapists (whatever) sounded similar to what I write in here. XP Or more similar to what I wrote in my Diaryland account.

Anyway. Um. Spent $85 on books. Might end up buying The Non-Designer’s Guide to Design by Robin Williams, but it’s not required so I don’t know. I’ll have to look at it. I got $5 last year for my marketing book. Er. Relationship selling book. If I don’t need my color theory book I’ll sell that back. Luckily I didn’t sell back the Printer’s Publishing Guide (?) from 202 ’cause it’s the required text in 203.

I have something like $3 in my Campus Express account. I have charged on my card so far: gas $26 (but I think Mum paid me for that, so meh), books $85, and I’ll need to charge $50 for Campus Express so I can eat. Um. But I’m trying to bring sandwiches from home. The problem with that is they don’t fill me up, I’m hungry half an hour or an hour later. I should bring something else to eat. But all I’ve got is junk food, like chips. I could bring fruit, but I hate warm fruit (left in the car), or squished fruit (left in my bag), same for veggies, and I especially hate eating apples in public, I don’t know why. Oh well.

I meant to rewrite notes from 202 but first I wanted to set up my speakers for music and realized I left the power supply at home (same with the battery-backup power strip for the desktop x.x) so after that I went meh and got sidetracked. But I should get back to that.

(…I wrote this in my journal originally, so excuse the ramblyness.)

antsy today

I feel so antsy. o_o

Woke up at 9 this morning; ate breakfast (mochi with little fishies); washed dishes; took out the trash; vacuumed the living room, my room, the bathroom, and what Hidek swept up from the kitchen; packed up most of my stuff (computer still being used); scanned random stuff I thought would make nice Photoshop brushes; and paid cable/internet bill. o.o Busy!

Now I don’t know what to do. I’ve got three hours left til I leave for my last final. I looked over the study guide last night, feel I know the stuff well enough to answer the questions. Just need to study the equations (ppi/dpi/lpi stuff).

And theeeen … I drive for three hours back to L.A.! Yay! I think I appreciate the drive more if I don’t have to drive back in less than 48 hours. And I’ve got good music to listen to. I think Hidek is tired of it though, I keep listening to it in the car. XD Maria Mena (two latest albums), the Submarines, Evanescence (The Open Door), Muse (Absolution), Mirrormask soundtrack.

I think I should eat lunch. That would be a good idea. Then maybe I’ll watch a movie. Maybe.

shopping, the end of eras

Mum and I went the mall. Payless Shoes, Forever 21, Borders Express, and Hallmark. Forever 21: Mum’s comment sums it up for me. “It reminds me of the 70s.” Not that that’s a bad thing at all, I’m just not a 70s-style sort of person. Yes, I like the clothes, I think they look nice, different, not blah, but will I wear them? Heck no. Now I’m all sad. Anchor Blue closed at Westside Pavilion, and Forever 21 is going in a style direction that I don’t care to follow. Where am I supposed to find clothes???

At Borders Express I saw Nana volume 5 (in plastic wrap o.o!!) but I didn’t have a coupon and I’d already spent $20 on a watch and didn’t want to spend money that is coming dearly at the moment, so I skipped it.

Hallmark still has the giant Snoopy plush. XD I want! It’s $20 even, and ish big and not wearing any accessories (except a collar) or hugging Woodstock, so it looks like an extremely huggable Snoopy, like my Mr. Snoops. Snoops makes me sad, he’s all squished out flat and not very stuff-y and dirty, his fur’s not soft and new. But again, I didn’t want to spend money.

So what do I do today? I went with Mum and Mickey to CompUSA’s clearance sale and spent $56. (How can they be closing?? Noooo, Best Buy and Circuit City suck in the computer department!! CompUSA was my saving grace! And Fry’s drives me up the wall, it seems so dirty or unkempt or something.) I bought a mousepad with a frog on it ($7), a Tetris game for Windows/Mac ($15), DVD-Rs ($15), and an 80 pack of slim jewel cases ($17). Yes I am insane what the heck am I going to do with 80 of them I don’t think I’ve ever needed to use even 10 of them in my entire life so far.

I’d even told myself to not buy anything with my credit card this month, because the past few months I’ve had $50+ bills every single time. So somehow my debit card is exempt from my spending ban? Grrr. I guess I’ll just have to work extra long hours this summer. (Since my cousin says the guy is swamped with work, I guess I definitely have a job with him again. *crosses fingers and knocks on wood* I haven’t even really bought clothes in a year! Where’d all my money go? *cough Borders and its ebil membership cough*

Mickey wanted a mouse and numeric keypad for the laptop he’s buying in a little while, but ended up buying a controller for the racing game he’s getting, since CompUSA didn’t have what he liked. XD Mum bought a mouse for the old computer (so Mickey doesn’t have to buy a mouse anymore; he’ll just take the one from his current computer) and a 100 gig external harddrive. :O I’m a spoiled brat. I was looking at them because lately I’ve wanted to backup my laptop AND my desktop, and if my desktop serves as my laptop’s backup, where is my desktop’s backup? Plus, it’s really annoying being on my laptop and having certain files I want that are on my desktop. I hate to fire up the desktop just to get a few files. So now files will be central on the external harddrive and I can move stuff off my laptop!

all things Japanese

I don’t want to go to sleep (despite it being almost 3 in the morning >_<), but I don’t really have the mental capacity to do much of anything, so I’ll just ramble on here for a bit. (Nice statement, no? “I don’t want to think, so I’ll just write in my blog.” :x)

Last Saturday I was home, and Mum and I went to Mitsuwa. Mostly she needed some groceries, and I also wanted gyouza so I could use up the ramen broth packets she bought for me.

While we were in the market area this song came on over the sound system that sounded extremely familiar to me. I said, “Hey, I have this song. It’s Utada Hikaru, ‘Colors.'” Do you know how rare it is for something like that to happen? One, I don’t have many Japanese songs on my computer (or many that I listen to often). Two, what are the chances that I’d have a song that is popular enough to be played in a Japanese store in America? So that was fun.

We ended up buying … well, sad to say I was very self-centered and didn’t notice what Mum bought. I just know she bought dashi because she said she needed it. Oh, she bought kamaboko too. I remember that because it was the normal kind with the clear packaging so you can see that it’s the normal kind, and she said it was probably just New Year’s causing it to be sold out.

Anyway. I bought (with Mum’s money) gyouza and this product that they had free samples of. It’s some ramen, not really the instant noodle type, although it’s similar, but a fancier version. We bought the miso ramen one. It was in the freezer section. The instructions say cook the (frozen) noodles in boiling water for 2 minutes, then in the bowl place the broth and mix with 1–1½ cups boiled water, then when the noodles are done drain them and put them in the bowl. Similar to instant noodles, no? It has 123% the daily recommended value of sodium. ACK! It’s pretty good though. I think I’ll water down the broth more next time though.

I seriously feel like going to a Japanese restaurant. But I don’t have the stomach for what I want. *ticks off on fingers* Unagi donburi, sushi (specifically the eel sushi from Ozeki’s with the eel sauce *grin*), ramen, teriyaki chicken (specifically from that one place at the outlet mall)…hee. Too bad I’m living on a student’s budget. *snerk*

After the groceries I slipped over to the bookstore to look for Kera, but they sold out again. :( I guess it’s really really really popular now. (Darn!) Mum offered to buy it for me whenever it comes in, but I told her she didn’t have to bother herself with it.

Next I looked for any Anna Tsuchiya music, but they didn’t have any. boo. I looked on Amazon; they have her album for $35 as an import. Better than Tommy heavenly6, I had to buy from the marketplace for her album, but not so good because it’s $35! (I think the Tommy heavenly6 album was $25 or something? Not expensive. Maybe it was $15, I don’t remember.)

That was my Japanese excursion, which refreshes me after being in SLO for so long. hahaha.

Now I guess I should go to sleep. bah.