12 december 2000 // Red mecha, holiday festiveness, and random linkage! (really long, and with pictures!) [pi]
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Gomen, it's been a while since I updated this... so now you get a biiiiig looooong entry with pictures and everything. *g* It's three, three, THREE entries in one! Or something. *sweatdrop* So enjoy... and Happy Holidays! ^_^
I seem to be developing a minor collection of red mecha. Okay, three so far, with the addition of the SD Gundam Epyon that arrived in the mail yesterday. No, wait... four - I forgot the Fuchikoma. ^_^;; That's still more red mecha than all the other colors I have combined... no, wait, there's the SD Gundam and Escaflowne keychains. Ah, nevermind. Anyway, the red mecha are the cool ones.
Alseides - awwwww, yeah. Dilandau-sama's kickass guymelef... these "invisible demons" can fly, stomp around in stealth cloaks, they've got flamethrowers and crima claws - liquid metal, kinda like the T-1000 in Terminator, only bigger, more destructive, and therefore cooler. The Alseides are the most menacing mecha in Escaflowne ... especially when you consider the pilot of the red one. *grin* I still need to finish and paint this model... and then I need to get some more so I can paint them blue and have the rest of the Dragonslayers! ^_^- Evangelion Unit 02 - Say what you will about Asuka, I still like her. She's me on a bad day. ^_^;; I've got the sparkly version of her Eva - the "metallic repaint" special edition. *grin* It's got a big sword, and lots of different hand poses that you can attach (no, none of them are flipping the bird). And it's sparkly! *grin*
SD Gundam Epyon - hehheh... The SD Epyon, and to a lesser extent, the Fuchikoma, are cute in the same way a chubby toddler in a Harley Davidson leather jacket and a mohawk is cute - they're cute with attitude. They're cute that says in a punky little gremlin voice "Yaaaaaah!!! I'll kick yo' ass!!!" And the SD Epyon even has big gremlin ears to go with its laser whip and beam sword (which I need to paint still... need day-glo green paint...)!
So anyway... sorry it's been so long since I updated this thing... I've either been too busy, or sick, or couldn't think of anything to say! ^_^;;; But now the holiday season's in full swing.
I've already done the holiday concert with the NMWC - that was great! For the first half of the show, we performed Benjamin Britten's A Ceremony of Carols, which I rather enjoyed, but I think Britten, like many 20th-Century composers, may be a bit of an acquired taste. ^_^;; The second half was a mix of holiday-type-stuff from various cultures - the Kwanzaa piece was especially fun, since we got to work with the choir from the Unitarian church where we perform, and we had lots of cool percussion. :) As my solo, I performed "Starlight" by Avery and Marsh - one of my favorite Christmas songs to sing - the lyrics are so wistful and wonderful. I first sang this song before I really knew how to sight-read, so I kind of made up my own melody. Mr. Conklin, my chorus teacher in high school, was very good at following along and playing by ear. ^_^ So is Matalie Wham, the marvelous music maven at my church. *grin* When I asked her to be my accompanist on this song, she worked with my melody and came up with a very different chord progression than the original, even than the one Mr. Conklin did. It was very jazzy and mellow, very... starry. :) It was wonderful... better than I'd even hoped! *shoujo sparkles* Hopefully we can record it sometime... if we do, I'll post an mp3 of it here or something. *grin*
We finally put up the Christmas decorations at home last Sunday. ^_^;; We've got this fabulous old plastic tree that's practically a family heirloom - it looks almost real, each of the pine needles individually molded, the trunk and branches nicely shaped and detailed... I don't think they even make them like this anymore. *lol* However, for the past three years, we haven't really had a place to put the thing up the way it's supposed to go - there's this big all-purpose table that takes up the whole living room/dining room area that's too high to put the tree on top of... but it makes a hell of a buffet table. *grin* So we use the limbs of the tree to line the back of the table like a garland-type-thing - usually with lights and all - and then hang a few choice ornaments on the ficus tree in the window. Hey, it works. :) This year, I actually did outdoor lights too - one of those nets of little lights draped over the bush in front, multicolored and twinkling. It's nice and subtle next to the bright white icicle lights and moving wireframe reindeer next door.
Of course, for me it's not really the holiday season until I've folded at least a hundred luminaria bags... and I haven't yet... I probably won't, this year. *sigh* Um... in case you aren't familiar with this New Mexico tradition, luminarias are paper bags (lunch bags) with the tops folded down (about an inch cuff, rolled over twice - I'll admit, I get picky about how the bags are folded... I've been doing it for about 15 years or so) and a couple of cups of sand in the bottom for stability, with a votive candle inside. Since I grew up in northern New Mexico, I know that the real name for these things is farolitos (and luminarias are little bonfires), but Albuquerque and the rest of the state don't seem to know this, and so I'll call them by their popular name. *sigh* Anyway, we line streets and walkways with the luminarias and light the candles at sundown "to light the way for the Christ child". The effect is quite beautiful. Albuquerque's "Old Town" goes all out with this on Christmas Eve... so even though I'm not folding any this year I'll still get to light them and enjoy. :)
Okay, just a couple more random things... Found another nifty online comic, Megatokyo - some of it is eerily familiar ... In my CD player right now is the Christmas Songs compilation from Nettwerk Records - this is such a wonderful album! I especially love Dido's "Christmas Day" ... After listening to many wonderful downloaded mp3's, I actually ordered (from CD Japan) L'Arc~en~Ciel's latest CD, Real. Wow. Hyde has such an amazing voice - listening to "get out from the shell" I can imagine him as Geoff Tate's Japanese counterpart *drool* ... Yaaaay! Finally, the Anime Lyrics and Translation Archive is back up at its new location, www.jlyrics.org *cartwheels, shoujo bubbles and sparkles* ... I've fallen in love with Rurouni Kenshin ever since I got my DVD player and the three DVDs that are out so far - and I love the fact that translated manga is available online ... so is the Houshin Engi manga ... I still need to update my main website, it's been over a year *faint* ... Julie Dillon's website has a beautiful new look - check it out. I absolutely love her artwork! *swoon* ... I'll finally begin running my Big Eyes, Small Mouth game at Active Imagination this week - this is a supercool, super-flexible multi-genre anime RPG, if you haven't yet checked it out, it's really nifty ... um... I think that's about it. Whew! Hey, it looks like it's thinking of snowing outside... yay!
Ja ne!� � � - elya-chan ^_~
recent alterations //
21 November 2002 // I'm not dead yet!
03 October 2002 // Snarling bitch to genki fangirl in 0.8 seconds flat! [i]
27 September 2002 // He's got butterfly wings, not feathery angel wings. Geez, people!
25 September 2002 // The Great Oekaki Contest Begins! [ai]
14 September 2002 // The obsessiveness continues...
