Christmas

Merry Christmas everyone!! =D I hope everybody had a good day today. And if you're not Christian then Happy Holidays to you! haha.

This picture is first thing in the morning this morning. 8:30am!! Usually we don't start the Christmas opening until a little bit later I thought but apparently not this year. My brother came down at 8am and turned on the light in my room. After a futile effort of trying to fend off the light I gave in and decided to get up. I went upstairs, had some coffee and then there we are - all ready to open presents. That's my sister, me and my brother from front to back. My brother and I are wearing our TMNT toques that we got in our Christmas stockings.

All in all everyone had a pretty good Christmas, including the dogs as you can see in the picture. They're all fighting over a new toy they got. In the end the big one (spotted) decided it was his and kept it haha.

I got some really nice presents including an Ipod Classic 80gb, FujiFilm A820 8.3MP Digital Camera, a new suitcase for my trip to Japan, GT4, the new Tolkien book, the next book in the series I used to read!! (My sister randomly chose the book thinking I might like it and it just happened to be the next book in the series I was reading. She didn't even know I had any of them), a gift certificate to The Gap, some cash, a t-shirt and some other presents ^_^. Thank you to everybody!!

After all the craziness of opening presents we had some Eggs Benedict for breakfast. I had 3 and was pretty stuffed after that. For the rest of the day up until dinner we were pretty busy with our gifts that we got. My sister got Guitar Hero 3, my brother got WoW, and my mom got a karaoke machine. Actually my mom was most busy making us food so thank you mom!! We had cheese and crackers for lunch and a wonderful turkey dinner as is tradition =D I ate so much and was totally stuffed after that too. Today was a pretty good day for food actually! I really can't complain hahaha.

Today it snowed also! So I got my wish, we had a white Christmas here in Penticton. It was pretty clear out for most of the day but in the evening it started snowing quite a bit - windy too. But it was really nice. Today was one of those days you don't really go outside so who cares if it's windy ^_^ This evening we played a game called Mad Gab - it's super fun. You have to try to read these seemingly nonsensical sentences but really you're saying something else... It's kind of hard to explain. Maybe check the wikipedia for more help. It was really fun though. We played with my whole family and my old baby sitter from when I was a kid. It was nice seeing her again. I haven't seen her in years! I won't put a picture of her because I'm not sure if she'd want me to but it was really fun. We played 'old vs. young' or "parents & babysitter" vs. "kids" and we won!! Take that adults! But in all honesty, it was a really close game. We played to 25 and we only won by 1 or 2 points. I don't remember exactly. This, on the left, is my Donatello toque I got in my stocking. It was an awesome day.

Merry Christmas again!!

あなたが そこに いるだけで

This book, my Hime sent me from Japan for our Anniversary. It's all in Japanese so it's kinda difficult to understand but I had my good friend 隆さん (Ryu) translate it for me.　It roughly means "You're presence is all I need" or "Being with you is all I need" or something along those lines.It's a super pretty book and I really wish I better knew Japanese so I could understand it more clearly. My roommate isn't home right now so maybe later I will put some pictures of it on this blog. Update: And Now they're here! (as you may have already noticed - ありがとう隆さん). This is the bookmark it comes with (even though you don't really need a bookmark because it's short) but the bookmark is also so nice. And in English too. Interesting. (Japanese people really like English) Anyway, I took a picture of one of the pages I like a lot (which is every one but I had to choose one). The Japanese on this page means something like this "When I'm alone, I can't see. When we're together I can see." I know it's a little bit strange but the sentence is backwards - If it was written in English it might say "I can only truly see when we're together". Actually there's another page I really like that says something along the lines of "When we're together all my life's complications are fixed". So pretty >_< . Now I gotta get crackin' on my Japanese study! I know I mentioned it in a previous post - but it never really happened. Well now's the time! I gotta learn enough to be able to understand this book! =D

And for those of you who are curious. Here's a picture of what I got for her. Did you know... sending stuff to Japan is terribly expensive. I talk about things being expensive a lot don't I?　僕は少しけちと思います。 It took me a long time to find a present I thought she'd like and I think she liked it =D I think she liked the card more but it's kinda personal. But I'll post up the cover of it! It sucks we weren't able to actually spend time together this anniversary but there's always next one =D This time next year I should be enjoying my time in Japan! I might have to start a new blog for that... or continue this one - I'm not sure. Either way it's gonna be awesome and I'm super excited.

We're Moved In!

Hime and I moved in on Monday of this week and it went pretty smoothly. No major hassles or anything. The move itself went just about as smooth as you could ask for. Nothing broken and so far nothing lost. The major problem we ran into was after the move when we discovered we were missing a lot of essential things such as a pot, a can opener, bowls, microwavable plates, plastic wrap, a toaster, oven mitts, some kind of sharp knife, and a few other things. Actually I just remembered I do have a couple of sharp knives... but my old roommates must have packed them up with their stuff by accident. I'll have to call them later and get them back.

Our new apartment is really nice; I'm super happy with it. It's fairly large and it has a wonderful layout. Can't ask for too much more. Oh, it also has a balcony and is a block from Robson street =D. We still have to get a little bit more furniture such as a coffee table or a TV stand (since the TV is currently on my coffee table), a dining room table, a second desk for Hime and a few other things. We also will be looking for a roommate soon so we will have to buy a second bed for the roommate to sleep on and probably a desk for them to do their work on. The kitchen is great. There's lots of cupboard space for the size of kitchen it is and still enough counter space too. Also, this time, the counters are the right height. In my last apartment the counters were made for midgets, I swear. I feel so comfortable here. I'm so happy we found this place and I'm with my hime.

By the way, I finished reading Ancestors of Avalon and it wasn't very good. It also took me a terribly long time to read. I plan on reading a good book next.

The Ultimate Recap

I haven't written on here for a while and a lot of things have happened so this will sort of be a recap of happenings since my last post. I have a feeling it's going to be sort of.. all over the place but I will try to keep it as chronological as possible so it makes a little bit more sense (even though almost all the topics are completely unrelated).

I had my "3 month review" the other day... (I've worked for my current company for almost 6 months now, I think) So I was a little bit surprised when they told me I was having my 3 month review. In any case I had a really good review and then received a 25 cent raise so now I'm up to the big $10.50/h. They also said that since it technically IS my 3 month review that I will be getting "retro pay" from my 3rd month up until the present. So that means I'll have an extra cheque for $50 or something which is good.

I started reading the book my sister bought me for Christmas. It's alright, I haven't gotten too far into it yet though. Just 50 pages or so I believe. I'm finding it pretty hard to get into. I think it's mainly because every time I've tried reading it I've been really tired. Hopefully I'll get a chance to read it when I'm not so tired though so I can get more into it and start enjoying it a little bit more. At the rate I'm going at, I won't finish the book for another month or something. >_< Mondo Gelato to get some icecream and talk to my friend Jay. I was surprised to see my friend Toune in there too. I graduated with both of these guys but Toune had moved back to Niagara Falls after we graduated and I didn't know he was back in Vancouver. I talked to them both for quite a while but I ended up talking to Jay the most. He started talking about this funny CG cartoon called 金卵(Kintamago) that you can find on youtube. He seemed pretty excited about it so I figured it must be pretty good. After we got back to my place after icecream we went on youtube to check it out. It wasn't very funny. We only watched one episode and yeah... not the most interesting or funny cartoon.

After that we headed off to Daikichi Sushi. We go there so often it seems. Hime always has second thoughts about going there because she is worried the lady who works there is going to think she is crazy. But I really like it and its cheap so I figure "why not go there"? ^_^

Ah yeah. So I installed Ragnarok Online II the other day too. This game currently isn't playable nor is it released in either North America or Korea. It's still in development. I know a few people working on understanding how this game works and I managed to find a downloadable and working copy of the game online. It looks really nice and I would really like to play it soon. If it's anything like Ragnarok Online, I will probably like it a lot.

The other night we watched The Elephant Man. Hime bought this movie before we went to my family's house for Christmas, we just never had time to watch it before now. It's a really good movie and it's also really well made. It was made in 1980 and was wonderfully done. It's also based on a true story after the life of "The Elephant Man" AKA Joseph Merrick. I watched the special features on my own time and they were also quite interesting. I'd suggest everybody watch this movie whether or not you think you'd enjoy it. It's not the most action packed movie - that's for sure. But it's a really interesting movie to see. Keep in mind its based on a true story after a real person (who looked VERY similar to the actor in the movie).

Saturday morning I had a phone interview with the Vancouver Japanese Language School. I'm planning on taking their 10 week course. It's one day a week for 10 weeks for $180. I applied and then had the phone interview. It went pretty well... I guess. I found out my weak point is definitely sentence creation. I can understand fairly well and my listening skills are also pretty good, but when it comes to responding... I really struggle. She said I placed into the Beginner 2 course but the course MIGHT not have enough people to run this time so she would get back to me. I really hope it works out because I would really like to take some REAL Japanese lessons from a teacher in a classroom lesson. It seems like it would be a really good school for me and from what she told me, most of what I would be learning would be how to communicate in Japanese... which, right now, is where my problem is.

After I finished work I went out for dinner with Hime. We went to this Persian restaurant and got two different dishes. I don't remember exactly what they were called but it wasn't the best food and it was also a little on the expensive side. Hime didn't like what she ordered at all and I thought both were kinda mediocre so I traded with her and ate hers while she ate mine... or most of mine. When we checked the time we discovered that it was already 9:45 and I had told Kenji that I would phone him at 9:30 so we had to rush out of there pretty quick.

I called Kenji and then Dom and then Jay. Jay didn't answer his phone but both Kenji and Dom did. I explained the situation and went to meet Kenji up by the Blenz. Kenji, me and Hime headed off to this place called 1215 on Davie street. It's a Japanese bar and it was pretty neat. There was this one Canadian guy in there who I've met before that was really loud and causing a lot of trouble it seemed. Stupid guy. In any case it was really fun. Kenji ordered this dish called たこ焼き (Takoyaki). It's more or less octopus but go read the wikipedia for more information on what exactly it is. It was sooo good. The first one I ate was incredibly hot but it was tasty. I really like trying new food. Later in the evening Hime ordered me a drink. A green tea drink.. I also don't remember what it was called. Maccha something. It was really really good. She ordered it with soy milk. Its made with Maccha and Vodka and soy milk and I'm not sure what else. Dom showed up just as 1215 was closing so we went across the street to Sugar Daddys.

It wasn't too busy so we grabbed a table for the 4 of us and ordered a pitcher and started to drink again. After we got the bill for the first pitcher I showed them all this stupid little magic trick which turned into a big talk about magic and us trying to figure out new tricks and whatnot. It was really fun. Kenji made up the neatest trick. I won't explain it because well... it's magic. But it was great. We got him to show the waitress and then she showed us this other really neat trick with a little bit of ash. After that Don got her to explain how she did it and then he tried to do it to us but I figured it out when he tried it. I haven't tried it myself but I think I might be able to pull it off if people were drinking hehe.

After we left we said bye to Kenji and then Don and I walked Hime home. He came back to my place to crash. We ended up talking and playing guitar until about 5:00am or something. I taught him how to read tablature and how to play Good Ridance (Time of your Life) by Greenday. I let him sleep on my bed and I slept on the floor with a bed made up of a bunch of different sweaters. It was surprisingly comfortable.

On Sunday I had to work alone from 3:30 - 6:00. It was really strange working by myself. I still took my lunch break so for 30 minutes there was nobody working and a lot of calls started to pile up. I really don't care though, I think it's stupid they didn't schedule anybody else to work with me. They fired the person that usually works with me on Tuesday and then never bothered to ask anyone to take the shift. They just let me tough it out all alone. So they can go suck on it for all I care ^_^.

When I got home from work I went over to my friends place to play D&D. Right now I'm a sorcerer. I'm level 3 and we're progressing quite quickly. The DM is really good and I'm really enjoying his campaign. We have to do a lot of roleplaying and its really fun. At the moment we have this illusion spell stuck on us that has turned us into these crazy monsters. I'm a mind flayer at the moment (well I'm not really, but other people perceive me as such). We have to drink this potion to keep ourselves in our regular form but it only lasts for so long. At the moment we're looking for ingredients to cure ourselves but its proving to be quite the arduous adventure.

On monday, after work, I bought some flowers and went to surprise Hime at the library. At first I couldn't find her anywhere but I think it's because I got there before she did. I searched the whole 2nd floor then went up to the 4th floor and looked there. It took me about 30 minutes to search both floors. After that I thought about it and figured "ah.. maybe I was too quick getting here" so I went back down to the 2nd floor and started searching again. I found her without too much trouble... In a place I know I looked earlier, so I knew I was too early. In any case I snuck up behind her and put the flowers down on top of her book. She was so surprised and made a little noise then looked embarrassed because it was so quiet in the library. It was so cute hehehe. After that we studied English together for a little while and then she went home. More or less...

Today I had free pizza at my work. Lots of free pizza. Because of the shift I work I got free pizza with the morning people and free pizza with the afternoon people. So I ended up eating 7 pieces of pizza throughout the day. Complimented with a bowl of baby carrots and another giant garden salad. So much food. It was nice. The pizza wasn't really the best pizza but what can you do. Tomorrow we have a company-wide meeting. We're speculating that the company is gonna bite it and we're all going to get laid off. I'm happy. I can't wait till the meeting hehehe. Severance pay FTW. But I can't get my hopes up too much until tomorrow though. I will post what happens tomorrow... Hopefully (I might forget.. or have other things to do).

So I have to start looking for a new apartment because my roommates are moving out in March which means I will also have to move out in March. I want to move in with Hime but she has to stay with her current roommate until April because they are in a contract for 1 year. It sucks. I think I might find us a place together and then just live alone for 1 month. Then again she will probably end up living with me anyway for that month hehe. I have to figure it out pretty soon. Before January ends.

Also Hime's parents are coming to Canada in February. I'm so excited. Well... excited and scared at the same time. It's a big thing to meet someone's parents. Especially when they travel from Japan. She said they just want to see Canada. I sure hope they aren't coming just to see me. Not that I think that's the case because well that would make me seem pretty conceited but I still worry that that's the reason. I would feel like such a burden. But I'm still so excited to meet them. From what she's told me I think I will really like her parents.

This Thursday will be Hime and my 2nd month anniversary. It doesn't seem like 2 months already but it is. I'm not sure what we will do but I will meet her friend late late Thursday night. Well... technically Friday morning. At around 1:30am probably. I'll have to make some plans for what we'll do on Thursday though hehehe.

New Bookshelf

So last night when I got home from work, I passed a bookshelf in the alley of my apartment. First thing I thought was, "I could use that". But I went inside and sat down on the computer instead. After some game playing and chatting and whatnot I decided that I really DID need that bookshelf. So at around 12:30am I went back outside and grabbed the bookshelf. I tried my best to reorganize my bedroom but it didn't quite work out 100%. My room is still a little messy (but definitely a lot cleaner than it was before). It's a ratty old purple bookshelf that looks like it was made by an aspiring 10 year old and then painted by his little brother. Either the last person who had it used it as a punching bag, or it was fashioned from random planks of wood found in the dumpster. But it works, and now its mine.

Today, work was boring. Then again, its always boring. This girl, Rupe, asked for my email today at work. Normally I'm not a fan of making "work friends" but she's pretty cool. That makes two people's emails I've got at work. There's one other person's email I'd like to get. This french lady named Gill. She's very cool - my favorite person to talk to at work right now.

So, my Hime comes home from Japan tomorrow. I'm so excited. I'm going to go meet her at the airport tomorrow morning and spend, hopefully, the rest of the day with her.

Right now I should be sleeping because I need to wake up early in order to get to the airport in time to greet her when she gets off the plane. She will probably be tired since 9am our time 2am in Japan, so if she didn't sleep on the plane she'll be wanting to sleep ASAP after she gets off the plane probably. So weird to change timezones so drastically like that.

Today I got my friend Sol8 to make a blog and hopefully he will be updating his quite frequently too. I also tried to convince my friend minibean to make a blog but she refuses. She hasn't even read this yet. So, minibean, when you read this, email me.

I think my room is about as clean as it is going to get tonight since I have to get to sleep pretty soon. I made two teriyaki chicken breasts for dinner and man where they tasty. (But I probably didn't make them 'correctly' according to tradition... but whatever, they sure tasted good)

Oh yeah, I should talk about Empire (Orson Scott Card's Novel). I finished it today and it was really good. It was hard to put down. I had to force myself to stop reading. In the beginning I wasn't totally sure I would enjoy it, but after I got into the story... really good. It is worth buying in my opinion. Definitely worth reading, that's for sure. It was a Christmas present from my Mom. =D

The next book I'm going to read is "Marion Zimmer Bradley's Ancestors of Avalon" of the Avalon Series by Diana L. Paxson. My sister bought me this for Christmas so its time to read it ^_^

Well sleep time. I hope to post tomorrow evening.

Holiday Recap

So my Hime and I went back to my hometown to spend Christmas together with my family. Sadly I don't have any good pictures at the moment so I will have to put up some pictures later. Seeing my family and being with my girlfriend was awesome. We had a great time. We didn't do too much back home. Just relax, chat, enjoy the scenery; same ol' same ol'.

She left to go back to Japan at 5:45 in the morning on the 26th. I won't see her until the 9th... which really isn't THAT long, but it sure seems like a long time already and its only been 5 days. By the sounds of it she's really having a lot of fun over there with her friends and her family. New years in Japan was 7am my time. I talked to her this morning at 11:00am and she was still awake (so 3:00am Japan time) She seemed like she had lots of fun but I think she was pretty tired. Right now I'm just waiting for her to call me ^_^

My Christmas was awesome. I got almost everything I asked for and more and I think so did most of my family. It wasn't a white Christmas but man was it a white boxing day. Like 6" of snow or something. I'm not 100% sure how much but it was pretty crazy. Luckily Hime left so early in the morning because all the flights later in the day and the day after were cancelled because of the snow. If she had missed her flight in my hometown she would have missed her flight to Japan.. and that would have been expensive >_<

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Currently playing: Metal Gear Solid 3: Subsistence, 大神 (Ōkami)
Currently Reading: Empire - Orson Scott Card

姫

So for the past 2 weeks I've been so busy with things. Mainly my girlfriend; I've seen her just about every day in the last couple of weeks. Which is a good thing mind you, surprisingly. I never thought it was possible to hang out with somebody every day for near a month and not get bored, but that's exactly what we've done... and I'm not bored ^_^

About a week and 1/2 ago I went to her friends フラミンゴさん's (I'll just call him Ming) birthday party at Shinanigans. It was pretty cool, he's an awesome guy. Hime is going to give me his MSN soon. Right now he's in yellowknife with his friend なっとさん (Nat). She's pretty cool too even though I keep forgetting her name.

Here's two pictures of the birthday party:

First: フラミンゴさん(Ming),　姫様(Hime), and me.
Second: 姫様(Hime), Me, なっとさん(Nat)

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Current Games: Final Fantasy VII, Halo, Knights of the Old Republic II - The Sith Lords
Reading: A Game of Thrones (Book1:A Song of Ice and Fire) George R. R. Martin

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What I want to play: Neverwinter Nights 2, Dark Messiah of Might and Magic, 大神 (Ōkami)

A long day out

So today I left my apartment at, I believe, around 7:50. I grabbed a coffee from the Macs up the street and headed off to meet Hime. It was really cold outside... Hime and I bought $0.99 gloves from London Drugs before we left downtown... Which reminds me... I had to go to the bank to figure out why I was $1,000 in debt since... I know I wasn't. Apparently someone had "skimmed" my card, deposited an empty envelope for $1500 into my account and then withdrew $1000 of that amount. The bank put a hold on the $1,500 amount (since the envelope was empty) and thus leaving me $1,000 in debt. It was definitely an interesting morning. After signing some papers and talking to this cool guy named Mauricio we were off to coquitlam.

Coquitlam was interesting - It took a long time to get there by public transit and it was pretty damn cold. We found the mall without too much trouble and started exploring. Nothing too interesting.. There was a salesperson selling massage items that tried to offer us a deal but after I refused he got pretty rude and so we avoided walking past him the rest of the day. In any case though we found the bookstore I was looking for and browsed around for quite a while. I bought a few books. One of which was for myself: A Crack in the Line. It was an okay book. Not amazing by any standards but it kept me interested for the couple of hours it took to finish. After that we had a mocha at Starbucks (I really don't like Starbucks) and headed back home.

It was still very cold.

We had sushi at this awesome little sushi restaurant on Burrard called Daikichi Sushi. It's one of my favorite restaurants and I would suggest anyone who likes sushi to give this place a visit. (Its close to VFS, near the Burrard Bridge). おいしいです。 After that we met up with my friend Kenji ( 乾児) and studied English for a while. That was about it. We said bye to Kenji and I walked Hime home and then went to sleep.

Damn it's cold.

So I live in Vancouver and right now we have snow. It's really quite strange. But what's even stranger is how cold it is here. Right now the temperature is -8 according to the thermometer but the "feels like" highs and lows for today are -11 and -17 respectively. Right now it "feels like" -17. Chilly.

Today I'm going to coquitlam to check out a bookstore a friend at work suggested. After that I'll be going skating with my 姫. It's Robyn's birthday today and I think she just wants to relax so I'm going to try my best to be out most of the day.