Windows XP stable my ass. I was doing a remote upgrade on the desktop computer back home in California and installed Service Pack 1 because my test installation of Matlab needed it. Since I'm using it via network, I can't see what happens during reboots. So after I installed the service pack, I told it too reboot, but then I couldn't connect to the computer anymore. So I call home, talk to my brother, who told me that the reason why was because the computer kept on rebooting by itself. It would bootup, get a blue screen, and start over again. How annoying. SP1 was supposed to fix bugs, but now I can't even get into the computer! So after a while, I had my sister pop in the XP CD (lucky I made a backup and kept it at home) and did a repair job. Damn.
Ten minutes. Ten minutes was all it took with the TA. Most of the time, it was him that was reading and thinking about what I'm doing. It would have been 5, but I was grilling him about how the project was to be done. He said he was impressed and wanted to see the final product. Maybe I should have showing him 'scribbles and Hina*. Nah. I hate setting expectations for myself.
Have I mentioned that the CS students here are idiots? So I was supposed to meet with my TA today to discuss my database project. Fine. The first part of our project is to meet with the TA before Thursday. It's my day off, but I came onto campus just to have the meeting. According to the web site, each meeting was supposed to be AT MOST 5 minutes. Well, I come here at 1:10pm and start waiting (his office hours are from 1-2) and am 4th in line. The FUCKING FIRST GROUP TAKES UNTIL 1:30. The second group FINISHES at 1:45. The third guy finishes at 2pm, and when I come up to bat, the TA says sorry, I have class now. I then kindly mention to him that the meetings were supposed to be 5 minutes long. He apologizes profusely, and I say fine. I'll meet tomorrow. But only if he gives me an extension till Friday if anything's wrong. But still, I'm pissed off. Wasted a frickin' good hour sitting around. It pisses me off even more that as I'm listening to the other groups, they have really no idea what the hell they were doing. So they keep on asking questions and questions and dragged out their meeting. I on the other hand, know EXACTLY what I want to do and have to do (the project is codename: Lunar Scribbles Enhanced). I'm going to go buy some manga now.
During the break between my classes, I headed down to Rockerfeller Center to Kinokuniya to see if they had the new Shonen Special magazine and Iro-Hina #5. They were supposed to be released on 9/20, but I guess it takes time for them to ship it here. So as I was walking back to the subway station, I was walking past this guy and my hands bumped into his. The thing is, he was holding his pair of reading glasses and it popped out of his hands and landed on the ground...lens facing down. I saw this and knew it wouldn't be good. I said sorry and kept on walking. The guy then catches up to me and taps me on the shoulder and shows me that there's this huge scratch on his left lense. I say sorry, and he says they were prescriptions. I said that he dropped them, he says it was because I bumped into him. I said that he should hold on to things tighter and he stopped pestering me. Go cry me a river.
Wait, wait, wait. I got my Kenshin complete CD box set with 12 CDs full of Kenshin music! It takes forever to encode all of it to MP3, but after that, the CDs are never going to see the light of day again!
So yesterday night between 11pm-12am, I was coming back from Queens from a dinner with a friend. I get off the subway and start walking to my apartment. At a street corner, some guy calls out to me saying if I spoke English. Usually, I would have my headphones on and even if I could hear people calling me, I ignore them (the NY way!). But this time, I had my headphones off (safety reasons...need to be able to sense my surroundings) and so the guy looked innocent...maybe he was lost. So I say "yeah." And then he tells me if I could help him out. He explains that he just got out of prison and said that if I wanted proof, he can show me his parole papers. Hmm. Well, the guy seemed nice enough, so I listened to him and at the end, I game him a dollar and wished him good luck and went along my merry way. What a strange encounter.
As I was walking around the Times Square area to the Toys 'R' Us to buy my Gameshark, I saw this lady walking around and in her hands were these cards that said "Street Smarts." If you don't know, "Street Smarts" is a TV show where they interview random people and ask seemingly easy questions but some people give very creative answers. They didn't come up and ask me though. Maybe I looked a little too intellectual and probably wouldn't have been a good interviewee. (deflate ego now).
Spirited Away (Sen to Chihiro no Kamikakushi) is an excellent movie. Although I prefer a brighter style of drawing, nothing beats a very well thought out story. And fortunately for me, the Loews near Times Square were showing it on two screens, one with subtitles, and one dubbed. The dubbed one was showing in their digital projection theater though, so the picture probably looked better.
I also got a Gameshark for my PS2 machine. Found out that it allows the PS2 to play DVDs from any region, and sure enough, Love Hina OVA is playing on my TV as I type this. This probably also seals the fate for Ground Defense Force: Mao-chan. One of the reasons I wouldn't buy it is because it's hard for me to watch it. But now I can. =)
In walking around campus today, I noticed a film crew there with a huge ass camera and the director scoping out the scene. Hmm. I wonder if they're going to make a movie. I hope it's not something pathetic like "Stealing Harvard" or even worse, "Orange County."
Just finished with the first volume (there's one Japanese book, but for the English translations, it's split up into 2 volumes). What a trashy book! Much much more lewd than the anime or the manga. Oh well.
Before I begin, I would like to confess something. I am a LOSER! I'm reading the english translation of the Love Hina magazine novel. And with that said, off I go reading.
How cruel, how cruel. The official font of Hina* (Spumoni) crashes my recently installed JBuilder (program to program in Java). Sucks.
No news here. Should be getting a few books from Amazon Japan tomorrow. They're in English though =).
Mmmm....the things you get to see at 2am on cable TV. I got the privilege of watching a Satanic mass, complete with the trailing video effect of various "satanic" objects. People really do have too much time on their hands...not like I really should be criticizing others...=)
Spent the day indoors (very very hot 'n humid) working on Hinastar. Spent the last few hours going through all my bookmarks and deleting appropriately. It's amazing (or not) how many sites no longer exists anymore. It's also somewhat nostalgic browsing though sites that I had previously bookmarked during the different phases of my life, i.e. the Sailormoon pages, the Lunar pages, the Final Fantasy pages...
Here's the DVD purchase list until end of the year (excluding R2 DVDs):
9/24 Rurouni Kenshin #22
9/24 Evangelion: End of Eva
10/8 Grave of the Fireflies Collectors Series (dunno yet)
10/22 Love Hina #5
10/22 Strawberry Eggs #2
10/22 Saber Marionette J->X #4
11/12 Cardcaptor Sakura #12
11/12 Fushigi Yugi Eikoden
11/12 Utena #3 (finally!)
11/19 Cowboy Bebop Best Sessions (dunno yet)
11/19 Love Hina #6 (last one!)
12/3 His and Her Circumstances #2
12/3 Love Hina Christmas Special
12/12 Strawberry Eggs #3
12/17 Saber Marionette J->X #5
1/7 Cardcaptor Sakura #13
There really isn't anything on TV nowadays. So I just got my cable yesterday with a one month deal of $45 bucks for cable modem and digital cable (a hundred or so channels). If I had ordered it myself, I would have just gotten standard cable, but it seemed like a good deal considering cable modem by itself would have been $45 bucks already. But when it comes down to watching, I still just stick with my Fox News, CNN, or MSNBC. However, I am currently watching the one hour block of Japanese programming on the International channel or something like that and let me tell you, it is some weird stuff. It's currently some buddhist monk putting this lady into a trance and then channeling her past lives. Despite only understanding about 50% of it, I can tell when the monk asks "Who are you?" and "Do you know where you are?" as well as the words, "spirit/ghost." Uh-huh. Click.
Back in business! The strange thing is that I bought my wireless network card last year on September 11th (I distinctly remember the clerk and I waiting there as my credit card was being authorized, hoping that the system wasn't down despite the fact that it was already 11am).
And then today, I get my cable modem! Whoo hoo!
Yes, it has been confirmed that yours truly does NOT have willpower. Just lookie at what's coming to the states, specifically, to my house, in the next few weeks from Amazon Japan.
Love Hina Novel #2 (Japanese)
Love Hina Novel #1 (published in Japan, but translated to English...I have the original Japanese book)
Love Hina Novel (also in English...but I don't have the book #)
Hand Maid May Project File (artbook)
Para Para, Syoozyo MAX (anime songs...kinda)
I, My, Me Strawberry Eggs Soundtrack
and the will-breaker:
All My Love by Yui Horie (Naru) singing the songs for the new show Ground Defense Forces, Mao-chan.
I've already been through so much anime that I know that I'll like the series just by the looks of it (also done by Ken Akamatsu, creator of Love Hina, as well as the same director of LH). I know it's about 3 8-year-olds who happen to be trying to protect Japan, but hey, I'm already a big Cardcaptor Sakura fan too.
As any student can testify, one of the most embarassing situations at school is when you're walking around with your backpack WIDE open and not noticing. Yup, just happened to me. Fortunately, I only had a notebook (the paper kind) and a textbook. Nothing too incriminating...(fortunately empited out this month's Animage magazine from my backpack just yesterday).
So yours truly opened his big mouth again while buying that Animage. So I head over to Kinokuniya two days ago to buy the magazine. I bring it up to the register and the clerk greets me, "Irassyaimase. Hachi doloru yon-zyuu sento." I give her a $20, but then in my infinite wisdom, decide to dig for some change. I say "chotto matte..." and dig for change. I could not come up with the 40 cents so I proceed to say "sore wa ii desu." And from then on, the clerk spoke in English. "11 dollars and 60 cents. Thank you." I WAS DISCOVERED TO BE A FRAUD! How embarassing.
Besides that, things have been fine. My cable modem is supposed to be this Wednesday. Hope hope... Maybe then I can go back to full-time emailing (there's just something strange about writing personal emails from the library).
Konbanwa minna-san! I guess I'm long due for a journal entry, ne? So this evening, I went with a friend of mine to a comedy club, called "Comedy Cellar" in the Village. As we were walking there, we just dropped by a Chinese restuarant and had dinner there. The comedy club cover charge was $15 bucks as well as having a 2 drink purchase requirement. I got meself a pina colada and a melon ball (OJ w/Vodka). Both went down smoothly (I hate bitter drinks such as beer). While I usually never drink, I think I have a pretty good tolerance for alcohol and I had just stuffed myself with a lot of food at the restuarant. So the host of the comedy club was none other than that "Make 7-Up Yours" guy from the commercials (you never know who you'll see in NYC, ne?). The 4-5 people on stage were okay, some were more funny than others though. Just have to say that it probably was not the place to be if you were gay or of Arabian descent.
Now let's go way back to last Saturday at the Anime Expo. Like I said, I dropped by Anime Expo. When I first went there at 9am, the lines for registration were incredibly long. I had completely forgotten that a majority of the people who are anime fans are the ones who watch Dragonball Z on the cartoon network. They were there with their parents who didn't seem too enthused. So I leave to go look around Times Square when low and behold, I see a friend that I haven't seen since graduation a year and a half ago. He was going there to the expo and had pre-registered. So we both head back and register. By then the lines had shortened.
We were waiting for the doors to open in the hotel lobby, a rotunda (circular floor). They announced that there were only going to open 2 doors, so the line for that door wrapped around the floor and where we were standing was about 5 feet away from the entrance. But then when it opened, they opened ALL the doors and so we lucked out and snagged first row seats!
So they're there and introduce all the guests of honor to the event. When someone was introduced, that person would say a little something. Since they're all from Japan, the extent of their English was limited to "How are you doing?" And then they would say stuff in Japanese. There was a live translator there to explain what was said. The interesting thing I noticed was that when one of the guys cracked a joke in Japanese, only about 10% of the crowd laughed (myself included). The other 90% laughed after the translator translated it (and it wasn't even a correct translation!). Makes me wonder if I'm more "hardcore" since I actually took the effort to learn Japanese for anime...hmm. Probably not. There were a lot of hardcore people there.
In my opinion, the opening ceremony was so so horribly organized. It was scheduled from 10am to 12pm, when everything opens. But in fact, they were 30 minutes late and finished at 11am. So from 11am to 12pm, everyone was waiting outside the retailer's room to wait and spend money. We my friend wait and wait. We see some cos-players in the crowd, but they were pretty...umm...pathetic. Maybe I'm comparing them to the cos-players I've seen from Japan. So the doors open to the retailer's room and the hordes go in there. Oh oh, before I continue, I observed a guy over there who kept on refering to anime as "AHH-NI-MAY" as if he had an air of superiority. Very annoying. So the hordes rush the room and start buying things. You could barely walk in there! And in fact, in the mad rush, I was almost tempted to buy a few Love Hina trading posters...but then I restrained myself saying that a poster won't help my Japanese. I wanted to buy things from the Anime Jungle booth, but quickly gave up because there were just TOO many people. Anything I want, I can always order from them directly or get it from Amazon Japan. I did, however, get a gift for a friend from the Sasuga Books booth.
After that ordeal, I sat through two anime series, "X" and "I'm Gonna Be An Angel." The former is not my type of anime. Very dark, depressing story with blood and guts. Surprisingly though, I found out it was made by CLAMP, the all female animation group who made Cardcaptor Sakura and Magic Knight Rayearth. The next show was just too strange. Very cute, but strange.
After the shows, I went to the Production I.G./King Records panel. They showed the trailers to a few of their shows, one of which is Love Hina Again.
Afterwards, I decided to come home. Nothing else to see nor buy.
As for classes, they're okay I guess. I'm thinking of dropping one of my classes because I really can't stand the teacher. The closest type of person I can relate him to is Nedry from the first Jurassic Park. He's fat, seems to be very arrogant of his knowledge, and doesn't seem to care about teaching. He just wants to have the experience of teaching so he can write his textbook or have notes for the future. On top of that, he wants us to use FreeBSD to program our assignments on. With the computer labs, I have Windows, Mac, Solaris, and Linux machines to work on. But no, this guy wants us to go out of our way to install another operating system, FreeBSD, just for his class. No way.
Hate to do this, but I'm already late for the finale of American Idol. Must get home before 9:30 to watch it! Gomen (don't trust the time stamp on the site...it's may or may not be on EST).
First boo-boo of the semester. I walk into class and just as the professor starts talking, I reach into my backpack to find out that I completely forgot my pencils and pens. So I just sat there absorbing whatever he said without trying to be a stenographer. Who takes notes in a videotaped class anyway, right? I can always watch it again the library.
My package that was shipped from Japan to Santa Cruz, CA and then to NYC has finally arrived in my room. It's been living in the post office since Saturday. Poor thing. But at least tonight, I'll be able to continue and finish the Love Hina OVAs since the second disc came in the shipment (I had the first and last, but not the second beforehand), as well as listen to some PARAPARA anime music from their BEST collection. PARAPARA is a group that sings songs in euro-beat and the anime collection are songs from anime series that they've remixed.
Yes I went to AnimeExpo yesterday, and as an added bonus, met a friend of mine who I haven't seen since graduation there. Lots of stuff happened there, but I'm in a rush right now (battery's dying as I'm typing this in the student center at school). Read the Love Hina related part on Hinastar, and I'll fill in the rest tomorrow, or the day after, here on 'scribbles.