I write this today not to speak of what’s going on in my life or what I’m currently obsessing over or even with news that I made more icons. No. I write this today to speak of history. I’m not exactly sure why Ferdinand Magellan even came into a conversation between my brother and I, but things like this do happen. My dad says it’s inevitable between two nerds (for the record, I’m a geek; not a nerd), but who’s really to say?

Anyway, as soon as Magellan came into the conversation, my brother and I stopped and began to wonder: what was it that he did again? Surprisingly, I came up with the answer…sort of. I said he discovered some straight or something at the tip of South America while he was traveling around the world. That much was true. After a quick Google search, we discovered I was right about that (and the location!). The straight is lovingly called, The Straight of Magellan. My brother got the second half right: Magellan is best-known for traveling around the entire globe. So that just proves that paying attention in History class does pay off in the end, right?

I’ve been hearing rumors of a fourth installment to the Pirates series. Though it hurts me (and excites me) to hear that they’re thinking of this, I have come up with a theory to what this next movie — if it does come out — would be about: the fountain of youth. And why exactly? Because I remember sitting in 5th grade world history and my teacher announcing that even though we may not remember what he did, we would remember his name for the rest of our lives. That explorer’s name: Ponce de Leon and he discovered Florida while searching for the fountain of youth all in the name of Spain (or Portugal).

I remember spazzing out about it in the theaters because I absolutely loved that explorer for reasons unknown. Something about how his quest for immortality lead to discovering a new land appeals to me, despite how “dull” it turned out. Think of the adventure (and disappointment!) he had as he searched for the mysterious elixer of life and possibly fought Aztecs. If Aztecs even lived that far north… But I’m quite sure he had to fight some sort of amazing American Indian culture!

And so that concludes my history lesson of the day. Hopefully you learned something or if you remembered any of that from any of your history classes, give yourself a pat on the back. And take a virtual cookie.

1. Muse - Supermassive Black Hole
2. Paramore - Decode
3. The Black Ghosts - Full Moon
4. Linkin Park - Leave Out All the Rest
5. Mutemath - Spotlight (Twilight Mix)
6. Perry Farrell - Go All the Way (Into the Twilight)
7. Collective Soul - Tremble for my Beloved
8. Paramore - I Caught Myself
9. Blue Foundation - Eyes on Fire
10. Rob Pattinson - Never Think
11. Iron & Wine - Flightless Bird, American Mouth
12. Carter Burwell - Bella’s Lullaby

My personal favorite is Iron & Wine’s song. It kind of has a 60’s folksy-rock sound to it that makes it very likable and addicting to listen to. However, the lyrics don’t make any sense and I can’t even begin to picture where that song would even fit in the Twilight movie. My brother suggested that the perfect place to place it would be in the middle of the big battle scene; the action would be in slow motion and then all of a sudden you hear happy music. I must admit, it’s something that a director would do. Now I think he wants to see the movie (despite me telling him he may not like it because the book is heavily based on a relationship) just to see if his theory is correct. He also told me that he might like it in the end because all the commercials he’s seen involves action and Edward acting like Superman during the car crash. I tried to educate him…

My dad and I went out to the mall to pick up some natural toothpaste. We’re currently using tea tree toothpaste, but he wanted to try some sort of seawater/sea-salt toothpaste. Now, it is a tradition that all the Christmas decorations and taking pictures with Santa Claus all happens after Thanksgiving (the last Thursday of November). When the two of us walked in to a surprisingly, crowded mall we saw: a man making animal balloons, Santa Claus, Salvation Army helpers, a small train for children to ride around in, a place to make paper chains, a small area set for the men to watch football on two widescreen televisions, and reindeer. Yes, reindeer.

Mind you, we never had animal balloon people, a place to make paper chains, or an area for the men to watch football before. And definitely not reindeer. The small train is a holiday tradition as well as Santa Claus, but like I said before, that doesn’t happen until after Thanksgiving. Christmas decorations were put up and Christmas music was playing cheerfully in the background. I’m surprised the Christmas tree wasn’t put up. But what surprised me most of all was the atmosphere. You know during Christmas women are like really scary and nobody seems to be…happy? Well there was this really festive atmosphere and you couldn’t help but be happy. I don’t think I’ve ever seen so many smiling faces (except on Beggar’s night, because free candy is something to be happy about).

Speaking of Christmas, my family usually goes to see the Trans-Siberian Orchestra. I wanted to buy the tickets this year and I was going to get the concert tickets when my father brought to my attention that the Rockettes were touring this year and they were coming close to where we live. After a night of thinking, I made my decision and bought tickets to see the Rockettes for everyone; I demand that my brother get cultured even if I have to tie him up and drag him to see them. I have his ticket anyway.

I also made about five Twilight icons last night, but I’ll post those later tonight. I’m about to go eat dinner at Yamato with my family.

[EDIT] I’ve uploaded the icons and you can find them on the icons page. Two of the icons have a text and non-text version, which is a first for me. I was too undecided so I’ll let you choose which you think is better. Hope you enjoy! [/EDIT]

Even though we ended up with a ton of candy, I still felt that it was necessary to try out a recipe from this amazing cookie recipe book I bought. It’s a huge book with about 150 different recipes and I got it on sale for only $8! Boo-yah!

That delicious hunk of peanut butter and chocolate are peanut butter no-bake bars. Just as my dad and I were leaving the bookstore, an author began to set up a little meet and greet. I had no idea who she was or what she wrote, but I did get to pick at her brain into the world of writing which was pretty insightful for me. I even ended up buying her book, Harmonia, which she signed for me. Sandra Cota, the author of the book, told me how she met Kelly Ripa from Regis and Kelly. Kelly seemed interested in the book and told Sandra she’d read it to her kids; who knows if Kelly thought it was good enough, Sandra could be the next best-selling author! Shame I left my camera that day… I also got new glasses this weekend because I think I was in desperate need of a new pair. Or maybe not? What do you think?

I downloaded like a ton of new Twilight images. I’ve been holding back and waiting for a batch of new ones to arrive, so I might go on another Twilight icon craze. If it does happen, expect them sometime next week.

Besides cookies, my dad managed to persuade my mom to get another dog. I’m starting to really think there is something in the sushi my dad gets her that makes her say ‘yes’. Our two terriers that we obtained was a cause of Japanese cuisine. With the addition of this new boxer puppy, we currently have four dogs. She is quite cute though.

I think her name will be Mia, but it could also be Sasha. We might still be in debate mode. I also took a snapshot of our other (and much older) boxer, Max. He’s been laying in the terriers’ bed recently because I guess he likes their bed better than his own. It’s so funny because their bed is so tiny and yet he manages to squeeze his huge body perfectly into it.

The Gaia Halloween Event is under way! I’m currently running around as a dark elf; I got all the vampire items earlier this morning. I also learned that Gaia’s highly anticipated MMORPG, zOMG!, will be launching soon. I can’t wait to check it out! If any of you have a Gaia account, you can find me with the user name: Kaia Ketoki.

Yesterday I went to a dog show. They were just in the process of doing best of breed. I think they might be doing best of group and best in show today. Who knows. My dad is a huge lover of all things dogs, so of course he had to go. I decided to tag along and take pictures. There were so many dogs! I don't think I've ever seen so many Chinese Crested in one place before. Every time we walked around, it seemed a new breed would be gathering to show and they just magically came out of nowhere. Quite incredible. My dad got to pretend to judge a Saluki to help it prepare since it was about to be shown. It was an interesting thing to witness. He actually did it quite well; it was like he was a judge in his past life or something. Though, that tells me he's been watching a little too much dog shows. I mean, it's like learning how to do surgeries if you watch enough of it on television!

The boxers were of course, adorable, but I think the dog that we saw that I had a fun time with was Flynn, the giant Schnauzer. He was acting like a clown, rolling around in the grass and leaning on everybody. When I first saw him in the distance, he looked silky, but up-close it was quite the opposite. I learned that their coats are supposed to be textured and that instead of clipping them with trimmers, their coats are stripped. The process sounds painful and inhumane, but I assure you that it isn't at all. Being there at the dog show, you get to witness a lot of the behind-the-scenes type prep that goes on: the last minute grooming, the last minute 'stay' commands, handlers walking up and down, and I think there was more perfume and hair spray being sprayed there than at a beauty pageant. The time was even a learning experience: most of the groomers, handlers, or owners (if time allowed it) would talk about their dog and the breed in general. My dad had a question about the care and maintenance of our Soft-Coated Wheaton Terrier, and a woman who owned two kindly brought one out and explained the wonderful world of keeping their coats in proper order. We learned that ours was in the worse stage of hair knots, but were assured that it does get better! I also managed to learn the names and faces of a few more breeds thanks to dad, who in my mind is a walking, talking dog encyclopedia. Have a dog question? Ask him! I'm sure if he knows the breed well enough, he'll even give you the history of it.

Check out the dog show gallery!

We also got high-speed internet recently, and it’s such a blessing! I’m trying to catch up with the English episodes of Gurren Lagann which is turning out to be a surprising find. After that, I’ll be watching the Korean dramas, My Girl and Goong and my friend wants me to check out the Sailor Moon drama. I think another big one I’m going to have to watch is Hana Yori Dango. Are there any others that I should add to my list?

Raven is holding her annual contest for CardCaptors Forever. It’s a wallpaper contest this year, and I think I just finished mine two days ago. I need to submit it sometime soon.

Judging is underway at Intoxicated Design’s contest! Wish me luck, I’ll probably need it.

Aside from that, I did manage to get some nice presents. My parents managed to get me a new comforter (because it was driving my mom crazy that my old one was slowly coming apart) and a matching quilt. They also surprisingly, got me the Cowboy Bebop box set! Though I’m not too shy about proclaiming my love of anime, I was quite surprised simply because they don’t usually get it for me. I think it’s because they don’t want to fuel my “drug addiction”, but who knows? And my brother got me the first DVD of The Melancholy of Haruhi Suzumiya. I think it was the first present that he actually bought for me with his own money, so I’m quite flattered. Axel (whom I’ve dubbed my brother) usually knows what I like when it comes to anime because I got him into it. So he usually knows what titles I’m debating over watching; I’m just surprised that he actually payed attention to me; he always appears like he’s not. It was strange too, because I almost bought Cowboy Bebop and Haruhi today, but went against it. Instead I bought the Code Geass: Lelouch of the Rebellion box set. I haven’t watched any of the episodes yet (it only contains 1-9 and I’ve seen them on T.V. already) but I did manage to put in the drama CD that came with it. I’m quite entertained by the second track. Shirley just received the concert tickets from her father and she begins to daydream about different scenarios that could occur if she asked Lelouch to go with her. The scenarios are all crazy and outrageous in their own right, but I love one of the dream-Lelouch’s answer: “How rude! I have my own plans you know! Plus my student council work and I have to do my homework, not to mention cooking, cleaning, gambling…” Axel and I burst into laughter as soon as we heard “gambling”.

Axel was borrowing my Mar collection while I continued to buy new manga volumes. The vast amount of manga that I own is currently crammed within two shelves of a small kitchen cabinet/hutch that I have turned into my very own bookcase. He recently returned the ten volumes and one volume of Death Note back to me and I had to somehow fit eleven volumes into a space that refuses to hold anymore. This raises an obvious red flag. Since purchasing new furniture for my bedroom, all of my actual books now currently reside in two bookcases on either side of my new television stand. I think I still manage to have a few books floating around my room because they won’t fit in the bookcases. Tragic, I know. Obviously, I must intend upon living in a maze of books. It would make sense for me to possibly stop buying so many books and, I don’t know, maybe actually exercising my library card? But that would make too much sense, and that’s just silly.

Since I no longer own a fish tank in my room (I had my fish moved to the larger fish community in the family room) there’s this vast empty space along a wall. It looks nice as it is because I don’t believe I have much empty space along any of the walls period. The emptiness is almost serene in a way; it’s so deprived and isolated of anything that it gives me a sense of peace. But sometimes, I look at it and I wonder, “What can I put there?” As I said, I could leave it empty, but the thought of purchasing another bookcase is tempting. And pathetic. I think my bibliophilia is turning into some bizarre drug addiction, and that’s something I don’t need especially when I’ve discovered I need either a) a new media tower, or b) a CD tower so I have more space for my games and DVDs. Getting a CD tower makes sense, but another media tower is just too tempting. I need the extra space anyway if I’m going to continue buying anime, which as far as I can see, I will be.

[EDIT] I recently upgraded to Wordpress 2.6.1, and I’m having technical difficulties. If you go back about two pages, the pages are blank and the posts won’t show because I’ve excluded a couple of categories for icons and albums. The code I had been using worked fine with 2.5, but it fails in 2.6.1. So, if you see anything that looks out of place (with the exception of blank pages on the home page) please tell me about it so I can attempt to fix it. I’ll be moving my icons and albums elsewhere in the next couple of weeks to fix my previous posts problem. [/EDIT]

After giving myself about two weeks to come up with a decent storyline — and then failing to do so — I was going to give up on this whole shonen-ai original oneshot. And then, by some sort of divine miracle, the pieces started to form three days ago after I had stopped thinking about. With only three days left remaining in the Intoxicated Designs’ contest, I hustled and tried to put together all of my thoughts to write a fairly decent shonen-ai story.

Since I wasn’t familiar with the genre, I was afraid that I was going to hit some bumps — and that wouldn’t be good with only three days left, right? But the characters paved the way, assuring me a very easy writing experience. I’m actually quite satisfied with the outcome of the story and may end up expanding it later. But for someone who continuously shunned away the entire BL (boy love) genre, I’m surprised to find that this story is actually one of my favorite ones that I’ve written thus far. Who knew that by challenging myself, I’d find “my own treasure”?

Written exclusively for Intoxicated Designs’ contest that ended in August 2008. Travis is about to get married to the woman he sees the rest of his life with, but the commitment seems daunting to him a week before their marriage. When he meets a man at a diner who suggests going on a road-trip to clear his mind, Travis reluctantly agrees and ends up finding the person he can’t live without.

Read “My Own Treasure”!

Oh, I also managed to finally see The Dark Knight yesterday. I finally see what all the fuss is about, and I must admit that I’d love to see it again. Heath Ledger’s performance, was without a doubt, Oscar material. I was ecstatic to see that Alfred’s character had so much more depth to him in this movie, than instead of being seen as the butler that works in the bat cave. And I loved to watch how versatile Aaron Eckhart was; I’ve only seen him do comedies or dramas, so watching him transform into Two-Face was amazing. As much as I would love to go on about how awesome the movie was ( ), I’m afraid I’m going to have to cut it here. If I don’t, I’ll end up spending half the day typing.

I’m a bit of an English nerd, so it really hurt me to even read it. Somehow I managed to get through ten chapters — someone in heaven is looking out for us; the chapters are extremely short — before I headed over to look at the 12,000+ reviews. The reviews are quite hilarious.

If you’re a huge fan of Harry Potter and don’t wish to see any of the characters be ripped apart to the point where the only thing that’s the same about them are their names (and sometimes even those got changed) please, don’t read this fic. However, if you’re a huge fan of Harry Potter and can think of this fic as a parody, then go ahead and read it. You would be amused to know that if you Google ‘worst fanfiction ever’, the first hit is the fic.

Read “My Immortal”

For my own sanity, I’m going to provide the first chapter here with corrections and my own notes. Those corrections and notes will be provided between bold brackets.

My Immortal, Chapter One — by XXXbloodyrists666XXX

AN: Special fangz [After much thought, I finally figured out this was supposed to be 'thanks'] (get it, coz [it's 'because'] Im [I'm (there's something called an apostrophe in the English grammar system)] goffik [Are you trying to irritate me by misspelling everything?!]) 2 my gf (ew not in that way) raven, bloodytearz666 4 helpin me wif da story and spelling. U rok! Justin ur da luv of my deprzzing life u rok 2! MCR ROX! [Translation: to my girlfriends (whom are strictly friends): Raven and Bloodytearz666, for helping me with the story and spelling. You rock! Justin you're the love of my depressing life, you rock too! MCR rocks!]

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

Hi [Um, hello? Shouldn't there be a comma here?] my name is Ebony Dark’ness Dementia Raven Way and I have long ebony black hair (that’s how I got my name) [My, how original...] with purple streaks and red tips that reaches my mid-back and icy blue eyes like limpid tears and a lot of people tell me I look like Amy Lee (AN: if u don’t know who she is get da hell out of here!). [This is really long. Honestly, you can shorten this sentence with the use of commas and quite possibly a semicolon or just break it up into two sentences. And why, oh why, are you putting in Amy Lee? Not everyone is familiar with Evanescence! And that author note, is just rude to your readers in the first place.] I’m not related to Gerard Way [who?] but I wish I was because he’s a major fucking hottie. [Right...because being a hottie is a good enough reason to want to be related to someone else...] I’m a vampire but my teeth are straight and white. [Ah, a Twilight reference?] I have pale white skin. [You stated she's a vampire, so being pale is going to be a given. Besides, this sentence should've been combined with the previous one.] I’m also a witch, and I go to a magic school called Hogwarts in England where I’m in the seventh year (I’m seventeen). [I highly doubt you'd be genius enough to skip a few grades.] I’m a goth (in case you couldn’t tell) and I wear mostly black. [Not all vampires are goths! So, no, I couldn't tell.] I love Hot Topic and I buy all my clothes from there. [Because there are so many in England and all the witches and wizards go buy their clothes at Muggle shops!] For example [I personally would've added a comma here or a colon.] today I was wearing a black corset with matching lace around it and a black leather miniskirt, pink fishnets and black combat boots. I was wearing black lipstick, white foundation, black eyeliner and red eye shadow. [Why white foundation? Isn't she pale enough?] I was walking outside Hogwarts. It was snowing and raining so there was no sun, which I was very happy about. [I understand that it can snow and rain at the same time. But when it does that, it's understood that there are plenty of clouds in the sky and little to no sun at all.] A lot of preps stared at me. I put up my middle finger at them.

“Hey Ebony!” shouted a voice. I looked up. It was…. Draco Malfoy! [Ellipses shouldn't be used like that; it's a crime.]

“What’s up Draco?” I asked.

“Nothing.” he said shyly. [My brain just stopped. Draco said something...shyly?! And are you seriously afraid of the comma? You need to replace it with the period after 'Nothing'.]

But then, I heard my friends call me and I had to go away. [But then? It's not needed at all.]

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

AN: IS it good? PLZ tell me fangz! [Translation: Is it good? Please tell me, thanks!]

If you loved my notes, then comment away. I’ll continue correcting/noting this fic if enough people actually enjoyed it.

I was searching for Code Geass images to use in a wallpaper a couple days ago when I happened to come across Intoxicated Designs, a graphic site dedicated to shonen-ai, or boys’ love. I am not in any way a fan of BL, shonen-ai (shounen-ai), or yaoi. In fact, I tend to avoid it at all costs. But when I saw the pretty contest link in the navigation, I couldn’t resist myself; I had to click it.

I found out that the site is holding a contest dedicated — surprisingly — to BL. As soon as I saw that I could enter an original fiction, my mind started churning. So now, I find myself trying to come up with a decent BL storyline that doesn’t sound cliched. As of right now, I have the outline finished. I don’t like the ending, at least for now. The reason behind entering this contest? I’ve never written anything close to BL, so I thought it would be challenging. Trust me, creating the two main characters without making them seem stereotypical is a challenge in itself. There’s really nothing much for me to reference on, except the stereotypical gay guy.

Surprisingly, I found my old CD where I put my old stories before I found the miracles of flash drives. I rewrote an old short story, and I should be posting it up soon. So, look out for that. And no, it doesn’t contain any BL. It’s more of a suspense story.

They have just started showing Beauty and the Beast a couple weeks ago and as soon as I found out, I decided to take my parents on a night out. The food was excellent. Especially the peanut butter pie. I even enjoyed the special dressing they used on their salads: papaya chutney. I was afraid I wouldn’t like it since I’m typically a ranch kind of girl, but change is good every now and then, right?

The stage wasn’t huge, but it wasn’t tiny either. I think what made the experience so amazing - even despite the lack of glitter and glammer in Be Our Guest - was the fact that it was an intimate setting. The stage was on the floor, so those lucky people sitting on the first floor were like…there. There really wasn’t a bad seat there, but I was lucky enough to snag a table somewhere near the center.

The woman who played Belle was amazing! She sounded so close to Paige O’ Hara (Belle) and her singing voice was so pretty! I read her biography in the playbill and was surprised to find out that she’s attending college. The very same college my friend is at studying the same major. Hm… Maybe they know each other? But I’m sure the woman who played Belle is two or three years older than my friend. I loved the entire cast (Chip was so adorable!) and they all did great except Mrs. Potts. Her voice cracked in the first song she sang and it was a little off in Human Again. Thank god she got her act together for Beauty and the Beast. I was worried that song would sound iffy with the way her voice was acting. Magic was brought to stage once again when the Beast transformed. It’s so amazing how they transform in front of everyone and he’s floating!! Between that scene and Be Our Guest, I’m not sure which one is my favorite. Perhaps they’re a tie.

On top of all of that, I managed to snag a souvenir glass and a collector’s item. I would have bought the entire Beauty and the Beast collection they had from Lenox, but it was pretty pricey, and the item I went with was the most expensive of all. But it looks nice. And I love it. What can I say? Besides anime, Beauty and the Beast is like my drug. Or maybe all things Disney is like my drug, but more so for Beauty and the Beast. And FYI, I almost came close to crying at the end. But I managed to hold it in. Thank god. The last time I went to see the musical (which was a professional troupe doing it with all the Broadway works) I was bawling by the end of the show out of fear that the Beast would die, despite the millions of times I’ve seen the movie. And then I ended up being so happy and marveled at the Beast’s transformation (if you know how this is done, please keep it a secret from me. I love the mystery of his transformation on stage) that I couldn’t stop crying.