vanilla salt

fuck blogspot

2011-02-07T00:18:00.001-08:00

Ok so I stopped writing in here because blogspot seriously sucks. If you want to continue reading about my awesome life story, visit ajinkris.wordpress.com for the new and improved blog!

Ciao blogspot. It was good while it lasted.

somewhat keen observations (inception ending)

2010-07-17T04:29:00.000-07:00

SPOILER ALERT
YOU HAVE BEEN WARNED
AVERT YOUR EYES NOW OR BE SORRY

I'm awaiting the barrage of analysis on the ending to start right here!
I want to hear what people think, but here are some observations my friends and I made after watching the movie:

[spoiler]
1. Mal's Totem: one of my friends pointed out that you never actually see Dom's totem, and that he uses Mal's totem throughout the course of the movie. Since they bothered to make such a big deal out of the totem issue, one can conclude that Dom never made an actual reality check because he had been using someone else's totem the whole time. One rebuttal to this argument is that Mal was already dead and that ownership of the totem is irrelevant as long as one understands the weight. However, how could Dom understand it if he never touched it in real life?

2. Waking from Limbo: another friend pointed out that during the final airplane scene, Dom and Saito wake up without any machinery attached. They also woke up without a "jolt". My argument was that the time it took for Dom to find Saito was in actuality just the short amount of time during the actual airplane flight. However, because Saito died and entered limbo, he had aged much more than Dom did when Dom showed up. The scene cuts from them reciting each others' lines because of the altitude drop serving as the jolt. By then, everyone had already removed the machinery and were just waiting for the two to wake up.

3. Spinning Top Scene: if the first scenario I mentioned is indeed correct, then Dom is actually so deeply wrapped in layers upon layers of dreams that he can no longer differentiate dream from reality. It's like that one Twilight Zone episode where the guy kept waking up from nightmares - except in this one the "dream machine" serves as Dom's way of constantly digging deeper into the dream world. While various sites have mentioned that this is supposed to be a "buzzed" and "open-ended" finale, I'd like to think that this entire movie was but a segment of Dom's larger dream that he never left.

[/spoiler]

*this is an excerpt from a forum post I made, so sorry for the lack of proper grammar.

the long awaited (scarce postings)

2010-05-12T22:52:00.000-07:00

So I don't write much here anymore. No, I don't have any new excuses, cause they're pretty much the same. I do want to talk a bit about what I've been up to lately though, cause I feel like I owe it to both myself and the few other people that read this blog.

First off, I'd like to say that my personal branding is indeed in the works. I agree that I could also say a billion other things are in the works, but I only have less than a year left until I graduate - it's best I begin thinking about how to sell myself. I have a few ideas, but none of them are truly amazing. It's going to take much more soul exploring to finally derive the perfect theme for myself. When that happens, this blog will no longer exist (sadly), but I will redirect all users to my new site! Look forward to this very much.

Secondly, I've been playing some Super Street Fighter 4. I'm actually spending a lot more time with this version of the game than I did its predecessor, though that doesn't mean I actually love the game. I plan on learning it to a decent level at least so that I may walk into a crowd or the arcade without embarrassing myself. Yes, Dictator is indeed still my main, but I do plan on learning Juri and a few other characters to that I may diversify my character vocabulary.

Thirdly, I have begun to play World of Warcraft again. It's been a long time, and I'm glad to find that upon my return I've been warmly greeted by all the veterans of the original founding members of my guild, Art of War. I must say that the quality of players has really improved; some of the people that I remember were fairly terrible are now leading the DPS meters or officers or both! What a change! I'm glad that players are able to grow and learn to become good at the game - it brings some sort of peace to my heart lol. After raiding twice so far with AoW in Icecrown Citadel, I must say that I definitely enjoy a guild where I only have to raid twice a week versus five days. Unfortunately, as well as I am able to dodge fires and void zones, I am unable to compete with the more geared players in the guild now on the DPS meters (I'm about 5300 gear score now, versus the other players who are around 6000 or more). Believe me though: as soon as I reach that level of gear, I'll be back in the top 5 for damage, I guarantee it. I pride myself in being able to optimize my gear, research the specs that yield the most personal DPS, and masterfully execute my Death Knight rotations. All it takes is time, knowledge, and dedication.

Lastly, I was invited to the World of Warcraft Cataclysm Alpha! I think there's a pretty heavy hand on the NDA right now, so I can't say much I'm afraid. I am going to end this post with a screenshot though (which honestly doesn't spoil that much), but I have to say that I am thoroughly enjoying the Worgen campaign and will definitely be making a Worgen alt when the release is out. There are a ton of other changes I'd like to talk about as soon as the NDA is lifted, so keep in touch!

The Worgen warrior animations are definitely the coolest!

Thanks for reading this, and have a nice fucking day.

the taste of sheer anger (a tale of lost sleep)

2010-04-05T05:07:00.000-07:00

I don't give a shit who reads this post, or what people think of me after tonight, or if people will get in trouble for it. I want to make sure that I am perfectly clear on what I have to say.

This blog post is probably going to be one of the more peculiar ones, as I am writing this "in the moment". To say the least, I am angry. It takes quite a bit to get me all riled up, but there are just a few things that send me over the edge rather quickly. Before I get into that though, let's flash back a week or so ago.

My parents would be out of town during spring break. This a green light for me and my sister to host gatherings at our pad. Skipping forward a bit, I had two miniature gatherings for some old friends of mine, and I promised to let my sister host something Sunday (or yesterday). So Cory and Genny come over and my sister asks me to pick her up two 30 blocks of beer. So now I know that alcohol is going to be involved in this party - okay sure whatever. I trust my sister enough that I know things won't get out of hand.

Here's where things get tossed into the haymaker. I have class at 7:30 the next morning, so I tell my sister to clean up after herself, and then hit the sack before midnight. Prior to this party, I asked my sister exactly what time it would end. She said it would take 4 hours (starting at 8). Okay we all know that 4 hours isn't going to happen, so I figured I'd give them an hour or two leeway. I try to fall asleep for about 30 minutes before realizing that it's going to be an impossible task. I then set myself to playing a bit of Final Fantasy XIII, hoping that it'd die down soon. It's 3AM and they're still noisy as fuck. I storm outside of my room to take a piss, except both our bathrooms are occupied, so I go to my parents' room. On my way back up the stairs, my sister and I make eye contact, and I give her an ice cold stare. If that wasn't enough, I slammed my door as hard as I could so that everyone at the party could hear it. I figured that my sister would wise up and tell people that it was time to either shut the fuck up or leave. Well, this bullshit continues for another 30 minutes and I'd had it. I call the house, and my sister picks up the phone in a cheery voice. I tell her to come upstairs, and she instantly changes her tone. "Okay".

All the lights are off in my room and I can hear her sniffling as she slowly climbed the stairs. When she gets here I drop bombs on her. "I thought this party was only going to be four hours? You know I have class in three hours. I probably won't even be able to make it because I'm deprived of sleep. You're denying me class, you're wasting my money, you're wasting mom's money." I am fuming at this point, and her rebuttals included that she couldn't get people to leave and that others claimed they were too drunk. I think this is the part that ticked me off the most. Don't invite people that you won't be able to control, and if they're too drunk, tell them to get a fucking cab. I tell her that I am THIS close to kicking everyone in the house out, including her boyfriend. I don't give a fuck if people don't have rides, I don't give a fuck if they don't want to leave, this is my fucking house and I need fucking sleep. She leaves my room and I expect some results. Well, it's still loud downstairs and now I am completely furious. Either my sister isn't being vocal enough about it or these people are all just meatheads. They had pulled the last straw.

My sister knows that I like to play Guilty Gear, and I know that you can hear the tapping sounds of my joystick in the entire house. I got out of bed, turned on the TV, and started playing Guilty Gear. I think that got the message across, cause the house turned pretty damn quiet after that. In my anger, I decided to just not sleep and so I am sitting here with my music and writing in my blog about this utterly pointless all-nighter.

I try hard not to be mean to my sister. I don't like doing it, and I feel bad when I am obligated to. I know she looks up to me in many ways, and it kills me to embarrass her in front of her friends. But some things just do not fly, and this is one of them. I realize it's also partly just mistiming, as today is the last day of my spring break while tomorrow is the first of theirs. Regardless, that doesn't mean I'm going to allow an underage drinking fiesta continue into overtime at my house, with a slew of strangers that don't want to leave, while I need to wake up at 6AM. I think I was already nice enough to buy alcohol for my sister, allow her to invite ~20 people to our house, and not tell the parentals about it. Part of me wants to teach her a lesson, and I know that telling my parents about it would be the most devastating way to do it, but I also know that doing so would literally destroy the rest of her years in this household.

In the end, I'm going to decide against it. I think she learned her lesson already when I expressed my anger towards her tonight. People might think I'm overreacting or a douchebag, but you know what, it irks me when my sister is unable to handle herself.

My body is fairly unhealthy right now and this isn't helping. Fuck I am tired.

stress test (and self realizations)

2010-03-16T19:38:00.000-07:00

Over the past month or so, I've come to realize the consequences that result from the "cause and effect" phrase, so famously coined by the Merovingian. On one hand, there is the me who wants to be funny and spontaneous, and on the other hand there is the annoying and offensive side of the exact same coin. At what point do I cross the line? Or in another case, I have a partner for an assignment that I feel is extremely under-performing and unable to take constructive criticism. I beat around the bush, hinting at that fact and eventually force my opinions through. At what point do I cross that line of courtesy? How about this very blog? The things I write on here are oftentimes insensitive and disrespectful. At what point does my free speech turn into feedback?

I feel like I have a unique personality type. I take things seriously and not so seriously at the same time, if that even makes any sense. I still go through the motions that life requires of me to become a successful being, but I do so in this third-person perspective that allows me to realize that in the grand scheme of things the little things we do actually don't matter. Sometimes, I forget about my own philosophies and I let these "little things" get to me. But I still can't help but to ponder and question myself: should I express myself and take the heat, or should I keep my thoughts inwards and suppress my urges.

I find the latter choice to be counter-productive to my very being. I have always tried to express myself, though tailored and edited, and have been supported in most cases. Sometimes I don't tailor correctly, or I come off the wrong way, and end up hurting someone else, and in return hurting myself. It's a fine line to walk. I bring up this topic because there have been, coincidentally, several occurrences that have caused me to question myself, my motives, and my thought processes.

I think every artist runs into this identity crisis. For me, this is not the first time. It's this sort of nagging, depressing feeling. Or as Bilbo would say, "like butter scraped over too much bread." It's this constant subconscious worry and self-doubt. In the end, I always find my resolve, but it always takes a little while. The truth is that people, in general, love being judgmental. Even the most open-minded person will still inwardly deem their own beliefs as the most righteous; they're just excellent at acting discreet about it. It is impossible to write something or say something, and not be offensive in some way or some manner, in context or out of context. If I said, "I love America", god knows how many people I'd be offending. Or even this previous sentence - not capitalizing "god" might offend Judeo-Christian believers.

So then what was the point of this whole post if you're just going to continue slandering the fucks that squander expression and take life too seriously? Nothing. Just some self-reassurance that I was born to piss half of you off and have the other half laugh about it.

I'm supposed to promise here that I'll be writing in my blog more, but that'd just be lying lol. More stuff on Magic philosophy and flavor, notes on my industry, and me raving about how not awesome my life is in posts to come. Good fucking night.

lifestyles (of the lazy and fat)

2010-02-17T00:25:00.000-08:00

Life moves on. My motivation, however, is not moving with it. I've learned that working and schooling simultaneously is a very viable reason to allow whining/bitching/sadfacing. When the weekend finally rises on the horizons, I am so facking tired that I don't even feel like going out, let alone sitting on my ass to write in a blog about nothing. And you will probably hear these complaints coming out of my sorry ass for an entire year to come.

I was about to write something nasty about my classmates, but I'll save that for another time. But for a chuckle, I guess I could let you know that for my speech class a guy decided to talk about how his online dating experience wasn't working so well. This is a lesson: don't homeschool your kids.

Burnt Toast: Guilty Gear Accent Core!

So two Saturdays ago, Black Chris (aka RaZyRbYrN or however the fuck you spell it) hosted our first ever SoCal Burnt Toast tourney in Walnut. For those who are unenlightened, the name Burnt Toast pays homage to the original West Toast, which was hosted years ago at the Family Fun Arcade. I don't really practice Guilty Gear like I used to, but I still try to watch some videos to see some of the new techniques and matchup nuances that happen over in Japan. The same can be said about most of SoCal though - none of us really play the game consistently anymore and we are all sloppy as hell now. It doesn't help that Blazblue really ruined a lot of players' strict habits that they had honed through Guilty Gear, where holding UP is not an option. Regardless, it was time to see how much I had improved over the past two years.

Round 1: Brett (The Sadder) playing Johnny

Brett is severely out of practice, so I sorta just do my thing and he doesn't really find a way in. In all honesty, I think Brett could be a pretty good GG player if he kept at it. His knowledge of the cast is pretty well-informed, so he has at least that in his side. During casuals later he sorta figured out how to play against Venom.

Round 2: Black Chris (RazyrByrn) playing Zappa

I think Chris and I have played this matchup a lot more than I've played ANY match in SoCal. We both know what we want to go for, but I usually come up on top because Chris isn't as aggressive as he should be in this matchup (IMO). He manages to take the first game thanks to tight play on his part, but I end up taking the next two after playing a bit more patiently. Reckless ball summoning is what'll get you killed here (or in any matchup really), but two mistakes and you're going to have Raou on your ass. What's weird is that Chris has a real hard time against me, yet in Japan they rate Zappa as being greatly favored against Venom. Weird.

Round 3: Mike Z playing Potemkin

Mike Z is out of practice, but that doesn't mean he's a pushover. As a person who is so technically immersed in all of the games that he plays, you can expect a lot of that knowledge and experience to re-seize his control systems. The matches were close, and in all honesty, I should have been able to beat him. Mike Z likes to do things on wakeup. It isn't a very good strategy, but it works for him, and this is America. To punish this, I like to set up very meaty ball formations to try and hit him out of his backdashes. Where I fail is in three places vs Mike: not remembering the Pot matchup, the inability to read his mixup, and missing my air-to-ground links. These three things combined give Potemkin enough leverage to kill me. It came down to the very last round where I threw it away by iad j.H into Pot's fat hitbox and landed short of my blockstring. Being close to Potemkin is a bad thing.

Round 4: Andrew (Dr. Stormlocke) playing Robo-Ky

Strom has always been good at this game. There isn't much to say. My win ratio vs Storm is probably 30% because he understands Guilty Gear habits well and punishes me accordingly. Some furious matches, and I will say that a few rounds we played I locked him out pretty hard. It all came down to me not blocking Robo-Ky's 5D though. Americaaa.

I ended up getting 5th place. Meh. Better than before, but I know I can do better.

Magic the Gathering: Elder Dragon Highlander!

I'm all for fun and retarded formats. This time around, I'm playing in a format that has been growing at a rapid pace.

Just a little blurb about EDH - it is a 100-card format much like Highlander. You pick a legendary creature to be your general and you may only play cards of your general's colors in your deck. You may also only have one of each card, barring basic lands. The interesting part of the format is that your general begins in the command zone; you may play your general from there at any time in the game, and return it to the command zone when it dies. That said, you want to build a strategy around your general or use a general that compliments a strategy, which creates a lot of fun interactions and cool combos.

Due to the nature of Highlander formats, games can be ended unpredictably and swiftly. A timely Armageddon or Warp World can really shake things up. But hey, that's what makes the format wild and fun. Politics are more important than how good your deck is to win, but honestly, winning isn't even that important. It's more about having a good time!

My current three generals are:

Xiahou Dun is my favorite (and subsequently a fully pimped-out deck). The deck is decent in 1v1 and pretty strong in multiplayer. By abusing recursion effects, you can constantly "witness" back cards to wrath the board, tutor for mana acceleration, and ultimately drain everyone's life totals.

Ghost Council is my multiplayer general of choice because he is built around sweeping and token generation. Xiahou Dun's main weakness is dealing with problematic artifacts and enchantments - both of which Ghost Council is adept at. By using enchantment-based token generators, I can wrath the board, save Ghost Council, and still continue my beatdown. Orzhov is definitely my favorite combination of colors.

Captain Sisay is a powerhouse for 1v1. At first I built her cause I thought she'd be a great toolbox deck, but I end up just tutoring for the same things, in the same order, every game. In the end she is a very linear deck with clear answers and an even clearer gameplan. Get Gaddock Teeg, get Hokori, get Gaea's Cradle, get Kamahl, get Crovax, blow up their lands, profit. I usually don't bring her out unless there's someone I really want to destroy. I would consider her on the A-tier of generals, right behind decks like Arcum Daggson, Rofellos, and Vendilion Clique.

I plan on building one more, but I'm not sure what yet. The problem is that all of my favorite colors splash into each other, meaning I'll have a lot of redundant decklists. I love board control, so that automatically means I'm in white or black. I might try a mono-red list like Akroma or Ashling. We'll see :)

Anime 2010: What am I watching?

Nothing spectacular really:

-Fullmetal Alchemist: Brotherhood

-Kimi no Todoke

-So Ra No Wo To

-Ladies versus Butlers!

-Mobile Suit Gundam Unicorn

Of these, I like So Ra No Wo To and FMA the best. Looking forward to Gundam Unicorn. Also, the Gurren Lagann movies are extremly hype.

Closing Out: Some Pics for You!

Apparently this combo is worth a $40 buyout.

My new awesome Eva 02 Swiss Army Knife!!!

Thanks to pulsr, my life is now complete.

Sorry for the writing delay everyone! And my bad, the formatting on this post is all jacked up - I updated the editor halfway through the post and am too lazy to go into the HTML to fix the problems.

consistency (or lack thereof)

2010-01-31T21:30:00.000-08:00

I feel obligated to pay my upkeeps and post on this blog every week. Lately, that willpower has been waning. I hate to sound like a little bitch, but school and work ARE really kicking my ass. So when I'm not actually tired out of my mind, I will post something meaningful here. And next time you're on the freeway asking yourself why the fuck traffic is going so slow and that the ONLY thing that could POSSIBLY cause this kind of slow down is a car on fire...well, be careful what you wish for.

Cheers.

nobody ever really quits crack (big black pimping in magic: the gathering)

2010-01-19T19:46:00.001-08:00

Cardboard crack, anyways. I promised a long time ago that I'd tell the story about how a stupid lunch table card game changed the channels of my thought processes and, ultimately, my life, forever. And that day will still not be today. Because I am fucking tired. Because school and work are draining my life away like a hooker drains my wallet. It wouldn't be so bad if I didn't have back-to-back 7:30AM classes. You guessed it - fml.

Today's random little blurb that has managed to surface itself from the bubbling muck of my brain's swamp-filled crevices - a short on my epic journey #2: to pimp my decks. I've always had this obsession about pimping my storm deck. Why? I don't even know why. The concept of the archetype is just so god damn intriguing like looking down a low-cut shirt. Anyways, my idea of pimp started way back when with TES (or THE EPIC STORM - what a fucking original deck name, Bryant Cook. You're such a fucking lucksack I hope you're not reading this) and I remember getting ripped off by this guy at my card store with plugs so wide that I could put my dick through em. A whole quarter-inch diameter. He sold me a playset of MINT (you can actually smell the leaves off these babies) Japanese Mercadian Masques Brainstorms. Hawt shit. BUT THAT'S NOT ALL. For a ridiculous price of *undisclosed*, he sold me a playset of MINT Japanese Time-shifted Gemstone Mines! HOLY FUCK! Back then, that's what I considered amazing pimpness. I was ONE step closer to achieving maximum Asian-ing (azn-ing? asian-ed? a's in ning?) my storm deck. Well, a week or two after that happened Wizards of the Coast R&D decided that Brainstorm was a broke ass card in Vintage and restricted the bitch pointing fingers at her head with yellow balls spinning around, meaning the price immediately went from 10 bucks a Brainstorm to 1 buck a Brainstorm. Well, three years after that happened, I don't even fucking play Gemstone Mines in my deck.

I'm going after the big fish.

Vintage and Legacy are the two prime candidates of the PIMP SLAP. Because of the lasting value of cards and that rarity of them, players are more willing to shell premium dollar to make sure they blind their opponents while playing a game of magical cards. Some cards, however, are immune to the pimp slap because the PIMP SLAP only goes as far back as Urza's Legacy (or for you non-nerd-literate folk, circa 1999). These cards are the money cards, because they are hard to find, expensive, and most of all, immune to the PIMP SLAP. They're all about the BB, the BLACK BORDER. I'm not talking about the Mississippi, I'm talking about the night-colored 10-point stroke that surrounds your magical card. You see, when a card is WHITE BORDERED, it has no protection, it's like it's naked. Disgusting and uncouth. Put on some clothes man, you're gonna give the women nightmares.

With that said, there are various levels of the BIG BLACK PIMPING:

Regular PIMP SLAP

Alright dude! It's coo, it's coo. Yo PIMP HAND is solid, I'll give you that. But guess what, it's a mothafuckin DREDGE deck. You know what that means? That means I could probably find these cards at WAL-MART. They're fucking everywhere. A real pimp knows that the TRUE GEMS are in the aged wine. Almost cool with those City of Brasses, but nice try.

AZNING PIMP SLAP

This is the LEVEL TWO PIMP SLAP A.K.A. CHING-CHONG-CHOOING. From the motherfuckin far EAST, these cards are hard as FUCK to come by. It takes some serious time and dedication to track these bitches down and shove them into your plastic SLEEVES. When you adorn your most favorite cards in a cryptic language that you can't even read, you're on your way to PIMPDOM.

MEGA PIMP SLAP

OH SHIT HOLD ON! What we got here? CHING-CHONG-CHOOAAAAHHH!! I'M BLIND! This is the MEGA PIMP SLAP!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! When you mix the far EAST with BLING, you will destroy minds. Not only can your opponents NOT read your cards, they get shined in the face when they try to read them. Props mothafucka. Too bad your farmer boys could use some pimpin.

BIG BLACK PIMPING

It might entertain you, or it might scare you, to know that this collection of cards is probably worth more than your car. We have here, foil Japanese fetchlands, signed Guru basic lands, signed Beta dual lands, the complete Beta Power 9, several custom-altered and signed cards (including a full playset of Force of Wills by Terese Nielsen herself), signed and altered playset of Mana Drains, and Japanese foils everywhere else. In Buddhism, they would call this enlightenment. In Magic the Gathering, we call it BIG BLACK PIMPING.

So, Chris, where are you on the scale of the PIMP? In other words, how STRONG is your PIMP HAND? My PIMP HAND is mediocre. I am trying to AZN out my storm deck, and I am nearing completion. All I have left to purchase is a playset of Japanese Lion's Eye Diamonds and I'll be finished. Two years of scrounging around has gotten me all of this, and I am extremely proud of my deck. I'll show it to you guys when I complete the bitch.

If you want to watch a good anime this season, watch So Ra no Wo To. I promise you won't be disappointed even though you have no reason to believe me since I predicted Rideback was going to be good.

it's back to the grinder (new years resolutions and shit)

2010-01-11T03:33:00.000-08:00

Well, my three month vacation has finally come to an end. I probably didn't get as much done as I'd like to have, but it was a decent run and had one helluva blast. Thinking about it only makes me want to return to China - oddly enough I feel like I belong there more than I belong here. Is that weird?

Stepping away from forbidden nostalgia, I'd like to talk about some (serious) resolutions I have for the coming year.

- Cleaning up. Seriously. I am a filthy mess. I'm not just talking about my car and room , I'm talking about my overall appearance, tousled hair and sloppy clothing. I actually want to leave a good impression on people, and my hermit clothing is in no way aiding that. The first thing to do is to revamp my wardrobe with some decent dress shirts. The upgrade from the t-shirt to a nice striped button-up is the initial step to looking presentable.

- Living healthily. Staying up late at night is a pretty good way to ruin your natural cycle. Ever notice how sleeping at 4AM and waking up in the afternoon leaves you in a zombie mode? Yea, it's cause your body isn't designed for that kind of abuse. Sleeping properly (and I mean going to bed before or at midnight) allows your body to correctly detox. It's not superstition, it's true!

- Organizing responsibilities. I'm pretty carefree about my education and sometimes even my work. It's pretty sad, because I feel like I am an extremely efficient person WHEN I AM FOCUSED. Most of the time my energy is just wasted doing absolutely nothing. I want to prioritize what's really important to me (work and school), then push them as far as they can go. In this way I am simply just maximizing my time/getting shit done ratio.

- Winning. I'm being a bit vague about this one, but I suppose this word is the best way to describe it. I am often the person who makes the compromise with the happiness of other people on my conscience. And the result is that I never truly win. I really have to reach out and push myself to obtain my goals. I'm not saying that I should kick everyone I know down into the dirt, I'm saying that I should be more aggressive about accomplishing things instead of sitting back and complacently seeing things pass me by. Too many opportunities have been lost with such an attitude. Definitely easier said than done, but I know I am capable of doing so much more. I just have to fucking do it.

- Women. I'm just going to stop right here.

Lastly, I have to end this post with a bang: Bayonetta. I can see why Famitsu would reward this game a 40 out of 40, as there are only a few very minor quirks about the game that I have to complain about. While I wouldn't go as far as saying it's a "perfect 10/10" game, I would still put it in the realm between a 9 and a 10. The action is really breathtaking and the over-the-top style is both humorous and exotic. People have put a lot of time into this game, and players have been rewarded with a sexy outcome. Don't believe me? Check this out:

Well, that's it for this week folks. Thanks for reading my bullshit for as long as you guys have!

human willpower (evangelion 2.0 - you can (not) advance)

2010-01-01T19:14:00.000-08:00

The title of this post not only refers to the glue that holds the human race together in the face of Armageddon, using angelic abominations to combat a prophecy set eons ago; it refers to the fact that I could not wait three more months for the DVD release of the Rebuild of Evangelion 2.0: You Can (Not) Advance.

You always hear me talk about movies and how they're so amazing and whatnot, but I will tell you right now: the Rebuild of Evangelion series so far has really set the bar for Japanese animated movies of the coming decade. The cutting is succinct and powerful; the rendering is awe-inspiring and flawless. Everything that needs to be said is said, and the omitted purposefully omitted for collateral effect. Unlike many previous anime movies I've watched, nothing covers the bases as well as these movies have. It would take VERY much to surpass this level of amazingness.

Because I did not write a review for the first Rebuild of Evangelion, I will begin with a small blurb I wrote for a review site about You Are (Not) Alone for those of you who are unfamiliar with the series (doubt it):

"Neon Genesis Evangelion was, and still is, beloved by the anime community for not only bringing forth exceptional animation and a compelling story, but for completely revitalizing anime in its slump during the early 90's. Amazing as the original was, fans were sorely disappointed with the ambiguity and elusiveness of the series' conclusion. Some people say the director was crazy; others say that the budget ran too low; and a few also claimed that the movie "End of Evangelion", was Hideaki Anno's stab at the fans for the hate he received for the original ending. Whatever the case may be, nearly a decade later, Anno returns to "rebuild" and re-imagine one of the most successful franchises in the history of Japanese animation. Without spoiling anything: to those who have never seen the original Evangelion, this movie is a perfectly fine way to get into the swing of things, as the biblical allusions and psychological tantrums are shrink-wrapped into a very understandable shell. For those who have already seen the original, you will be pleasantly surprised. Witness all of your favorite characters and moments, re-mastered, re-animated, and re-defeating angels in the final battle for humanity. The story has been abbreviated, cutting out all unnecessary fat, and highlights the most intense moments from the source anime. And while this anime to some may be nothing more than a rehash, Anno has promised the fans that the coming three movies will deviate greatly from Neon Genesis Evangelion."

Rebuild of Evangelion 2.0: You Can (Not) Advance

SYNOPSIS

It's almost daily life at NERV headquarters for Ikari Shinji, going to school and battling angels, till the pilot of EVA 02, Asuka Langley Shikinami, arrives. Obsessed with the need to prove herself as the most independently capable pilot, Asuka pushes herself against angel attacks but begins to realize that she will need the aid of friends in times of need. Shinji and Rei begin grow closer to each other, and Rei finds an opportunity to try and reunite Shinji with his father through a family dinner. All seems to be going well until the 9th angel appears on that very day.

(Please excuse the terribad screencaps. They're from a cam rip so I had to crop out the hair from the guy sitting in front of the camera.)

REVIEW (no spoilers)

As promised by Anno, 2.0 delivers a completely revamped and revitalized story. No longer overly concerned with its Judeo-Christian lore, Rebuild instead pushes the emphasis onto the tribulations of humanity. Stepping away from rampant negative emotions and Shinji's constant self-loathing, 2.0 re-weaves the story to create previously unseen, dynamic interactions between the entire cast. The movie ran the spectrum of themes with a much greater focus on comraderie and affection - two elements weakly explored during the TV series. Anno's new effort and planning is clearly visible as he rearranges key plot points to not only accommodate a 2-hour feature length film, but to greaten their impact. No longer is this only about a story of a young boy, faced with all the troubles of the earth, drowning in remorse and self-pity; this movie introduces all the colors of the human soul.

The one word to describe Rebuild is "growth". The series learned from its mistakes of the past. The new movies do not reinforce the cryptic messages and shadowy tones of the TV series, but have instead changed to cover all of the things that the original had shied away from. Now backed by an aura of overwhelming grandeur, Rebuild of Evangelion manages to redefine anime greatness.

The DVD for Evangelion 2.0 will be out sometime in the Spring. Look forward to extremely high-quality epicness. Next, wish me luck this weekend at the SCG 5K! And finally, HAPPY BIRTHDAY VANILLA SALT! IT'S BEEN ONE WHOLE YEAR OF MY RANDOM MUSINGS!

the story of cristobal (non-fiction fiction)

2009-12-28T22:13:00.000-08:00

~~~*~~~

There once was a girl named Cristobal, not to be confused with the glass object that Ursula uses to spy on people. He work in an apple factory that collected Mexicans that would collect apples for them. Her goal in life was to become a prince - but not just any princess. Cristobal wanted to become Prince. Purple rain. Rain down like sperm across a pornstar's voluptuous chest. This was the kind of princess that Cristobal wanted to be.

One morning, Cristobal woke up with a tiger uppercut and landed headfirst on the marble floor. As blood slowly pooled around his dying body, all she could think about was not being able to play Diablo 3.

~~~*~~~

Ok so I don't really have much to write about today, so I figured I'd post some pictures up for you guys. I have about 60,000 pictures that I've collected over the past 5 years of browsing the internet. And yes, this is 110% non-sequitur, so just don't.

Okay so basically after I wrote this post, I seriously debated whether or not I should have published it. Based on what you're reading now, you can decipher the result. I had a wtf Monday, give me a break. Vanilla Salt. Definitely a salty one.

embracing vicious lust (lady gaga live @ the nokia in los angeles)

2009-12-22T01:43:00.000-08:00

"Image". One sole word drives the unreal spiral of success that has pushed an outrageously bold figure into stardom. Lady GaGa is her name. To be honest, I started out with very little interest in her "dance music" that involved poking faces and disco sticks. However, YouTube mysteriously recommended a Lady GaGa music video to me one day, and being the crazy motherfucker that I am, I clicked it.

What the fuck just happened?

Masquerade masks, dalmatians, leather, all drenched in an aura of sex. Count me in. Ever since then, I began following Lady GaGa as her singles rose to success. It wasn't so much the music that got to me, but her image as an expressionist - like a rebellious teen that said "fuck the real world" and actually came out on top.

My sister and I saw Lady GaGa at the Nokia Theater on the 21st. Slightly disappointed that Kid Cudie would not be starting her off, we entered the place after paying $25 self-parking. Fail. The show started off with Semi-Precious Weapons. Not exactly my cup of tea, but it was entertaining watching the dude prance around in tights while yelling almost incoherently into the mic about biting down on diamonds and sticky champagne. After that came the intermission, which lasted a drudging hour and a half. I had almost wondered if the show was even going to happen when the lights finally dimmed.

Just...wow.

Lovegame.

The stage was set up with a "box" that would splay all sorts of different graphics and textures over the dancers while the background flashed different videos and images. I'm not going to post anymore pictures from my shitty as iPhone camera cause they won't do her justice. I was in a trance the whole time, consistently blown away by her AMAZING outfits and intense visuals. And when she hit her piano solos, I melted. Mentioning how critics would scoff at her for just making "bland dance music", she makes it a point to show that she can fucking sing like a nightingale and play the piano like a goddess on a harp.

She would talk to the audience quite a bit, and I'm surprised about her personality. Half of her is a regular girl, the other half is this star she wants to be. GaGa thrashes out vulgarly and boldly, but still hints at how appalled she was to have risen to such blazing success so quickly. She represents all of the closet freaks and artists within ourselves. No, I'm not talking about painters and goths. I'm talking about you, and your fear of liking things that society would not deem "acceptable" or "cool". Fuck it all; do what you want.

Lady GaGa announces her new global hand gesture, the "little monster".

In all, it was a great experience. I wouldn't hesitate for half a second before purchasing a live DVD because her performance left me flabbergasted. Her outlandish style very closely coincides with how I think and how my personal artwork flows: chaotic but focused at the same time. Society has seen too much of the same shit happen. This is the reason for her success: the need for something new, something expressive, and something unafraid of itself. We're at a turning point in the world of art and entertainment, and Lady GaGa is just step one.

Nothing much to say. Xmas, New Years, then back on the grinder. Yucks.

final cut (kara no kyoukai 7 - a study in murder [part 2])

2009-12-14T18:07:00.000-08:00

Although I was not fortunate enough to have caught this while it was still in theaters, I managed to snap a pic of this DVD poster while in Akihabara, Tokyo. The much anticipated wait for us overseas fans finally erupted over the past weekend as the final Kara no Kyoukai DVD hit the shelves in Japan. Two years of repeated excellence are coming to an end at last with the haunting and gratifying finale of, arguably, Kinoko Nasu and Type-Moons' best work to date.

While this may not be the most exciting installment of the seven part series, it offers very appropriate closure and delves into tying off the loose ends of several major themes that have run its course throughout the story. Finally, we see the reasons behind the complex mentality of Shiki, the unraveling of Souren's plans, and the ultimate cause and effects that led way for some of the most intriguingly discombobulated storytelling in the history of anything I've ever seen.

Kara no Kyoukai (The Garden of Sinners) -

A Study in Murder (Part 2)

(殺人考察(後)

SYNOPSIS

The story begins a month after the events of Oblivion Recorder. A series of gruesome murders in the back alleys of the city raises many eyebrows when eye-witnesses claim that a "person wearing a kimono" was seen at the events. Fueled by suspicion and worry, Mikiya Kokutou begins to track various leads that may unveil the true homicidal maniac, while still hoping that the recently missing Ryougi Shiki is not the culprit. Discussion with Aozaki Touko does not aid his conscience, as she talks of Shiki's lost alter ego and her need to fill that void of murderous intent. It then becomes Kokutou's task to save Shiki from destroying herself before time runs out.

REVIEW (spoilers!)

The key points of this final movie have nothing to do with Lio, the homicidal maniac, but rather Shiki's personalities and her relationship with Kokutou. Lio's role in this story was to disprove that Shiki's murderous intent was a blind one, since his homicidal habits were a result of Souren awakening his beastly origin, and not born from the pain and circumstances that Shiki endured. This is reinforced during Kokutou's conversation with Touko about the difference between murder (with intent) and slaughter (without intent). Shiki has been able to control the former all this time, while Lio's primal need for consumption demonstrates the latter. Moving on - the most important scene, to me, was the flashback when Shiki's alter ego chose to throw herself in front of the car. Two important notes on that scene: Souren's observation that Shiki should not be killed at such an early age (as he knew she carried the potential for something greater) and thus the spiral of contradictions that would ultimately lead to his own demise. The second is that Shiki's alternate ego, one who could not control the murderous intent, chose to sacrifice herself over killing Kokutou. The sacrifice was testament of Shiki's true desires to live a life of normalcy with Kokutou. Another very important theme that this movie touched upon was the idea of only being able to "kill one person in your lifetime". These were Shiki's grandfather's parting words right before he left the world - "We have but one chance in our lives to allow ourselves to die. They say it's your life, but that doesn't mean that it belongs to you. You can only kill someone once. Those who have killed someone once and used it up can never kill themselves, and never die as a human." Very deep words that carry a line of thinking I've never even thought of. In the final moment, when Shiki kills Lio out of revenge, she falls in the snow and wonders at how Kokutou wouldn't forgive her. Lucky for the both of them, a knife stab in the face isn't enough to kill Kokutou. While they embrace, Kokutou tell her that it's okay because he would be the one to "kill her" by bearing her sins in her place. This brings a roundabout back not only to the entire "killing one person" mantra, but the relationship between Kokutou and Shiki. The reason why Shiki was able to suppress the urge to kill and not fallen into the category of "homicidal maniac" is separated by the consciousness that loving Kokutou had given her.

As I've stated before, the movie itself was not the most impressive. In order to give fans their fill, the movie was lengthened to a full two hours, which I believe could have done without the extra half hour. A few things bugged me, namely: Mikiya still being a useless pussy (seems to be a running theme for main character guys in Japan), Shiki and him never kissing (reinforced), Mikiya having the hardest head ever, and much lost suspense by dragging out the film.

However, when I step back and look at the whole, it makes sense to do it this way. This final movie was a perfect, melancholic closure. The apex of the story was indeed during Paradox Spiral and the defeat of Araya Souren, but what is amazing is that his master plans and failed experiments are still in motion all this time and integral parts to completing the viewer's puzzle. The construction and storytelling of Kara no Kyoukai is what makes the series so intriguing, and the beautiful animation and effects that make it so breathtaking. Without a doubt one of the most amazing anime I've ever seen, Kara no Kyoukai will forever haunt my memories in all of its complex and horrifying beauty.

Thanks to everyone for my 21st birthday. Unfortunately, what happens in Vegas stays in Vegas. Maybe I'll bring myself to tell the "epic story" sometime in the future. In other news - got my Xbox360 only a year late. Grats me (thanks Genny!)

feeling blackjack (21 at last)

2009-12-08T00:40:00.000-08:00

I guess you could say everyone looks forward to their twenty-first birthday. But once you're there, you realize that all those "daring" things you've done in the past have just lost all of their thrill. I can sit down in a bar, order a glass of alcohol, and not break a sweat. Life's most primitive tribulations have now been solved.

I want to throw a thank you out there to everyone that showed up to my surprise party. I was literally stoked beyond words when I saw an entire table filled with my best buds. And it had to be at Carrows too. Epic. Hopefully I don't die this Thursday when I go to Vegas.

Where things in my life are heading

I am still in college, yes. It bores me to think that I'm going to have to return to that shithole for another year and a half of grinding. It scares me, because I feel like I've become overly lethargic over the past year. I know I can do so much more and that my capacity for great things is limitless, but when I look at what I've done, I'm really not impressed _at_all. They say that the best are naturally never satisfied with their work, even though their accomplishments are already considered amazing. For me, I feel like I'm lacking the latter portion of said statement. I have so many daring ideas to shatter the boundaries of conventional marketing and design - I have to get up off my ass and JUST DO IT.

At first I thought I'd be a fine artist. Then, I thought I'd be a graphic designer. Then, I thought I'd be an art director. Then, I thought I'd be a copywriter. Now, I think I won't be any of those. My path, which has strut itself in so many directions, has given me many opportunities to flex myself beyond my comfort zones and expand my arsenal of abilities. I really wonder what I will become, but I've decided to let the rivers of fate guide me along. I do know, however, that I will be spending the coming year completely revamping myself - cleaning up, branding myself, updating the wardrobe, and really pushing the envelope on my design projects. I'm looking forward to it.

And...I know this has nothing to do with anything I just said, but HOLYBUTTFUCK:

Things aren't as fast-paced as before, so I'm going to change the weekly quote and banner to a monthly thing. The truth is I just really like this banner rofl and am really lazy. ANYWAYS...

Things to look forward to...there are so many!

-Joa's HEADLONG Armored Berserk should arrive tomorrow or Wednesday!

-Kara no Kyoukai 7 DVD comes out in two days, which means we'll have hardsubs by the end of the week!

-Blazblue Continuum Shift is now at Arcade Infinity - time to practice up on Lambda-11.

-Two major MTG Legacy tournaments coming up towards the end of the month!

-Hopefully they'll announce the Rebuild of Evangelion 2.0 DVD release date sometime soon.

-Ditto for Diablo III. (Okay maybe not)

berserker barrage (not a marvel update)

2009-11-30T14:10:00.000-08:00

So, as promised to those who give a crap about my Berserk collection, I have an update today on the progress of my quest for epicness.

Skull Knight on Horse II

I think this was the first statue I saw that made me want to collect Berserk. It feels weird, knowing that I've finally obtained my "grail" statue. The proclaimed "best statue ever produced by Art of War" indeed lives up to its name. The detail on this sculpt is astounding, and the majestic aura that shrouds the piece definitely makes it one of my most prized statues. If I had one word to describe it: classy.

Meet the REAL grail statue

Well after commissioning Joa to paint my HEADLONG Armored Berserk back in June, we are finally nearing completion. I have to give props to Joa, because he has so far exceeded my expectations in virtually every way. I don't think words are enough to express how I feel about the statue, so I'll just let some pictures do the talking.

As for other things NOT Berserk, we have a major Legacy tournament hosted by Starcity on January 3rd. Expect me to be there with tendrils. Still deciding between ANT, ANT/DD, and NLS, although I have a good feeling I'll just be taking regular ANT to save myself the headache of trying to come up with Doomsday piles during an 8-round tourney.

My 21st birthday is in 2 weeks!

bloody hell (a love affair with dragon age: origins)

2009-11-22T21:03:00.000-08:00

So upon my return, I thought about playing World of Warcraft again.

I THOUGHT ABOUT IT, BUT DID NOT ACTUALLY GO THROUGH WITH IT OKAY? STOP JUDGING ME.

Anyways, I was doing my usual rounds around skullknight.net (one of the world's primary Berserk fansites) when I came across a Dragon Age: Origins thread. I remember the previews for this game, and I also remember not being impressed...at all. In light of recent reviews and a SLEW of screenshots that Aazealh (one of the site's mods) posted, I was utterly convinced otherwise. The primary reason? This game is single player. I had originally thought it to be another failure MMO trying to penetrate an impossible market that is already bloated with night elves. With single player, I can move at my own pace and ignore the bustling about that is required for success in an MMO. So, I downloaded the deluxe edition on Steam, and began playing it. What started as quite an awkward experience trying to adapt to a rather odd "RTS-RPG" quickly turned into adoration. The game was challenging, in some respects, but that's not really its selling point. The true charm of Dragon Age is in the choices and flow of the game. Much like several other popular RPGs (like Knights of the Old Republic and Baldur's Gate), your decisions in the game will ultimately affect multiple facets of your party and the outcome of the story. I find that fact extremely intriguing and worth tons of replay value. Being able to pause the game also means that you are able to make decisions without the stress of a time constraint and at the same time react to certain situations, evaluate, and act accordingly. The freezing also promotes screenshot happy people to break their print screen keys. I know I already have; check it out.

Meet Skuru. She don't fuck around.

Dual Wielding is totally my thing.

Another day in the life of.

Here, let me seal that wound for you.

Right in the nuts!

Meet my awesome team. Yes, all four of them are wearing plate, including Morrigan, my caster.

Alastair, my tank, doing werk.

Do you do dragons?

Not a problem.

This one is for Pat. Winged helms much?

Vanity shot #6794.

Moonlight romance. I totally hooked these two up.

Also, before I close this post out, I must mention a little something about my Berserk collection. By mid-December, my collection will be pretty much complete. I managed to FINALLY find a decently priced Skull Knight on Horse II, after looking for about two years. I don't have it in my possession yet, but both Joa's Headlong kit and my SK should be here before November is over.

Coming soon!

Anyone that wants to come with me to Vegas for my 21st, let me know! It should be during the second week of December!

in nippon (an otherworldly journey)

2009-11-15T11:37:00.000-08:00

OGAWA~!

So after my month in China, I was given the privilege to visit Japan! For the third time in my life, I'd be returning to my oddly distant home, where several of my hobbies are born from. I only had five days to spend in wonderland, so I had to make haste.

Mikado Arcade

The first night I arrived, I checked in at my hotel and was filled with a sense of immense gratitude. The bathrooms were CLEAN! The toilet paper wasn't THIN! The attendants were POLITE! What a fucking godsend.

My hotel room at the Shinagawa Prince!

Bathroom - it's clean!

I contact Sam (aka Raviloli on Dustloop) and ask him if we could meet up for dinner and then some. He responded rather quickly and we meet up at the Shinigawa JR Station (which was conveniently right across the street from the Shinagawa Prince).

Shinagawa JR Station.

We chit-chat a bit before finally deciding to eat at Denny's. I had not spoken so much English in over a month - it was quite a relief. Sam is from North Carolina and used to be a GG player (Potemkin), but has since then moved on to SF4. He plays Dictator, so we instantly connected.

Look at that classy Denny's menu.

We conversed, over a course of quality Japanese Denny's dinner, about the fighting game scene in the far east and then set off to the highlight of the night - Mikado. For those of you non-otaku, non-weaboo folk reading this, Mikado is one of the major arcades in Tokyo, Japan that places emphasis on Guilty Gear. They hold weekly tournaments, and ALWAYS have competition playing there, no matter which day you choose to show up. The JR ride was slightly unpleasant, as I became a human sandwich. I felt even more sorry for the women. Upon our arrival at Takedanobaba and a quick turn around the corner of the station, I finally arrived at the place that I had been longing to visit for years.

Mikado.

Guilty Gear everywhere. In other words, heaven.

Just fucking wow. That's SIX head-2-head Guilty Gear Accent Core cabs, WITH a projector and HD TV broadcasting the feature matches. Every person playing was seasoned and at LEAST as good as America's more solid players. Let's not even get me started on the famous players that I saw that night, including Misturugi (ZA) and Taku (SL). I put my coins in, rather unsure of how the rotating process works here. When someone loses, they'll usually get up, look around to see if there are any challengers, then open up their purse, and put in another coin. Being the greedy American that I am, I just kept putting coins in. I'm going to fucking feel the might and burn of Japan at my fingertips, so deal with it.

After about 5 hours of mashing, I walked out of Mikado, electrified. The level of players here is beyond the comprehension of America. Those people, who think they're hot shit here, have absolutely NOTHING on Japan. I consider myself about a level 7 (of 10) GG player in America. In Japan, I consider myself a level 4. That's below average, folks. These people have lived and breathed the game, every weekend of their lives, for the past three years. They constantly compete with the best players in the world, of every character in the cast, and dedicate tremendous amounts of time to the mastery of their matchups and technique. How can America compete with that? They can't. The convenience of riding a 20-minute JR line to the nearest Ogawa is non-existent.

"So did I do well?" you're asking. Well, the short answer is no. Against the average/scrub players over there, I can trade games. Against anyone slightly above average, I will get beat up bad. Against anyone pro level, I will get destroyed. These guys won't let you breathe, won't let you poke, and won't let you make ANY mistakes. I think one time I missed a run-dashing j.K on a K.ball seisei oki and I died for it. I managed to play against Misturugi and Taku that night as well. Mitsurugi wouldn't let me touch him, and his mixup and poking game were FAR more advanced than any Zappa I had ever encountered before. I kept getting beat out left and right - the feeling was a black, disgusting despair. Against Taku, there was a different feeling. I'd spend an entire match zoning him out, trying extremely hard to outpoke him. He'd be relaxed the whole time, even when I began using non-conventional mixup. Then, one counterhit, one DoT FRC and I'm dead. Happened for about 10 games in a row. The level of execution and matchup knowledge here is sick. I think I woke up in cold sweat cause I dreamed of Taku 5HS counterhit a wakeup backdash. Scary.

Akihabara

The haven of nerds. I had finally arrived in the place where all of my interests meld into one. To save you the headache of my week-long endeavor, I will just post some pictures and caption them. Yes, I spent four days here (including the last day before my flight) and I still don't think I covered all of it.

English for the noobs.

Crowded as hell.

Big ass posters on the side of buildings. In this case, two favorites: Bakemonogatari and Kara no Kyoukai <3

Not just a Korean MMO.

Evangelion Pachinko!

This is for Joa.

I found the Berserk!

Kenshiro at his best.

This Saber figure is HUGE and BEAUTIFUL.

MTG in Japan!

Food ordering machine.

Amazing beef bowl. The secret? Add a raw egg on top.

Club Sega

Located in the center of Akihabara, Club Sega features 100yen 3/5 GG games. The competition here was more fierce imo. I saw many more strong players and even met Ogawa! Probably the highlight of my fighting game trip, I took a game off Ogawa. It wasn't sheer luck either, I had some good oki setups, annoying evasion, and little eddie poking. One game, when he was at about 5% life left after a knockdown, I did my Carcass Raid charge > cancel > dash throw trick. Of course he had the reactions to jump, but motherfuckin 5S.c OPTION SELECT FOR THE WIN. 3rd hit connects, j.P j.S jc.S j.D victory.

The place where Americans get destroyed.

"Hay guys wat u wanna do after werk?"

Taku owning pretty hard.

Coincidence with Tiffany!

It must have been pure chance that Tiffany would be visiting Japan at the EXACT same time as me. She came to see Laura, a junior high school friend of hers. It was pretty chill, as we spent the day in Akihabara (big surprise). We ate at GO!GO! CURRY and then shopped around for the rest of the afternoon. After we visited Art of War, we had dinner at Denny's (again), before having to say goodbye. Unfortunately I don't have the picture we took together, as it is on her camera, but just check out her Facebook after she uploads it.

Pigout.

GO!GO! CURRY sign, live-trace gorilla included.

That was one fucking huge plate of katsu curry.

Art of War

Being the Berserk fanatic that I am, I of course had to visit the Art of War headquarters. It took Tiffany and me about an hour of aimless walking to find the place, as it was underground in some office building in an area full of banks. We spent about an hour there, chatting about past, present, and future products with Songe Lee, the international agent. I even got to see a few statues in person! I now have to obtain a Skull Knight on Horse II.

Wasn't supposed to take this pic, but I'm a sneaky bastard.

Songe Lee and me! (that rhymes)

Back Home

It rained hard the last day. I spent the entire morning in Akihabara looking for COSPA and doing some last minute shopping at Animate. Check out some of my spoils from Japan!

From left to right: 3 keychains - Berserk Beherit, Kara no Kyoukai Eye, Evangelion Unit 02; Ryogi Shiki Nendoroid; Unit 02 Revoltech figure (2.0 movie edition); Saber Lily Nendoroid; Rin Tohsaka coin pouch; Evangelion NERV headphones; and Fate / Stay Night Metal Charm Collection - Azoth Blade (used by Rin Tohsaka).

OMG - Ryogi nendoroid is TOO cute!

Around 2PM I got on the bus headed to Narita Airport. My long, long journey was finally coming to end. I felt kinda sad - something I wasn't expecting to feel. My time here in Asia was something to be treasured.

Of course on my arrival, the first thing I did was eat some fucking amazing breakfast foods (that were definitely more oily than I remember). And when I got home, I unpacked my 20th Anniversary Armored Berserk. What a fucking beauty.

So I'm back and I have a lot of crap to catch up on.

-Joa's buildup of my kit will be coming in about two weeks-ish. Meanwhile, I bought a steel track with lights to install on my ceiling and give my whole setup an epic appearance. Expect a pretty picture heavy post when that happens.

-While in China and Japan, I spent a lot of time researching Legacy (cause I was freaking bored). I've been fishing a new storm combo deck called NLS (Next Level Storm), and am probably going to the Knightware tournament on the 22nd. Doomsday is fucking rad.

-Anime I've been watching FYI: Fullmetal Alchemist: Brotherhood, Darker than Black - Ryuusei no Gemini, Bakemonogatari, Kimi ni Todoke, Kampfer (please don't shoot me), and Fairy Tail. Considering a few more, like Letter Bee, The Sacred Blacksmith, and Book of Bantorra, but not enough time.

-I have about ~7 weeks before school starts again. I will be spending this time at MEDL Mobile and working on several side projects that I have. This includes revising my book pieces, improving old stuff to put into my book, finishing branding myself (already have the idea, just need to execute), designing the package for a friend in China's wine company, designing the labels for my dad's herbal product, revising my dad's business cards, and researching art lounges / galleries for when my aunt comes to America and plans to set up a store. Good shit.

-While watching Darker than Black 6, I was in the middle of eating a Chipotle burrito. When I found out it was YIN in the box, my jaw dropped and a bunch of burrito innards fell onto my carpet, which my dog then ate.

a month in the red country (a tale of beer, cigarettes, and 1 dollar fried rice)

2009-11-06T06:52:00.000-08:00

China - a land of growing prosperity, a culture of deep history, and the cheapest fucking food in the universe. I have many profound things to say about my brief visit to the red country, but first I must proclaim that beer is cheaper than water. Think about that for a second.

Since the beginning of October all the way till now, I've been in Guangzhou, China, exploring the other side of the world and experiencing what my distant biological origin has to offer. I've learned many things - sad things, funny things, amazing things, but most of all I've learned that China, while evolving rapidly, is stuck in the uncomfortable position of growing out of its old shoes. Not only was I able to witness the daily routine of city-dwellers, but I was introduced to all different facets of the design and marketing industry thanks to my dear aunt, Amy. I shadowed around an ad agency for three weeks, and spent some time visiting her large print factory. While I will go into more detail about this later (probably in an entirely different post), my realization is that China is second to no one when it comes to execution and technique, but utterly fails when it comes to innovation. The "traditional" mentality of both clients and marketers are forever in this awkward state of wanting to progress while still maintaining the flavors of China. The result is an ad nauseum of ideas that carry no variation from one brand to the next. Because of the over-abundance of people, the value of labor is non-existent. A country that does not care for the well-being of its own populace, drowned in selfishness and progressive mongering - this is the China of today. And while it may seem that all of these are negatives, it is because of peoples of the Republic of China, in all of their concentration and unfaltering dedication, that persevere and are able to catch up to the neo-world over the span of twenty years in comparison to the hundred that Western countries have had.

That's enough talk about the state of China. Let's move on with MY story!

Crossing the Pacific

Courtesy of Mr. Takanawa

I told myself I wouldn't watch a tear-jerker. There's nothing more awkward than trying to block the person sitting next to you's sight with your elbows while you quietly whimper. While I started off by watching Evangelion 1.0 (You are "Not" Alone) (amazing) and "Tomorrow Never Dies" (I know fucking random right? rofl), I ended up watching "Dear My Love", a Japanese love-comedy-drama about three couples re-discovering the meaning of "love" at the age of 60. I'm not a sucker for chick flicks nor was this movie a chick flick. However, while watching this movie, I will proudly admit that I had use my elbows to block Mr. Takanawa from seeing my watering eyes multiple times throughout. Japanese - they know romance-tragedy, and NOT the kind that involves cancer and memory loss.

Sai no Rabureta, "Dear My Love"

I would usually write something about the airplane food but I honestly don't remember what I had to eat. All I remember was that on the transfer flight from Tokyo/Narita to Guangzhou, I sat next to a Pakistani dude (lol talk about awkward being an American right?) who ordered this special Pakistani food that smelled just as bad as he did. He also sat cross-legged on the seat with his shoes off, so I had the wonderful pleasure of having a curry scent added to my meals. We had polite conversations - apparently he was a businessman who had been living in Japan for near 20 years! He even has a Japanese wife! All the while I was thinking to myself: "props to her! She must really fucking love curry!".

A Life by the Lake

I arrive in Guangzhou pretty late at night. Customs were a fucking bitch and I ended up being the LAST person in line to get my shit stamped and whatnot. Amy and her good friend, Xiao Jun, were there to pick me up. I slept pretty well in the car, and when we arrived at my aunt's house, I was literally awestruck.

Breathtaking view of the lake from the third floor of her house.

Xiao Jun snorlaxing on this stylish couch.

My aunt has great taste. A very modern looking home.

I knew that my aunt had a son, but when the front door opened there was a cute little girl waiting to take my shoes and give me a pair of household sandals. I thought to myself: "oh maybe it was a daughter and not a son?" But then her son came out from his room and only then did I connect the dots - she was the house maid! Talk about what-the-fuck-baller! (Only later did I realize the sad truth that she only costs $150 a month to do all of the cooking, cleaning, and housework) Amy prepared the glass house on the third floor for me to sleep in. The experience was breath-taking, laying on my back, seeing the scenery 360 degrees, the stars and the moon, with a gentle, cool breeze from the lake caressing my skin. What-the-fuck-baller indeed.

The Story of Ah-Tsun

Let me begin my explaining the nick-name system in China. Chinese names are comprised of three characters: Last name followed by middle name followed by first name. When you call someone by their nick, you take the last character (in other words, the first name), and add an "ah" to the beginning of it. When I woke up for breakfast the next day, I smelled something wonderful from the kitchen. The house maid, Ah-Tsun (which stands for "orange"), was making Chinese pancakes and a buttload of various dishes. I was thinking to myself: "wow this girl can do quite a bit at such a young age". The craziest part is that she looks like she's 12, but she's actually 18! You can never tell with asians. She always puts up a smile and never complains about anything, and so when I inquired later about her story, Amy spilled the beans. Ah-Tsun came from a family that was so poor that they often times could not afford to eat. Her father is sick and her mother works two jobs, desperately trying to support the family. At the age 16, after highschool, Ah-Tsun decided to give up her pursuit of higher education and enter the workforce to pay for her father's medical bills and to support her younger brother so that he may achieve what she could not. However, the age requirement to work in the city's larger factories is 18. One of Amy's management underlings hired Ah-Tsun out of pity, and she spent several months in the print factory. One day, Amy was inspecting the factory and caught sight of Ah-Tsun.

"How old are you?!" she demanded.

"Sixteen."

"Too young, get out."

While this may seem harsh and cruel, understand that the punishment for under-aged factory workers is heavy-handed. When Amy's underling explained Ah-Tsun's situation, she grew soft-hearted (who wouldn't?) and devised a proper solution. "Come home with me."

And that's her story. While I sometimes feel bad for her, she doesn't really feel this way herself. Growing up in a situation like her's is not all the uncommon in China. While Ah-Tsun wasn't really a central point of my trip, her presence and story had a large impact on me. This young lady, in front of me, has and is still enduring hardships far beyond my own comprehension - and meeting it all with a smile.

What is Considered a "Pretty Good" Hotel

So after spending the weekend at my aunt's lake house, it was time to get down to business. We drove to the city, which was about 45 minutes away, and I finally got a good look at urban life. What's the word to describe the feeling I had - people. There's so many fucking people everywhere it's god damn ridiculous. Xiao Jun pulls up at the corner of some big street and we get out of the car. The reception area looks pretty nice, but don't be fooled.

My room in a nutshell.

Yes, the toilet is connected to the shower. Or rather, the whole thing is one gigantic porcelain bath.

That is hair in the drain from the previous lodger. Awesome.

My humble little setup.

The metal in the water heater is rusted. Yummy.

My ghetto laundry rack.

Of course I can't and won't complain. Compared to some other places I've been to and seen, this was an absolute godsend. Either way, I had to bear with it, as my next 30 days or so would be spent in this room.

Print Factory

Amy then took me to visit her print factory, which was something like what I expected - in a broke, poor-ass neighborhood with a lot of workers, a lot of big machines, putting out amazing products. Take a look.

Ad Agency

The last stop of the day involved the ad agency that I would be shadowing for the next three weeks. This place is no joke. Located on the 17th floor of the Dong Bao tower, 天罡道 Toguidance Advertising Agency boasts several large clients, including Konka (a major electronics brand in China). Amy was classmates with the owner, and friends with the creative director, Quinton or QT. I was introduced to the offices and would be coming in every day to experience life in the agency.

Dong Bao Tower

That night we had dinner and they dropped me off at my hotel room. As I walked into the oddly crab-stenched room, I sat down on my bed and opened up blogspot only to realize that I could not. This was going to be a long, long journey.

The next morning, I woke up rather early. Having slept at 10PM the previous evening, it was only natural that I went downstairs at 7AM and started looking for something to eat before heading to work. I ended up just buying some bread at the store downstairs because I was located in an area with more business working places and less food carts / small restaurants (only did I find out later that these places were all hidden in the alleyways!). After breakfast, I decided that I would leave around 9:30 and arrive at my workplace by 10. I ended up arriving about 11 because I totally walked in the opposite direction (thanks to some poor directions by a local asshole), and fast walked till my otaku legs were on fire. You have no idea what the feeling was like - lost in a major city, walking in some direction HOPING you were on the right track, and still not seeing that gigantic tower with two huge red letters "DONG BAO".

Upon my arrival, the super-cute secretary sat me down in a little ring of people and introduced me to Ah-Sunh, my art director. I would eventually be helping them design the front of an up and coming laptop brand named Lapad. The next three weeks were quite fun, as I made friends with them and had some great laughs. Here, I'll share some of them with you; they have pictures to go with them lol!

My art director, Ah-Sunh, and Xiao Ing in the back.

Ah-Ming being a retard while Ah-Sunh is stressing over a deadline.

My other humble little setup.

Ah-Jie doing what he does best when he's not playing World of Warcraft.

Ah-Ming diligently taking notes.

nvm.

There's a hilarious story to this note. One of our coworkers decided he wanted to take the day off so he wrote down on the sign out form "going out to buy something". Of course he never came back that day, and the secretary called him and owned his ass. The result is this absence slip, docking his pay for the entire day. Reason? "Went out to buy something".

Eating a grand dinner with QT and co.

My work came to fruition, as the design I created will be used as the packaging for all Lapad laptops!

During my time at work, we often had to stay till about 9 or 10PM before we could clock out. This kind of mandatory overtime is not at all uncommon in China. As a result, my coworkers and I would often go out to eat dinner. We ate at this one place like 10 times, but I didn't mind, cause the fried rice there was only a dollar and fucking bomb.

The Food

Ok time out on the story. I have to do a blurb about the food here, cause it was definitely focal point of my trip. Let me start by saying that I lived off of about 80 bucks USD during my entire stay in China (sans purchasing some brand-name clothes - more on that in a bit). These 80 precious dollars included all of my meals, snacks, drinks, and traveling costs. Hell, I even paid for some of my co-workers' meals. Food is literally worthless here, but that doesn't stop it from tasting ridiculously good. Some of the best Chinese food I've ever had, without a doubt. Check it out.

The best fried rice I've ever had in my life.

The best fried rice I've ever had in my life to go.

Grand Master Chef Xiao Jun

Does that look fucking delicious or what? Homemade ftw

Potstickers and quail eggs. De-fucking-licious.

This place was one of Amy's dear clients. The guy cooked up a fucking storm - something like 12 dishes.

Cow Brain Soup. Excellent flavor.

Tian Jing style food. This stuff was really, really tasty.

Porridge with chunks of yo tiaw inside. A treat from Ah-Sunh.

Fish wrapped in rice patty.

This was the best meal I had during my stay in China. In this pot is about 12 frogs. The flavor and texture was to die for. Add in meatballs, lamb and beef slices, and some vegetables, boiling in a spicy broth - amazing.

Leon, Amy's husband, is stunned by all the dishes here.

Yes that is a bird's head. Yes I sucked the brains out of it.

More home made cooking by Xiao Jun! We've got eggplant, beef n potatoes, and bamboo shoots!

I had to. This was during my first Friday and I was going to fucking celebrate.

Absolutely delicious. You wish America had fast food this good.

Another obligation. This time however, the food tasted exactly like American. In other words - fattening but fucking delish.

The Last Supper for me in China.

How I Spent my Weekends

After a week's worth of hard work at the ad agency, my aunt invited me out to Xiao Jun's birthday party. What did this involve? Karaoke...and drinking. Lots of drinking. After I pounded about 12 beers, my head was pulsating from the alcohol. That's when things started to get interesting, as me and this extremely cute chick chit-chat about my life in America. Bitch wanted my green card, I could tell at least that much. I ended up shrugging it off since she was pretty drunk too, but she ended up giving me her business card (to which I have not responded yet - and don't plan to lol).

Karaoke commence!

I LOVE BEER AND GIRLS.

This chick to the left was the girl I was talking about.

Xiao Jun is a little bit too happy

...and wasted.

Everyone was yelling into the microphone and the lone bathroom in our karaoke room had vomit all over the sink. Around 3AM, I decided I had had enough and packed my shit and went home.

I didn't wake up till about 3PM the next day, but today I had a goal - to find a Guilty Gear Accent Core cab. I went ahead and hit up Tainhe Tsun and Bai Shong Guang Tsang. What did I meet with? The first, a Guilty Gear Slash cab without a dust button. Fucking awesome. Second, only a Blazblue cab with no one playing it. Epic. Fail. I went home somewhat sad, but thank god I found Stunedge and he ended up hooking me up with the Guangzhou GG scene.

A mall is worthless without a good arcade.

The next Friday, I went out to City Hero, an arcade that actually has an Accent Core cab and Accent Core players. There were a few guys there: a Dizzy, Zappa, Slayer, May, Bridget, Ky, and Sol. I made quick work of the Sol, Bridget, and May players, but the Dizzy and Zappa were made of something else. Between the retarded IAD crossup shenanigans, I was really starting to pull my hair out. The Zappa player was extremely aggressive, which is a bit odd from my experiences. The Slayer and Ky players were very good as well, but nothing I couldn't eventually trade games with. Overall, the Guangzhou GG scene is solid, but nowhere near the might of Japan (which I have come to experience prior to writing this).

I FOUND THE GG SCENE!!!!!!

On Saturday, I had my epic drinking day. Amy's husband's classmate opened up a small "Gypsy Den"-like lounge over in Tian He, and my first impression of the place was quite good. The dim lighting and ornate decorations set the mood for a great night. The owner introduced to us their signature drink, Long Island Iced Tea (go figure). The shit was good - slid down like silk. While conversing about the tribulations and trials between American and China, we had downed somewhere between five to six pitchers of this stuff. For those of you who aren't familiar with the contents of Long Island Iced Tea, we have here Tequila, Gin, Rum, Vodka, Triple Sec, and of course Coca Cola to fool our eager bodies. Around this time, the owner invited two female employees to come sit with us. One had to leave early, but the other one and I totally hit it off. We talked with my aunt about how our generation doesn't believe in male superiority, and that Amy was in a tight spot because she had to appease her husband's traditional thinking while still pushing forward her very successful printing business, which had long cast a shadow over his own income. She was born in the same year as me, and we said cheers to that about ten times, ten shots. The owner, who has NEVER been drunk before, started to get dizzy, and being the gentleman that I am, decided that I'd vouch for him. In honor of my distant Jiang Xi brother, I took about six shots for him, ontop of my own. At one point in time, I remember drinking all six shots on the glass holster. I must have had a total of 30-something shots that night. The female worker was thoroughly impressed and told everyone that she liked me very much. Eventually we sat next to each other and she started whispering in my ear. I don't really remember what she said, but I was kinda sad that I couldn't get to know her better, seeing as I'd be leaving Guangzhou so soon. When I got up to pee, I was already starting wobble left and right. It was about time to go. Amy had the worker take me back in a taxi. I almost thought about asking her to come up to the hotel room with me, even though I probably wouldn't have even been able to get my dick up, but decided not to do anything stupid. Instead I asked for her name and told her that I would come see her again before I left. Too bad I don't remember her name at all.

Beautiful shot glasses. My lips have touched every single one of them.

The bar counter. Pretty awesome place

My aunt and the owner, talking about something I don't remember.

The best picture I have of that girl. I would totally ask her out if I was still over there.

I woke up the next day around 4PM and it took me a few hours to get over my hangover, which was very much aided when I called the lobby and asked the bitch to order me a large pizza from Pizza Hut. Their large pizzas are the size of our medium ones. Fucking a. I devour the commercialized-Italian piece of junk food and spend the rest of the entire day catching up on anime.

You have no idea how good this was to me.

The next weekend I attend Amy's coworker's wedding. Once again, more drinking, but this time a lot more pics. I also score this one girl's number, but she never called me and I never called her. I might have given her the wrong number though, cause excessive amounts of wine and beer does that to people. Check out some awesome pics.

Xiao Jun and me!

Me with some of Amy's underlings.

Me, Xiao Jun, Leon, and Amy (with an insane hair do)

"On noes I am teh durnk!"

The Last Few Days

I spent my last week with Amy mostly. We went to the Guangzhou International Convention and caught sight of potential business (which I will talk about later). To suffice, we found very cheap access to high-quality paintings and hope to begin a business in America for Amy after she moves here. Amy also decided to buy a freaking massage chair on top of several sample paintings. I ended up waiting for the show to end and them to pack up the all of the chairs at the booth (which took about 3 hours). Luckily there was also a cute girl that I had the chance to make chit-chat with. She was a recent graduate of a local college and began working for this massage chair business right out of school. It was fun, but all good things have to end. We spend about an hour trying to figure out how to fit about 10 paintings, 5 gigantic frames, and a freaking massage chair into a tiny ass van. By the time we had packed up, it was already about 9PM. I end up spending the night again at her lake house after Amy decided that the massage chair should go there. It felt extremely conclusive, to have begun the journey here and finally seen it for the last time before leaving.

Guangzhou International Convention

We spend my last day drinking again with some of Amy's associates and I have to wake up at 6:30AM to catch my 9AM flight. I get pretty much no sleep, as my mind raced with thoughts of Japan. We wake up, eat a hearty breakfast, and bade each other farewell before speeding off to the Bai Yun airport.

In retrospect, I must say that I experienced a lot during my stay in China. As I sit in the Shinagawa Prince Hotel in Japan writing this, I can tell you that China is really a one-of-a-kind place. A period in my life that I will truly never forget. I'm sure I have more to say, but this is already long-winded enough and I'm also drinking a Japanese juice that I thought was juice but was actually an alcoholic beverage. Great.

Coming Up! Rantings about my stay in Japan!

superfast update (in JAPAN)

2009-11-05T23:49:00.000-08:00

Hey guys!

To all those wondering what the hell happened to me, Big Brother China decided that Blogspot, Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, Myspace, Google Images, and Hulu weren't cool enough for the gang. So what's the result? I super-mega-fucking-huge post that's about to come in the next few days. Stay tuned, cause I have A LOT of stories to share, and even more pictures to go with them.

Brb Guilty Gear.

a la china (101st post)

2009-10-09T00:19:00.000-07:00

Sorry to everyone I didn't get to say goodbye to. The week was very, very hectic, as I spent probably 30 hours in the office trying to buildup new pages for about 10 different new apps, as well as designing a bunch of new features and embedded flash stuff. The hardest part of the whole thing was not being a web major lol. I had to really figure everything out on my own. While frustrating at first, the end results ended up being twice as rewarding (both personally and literally). Hopefully I can continue to maintain and update the MEDL remotely from China - otherwise my buddies at work are going to have one helluva time. Also if you guys have an iPhone, check out our new game: BOXHEAD - THE ZOMBIE WARS. It's coming out in a week, and after all the bug fixes, is a total blast to play! Support my hard work and enjoy yourself at the same time! Also coming soon - Boxhead viral video of my friend getting shot by a paintball gun. GET HYPE~!

I managed to finish up CANAAN between the cracks of my time, and my verdict is mixed feelings. There were some parts of CANAAN that were done really well, like character complexities, but between the fanservice, over-exaggeration, and convoluted story-telling, too much was lost in the translation. What could have been pretty freaking awesome ended up just being average. It's hard to say "average" though, cause the series had peaks and lows, not a steady feed. Some character relationships were just weird or even annoying (like Maria X Canaan, Mino X Haako, and "oh god =.=" Cummings X Liang), although the setup between Siam, Canaan, and Alphard was done in a way that really piqued my interest. I love it when the past is broken up and slowly revealed throughout the plot, only to finally hit the nail on the head in the last episode as everything comes into plain sight. I also felt a great affinity towards Alphard's character. The way she acts, everything she stands for, and how she decides to deal with Siam's ghost allowed me to be very empathetic with her, and she is definitely now one of my favorite female anime characters of all time. The ending was bittersweet and nonchalant, which I think is good for a change, but trying too hard for this series. Too many cliche motifs that you see in other anime, and trying too hard to be epic. Otherwise, just a decent watch for 13 episodes and an awesome take away for me - Alphard!

Hummm...not much else to say. Darker than Black 2 - Comet of Gemini premieres today, so GET ON THAT SHIT. Otherwise, just hope that I don't get mugged or contract an STD from a green card mongering slut. Will keep you guys updated!

PEACE,

CHRIS

fall breeze (the smell of beautiful)

2009-10-04T14:25:00.000-07:00

Do you ever feel those moments? Like a flash, an instant where your soul evaporates and returns to a time not your own. "I know this place," you say to yourself. A land so familiar, yet lost; a memory so fond, yet forgotten. It is your home. Or it was your home, rather. Sometimes just daydreams that scratch at your brain or a well-acquainted scent - I have no idea where these recollections come from. They're just apparitions that choose when and where they wish to appear, flaunting the beauty of a memory that no longer exists. When I smell the fall breeze, which ever so gently caresses the dying leather of trees, I remember that home.

This coming Thursday, I will be visiting China for a month. The notion is somewhat daunting, seeing as I have no comprehension of Cantonese. Nevertheless, it'll be an opportunity and experience that I'll never forget. After that trip, I will be venturing to Tokyo for a week before my return. I could say the exact same thing about Japan, except for the fact that I'll be too busy getting my ass destroyed in Guilty Gear to even notice. With this said, I will be blogging still, yes, but don't expect too much crazy stuff. Alongside of being introduced to the inner workings of my aunt's print shop, I will still have to maintain and complete projects assigned by my work at MEDL Mobile back home, but I do promise a very, very long and detailed post about my journey upon my return.

Before I leave, I will eat In-N-Out for three meals before getting on the plane.

Other crap: Bakemonogatari 12 was great; massive Berserkage on coming in November; new animes I'll be following: The Book of Bantorra, The Sacred Blacksmith, Darker than Block 2, Kobato, and Kimi no Todoke; will be working on branding myself while in China; still going to play WoW while I'm over there muhahhahah. Also, FMA 26 was strangely powerful - it's a series that is so perfect - lighthearted yet so heavy at the same time.

rising smoke (post finals)

2009-09-28T16:11:00.000-07:00

We were doing our presentations in front of the entire class last Thursday, and the moment Andre walked up, I knew he was fucking faded out of his mind. Pretty sure the class knew too. Including the teacher. He was having a bit of difficulty inserting the thumb drive into the computer, and when told to hit the "on" switch for the projector, he sorta just stared at the control panel for a good 30 seconds. "Oh there it is! Hahahahaaahaa". Off to a good start. So he sits down in the chair, slouching comfortably, then mouses over My Computer, and then double-clicks into his thumb drive. He fumbles around for another minute or two, looking for his Power Point presentation, but instead decided to click on a cached file over and over and over again. People in the audience were like: "hey dude stop clicking on that" or "try opening it in Internet Explorer" or "try restarting the computer". I just sat there, along with anyone with half a brain, and tried to suppress laughs. Eventually he gave up and just spoke about his presentation. Later on, a girl would talk about her swimming scholarship and how she would swim at the beach for three hours. Andre goes "lol you'd look like a big grape". My teacher inquires, "you mean like a raisin?". "Yah. Hahahahahahahahahahhahahahaha."

This past school quarter was pretty whatever. I found myself having a hard time putting in decent amounts of efforts, or even caring, really. And it's almost sad to say that the highlight was definitely landing that internship. And now that I'm on break, I still feel pretty fuckin burnt out. This coming break for me is extremely overdue - 2 years of school without any pause has really worn me down.

I don't really feel like talking about all that stuff now, but I just want to say that I will also be spending this break branding myself and possibly creating a mock-up non-flash site. I want to do something unique, and I have a few ideas, cause "Chris Liao Creative" just sounds fuckin boring. I won't spoil my idea yet, but it has something to do with my favorite food AND my favorite manga, but STILL remains disconnected enough from both to become its own entity. Maybe you can guess what it is? *muhahah*

I figured I'd just make this another picture blog, since that's what people like seeing. I managed to snap a few shots of my workplace, so take a peek!

Everyone else has like fancy paintings. Me? Nah.

Lined up my shelf with those HG SEED Gundams. They were collecting dust at home anyways.

My two bosses walking around the common room. (Yes that is a ping pong table bitches)

How we organize our thoughts at MEDLmobile.

What else am I leaving behind when I go to China / Japan for a month? My beloved Berserk collection~! (which I realized has become my temp girlfriend - all of my time and money has been going into this. Yea fml. A little bit.) ANYWAYS, I just wanted to show you guys what I had planned to happen with my collection by the holiday season. It's going to be grand and pompous.

Estimated collection value (sans display cases): $5,210

Of course blogspot will downplay the grandness by auto-reducing my image size and quality, but whatever. I bought these awesome Grundtal strip lights that I plan on installing on my ceiling for some massive (affordable) lighting action. As for the Klingsbo case in the middle, well here it is! I was also extremely relieved that you didn't have to install the stupid flower thing on the bottom, cause that would have been a bunch more work having to measure, cut, and fit a black matte board ontop of it.

Zodd fits like a glove in there, with enough air room to make things feel spacious.

Fuck IKEA. That gap is fucking gigantic, and there's nothing I can do to fix it.

On other fucking awesome news, I found out that Fullmetal Alchemist: Brotherhood is actually NOT 26 episodes. ANN has titles up to 38, so it's very likely that the anime will tail right behind the manga releases, and we'll have a legit conclusion! We're looking at an estimate of ~50 episodes again. Finishing up Bakemonogatari, CANAAN, and Princess Lover! soon, so I'll probably write about those.

Been playing L4D and some WoW. L4D is somewhat refreshing, though somewhat difficult to grasp all the details right away. Playing with seasoned friends is somewhat disappointing for the both of us, since I pretty much know nothing. Update comes tomorrow though, so we'll see how that goes.

Zendikar limited. Power curve is a lot lower than the past few sets, so gauging creature quality was a bit of a trip. Bears are actually pretty solid now! There's quite a bit of (blowout) removal in the set as well, which is refreshing after a pretty pitiful past few sets. Do I like the set? It's not bad. I like it a lot more than Shards, that's for sure. That also has a lot to do with how I draft though, which is always focused around solid beats and a curve. I'm not as synergistic as some of the friends I play with, nor do I like to splash much. I pick extremely conservatively, meaning my games will oftentimes be of similar length. Less extremities, more solidity. Playing through the draft simulator a few times, I also felt myself leaning towards white. Trip Arrow Volley Traps, dub Journey to Nowhere, dub Kor Hookmasters, and a Pitfall Trap - might've been good times IRL. Too bad that'll never happen lawl.

I'll probably write two more blogs before I leave. My stomach hurts right now and I need to poo, so later.

falconia (and so it begins...)

2009-09-21T21:14:00.000-07:00

Remember what went through your body when Griffith sacrificed the Band of the Hawk? We come to it at last.

*imaged snipped*

For those of you who missed it, it was Episode 307 of Berserk.

No words guys. There's more.

Many thanks to Joa for going all the way on my kit. I would also like to thank the encouragement that the SK.NET Berserk community has given me in my hobby endevours, especially Joa and Derek. Finals this week. Will be setting up the Klingsbo case this weekend. New things to look forward to.

i'm so excited i screamed and woke my family (BERSERK 20th anniversary)

2009-09-18T08:13:00.000-07:00

Next Friday, September 25th, 2009, will mark the 20th anniversary of the Berserk manga, since its birth in 1989. Young Animal, the serial that Berserk is produced in, will be doing a special commemoration issue for the event. The same week, volume 34 will be released, ending the Millennium Falcon Arc, and Young Animal will feature episode 307, the beginning of Miura's new arc.

And yes, I really did squeal this morning.

Allow your eyes to feast:

Young Animal Promo Site

Limited Edition Cover

Young Animal Cover

Poster Insert

To celebrate even more, the 20th Anniversary Armored Berserks will be shipping at the end of the month.

It is a good time for Berserk.

dark circles (eyes for the random)

2009-09-13T19:58:00.000-07:00

I don't have a main topic to write about today, but I feel like there are a lot of little things that I should probably tie up or cover. SO! I will spend this post talking about anything and everything that I deem worthy enough to make an appearance here. EDIT: Going back through this post, I noticed that I totally did things WAY out of order. My bad and deal with it.

Big Skullies

The first topic would definitely be our good friend James's Skull Knight 1:1 helmet. This amazing sculptor was found by Derek (the same guy that runs BerserkStatues.com), and after the relatively popular success of his first helmet, the Armored Berserker, they decided to move forward with a Skull Knight one. At first I wasn't thinking about purchasing it, but the more I see the details, the more interested I'm becoming. Let the work speak for itself!

Absolutely stunning. Visit www.skullknight.net/forum and browse the merchandise section if you are interested in picking one up. There will only be a very small, limited number produced, so put your name on the list or forever hold your peace!

FMA S2 and Akira Senju

Anyone who has been watching the hagaren this season knows that the score for the series is without a doubt some of the best stuff ever produced in the history of anime. In fact, I scout weekly on Nipponsei to see if I can try and find out when exactly that damned OST was going to be released. To my pleasant surprise, we have a release date!

October 14th

Fullmetal Alchemist 2009 OP3
Fullmetal Alchemist 2009 OST1
Fullmetal Alchemist "Theme of Alphonse Elric"
Fullmetal Alchemist "Theme of Edward Elric"

(source: nipponsei.minglong.org/upcoming/)

If you can't recall what the hell I'm talking about, refresh your memory and check out the little snippit below. Akira Senju is an acclaimed Japanese composer who has done scores for over two dozen TV shows and counting. He's won several awards, including best musical arrangement for Strawberry Shortcake and composing the theme of Furikazan.

Home Decor

I've already spent a lot of money on not only my Berserk collection, but setting up for it as well. After some searching, finding a larger display case for a decent price is nigh impossible. I then decided to go back to the IKEA store and see what else they possibly had. I managed to find this two foot high glass cabinet that looks like it might be the perfect centerpiece for my collection. This would also allow me to store the manga and miscellaneous collectibles inside of the smaller shelves, add a glass shelf to the wall above it, and still have plenty of room to complete my mural. Seems like a pretty win-win-win situation. I'll do a mock up of the room in sketchup sometime, but here's a picture of the case. What do you think?

Klingsbo Glass-Door Cabinet

Constructing Daily Banners

Many of you who do frequent my site are like: why the fuck do you always change your banner? Well for you fucking idiotic morons, I change my banner every_single_time I make a new post. It's a mandatory thing. Why do I do it? I just have a lot of cool pictures in my stash that I'd like to make colorful and post up. I'm a person of too many interests to just keep one lame ol' banner. ANYWAYS, I figured I'd just show anyone who was curious the steps I take when trying to make one of these things. Who knows, maybe I might inspire one of you!

Let's go with the banner yesterday as an example:

The main things I think about when designing a banner is: the content of my post and how rad the source picture is. More often than not, by some divine kismet, these two notions coincide. In the case above, I chose an image of Arthas because I've been playing my Death Knight again.

Here is the original picture, as found from the Blizzard fan art program. It helps a lot that the original picture is quite fucking awesome.

Next step is to crop this bitch. I have a saved template that has a bunch of sizes and "vanillasalt" written in different languages that I turn to.

This is where I can start doing fun things. I took a large picture of an inferno and placed it above the image of Arthas. I altered the hue to a more violet tone, then changed the layer style to Overlay, allowing the fire to create a cool texture and shift the existing color theme towards some more pinkish hues.

The next amazingly fun step is choosing type treatment. I love using Asian symbols because they serve both the function of saying "vanilla salt" and great looking shapes or patterns. In this case, I saw that Arthas and Icecrown where equally spaced, so three large characters between the gaps would make sense. I decided to go with an enlarged-cropped style, but felt that the "tsao" in "shiang tsao" was too detracting from Arthas.

The only thing Photoshop can't do is cure cancer. I went ahead and rasterized the type layer and changed it to overlay as well, giving this sort of halogen white and blue look. I then set my eraser opacity and flow to about 40% each, and started to brush away the "tsao" where it was blocking Arthas's cape. Now it looks like Arthas is standing in front of the letter!

Finally, I added in "vanillasalt" to align with the right-hand crossbar from "tsao" to give more a-symmetrical balance to the piece. Where Arthas is a bit heavy, Icecrown combined with "vanillasalt" helps to even out the visual weight of both sides.

You might say: hey all you did was change the colors of a picture and put your name on it. Well, that's what I did, and I'm not denying it lol.

The Status of My Berserk Stuff

I know I have a few readers here that are interested in my quest to obtain epic Berserk merchandise. I plan to do a major update around late November, when I've finally set up my room to be a museum. These are the statues I currently own:

- Knight of Skeleton, Green-silver Armor (#1634 of 2000)

- Guts the Black Swordsman, Episode of Birth Feast (pvc ver.)

- Guts Hawk Soldiers, Limited Edition w/ Blue Cape (#733 of 1500)

- Griffith Millenium Falcon I (Toycom release)

- Griffith the Shooting Star Night, Silver Edition (#077 of 300)

- Griffith Hawk Soldiers on Horse 1/10 (painted recast)

- Femto, Custom Black Repaint (#522 of 2000)

- Zoddo Senma (#137 of 350)

- Zoddo III (#378 of 500)

I am currently commissioning / receiving this before the end of the year:

- HEADLONG 1/8 Armored Berserk (sitting) - by Joa

- Atelie Real Spirits 1/12 Casca - by Joa

- Guts Kingdom of Falconia (#269)

- 20th Anniversary Armored Berserk (bloody ver. w/ Daiba)

Working on the following:

- Knight of Skeleton on Horse II, Limited Edition (to be repainted by Joa)

- James's Skull Knight 1:1 Helmet

And of course, a tease from Joa.

A lot on the plate right now. CNBC is visiting my workplace this Thursday, so we're totally excited for that. I have finals next week, followed by leaving to China the first week of October. Busy times.

cleavage (the wow kind)

2009-09-08T20:08:00.000-07:00

So today I was sitting in class not really paying attention to my classmates' presentations when I was spamming all of the F# buttons on the Mac in front of me. When I reached F12, this crazy thing happened where the screen dims and four boxes fade into view: the weather, a calculator, a calendar, and I forgot what the last one was. Anyways I kept mashing that button over and over again, causing those boxes to constantly fade in and out, and I started to realize that you could negative edge the button. That means, I can press and hold F12, then when I release F12, the boxes would go away. If I tap F12, the boxes will come into view and not go away. That means there are probably 20 frames or so of startup, animation and recovery of the boxes appearing that I am given to release the F12 button. I then started to see if I could perfectly let go of the button as soon as the recovery ends to min/max F12 box uptime. Let me just say, if none of this made sense to you, then good, cause fighting games have really fucked up my thought process.

Don't even get me started on talking about freeway yomi.

I don't really have much to say this blog because, well frankly, I've been playing WoW again. It's like a cold - you're going to contract it at least once a year because the virus keeps evolving. I'm sorry if I don't answer your calls or if this offends you, but just fuck off cause I need to grind honor it's AV weekend. For those of you who do care, I've been playing the plate cleave team that ~~cheesed~~ won Blizzcon '09. I was trying to level up some alts, but since I came back JUST as the new season started, I figured I'd start afresh. I dropped Herbalism (who the fuck needs a 3K heal? That's like one attack) and picked up what I thought would be an easy profession to level up: Tailoring. I ended up spending about 400g (which isn't bad for almost maxing a profession) to reach my magic carpet, and now I have Swordguard Embroidery on my cloak. I'm a glutton for procs, of which I will soon have: Runeforge of the Fallen Crusader, Sigil of Virulence, Darkmoon Card: Greatness, Darkmoon Card: Death, and Swordguard Embroidery. As for my alts? Well, they can just sit there and rot while I re-farm honor and gold for my main. Death Knights are still retarded - why did I ever think I'd want to play something else?

Things to look forward to: not reading this blog for a month cause I'll be in China, massive Berserk updates right as I get back, more QQ about work and school, a review on Nine possibly, going over how I make banners, and the finale reviews for a few animes ending this season (namely FMA). Have a good fucking night.

luladins (preparing for september)

2009-08-30T18:21:00.000-07:00

We're hitting critical mass. A lot of my classes are rounding to begin our finals, tons of crunchtime jobs at work for several new apps we're releasing, my 20th Anniversary Armored Berserk is coming in soon, AND I've been playing WoW casually ontop of it all. In other words, I am _fucking_ tired. But is it bad? No, it really isn't. I'm having too much fun.

One sad thing that did happen was that my paladin's original name, Flaminghomo, was banned. See details below:

His name is now Grifisu. Not as cool, no, but it'll do.

He's currently level 36. You won't believe how fast levelling is now! Here's some perspective - Grifisu was level 17 when I began playing him on Tuesday. It is Sunday, and he is now 36. I've played about 12 hours and gained 19 levels. That's insanity! Plus I have a mount and am getting an epic Charger at level 40.

As for my other hobby stuff, Cory and I setup a second Detolf case after moving the second couch in my room downstairs. My room is now infintely more spacey!

The centerpiece is going to have some reworking. I want to raise it up and purchase a display case to put the 20th Anniversary Armored Berserk in. Also, I'm planning on creating a HUGE Berserk mural that will be composed of several picture frames, each containing epic covers and inserts from the manga. And to top this all off, I'm probably going to install track lights on my ceiling. This is serious business, and it's going to be fucking epic.

Lastly, there was a request here by a reader for me to post a picture of the Scrojo Butcher shirt from Blizzcon. Here you go buddy, and thanks for your comments!

Fuuuuck. I'll be in Canton, China from October 8th to November 6th. Let's hope that goes well rofl. See you in Azeroth.

sprinting wolfmen, explosive monks, and a queen of blades (blizzcon '09)

2009-08-23T23:04:00.000-07:00

Blizzcon this year was, as anti-climatic as this sounds, the same as last year. I'm not sure why I'm always expecting something amazing to appear out of the blue, but the internet has pretty much denied any possibility of such a dream. Even though I had to work the morning of, I pretty much went to MMO Champion and Blizzard's website and viewed all of the information that was released. The luster of it all has vanished, but I did indeed enjoy myself, seeing the grandness of it all. Even after all these years, I still gape in awe at the sheer amount of people, un-ashamed of their roots, coming to this annual event and showing their unsuppressed love and passion.

Kerrigan statue. This thing has been around, but I never get tired of it.

Let me first start out by saying FUCK YOU ANAHEIM CONVENTION CENTER. That's right. Making us pay for parking while all we were doing was picking up our tickets is all sorts of bullshit. Now that I have that out of the way, I think I'm gonna go ahead and talk about what I thought about some of the new games and changes.

World of Warcraft: Cataclysm

Most of us had guessed it already. Nothing escapes the whispers in the wind. Several weeks ago, people were already talking about Worgens and Goblins, and now that it is finally upon us, we sat in anticipation for the most important aspect of all WoW expansions: changes to the game. Simplification of stats? Good shit. Multi-levelling in crafting professions? Fuck yea. Taking mana away from some classes? Let's see where this goes.

Wang Wei's new Deathwing art is wickedly awesome.

I for one think that Blizzard kinda messed up on WoW. They cater to the pros, then they cater to the noobs, then they have to cater to the PvPers, then they have to watch out about how that will affect PvE, and vice versa. In the end we have a hodge-podge of classes that can do just about anything and everything. RNG has pretty much destroyed the professional WoW PvP scene and the redundancy of PvE tank and spanking has really yanked the sparkles out of this game. Cataclysm presents a lot of great new ideas, but most of them are lore-related. Long lost speculations of the Greymane Wall, Gilneas, Furion, Uldum, Grim Batol, and Deathwing have all finally resurfaced - and I'm glad. This alone is enough to pull me towards the expansion, but will it satisfy those who have already been fumbling through five years of grinding? The best way to re-invigorate WoW, IMO, is to give the whole game a face lift. Upgraded textures on a flat breasplate still means you're wearing a flat breastplate. Otherwise, Blizzard has been polishing a game that loses depth by the patch.

Starcraft II: Wings of Liberty

Now here's something I didn't think I would be so excited about. They talked about the campaign being extremely grand, but I didn't expect this level of quality. Okay, maybe I did. The in-game cut scenes are literally of MGS quality and the voice acting is superb. They even got that chick from Battlestar Galactica to voice Kerrigan! I am hella rooting for this game now.

Yea I know this picture is old, but it's awesome.

It just sucks that the beta for the game got delayed. I was hoping to get in on that by this Winter, but it seems like the Battle.Net team dropped the ball on this one. We probably won't see Starcraft II launched till mid to late next year.

Diablo III: Monk Class

Fuck yes. When I heard about this, all sorts of stuff popped into my head. Monk as in healer? Or monk as in melee combat, fist guy? NEITHER. Monk as in badass fucking, explode your heart, shinning glyphs, holy warrior with AKUMA BEADS. While somewhat fragile in terms of his lifepool, the monk can dish out tons of damage and at the same time use powerful defensive abilities to escape dire situations. I really had a blast playing this guy, and if the final class isn't something wickedly amazing, I will probably be choosing between the monk or witch doctor.

Talk about badass.

I even bought a Diablo III poster and a Butcher t-shirt. If you didn't know, the Diablo franchise is probably my favorite of all time. Not only was it the first real Blizzard game I owned, but the cornerstone of my adolescent gaming.

On a final note, I can't believe this costume didn't even get an honorable mention. She could have totally beat out the paladin and Kel'Thuzad that got 4th and 5th place. You had to see it in person, it was fucking awesome and extremely true to the in-game armor.

Night Elf Priest wearing tier 8.

Before I close out this blog, I'd like to throw out a big thanks to Sean Wang and Mike Schwan. You guys fucking rock and made my Blizzcon experience possible.

And finally, a little taste of what's to come...

It's been a busy week, and it's only going to get busier. As school moves forward and work is piling up from MEDL, I will be able to see less and less sunlight, and far fewer hours doing the things I like to do. I do however, still want to paint another Berserk kit before I fully turn away from modelling, so keep an eye out for that!

the white hawk (has landed)

2009-08-16T02:48:00.000-07:00

It's been about a month since I first received my Griffith Hawk Soldier 1/10 on Horse garage kit. Through these past few weeks, I've gone through some of the most tedious yet awe-inspiring moments, as I slowly, piece by piece, assembled my beloved Griffith.

The journey was long, but I feel extremely satisfied now at the end. Research, planning, hard work, dedication, the right tools, and a little imagination allowed me to create my first amazing statue. Before I go into more progress work, I'd like to thank a few particular sources: Joa (for the inspiration), Steve (for TONS of tips and suggestions), HobbyFanatics.com (for a slew of ideas), Cody's Coop (for the general tutorial), and M_Candy's youtube guides on garage kit building.

A comment on the kit itself and my decisions on how to construct it - I had originally wanted to follow the traditional color scheme (blue lightning bolts, silver armor, etc.) but then decided against it. After careful consideration and research, I consulted a few friends and we all ended up agreeing that performing an ivory white paint job (much like Art of War's Griffith repaints) would much better depict the "immaculate white hawk" that I had originally intended to portray. With that came the gold splattering on the base and the flag idea, which was drawn directly from one of Griffith's victory scenes in the manga. A little bit of improvisation and the use of a pastel purple instead of the over-used, bludgeoning blue took the kit a long way forward. Once again, I am extremely satisfied with the results, and I hope to do more of these things in the future!

And so...continuing where we previously left off:

Over here I added several rocks made of putty and apply the Taka no Dan decal.

After I primed the flags, my sister and I hand painted the Taka no Dan crest on both sides of each flag.

Primed, painted, and washed the rocks in the same colors as the base.

Added the same gold sprinkling effect that I used on the base.

I had a good feeling about adding foliage to the mix, so I went with a fall palette to give a sort of drying moss/leaves to the base and ultimately give the piece more dynamics in color.

A peek at what the other side looks like.

Stuck the flags in, two in the front and three in the back.

Rear view.

Installed footholds after epoxying Griffith to the saddle. He, surprisingly, doesn't need to be pinned down. His weight and how the saddle is made can easily support him.

Used the brass sheet again for the reins and attached the scabbard to Griffith's waist.

The final step of the piece - painting the Taka no Dan crest gold!

Peeling off the decal to a pretty amazing finish.

"Griffith, The White Hawk"

Note to self: don't drink three heavy shots within the span of 15 minutes. Your head might hurt the next day. Other than that, I hope you guys enjoyed reading about my progress with Griffith. Lots of pictures, I know. I'm hoping to work on something easier for the next one - probably a Casca. School, work, then Blizzcon on Friday. Good shit sirs.

burnt to a crisp (but still light as a hawk)

2009-08-12T12:50:00.000-07:00

It's surprising that I can still take time out of my midterm schedule to write here. In reality, I'm being suffocated by a mountain of work that I still need to power through - it wouldn't hurt to take a breather ever once in a while. Between each project I'd sit down and watch an episode of anime or work on Griffith for an hour or two. It's perfect since I'm usually waiting for something to dry or set.

FInished priming the bastard.

Masking out the lightning bolts.

Finished painting and touching up the horse, added the tail, put Griffith on (not glued yet) just for this picture.

Home Depot was being a douchebag and wouldn't help me drill pilot holes, so I took my Dremel and did it myself. Slow and messy, but whatevs.

Three screws about 1'' above the plaque's surface for stability. I added a bit of epoxy for good measure.

As suggested by my friend, Steve, I went to a hobby store and bought thin sheets of brass for the flag diorama.

Surprisingly, the best way to cut this stuff is by using oldschool scissors.

I'm going to paint these white and add stencil the Taka no Dan symbol onto all of them, then splay them around the base. I'll also be adding additional rocks and sprinkling the whole base with more gold paint. GET HYPE.

Anyways, back to the subject of anime, I want to point out that Fullmetal Alchemist (Brotherhood) episode 19 was seriously one of the best episodes, both in plot and animation, that I've ever seen. They hit ALL the sweet spots and pushed ALL the buttons over and over again; they even added a major cliffhanger for good measure. After I soaked up all 24 glorious minutes, I immediately returned and began to take screenshots. I ended up with about 20 ... yea, there were that many awesome scenes. For your sanity's sake, I will only be listing about half of them :P

I ASSUME everyone has a general idea of how FMA goes, but I'll go ahead and put this disclaimer here that there might be some spoilers, though most of this is just action and me pointing out how awesome the animation is; scroll down at your own risk.

Look at how they "paint" the scenery. Rough, but extremely effective.

I never expected this. The way they animated this was beyond words, watching the pieces of Barry's armor fly towards the audience, in pieces.

Even minor details, like Hawkeye's tears, were extremely well done. Watch for the sparkle JUST as the tears begin to slide down her cheek. Details man, details.

This is probably THE badass shot of the episode. The slow-mo with the armor debris flying was extremely captivating.

Not the most awesome shot, but this shows the sheer power of Mustang's fire.

After watching this, I finally accepted Lockon Stratos' voice acting. The way he lets loose with words "kisama wa koi tana", sent chills down my spine.

Extremely voilent. Almost shocking, compared to other BONES series. But extremely well-animated, and the point of her suffocation is made extremely clear.

That perspective. Look at Mustang's pose and the downwards trajectory that we're shown. This not only displays a very unique view that is rarely seen, but demonstrate's his superiority in the situation.

Change some hues and light some bitches on fire.

Sweet ass pose, T-1000 style.

The way they do disentigration in this series must be some new technique, cause it looks fucking amazing. This is ESPECIALLY apparent when we see Lust's stone disentigrate. Do it in chunks, not linearly.

So that's my image-filled orgasm for FMA. Really though, the production this season is breathtaking. Backed by Akira Senju's score (which will probably be one of the best anime OSTs of all time, no joke) there are probably very few to no flaws.

Okay back to midterms =.= I'm about 90% done with Griffith. A lot of the stuff now is minor details, like adding the reins, the saddle strap, creating some more diorama rocks, painting those rocks, and adding the painted flags to the mix. I might also burn-engrave the Hawk symbol onto the wood, but I'll need help with that haha. Anyways, I might be going to pulsr's place this Saturday for the SBO BBQ. Let me know if you want to come. Peace.

the finish line (i can taste it)

2009-08-09T21:55:00.000-07:00

It's been a busy, busy week. First off, I want to say I landed an internship at a cellphone app creation company. It's pretty sweet, and I will be working part time there in the coming days. Besides that, been hard at work on my Griffith garage kit. It's surprising to think, after all of this hard work and insane labor, that I am pretty damn near close to finishing. I thought that the post-prep work would be fairly difficult (such as painting and attaching all of the little shits), but it's actually quite the opposite. I sat down and managed to paint all of Griffith in one night, save the sword and scabbard. Albeit it took the entire night (about 6 hours worth), he came out rather nicely (or IMO anyways). My phone camera was a real poor choice for this, both because it hides my mistakes as well as the extra effort I put into small details. I promise that when the statue is complete, I will take my dad's 9 thousand megapixel camera and do this kit some justice.

I had to pretty much re-mold several broken/missing pieces out of Milliput. Fuck Thai resin.

Tamiya Masking Tape is really godlike. Sticks decently and is easy as hell to pull off.

Priming outside my house, in my underwear, at midnight.

This was tricky as hell. Since the cloak pieces are rather heavy, I had to apply massive amounts of masking tape to make sure the chunks would stay in place while the epoxy glue dried (which takes several hours).

My ghetto triple stack foam dryer.

Everything (except for the cloak) is primed! Testing it out.

While the glue was hardening on the horse, I decided to paint Griffith, starting with his face and hair.

I then did his clothes a pastel violet and his boots a rosey leather.

Painted his armor ivory white and added gold to all his buckles.

Attached the cape with some epoxy and called it a night. Woke up the next morning and the cloak was stuck on rock hard.

Decided the white armor needed a bit more flare and added gold to all of the bolts.

Finished building and painting the sword! You also cannot take that out of his hand, his two-part fist clenches it in place.

The final stage of prep work for the horse - puttying and epoxying the gaps between the cloak. Took about an hour.

You can't really see it that well, but this was the innovation of the night. I took an old toothbrush and the gold paint and flicked gold flakes all over the base. It's really sublte, but I think the overall outcome was great.

Now that the Griffith stuff is over, I just wanted to share some snapshots of an ad I saw on TokyoTosho. Darker than Black was a decent series; I'd actually rate it slightly above average in overall terms, but the entertainment value was definitely much higher. I did enjoy the first season, and I am definitely looking forward to the second!

Midterms this week, and work. That's not going to stop me from finishing my Griffith kit though! And on a final note: may my uncle rest in peace. He left us just a few days ago, and I wish him all the best wherever he is now.