License Plates

Happy Tuesday.

Have I mentioned that I hate Tuesdays?

Though, for a Tuesday, I suppose today wasn't so bad.

Today was my first full day driving around with my new license plates:


Yes, thank you; I am fully aware of the awesomeness at work there.

So I now get to cruise down the road (or, rather, slide around on the ice) with my AKB48 plates while I listen to AKB48. To all other AKB-fans: I WIN ^__^

My ankle was hurting really bad on Monday when I was running, and it's been bugging me for the past couple of weeks, so now my supervisors (all the way up to the senior SNCO) want me to make an appointment to go get it checked out. I think I just need to stretch it out a bit better, and maybe get some new shoes, so I'm pretty sure going to the doctor is a waste of everybody's time, and it's kind of embarrassing to go and be told "there's nothing wrong with you; go away." But, if to appease they-who-outrank-me, I guess I'd better go ⌐_⌐

While I'm in a complaining mood, I suppose I'll mention the fact that I am really beginning to greatly dislike being a chauffeur. There are three guys that I drive to and from work and the gym every day, and while I honestly don't really mind doing it (we are, after all, going to the same place), it's...irritating. I was ready to pull out of the parking lot at 7:00 this morning, and only had one of the other Airmen ready with me. So I sent text messages to the other two. One responded with "5 minutes," which was not ideal, as I wanted to get to the gym early, but I was okay with it. What I was not okay with was the fact that he came downstairs 16 minutes later. As for the fourth member of our little party...he was nowhere to be found. So I left. I hate being in a hurry when I'm driving on ice, but I always seem to be in that situation, through no fault of my own. I ended up getting my shoes changed and my stuff stashed in the locker room, and hitting the gym floor with literally seconds to spare. Today, of all days, I wanted to be early. After all, the WING COMMANDER and his Command Chief were joining us this morning. And to top things off, the fourth guy that was nowhere to be found? Yeah...he was already there. I don't know who he rode with, and I've been his established driver for, like, three weeks now, so why in the world he thought it was a good idea to not tell me...grr...

Sorry. I'll stop there, although I could go on about lunch-time today when I took one of the guys over to Family Readiness to "just drop off some paperwork" and ended up sitting there for an entire hour...but I won't mention that...

Sorry again. It's driving me crazy, though. One of them is getting tires for his car within the next week, so he'll be able to drive himself. One's getting married in March, so I sincerely hope he has some sort of transportation on the way (he's new here). As for the other one...no idea. But at least he's always punctual and doesn't randomly ride with other people.

**sigh**

I need to get off my rant now...OH! I didn't mention that yesterday was Akane Takayanagi's birthday. I have to mention it, because she's a favorite of mine. Not too long ago, I decided to make her my top-supported member of SKE48, but then I noticed Masana Oya (the one from the trading card I flipped out over), and Takayanagi ended up taking a back seat. I feel kind of bad for that, but so it goes. She's a very close 2nd, though.


Oh my, look at the time.

Gotta go.

^_^|/

Tired

I'm tired tonight, so I won't be here long.

Kind of a crappy day today, to be quite honest.

A few good things happened this afternoon, though, which helped to even my mood out.

Heh...I think the only reason I got on here was to not break my habit of daily posts before I got the habit re-started ^__^

I'll go more in-depth on some things tomorrow.

Right now? Bed.

^_^|/

Thanksgiving and Stuff

It's hard to re-establish the habit of getting on here and writing something daily.

Sorry.

I actually promised myself that I would have my domain up and running by the end of the year, and as I've now realized that I have only a month left, I've been a bit busy on that. Once that's operational, I'm not entirely sure what I'm going to do about my Blogspot page here. I guess I'll wait and see what happens.

Designing a website is a nightmare, it turns out. I know more about Javascript and CSS than I do about basic HTML, so I know how to make a page dynamic, but I have trouble making an actual baseline page. Feels bad, dude. I may end up cheating and straight-up jacking code off some other site, and just modifying it from there, rather than trying to do all this from scratch. I would show you what I've managed to create, but it's...embarrassing.

Tonight is the final night of a four-day weekend, which went by way too fast. This was actually my first Thanksgiving away from my family, which was a bit depressing, but I went over to a SSgt's house with a few other guys from work and had a good time. Now I have three full weeks of work coming up, then it's another four-day weekend, plus an extra Tuesday, for Christmas. Can't wait for that ^__^

This picture serves, like, a three...no...four-fold purpose.


First, to comment on the fact that I both love and hate the fact that four-day weekends are just enough time to almost grow my goatee back ⌐_⌐ Now I need to go shave it off before I go to bed tonight, and that never feels pleasant.

Also, notice my Ohio State flag in the background. The reason it looks so happy is because Ohio State trampled Michigan on Saturday, which wasn't a surprise, but is still nice to gloat about. No Rose Bowl for us this year, but we should end up in a good game.

Thirdly, see the CD I'm holding? It's only the greatest J-pop single ever released. Seriously. Also, it's the first-press limited edition, which is beyond awesome, especially considering the crap I had to go through to get it. I was reduced to the email equivalent of getting on my face and begging the CDJapan folks to bend their rules a bit in order to let me have it. Each first-press limited edition comes with a trading card of one of the girls. When I opened the case, removed the insert, and saw this...


...I had a nice little freak-out session, because Masana Oya is my favorite ♥

The Fickle Finger of Fate was so very kind to me ^__^

And the fourth thing I came up with in that photo of me ties into the third a bit, because November 29th happens to be the birthday of the girl in the center of the album cover, right above the pink exclamation mark. But since today is the 28th in this country, I guess I'll wait until tomorrow to mention it.

I just came up with a fifth thing. I'm wearing a sweater in the picture, which is because it's cold here in Alaska. Shocking, I know. We got a good five inches of snow on Thursday, which made the trip to and from my Thanksgiving get-together quite an adventure. I didn't end up leaving until 1:30 in the morning, and the roads were unplowed, but my car handled itself just fine, and I handled my car just fine, so no problems. Driving in this stuff is still taking a lot of getting used to, and there are no "casual trips to the store." If I have to go somewhere, it's because I HAVE to go somewhere. I guess I need to get out and drive around a bit, and force myself to drive over to Target or something, because it's really not as bas as it seems once I'm out doing it. The problem is convincing myself of that. Luckily, I have about five more months of winter to figure it all out ⌐_⌐!!

By the way: this was pretty much my reaction when I saw my Masana Oya card...


^__^|/

Ice

An already short week became a whole lot shorter today.

It rained last night, which pretty much covered EVERYTHING in a nice sheet of ice. There wasn't a safe place to walk, let alone drive, so nobody had to go into work today. Of course, we find out that we're not supposed to be driving AFTER we all get up and drive to and from the gym for PT ⌐_⌐

More rain is expected tonight, but the temperatures are supposed to be well above freezing, so we'll see what happens.

I slipped over to the post office today (on foot) and picked up my fruit cake, potato candy, and Buckeyes, which made me happy. Now I need to go get some eggnog ^__^

Hmm...I didn't do a whole lot today. Played some Fallout: New Vegas, in which I have now clocked over 80 hours, and have just reached level 21. This evening, I've been playing around on my violin a bit, trying to play TWO ROSES, which I think is going to work out pretty well, so stay tuned for that forthcoming YouTube video. I'm loving this pitch-changing software I have, as I can choose what key I want to play in and adjust the tone in post-production. It's kinda cheating, but not really ~_^

Speaking of TWO ROSES, I got an online confirmation that my SKE48 CDs arrived Friday, but when I went and asked about them today, I was told that the package is not here yet. Maybe tomorrow. I really, really, really, really want those discs. I was lucky enough to snag the first-press limited editions, and am anxious to see which trading cards I got. If I get an Akane Takayanagi, I'll flip out. It'll be like when Charlie found the Golden Ticket. I'm such a geek.

^_^|/

Sashiko

I meant to restart this, and keep it going daily once again, but then I got distracted by the new Call of Duty game before I was able to re-establish the habit of sitting down and typing something out every evening.

So...let's try this again.

Got a good week coming up. Three days of work, followed by a four-day weekend ^__^ I can't believe it's already this time of year. Christmas is only a month away? That's crazy. I'm so happy I'm not working in the retail industry this holiday season...because that was also crazy.

It hasn't snowed since the last time it snowed, which was a while ago, but it's still on the ground. It's been cold enough that it hasn't melted and frozen into ice, which makes the walking and driving conditions somewhat bearable.

The late sunrise/early sunset thing is already starting to get to me. 6:00 in the evening actually feels more like 10:00, so it's a bit strange. I'm sure the vampires love it up here, though.

Ohio State beat Iowa on Saturday in an epic 4th quarter comeback. It had been a while since I watched a football game where I felt like I had to sit down and recover from it afterwards.

I finished Lost earlier this evening. Right now, I'm just letting my mind piece the whole experience together, but I do know that I quite enjoyed the ending. It's always a strange feeling, realizing that something you invested so much time into, characters that you got so emotionally attached to...that it's done; they're done. There's no more story to tell. I haz a sad, but at least I'm satisfied with the ending.

One more mention before I go to bed...you guessed it...birthday time! This one's important, because she's my second-favorite member of AKB48. Rino Sashihara. A couple of months ago, there was an announcement that she was changing her name, and would be from that day forward going by the stage name "Sashiko." I thought it must be a joke, but she confirmed it on her blog, then I saw that her name had been changed on a popular fan-site forum. I still refused to believe it, until I went to the official AKB48 site and saw that the name-change had been reflected on her official profile. I was raging all day about the stupidity of it, and , of course, my ire was compounded by the fact that this stupidity involved one of my favorites. The name on her portrait in the AKB theater was changed...there was even a commercial promoting their new single that mentioned "Sashiko." I wouldn't have been able to sleep well that night had she not revealed on her blog later that evening that it was, in fact, a joke. On one hand, I was really upset that they would trick me like that, but on the other hand, hats off them for going all out.

Happy Birthday!! (And don't ever do something like that again ⌐_⌐)



Bed-time for me. G'night.

SQL

I've been playing with MySQL all evening, and I'm starting to get the hang of it again. I haven't touched it since tech school, so I'm...rusty, to say the least. I'm hoping to learn PHP eventually, but for now I'll just be content with building my databases.

Conan O'Brien's first TBS show was just on, and it's great to see him back to doing what he does.

We got some snow last night. Like, for real this time. About three inches of it, and possibly more on the way tonight. It's crazy to think that this place is going to be like this for the next five or so months. It's pretty neat right now, but I imagine I'll be incredibly sick of it by mid-January-ish.

Have I mentioned that I can't wait to get out of the shop that I'm in and move into my real job? Well, I can't wait to get out of the shop that I'm in and move into my real job.

Call of Duty: Black Ops is out tomorrow, and I will most definitely be picking it up. Lately, I've been playing the crap out of Fallout: New Vegas, and am thoroughly loving it. I've already clocked 73 hours, and have only managed to reach level 17. That's what I get for refusing to fast-travel ^__^

I haven't watched "1! 2! 3! 4! Yoroshiku" all day. Unacceptable. The last PV that I watched this incessantly was...let me think...I really can't come up with one. And what really gets me about it is the fact that all I have at the moment is a rather low-quality YouTube rip. Once I get it on DVD, it'll be even better, which is kind of a scary thought.

Time for me to go to bed.

Tomorrow's Tuesday.

I hate Tuesday.

^__^|/

Three Months Later...

I'm not going to waste too much time explaining my reasons for not writing anything in such a long time, but those reasons started off as legitimate, became semi-legitimate, then just flat-out turned into nothing more than me being out of the habit of doing this.

But, I've been both internally and out-ternally prompted to get back on here, so I'm back on here.

And I don't know where to begin.

The last time I updated this, I was still in Texas...almost three months ago.

Have I really been here in Alaska for three months?

Actually, now that I think about it, in so many ways, it seems a heck of a lot longer than that.

Never a dull moment.

Finally being in the operational Air Force is wonderful. Even though I'm not currently working in the shop that I'm "supposed" to be in, my fellow Airmen, my trainers, my supervisors, and pretty much everybody in my squadron are all great, so I've been enjoying going to work, and I've been able to make the most of a less-than-ideal situation.

As far as moving to my "real" job, it's looking like it could happen by the end of the year, but if not, then no later than January. The help-desk technician stuff is just not where I belong, but I'm learning.

More importantly, I've been moving along at a pretty good pace with my upgrade training, getting tasks signed off and continuously progressing towards and inquiring about the next steps on the road to my 5-level. Once I get that out of the way, I can look into finishing up my degree, which will be a huge deal.

Winter finally hit us last week, so this place is going to be very white for the next few months. It actually snowed some more this evening, and there's only about an inch on the ground right now, so it's not too bad. My vehicle seems to be handling it with no problem, so that's one less thing to have to worry about.

I think I mentioned that I was going to sit down and work on a few serious pieces of writing, to sort of give some closure and to sum up some of my experiences from the past year. As I wrote these things, I fully intended to type them up on here, but after some consideration, decided against it. Maybe some day soon-ish I'll share it, quite possibly as a year-end thing (and most definitely edited down), but it turned out to be more "dear diary" stuff than share-with-the-world content. I guess I realized that it was just something I needed to do for me. I don't ever want to forget what I had to go through to get where I am. 2010 has been quite a year. It seems like I've experienced more in these last 10 months than I had in the entire rest of my life.

Craziness.

I've been off-and-on working on building my html for my domain (more off than on, naturally), and I'm thinking I may just go ahead and either use a bare-bones design, or use templates for the time being, so I can at least start getting some content on there. This site here will remain the site of my personal journal-type writing, but I'm planning on putting quite a lot of stuff over on the new one, and making it my main hub of...me. Right now, though, the whole thing is really, really frustrating. I tried to make a site map the other day for one section of what I want to do, and ended up getting hopefully lost. And I can already tell that I'm going to get really sick of typing "href=" ⌐_⌐

As far as a J-pop update goes, right now I seem to really be into SKE48. I now know most of the 32 members, and hope to have them all down before Team E is created. I ordered both editions of their upcoming single, mainly due to the fact the the accompanying PVs are all stellar, especially the title track, "1! 2! 3! 4! Yoroshiku." In fact, I recently deemed it "The best PV ever. Period." That...that's a bold statement, but I may actually mean it. I just looked on YouTube, and it seems they've replaced the full videos with 46-second previews (probably because the single hasn't actually been released yet), and since the "Cosmos no Kioku" preview is better than the "1! 2! 3! 4! Yoroshiku" one, I'm putting it here:



Alright, that's enough for tonight.

Feels good to be back doing this.

^_^|/