It's almost time for the fall semester to begin once more. I move back into my dorm this upcoming Wednesday. My summer's gone by so quickly! I've started to watch a new anime: Fairy Tail. I've wanted to watch it for god knows how long, but never got around to it because of school work/watching other anime. However, now that I've started it, I can honestly say I love it! :D The great thing about picking up a longer series like Fairy Tail is that I can keep watching (to an extent) if I want to because there are so many episodes. Obviously, once I catch up to the current episode, it's going to be super painful, but right now it's a wonderful experience :) Much easier to watch than Tower of Druaga (which I liked, but not as much as most anime I watch).

I've also been reading pretty extensively lately. I've picked up a wonderful book by Brandon Sanderson called Mistborn. Basically, the "Lord Ruler" has oppressively ruled the Final Empire for quite some time, and the protagonists are trying to overthrow his reign. I swear, it's much more interesting than I'm making it sound though XD I haven't finished yet, but I suspect I will finish or come close to finishing before classes start. So, I'm probably going to pick up the next book in the series and bring it with me to Uni.

Finally, to the main reason I'm writing this post. My music tastes/experiences in JPOP have developed a lot over the past few years (I started back in 2008!), so I've decided to create a separate blog for JPOP idol topics. I don't know if this is whim of the moment and my mind might be changed tomorrow, but I really want a place to intellectually analyze some of my thoughts. My livejournal has its share of JPOP idol obsessing, but it's always been in a kind of a spazzstic "OMG I LOVE THIS" way. That'll probably still show up here, but posts of greater depth will probably appear on that blog instead. I've developed a love of reading Jpop fan blogs, and this will hopefully allow me to engage in the ongoing dialogue that I've been observing for the past 3 years.

And I think that's it for now. I'll see you guys around :)

Loosely-related titles ftw! ... Not really lol. But anyways, this summer's rolling to an end. I have to say, this is probably one of my favorite summers in quite a few years. I opened it up by babysitting my friend's fish Sailor Jerry and speed watching Heroes. Man I love that show, and the actors/actresses keep popping up everywhere. Whenever I watch Star Trek, I'm like "SYLAR!" Too bad the show ended kind of prematurely and... with kind of an awkward last season imo. I also beat the main story of Arc Rise Fantasia, which reminds me I still need to go back and tackle the extras... I then went to Six Flags with two of my closest friends and hung out some with my BFF before she moved away... *sad face*

Then the main feature of my summer started, my job! My job was about a 6-7 week mentoring of middle/high school students aspiring to go into STEM fields. I myself had participated when I was in middle school and loved it, so I thought it'd be a fun summer job to have that kind of goes with my major (engineering). At the same time, I got to review logic, which I will indubitably need as an electrical engineering student, and got paid :D There were a few moments when I was super frustrated because the students wouldn't listen to instructions, but I ended up really liking all of them. There's a good chance that I won't see any of them again unless do the job again next year for year 2, but even then it's a slim chance since they'll no doubt be separated. However, since next summer will be my third year summer, it's probably more vital that I get internship/research experience. I also stupidly never gave them a way to contact me because I forgot so it really is like goodbye. I thought about adding the ones I could find on Facebook, but I realized that that might be easily misconstrued so I'm thinking maybe I shouldn't unless they add me first. So complicated... or maybe I'm just over-thinking it. Well anyways, this job in large part is what makes this summer so memorable. This marks the third summer where I've been in a teaching/mentoring role lol. I guess that means I'm literally fated to go into education XD

In the middle of the summer during my job, I also got to hang out with my friends again. We went to Natural Bridge Caverns, Six Flags again, ice skating, and went to the movies multiple times and saw Cars 2, Green Lantern, and Zookeeper. I also watched a lot of 24 (the TV show) and I'm still watching it. Anime-wise I picked up Cardfight Vanguard. It's all right. In some ways it reminds me of Yugioh but at the same time, it doesn't. The protagonist doesn't have the RIDICULOUS luck that Yugi has in deck draws, and card games don't take THREE WHOLE episodes to finish lol. There is a bit of supernatural stuff involved, but at the moment, it's pretty minimal. Inazuma Eleven Go is still good. I definitely want to see what happens next. Digimon Xros Wars is almost over, so I'll probably be looking for a new show to fill that gap soon. Any suggestions? I have a list of "to watch" shows, but I love being able to talk to other people about shows, so I'm very open to suggestions. Music-wise, I'm loving AAA and the AKB48 subunits more and more. no3b's and DiVA's recent new singles have been pretty awesome~

Preparing for the school year, I've been fixing one of my organization's website and it looks like the old webmaster seriously used a pagebuilder. There's so much excess code that can be trimmed down (empty table cells which literally do nothing) and the email form doesn't even work. I'm considering redesigning the site completely, but what I'm more interested in is practicing my PHP. I planned on doing that a long time ago, but never got around to it. I'm also preparing for the school year as one of the yearbook editors.

Anyways, I'll leave it at that for now. See you again!

Hmm well after today, I only have one more day of teenager-hood before I hit 20. I'm gonna spend my birthday working, but some of my friends and I might end up going to Natural Bridge Caverns that night (LOL most people go to a party or a movie; we go to a SCIENCE-Y CAVERN).

In other news, I'm finally branching more out from Hello! Project. I saw AAA's No Cry No More pop up on the Oricon charts predictions. I watched the video and... REALLY LIKED IT :D Since then, I've been listening to some other songs as well. I really like Hide and Seek although it looks like two lead singers, a rapper, and backup dancers. Oh and the girls stare into your SOUL in that PV. The nice thing about listening to groups with guys in them is that I can actually sing in their range and sound somewhat natural XD

PREP mentoring is going well. Everyone likes to talk A LOT but I really like the students ^_^

I think I'll leave it at that for now. If Xenoblade or The Last Story suddenly gets announced for America, that'd be nice *coughhintnintendoofamericacough*

Sometimes you just want to write, so please excuse the title. Seeing as how I haven't updated all semester, I'll start with an update on why I've fallen off the face of the planet we know as the internet.

( Nostalgia plus reflection... you know the usual )

Welcome back to non-nostalgic blogging. In fandom land, Inazuma Eleven is OVER O_O Bye super awesome anime... But on the plus side, Inazuma Eleven GO is here to fill my void! YAY YOU! I like it so far, but I reserve my opinion until I've seen more than just the first episode lol. Xros wars has kind of returned to its formulaic setup. I'm a little upset, but the super evolutions are a welcome addition, as I missed normal evolutions. Now we just need Sparrowmon to super evolve and triple cross with the others~ Tower of Druaga is the non-Ryuu_Rogue anime I'm watching lol. Pretty enjoyable and funny in its own right. A little on the short side, but oh well. I've also started watching both Glee and Heroes. Oh man all my friends were right. I'm such a SUCKER for Glee. A show all about singing and high school drama? I'm sold (I'm such a loser lol). Heroes is pretty cool too. I'm still in season one, but I love watching how everyone's stories are coming together. (Note, most of this watching has occurred either slowly over the semester or within the last week since I finished the semester lol)

As far as music, Hello! Project still wins my heart. Berryz <3 C-ute <3 And Momusu <3 (And of course S/mileage, but Koi no Booing was just... let's just say it hasn't grown on me yet). Also listening to Arashi, AKB48, Tokyo Girls' Style, and Perfume lately too. Do Jpop idols dominate my music taste? *nod*

I also did some driving practice for the first time in ages. I forgot how to park, so I can't do that worth crap yet, but I've got the driving part down? *thumbs up* I beat Arc Rise Fantasia. When you ignore the voice acting, it's actually a really decent game. I clocked in 60 hours so far and I still have post-game sidequests to do, but I might just move onto going retro and playing more PS2 games. Xenosaga marathon anyone?

Speaking of Xenosaga, Xeno Star is going to be switching subdomains. If you happen to still visit it, please change your bookmarks to: http://xenostar.ziedrich.net/ I haven't gotten everything there yet, so it's just a temporary page, but that's where we'll be before the end of June.

And that's it for now. I have way more to talk about, but you're probably bored and I'm tired, so I'll stop lol.

But we're waiting until next week so that my haircut will last more into the school year. Anyways, wow I'm super impressed with how often I'm updating my livejournal this winter break :D Go me? XD

I'm in the process of applying for internships and/or summer research. Unfortunately, I've just recently found out that one of the internships I'm applying for is for working during the school year. It's very possible for a lot of people to do, but I feel like I'm already going to be at my limit with 19 hours, work, and clubs to take care of =/ My uncle suggested that I apply to at least get interview experience though and maybe even arrange to work at the internship next semester instead of this semester (i.e. get my foot in the door). Speaking of which, I have a new baby cousin! He was born the day after Christmas :) Most of my textbooks have also arrived for the next school year. Wow this paragraph lacks topic unity lol -- not that any of my LJ entries ever seem to have properly organized thoughts anyways XD

I am SUPER SUPER SUPER excited for two upcoming RPGs for the Wii: The Last Story and Xenoblade. They BETTER bring those games over. The Wii has so many great platformers but almost no RPG selection. The Last Story in particular looks awesome~ They had a live demo with the director and music composer, both former workers on Final Fantasy X3 Please bring 'em over to the United States ASAP. Thanks <3

Newsflash! S/mileage has been named the Best New Artist of 2010 in Japan :D GO S/MILEAGE~ They aren't the strongest vocally, but their songs are nice ^_^ Oh and Berryz won't be singing the next Inazuma Eleven ending theme. Boo >.< I enjoyed hearing Berryz after each awesome episode of Inazuma Eleven -- speaking of which zomg THE KINGDOM DRAMA in Inazuma lol. I still need to start watching some new anime. I totally got side-tracked by Lil*Pri >.> Also yay Xros Wars has finally started shaking things up. I was a little afraid that it would stay as predictable as the first two or three zones, but it's really cool now :D

We went to go replace the strings on my viola today (having the same set for one year is WAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAY too long) and the difference in the sound my viola is producing is scary o_o I'm glad we went.

Oh and Fubuki is my new desktop wallpaper ^____^ Yay Inazuma Eleven~ That's all for now folks. See you guys later~

Hola everyone!

Winter break is just what I needed. My days are budgeted as such: Wake up stuff/Breakfast -> Video Games -> Lunch + Anime -> Internet -> Viola -> TV -> Misc. Activities -> Dinner + Anime -> Internet or video games -> Sleep

It's quite awesome that I finally get to do all the fun stuff I'm missing out on during the school year to keep up with engineering. On the plus side though, all that work I did last semester paid off! I got all A's this semester (4.0 term GPA, 3.96 overall GPA). I was a really worried because it was a hard semester and I messed up some of my finals, but I made it ^_^ Next semester's another tough one, but I'm taking a lot of classes I want to take (including some music ones!) so I'm really looking forward to it :D

The game I'm currently replaying is Kingdom Hearts. I would like to RP as Sora at some point (even if it will have to wait until I have sufficient free time and a RP to play him in), so I figure replaying KH1 and 2 will be good for me. I've already played Chain of Memories via the PS2 remake last year (which is hard yet awesome) so I think I'd be good on general character knowledge. He just seems like such a fun character to play :D The replay is on Expert mode which is both "ARGH" and "YAY" at the same time XD The game is giving me about the same level of difficulty as I had when I played it when it first came out on the "normal" difficulty, so it's great to see that I've evolved as a gamer to be better than a button masher XD It must be all the platformer, shooting, and fighting game "training" I've received lol.

Viola-wise, I'm choosing between two Bloch Rhapsodies to play next since I'm almost done with my Schubert Arpeggione. They're both cool and difficult, but one is MUCH more difficult than the other. I usually go for the harder challenge because I like to push myself, but the harder one is so gypsy-ish and difficult that it might be out of my capability at the moment (most of my experience is with classical concertos). Hopefully I can decide in the next few days so we can go out to buy the music after Christmas. I'm also in the midst of arranging a trio for violin, viola, and cello so look forward to that :D

Quick summary of my music life out of necessity: 5-nin momusu *tear*, 9th gen YAY (creepy that wota are so good at stalking that they found out the names of two of the finalists with nothing to go off of), oh hey it's Stereopony again yay, waiting for Buono's new song, Mano Erina's new song is so catchy o_o -- it's like Ogawa Mana, S/mileage has awesome album songs~

And finally I'm looking for an engineering internship. Someone please hire me lol. Wow so I've basically traded not having a life scenarios (one where school consumes my life and one where I'm not being very social to the people I know in RL). Anyways that's it for now. TTFN; ta-ta for now!

So far, I've taken 3 out of my 5 finals, and now I just feel strange. The two finals I have are viola jury (Monday) and Electric Circuits (Thursday), so I'm already in downhill-mode and want to just go home. The other three exams I've already taken (4 if you count my lab report which was due the day before the first day of finals) were all within the first two days (Friday and Saturday), so that's only feeding to my want to go home and not do anything. Everyone always seems to have copious amounts of free time during the school year, but now that I have some free time, everyone's busy. I understand why, but it still kind of sucks.

How did I do on those exams? That's still up for debate, as I realized I made stupid mistakes on all of the test ones (the third one was a presentation). I hate it when you realize that you made a stupid stupid stupid error on a problem or two >.> It's the worst feeling and now I have to just live with it until I get my grades in a couple weeks.

My neck has been hurting recently, and I'm not really sure why. Too much looking down for studying and testing maybe? Anyways, that's it for now. TTFN -- tata for now~ *shot*

It's hard for me to believe that my last update was at the beginning of the school year, but the proof is there. I used to update this guy every few days, and now it's dwindled down to once every few months. I also used to not begin every entry nostalgically but look at me now XD Onto the main stuff then!

It's Thanksgiving, and this year is the first year we've stayed at home for the holiday. We typically go over to a family friend's, but this year, my mom decided to do the cooking herself. Sadly, that does call for a much less-lively holiday, but we were still able to eat turkey, ham, cranberry sauce, and thin noodles like usual. Still quite delicious despite having mostly premade stuff. We also decided to go out and watch Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Part 1. It was quite good IMO, but it might be because I haven't reread the book yet and go "asdflkjahsdfa they forgot _________________!" Whatever the case, I enjoyed it so it's at least enjoyable!

I've decided that my Thanksgiving break "assignment" will be to complete Super Mario Galaxy 2 in terms of collecting 120 stars lol. I'm already at 105 I believe, so getting the last 15 shouldn't be too difficult. The game is both very forgiving and cruel at the same time, but more importantly, it's super fun to figure out the best way to complete each level ^_^

School-wise, things are going okay. The super-stressful semester is winding down: chemistry lab ended a week ago, circuits lab audio preamplifier final project demos will be on Monday (although the caveat is that we have a super report to write as well), I got a 99 on my differential equations and linear algebra test and have a few more tests coming up, badminton is still super fun, yearbook is winding down, and I've been invited to twenty-one divided by seven white elephant parties (why do people at my school think it's fun to spend money copious amounts of money? x_x). Orchestra is also super fun still, and I got to take a lesson with Christof Huebner of the Walden Chamber Players. It was SUPER fun and I learned lots :D

Anime I've been watching throughout the school year: Inazuma Eleven/Digimon Xros Wars as episodes are released and Tengen Toppa Gurren Lagann/Last Exile/Sengoku Basara/Hellsing with my school's anime club. Yep, I finally joined an anime club, and it's pretty cool. The people do weird things sometimes, but if I feel weirded out, I just laugh and stand to the side lol. Inazuma Eleven is awesome like always! Digimon Xros Wars has REALLY picked up since Baalmon's story was revealed so I'm happy in that department. We're in the last 5 episodes of Gurren Lagann and I have to say I love the series. It has the usual character archetypes of blockhead, shy hero, fanservice girl, genius weird person, and mary-sue girl, but the story takes you along for the ride with its unexpected twists and turns (although these last few episodes, my friend's been calling everything that happens lol). Last Exile we pretty much ditched because everyone thought that it dragged a little too much (I haven't seen much of it because I'm not there most of the time we watch it). Hellsing is... interesting. We watched it as a Halloween special, and I will admit that the plot has me really hooked, but blah all the blood and grossness and ahhh. Good thing Darker Than Black already de-sensitized me to blood >.< Finally Sengoku Basara is what we only recently started watching after ditching Last Exile. It's about Feudal Japan and the clash of the small armies and such. Pretty good in its own right. I'm glad I joined the anime club or else I probably wouldn't have watched any anime at all this semester lol.

And finally we're down to the topic I used to be and still am obsessed with: jpop lol. Hello Project is still dominating my tastes like no tomorrow so I probably don't need to talk too much about them (Berryz and C-ute and S/mileage and Momusu zomg! (p.s. I miss you Buono! as my current song implies *sniff sniff*)), however I have been broadening my tastes a bit. Probably not to Joh's liking though, my expansion is still in the Japanese idol world lol. AKB48 is so fanservice-y that it's awkward for me, but I really like their newest song Beginner. I think I would like it even more if it wasn't an "all-unison" song and had some solos, but it overall has a pretty catchy sound. Momoiro Clover is also getting some attention with their debut song Ikuze! something something I forgot XD (hey I'm not good with names -- don't even get me started on S/mileage songs. I still can't spell onaji blah blah, asu wa date blah blah, otona blah blah, the kansai-ben gambatte song, etc. even though I love all of those songs lol) and their most recent song Pinky Jones. The latter song I actually stumbled onto on accident because I was just tracking Berryz's Shining Power and it came up on Oricon at the same time lol.

Okay so that took way longer than I thought it would, but there we go. My first proper entry in ages. Happy Thanksgiving to those who celebrate it, and see you guys around ^_^ *gets shot by friends for not using "y'all" lol*

As I was in the midst of my Differential Equations and Linear Algebra homework today, a sudden wave of nostalgia hit me, and I decided to finally take a break from studying and write my first proper entry in what seems like ages.

( This is probably going to end up being long, so cut! )

I haven't even been back for a week, and Tsunku's already announced Kamei Eri, Jun Jun, and Lin Lin's triple graduation from Morning Musume. Kamei Eri and Lin Lin were my two favorite members of the current Morning Musume line up too T_T 9th generation has some big shoes to fill. I hope we get some great girls.