Bodhran

Mood:

By the Young Dubliners. One of the few Irish tunes I have. I really need to get more...(Considering it's a part of my heritage.) The bodhran is a type of drum, which can be heard clearly at the beginning, before a bunch of other instruments join in. It's a cool looking one. I think we have a bodhran here at home. The Young Doubliners are an American 'Celtic' rock band formed in Los Angeles, California in 1988. They fuse traditional Irish instruments and music with modern rock. The lead vocalist and guitarist founded the band, and is a Dublin native. (Makes sense to call the band that, then.) I've found a couple other cool tunes from them. So, look for those in the future!

Managed to finish my 'design' for a book poster. I'd like to advertise it somehow, and I thought maybe printing out a poster/flyer and putting them up in cafes, shops, and such will help. Noticed another person downloaded the sample today! Yay! Up to 14 downloads!Hopefully, some of them will eventually buy it...We'll see. I looked at the online retailers list to see if they have gotten the 'shipments' of my book yet. I know it's up on Sony (Kobo), Apple (iTunes), and obviously Smashwords. For some reason, some are revising their shipments, and taking a while to finally have it up. These are mainly Barnes & Noble, and Baker and Taylor Blio. It's available for libraries to purchase directly, now. For Amazon, they said it will be shipped. Same with Baker-Taylor Axis360. So, things are coming along, just a bit slower than I expected. It was going so quickly at the beginning. Like, making it into Smashword's premium catalog within just 3 days of publishing it.I might start writing my next book soon, too. I'm itching to write this one!I think it'll go quicker and smoother. 

In Otenki Onee-san, the killer was a yoga teacher. Funny thing is, she taught Abe and Mitsuyo the same day she killed someone. Abe's frustrated, and feels like she doesn't know how to express emotion. It was interesting to see that side of her. She fearlessly decided to confront her yoga teacher on her own, about the murder. The teacher only confessed, told her why, and stared at her until the police arrived. Kind of awkward, but Abe couldn't move because she had started with doing yoga before interrogating her. So, she was stuck in one position the entire time. One of the anchors for the regular program has a stalker. He's been following, watching, and forcing her to meet with him. Now, he's gained a position with the network as an AD or assistant to the director. As close as he's ever gotten to her. He believes that they are dating, and yet she's told him numerous times that they aren't. Looks like something big's about to happen. Should make it even more interesting. This show has only gotten better with each episode. Great acting, hilarious at times, interesting background music, and seems to feel more 'real' to life.

In Hitman Reborn, it was 'Parent Participation Day' at Tsuna's school. I don't remember this happening in the anime...But, it was just a fun goof-off chapter. Tsuna was worried, at first, that he'd answer a question wrong in front of his mom. Turned out that Reborn, Bianchi, I-Pin, and Lambo had tagged along. Every time Tsuna was about to answer a question incorrectly, Reborn threw something dangerous at him. Saying that it was his duty as a home tutor to make sure his student is progressing. Gokudera knew everything right off the bat. He's really smart book-wise, but not so much with common sense. Eventually, Lambo, Bianchi, and I-Pin disrupted the class, and were forced to leave to help Gokudera go to the nurse's office. (He gets a stomachache every time he sees his sister, Bianchi.) While their regular teacher went to help them as well, Reborn took over. He would be a scary teacher! Odd that he knows so much and is so violent, when he's just supposed to be a baby. Although, he never appears to age. (And, a lot of the time, he looks more like an old shriveled up man than a baby, to me.) This was the end of the volume, so there were some 'extras' and fanart submissions. Always interesting to see. Next time will apparently be about Futa. He's kind of an odd character. It'll be interesting if his story will be slightly different or have added stuff to it in this version. 

日本語

Today's kanji was: 州. (This one's kind of fun to write.) When pronounced as しゅう (shuu): state, province, county; continent. (This isn't used too often for continents. Mostly for states, provinces, or other regions.) As す (su): sandbank, sandbar. 九州 or きゅうしゅう (kyuushuu): Kyushu (the southernmost of the 4 main islands of Japan). 本州 or ほんしゅう (honshuu): Honshu (largest of the 4 main islands of Japan). 欧州 or おうしゅう (oushuu): Europe. 豪州 or ごうしゅう (goushuu): Australia. 

Started figuring out how many and which characters I still haven't drawn the heads of. For my character 'face' sheet designs, based on my novel, Alliance. I stopped a while ago. Apparently, had skipped a bunch of the characters that were towards the beginning of my story. Also, skipped Doina. All in all, about 6 of them. Just the right amount for a full 'sheet' or page of them. Hope to start that new page next week. 

Youtube:

A hilarious/awesome Naruto Shippuden amv by someone I subscribe to:

National Taffy Day!

Mood:

This is actually tomorrow, but I kind of have a hankering for it. Taffy's awesome!But, we don't have any at the moment. There's so many different kinds out there! Root beer, Neapolitan, and caramel apple are just a few of my faves. 

I tired myself out on Monday, with the added fitness stuff. And, didn't feel up to blogging. Tuesday, I slept in a bit later than I wanted to, and eventually it felt like that day was shot.Even though I slept in today, I was able to get quite a bit done. So, yay! Getting back on track. (I will keep those new exercises, but it'll take a while to get used to them.)

Submitted the drawing meme that I was working on. Only have one fave so far, but I'm getting a ton of views. Maybe more than I've had for a drawing that's only been up for barely 2 days.It's at: Character Art Mad Lib- Singles. 

Yesterday, would have been my mom's birthday, if she were here.So, it was a bit of an odd day to start off. Dad came home early, and we went to Poulsbohemian. (A cafe.) I had their black cherry tea. It was pretty good. While I was there, I read more of that book on Kabbalah. The forward in the book was pretty long. I guess he wanted to prepare the readers for it. Once I finally got to the actual 'meat' of it, it was really interesting. It was hard to stop reading it. Somehow the concepts of Kabbalah have always been fascinating to me. They're kind of mind blowing. It's a short book, so it probably won't take me long to read. 

Went to the support group meeting last night. This time the organization had to move temporarily to a church. So, it was the first meeting there. A lot of people were uncomfortable about it. I am a bit too, but I'm also very grateful that they let us use a small space there. There were 3 people besides Dad and I. So, really not a very big group either. It was still a nice meeting. 

Dad and I went to Shari's afterwards. I had my usual strawberry lemonade. Got their strawberry pancakes. It had strawberries, strawberry syrup, whipped cream, and chocolate shavings on top of the pancakes. Really good stuff!Also, had some scrambled eggs, and hash browns. I was going to let myself eat the whole thing (for once), but couldn't. My stomach must be much smaller than it used to be.That might have been the last time that we'll go to that Shari's. They're always super slow. Takes forever just to get our food. Maybe the group will find another hangout after meetings. I think for some it was more 'therapeutic' for them than the meeting. 

Someone from Japan found me on facebook a few days ago. I looked at his friends' list, and I apparently was the only non-Japanese person. He later messaged me in Japanese saying that he happened upon my page by chance. He was just looking around, and came across it. He said that he might not be able to use the English version of facebook, and would it be ok to talk through email. (He loves the Japanese one, and might have a separate account there. Thought it'd be interesting to try the English one.) Soon enough, he was kicked off of the English version, but is still on my friends list. I messaged him back in Japanese through my email. Hopefully, he'll understand it...It'll be good practice for me, if we keep it up. I've corresponded with people in Japanese before, but it didn't last long. They understood me, just didn't have much extra time. A lot of them just wanted to correspond through snail mail. And, that takes forever. Also, thinking of downloading Second Life, and joining some of their learning Japanese groups. That would help a lot too. There's also ally support groups, Jewish groups, etc. Sounds awesome! That's of course if it runs well enough on my computer. We'll see.

日本語

Today's kanji was: 受. When pronounced as じゅ (ju): (Buddhism) vedana (sensation). It's also mainly used in compounds. As う.かる (u.karu): to pass (exams). As う.け (u.ke): (suf) popularity, favor, reception; defense, reputation; agreement. As う.ける (u.keru): to receive, get; to catch (e.g. a ball); to be struck by (wind, waves, sunlight, etc.); to sustain (damage), incur (a loss), suffer (an injury), feel (influence); to undergo (e.g. surgery), take (a test), accept (a challenge); to be given (e.g. life, talent); to follow, succeed, be descended from; to face (south, etc.); to be well-received, become popular, go down well. 受刑 or じゅけい (jukei): punishment. 受験 or じゅけん (juken): taking an exam. 受賞 or じゅしょう (jushou): winning (a prize). 受諾 or じゅだく (judaku): acceptance. 受動 or じゅどう (judou): passive. 受難 or じゅなん (junan): suffering, agony, passion.