National Peanut Butter Lover's Day!

Mood:

I love peanut butter!This was actually on Saturday, but why not keep celebrating it? Even though I love it, a little can go a long way. I especially like the crunchy kind. Feels more 'real' if I can crunch down on a peanut bit. The smooth stuff, to me, might only be good in baked goods. 

This is my wallpaper for March. As it says, it's Hibird from Hitman Reborn. He's Hibari's bird. Most of the time he's with Hibari, unless told to leave, which isn't often. Thought it was cute, funny, and spring-like. The sakura flowers are kind of funny, since Hibari has an aversion to them. Ever since he first fought Mukuro, he's kind of been afraid of them. Wonder what he'd do if Hibird actually gave those to Hibari...

My Italy calendar features Tuscany this month. We're back up a bit towards the north. There's some info on the region and its history. The main pic's of a church called San Biagio just outside the city of Montepulciano. Looks pretty cool. 

My Jewish calendar features 3 megillot (plural for megillah, lit. 'scroll') or Esther scrolls. The main one has an anonymous maker, made out of parchment and wood, from the Netherlands; 1700-1750. It's rather interesting looking. There are some illustrations where they look like they may be acting out some of the parts in the story. And, there are weird looking animals encircling the text. Another one had an anonymous maker, made out of silver and parchment; 1700-1750. (They don't mention where it was from. Maybe it's from the Netherlands, too?) It looks kind of like a mini fancy Torah. (Not all of them look like that.) The last megillah was also made anonymously, made out of parchment, ivory, and silk; 1800-1850. (The place isn't listed for this one, so maybe it's also from the Netherlands?) It's really tiny looking, has only one 'roller', and has very tiny print. Kind of cool looking ones. And, really old. That makes them even more interesting.

We read the megillah on Purim. It's the story of Esther. We're told to recite it every Purim. Only since it's supposed to be a fun holiday, people act it out, do things when certain names are mentioned, if just read they might do it in a certain accent, etc. It's very interactive. That itself can be a lot of fun. Purim is on the 16th, and Shushan Purim is the next day. In cities that were walled at the time of Joshua, Purim is celebrated the day after. (Some interpret it loosely to mean all walled cities.) Shushan (the city in the story) was a walled city, and according to the megillah, deliverance from the massacre wasn't complete until the next day. People living in Jerusalem celebrate it then. (They're one of the few we know for sure was a walled city back then.) I decided that I might want to go to the 'Anatevka' or Fiddler on the Roof-themed one. It sounds like it'd be fun! They're going to recite it in Russian accents, have a Russian 'peasant' lunch, they've asked people to dress up according to the theme, there's an art show, and more. I'm not sure what I'll wear, though...Today is the first day of the 2nd month of Adar or Adar II. (There are 2 months of Adar during a leap year.) Pesach or Passover is a month after Purim. Crazy that it's coming up so quickly!

The month-long holidays are: National Celery Month, National Noodle Month, National Peanut Month, National Frozen Food Month, Bell Peppers and Broccoli Month, Berries and Cherries Month, Irish-American Heritage Month, National Craft Month. Some are important causes, some are to make you appreciate things you may take for granted, and some are just for fun. Lots of awesome food ones! Cool, I'm Irish-American! Good to connect with people's heritages. Crafts can be fun. I'm not too into them, but once in a while they can be fun to do. 

Couldn't sleep very well last night.So, I got up even earlier than I'd like to. I think I was wide awake at 4:30, and tried to make myself go back to sleep. I couldn't, and just decided to get up. Funny, because I ended up going to bed slightly later than I'd like. But, that was mainly because my grandpa called, and we hadn't talked for a long time. Plus, it was 3 hours later over there, but he decided to call us anyways. So, I would have felt guilty if I hadn't talked to him.

Tried a new restaurant called Elmer's last night. It replaced a not so great or so-so one (Taprock). And, before that there was another restaurant that everyone seemed to like. (Mitzel's.) And, I have some pretty fond memories of it.(It looked different back then.) There was a huge fire that basically destroyed everything, and after it was remodeled, the so-so restaurant went in. This place was much better. They used the same layout, the seats were the same, and the menu's design looked similar. But, they had some much more exciting sounding stuff. They had German pancakes, omelets, crepes, cinnamon bun French toast, lots of burgers, fish and chips, steaks, etc. I had their ranch house burger. It had a pretty thick patty, cheddar, an onion ring, BBQ sauce, lettuce, their 'special' burger sauce mixed in with the lettuce, and a crispy bun. It was very good.There was a really big pickle and some fries on the side. The fries actually had flavor, and were a decent cut. Very good all around. 

I decided to sign into Plenty of Fish and Jewcier a few days ago. I hadn't been on either for a long time. Its been the longest time since I've signed in to Jewcier. Had to actually reactivate it.I mainly wanted to check out the revamped version of it. Anyways, as soon as I signed into both, I had a ton of guys saying they wanted to meet me or were messaging me. (There's a button on POF that says Meet Me under a person's pic. If someone clicks it, you get an automated message saying someone wants to meet you.) It was weird, because the last time I signed in, I barely had anyone message/want to meet me. I'm not really used to it. I wonder what changed...Although, I kind of understand Jewcier being different since they've changed their system a bit. It still surprised me. Also, there were some decent looking guys who messaged me this time. Most of those messages were through Jewcier, so they're Jewish too. Yay!One said on his profile that he's trying to come up with as many recipes for banana bread as he can, and that maybe someone could taste-test it for him. He'll cook other things for them too. Yay, someone who likes to cook, too! That'd be awesome!But, I might gain weight...Anyways, should be interesting to look into these. 

Did more of that oc writing meme. I feel like I'm really getting into them. Funny that one of the questions was about a zombie apocalypse. There aren't that many zombies in their world, but they exist. And the question was aimed at just a few of the demons. They don't really care. So to them it was kind of a boring question. It's fun for me though to write about these 'situtations'.The dinner party one was interesting, too. I think I'm close to finishing this meme. 

Studied more kanji through JapaneseClass' site. Did pretty well this time. Had some pretty long combos. (The more questions you get correct in a row, the higher the combo.) Made it to the front page. If you gain enough points in one day, you're added to the top ranked scorers for the day. 

On Saturday, I had my own little afternoon Shabbat service. I hadn't done that in a long time. It felt kind of nice.Also, read the portion or parsha. It's the last one for Exodus. 

Later, I also had my own Havdalah service. I haven't done Havdalah at home since Mom did it occasionally. And, that was years ago.It's the concluding service or ceremony for Shabbat. A lot of people just do it at home. It's a little dangerous if you're by yourself, because of how big the candle's flame can get. It's a special braided candle. Usually pretty colorful. I used the one I got from Tzfat or Safed. It was from a candle shop where they actually make some of the stuff in front of their customers. I got a rather large one from them. I also used a spice box Mom made a long time ago. Still smelled awesome! We didn't have regular grape juice, so I used some sparkling grape/raspberry juice. (It's like a fancy French spritzer we got from Costco a while ago.) Havdalah is one of my fave services/ceremonies. It's beautiful, when with others it brings them closer together, and it feels cozy or homey too. It's supposed to be bittersweet, because it's the end of Shabbat, but the beginning of another possibly joy-filled or good week.It's a short ceremony, too. 

I installed the newest version of Spybot Search & Destroy. Thought I'd see how my system was doing. I had over 48,000 temp files, and over 500 'threats'.Got rid of them, and things are running much smoother. My computer isn't 'thinking' so hard. Also, decided to install the newest version of Panda Cloud. It's a great antivirus thing, where most of it is stored in the cloud. It monitors computers from all over the world at once. When a new virus is found, it updates itself and takes care of it right away. It's pretty awesome. It has things Spybot S&D doesn't have, and vice versa. So, it's good to have both. It's running even smoother now. I checked, and apparently it freed up 3 more gb. Crazy! That's about the same amount I cleared out a few months ago. So, all together I've freed up around 6 gb. That's a lot. 

deviantART fave: Pizza Cake I did not make this! An awesome looking cake made to look like a pizza. The toppings are made out of chocolate, fruit jelly, and icing. It looks amazing. I love those sweets that look like actual dishes. They're cool and very creative, especially when done right. 

Ship of Fools

Mood:

From the Tsubasa Chronicle soundtrack. I think this is usually when they're about to/are traveling through different parallel universes. It's one of the best ones on there. Kind of sad that they might be referred to as 'fools'. I can understand the ship and traveling part. But, I don't really think they're foolish.They just don't know about what it really means to be traveling through these universes. Like, are the people they knew in their world really different in others. They've realized that they may all possess the same 'soul', but they still don't understand much beyond that. And, just because one was a villain in one world, doesn't mean they are in the next. They may be a hero. It's become something more than them just trying to find Sakura's feathers that hold her memories and are scattered to parallel universes.

Went through more of my closet on Sunday. I think I spent about 3 hours trying on clothes and tossing out ones I didn't want.Made another big bag full of clothes for the dump. These ones have things like stains, rips, holes, etc. Not really suitable for charity. Remarkably, I fit into a lot of what I tried on.Some I haven't been able to fit into since high school. It's crazy that I've lost that much weight already. I still don't quite believe it, and yet things back then fit me so well again. I found a few nice dresses, but most are more for warmer weather. I thought I only had 1 or 2 dresses left that fit me, so it was nice to find more.I still fit into one of my high school marching band t-shirts. Also, more for warmer weather, but cool nonetheless. I went through so much of it, and yet there's so much left. I have about a third left of what's hanging in my closet to go through. Then, there's the massive pile of clothes on the right-hand side of the floor of it. Plus, my shoes on the other side. Also, there's stuff on the shelf above the things that are hanging. That doesn't have clothes-related stuff, but I'll still have to go through it. So, there's quite a bit left.Should be interesting. I might go through more during the weekend. Oh, and the clothes that fit, fit differently than they did back in high school. For one thing, I'm bigger in my chest area...I'm filled out more in that area for them. I remember back then I used to be bummed about being too small, so this is interesting. Different experience/look with the same clothes. Fun! 

Last night, I had the pesto tilapia and a vegetable soup. With the soup, I used a vegetable soup blend we got from the same place we get our spices from. It has carrots, tomatoes, potatoes, cabbage, onions, parsley, and a few other things. All dehydrated. They said that it should cook in the water or broth for 30 minutes to get the vegetables to hydrate again. I added tiny star-shaped pasta to it. It was good, but you could still tell that they were once dehydrated.Maybe it needs more time in the liquid? I added some parmesan to mine, and it was even more awesome! Seemed like a pretty healthy dinner, too. Very filling. 

I tried my eyeliner on again on Sunday. Before that, I hadn't tried it since Halloween. I thought it looked bad back then. I did my upper eyelids. Thought they looked weird, but Dad said she liked them. I'm not really used to the overall look, so I'm not sure what to really expect.After a while, I thought it looked alright, too. So, I decided to experiment further and did my bottom eyelids. I looked really weird.Kind of like a sad clown, or raccoon, or something. Dad said I looked like Ozzy Osbourne. Hmmm...Maybe next time, I'll just try the upper eyelids. Eyeliner is weird. I probably won't use it much. Plus, it makes my eyes look smaller. My eyes are already small looking. (Funny, because I have super long eyelashes.)

I decided to reply to another interesting Gaia thread this past weekend. It was a PTSD support thread. I'm not used to talking about things I might personally be going through on a forum. But, I thought I'd jump in anyways. Much like I was with the trans support group with me having a trans parent. But, I haven't talked much to a therapist about my PTSD. I had 2 that were able to touch on it just before they quit or retired. One psychiatrist who I met once for something, immediately told me I definitely had it. I've never really been able to 'delve' into it. Anyways, I told them about my stuff, and I got a response pretty quickly. They said that how I viewed it was very common. (I used to think that only military people had it.) But, they said I shouldn't compare myself to others, and that my pain is just as 'real'. The first person who responded, had a really long post. Very wordy, but nice. In fact, every post he replied to after each of mine were all very long and detailed. It was interesting. I do plan to eventually talk more about it with my therapist. But, this was nice to see. 

I'm debating whether I should email someone or not.She was the person who invited us to Shabbat lunch recently. She's orthodox. Recently, she was very rude to my dad. She had read some things on a very biased and homophobic site. She said that she read that gays molest children or something. (Really bogus stuff.) She also is confused, and seems to equate trans people with being gay.(Even while we were at their place, she asked me secretly something like 'what's it like having a gay parent?', not trans but 'gay'.) There are some trans people who are gay, but they can also be straight, bi, pan, etc. It has nothing to do with sexual orientation. So, that's been bugging me a bit.Anyways, she told my dad that she won't shake hands with her again because she still thinks she's a man. (Notice, my dad didn't make a move to shake her hand.) That's one of the worst things you can say to a trans person. Basically invalidating who they are as a person. Not to mention we thought they were very nice before. In orthodoxy, they're not allowed to shake hands with the opposite sex. But, I thought 'modern' orthodoxy might be a little different. Anyways, my dilemma is that she wants me to email her. She knows that I want to know more about them, and be more into my Judaism. I kind of feel like maybe it was a brain fart. She seemed to be very easily swayed. So, if she didn't really mean it or came to her senses, what then? She still hurt my dad. I guess saying hello, and talking kind of surface stuff might be ok. But, what if she tries to 'sway' me? It won't work, but it would get very awkward.Plus, I almost feel that if I don't email her, she may think that my dad kept it from me or something. Hmmm...I don't know! Well, at least if I decide to email her, she can't hurt me...I just may correct her sometimes.

I watched the finale of the 2nd season of Jikou Keisatsu or Time Limit Detective. It's probably the series finale, since there hasn't been a new season since. There were some homages to the first episode of the series. I still remember them, even though it's been a while. Like, they mentioned that Kiriyama was wearing his glasses on a Sunday. There was a joke in the first episode where you shouldn't wear them on Sundays. It's like bad luck, and it's rumored that the British follow that too. (Not in reality. Not even sure if it was really true in the show's reality.) I love this series so much!There were so many quirky things to it. Eventually, it lead to lots of inside jokes, that if people who hadn't seen the series heard them, they'd be confused. In this final episode, Kiriyama even played the theme song on a guitar in a Spanish style. It was cool. The killer in this one is one of my fave actresses, too. She's an awesome comedian. The actor who played her husband has been in many of the shows I've seen, too. The killer mistook the person she killed as her husband. Finding out that she killed the wrong person, she felt even more stuck. She was and still is terribly bored of him. She thought she'd be free of him if she killed him. Kiriyama and Mikazuki told her that she should just have an honest conversation about it with him. He was listening in to the entire conversation. Almost felt like he was going to kill her after they left, but they didn't show that. He looked very hurt. Towards the end of the episode, it felt like Kiriyama confessed to Mikazuki in a strange way. He said that the team was more like a family. He went through the possible relationships, like the captain is similar to a kindhearted and funny uncle. He ended with him and Mikazuki as similar to being husband and wife in the family. Just when Mikazuki was going to ask him specifically how he felt about her, an earthquake hit. Didn't last long, but everyone came out to see them, so the mood was gone. I grew to really like the newest member of the team too. I wasn't sure of her at first. I'll really miss this show!

Decided to drop Mixed Vegetables. It seemed to be getting a bit dry. I could sense a lot of angst coming, too. Just don't see where it was headed. The story seemed interesting for a while. It just eventually got old.

On Saturday, I did the practice quiz for attendance on JapaneseClass' site. Did pretty well. For attendance, you have to answer 20 questions for the day. I also decided to do a bunch of chapter quizzes for kanji and vocab. Did well with all of them. Lowest score I got was 82%, but most of the others were in the high 80's and 90's. I'm apparently up to level 4 in kanji, and level 5 in vocab. I'm on the last level for vocab, so there's not much new stuff left of their list. I still have a little ways until I finish all the kanji. I've always been better with vocab. Probably because some kanji have multiple meanings and pronunciations. Some have a lot of strokes as well, and can be hard to distinguish. You can also quiz yourself on everything you've learned plus new stuff with the regular quiz. Kind of a continuation after the 20 questions. The big 'random' quiz reviews some of the stuff you might have come across at the beginning, new stuff, weak words, etc. It's very helpful. I have come across some questions/answers that are spelled wrong, or have the wrong recording. They're still ironing that out. But, with feedback from the community, it goes pretty quickly. We can also challenge others, go through new vocab that people have put up as cards or notes that might not be in the system yet, read articles, see trends in Japan, there's a forum, etc. I'm ranked at 695 on the site. That's out of 45,663 people. Pretty good, I think.Especially since I don't go on there everyday. My attendance 'record' looks kind of funny that way. 

deviantART faves: Random OC Meme of Randomness Draw My Life Meme I did not make these! The first one's an oc (original character) writing meme. Kind of similar to one that I've done before. It puts your oc's in weird situations, and you write out how they would react. I love those sort of things.The second's a drawing meme that's about the artist themselves. I haven't done one of those before, so that might be cool to do. It asks you what life was like for you in kindergarten through high school. Plus, asks where you're from, and an intro. 

Banana Lovers Day!

Mood:

Yay, for bananas!One of my fave fruits!(And, one of the most popular fruits in the world.) I usually have a banana everyday, but oddly we've run out. So, I can't have one today...Oh well. 

Had an appointment on Friday for a 2-hour intake 'interview' at the new counseling center. Well, it's new to me, since I've never had a therapist at this one. At the other place, the intake was just a 1-page questionnaire and a 5-minute phone interview. Nothing like this place.It's interesting that most of their clientele are in the LGBT community, and they're kind of tailored for that community. 

I'm supposedly considered to be under that 'umbrella', because I have a trans parent. They've kind of taken me in, and become somewhat like a family at the support groups. That's another thing I've noticed, is I feel like there aren't very many COTs (children of trans) like me around.At least that are open, supportive, and accepting. The breakout ally group that meets every other Wednesday through a main trans group mostly has partners or parents of a trans person. They told me the last 2 times I was there that there are a couple who are like me, but they don't go to these things because they feel they'll be the only one with this sort of relationship. Hmmm...They also said since they know another person, they might contact these people and tell them to go to the group next time. That'd be cool! (Although, I won't be able to go to the next one, because Rosh Hashanah starts that night.) This group meets at this counseling center. Dad and I sometimes joke, saying that I'm a unicorn. Since I'm so rare.

Anyways, the center sounds like they'll actually get where I'm coming from. I've had a therapist argue with me just over whether my Dad was trans or not.These people might actually be good to talk to in detail about it, and might be a lot more understanding. There's really nothing negative I feel towards it, I just go through a different 'experience'.

It was a very thorough interview. Just to see who would be the best therapist for me. I realized that I haven't really gone over mourning my mom with a therapist.So, that'd be good to go over, too. There were lots of other things that I never really covered before with previous therapy. Its been a very long time since my last therapy appointment, and they said I should probably be seeing someone at least once every 2 weeks. (Might have been since January or February since my last therapy appointment.) Eventually, I'll try to get a psychiatrist through them, too. 

After my appointment, we went to a very small Indian restaurant for lunch. There was very little seating, and it was a bit cramped. They had a buffet going for lunch. Very good food!They kept wanting to give us more things from their tiny kitchen. (Some weren't even in the little buffet bar area.) 

The ferries were running really late on our way back home, so we went up to the area where they have restaurants and stores at the terminal. I got a very good Ben & Jerry's brownie ice cream bar, since it was so warm out. Then, we grabbed some burritos from Taco Del Mar, and didn't have them until we got home. Would have been too hot to eat anyways. 

With the help of Pinterest, I've gotten more in touch with my style in clothing, and what looks good on me, as well. Its helped a great deal. I like dark fall colors (those in general look good on me anyways), and things like slinky looking soft clothes. For a while there I couldn't remember what my style was.Simply because I haven't seriously looked for things in a long time. And, now I have to. I'm running out of clothes, because I tossed a bunch out. I even found something interesting recently at a mall in Seattle. It was on sale, but still pretty expensive. But, the fact that I saw something I liked was good. 

I've been trying to really stick to my fitness routine this week. So far, so good.Up to 70 sit-ups, 2 times a day. I end up working up a sweat now. I can really feel it doing something after each time. Doing 2 of my 2-mile walks, as well. Still not entirely used to that, but it's getting there.I'm already feeling better. Feel like things are getting really baggy again. Even my new jeans seem to be getting that way. 

Did my nails again. This time it's a light pinkish-purple-y color. Kind of a bit metallic, too. There isn't a name for it on the bottle. I like it, though. Akuryo Byoutou is getting really good. The mystery behind the abandoned ward is getting more complex. 

In Hitman Reborn, things aren't looking too good for some of the Vongola. (Hibari's doing well.) It was interesting that Hibari knew exactly when his younger self was going to switch places with him. He just kicks butt all around. No matter how old he is, he seems to always be awesome. He's the most powerful Vongola member, and he only joins them when he 'feels' like it. Tsuna is surprising the enemy and Spanner with his ability to intuitively know what the enemy's about to do. And, how quick he learns from each fight. This whole story arc has been very interesting and intricate.

In Aka Aka, they still don't know much about this 'mystery man'. They just found out that he's using one of their friends' bodies as, essentially, a container for him to move around. And, he's not liking it. He keeps saying that he wants his body back to Yue. This has been very interesting too. The only downside is that I've caught up with the updates.The last one was 2 months ago. So, I don't know when I'll be able to continue reading it. In the meantime, I'm thinking of replacing it with another manga. One I obviously haven't read before. I have some ideas, but we'll see.

Played my clarinet. Did some klezmer tunes. Wasn't too bad. Only slipped up a couple of times. Wrote some more of my second story to my nightmare anthology. I think it's sounding scarier than it was in the actual dream it's based off of.

Sketched out an outline of Shadow, my main character. He's the first I'm drawing in my new 'project'. All my characters are going to be lined up and interacting with each other with a height measurement in the background. This way I can showcase their heights, clothing designs, and personalities. Shadow is one of the shortest ones. I want it to turn out with Junko hooking an arm around him, and have him waving. It might take a while to get that to look decent.

日本語

Today, I studied more compounds for the kanji: 真. There's a lot of them. Apparently, a very common one. All the better to go over them. 真面目 or しんめんもく (shinmenmoku): one's true character, one's true self, oneself; seriousness, earnestness. 真夜中 or まよなか (mayonaka): dead of night, midnight. 純真 or じゅんしん (junshin): purity, sincerity. 天真 or てんしん (tenshin): naivete. 真っ逆様 or まっさかさま (massakasama) (the hiragana is more commonly used.): head over heels, headlong, head first. 真っ盛り or まっさかり (massakari): height of, middle of, full bloom. Next time, I'll do more compounds for this kanji. 

deviantART faves:

Aliens from Strawberry Planet StupidFox - 95 You Tube I did not make these! First, a really cool up close pic of a strawberry. Second, a hilarious installment of the comic, StupidFox. Not sure how he got up there...Third, an awesome drawing of an artist's interpretation of what Youtube would look like as an anime character. Found this artist through dA's facebook update. They're drawing their own rendition of social media sites as their original anime characters. It's an interesting project. Chrome looks interesting, too. I decided to 'watch' them, too. Also, had someone fave a bunch of my dA food pics. They must have just come across one, and then found my gallery. It was interesting to see what they liked. I occasionally get those sort of people, but they always surprise me.