Rosh Chodesh Shevat

It's the beginning of the month of Shevat on the Jewish calendar, aka Rosh Chodesh (lit. Head of the Month) Shevat. On the 15th of Shevat, there's Tu B'Shevat, which is our New Year for the Trees. Another new year...It's basically to celebrate nature. We eat a lot of fruit and nuts, some people plant trees, and others just go for a walk or hike. There's also a seder, which is set up similarly to a Passover one. (Seder lit. means 'order', and it's usually used for a ritual dinner that goes in a certain order.) 

Went to Gig Harbor last Friday. It was cold and wet outside. The waterfront wasn't that exciting. There weren't as many shops as I remembered. We did see an interesting one that had various olive oils, balsamic vinegars, spices, mustards, and more. You can sample all the oils and vinegar. That was fun. I got Quebec maple mustard there. I didn't realize at the time that it was a grainy kind. Might not be the best for me, but it's not like I'm going to have a lot of it. It's stronger than expected, too. Can barely taste the maple part. 

Went to an Italian restaurant called Il Lucano Ristorante Italiano for dinner. It was great and seemed authentic. The owner comes from an Italian town named Lucano. He holds cooking classes at the restaurant. He greeted everyone and seated them when we were there. He seemed very friendly (maybe a little too friendly...) and full of energy. He sang to the music occasionally, which was interesting. They serve bread and olive oil with garlic and herbs mixed in. I've heard that it's a thing for Mediterranean countries, but not many American restaurants that have that theme seem to actually serve it like that. They might have bread, but usually not much else. There were a lot of good sounding dishes on the menu. I got their veal parmagiano. Seemed quite different than what I'd get at other restaurants. The marinara had a ton of olive oil and garlic. The pasta seemed fresh and like it was made by them. The veal was done just right. It was really good parmesan and mozzarella. There was also a ton of basil. I was a little worried when I found a bunch of fresh basil leaves connected to a long stem under one of the veal cutlets. I realized that it might have purposely added to some of the flavor. I was very impressed by the food there. We might make the trek out there again. 

After that, we saw Aquaman in IMAX. I think this was only my 2nd or 3rd time watching an IMAX movie. It's huge! Felt like I was surrounded by it. Not many people were there. My parent and I were there with 2 friends. That was nice. I liked the movie until about 30 minutes towards the end. It became way too corny. Why would you have a long kiss in the midst of fighting? Plus, why do the leg up thing during it? That was weird, too. Seemed forced. The slow and dramatic poses were funny. They might have been going for that, though. 

The plaza, where the theater was, was more interesting than the waterfront. Lots of stuff to see. Seemed like other big plazas around it were interesting, too. We saw a cupcake ferris wheel display at Home Goods near the theater. It moves, and you could probably rig it up to turn the wheel on its own. The more I thought about it, the funnier it got. 

I've been keeping up with my Italian for the most part. It feels longer than the previous courses I've gone through on Duolingo. I originally planned to do a new language roughly every 3 months. I'm still on track since next week will mark 3 months. It might end up being a little over, which is ok. I've got about 10 more units until the end. I usually just go through the first level, not all 5. At the beginning, I was maxing out the levels to familiarize myself. However, later on I got the concepts right away and haven't needed to do more of the levels. Each unit builds off of the previous, too. When I started the German course, Duolingo only had 1 level for each unit. I think the 5 is overkill. Sure, 2 I can see. Especially, if something really isn't sinking in. When I did the HelloChinese course, they didn't stick too long on one unit. Maybe I'm just a fast learner with this stuff. I hardly make mistakes now with it. The only times I do is when I don't see something right away. Another thing with Duolingo is you can test out of units completely in one part. There are 4 to about 10 parts to each one. At least I don't do that. It's good that they have a few different options since not everyone learns the same way. I also found an app called Mango. It has over 70 languages. It sounds better and more in-depth than Duolingo. Duo doesn't have that many languages, either. They have cultural, grammar, and pronunciation notes. Duo doesn't have that. They have speaking parts to it, which is great that I'd be able to keep that aspect of it. I'm going to give some of the languages my family might have spoke a try. They actually have Yiddish and Gaelic (I think both an Irish and Scots version) on Mango! That was surprising to see. Hopefully, that one will work out. Not sure exactly which language on my list will be next. 

I managed to practice my clarinet today. I hope to get back into the habit of playing every day, except Shabbos (Saturday). It's been a while since I last played. Might have been in October...Anyways, if I can keep playing every day, I might add more to it slowly over time. Like, going over things with a metronome that have odd time signatures. I think I've been speeding up on certain things, and slowing down with others. Then, I'll listen to recordings of what I play. I did this a few years ago, and it really helped even though not everything can be found online. Eventually, play with the recording. Then, record myself and post the audio to Youtube. That way I can hear myself and others will hopefully give me some constructive criticism. I most likely will get trolls, but at least I'll be able to hear myself. It'll take me a while to feel confident enough to do that. Didn't sound too bad today. In fact, it was better than expected. I also noticed something that I had a bad habit of doing in the past. I tried to break it down and play it the way it should be slowly. It'll be hard to break that habit, but with practice I know I can. I figured out a different one last time I played, and improved on that. It was better. Now that I'm more aware, it should get easier. I also finally used a new reed. I play a size 3, which is rather thick. It goes from 1 to 5 with thickness. (There are 1/2 sizes.) Most people don't play 5s. I think most of them play a 2 or 2 1/2. (It doesn't mean I'm better than them for playing a 3...) I might be able to play a 4 now, but that seems intimidating. Highly doubt I could ever play a 5. It gets harder to play, but the sound can be deeper and more full. 

I also got a walk in today. I hope to get back into doing those every day. Probably with my usual 2-mile one for a month, than adding another one. It was cold out there. By the end, I somehow felt both freezing and sweltering. Despite that, it was still nice to be out there. 

Started reading MAR Omega. It's the sequel to the manga version of MAR. I watched the anime, so I at least know most if not all of the story. I liked the anime. It's interesting to see it in a different light. It seems Kai is Ginta's successor. We don't know much about him, and he's an orphan. I have a feeling he was born in our world, and thrown into theirs right after (since he doesn't remember anything before being adopted). He has somewhat of a similar personality as Ginta. Ginta's his hero and he hopes to be like him someday. Should be interesting to see how this one turns out. It's much shorter than the prequel. 

Got back to editing Alliance today, too. There were a lot of errors. Hopefully, I can get back to doing this on a regular basis as well. I want to finish it so I can read/edit the sequel, read/edit Sweet Endless Terror, publish all those to Smashwords, and then finish writing the most current sequel of Alliance. Hopefully, get to writing new stuff, too. That's a lot, but if I do this almost every day, it'll be quicker than it has been. 

Went back to drawing today. Mainly just got to planning how I want Shadow to pose and looking at things like arm proportions. At least, I'm looking into it more. I want to do better with drawing a character's full body. I already came up with a much better head (hair, face, etc.) design for him. I'm much happier with that. It took some messing around, though. His neck and top shoulder area looks pretty good, too. I'm making progress with it. I think another drawing project I might do is a meme that has you drawing something new every day for a month. Drawing your portrait, a still life, pets, something in certain colors, food, etc. That sounds fun. I might need another drawing pad before then. I think I'm on my second to last page of the big one, and the small one is already filled out. 

Happy New Year!

First post of 2019! Yay! It's probably going to take me a little while to get used to seeing that. Hopefully, I'll post more often this year. Did much better last year. Close to twice as many posts than the previous one. Also, hope it'll be a good year. 

Went to a couple's place for a party to ring in the new year. They've been family friends for most of my life, and we usually go to their place for Thanksgiving, New Year's, and Passover. Besides my parent and I, there was the 2 hosts, and 1 other person. That person didn't stay for very long. I know most of the guests that go to these, but didn't know her. They usually have a lot more guests, too. The last few times it's either been just us or one other person. Makes me wonder...Although, one of their dogs is not doing too well health-wise. She has something similar to diabetes and has incontinence issues. She's always thirsty. Sad. Both of those big dogs are so nice and friendly. 

We brought rosemary crackers, spreadable Finnish cheese with dill, chocolate covered raisins and cherries, BBQ potato chips, dolmas (stuffed grape leaves), pickled herring, BBQ chicken pieces, raspberry Pim's, and a bottle of sparkling cider. The crackers were pretty good with the cheese. No one touched the chips. That's ok. More for us. Dolmas were gone quickly. Pickled herring is kind of a tradition for us on New Year's Eve. I think half of it was gone by the end. The chicken was good, and only a little was left. We weren't sure if there would be enough cider. They always have it available. That's usually what I have there. Turns out they had more than enough. Not only in the refrigerator, but in the garage, too. I opened ours anyways at some point, and it erupted. Luckily, I was in kitchen when it happened and it seemed like no one was watching. It must have been tossed around in the car. Went through about 2 bottles. Pretty much everyone had some, though. Oh, and my parent brought cava wine. The bottle was rainbow colored. The brand donates some of the proceeds to their local LGBTQ+ groups. They're Swedish. I remember there was a thing about it in the news that it was in response to an anti-LGBTQ+ ad by a vodka company (I think). Pretty cool. Even though I don't drink alcohol (mainly for health reasons), I tried a little. Didn't taste very good to me. Alcohol has always tasted a little weird to me, though. Could be because I'm not used to that taste. I like it in cooking, but the alcohol itself burns off that way. There was a spinach artichoke dip, small slices of bread, peanut M&M's, other types of chips, and pickled green beans as well. 

This is my wallpaper for January. It's One Piece's main logo. It has the Straw Hat's Jolly Roger in the O. A stylized version of Luffy is the i in it. It seems perfect for an anime about pirates. In the wallpaper, they also added the figureheads of both of the Straw Hat's ships. The first one, which is on the lower left, was called Going Merry. She seemed like she had a life of her own. Sadly she ended up breaking down beyond repair. There was a lot of drama between one of the members, Usopp, and Luffy about what to do with her. (Usopp even left the crew briefly.) The 'funeral' for her was one of the most emotional scenes. They sent her off to sea and lit her on fire, all the while the crew was breaking down in tears. She actually spoke and tried to console them as she burned up. It was hard not to tear up. The current one, upper right, is called Thousand Sunny. That one doesn't seem as 'alive', but it's virtually indestructible. Made from some of the toughest trees in their world. It's loaded with weapons, too. One of the members, Franky, who's a shipwright, designed and crafted it along with help from some of the best shipwrights. It's twice as big as Going Merry was. 

The month-long holidays for January are: National Candy Month, National Egg Month, National Hot Tea Month, National Meat Month, National Oatmeal Month, National Soup Month. Some are for important causes, some are to make you appreciate things you may take for granted, and some are just for fun. A lot of good food ones this time. 

This year, I was able to get a Jewish calendar. For the last few years, there haven't been any left at Barnes & Noble, which is where I usually get my calendars. I thought it wasn't that big of a deal considering I can follow it online, but I do like to see the antique pics in the one I usually get. It's from the Amsterdam Jewish Historical Museum. The main pic is of a tzedakah (basically charity) box that doesn't have a date. The other pic's of a velvet Torah cover from the 1800's. 

Got an elements calendar for the 'regular' one. This month's on strontium. It's a pretty pic of it. They have all sort of info on it. The atomic number, indicates where on the periodic table it is, melting/solid/etc. points, pics of what it's used for, a detailed info section, atomic emission spectrum, state of matter, etc. Fascinating stuff. I took chemistry (both high school and college level), but we didn't really go into too much detail of each element. It was mainly formulas and reactions. So, to get a more in depth look is nice. It was apparently used in bombs, but is usually not radioactive. It's occasionally used as an ingredient in luminous paints. Some of those are radioactive, but again strontium isn't what makes them that way. Strontium pills are thought to be good for your bones. It does react similar to calcium, but it's unclear if it has any affect on bone growth. 

Got a haircut last Friday. It was the longest it had ever been. My last haircut was just 8 months ago. Not much time in between. It was growing really fast. While I wanted long hair, it was getting too difficult to take care of and kept getting stuck in things. Felt like it was swallowing me and had a limited field of vision. It was so much I couldn't even put it up in bun well. It was so long, the hairstylist had to cut off some of it in order to just wash it. It was quite something to see it all on the floor at the end. It's now roughly half as long. Much more manageable, I can see more around me, it's more out of my face, people can see my face, doesn't fall into my food, don't have to hold onto it in order to eat, and so much more. Looked even better after I washed and styled it for the first time. It's still rather long, so I get somewhat of a similar feel. 

Got my DNA test results back from AncestryDNA. That's been interesting. I'm 51% Ashkenazi (Jews who came from Germany and out to eastern Europe), 29% Celtic (particularly from Scotland), 14% from England, Wales, and 'Northwestern Europe' (that's not very descriptive), 4% from France, and 2% from Sweden. I had no idea about the last 2. This means my mom was 100% Ashkenazi. There are some diseases that only they have or are more likely to have than the rest of the population. That worries me a bit. I didn't realize how concentrated that side was. At least, people can't dispute that I'm Jewish, I guess. They split that side into 2 groups: Western and Central Europe, and Central and Eastern Europe. There's some overlap with them, and I'm not sure why they split them. It was interesting to see the ethnic map.

They also have a history section where you can see where they started on the timeline, and where they immigrated. That timeline goes from 1725 to 1950. They only show the 2 Ashkenazi groups and Scottish part for it. They have dots of where they lived at the time. It's detailed enough to see the cities they were in. Some dots are huge, and that's where they're more concentrated. None of the Ash. groups have info until the 1800-1825 section, and that's with the C/E Europe one. The other group doesn't show up until the 1825-1850 one. I was surprised by where the Ash. groups were from. Sure, I knew about Germany, Romania, Belarus, and Russia; but none of the others. There were surprisingly huge dots in Poland, Lithuania, and Ukraine. The Scottish one wasn't as surprising, but interesting. They immigrated to Australia, Canada (particularly Nova Scotia), and the US pretty early.

Apparently, my family came from/immigrated to 26 countries and a territory. Here's the list: Germany, The Netherlands, Belgium, Luxembourg, Moldova, Romania, Lithuania, Latvia, Ukraine, Scotland, Ireland, England, Wales, France, Sweden, Russia, Belarus, Poland, Canada, US, Australia, New Zealand, Slovakia, Hungary, Austria, Czech Republic, Isle of Man. I'm kind of tempted to look into learning more about these places. Like, what's the culture like for Jews in some of them, about the cultures around them, trying foods from them, maybe learning some of their languages, about the Celtic parts as well, music of these areas, and more. That's a little overwhelming. I do have some knowledge of these places, but it didn't seem as personal in the past. Plus, if I ever go on that dream trip in the future where I visit all the countries my family's from, it's going to be a much longer trip than I thought. I could break it up, though.

For an extra $10, they give you results of 18 genetic traits. I did that not too long ago. Most of it was spot on. They thought I had a cleft chin. I don't. They were correct about finger length. My ring finger is slightly longer than my pointer. The hair type one was really laughable. It said I had naturally straight hair. Nope. Very curly. Most of my family has curly/wavy hair, so I'm not sure where this came from. They were right about hair thickness, though. It said thicker-than-average. The iris pattern part was interesting. I know I used to have flecks of gold in it, but can't see it too well now. They said I have rings. Maybe I'll look at them in better light at some point. For skin pigment, they said light to medium skin tone. I have a very light skin tone. Although, parts of me are slightly yellow/olive like. Interesting. The only food sensitivity (of the traits they tested) I have is to sweets. Makes sense. Sweet food has always been really intense to me. Most of the time I can only handle so much of it. If I plan to eat a lot of it (like if I'm at potluck/buffet, and a lot is probably different to me than others), I have to eat it slowly. It's not just the first bite that's intense, it's pretty much every bite. I've actually ended up with some enlarged taste buds after eating 'too much' sweets. Despite this, I do love sweet food. I think I have other sensitivities like that, but they didn't really test for many.

I'm going to try and go on social media less. Most of the week, only checking for notifications, and posting personal stuff (food I eat or other pics to Instagram and dA, personal statuses, sharing posts from here, etc.). Then setting a time during the weekend, or if I'm at somewhere like a restaurant waiting for food, to 'catch up'. However, making sure to not do it for too long. I tried this several months ago. It worked for a little while. Felt a lot better. The problem with this is I end up feeling like I'm missing out on too many things. Things like news in general, friends' stuff, and fun things. So, we'll see how that goes.

Finished watching Persona. It was pretty good. Seemed more real. Cases took weeks at least. Although, I felt like they added a soap opera-feel with some of the drama that popped up. I hate that they left such a cliffhanger at the end. Apparently, there is another season, but it's not on Netflix. Don't know if they'll get it. At least it wasn't as bad of a cliffhanger as Anjaan (an Indian supernatural detective show) I saw on there. That was one of the worst. Although, I just looked at Netflix, and they apparently added a lot more 'new' episodes. (About 50 more. They only had about 15 before.) Yay! At least I know there's more on there. I might watch Gab-Dong next. It's a Korean detective show.

Finished all of D.Gray-man. That includes the more recent Hallow sequel. I think some of the character designs in Hallow were awful or too 'different'. I read that those designs were more faithful to the manga, but it still didn't seem right. Lenalee seemed to be the worst. Her personality changed almost completely, too. Miranda looked odd to me, although she seemed more 'normal'. (Looked like a raccoon before.) Their eyes were 'shinier', too. A bit distracting. I do like that they didn't censor the blood in this one. In the first series, the demons exploded instead of bled. It ended at a weird time. Seemed like a pretty big cliffhanger, as well. Besides that, it seemed decent. I like how many complex layers Allen Walker had. He cares about both humans and demons, despite being an exorcist. He's part demon, too. His past from a very young age was traumatic. He even had a mental breakdown when he was little, after the man who took care of him, a clown named Mana, became a demon. He killed that demon himself. (If I remember correctly.) His 'innocence' (or weapon, to simplify it) activated on its own, and he didn't want to kill him. His personality changed after that. His hair changed, too. In Hallow, he ends up trying to get more in touch with who he really is. We all thought Kanda died, but he suddenly showed up at the end like nothing. Makes me curious about continuing the story in the manga.