( All about Harry Potter. )

Alright. Strikethroughgate appears to have been resolved. For the time being. Thank God, because LJ, I really like you a lot. I wasn't ready to break up!

I firmly believe some really spectacular things were accomplished amidst all of the hysteria. For one thing, fandom_counts is like, my new favorite thing ever. Once we hit 30,000, we'll be able to fill Otakon! (Guess what I'm looking forward to?) :D:D:D ETA: 31,330 and counting!

The other thing is fandom's new theme song!

YO HO, HAUL TOGETHER, HOIST THE COLORS HIGH.
HEAVE HO, THIEVES AND BEGGARS, NEVER SHALL WE DIE.

WTF, I need to go on medication at this point. Real Life, STOP SUCKING. Six Apart, STOP BEING BASTARDS.

I'm standing against Six Apart over Strikethrough '07.

fandom_counts. Stand up and be counted.

End of transmission.

I can't say I didn't love it! So many little things in this movie are so awesomely awesome it makes my heart hurt to think about him. Some things I didn't like so much. Overall, the pacing sucked a great, great deal, but that went away after the first viewing, so I figure I'll be fine watching it a third/fourth/nth millionth time.

Just to note, this movie was sort of weird. For as much info from the book as they managed to keep, a shocking amount of it came out in dramatically different way than it did in the book. I'm surprised, looking back, at how much of the stuff I really loved is completely movie invention.

( What I loved, didn't love, and what I just laughed at. This is gratuitously long. )

To be finished when I finally see this a third time (which may be never... >_>).

HOMG, linnpuzzle posted in my comment thread! *promptly explodes*

(For the my RL people who are no doubt scratching their heads, she's the one who drew the colored picture on my custom bookcover. I love her liekwoah.)

The last part of my con report. Sunday [ + finishing thoughts and a full look at the loot because I am a proud fangirl].

Part 1, Part 2

( Sunday )

( The Stuff )

Overall Thoughts

Before Otakon, I was reluctant to use the term 'otaku.' Literally, the word denotes something like 'a person with an unhealthy fixation on some hobby.' In Japan, when used in the context of anime, it connotes a socially-inept, perverted, young man with a disturbing fixation on animated women. When I realized I preferred my men 2D, I reluctantly acknowledged that I was an otaku, but the word had a negative meaning to me.

After Otakon, I realized there are thousands of people just like me. The word doesn't have to mean something terrible, it can be used in the context of 'completely obsessed fan.' I don't think the word should be taken lightly though. It should only be used for the most dedicated and obsessive and no two-bit 15-year-old whose only exposure to anime is from Cartoon Network should consider herself even close to that point. They are cosplayers, fansubbers, AMV-makers, professional artists, dealers and the people who appreciate them. They are people who spend hundreds of dollars on merchandise that they might never take out of the packaging. They are those people who have to buy extra shelving just for their manga collection. They are downloaders, MIRC- and Bittorent-users, who get anime and manga months, even years before it's licensed in the States. Conventions are where they come out to play. I went to Otakon and realized that I could geek-out with the best of them. That makes me an otaku. It's a badge of true geek-dom to wear with pride, nothing less and nothing more. Sure I could use some more sun, but so long as I remember the 22,000 other Otakon attendees, I'll never feel like that makes me any less of a person. So thanks Otakon. I'll see you next year!

Well, that was fun! I kind of can't believe it's over already. Not that you know, another day of that and I wouldn't have been passing out all over the place. Lack of sleep is an interesting thing. Anyway, this is going to be a gigantic post of all of my Otakon hijinks and oddity. There will be a ridiculous amount of pictures. Consider yourself warned.

( Read more... )

Well crap. We've been working on this for nearly three hours and we only got through Friday! It's late and we're sleep-deprived. I think I shall continue this tomorrow. Till then!

ETA: Part 2, Part 3

Things have happened. Lots of things. I haven't been on the Internet enough in the past 11 days. I'll do the quick overview, so that I can shut up that little nagging voice that says, "update LJ~~Update LJ~~~UPDATE LJ~~~~~!"

Friday: Party. Hotel. Sleeping in bathtubs. Setting off alarms. Dangerous games of spit. Scaring complete strangers who are unfortunate enough to ride elevators.
Saturday: Recovery.
Sunday: Mall for birthday like things. Manga. Clothes. Anime. Good times.
Monday: Bithday. iPod (FINALLY). On The Record (YEAGH DISNEY OBSESSION).
Tuesday/Wednesday: Getting acquainted with Yukio *pets precious*. Manic searches for title/artist/album names. Studying liekwoah.
Thursday: Three tests of ultimate DOOM.
Friday: Trip to Smithsonian. Saw Saw. Had Major Freakout with a capital MF. That movie embodies all things that reduce me to a gibbering mess of nerves, short of Midterms and Finals. Heck, maybe I missed that part. No, seriously, I have enough paranoia issues without having the completely ridiculous fear that some psychopathic murderer in a creeptastic mask is lurking in shadowy corners of my home. I may never feel wholly comfortable in a bathroom ever again.
Saturday: Boardwalk. Much fun with the DDR and the beating of the gators and what have you. Miss Congeniality 2. V. with the funny, but not much else.
Sunday: Family thing. Felt uncomfortable. Not wholly unpleasant though.
Monday: Nagh school. Ew running. Must get used to running again. Ew. Ew. Ew.

Somewhere in the process of this, I also updated my layout. I am so pleased with myself it is surely unhealthy. The picture came with Daisuke sitting looking like cute on a stick and then I got my grubby hands on it and photoshopped in my own frames and pictures which are supposed to depict the Major Outlets Of My Obsession-Minded Psyche (outside of school, of course). Left to right they are:

Shoebox Project, Bleach, Psyche (of the myth of Psyche and Eros, a la my mythology fixation and a nod to the symbolism of the pic itself ^^;), Lord of the Rings, New York, New York, and The Beatles. If anyone wants/needs to know what that heart thinger between frames actually says, I can assure you that it is dirty and I love Sirius. Lookit at the title of Daisuke's book! HEE. (...no I'm not trying to distract you at all...)

Frames, New York, and Psyche came from Google Image Search, Daisuke and Ichigo from Anime Visions, Paul pic from Let it Beatle (I think?), Lord of the Rings pic came from a screen cap site that I lost (*cries bitter tears*), and Shoebox things came from Shoebox.

I must figure out new wordy thingers, but as I have been on strained terms with the computer for the ensuing week after the update, I've had no time to do the necessary agonizing over it. Woe. If anyone knows any lyrics pertaining to framing someone, I'd appreciate a point in their direction.

I am such an idiot. In no more than 4 days I will have my cousin from France here and then in another three weeks will actually be in France. That is supposed to be friggin’ exciting. I should be out of my mind in anticipation. There should be yelling from rooftops and much of the insane grinning. Except there isn't.

As the days wind down, the only things I'm thinking are along the lines of "Damn I won't be around for that" or "Don't start that now, you won't be around for 6 weeks, its useless." I have such a gnawing and overwhelming want to get involved in all these new things, but I can't bring myself to start out as a newbie and then disappear for over a month. I am actually nauseous with wish that none of it was happening and I could spend summer in peace.

I am a sick and twisted individual.

I have this odd thing about being forced to do things. I think it developed from my father, who can be well-meaning but tends to go mad when you don't do things he tells you to do. It’s not really an old trait of mine. I only recently developed it. As a defense mechanism, I think. But it really is an aversion to making obligations and/or doing things other people tell me to do. Even if the things sound truly appealing to me.

Case in point: For a whole summer people kept telling me I should swim and I knew I would enjoy it when I did it, but I couldn't bring myself to make the effort and people telling me to made me annoyed. Sick and twisted, ne?

But damn it. I really want to join FictionAlley and I know I'll have to lay off when I go back to school... damn damn damn. I hope I can use a computer where I'm going, or else I think that I might have to die from withdrawal.

Of course there will computers, but... God it's just so hard. I don't want to be gone for three weeks. I don't want to be stuck with one person for three weeks before that. In fact, I don't think I've ever been very up to this whole excursion. From the very start I was like 'what?' and then it got to be three weeks... I think I am going to cry.

And I can't even justify these feelings. It's a really selfish side of me that I don't like admitting to, even though I'm quite aware of it.

But its also this overwhelming knowledge of the heart-wrenching homesickness I am going to feel when I am gone. That’s one of the main reasons I'm so adamant about getting people's addresses. I have this feeling like if I keep writing to people, it will keep that part of me sane. And good God I'm going to get all of my summer reading done because I wont be able to sleep. *melancholy sigh*

Growing up in the same house for the whole of your life... Living in that house with hardly any changes since you can remember... Hardly ever being away from that house for more than a few days at a time...

Being a picky eater and fickle sleeper and so far out of shape the word 'shape' is basically a foreign word...

I'm annoyed and uncomfortable and quite a bit scared about all of this.

Both for myself and for what I am going to inflict upon my hosts. *wry grin*