More Jpop!!!

Because sadly, my life isn't all that exciting during school terms...

BUT getting more CDs of my favorite bands always makes for at least a little bit of excitement, right?

So firstly, I got two more Arashi singles (regular editions this time... eh, monies...): "Dear Snow" and "Hatenai Sora", both of which I really love.  They're both excellent songs melodically and lyric-wise, but I especially enjoy "Dear Snow" because my lovely Nino-kun really gets to shine in it (along with ever-amazing Riida-san).  (*o*)/

And I also got the newest single from No Sleeves (no3b) "Answer".  I got the Miichan version, partly because she's my oshimen, but also because I wanted the nice clean instrumental for "Gyakuten Oujisama" rather than the crappy home-made one that I have currently XD

Yay Jpop!!  Too bad I wasn't fast enough to get the 1st Press for "Answer", so no member trading card or poster for me T_T

[Outfit Post] Spring Break

As previously mentioned (I think), I went to Boston for 4 days over spring break =3  And of course, I brought my little Lolita heart with me, but also didn't want to get too fussy or complicated in my packing, so I ended up wearing some casual Lolita-inspired outfits during the trip.

Firstly, for the airplane ride (both there and back), I stuck to a t-shirt under a JSK with a bolero, since this layering system made it easier for me to stay the right temperature between outdoors, airport, and airplane.

JSK: Bodyline

Beret: Handmade (by me!) with Metamorphose bow

Else: Offbrand

I brought only two skirts and two sweatshirt/cardigans, with different shirts to mix and match with them for the four days I was actually in Boston.

Skirt: Metamorphose

Else: Offbrand

Skirt: Rose Melody

Else: Offbrand

Skirt: Metamorphose

Else: Offbrand

Skirt: Rose Melody

Else: Offbrand

And of course, the only place where there was a tall enough mirror happened to be elevated such that I had to stand on the bed to even see myself fully in the mirror T_T Oh well, so it goes :-P  Also, on the way there, the stewardess told me that I looked "like a little doll."  ^o^

Ai-chan With Pink Hair?!

I've tossed around the idea of dyeing my hair for the past couple of months now, with one possibility being the Champagne Pink color from the Freshlight Blythe series.  However, I'm still too chicken to really take the plunge, plus I might actually want my hair to still be black if I do end up doing my Mio cosplay for ACEN.

That said, my favorite female J-pop idol apparently just had pink tip gradations put into her hair ^o^  This makes me consider the pink again... ^o^

Pic from her blog!

*ponder ponder*  I think something like the gradation she has would definitely be less daunting than going for ALL PINK, but I think I'd have to change the rest of my hair color anyways so it's not OMG BLACK followed by OMG PINK...

Visiting the Gibson House Museum

I was in Boston for the past week, and on Friday I went to the Gibson House Museum.  It's a historical house from the Victorian period that was preserved by its owners as a museum piece.  It's located right in the heart of Boston, and sadly is the only one that is left preserved, as its neighbors have been renovated into apartments or college dorms.

Here it is!

Image from: http://www.thegibsonhouse.org/index.asp

We got a one-hour tour of the house, which consisted of the basement, ground, 2nd, and 3rd floors.  I took a couple of photos of things I found particularly interesting to me, but feel free to visit their website to find out more if you're curious!

We saw the dining room first:

 The tableware was very pretty, and there were several more sets stored in cabinets around the room!

The next picture I have is from the music room.  The piano is a Mason-Hamlin, and it has a butterfly hinge design, meaning that it's symmetrical, and the lid can be opened to either direction.  That's pretty cool!!  If only I could have played it XD

Next, we went up the back staircase to get to the 3rd floor.  There was a really cool-looking telephone on the wall:

And the third floor had... a study room, which I didn't take any pictures in... and a bathroom!  Which incidentally didn't look all that different from bathrooms nowadays.  The toilet is prettier?

And next to that was the bedroom, with beautiful furniture.  I only took a picture of the writing desk, because that was my favorite:

Oh, apparently the Gibson House was particularly awesome for a Victorian house, because it actually had sort of a central heating system.  There was a big circular channel going up through the middle of the house from the 2nd floor up, which apparently would help all the hot air circulate up the middle of the house and into the living areas, and allow the cold air to go down the back/side staircases, creating a nice airflow and distribution of heat.  I tried to take a picture, but the sun made it kind of hard:

Last but not least, we went into the basement to see the laundry room and the kitchen.  There was an awesome call-bell system that was still in place:

Also, I thought the rice jar and its matching littler cousin was pretty:

So there you go!  A brief whirlwind through the Gibson House.  There were lots more things in there that I didn't take pictures of, partly because my camera was giving me the low-battery warning T_T.  For example, there was a cabinet Victrola in the music room that was really cool, and there were sooooo many books all over the house!!  Also, the butler's pantry had awesome teacup sets - including a pastel-colored set, where all the cups were a different pastel color <3<3<3  Such an awesome idea... I totally need one!!

Anyways, a more fashion/outfit-related post pertaining to my trip will be coming soon, but I thought the Gibson House was too awesome to not share (^o^)/

Tea Party @ The Drake!

To open this post in a less-than-bubbly fashion... Everyone knows about the devastating earthquake and tsunami in Japan, with the subsequent nuclear reactor situation.  I'm lucky that all my friends live in Tokyo, so they are all safe and in much better conditions than the hard-hit regions.

I had stopped following American news media, mainly out of laziness, but after seeing how they reported this natural disaster, I have decided they are largely full of money-grubbing/ratings-chasing idiots and will now actively decide to not follow/highly distrust them.  Their fear-mongering of the nuclear situation was entirely unnecessary, and only incited panick rather than helping anybody.  I'm also now painfully aware of how gullible large portions of the US population are...  But then again, most people don't have much knowledge about radiation/nuclear science; heck, even I have very little knowledge, and trust my boyfriend to be honest about giving me the info on this stuff.  What makes me mad most is that it made everyone essentially FORGET about the people are still struggling to survive in the shelters all over the Tohoku region...  A lot of people, living in winter weather with no heat, no food, no water...

That said... please, especially now that the nuclear situation is coming back under control... if you haven't already, please donate to any of the number of organizations that are helping with relief efforts in Japan.  Even a little bit, $10, will add up if a lot of people donate.  So please do so!!

List of good organizations (both US and international) can be found here: http://thecrowandtheradio.blogspot.com/2011/03/list-of-international-trustworthy.html

Now on to less ranty/sombre stuff...  Weird juxtaposition, isn't it?

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I got to go to a lovely fancy tea at The Drake yesterday!  Many thinks to Alice for working so hard to host the party!

It was my first time going to any sort of fancy tea service, and I was very pleased <3  The tea was great, the snacks were tasty, and I had a wonderful time meeting new people and hanging out with friends ^o^

I used this opportunity to debut my Viennese Waltz Frill JSK from Innocent World, as well as my pink heels that I bought specifically to match "IW Pink" (the dusty rose color that IW tends to call "pink").  I also spent like a hour curling my hair so it would blend in with the two large-pieces from my extension set.  I think I need more practice at being a girl... an hour just to curl hair and clip in extensions is way too long XD

Picture!

JSK: Innocent World

Blouse: Metamorphose

Socks: Innocent World

Headbow: Innocent World

Shoes: Secret Shop

I think I need a better petticoat for my empire-waist dresses...  And I just need a new petticoat in general, but that's another issue. ^_^

Tea was followed by hanging out, and going to a vintage sale as well as I Cream, where they make liquid nitrogen ice cream!!!! <3<3<3

Jpop Bonanza!!!

Well, totally not fashion-related, but getting new CDs is always an exciting part of my life, so I figured I might as well share ^o^  ESPECIALLY ARASHI CDs!!!

Lotus, their newest single! ^_^  I absolutely love this song... it's different from the majority of their other songs which tend more to the bubblegum pop side, or at least gentle ballads.  Lotus is on the more intense and dramatic side, which is cool!  And all the boys sound great in it, especially my lovely Nino ^o^  And the dance is awesome too, so much so that I'm even considering learning it as a dance cover, even though it's a little weird for a girl to dance-cover a boyband? I don't know XD

I got the Limited Edition because I wanted the pretty lyrics booklet with all their photos in it >_>;;  That means I don't get the 2 B-sides, and I have a DVD that I can't actually watch in any of my DVD players... but IT'S OKAY, right?  Pretty pictures...

Also, also, also, AKANISHI JIN's debut single Eternal!!! Containing two of the most beautiful jpop songs (in my repertoire, anyways).  While his voice can't compete with my lovely Nino's, or even Ohno's heavenly one, he's still fantastic, and the fact that he can COMPOSE such awesomeness makes up for any vocal lacking...

Got the... some-letter edition... XD  There were like 5 versions...  This one didn't have the extraneous DVD, but still had a pretty insert-sized photo booklet.  Yay!

And the third jpop awesomeness is AAA's new album Buzz Communication.  ^_^  I adore this group... they have an awesome mix of singing, dancing, and rapping skills, and one of their leads Takahiro Nishijima has one of the most wonderful male singing voices ever (I love him so much, even if he looks kinda awkward in some pictures) XD  I really like their most recent style, which works out great for this album ^_^

It came with so many unexpected extra goodies O_O  A member trading card (I got Urata...), plus a really beautifully done glossy-covered photo booklet!! Haha awesomeness!! ^_^

Also... my roommate bought a soysauce flavored KitKat bar on eBay, and we tried it today.  It was... interesting.  Tasted more like a cross between white chocolate, vanilla, and maple syrup.  Certainly not soysauce XD

On a more fashion-related note, my package from Innocent World arrived today, but I ordered with Yoshi-chan, so I won't be opening until we meet up on Monday evening ^_^

[Outfit Post] Lolita at School

One of the things I'd really like to write an entire entry about one day is that of balancing my fashion taste with what's considered appropriate for my everyday lifestyle.  Being a graduate student in a social science, I have more leeway with what I can wear on a daily basis (no restrictions from lab activities, etc), but at the same time, I have to be careful when attending conferences and other events outside of my home university.  It would be unfortunate to become "that girl who wore the crazy costume at the LSA".

At the beginning of my Lolita journey, I was very much straddling the sweet/classic divide, and felt magnetically attracted to all the OTT sweet things.  To the point where I even attempted a bit of a dabbling (for example, I have the Bodyline carousel skirt in pink, and a variety of fluffy Chocomint bows of all sizes).  However, I've more recently started being more honest with myself, and realized that while I looooove looking at OTT sweet (and I mean looooooooooove), I never really feel comfortable actually wearing anything that flashy, and it's really a more muted type of sweet, bordering on classic, that really makes my heart throb, and makes me feel most at home.  And luckily, this direction also fits in better with trying to not look toooo crazy to the academic world.

Long-winded stream-of-consciousness is long-winded.  The point is, I decided I wanted to dress up a little for a presentation today, because hey, dressing up makes me feel better, even if every other aspect of my day is a failure.  So I put together a very simple coord that is comfy (yay cutsew), but still pretty.  I've been finding that my headbands, lovely as they are, all give me a splitting headache, so until I have time to remove the decorations and turn them into clips/demi-headbands, I've just been mostly foregoing head decoration.  Which makes me sad, but hey, spring break is soon, so I can revamp all my hairthings then!

As for my outfit... le voila!

Skirt: Bodyline

Cutsew: Innocent World

Shoes: Secret Shop

Now I just have to survive the rest of this quarter before I get a short break!! ^_^

Gong Xi Fa Cai: Chinese New Year Adventure!

I attended a cold, wet, but fantastic meetup last Sunday to watch the Chinese New Year parade in Chinatown.  I had never been to the parade before, so this was pretty exciting! Plus I got to meet quite a few new Chicago lolis and see a lot of people I hadn't seen in quite awhile.  We went to the St. Alps Teahouse afterwards, which was delicious!  I got some ginger tapioca milk tea and a baked curry-over-rice casserole dish.  The tea was fantastic - I think I've decided that I love spicy hot drinks!  The curry was pretty good too, although I think I still prefer the Chi Cafe curry, plus there was no vegetarian option (only chicken) at St. Alps.

Because it was for Chinese New Year, I wanted to follow traditions and wear clothing that is brand new, and with lucky colors red and gold.  Turns out, I have no pure red in my loli closet - just bordeaux red.  However, one of said bordeaux things was my Twinkle Journey JSK from Meta, which I hadn't had any occasion to wear yet, so it was also brand new.  Outfit resolved!  I even did my hair in poufy pigtail buns, drawing inspiration from the stereotypical Chinese double-bun hairstyle.

Of course, it being cold and snowing heavily, the outfit ended up being underneath a coat most of the time, plus I switched out the shoes for boots after taking a peek outside.  But the coat was bright red, so yay good colors!

Anyways, this meetup was fantastic, and I just wish I had the time to attend even more meetups!!

Fashion Rut? Fashion Rut.

Despite my desire to create a nice documentation of my personal style, this clearly hasn't been happening so well.  Part of that is just due to sheer busy-ness, and stressing about being able to finish my qualifying projects/papers in a timeline that is satisfactory to my advisors.  The other is that I feel like I'm in a bit of a fashion doldrums lately.

A contributing point seems to be that I gained about 7 pounds over Christmas break.  As a result, I came back and realized my skirts were all kind of uncomfortably tight.  Now, it's not that I can't get into them, but they really cut into my abdomen more than I am okay with.  I'm really in awe of people who can withstand all that pressure on the belly... I just can't T_T  As a result, the number of pieces I can actually wear without pain has been diminished by about 80%.

The cold weather has also been a bit of a pain.  Tights with wool OTKs over them, with flannel bloomers, is sufficient for staying warm and comfortable, but I only have 2 pairs of wool socks, which isn't nearly enough for wearing every day >_<  Time to get more, I suppose.

In any case, not only have I not had time to document any style, I also just haven't been wearing anything I really consider interesting.  I've been too exhausted to think much about my clothes, and I'm currently still on a diet to try to get an inch or so off my waist so I can wear my skirts non-painfully again.  I love Lolita as much as ever, but I think it's just going to have to wait until I have the energy and body to wear it on a daily basis again.  Hopefully I'll pick myself back up soon and start being a bit more creative with my outfits, because I really enjoy it, and it would probably actually help relieve stress.

>_<

Little linguist in Pittsburgh-land

I've been busy busy busy lately, going essentially straight from my winter break travels straight into the long drive to Pittsburgh for the annual Linguistics Society of America meeting.  It was my first LSA, and boy was it exhilarating (and exhausting)!  It was like a gigantic buffet for my brain, and I'm pretty sure it over-ate :-P

In any case, it was tons of fun, I learned about lots of new research, and I got to meet a lot of fellow linguists!!

I'm planning/writing a more fashion-related post that is relevant to the LSA and my academic life in general, but for now, here's a couple of snaps of Pittsburgh scenery that I took from our hotel room window.

The river:

Heinz Stadium:

"The Point":

The outline of Fort Pitt:

The bridge: