Hell of a day today

Went out to start the car, and the battery acts like it's dead. Oh
great. Just when I need it. It was painfully cold last night, so I guess
the Autozone Duralast batteries last only when they aren't cold.

So I get AAA to come out. I also put on the charger on the battery -
last week on Thursday it did this thing as well. I had it jumped, took
it to Autozone, the guy tested it, but due to the loose connections,
they couldn't get a good reading. So I put on new tight American
designed top mount battery terminals. Paid a guy $5 to put a $3 part on.
Runs fine afterwards. Even started nice and strong on Tuesday when I
started it to what I hope would charge the battery.

Anywho, Just as the guy from AAA comes to jump, I try the thing again
after the charger was on the 10 amp charge setting for 1 hour and 14
minutes. It starts. Took it to Autozone again, the guy tests it. The
tester says to charge the battery and try again. WTF? But as it does the
test, I see the voltage reading creeping up to 12 Volts. The battery
obviously was cold and didn't want to work. ARGH. Guy tests the charging
system, and again it shows OK. I know the alternator is working because
when I had the terminals changed from the Kia strips of metal to the
significant ones I bought, the guy removed one (it just came straight
off) and the car continued to run OK.

Guy at autozone says if I still have problems, bring it back and they
will change it for sure. I mention the battery charger, and he says
putting the battery on a 2 amp trickle charge isn't a bad idea,
especially with the forecast of it getting damn cold in a few days.

Anywho, I get to work late, but I call to say I'll be late, is 10 to 5
ok? Manager OKs it, I tell this to the HR lady and she'll fix it because
Rick approved the change due to the circumstances.

Get ready to go home, get some water, and the right front tire is flat.

Well, this is the one that I put Fix a Flat in it, and it was working
until today, when I guess when it gets painfully cold and batteries
don't want to work, Fix a Flat stops working too.

Get back to work, try to change it, but the jack is rusted. I borrow
Jean's (she's got a Kia, too), and manage to do the change with the
spare.

Waiting at home is my Passport (less than 4 weeks!), and an order for
MP3 players that are also card readers, one of which I'm trading to a
friend for a 1G SD card.

My refund this year is over $700. If I had earned one penny less, I
would have $6 more in my refund. Instead of tax breaks, why the hell
doesn't someone increase the EIC?? Dammit!

Well, tax breaks would have been nice, too.

So all told, I'd have money for a ticket to Japan, but little else.
Someone said that in spite of credit cards being usable in Japan, it's
still mainly cash only.

I doubt I could receive my refund fast enough to be able to pull this
one off (well, there is electronic filing over the net... I guess with
direct deposit and stuff) or had time in March. Does Narita have that
airport exit tax still?

I'd have enough to go to Japan, shop for 1 or 2 days, then go home.

I'm tired, and I need a pizza and a beer.

ttaku... I'm going to see if I need to put the charger on the battery
over night tonight. It's been forecasted as being in the single digits
or lower for the weekend.... T.T

In search of another MP3 player!! Argh!!

What is it with Toys R Us?? They advertise a $20 MP3 player, 512MB, and
the very next day - they're all OUT!! Doesn't it make sense to order
MORE of what you advertise and make sure there's plenty on the shelf??
WHAT GIVES? I'm So frustrated at TRU for doing the Lure People In but
have only 3 of anything that's in their stinking ads!!!

Not surprised to see all the Tamago-chi Version 3s out. But still!!!
512MB for $19.99!! Dang it!! Toys R Us - ORDER MORE OF THE AD ITEMS.
IMPOSE QUANTITY LIMITS. OFFER RAINCHECKS!! ARGH!!!!!!!

So why are all these USB thumbdrive based MP3 players so dang popular
that everyone buys too many or more than they actually need?

Well, iPods, like all Apple Computer products, are Overpriced. the iPod
Shuffle, a 1G model is $74.

iPods have an internal rechargeable battery. Well, it recharges until it
doesn't anymore. Then it's expensive to replace, most of the time. In
order to put anything on it, you need a crash-happy Mac computer (which
can and do get viruses - shame on you liars for those misleading Mac
commercials - and with you having Intel processors now, it'll get even
easier to write Mac viruses!) or Apple's iTunes software on your Windows
computer.

I don't want iTunes on my computer. I don't want anything Apple on
there, but I'll put up with Quicktime. For the moment, anyway.

These thumb drive MP3 players are - cheap, easy to use, and use
replaceable batteries, usually a single AAA. You don't need any software
other than an MP3 ripper, and Windows Media Player 10 can do that. And
perhaps audio editing software like Audacity to optimize sample rate to
pack more files on your player. Copy the files onto it, and you're done,
ready to enjoy music.

In 1986, I had wished for there to be a way to reproduce music or audio
without any moving media (tape) or spinning parts (record or CD or hard
drive). 20 years later, I have a 128MB USB thumb drive MP3 audio player.
The only moving parts are a few buttons and the electrons in the
circuits!

I predict at some point we won't have hard drives anymore, but instead
flash memory like that seen in memory cards and thumb drives. I have a
1G thumb drive that's about the size of a cracker, and yet it can store
the entire contents of my Win95 laptop hard drive with some room to
spare, in both meanings of the phrase!! Sugoi nyo!!!

Suggestion I tried to send to Bandai

For some reason, they use a script that checks whether or not an entered
email address is valid - and it doesn't work!!! Here's what I wanted to
tell them:

Well... I think it's time you gave us U.S. fans of Tamago-chi the real
thing. I had a friend bring back the latest Uratama Tamago-chi Plus and
That is the product that Bandai should be bringing here. Except with a
Pause feature added in. Leave in the Japanese text support (and in fact
add a feature somehow to use that in the name of the Go-chi when it's
born ^_-), translate everything else faithfully and correctly. Keep in
the support to connect to ALL JAPANESE TAMAGO-CHI MODELS and Tamago-chi
Station - but make sure it can connect to ALL U.S. VERSION 2s AND
VERSION 3s as well! The ability to take and pass gift items between V.2s
and V.3s. V.2 to new Version and from New Version to V.3 or from All
Japanese models to US models - with the note IF it can be passed on or
not. HEH.

Passwords should also work the same. (I can't get e-tamago.com to work
right on any U.S. Windows PC for some odd reason and it should.)

Rumors abound that the Version 4 (also rumored) might be color. Eh.
whatever, Uratama has a blue LCD screen.

AND FOR ONCE - TELL PEOPLE HOW TO SAY TAMAGO-CHI CORRECTLY. Leave out
the "T"!!! and you'll do fine!! Even tell people you guys originally got
it wrong for no reason - here's a chance to fix all that. The people who
did the commercials need slapped upside the head.

GO GET A TAMA"GO"-CHI

Great toy, btw. But I want what Japanese consumers are getting. It's a
plus I can read and translate Japanese, so I can finally see what we
U.S. and other English-speaking fans are missing.

Oh yeah- Tamago-chis are so well made, you can drop one in a bucket of
water, dry it out, and it will eventually work right again. ^_^;;; I
found that out by accident.

Later!

This year's Black (ink) Friday parcipitation

Last year, right after Thanksgiving, if you haven't read on here about
that, I managed to buy my Cyberhome recorder at WalFart for $68. Circuit
City has one this year but with a $12 rebate. Oh well. Cyberhome went
out of business due to owing Philips Magnavox some royalties. I'm lucky
to have the update that fixed it.

tonikaku, while working on Thanksgiving morning (and once again
unfortunately putting the ads in the local paper wrong.. At least 2 of 3
inserts made it in - last year I forgot to put anything in! Geez, tell
me how many thingies go in so I have some idea!!), we go through the ads
at the store and look over the early specials. A few catch my eye:

We B Toys has 1 Gig MP3 USB thumbdrive players for $29.99. Ah. I have a
256MB model, it would be nice to have more room on it, even if I am
optimizing space using Audacity to reduce the sample rate without
sacrificing quality per se.

I'm also looking for a 1 gig thumbdrive by itself. Hmm.. Best Buy has a
PNY model for $14.99. Target had a "Dane-Elec" 512MB model for $7.97.
Office Max interestingly has a SANdisk 1G drive for $12.99, but they
also have a 2G drive for $24.99. Staples and Circuit City have 1 G
drives that come with a rebate. The Staples one (also a Sandisk variant)
would be $7.98 after $7 rebate ($14.98), and CC's one is $3.99 after $26
mail in rebate ($29.99).

Best Buy also has Sandisk 1G thumbdrive MP3 players for $34.99, so
that's a backup plan in case I can't get the We B special.

Targe't (Tar zhay) has the Jakks Pacific 5 game TV unit with Ms. Pac Man
and Mappy for $10!! I saw this at WalFart for $17, but decided to wait.

How did I fare?

I got up on time and left about 4:40 am or so and went out with money in
me pocket. I got to We B Toys just after 5:15 am and went in. There's a
crowd (of course!) and I look for those MP3 players. I did a little
investigating for drivers and what brand it could be because you're not
told that bit from the ad. I get close and guess it's a Diamond Memory
model, and Windows 98 SE drivers can be had on the company's website.

I'm there no more than 6 minutes before finding out those players SOLD
OUT already. I guess a lot of other people thought a $30 1Gig USB drive
MP3 player was a good idea. (The iPod Shuffle is 1Gig and costs $74!!!
Not only over-priced due to being an Apple Computer product (all Apple
stuff is over priced anyway) but you need their iTunes software to do
anything with their iPod products. USB thumbdrive MP3 players? Plug it
in, copy files onto it, eject, and go. How much easier could it be with
a PC? Macs get viruses too !! Apple - don't lie about Windows!!))

tonikaku, I leave as soon as the We B Toys employee tells me that and I
head over to TarZhay. I want the Jakks Pacific videogame unit.

I'm there in line at 5:31 am. I have my MP3 player that I've got already
(not an Apple iPod variant but better) and wait it out. Building lights
come on, and the line soon starts moving. Idiot woman grabs a broken
cart and someone with security tells her to leave it because there's
plenty inside everywhere and the one she's messing with is broken
anyway!

Now... having carts everywhere is good, makes them handy to get almost
anywhere. It's also bad because if you needed to leave in an emergency,
there's these shopping carts taking up space!

Everyone seems to head for the electronics department. I score the Jakks
Pacific Ms. Pacman and et al game unit. Trying to find the 512MB
Dane-Elec drive proved a waste of time. They're ALL GONE in minutes!
Win98SE drivers for it were on the company's website, even though it
didn't seem to have an English version page, the same file worked for
other European languages.

So, ok. I really wanted a 1G thumbdrive anyway, the 512MB cheapy was a
bonus. So I'm 1 for 2.

Get back to the car, and decide next plan. Officemax has the 1G Sandisk
for $12.99. No rebates to mail in. Where's the store? Ah.. one on the
Strip. I go there, because there's a Best Buy there, too. Right next to
Officemax.

I get there, and eventually find the Sandisk. Plenty of them! I guess
office supply stores aren't exactly hot magnets for early shoppers. This
is all still before 7 am. It took me an hour to get out of Tarzhay. So
for my goals, I'm 2 for 3.

But hey, we're here. Let's check Best Buy. I decide to look for the
Lazytown soundtrack CD ($11.99 - yay! Bing Bang!) and then they're
advertised 1Gig MP3 USB Sandisk thumbdrive player for $34.99. THEY'RE
SOLD OUT, TOO! Argh!!

I head people were camping out in front of We B Toys the night before,
as early as 11 PM. Sheesh! One guy who was in line said he had gotten up
to do something, and when he got back, police removed the chair he had
been waiting in! Heh.

So in the end, I saved $30 on a 1G player that I couldn't buy. That goes
back to be saved. Ah well. I got Ibuprofen for mom, and got back just
after 8 am. I go on to work today 12-7 and then I have 8 days in a row
off. Vacations are nice. Paid ones - even better.

Someone keeps putting up incorrect info...

On Wikipedia, I have been diligently trying to keep people updated on
how to say Tamagotchi correctly. Here's the edit I put up, which was
changed since the last time I corrected it:

Name origin and pronunciation

The name combines the Japanese word for egg ("tamago") and the syllable
"chi" which denotes affection, so it could be taken to mean "loveable
egg". It is also a pun on both "wotchi" borrowed from English "watch",
as in the time piece) and "tomodachi" (Japanese for friend). Because
"tamago" is Japanese for egg, and "tomodachi" is Japanese for friend,
Tamagotchi could be taken to mean "egg-friend."

In Japanese, it is pronounced with a long "o" sound ta-ma-goh-chee. The
romanization of the name from the Japanese phonetics using the generally
accepted method of doubling the consonant sound of the final syllable
("chi") produces the "tchi" spelling. The "T" in this case is not to be
associated with the preceding long "o" and resulting in an incorrect
pronunciation. Alternatively, the name could have been romanized as
"tamago-chi" which preserves the correct Japanese pronunciation in
non-Japanese text.

And so they opened the box they found...

I got to do something I felt was really worth it. But I have to explain
why.

The local school system got a new Junior High built, even though they
don't call it that - the term they use I absolutely hate because it
makes no sense. I went to a Junior High, and that's what they'll always
be.

Anywho, the old building was required by passage of the levy that built
the new one to be demolished. And as such, during the demolition, a
little copper box time capsule was found in the 1931 cornerstone. Today
that was finally opened and the contents looked at during a public
ceremony on the former site of Hazen Junior High in Minerva, Ohio.

HJH as I'll abbreviate it, was where I went to 6, 7, and 8th grades. It
was the source of some of the worst moments during the time I went to
school.

Mr. Hudson's shop class where I never got many good grades due to
Hudson's own judgement, which he never explained anything. I want those
grades expunged from my record. I don't know why he didn't give me any
advice as to what I was doing wrong. HE NEVER EXPLAINED ANYTHING!

Miss Beck and her math class - I thought it was incredibly funny to say
to her "I have your Teacher of the Year Award" then blow a short
raspberry in front of her, then run back to my homeroom. She didn't
think it was funny. Miss Beck, I'm sorry about that, but when you're in
6th grade, the strangest things are funny. It took a lot of courage to
do that. I remember flicking a booger that landed on the open book page
of the boy in the row in front of me, and I laughed to myself when he
and his friend next to him noticed it and wouldn't touch it because they
didn't know what it was nor where it came from!

Mr. Wiley and his insistence on the boys taking showers after gym class.
Uh, no. I got out of that one. I remember him trying to get me to take a
shower after lunch one day because I wouldn't do that in front of the
other boys after PE. It took so much effort that my mom had to go to
the school to get me out of that one. BTW, the day Wiley tried to force
me into the showers - I snuck out the other door to the boys locker /
shower room. Up until that time, the showers were inoperative, but man
oh man the things that happened after they were fixed.

Mr. Swank the music teacher throwing chalk at students who don't pay
attention. The time I took a stupid chord organ to school. Mr. Cyders
nosing in on us doing a play in 6th grade and getting me in trouble.
Miss Glauss / Mrs. Syverson (same person) banishing me from 6th grade
Art class because I used to look forward to art in school and kept
asking "What are we doing today?" too many times when she showed up. I
don't know what her frickin' problem was. It took meeting Mr.
Butterworth in 8th grade before I liked art class again.

But there were a few good moments and teachers. Mr. Miller in 7th grade
English. Mr. James Hetrick in math. Mr. Walker in 8th grade English.
Mrs. Pearl in 6th grade homeroom. (I'm sorry about crying at the
Christmas party that year - you gotta understand even in 6th grade we're
still kids who will cry.) That one kid who traded stamps with me and I
ended up with a load of them when he forgot to take them back. Heh.

(Never mind the sheets of notebook paper that people blew their noses in
and then handed them to me to look at. kimochi warui!!)

My "career" in any school choirs ended in 5th grade. Thank god. I hated
it. I don't know why I was forced into doing that. It had to do with
Miss Homer / Mrs. Fugelberg (same person) wanting the boys to do
something stupid to "I'm going to wash that girl out of my hair" at the
edge of the stage. I didn't know nor was I given the option to say I
didn't want to do it. I got sick the day we were supposed to do this for
people. Nobody believed that. I was summarily kicked out of choir.

I hated Mr. Wiley and gym class most of all. We all thought he was gay.
I hated wearing gym shorts. To this day I won't wear shorts of any kind.
I also don't go swimming anywhere.

Mr. Marcenkoy (sp?) at the high school made my 2 years in PE bearable by
not asking me to do anything except keep an eye on the baskets. Thank
you. I hated PE. I liked Marcenkoy. About the only part of PE I liked
was when we went bowling. I sucked at it.

Anywho, as the box from the cornerstone was opened, they presented 1931
copies of local papers: The Alliance Review, the Canton Repository (full
name there), and The Minerva News and Clay City Times. Where is / was
Clay City? The papers all mentioned the laying of the cornerstone on the
front page.

The Masons and the Oddfellows appeared to have had a hand in making sure
this school was built. Letters from the faculty, superintendent, and
principal were in there. A copy of The Crescent from 1931 was in there.
All items were practically still brand new as if they were in there
yesterday. Explanations of the Depression were abound. People unable to
pay property taxes lost their properties to the bank, and the banks
unable to collect on the debt went under. It was a massive domino
effect. Nobody at the time knew when it would turn around, and the
Depression lasted for about 10 years or so. Then Roosevelt (The 2nd one)
passed the New Deal and of course World War II happened. One paper
mentioned something about Chinese Troops in 1931. As soon as the items
from the time capsule are on display at the historical society, I plan
to read those newspapers, hopefully.

Lots of interesting things were in there. The Newspapers were most
enticing. The Minerva News was a whopping 8 pages!! I think I'll try
re-creating the masthead using Word. ^_^

It seems in spite of that building being the source of the Worst times
of being in the local school system had the last word as voices from the
past let us know what their hopes and dreams for the future of the
children and the school would be. They added more onto the building
later on, only to have it torn down nearly 75 years later. At least my
last memories of the building would be those from that box, and they're
good ones at least. I got video of the ceremony of the opening of that
box. ^_^

I wonder what's in the cornerstone of Mary Irene Day Elementary, or if
West Elementary has one??

Hisashiburi desu nyo...

I guess the lack of additions means not much bad has been happening. And
for the most part of that, it's true.

My older sister went back on her "promise" to have me be Property
Manager and reduce our rent. Hey, I work a more or less full time job -
I can't help it if on my days off I want to do something for ME. I can't
help it if I get 40 hours on a paying job. Some of the things she did
when she visited in June were some of the same things I needed help
doing. I can't do it by myself!! The basement pretty much got the
cleaning out it needed, but I still want to get some sort of power
washer down there. I wouldn't store anything in there for the life of me
- not without a good water proofing and replacement of insulation and
other stuff.

July was pretty damn hot. After I came back from Anime North, I put in
the small air conditioner we have (from mom's room on Eucild mainly) at
the top of the stairs, and it did my room and the first floor pretty
well. Then in July, it got hot. and I mean HOT. I was starting to wonder
if I should have put the big air conditioner in the window instead. At
that time I put it in, Apartment B was still not rented out.

Oh yeah, Apartment B - rented out to a friend of one of the ladies (who
no longer is assigned to help my mom) who came to help my mom with
whatever she does. Turns out she's kinda odd. The terms Redneck and
Trailer Trash almost apply. Then she was seeing this son of one of her
clients. He doesn't have a job or a car. She's got a job and a car. Then
he was all of a sudden staying with her in Apartment B, and she turned
nasty right after that. Mom says tonight they had some sort of argument
and he left. Heh.

I've been getting some good hours at work. Got overtime during July 4th
week. Been finding more $3 and $4 anime DVDs at local Big Lots and
Dollar General stores. Finally got to see Angel's Tail and Galaxy Angel.
Added the first OVA DVD of Stratos 4 to my boxed set of the TV series.
Heh. July was a rather expensive month. I started to amass a bunch of
DVD+R media for my recorder. HP DVD+R disks are working pretty much 100%
of the time. I have so many tapes I want to backup on DVD... Ranma 1/2
collection, Card Captor Sakura fansubs, and Miracle Girls. I'm going to
need a lot of media for this.

Heck, some of the cheap anime DVDs I haven't even watched yet!

Been trying to get things together and get my passport application
started. I still don't have photos for it.

Did I mention being able to re-pack the first Wedding Peach DVD and
extras disk in a 2 disk thinkpack, then including the other 9 thinkpack
disks in the first artbox? Heh!!

Gotta start selling things on eBay. I have to clear out space in our
only extra room somehow - and it's going to be done MY way. My older
sister threw away whatever didn't sell at the "yardsale" which was
pretty much putting things out on a tarp, then throwing them away
without our permission when some of it didn't sell. She took the money
people left for mom's books!! What a ----ing rotten landlord my sister
is!!! I thought stuff like that was ILLEGAL.

Still lots to do. We haven't settled in yet - still.

Anime North 2006 Report

Anime North was a Blast this year. While I think they've got too much
going on, too many people, and a little too corporate even for this
convention, my friends and I were a smaller bunch, up for less time than
in the past, and had one little troublemaker that had been in our group
now gone. We were able to have the fun we'd been missing in the past
couple Anime Norths.

We came up on Thursday and were able to get a few things done. The AN
Staff had set up pre-registration check-in at the Doubletree with a few
things going on at 6:30 until 11pm. This worked out great for us as we
wanted to visit Pacific Mall again and finally check out Market Village
early on Friday. We got our badges and pretty much didn't do a whole lot
other than that.

Friday morning we headed out with the intention of getting back in time
to find the Masquerade table and get the Coveted Attendance Sticker.
Pacific Mall is pretty huge by itself, but there's some out-plazas that
are worth checking out. Market Village has about 170 stores and 2 big
grocery-style food stores. There was one shop I had bought an Angel
Daisy doll for $7 Canadian that I almost hoped still had some left -
only to find they had several Tamagotchi 3s in stock!!! This toy is nigh
impossible to find around me in Ohio. I called 5 local stores and none
had any in, and got told things of product allocation to production
problems in China. And I find a store with 13 units in stock!!! Waaai!!
Waaai!! If I really wanted to, I could have bought 5 T3s and put them on
eBay and easily made my money back and then some. I got a clear red
plastic unit. I can lord it over people here that I got mine in Canada.
Heh.

It seems the Chinese bootleggers are getting lazier than ever. Most of
the shops with DVDs, if they weren't originals, were BURNED COPIES of
stuff they copied! I mean, nobody's going to buy it. (Obviously some
people have bought off them, otherwise the stores wouldn't exist.)
Laughably, there were copies of Da Vinci Code in one store.

One place to eat that I will recommend extremely highly, and this was a
recommendation off a friend who lives in Toronto - The Mongolian Grill
in Market Village - very good food, you can choose what you want and
then have them cook it on a gas-fired grill, much like the nomadic
Mongolian fighters used to do on their shields. (Or so they say.) No
more can people go in there to say their food isn't fresh or it isn't
what they wanted, because you can choose what you want, the sauces and
etc, and then see them cook it right before your eyes. What amazed me
was not just how quickly they did things, but the liquid of the sauces I
put in there, aside from what naturally would evaporate during cooking,
actually made it back into the bowl! $14.95 Canadian for an Adult lunch.
The place opens at 11:30 most days. It's All You Can Eat!! Lots of great
food there.

Since we were short one Looky Lou, we were able to cover both Market
Village and Pacific Mall in about an hour and a half. Having maps
grabbed and printed up from both websites helped out a lot. We were able
to check the stores we were most interested in and get done with 2 hours
to spare.

One shop had the Ranma 1/2 Mini trading figures listed in the last
Previews. I wanted the Shampoo / Ranma one, but they at first wouldn't
let me buy it. So I began purchasing one, and paid with a $50. Then
another, and another, and by the time I was going to buy and open a 4th,
the shopkeeper gave up. I was about to clean him out of change!!! ^_^ I
got my figure. They were selling them at $12.99 Canadian each. I have 4
others to sell on eBay, maybe.

One store near a shop called CD Dog had nothing but Gachapon machines.
In fact, between 2 stores with a decent selection of gachapon machines,
I managed to buy 4 capsules. I got some nice items, but after looking at
the insert sheets, I wish I had gotten some of the others instead.

After returning back to the hotel, we made it back over to the
Doubletree Friday night and while we were told not to wait for the
Masquerade info table to open back up, we went somewhere else, because
for some reason they had another table for people to sign up for
something in the same damn spot... Oy vay. It was for the Kotoko
concert. They could have moved it somewhere else... I don't know why
they didn't. Anywho, while the Masquerade Attendance sticker was highly
contended, I recommend getting it early on Friday so you don't have to
worry about getting one. Then line up early as possible (or as allowed)
and get a good seat. I managed to do both. ^_^

After I got that, I think I went over to the Toronto Congress Center. Or
did we eat at Boston Pizza? It took over the space of a small sub shop
that disappeared since 2004. I guess not many people ate there. I feel a
little sorry for the guy who ran it.

I think we did go through the dealer's room on Friday. I was looking for
a few things, like both Bottle Fairy DVDs. Hairy Tarantula people said
they had them, just didn't bring them in but check back Saturday
morning. I found another dealer with a good amount of stock, but decided
to give HT a chance to save me money. Saturday morning - they don't have
Bottle Fairy. That's OK, I still got it. I found the Collector's Box of
Wedding Peach with the beachball and extras DVD. I'm going to sell the
beachball with the first DVD. Heh.

I also bought the boxed set of Stratos 4 based on a scan of pencil
boards someone put together and posted on a.b.p.anime a week before the
convention. After doing some research, and seeing pics of Ayamo's one
piece swimsuit, I decided it was worth my time.

Anime North this year had a new thing for Friday Night - a Nominoichi
aka Japanese-style flea market for anime goods. I managed to sell some
items and made some money. I had hoped to meet up with one Canadian to
help me with the money-handling. I won't get into details, but since
that didn't work out, I still went ahead and set up on the table I got.
I'm glad to say it went well, and I don't have as many videotapes to
store in that little box anymore. Plus the 3 Chun Li / Cammy figures I
tried to eBay over a year ago sold very well. ^_^

Saturday... I blew off the Chobits Panel (and I felt bad about it) for
my tour of the Dealer's Room. I took along my Talking Luna Plushie (she
was a big hit) and got some cute girls one video and on film holding
her. Quite a few Sailor Moon cosplayers. One really hot PGSM Sailor
Mars, too, though I never was able to get her for pictures. T.T

I managed to see half of the Negima panel (I could have passed it up as
it was), and taped some of the Japanese Cooking Panel. I did a much
better panel in 2004, and I definitely want to do it in 2007, if I go
that is. I felt they tried pretty good for the panel, but I would have
whipped up some Okonomiyaki and Curry, and I can do both in 1 hour.
Easily. Curry can be done in about 20 minutes or so. I did it in 15
minutes one night I was really hungry and was going to do it anyway.
With a lot of prep done ahead of time, I can pull off both in one hour!
Iron Chef Otaku!! ^_^ There was a handout for the cooking panel, and I
may very well get around to adding the recipes to my page on Geocities.
^_^

For the first time ever, while going into Canada, we got pulled over for
an inspection of the vehicle. The two men were courteous and polite, did
their job with utmost respect, and while they were probably looking for
drugs or whatnot, and not finding any because we know that's illegal, we
had to wait a while for them to return our IDs. I don't know what that
was about. The guy we had to talk to before that was in the habit of
pulling people over, because the car before and the car after us were
also pulled over and inspected. Take a few seconds before progressing to
one of the border crossing booths to see who's getting people through
fast and who's taking a while and getting pulled over for inspections.
We were not searched when coming back.

Myers says those are the most nerve-wracking parts of the trip.

I'm going to go through the program and schedule booklet to see what
they could have left out and made it a better, smaller convention. Two
things come to mind though - the Midnight Masked Ball and the Japanese
Pro Wrestling thingy. There's more in addition to those they could have
left out.

Oh yeah, the Masquerade - they got the perfect host for the Masquerade
for once! He actually did prep work beforehand, and even got the
Japanese names right - and when idiots in crowd tried to "correct" him
on the pronunciation of "Clow" - he defended his pronunciation by
telling them to "Watch the subtitled version." Heh!!!

My Battle witht the Elements and my room

OK. Well, I finally had to get up in the attic, yes the joists and
everything supported me (you lose weight while asleep, I know this for a
fact - it may not be much but it happens), and got that big bunny
hanging up there down. It wasn't heavy at all.

Anywho, I had to get up there in my latest War With the Elements. Again
water decided it would invade my room but from above this time. I had
done a little taping up of the hole as well as some stapling of a
plastic bag to the ceiling, but I had to change that at some point, but
the root of the reason I write this is because I decided once and for
all (and it was the morning so I was feeling pretty brave and pissed off
at the same time - similar to that morning after that one hurricane (see
blog)) I needed to go up there and win another one for me.

It was a hard spot to find. It was practically all the way to the edge
of the roof. Based on what I saw as far as placement of electric wires
(and these were pretty new wires) to determine where the thingy for the
ceiling receptical was for maybe, oh I don't know, like a fan or light,
I judged well where I would place a bucket under the roof but above my
room. I think I found a 2nd leak over my closet - I'll have to check
this out very soon. I didn't know one was there.

This is a Catch and Release system. Basically, it's a slow leak, so
anything that catches the water will release it through evaporation. I
just hope, and it's likely, this will never fill up and does evaporate
pretty well.

Hell of a way to "meet" the neighbors

OK, So tonight around 6:30 pm I'm making dinner. I get mom's plate done
up and I begin making mine, when all of a sudden there's this loud
fire-cracker-like explosion sound that suddenly just happens. So we're
both like "What the hell was that?" and I try to figure out what that
was. Nothing in the kitchen was disturbed or exploded. And while I try
to figure that out for about 30 seconds, I see some guy walking out of
our yard looking at the house, I see him looking at me while I look at
him from the window. And I conclude at the time that for some reason
this guy set off a firecracker or something. Mom says calling the police
won't do much, but I maintain that calling the police at least gets the
complaint logged in somewhere. I call the police, they say over where we
are that's the county sherrif's department or whatever, and they refer
my call over to them. And I get a call from that person. They were very
helpful, explaining that this is just one incident and even though
there's nothing that can be done, they've logged the complaint and if it
happens again then they'll have to check into it.

I mention that I got a videocamera and not afraid to use it, and the guy
advises me something like that could aggravate things, but it could be
helpful but be careful. OK.

Anywho, I get to settling down, eventually getting something to eat
before a friend calls after that. I see the same guy again in our yard.
So I go out on the back porch and ask him if there's something I can do
for him. He says he's been practicing his golf swing and lost a golf
ball. I told him if we find it I'll be glad to return it. Then he
suddenly finds one in our yard out in front of the tree and goes on
about his way. I think he offers a bit of an apology for that.

Not a firecracker, but still an explosive sound. A golf ball hit the
house. Sheesh. Shoulda just come up and apologized rather than just
walking in the yard like he did.