To set the record straight...

In regard to one anime title...

妹さえいればいい
imouto sae ireba ii

ireba is a form of "iru" which can be read To Be, Stay, Keep, Be Doing, To Need



Instead of "A [younger] sister is all you need," the title is more like:

Good, if you need only a little sister

If all you are is a little sister, fine!

Let's break that down:
imouto - little sister
sae - ... even, only

ireba is already explained, so "ii" is Fine, Good, OK.

imout sae ireba - if you're only a little sister, or if you need only a little sister

ireba is the "if / when" verb form, so you can go further "Nice, when you need only a little sister!"

Translation of "Aishiteru" just to see if I could

I did this on a whim. Otherwise, I have no reason for doing this. May or may not be up to your standards, but it meets mine.

Sally Miura feat CLIFF EDGE – Aishiteru

たとえばキミに出逢わなければ
Tatoeba kimi ni deawanakereba
For example, if I hadn't met you by chance

今どんな未来歩いてたかな?
Ima donna mirai aruiteta kana ?
What kind of future had I been walking now, I wonder?
 
周りに流され誰かを好きになってたのかな?
Mawari ni nagasare dareka w(o) suki ni natteta no kana ?
Would I have liked being around someone who swept me away?

またなんとなく
Mata nan to naku
Somehow

Huu… Uu…


目が合った瞬間
Me ga atta shunkan
The moment our eyes met

映した瞳
Utsushita hitomi
Our eyes reflected

誓い重ねたIC 送信
Chikai kasaneta IC soushin
A vow sent on so many instant messages

たわいもないメールかき集めた
Tawaimonai MAIL kaki atsumeta
I collected all the silly emails

君への想いだけを走らせた
Kimi he no omoi dake w(o) hashiraseta
I ran only my feelings for you

I Pray 出会って全ての
I Pray deatte subete no
I pray we all meet by chance
 
タイミング & Feelin’ & おれとお前のKissin’
Timing & Feelin’ & ore to omae no Kissin’
Timing and Feelin' and Me and you Kissin'


アイシテル… アイシテル… アイシテル…?
Aishiteru … Aishiteru … Aishiteru …?
I love you... I love you... I love you...?
 
確かめたい不安だから (I love you miss you…)
Tashikametai fuan dakara (I love you miss you …)
I want to be sure, so I'm anxious (I love you miss you...)
 
アイシテル…アイシテル…　聞きたいよ
Aishiteru … Aishiteru … Kikitai yo
I love you... I love you... I want to hear it!

その声が好きだから
Sono koe ga suki dakara
Because I love that voice


淋しくて泣いていた花の様に (I love you miss you…)
Sabishikute naiteita hana no you ni (I love you miss you …)
I was lonely, crying like a flower (I love you miss you...)

いつの日もいつの日も君を待っていた…(miss you)
Itsu no hi mo itsu no hi mo kimi w(o) matteita … (miss you)
Day by day, I had been waiting for you
 
やさしさが怖かったあの頃に…
Yasashisa ga kowakatta ano goro ni …
Around that time, I was scared of your kindness...

さよなら今…ありがとう今…
Sayonara ima … Arigatou ima …
Goodbye now ... Thank you for now...

君のそばで　LOVE YOU…
Kimi no soba de LOVE YOU …
Beside you  LOVE YOU...


Forever love
Forever love
Missin’ you…


「まだ起きてたんだな こんな時間にどしたまた?」
Mada okiteta n da na konna jikan ni doshita mata ?
"I was still awake. How is it this time again?"

「へんな時間にメールごめんね」
Hen na jikan ni MAIL gomen ne
"I'm sorry to email you at a strange hour."

「お前と同じ気持ちでいつだって
Omae to onaji kimochi de itsu datte
"I always feel the same way as you

おれだってメール待ってるんだぜ」
Ore datte meeru matterun da ze
Because I'm waiting for your email."
 
「そんな事言われたらまた好きになる…」
Sonna koto iwaretara mata suki ni naru …
"If you said something like that again, I will love it..."

Huu… Uu…


付き合うまでは見えなかった
Tsukiau made wa mienakatta
Until we go out, I could not see you.

不安が二人を襲いだした
Fuan ga futari w(o) osoi dashita
Anxiety attacked the two of us

心配、勘ぐりはもういい
Shinpai , kanguri wa mou ii
Concerned, it's enough to be agitated

あの頃のやさしさが欲しい
Ano goro no yasashisa ga hoshii
I want the kindness of that time

一人の夜やけに 胸が痛い
Hitori no yoru yake ni mune ga itai
On an evening alone, my heart hurts
 
お前をいっそ独り占めしたい
Omae w(o) isso hitorijime shitai
I want to hold you all the more
(lit. I rather want to monopolize you)

アイシテル…アイシテル…アイシテル…?
Aishiteru … Aishiteru … Aishiteru …?
I love you... I love you... I love you...?
 
2人はきっと永遠だよね(I love you miss you…)
Futari wa kitto eien da yo ne (I love you miss you …)
The two of us will surely be eternal! (I love you miss you …)

シンジテル…シンジテル… 嘘でもいい
Shinjiteru … Shinjiteru … Uso demo ii
I believe... I believe.... but a lie is OK

あの日のkiss 嬉しかったよ
Ano hi no kiss ureshikatta yo
I was happy on that day we kissed!


トキメキは続いてる… 星空へ (I love you miss you…)
Tokimeki wa tsuduiteru … Hoshizora he (I love you miss you …)
My heart beating goes on... towards the starry sky (I love you miss you...)

どこまでも　どこまでも　キミに誓うから (miss you)
Doko made mo doko made mo kimi ni chikau kara (miss you)
No matter where, no matter where, since I pledge to you (miss you)

キミといる…それがきっといつの日か
Kimi to iru … Sore ga kitto itsu no hi ka
to be with you... Will that surely be someday?

かけがえない思い出に
Kakegaenai omoide ni
For irreplaceable memories

変わりますように　LOVE YOU…
Kawarimasu you ni LOVE YOU …
May we change  LOVE YOU...

Love you Love you Lovin’ you…

おれがお前のどこを好きになったかわかってるかい?
Ore ga omae no doko w(o) suki ni natta ka wakatteru kai ?
Do you know where I fell in love with you?

伝わってるかい?
Tsutawatteru kai ?
Shall I send it to you?

素直になれなくてゴメンね
Sunao ni narenakute gomen ne
I'm sorry I wasn't being honest.

強がったその顔じゃなく
Tsuyogatta sono kao ja naku
I bluffed without that face

着飾った姿でもなく
Kikazatta sugata demo naku
Even without my dressed figure

出会ったまま　あの時のまま
Deatta mama ano toki no mama
It's just as it is now as it was the time we met

お前のままで良いんだから
Omae no mama de ii n dakara
Because I'm OK with you as you are now


アイシテル… アイシテル… アイシテル…?
Aishiteru … Aishiteru … Aishiteru …?
I love you... I love you... I love you...?

確かめたい不安だから (I love you miss you…)
Tashikametai fuan dakara (I love you miss you …)
I want to be sure, so I'm anxious (I love you miss you...)

アイシテル…アイシテル…　聞きたいよ
Aishiteru … Aishiteru … Kikitai yo
I love you... I love you... I want to hear it!

その声が好きだから
Sono koe ga suki dakara
Because I love that voice


淋しくて泣いていた花の様に (I love you miss you…)
Sabishikute naiteita hana no you ni (I love you miss you …)
I was lonely, crying like a flower (I love you miss you...)
 
いつの日もいつの日も君を待っていた…(miss you)
Itsu no hi mo itsu no hi mo kimi w(o) matteita … (miss you)
Day by day, I had been waiting for you
 
やさしさが怖かったあの頃に…
Yasashisa ga kowakatta ano goro ni …
Around that time, I was scared of your kindness...
 
さよなら今…ありがとう今…
Sayonara ima … Arigatou ima …
Goodbye now ... Thank you for now...

君のそばで　LOVE YOU…
Kimi no soba de LOVE YOU …
Beside you  LOVE YOU...


Love you Love you アイシテル…
Love you Love you aishiteru …
Love you Love you I love you

Aldi's "Grain Salads"

Recently, I had the rare chance to buy something at Aldi's marked down to sell because it was a 'fresh' food item and the sell by date arrived a bit early and there was still more to go.

In this case, it was a selection of "Grain Salads." Normally $3.39, with $3 off stickers, which makes them 50 cents each. Bad math, right? I thought so, too. The cashier was completely unhelpful in my problem of being overcharged 88 cents.

At any rate, here are my assessments of the 4 different salads they had.

The Mango Edamame Quinoa was the worst of the bunch. The Jalapeño peppers ruined the flavor and was too much sting for this. I would try this with some grated Parmesean to offset it. Otherwise, just make it without the Jalapeños.

One called Tabouli could have been better. It was just too cool and refreshing. It could have used no Mint, less lemon (it already had cucumber and tomato in there), but add prepared mustard. 

The Curry Ginger Couscous was too dry and too sweet. Remove the raisins. Add more cumin but not enough to burn the mouth. Less lemon. I would add mustard to this one to counteract the unnecessary sweetness.

The best one to my surprise (and I wish I had bought more of it) was the Southwest Lentil salad.  All it needed was bacon bits and it was perfect!

Aldi's needs to address their Mustard Potato Salad. Whoever makes it needs to stop putting sugar in it, add red onions, and add hard boiled egg bits. That's how I make MY potato salad! It doesn't need any sugar!! Maybe celery seeds.

It'd be a shame to let it go to waste

Going through my dry goods / baking pantry / shelves, I found I had some old lasagne noodles that had been there a while. Something like 8 years. They still cooked up and were safely edible after a round of crockpot lasagna. I also had a considerable bag of rice I forgot I hadn't yet used. 

The interesting bit was an opened bag in a box of cake flour. I don't remember why we had it or what it got used in. The sad part was it hadn't been immediately sealed up and had been invaded by tiny bugs that had subsequently died in it. Well, it was a nearly unused bag of cake flour still in the box with one hole in a corner. Seemed like a shame to toss it without the rest of the product not having shown it was still good.

So I sifted it into a bowl. Carefully. Turns out little bugs stand out against white cake flour. If one fell through my sifter, I picked it out. I feel I got 98% of the offending bugs out of the flour, which meant when I use it next time, I'll have to sift again to catch anything else I didn't already catch.

Which I did on Sunday when I make pancakes from scratch. And used blueberries that had been in the freezer for... about 8 years. Surprisingly, they weren't dried out or freezer burnt. They thawed out just fine and associated juice turned the pancakes blue. Nice.

I've got more stuff in that area I need to go through. Since it's all dry (the spoilable items have since been tossed or used as appropriate), I hope to figure out what to do with it.

Sports depicted

I finally replaced that missing Ruby Moon pin!

Years ago, when I worked at that hell hole Long John Silver's in Alliance, OH, I used to put anime pins on my hat I wore to and from work. At one time, I had a Ruby Moon pin (a character from later Cardcaptor Sakura chapters) I had received from my friend Jay who had gotten it as a candy toy from his local Mitsuwa store. It was one of those things sold in a box with some chocolate crunchy crispies of some sort of candy. There was a considerable set to collect if you could get access to more of the little boxes. I never was able to at the time.

The photo from the eBay listing I bought!

At any rate, one day after leaving work, a wind gust blew my hat off and it slid underneath a customer's car. After I had managed to retrieve it, it was then I noticed my Ruby Moon pin somehow came loose and was now missing. Lacking immediate use of a metal detector, I was resigned to having it lost forever. I had managed to replace 1 or 2 others I lost, but this was a special item not easily found again.

Or so I thought. A couple nights ago or so, I was browsing eBay and I happened to use the search term "Cardcaptor Sakura character pin." A good number of pins showed up, but lo and behold, someone had a complete set of the candy toy CCS pins! And then... my missing Ruby Moon pin! Well, not my exact pin but another one being sold by itself! I waited for it to be relisted with a sensible price and bought it. If I could have afforded it, I might have gone for the complete set, but having this pin again is enough and completes a hole in my collection.

And a while ago, I was even able to fix the broken pins in my collection!

And yet another little room to wait in.

%@$#%^@$^%@#$^*% INTERNET - STOP CHANGING THINGS, YOU TURDS.

So I tried to get on Foosebook to post something to my computer services page, and Foosebook has F-ed it up. Again. My graphics aren't loading and I can't post or comment on anything. F ^ C K. So I get on Blogger to do something and it doesn't load my Blog Dashboard. REALLY??? Goddammit.

LEAVE THINGS ALONE. WHEN THEY WORK, PEOPLE WANT IT TO WORK THE SAME WAY. FOREVER. F^cking web developers.

At any rate, Flash Updater on your desktop should pop up to notify you of an update for Flash Player to version 25 0 0 127. If it loads your default browser, uncheck the option for Google toolbar. Browser toolbars are so 90s.

A friend had fished out a computer box from the garbage somewhere, and it's in relatively good condition. It has a Soyo K7V Dragon Plus motherboard, and 2 ATI graphics cards. So I get to looking and I can find drivers for things on it that run under Windows 98SE and Windows XP. XP might take some work to install and not expire itself but yet activate. 98SE is not a problem but less useful.

The previous owner yanked the HD and memory sticks out of it for some reason, so I've never tried to turn it on. Without RAM, there's nothing to do. I was able to find out the motherboard uses PC1600 to PC2100 speed DDR unbuffered RAM. I have a couple of sticks that are rated above that speed, so I should be able to toss one stick in and see if it turns on. You can put faster RAM in a slower machine, but not the other way around. It'll just run as fast as the motherboard can.

I found drivers for the ATI 9200SE, apparently a Radeon model, that's an 8X AGP version, while the other card is an ATI Rage 128 PCI version. XP and 98SE drivers, good to go.

Audio is an integrated C Media 8738 chipset and drivers were found for that, too. Even the card reader and Ethernet card. And yes, the MB chipset, too.

If I feel capable, I'll at least toss a RAM stick in and see if it turns on and beeps. If it works, I'll spend some money on more RAM in case I want to run Windows XP on it. Otherwise, 512MB for Win98SE would be enough. And a cheap hard drive. Just to see what I can find out.

I got a Dell V313 All in One printer from a relative, and found both 32-bit and 64-bit driver software for it in case I need it. I should see how much ink cartridges cost for it.

A Windows 98 tower given to me some time ago I have no idea if it works, so perhaps I'll find out soon if it does. I need to check my friend's old HD from his XP box, and perhaps I'll finally locate that loose solder trace from his monitor and fix that.

So the cable company did it? WHY?

So the techs get here and I find out one of them shut off my connection without telling me bc some other cust having probs?? Unacceptable. New coax is being hung.

Da Fq?

Internet down for some reason. Was working last night at 3 a.m.! What the heck?