Past the Point of No Return (2 lefts and a wrong turn from easy street)

Okay, again I fail at LJ. Um, I don't actually remember when I last updated. I mean, it wasn't that long ago, I just don't remember what I've mentioned and haven't... so whatever, here is the general overview of the life of me for the last few weeks.

* Gaming - Finally played and finished Subarashiki Kono Sekai, AKA It's a Wonderful World, AKA The World Ends With You (and no, I don't know why they came up with a whole new title when the Japanese version had an English subtitle, but whatev) and got briefly eaten by fandom. Briefly only because it's not a huge fandom; I love Joshua and his fabulous bitchface. Currently am playing Pokemon SoulSilver on DS, Trusty Bell AKA Eternal Sonata on Xbox360, and Kyou Kara Maou! Shinmakoku no Kyuujitsu on PS2. Although all fairly casually, so actually less gaming than usual for me. The KKM dating sim is hilarious and very rewarding; SoulSilver I'm still only poking at mostly, but Becky and I got a trade working the other day which was fun. It has a really fuzzy voicechat, which I think the only thing it actually caught was my ridiculous giggling. XD

* Uni work - Have been spending a fair amount of time in the law library trying to make up for being a slackarse all first term. At least I have almost caught up on Restitution and Syntax reading, which are most urgent because I have a Restitution exam next Wednesday and a Syntax assignment due next Thursday. (That's practically done. More worrying is the research paper due at the end of the month I haven't started.) I should also put some energy into Income Tax, which has a takehome exam Saturday fortnight.

* Honours thesis - a part of the stress was also needing to do research to find a topic for law honours next semester. Research was done, and a topic and adviser have been secured, so stress has dropped considerably. More on this later, when everything is all official. Although there's a workshop I'm going to on Friday afternoon for it.

* Work-work - I still don't have a regular part-time job, but last week I had a preliminary interview for a paralegal job with a law firm in Canberra (which would also function as a graduate job offer, hence the rigorous interview process). It went well and I was assured I'd go on to the second/final round interviews. I still await an email, though, about when this will happen. I wish my mother would stop asking me about it. >__< Meanwhile, graduate job applications continue in a mildly stressful and very obnoxious fashion. It is particularly frustrating how all the departments of the public service demand such different things in their apps. LEARN TO STANDARDISE, GUYS. The Department of the Environment, Water, Heritage and the Arts has its deadline tomorrow; Australian Government Solicitors and all the law firms are on Friday. orz

* Translation work - Although I said I don't have a regular part-time job, I DO have more professional translation work. I actually picked it up at the same time as the other one, but it's a big job ranging over a schedule of months, so we haven't actually started the translation work yet. However, over the last few days there's been a volley of emails amongst the author and translators about a list of standard terms. It's a very interesting experience, particularly since the whole thing is conducted in formal Japanese.

* Reading - Basically, my lifestyle, particularly my free time, is dictated by the whims of my cyclic interests. Sometimes I want to do nothing but play games; sometimes I want to watch anime, or Western TV. Sometimes I want to read manga or books. Sometimes I even feel like working! But sometimes, what I really want to do is read Japanese light novels. Go figure, I know. Anyway, that is the mood I am currently in, so I am delighted that Mari loaned me a bunch of her books because she has a very impressive collection. Really I just want to sit around tearing through them, but sadly I am a pretty slow reader in Japanese and have really only been reading the Kyou Kara Maou books, or more accurately maruma, since that is not actually the title of the books. (The first book is "kyou kara MA no tsuku jiyuugyou!") Also, I read all of what's currently available of Sekaiichi Hatsukoi, which is by the same author as Junjou Romantica but much better. I mean, I quite like the latter for all its flaws, but Sekaiichi Hatsukoi is just, well, a lot better. Plus it's interesting seeing the inner workings of manga editing from someone who presumably knows what they're talking about! ... On a random sidenote, in the cover flap I discovered the author has the same birthday and blood type as me.

* Writing - I am actually still writing. Just... slowly. And in a fandom/pairing no one cares about. XD; Well, except Becky. And me, obviously. But anyway, it is Suikoden Tierkreis fic about Meruvis/Asad which is like, oh my god, I have been reading too much doujinshi and am a terrible person. orz Meanwhile though I think I will do the sequel to last year's ST Big Bang for this year's STBB (assuming honours and the translation job and interviews don't put the nail in my coffin, that is). Also, I have not abandoned BBX! I still think about it frequently! It is just... percolating.

だめな小説家であってすみません. orz Or rather, I'M SORRY I SUCK.

And now to end the post on the note that actually prompted me to finally make this post, probably no one but other law students/lawyers will find this funny, but this paragraph in a judgment just made me stifle a giggle:

"The decision of this House in Sinclair v Brougham has loomed very large in both the judgments in the courts below and in the admirable arguments addressed to the Appellate Committee of this House. It has long been regarded as a controversial decision, and has been the subject of much consideration by scholars, especially those working in the field of restitution. I have however reached the conclusion that it is basically irrelevant to the decision of the present appeal."

ETA: Link from youkofujima that is hilarious, law jokes aside. I CRIED with laughing so hard.

http://www.cracked.com/funny-163-australia/

Also, this is funny if you know Tales of the Abyss, from littlelinor:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_E2mCAmH94I

And another very funny one from beckerbell, minigames parodying oldschool RPGs:

http://www.skipmore.com/freegames/synopsis/synopsis.html

As of Friday: free!

Ish.

It's only a two-week break, and I have a paper due next wednesday and an exam and a Japanese composition in the first week back. But it's close enough! So far I have celebrated this by going to bed pretty much the same time as during term (ie, 2-3) and playing disgustingly copious amounts of Tales of Destiny II which I am RIDICULOUSLY IN LOVE WITH yesss preciousss and I will never remove Judas from my team ever except when I have to. ♥

As for the international law assignment, it is done. It was handed in 15 minutes before the deadline. I am paranoid something went horribly wrong. I am fervently thanking my freakish good luck in waking up at 9am on Friday and deciding to get up despite having gone to bed past 4, because I only had footnotes and a reference list to do and thought it would be cakewalk but I DID NOT FINISH IT UNTIL 3.30, i.e. half an hour before it was due in, having worked on it without break (except for lunch) from about 10.

But it's done. Hopefully it is better than my usual law assigments. I really want to do well on this one, more than just my general desire to do well, because I care about the subject and found the topic interesting.

Anyway. On a random note, my music/cd drama folder is 20gb. I didn't know this and find it quite frightening.

Returned from Sydney. Tired, sore, stressed, etc etc so no change there. Speaking of, I apologise in advance (and probably retrospectively too) for spaciness and/or grumpiness, because I've had comments to the effect that recently I have been, both online and in RL. Hopefully this should cease in about a week, once I've got my assignments in and am on mid-semester break and can SLEEP oh god.

I think I'll maybe be okay with said assignments. International is the major one out of the three, and I've read (all 73 pages of) the majority decision and highlighted my way through three main relevant treaties, so I at least feel like I have a vague idea what I'm talking about. That doesn't mean I feel any less stressed, however, what with the sore muscles and headache and sleep dep on top of everything else. *hasn't done the reading for this week or completely caught up last week, but that's what the holidays are for! or something.*

Actually, maybe I've got PMS. That would explain the soreness, the grumpiness and the general bloated feeling/whacked out blood sugars. And I haven't had my period in about two months or so. Huh.

I was going to talk about Sydney but my headache is killing me, so maybe tomorrow. Or maybe not. Whatever.

Okay, so that work I had to do? Studied for tomorrow's kanji test and did the newspaper mini-assignment for Japanese in the last half hour. Read maybe 3/4 of the legal theory reading before the sheer vitriol of the article made me give up in disgust (SHUP UP about how naive the other philosopher's theory is, for GOD'S sake! I don't even care if you're right about the flaws, it's obnoxious and makes me hate you and your point on general principle!) and haven't touched the international law tute reading on child soldiers. Nor did I do anything on any of my three assignments due next week since getting home.

Uuuuurgh. You know I was up to date on my reading, right up until this week? The procrastination and short attention span has utterly swamped me.

In other news my back hurts, there is apparently nothing wrong with my pc and it booted fine first try at the computer shop (wtf?), and Mari and I have concluded that my Japanese accent is somewhere Kansai, despite the purely standard Japanese (aka Tokyo) vocab and grammar. We don't know where we got it from. It's quite odd.

On a sidenote, what is UP with the smallville fandom and Clex mpreg? I know Clark is an alien and all, but seriously.

I have named my laptop, after being asked several times what its name is. Ji and I discussed it, and I have decided to call it Lex for the following reasons:

• I am easily swayed by current obsessions
  
• We decided calling it Sei-chan would be too scary
  
• I wanted it to be suave and amoral like my desktop keyboard, which is called Crowley
  
• Lex is rich and hot. He is also insane. However, he's the kind of crazily obsessed that works in your favour and buys you expensive cars if you don't lie to him.
  
• He's got super healing powers and is hard to kill
  
• He won't object in a morally righteous fashion to any infringement of copyright that he may be implicated in
  
• He's super intelligent and capable of taking over the world

Also, it gives me the opportunity to nickname my laptop Alexander the Fabulous, which I saw in a fic and thought was brilliant. My laptop is suave, amoral, and FABULOUSLY fruity. It's the armani-wearing porche-driving purple-loving laptop, you know. It probably twirls. (I have a gif file of Lex twirling mid-step, for those who haven't seen it.)

Plus, Lex the laptop has an inbuilt microphone and I can talk to people over IM. Ftw!

Anyway, today has been spent largely on japanese phonetics & phonology. I totally don't care about whether or not there is a difference between final-accented and unaccented words in tokyo dialect, for serious. *grumpy because she has to summarise this article in 300 words for assessment*

Currently I am listening to I Want You Back on repeat. I have decided, because I have no willpower to resist temptation, that it will be involved in popband!X AU. It will be wonderful. Mooahahahahaha!

I want to work on popband!X, dammit.

ETA: Something I forgot. I want this like BURNING. Not just Tales of Phantasia on PSP-- which I crave, it's one of the reasons I'm going to get a PSP eventually-- the limited edition bonus DVD that you can only get by preordering from certain stores. Amazon being one of those. And I would so do this, I would happily part with my $42 odd plus postage, IF IT SHIPPED OUTSIDE OF JAPAN AAAARGH. Is there anyone living in Japan who'd be willing to take the order and send it to me? I'd pay poooostaaage. I'd write you fic. I'd grovel appropriately and love you forever? D:

Oh, and we might be getting a new printer. 2 or 3 years since we got the last one, and at half the price, it's 4 times faster, 4 times the resolution, and a 3-in-1 fax/scanner/printer. Oh, technology, you move so fast. *rueful*

The song-letter meme, gacked from Xyn. Comment to get a letter, then upload 5 (well, I did 10 because I'm indecisive, and that was AFTER I chose to ignore all songs from video games or starting with 'the') songs you like starting with that letter.

( This song upload post is brought to you by the letter M! )

I am very tired, I am constantly very tired, catching up uni work is a bitch and it's made even more of one by an unfortunate readdiction to smallville fic. It's cyclic. Sometimes that fandom just sucks me back into its gaping maw and then there are so many, like, full-on 100K word fics that are also quality that I never get my life back until I burn myself out on them. So I'm not writing at all. Though I am playing Tales of Phantasia: Narikiri Dungeon. Mostly I'm levelling up. See again the not helping on the catching up of uni. I am getting there, but it's slow going and I missed all my lectures last week. SIGH.

Let's see. Have a laptop. Have bruises all over my hands and arms from the bloodtests and the drip. Am back to eating dairy products as of yesterday. Going back to uni tomorrow. Have Japanese quizzes to make up. Did last week's law reading; well, I did the International Law while in hospital. Did the Legal Theory yesterday and Friday. The first two articles were okay, the third one made me want to bash my head into a wall repeatedly to escape the pain. I swear it wasn't even English, it was such wanky bullshit.

Haven't done tomorrow's reading. So tired. AUGH. Am so going to bed now!

One of those updates that sometimes happens. Changed a few little things about my LJ-- interests, profile, name. No major overhauls, but. I also went through and did my comment/email backlog. I wish I didn't have the habit of letting these things build up. ^^;

Let's see, last time I updated was... Friday. Huh. Saturday, didn't do much until we went out for dinner to the Chairman & Yip, one of the best fine dining restaurants in Canberra (which is the city with the most restaurants per capita in Australia, for the statistically inclined). The cuisine is sort of modern Chinese-Australian, though it's more Chinese inspired than anything. You share the food and the dishes have an oriental bent but there is also elements of French cuisine and you eat with cutlery, not chopsticks.

Anyway, the service was very prompt (3 courses in about 2 hours) and the food was excellent, so I think that was a good idea on my part. (I suggested we go out to dinner, since Chas was going back to Sydney Sunday, and I chose the restaurant. Usually dad does that kind of stuff.)

Sunday I went to Mari's and surprised her (not on purpose) by coming about 5 minutes earlier than I said (2.30-3pm) when she was expecting me to be about 2 hours late. XD That was funny. She was very flustered because she ALWAYS expects Jen and I to be late... and we always are. But I didn't call her to say I would be there around that time until I was half-ready and Marie was dropping me off on the way to meeting someone herself so I was more accurate than usual in my estimation. *amused*

As for today, I cooked dinner. It was pumpkin soup, of which there's lots left over for lunches. It was maybe a bit thin but it tasted good.

Mm, what else... I got an account for my HECS fee today from uni. They're going to have to send another one, one of the subjects is wrong. Not that it matters because they're the same band so they cost the same, but I know from experience they will because they want their records right. The reason there's a wrong subject on there is that I can't enrol in one of my courses without a permission code (because I haven't done Spoken Japanese 1 & 2. NEVER MIND THAT I DID 3 & 4 LAST YEAR.) and I'm still waiting ever less patiently for admin to email me one, me having emailed the lecturer as told last week. On the continued topic of my second semester woes, the aforementioned course still isn't up on the timetable (classes start in a week) along with all the tutes for one of my law classes and I suspect my very favourable timetable is going to be destroyed when they're scheduled, and I just realised today that I have to get my books. I don't even know what my books are or when I'm going to have time to get them. sajfkl;sjklf;asdjkf;la!

Thinking about uni is infuriating and frustrating me, especially since I have to get up early on Wednesday to make sure I can enrol in the lecture I want for International Law (who the hell has enrolments for LECTURE streams? pah), so I'm changing the subject. >(

Um. Today I bought Tales of Legendia and Big Brain Academy over the internet. I wish I wasn't so weak to discounts. >< Especially very large limited-time-only discounts. Oh well.

I procured myself the PotC 1 & 2 sountracks, and some Tales of Phantasia cd dramas etc. While I was doing that latter, I also did an online IQ test, because the link was there and I was bored. I'm sure they're all very innacurate etc, but they're fun enough to do, so why not.

( Results plus link )

Been playing Narikiri dungeon 1, which is cute but makes me make decisions about how I want the characters' personalities to change. I hate decision-making! D: Although this is one decision at the beginning that wasn't quite so hard:

( Ai-suru anata-samaaaaa! ... when is dinner ready? )

Tonight when I was feeding the dog I banged into the door. My left knee and toes are KILLING me, I can't bend the toes. Oops.

I know I said there'd be more Gakuen Heaven and Tales of Destiny remake soon, but this entry is already long enough and it's mostly for my own benefit anyway, especially the latter, so today is not that entry.

... AND TWO OR SO HOURS LATER I REALISE I DIDN'T HIT POST. *facepalm* Smart, me. Since this entry is still here, I wish Winamp would find a way that you could change filepaths of things in the media library, because it's very annoying to have to delete the songs and readd them when you're shifting folders around.

I have my LAST EXAM today. I hope I don't fail. In fact, I hope I get a credit. But I'm not holding out too much for that, for fear of disappointment. I did the work throughout the course, but as soon as it hit revision period I was like "BLEERGH" and did jack all, so my summaries are really shoddy. Worst to worst, I have the information in my lecture notes and will just run out of time, I guess... <<

Exam yesterday was Japanese Grammar. I think it went quite well. I finished early, didn't take a rest break. It's worth about 25%, I think, and I was already sitting on an HD for the rest of the course.

( More on dreams, this time involving Kelsey, Shi and Sephiroth. Not all in the same dream. Er, I don't think, anyway. Also, my dreams are like badfic. )

And in conclusion: MY DREAMS ARE BADFIC!

To change the subject, amazon shipping rates for books are HORRENDOUS. I was looking at the Squeenix site, which taunted me with its shiny game novels and guidebooks and manga, and I was like, god I want the KH ones. Well, after going "HEE THE FFXII GUIDEBOOK LOOKS LIKE IT HAS DARTH VADER ON THE COVER!" because I'm just like that, but. XD And I went to Amazon. I could have gotten the Ultimania alpha and first novel of KHII for like $20, but then the shipping was another $17 or so! AUGH. I gave up, because that's just not worth it. *cry*

Oh, also. Last night I read the 3 volumes of FuruBa you gave me, Cathy-- AM HORRIBLY ADDICTED AAAAH. *goes in search on the internet for MORE, PRECIOUS*

On a final note, ideas for bandAU!X progress nicely. By which I mean I have three words for you: the mammal song. XD

Because I can't be bothered explaining my dream twice, you get it in chat form. XD

Ebony: also, I had a dream last night
not in the Martin Luther King sense

Ji: aw, man
tell

Ebony: it was half funny, and half vexing.
like, I'm not sure how these two parts connected, though I suspect they did and I've forgotten a bit

Ebony: but there was this little black poodle puppy that looked like Ebony when she was a baby and I was like "AAAAW" so I kept it. In addition to the real Ebony. and Rohan came into the kitchen while I was holding it and was like, wait, what? last time I checked porkums was like so: *it was THIS BIG gesture*. And I was like, yeah, this isn't Ebony, Ebony is over there: *points to kitchen chair that Ebony always lies on, where she is indeed spread out*

And then Rohan said something about duplicating jeans and being annoyed because if you don't do it right the stains, tears, whatev, get bigger. And I was like, "..........." and checked the puppy. And the puppy had all Ebony's scars. And I was like, OMG, EBONY CLONE. HOW THE FUCK?

And then my mum told a story about how when she was a child she had a donkey, and one day she found another donkey that turned out to be a clone of her donkey. And in the back of my mind, I was like "since when did mum ever own a donkey?" and at the forefront of my mind, "how did they even clone her without me knowing? and why was the puppy just wandering around for me to find? WEIRD, MAN."
but I was like, YAY, EBONY CLONE. I LOVE THEM BOTH.

Ji: donkey ... up a minaret!

Ebony: that was just way on crack. I think there may have been a more scientific concern there about the puppy aging quicker, but I don't remember.
anyway, the other part of the dream

Ebony: For some reason people had taken up residence in my room. I'd been not using it for a while and they were there for some purpose or other-- delivery, maybe-- but then they'd decided to stay there. And I was like, bastards! My stuff's still in there! and I went in there to get this box with important... scented dragon candles... LOOK I DON'T KNOW it had something to do with the part of the dream I forgot which was more like RPG dungeon-y exploration stuff, but it was important and I needed it for something. And there were like, rar, get out! And I was like, AUGH I AM SO SUEING YOU PEOPLE. MY FAMILY ARE ALL LAWYERS. >(

And they were like, yeah, whatev man, you can try.

And then I was talking to my dad, and he was like, well the problem is that we can't sue them for trespass because they were invited on to the land. So we were all trying to think of some sneaky more obscure action to bring, and I was thinking, there's something wrong with this. I know it's illegal, but I can't figure out how.

And then I woke up and was like, wtf? It BECOMES trespass as soon as permission is revoked and they don't get off the land.

And why am I dreaming about trespass to land when I haven't studied for over a year anyway?

Ji: ....
i have no idea

Ebony: *brightly* so anyway, that's my subconscious! Sueing people for trespass, finding treasures in random dungeons and cloned poodles!

Ji: you are indiana jones

THE END.

(In other news, I'm trying to do a 24 hour take home exam for Japanese which is basically a comprehension paper and makes my brain hurt. "[japanese] Do you think the salaryman's letter answers the housewife's letter?[/japanese]" "OH GOD I HAVE ANSWER THIS IN JAPANESE. [japanese] On the one hand, he has said that in order to get ahead in the world it is necessary to be in 24 hour service to the company--[/japanese] AUGH MY BRAIN HURTS.")

Okay, so like.

I just found $60 rolling around in one of my many random bags that I sometimes use when I go out.

The hell? Is it mine? Why is it there? Where did it COME from? Did *I* put it there? And if so... why? And how did I forget?

O.o;

Weird.

Me quote of yesterday, when asked which way I wanted to get to Caterina's, through the arch or by the Law Link Theatre:

"Ew, no, let's go the other way. I don't want to go near the LECTURE DEATH RAYS."

Complete with wiggling hand gesture. That actually was my gut reaction, and right after I said it I was like, *FACEPALM*. XD