I spent 90% of today cleaning my room! It's much nicer now. I still have way too many things and not enough drawers for them all.

Just thought I'd update!

I'm in such a happy mood with such a clean room!

And I loved watching ZERO and ANS tonight! *bounces around happily* Sho-chan!

BTW Arashi is going to do KOUHAKU! OMG I can't believe it! I'm gonna miss them at the Johnny's Countdown (they're probably arrive with TOKIO) but at the same time, just wow! <3 (Aiba and Hikawa Kiyoshi in the same room is a conversation between a Slowpoke and a Psyduck just waiting to happen! Kidding - they're both adorable baka! xD I really want to see it one day! lol)

I feel so bad for being so happy about the announcement that Ms. Mao Kobayashi (who does News Zero every weeknight, meaning she works with Sho-chan on Monday night) is going out with a kabuki actor and not Sho-chan as many people were rumoring. The media labels her boyfriend as a bit of a play boy though. Please take care, Ms. Kobayashi!

I once called her a "smiling git" and I apologize for that comment. She's a wonderful example of a well-mannered, well-dressed career woman (I find her to be one of the best and most conservatively dressed announcers on TV.) To be honest, I do believe her and Sho-chan would make a very nice couple, but I still can't help myself feeling quite elated that she's not. Okay jealousy is sort of a factor but as I've said before my thoughts on Sho are a mix of yearning and admiration.

I think I was scared that if they were actually dating, they wouldn't tell us about it. I was frightened that they would both keep everyone in the dark even if they got married. (And if they'd done that I would have felt so betrayed.) I think more than anything I'm glad to know a definite answer. To be honest she could have announced she was dating Sho-chan and I think I would have eventually got over the shock. I'd still follow Sho-chan. (Mind you, if she'd suddenly said that they were getting married, I would have been far more shocked and far less unsure of the sudden bombshell.)

Either way, I'm glad that she was kind enough to give a definite answer, even if it's only to say that she's seeing someone who isn't Sho-chan.

I'm sorry I didn't get to properly update this. I get away from everything for four days only to have all the shit that gathered on the fan fall kersplat in my face all in one go. But never mind that for now.

Must just be the atmosphere, but I'm so happy! (Though the room was so stuffy I had to open the window a fraction last night despite the freezing cold - a fraction was just enough to make it comfortable.) Nice breakfast, nice company!

We're going out today, hopefully to the Historical Village of Hokkaido, The Sapporo Factory, a good ramen shop (maybe in Ramen Alley!), and karaoke! Then we'll come home tonight and make psychotically bright uchiwa while watching Music Station and My Girl!

FINAL THOUGHTS
Today's Final Thoughts thanks to tenjostyle and mirei_22

Sho-chan has done it again! Or will do in an upcoming episode of Himitsu no Arashi-chan! Remember the maid outfit, the one which Sho himself claimed he looked "Maximum Kawaii" in? Well a rival outfit has appeared. It may not quite outdo the maid outfit but it is damn close. Maid Sho, may I introduce Chinese Dress Sho! (And I thought Sho looked good dressed in male Chinese clothes!)



Sho-chan, how come you're so damn pretty!? It's hard to call him the proper, respectful "Sakurai-san" when he's dressed like that!!! (>/////<;) Just....*dies*... then he goes and sits like this! I know I'm being a Maximum Pervert but LOOK! I can imagine my hand wandering up where it shouldn't be and then getting slapped... *______* Better still Aiba's hand could... That'll make for good fic. *dies again*

PS. Someone make me an icon. Pretty please?

Well, I made it. The hotel is nice! <3 Sapporo itself kind of reminds me of the image of have of countryside America as it comes closer to winter. The trees and bare fields just kind of reminded me of it. Not that I've ever been to America so sorry if I'm offending anyone.

On the trains towards Sapporo I was confused by all the seats facing forwards. I thought surely they must be reserved seats as public seats in Tokyo face the sides of the train. lol

I have two more things to say:

They got him! They arrested the guy who butchered a NOVA teacher over two years ago. He's even had plastic surgery done and looks almost nothing like the original security camera footage from the night she was murdered. I'm so glad he's not at large anymore. My sincerest regards to her family, most especially to Mr. Hawker. I hope they can find some peace at last.


Secondly - a letter.

Dear ANA,

Thank you for the lovely flight. It was far more pleasant and shorter than I expected.

However, I have one complaint.

I chose an aisle seat because I was too frightened to look out the window. I did not appreciate the live video feed from somewhere under the plane, being broadcast on the cabin screens during take off and landing.

*shudders* Still hate flying in planes. I especially hate take off and landing but some reason I've developed this odd habit of falling asleep just as the plane starts to descend. I'm usually then awoken by the wheels on the runway as the plane hits land again.

For some reason I'm fine with helicopters. Must be because they don't go up as high and they don't tilt much on take off and landing.

Okay, gotta go pick up my new Arashi buddy Abby from the airport!

Love it. Thank you, Arashi. The new song is gorgeous. It's also very deserving of its bittersweet music video. One of my favorite Arashi songs in ages!

( My Girl (English Translation) )

This is just amusing:

( John Cleese's Letter to America (Notice of Revocation of Independence) )

Okay it's been two days since this began and I still don't have my voice back properly. It's been four hours since I went to see the doctor about it and my nose still feels like I was stabbed up the nostril. Stupid flu test. Well I don't have the flu. I have a bad head cold. Now I'm taking medication, have a doctor's receipt, and won't be going to school yet again tomorrow.

Dammit. I would go, but I do value my voice and I've been told it'd be better if I didn't. Technically I'm not that sick but I'm meant to be going to School B which has had outbreak after outbreak of influenza. If I go like this, I could get worse. :(

Guess I'll just have to make tomorrow productive.

Things to do (not necessarily in order):

- Clean my room
- Finish fic requests
- Plan Sapporo holiday
- Plan December holiday
- subtitle Yatterman clips
- budget
- write letters
- apply for 7-11 savings account
- make Arashi Top 10: BCP vid

Well...should keep me busy. Let's see how many of these I can get done tomorrow.

PS Want to see the Silent Hill movie for the hell of it, and because I don't wanna play the games...I hate games where I'm being chased...

After watching my hero, Sho-chan, doing his thing last night despite terrible heights and the cold rain, I decided to do my best today at work despite my head cold. I only lasted half the day then I lost my voice and had to go home. There goes half a day's pay.

But there was something waiting for me when I got back!

( Friends and family, feel free to skip the following Arashi fangirling session. Everyone else, come follow me! )

And in part two, there is even more Arashi awesomeness!

( AU x Arashi site! )

The Arashi SP was beyond awesome. I knew how most of the experiments would turn out before they happened but there was so much more to this 3hr Arashi romp!

I don't want to spoil it for anyone but KYAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA!

Awesome moments:
- Sho in a red body suit (yes my eyes went directly down - I couldn't help it.)
- Murao-san on helium
- The SWING!
- Arashi live and in 3D!!!!
- Sho-chan making a short black skirt (over tight black pants) look very fashionable on a guy! (I swear only Johnny's can pull that one off!)
- Hatori-san! <3
- The return of something once left behind! <3

It was just too great!

I'm going to fangirl my way into my dreams now! Yaaaay!

I'm currently writing my Arashi x Halloween fic! Yes I know I have to get a move on but there are two things I wanna say first!

1) Arashi Challenge Week is so much fun! I'm totally loving seeing Arashi on random CMs, promoting it next NTV's mascot DA BEAR. The only thing I'm a bit hmm about is the replays. D no Arashi rules! Gyakukaiten, A no Arashi, the origami boat and the abandoned places eps totally deserved to return! That said, I'm really sorry but the only good thing about Air Guitar was seeing Arashi in skimpy clothing....oh....Um, ok then someone explain the Zoo ep! It was a funny ep, but I felt there were eps which deserved more attention. And how come there's no Mayonaka no Arashi?

2) Last HnA was HILARIOUS!!!! Skip over the VIP room - it's only worth watching for the horse moment. The second part, Araoke, was HILARIOUS! Basically HNA borrowed a karaoke room, filled it with cameras, made it free for half an hour, and put up posters saying there was a free drink for every Arashi song which gained 80 points! The moment someone started singing an Arashi song, the REAL Arashi would barge in and start singing too! I couldn't stop laughing! Arashi totally abused the Japanese karaoke booth system! LMAO. Actually they kind of cheated so apparently there will be a comeback of this segment! Yaaaaaaay!

Okay back to fic!

<3

PS: "Shimono-sa~n, Shimono-sa~n!" LMAO

Friday night was a dream come true!

Ever since my first year at uni I have missed the film and television subjects. Unlike literature writing teachers (it should be called Literature Writing and not Creative Writing), script writers don't whinge about your style of writing. They don't care if your content is genre-based (as in horror, SF, romance) rather than some elaborate weaving of words (Jane Austin style - I'll never forget her two pages on someone taking off their hat.) All script writing teachers care about is 1) how it will look on screen and 2) if they'd want to watch it or not. Everything else is up to YOU! Including the story you want to tell! THAT is CREATIVITY!

On Friday night I had my first class in Creative Scriptwriting at NTV GAKUEN in Tokyo. It was two hours of talking from a person who had been in the industry for over 20 years and who had been teaching the class since it first started 14 years ago. He was so great, I didn't feel the time pass at all!

He went through the things I've been through many times before but in such detail and with such great, simple explanations. He said what not to do, but he also said WHY you'll fail if you do that.

I was once told by a uni teacher, "I love the world you've created, but why don't you write something in real life?" (You have no idea how much that comment hurt me.)

The NTV teacher, Mr. K, said things like, "Don't write Crime/Mystery. Why? Firstly, you have to be someone in the field to get your facts right. Secondly, ever believed any of the motives you see on TV? No, because it's damn hard to find a REAL reason to kill someone."

He also said to write about real experiences you've had. Or if you go the other way, add a real experience or a love story to the story you're working on.

He explained exactly why things don't work in stories, why even if you're writing about a baseball team you can't have nine protagonists, why a "Three BFF" story always needs to end up with one main.

He did tell us not to write SF and Fantasy (well if you look at the industry, only anime do that sort of thing,) but when I asked him if I could write horror/ghost stories, he told me he was very much looking forward to my project! :)

Our project is due for submission in January but it's only 60 pages long. Think I'll be done long before then. I'm more worried about filling out my Japanese resume correctly. I've never done it before. (They gave us resume sheets in case real producers like the work they see and want to turn it into a real drama. If no one bites, they'll shred our resumes about six months after we've finished the course.)

Okay, I'd better get in there and finish my homework! Need to get my resume done and write up my outline for my final project!

Whee, I'm so excited!!!

PS "Oh Yeah" would make a great opening song for a series! <3

Let me say one thing: I loved The Quiz Show because well Sho-chan was in it and he played a character I really loved to watch. The story was okay, gripping but rather repetitive at times. I loved the style, quiz show inside the drama.

MAOU was just brilliant. It was so well re-done that I could just watch it over and over if only I could afford the DVD box. The acting was fantastic, the story had you clinging to your seat, every twist had you sobbing for the BAD GUY...And I'm not really a big Ohno fan.

Both shows are of a similar genre, cover the same shocking themes (TQS showed someone dying on live TV - now that's just wrong when you put that into context,) have strong lead cast members, were both aired at fairly popular time slots, and have a tragic story that really just makes you wanna kick someone's ass while you're blowing your nose.

However, I was quite surprised to see that more people were apparently watching The Quiz Show.

Maou ratings - TQS ratings

Honestly, Maou was a far better show, so any guesses for why the ratings are so high?

I'll give you a hint. Of all the members of Arashi, Sho was voted the No. 1 member that young kids would want as their papa! (Not to mention that all the kids at school seemed to love my "The Quiz Show!" impersonations!) ;)

I love playing with my voice! I like making silly voices and accents! I'd love to do some voice acting or seiyuu work one day!

Wait...WTF! Sho-chan!? lol



LMAO! <3!

My eyes are bulging after reading this in the Daily Sports Online's entertainment section.

Actor Sho Aikawa (48 - starred in Kisarazu Cat's Eye, Kurosagi, and appeared in the first episode of The Quiz Show) and singer aiko (33 - singles include milk/Nageki no Kiss, Star, and Kabutomushi) were involved in a minor car accident.....whilst driving two different cars. That's right, two of the most famous faces of the modern Japanese entertainment world were somehow at the same intersection, at the exact same time, and somehow made the exact same mistake. For those of you who are thinking "So?", let me put it this way. It would be like Clint Eastwood and Alanis Morissette with two completely different agendas, suddenly getting stuck in the same elevator. You can imagine the shock of the officers on duty in the local police box (apparently three policemen in their 30s) when Aikawa and aiko, both looking quite annoyed, stepped into the police box to announce the accident. (The officers themselves hadn't heard the accident despite it occurring so close to the police box.)

I've always felt that Japanese celebrities really live in a small world (they could pretty much rub shoulders with anyone else in the Japanese geinoukai if they wanted to,) but this is a tad ridiculous.

I hope everything works out well and I'm glad there are no injuries.

Be more careful, celebrity people!

Dear News Zero
(only because you are a major culprit and you are often in my range of vision),

Please stop using expressions such as the following to communicate the hardships of Japanese athletes who choose to train in overseas countries such as America.

Welcome back to Science Friday! Check out this beauty! (Usually, they're this color!)



xD I love sharks!

I've been running tight on cash as of recent. Not only am I supposed to be going out on Sunday with cutetakato, but yeah the whole DVD incident (how the hell two of the SAME DAMN DVD came to my door, I will never figure out. Thanks, cutetakato for offering to take it off my hands.)

N-E-way... School B has a budgie now! It's sooooo cute! Scared shitless of all the kids that come bang on its big tall cage. Why do kids get it in their head to smack their hands against cages, pens, and tanks? Bet the kids at Schools A and C wouldn't do it - they take care of their animals! The School B kids forget they have rabbits until the things are on stage for assembly, tug the legs of their turtles which desperately try to escape, and "pretend-fish" with the poor carp. Anyway, the budgie is pretty flighty and nervous but it will sit there and whistle or listen to me chat to it. Hopefully if I chat to it enough, it'll start coming over to chat with me.

Here's a pic of Budgie! Soooooo cute!



Today in an effort to save money and... I don't know....waste time? I decided to walk home from School B. Now, usually a bus (which goes the back way and stops a lot) takes about 30 minutes to get me home. I've caught a taxi once or twice however and they take the direct route, which is only about 10 or 15 minutes. So, 30 minutes or so to walk? Well I must have screwed up somewhere whilst avoiding the infamous Tokyo line train crossings. Got home like two hours later. Yeah, my feet do hurt. At least I saved 210 yen. lol.

On the way, I found a "Marine Fish" shop, which was selling various saltwater species of fish. They had a baby Japanese topeshark which kept poking her nose out of the water and looking at me through the glass! She was the most adorable thing! As much as I want to take care of her, I know I'd just end up killing her if I took her home. Just don't have the resources. *sigh* One day I will have my own, I swear it! In Chiba!

....Maybe I should start with smaller saltwater fish first and work my way up....


Japanese Topeshark (Hemitriakis japanica)

Finally:

a) Sakurap rocks and should be its own genre! (Especially love Believe, Step & Go and Once Again!) BTW technically, anything before Kotoba Yori Taisetsu Na Mono is NOT Sakurap! You can tell the difference in rapping style anyway.
b) My G no Arashi sim mods are coming along! I've almost got the base uniform down pat. Will need to edit it for each member! Then I'll find suitable hairstyles (tempted to make Nino bald but that would be as mean as giving Sho the Kiiroi Namida look). After that, I'll just map their faces onto suitable heads!

I stuck Sho's face on the face of my Sim version of Squall Leonhart and it worked pretty damn well. Well, except that Sho's nose is a tad too big.

AN-Y-WAY!

I want to make full Arashi skins. I need clear face-on shots of the boys with little or no shadow, little or no tilting of the head, and little or no smiling (no teeth).

I also need to figure out which costume I could put them in. I really want to dress them up in their G no Arashi outfits but I think those would be too hard to make. I think something like their Dream-A-live/Time pink pants and t-shirt/tank top, would be the best.

Any suggestions, help, photos, Sakuraiba moments? Pretty please?

In other news: I bought two new kanji dictionaries - books. One for adults, one simplified. It's to help me remember kanji as I physically look them up. One also has the written stroke order. Good, as it took me two hours just to write three pages of script last night because I couldn't get my kanji right.

LMAO