So, I realized that I haven't posted about my recent transportation situation. I used to drive a 94 Chevy Blazer, but that has finally been put out of commission about two weeks ago, since it's transmission decided to totall give up on life. Since then, I've been driving or being driven by my parents' diesel trucks. This past week, I've been cruising in my mom's Ford 350. So today, after class, a friend and I decide to go around some dealerships for a new car. My dad laid out some "guidelines".
-Must be of GM make (Buick, Pontiac, Chevy, GMC)
-Must be new, because he has a 4k credit towards new 09 and 10 vehicles
-If it is a car, it must have front wheel drive. (No cars; too small to haul anything in them, let alone me.)
Of course, anything luxurious or fancy will be out of the question, which I don't really want anyway.
So today, my friend and I are driving down in the Ford 350. On the way, a small Ford Probe stops very suddenly to make a left turn. I stop very quickly, and I hear wheels screeching, and think, "Those can't be my tires, can th-"
WHAM!
We get rear-ended hard. We both pull over into the next street on the right, and we both get out. The other dude's ride is FUCKED. It was a GMC Yukon Denali XL, very fancy. His entire front end was smashed in, and leaking coolant. Because the 350's bumper is so high, when he braked his front end dipped quite a bit, and he got his front right under my bumper, thus WRECKING his ride. The status of my diesel? Bumper is slightly crooked. Oh, and some rust got knocked off. Just a little.
I felt so bad for the dude. We were both very friendly to each other, had no problems. He recognized that it was his fault, and we got along just fine. He was going to pickup a four-wheeler from a shop, which he was going to take down to southern Illinois and go hunting with his son. Not anymore. Plus, it turns out he was gonna get screwed for the repair job on his four-wheeler. AND, his car had JUST got out of the shop two weeks ago for a job on his radiator or something. He was having a really bad day. Then the cop took forever to get there, and took even longer to sort things out. Plus, he was an Elgin cop, who have a reputation for being sour. The guy who just had his fancy ride smashed was in a better mood; he even tried to make a joke or two the officer.
So after about an hour of waiting, the other guy gets a ticket (what a terrible day) give us both paperwork to fill out, and we go on our way, the other guy in the passenger seat of a tow truck.
We hit up two dealerships, a Chevy, and a Pontiac/Buick/GMC. At the latter, we see quite a few Denali's, and I thought, "You know, when they're not getting wrecked by a 350, they actually seem like nice cars." So I find a 07 6.2L (BIG freakin engine) Denali XL, and take it out for a spin. This car that just got wrecked had just about everything inside of it, and cost about 60-70K.
*jawdrop*
I don't plan on getting it for another forty years or so, but I really wished that the other dude could have picked a worse car to rear-end a monster.
Oh, and we're all fine by the way. >>
-Ryu
"Vodkaaaaaaaaaaaaa!!!"
-Russia
Hey all.
I won't touch much on Youmacon, since there are already a few posts about that, as well as videos and pics to come, which are far more interesting than this.
Thursday-
-Drive was pretty and uneventful, until the last fifteen minutes, where we couldn't find our hotel and got lost for an hour.
-Ended up staying in Hyatt cause Hotwire is a douche.
-Ate dinner with Kat, Kastom, and Nehs, and went on late night Meijer excursion for no particluar reason.
Friday-
-Dressed up in cosplay, packed, got badges, and moved out to Red Roof Inn.
-Picked up Nehs, headed back to con, walked around a little bit and checked things out, spent the rest of the day hanging out at the Inn.
Saturday-
-Got up, got into cosplay, had a free breakfest at the diner that was in an alliance with the Inn, headed to the con.
-Went to 'Original, Obscure, and Rare Cosplay' photoshoot, which was rather lame.
-Popped in and out of MSTK4 for the next 2 hours. I didn't really like it, the riffers were really annoying because they laughed a lot, made a lot of noise, drowned out the movie completely, and made too many riffs, which resulted in often talking all at once.
-Meandered around some more, went to the Little Kuriboh and Team Four Star panels, which were hilarious.
-Made the mistake of going to the Whose Line is it Anime? briefly. I stayed for about twenty minutes before leaving in search of food.
-Ate dinner with everybody, including latest addition, Hiko, at the food court, as well as being joined by Random Bruno. Random Bruno is Random. We didn't know him, and he was definitely addled in the head a bit, he just decided to eat with us. He approached us as such:
"I'm gonna eat with you guys."
"..."
"...you gonna move this Fender off the seat or what?"
I decided to not be a dick and moved it for him, and he talked to us for about ten minutes before we decided to go leave to meet the Captain at Nehs's house.
-Met the Captain, as well as the rest of Nehs's family. It was enjoyable enough; I talked a lot to the Madre in hopes of alleviating her suscpicion and prejudice against internet folk. It seemed to work.
-While the others retired at the hotel, I went back to the con for the rave. I have never seriously danced that much for that long, and I had a blast. Unfortunately, I got really into it, and took off both my undershirt and sweater, which I put a lot of time into making. I threw them into the corner, and when the rave was over, they weren't there. So I wandered around the Hyatt a bit shirtless (thank god I had some really sexy pants) looking for my clothes. I was going to go to the Mario Party After Dark initially, but it was so delayed (rave ended at 3:15 AM, MPAD was supposed to start at 2.) I decided not to go. I ran into Keiser of Team Four Star, who I had conversed with previously at the panel. He saw me first, and waved me over, asking what I was up to.
"Have you seen my clothes? Someone took my shirt."
"No, but don't worry, you look fabulous without it." [/gay accent]
Sunday-
-Went and bought all I wanted to buy at the very small Dealers room.
-Said good byes to Kastom and Schultzie, and drove home wonderfully uneventful with Kat.
-Popped in for MST chat halfway through.
Monday-
My saxophone teacher left me a message on my cell phone saying he will no longer be teaching lessons. This was a bad and a good thing. He was a really excellent sax player and teacher, and I owe a lot to him, but I fealt for a long time like I was letting him down. I wouldn't always come ready to the lessons, and it eventually felt like I was wasting his time. Still, I'm glad for all the wisdom he was able to impart to me, and I'll definitely start working harder once I start playing more.
Today-
Pretty good day. I went to an interview with Target, and left with the promise that I have a job as long as I pass the drug screen, which I went and did straight away. However, it will only be seasonal, but I'll still be getting a good income, and there is always the chance that they'll want to keep me. Also, in Anime Club today, my costume for last weeks costume party won the prize for Most Creative. If I had voted for myself, it would have won Best Overall as well. Anyway, I got a $25 dollar Borders card as an award, and spent that right away on the two mangas that sold out quickly at Youmacon: Gurren Lagann vol. 2, and Nabari no Ou vol. 2. And then I came home and saw that L4D2 Demo is ready to go. :D
So hopefully, things will start looking up for me as I actually start to make money soon.
This is the only item from the weekend that I am required to share. It's the official Youmacon Otaku Meetup photo.
"That Melvin is wiggety-whack, ya'll."
"You're not black anymore, Tristan."
"Sheeeit..."
EDIT: Rather ingenious update at http://www.lordgenomeshead.com.
I watched the first episode of GintS SAC just now, since I figured I ought to have a masterpiece series like that under my belt. I plan to watch the rest.
-Ryu
"No man is an island, entire of itself; every man is a piece of the continent, a part of the main. If a clod be washed away by the sea, Europe is the less, as well as if a promontory were, as well as if a manor of thy friend's or of thine own were. Any man's death diminishes me, because I am involved in mankind; and therefore never send to know for whom the bell tolls; it tolls for thee..."
I've always heard the last line, but never really read the poem until now, and I kinda like it.
Hey all.
So, Youmacon is tomorrow, as is very well known among most of the readers here. Departure time for Kat and I is about noon, so we ought to get to Dearborn sometime around 5:00-6:00; earlier if I drive fast. I really like traveling, and I had better, cause I do it a lot. I went grocery shopping yesterday and picked up some Mountain Dew, Poptarts, candy, and batteries, although I need to pick up another kind of batteries as well. And once we get there, I'll get bacon. Cause everything is better with bacon.
I have sucessfully finished the costume to my satisfaction and added the final touches yesterday. There was also a costume party at anime club yesterday, so I used that as a test run. The other members thought it was cool, so so far, so good. There was a slight detail that was impeding my guitar playing, but I fixed that. The only variable for the outfit is, as always, the hair. I'll figure that equation out the morning of Friday. I'm really excited; I put a lot of time and work into this thing, and really hope it works well. My aunt helped out a tremendous amount as well, so I don't want it to be a waste of her time either.
There's a few really cool things at Youmacon in particular that I'm interested in:
-Any good gaming tournaments they have going
-Little Kuriboh. Gotta meet him at some point.
-Masquerade, Dance, and Mario Party After Dark. I didn't go to the first two at Acen, so I'm just curious, and Mario Party After Dark seems like fun in a weird, perverted, possibly STD way. o_0
-Find a Cloud and start playing One Winged Angel. For the lulz.
I'm really looking forward to seeing both new and old faces there. This is gonna be great.
I also got four people from anime club to give me registration stuff so I can pay and sign them up for Acen at Youmacon. Hurray for being a good Treasurer!
Speaking of Anime Club, that costume how-to that the VP put on was just as lame as I thought it would be, but luckily, nobody really paid attention. I did my lameass ninja and John Lennon costume modeling as animated as I could, to the amusment of others. I jumped and snuck around like a ninja, and did somersaults and rolls, and mock-snapped the projectionist's neck. I rolled away, and didn't notice that I rolled under a table, but I found out pretty quickly after I jumped up very fast. Luckily, I duplicated similar head-bashing stunts throughout my childhood, so my head is hard, at the sacrifice of being a few brain cells behind. I didn't notice Waffuru in the 'audience', so she came up to me after it was all over. She was having a good time texting my antics to Kat.
I told my aunt about the crapiness of the VP's idea of a costume, and she just couldn't get over it. She told me so. She came back to help with the costume two days later, and simply said, "I can't get over that vice-president's ninja costume idea..."
"Yeah, she's not really good at any costume she makes."
"....it's a GIRL?!? o_O"
I made a card a while back, but for some unexplained reason, it didn't get published.
I suppose an Adam-fanatic would find it offensive.
It's 10:38, I don't wanna go to sleep, and I don't want to wake up until 10:00. Time for some DotA.
YOUMACON!!!
-Ryu
I JUST FOUND $45 IN THE LAUNDRY!! HELL YEAH! TWENTY FIVE MORE BUCKS FOR YOUMACON!
The other twenty goes to me, cause I've been goin hungry for the past three weeks. Like, Poptarts in the morning with coffee/water, and dinner. I want food.
-Ryu
