Had a really quite lovely day today. The weather is beautiful, I colored my hair, my bag finally came (!!!!!!), I got two boxes of clothes unpacked, and my adorable grandparents came over and brought us a few things that were still at their house. Considering how dreadful the past few days have been, that's a rather lovely change.

Now to go poke around on LJ.

I'm tactfully ignoring the Hoshigumi sayonara videos that are on YouTube right now, because I am a smart enough woman to know that watching those right before bed on a night when I have to go to work the following day would not be a wise plan. Especially since I've barely recovered from the cover of Touko's sayonara Graph.

I'm feeling a lot better than I was, thankfully. I'm still fairly tired and have been getting more sleep than usual, but I'm functional during the day and not a zombie. I also get two days off in a row again, which means I might actually get something accomplished as well as resting.

I've been watching Nana, forever and a day after people started reccing it to me, and can I just say that I have never met a more adorably dysfunctional group of characters? I'm on episode 22, and I really think Nana, Hachi and Ren just need to go off and live in a commune with the rest of BLAST and be done with it. Because I'm sorry, you cannot tell me that any of them is going to be happy unless they're basically ALL together.

And now it's time for bed. *yawn*

I slept twelve hours last night and I still kind of feel like crap. The clothes are still in boxes, the dishes aren't done, the closet isn't cleaned, and there is so no way that's getting done tonight. I did manage to get my jewelry organized and put away in some semblance of order, so that's good, but it's pretty minimal accomplishment for the entire weekend.

I really just wish I knew why I was still tired. I mean I know I was sick and all but this is getting ridiculous.

The cover of La Donna, Asuka's photobook, is so gorgeous. Oh Asuka... ;___;

I have no motivation whatsoever today, which is frustrating. I'm just so tired from being sick that I have no energy after working all week, but there's so much crap I wanted to get done, mainly finally unpacking the rest of our clothes and getting the closet organized. We'll see if I feel more up to it in a bit, but as of right now it's all I can do to not go back to bed.

Oh Kai-chan, KAI-CHAN, I AM SO EXCITED!

Seriously thank you Hankyu for restoring a little bit of my faith in you and giving me something to look forward to even if I was hoping for a miracle to occur and Eri-chan to have the musumeyaku lead. She's going to be adorable and I am so excited for her!! And I'm glad that it seems that Tara-chan's lead in ParaPuri was not a total blip and they actually are going to pay attention to her and give her some credit where it's deserved.

I have to admit, for a split second I had the thought "I wonder what they're going to do with the 88ths", and then I remembered that they're upperclassmen now. Eep!

I started this several days ago, so forgive me if some of the answers are disjointed (or out of place since I wrote them the day of New Orleans raku).

( The 100 Question Takarazuka Survey, finally finished! )

The day has come, the first raku for New Orleans, complete with what sounds like an amazing sayonara show. I'm trying to be prepared for the pictures and further reports that'll be coming, though I'm not sure how possible it really is.

Touko, thank you for sharing your talent with all of us for the years that you have and thank you for the intelligence and humility and honesty that you bring to everything you do. I can't imagine Takarazuka without you, but I know you will go on to do amazing things that I am excited to see.

Kazu, thank you for sticking it out and thank you for your smiles and your pink lipgloss and your ugly shirts and your jokes with Haya and just you. I'll miss you, very very much, and I hope that whatever you do with your life will make you happy.

Asuka, don't think I mean it lightly when I say that I want to be you when I grow up. Charm and poise and talent and wit and still such a childlike joy. You reminded people that musumeyaku can be feminine and elegant while still sometimes stealing the show from their partners.

To all the other taidansha, ganbare and thank you for all you've done for Takarazuka and your fans.

I slept for like eleven hours last night, so I feel far more human than I have in days and the threatening twinges of a migraine I was fighting back most of yesterday are gone. We'll see if I actually end up going to work tomorrow or if it snows enough that the entire city goes "OMGWTFBBQ" and I end up staying home.

I should know better than to listen to Edith Piaf because all it does is make me ridiculously nostalgic and slightly morose in a very French kind of way. That combined with the ridiculously gorgeous picture of Touko and Minami Mari that mizukusa posted has me clinging to my Toukocheetah more than I have been in recent weeks. I really should have expected that just when I had thought I was getting a little zen about the whole Touko and Asuka retiring thing the show would actually start and I'd have to go through wave two of flailing. It doesn't help that with moving and everything I haven't had a chance to finish the letters for both of them to go with the presents I have for them, and now I'm not going to be able to get them there before mura raku and there's no more sending packages to Tokyo, so I'm just going to have to send them anyway and hope they get to the right people in the end.

And now I'm going to go faff about for the rest of my day off since the weather is making it such that I can't do the things I had planned on doing and I have memes to do.

So instead, a post about how absolutely ridiculously much I love this woman. She looks like a flower sprite or something and I am so dead. I need an icon of this SO BADLY. ♥ ♥ ♥ ♥

Finally booking flights tomorrow. Woot!

I know it will have been more than two years by the end of the run of Bara ni furu ame, but that doesn't make it okay. Dammit, what the hell is going on here, Hankyu? This whole "mass exodus every two years" thing is getting old.

*clings to stuffed animals*

ETA: Ume-chan, please stick around and go back to Hoshigumi for Chie? Please?

It's amazing how much I end up taking stock of the material possessions I've encumbered myself with when I start contemplating the reality of a 3000 mile move. There is a remarkably strong temptation to just toss the clothes I am particularly fond of, my pictures and my 'Zuka stuff in a suitcase and hop on the plane without looking back. Obviously I won't actually do this, but I'm hoping what actually happens won't be too terribly far off. I'd really like to be able to start semi-fresh without unnecessary clutter and build a life that's really ours, without all the trappings of the lives we've left behind. Not that I don't like my past, that's not what I mean, but part of what I want out of this move is a fresh start without the physical and emotional baggage I have in CA.

This afternoon naval gazing brought to you by not enough sleep, too much caffeine and high fructose corn syrup at lunch, and a half dozen emails from movers with quotes that could give a lesser person palpitations.

Discussing the BeruBara cast tonight before dinner and whinging about Eri-chan's lack of name when kinnosuikazura says "well maybe it's because they're transferring her". >.< Not allowed Hankyu, don't even try it. You were allowed to transfer her to Hoshigumi to be paired up with Kazu, but since that's a non-option now ;___;, she has to stay in Sora. *angsts* But I don't want her to have been shafted either. Does anyone have historical data on people being on the initial cast lists for shows and then consequently being transferred before said show?

Actually got to put my discount to good use today and ordered midoriseppen her new pink nano. It was oddly exciting. XD

Off to refresh the Hankyu page for a bit more before forcing myself to go to sleep so I'm not a total zombie tomorrow.

Dai-chan is Larry. Oh OH my darling you are going to be so freaking adorable and hilarious I can't even handle it. Also yay Mii-chan also having a good role. ♥

BeruBara.... hrmmm. Lots of new characters, a noticeable lack of Eri-chan having a name >.< and the promise of adorable flashbacks. It's BeruBara, I can't be too excited one way or another about it at this point. Also because so many of the character names are unfamiliar making it impossible for me to form too much of an opinion.

And now off to refresh some more, just in case.

Had kind of a weird blah day today. It's been gray outside and none of us are feeling excessively well and my stupid obnoxiously expensive inhaler is making me all jittery. But I have dinner now, thanks to Vicky's ever awesomeness, and my grandma got through her latest round of unpleasant medical tests all right, and I heard back from the recruiter for the transfer I submitted for, so all in all I can't complain.

Also today (for the good and the bad, potentially) there should be news from the great gods of Hankyu. Just don't keep me waiting too late, eh?

Had a weird dream last night and was in kind of a funk as I was walking to the bus this morning. About halfway to the bus stop I cross a small canal and this morning, out of nowhere, a huge white egret swoops up from under the overpass and up into the sky. Egrets are an animal that I absolutely associate with places that are homey to me, especially the beaches near where I grew up in the Bay Area and the Gulf Coast in Florida where my mom grew up and where we used to vacation when I was younger. So yes, it was definitely a good omen and put me in a better mindset for the rest of my first day of the year.

Work was uneventful, and now I'm resting and refreshing the Hankyu page. Again. >.<

I don't normally do resolutions, because they tend to do nothing but make me annoyed with myself id I don't accomplish them.  I will say that for next year I resolve to take care of myself.  That's it.  Sometimes that means saying no, and sometimes that means taking the time to nurture and love the people around me.  The trick is just to know the difference, I suppose.

I think I may go get cake and ice cream now.

I had forgotten that codeine tends to give me very weird dreams. Llast night I had a dream that involved me, Jenn, Vicky, Julie, plushie flowers with faces, homophobia, and me having a hysterical breakdown at My Dear New Orleans shonichi. I woke up about the time I was falling out of my B-seki seat sobbing. It was bizarre to say the least.

Today I went out in search of ice cream for New Year's Eve and came home with a five quart container of Neopolitan that cost me less than $5. It's amazing. I love Grocery Outlet (which used to be called Canned Food Warehouse and was called Garbage Warehouse by my family when I was a kid). It was a successful outing.

I also then did (and put away!) three loads of laundry and did a wee bit of reorganising in the closet. I feel quite accomplished.

*goes back to refreshing the Hankyu page even though there so won't be anything*

ETA: I watched the video for "Dreamer" the other night when I got home from work and... yeah. It's schmaltzy and ridiculous, I admit it. But I cried like a baby watching it. Touko and Asuka are so perfect together. ;____; Also ♥ ♥ ♥ ♥

Went to the doctor today, since I have come down with my annual "cough appropriate only for consumptive heroines in 19th C. drama". An hour wait in urgent care, FOUR prescriptions and $60 in copays later, I am home and medicated. I am also marginally hating the government because apparently the generic Albuterol inhaler (that has CFCs) is no longer available but the HFA propelled version is still under trademark so it was freaking $35 instead of $5. Doing a little bit of research it also seems that the HFA version is ineffective for some patients, so I really facepalm epically at this move. What should have been done is they should have waited to make sure that either an HFA version that is effective for everyone or a powder version is available because with a medication this common, I have to imagine that there are people out there who are going to have problems either because the HFA version doesn't work for them or because their income doesn't allow them to pay the ridiculous cost of a name brand prescription. I have very good prescription coverage and my insurance company considers it a "Tier 3" medication so it is literally the highest prescription copay possible.

In any event, the medication seems to be working so far. Luckily.

However, I have mint nougat chews that remind me of the Trader Joe's French Mint Chews that they stopped making that I used to absolutely LOVE, so life is quite good. ♥

I forgot to mention, I got a gorgeous gift from quinquin and a lovely card from arlecchinic. Thank you both!! ♥ ♥

It's the 29th in Japan. Which means Dai-chan's Cafe Break is on today. *quietly curses the fates that prevent her from watching it OMG NOW*

Let it never be said that I am anything other than impatient. >.