Chasing After Rainbows

(continued from Part 12 ) Just as I was about to leave, Shin'ichi wanted to tag along with me. Well, since he's about to enter middle school next year and the most mature among my siblings, I don't see why not. Along the way, we walked past an ad for enrollment into a university and academy specializing in certain fields: the school our cousin went to was one of them. The sight of those ads made him think about which middle school he should go to. Me: "If you're thinking about entering the academy Aiko went into, you should keep in mind that many people are applying for it and admission is based on the grades you scored for the entrance tests and the amount of places avalable. So in order to guarantee being able to get in, you need to score around full marks." Shin'ichi: "Kotomi----oneechan, why is it that you did not enter that school and chose a normal high school instead when you obviously can score high?" This brother seem to alwa

I don't know what to write. My head gets fried when I try to think. Maybe it's the overload of unnecessary stuff I had learn since childhood, like why a particular day less than a week after my birthday some years earlier that important to a particular country somewhere is over-emphasized to the point I don't want to hear it. Or maybe it's the overload of the number of languages I was exposed to: at least 10. Español, Français, Deutsch, 中文/汉语, Bahasa Indonesia..... must I list them all? Many people around the world seem to be exposed to only one or at least two, but unlike those fast learners you see on TV, learning them is at a cost of learning other things like the molecular structure, the contour lines on a map to determine the height and steepness. Anyways, I'm exposed long enough to know what is being communicated but not the other way around or what is being said in written form. This could partly because it could be related or structured similar to what I alr

(continued from Part 11 ) It has been quite some time since my birthday. The weather has started to get colder, and the trees are shedding their leaves with some already bare. I find myself to be with Itsuki and at his house more than I do with my other friends when I'm not working. I don't know why I am seeing him more frequently lately. Is it because of his house? That's not it: his house seems average but less maintained compared to mine. Not to mention the mess and dirt I saw when I first went there. The food? Wait, it was me who bought, prepare, and cook them at his house... Something he did at school? Unlike me, he seems to be the very opposite: hardly anyone knows him, scores quite low for exams, not in leadership role of the things he joined... Why did I choose him over guys all the girls are crazy over, or one of the guys who showed interest in me? The answer to that: I don't know myself. I woke up to a cold Sunday morning. It took me a while from the tim

Video requires a browser that supports HTML 5: Besides that, I have yet to play around with it to tell what it's like, but it's performs beyond expectations. Maybe because I added more stuff then when I was using the beta and release candidate versions. The only problem is that it uses about 470k+ of memory unlike the previous version at 350k+, at least, with the plug-ins I have installed. Such a memory eater... Since I have 2.5GB of RAM and is not fully utilized, it actually runs smoothly and a lot faster than the earlier version. I use Firefox as my primary browser, but I do use Chrome on slow PCs, Safari if I don't like the way Windows renders text and as a standards-compliant reference since Safari 4 passes the Acid3 test at 100. For backward compatibility (or just want to know how horrible the page is rendered), I would use Internet Explorer 6-8 too. I do use Opera on mobile devices, as a USB-installed browser, or as a non-Firefox browser in Linux. In case you were won

(from Facebook ) On the Sad morning of June 25, 2009 Michael Jackson was discovered collapsed at his rental home in Los Angeles. 911 emergency services responded promptly at 12:21 pm Pacific time arriving at 12:30 pm to find Michael unconscious and not breathing. He was rushed to the UCLA Medical Center and after a brief slip into a coma Michael was pronounced dead at 2:26pm; the cause reported as cardiac arrest. THE Los Angeles Police Department has opened an investigation and an autopsy is scheduled for Friday, June 26, 2009. (from YouTube ) Michael lived a very colourful life and during a short 50 years he made an indelible mark on the planet Earth. Whether or not you are a fan there is nobody who can deny his impact and the memory of him which will persist in all of us indefinitely. Spread the word of Michael Jackson's legacy and make sure everyone will always remember. NEW YORK, NY June 25, 2009 Michael Jackson, one of the most widely beloved entertainers and profoundly influe

Links: Winter 2009 review Spring 2009 list Huh? Anime like "Library War", "Kure-nai", "Strike Witches" was Spring/Summer 2008 anime? Already? It seem that these were out not too long ago. Oh, and "Welcome to the NHK" (Summer 2006) too? Time sure flies... Anyways, here's a write-up of what I had seen through for the Spring 2009 anime. If it's a 11-13 episode series, it would be the entire thing, but if it's scheduled to have more, I would cover what I have already seen. Since I have dropped all the Winter 2009 anime, including "Sora Kake Girl", I won't be reviewing any of those. Eden of the East (東のエデン): Though the character design does not have the features from a typical anime, the great storyline and the details of places (like Whashinton DC) and objects makes up for it. The shocker about it was that the series ended as a cliffhanger with 2 movies scheduled in end-2009 and early-2010. Reminds me of: Code Geass as tha

We stayed in the school until quite late at night to help around with some last minute preparations. I saw Saeko looking at me from the outside before disappearing into the crowd. I haven't seen Kenjiro since I was in my former class earlier. I saw most of his classmates walking out of the school gate around sunset along with most of the other students, so I guess he must have headed back home too. There's now only Kotomi's class and a few others that are still around, so the school is mostly deserted with the outside being dark now. Since Kotomi is not involved with the act herself and is somewhat emotionally unstable (after what happened earlier), she did not hang around too. I noticed that most of those who stayed behind are third year students. I guess this could be the last time they would enjoy the festival as students and with many people they know as carefree people. That feeling seems to be missing in college and in the adult world, there are a lot of people you

I feel that something is missing in my life. Like the missing pieces of a jigsaw puzzle. I don't know what it is, but it feels that I somehow need that something badly. Where, when, and how I would find it, I don't know. Might appear when I least expect it. May look the same as everything else, but that particular one could be what I'm looking for. Who knows how it would turn out. Hope I would find it...

( originally posted on the updates blog a while ago ) I have replaced the Japanese version of my main blog with this new layout. Readers who had been to my layout-testing blog recently (before it got marked as a spam blog) or had been to my main blog (in English) around Mid-2008 or earlier with "Hatena :: Diary" at the top left. ( Hatena is where the layout came from and had to modify to be usable as Blogger Classic code.) This was because the old one started to looked awful and it's kind of ironic that both the English and Japanese started off with the same layout theme at the time I first implemented it (forgot when that was though) and that the former blog started to drift apart. The same layout code was also gradually applied to all my other blogs, but with modifications to make them look different. With this change, I have also changed the side navigation menu to the new style since the old one didn't really match well and can't even see the first post with

Well, the old title of my stories has been bothering me for a while. At the time of creating them, I don't really know how to name them. I spend too much of my time thinking of titles that I just put whatever was on my mind in there or was originally planning to write at first from scratch. However, it's these titles that don't seem to match much as the story progresses. Add that to the fact that most of the titles I could think of are used or are not good. Naming characters is not as hard as the title. I never gave the exact name or location of places or the unique features because I don't have a clear idea of what the place looks like except the area where the main character frequents at. 1st story: You know the protagonist was never given a name, right? Well that was because he is already in Haruna Kobayashi's body, his childhood friend, after he had (supposed to have) died. I see no point giving him any as people are going to call him by the body he is in anywa

Kotomi dragged me to an empty computer room, locked up all the doors, and closed the curtains. She also turned on the lights, air-conditioning, and one of the computers. What was the point of closing the windows and switching on the lights? Something seems suspicious... Kotomi: "A classmate of mine has fallen ill recently, but the problem is that she the main actress of an act my class has done. I know it's strange for me to ask you for this, but only you can fill in her spot in such short notice. Saeko is now in my classroom trying to rehearse, and to give them the impression that you, Mamiko, have actually practised." I was going to ask why I was playing a female role, but I just remembered that I am now a girl myself now. Me: "But you know I'm bad with memorising lines, let alone on such short notice. How do you expect me to pull this one off?" Kotomi suddenly plugged a wire on me through the bottom of my skirt with the other end already plugged

It's hard to come up with something to write, but it's even harder to have it scheduled in the future and still remain relevant. That would explain why the numberings of some posts are skipped, as they were scheduled from some variable time in the past, but my stories and some posts aren't numbered. Wanted to write something back on Wednesday (10 June), but I mysteriously fell ill and can't get out of bed with pain and headache all over. Strangely enough, I can't seem to fall asleep too.

I was watching K-On! episode 6, when I thought I saw something odd: There was a extra large feet in the air at the center! Didn't really see this earlier as it was too fast. I was like, (O_O) when I saw that.

(Continued from Part 10 ) On a particular day not too long after I noticed people behaving strangely towards me, the principal had called me to his office at the end of school. Well, I don't have anything on today, so I don't mind being held back, but for what reason? Since the announcement was through the PA, everyone knew about this. The only times I heard of a student being calling to the principal's office was if they had done something seriously wrong or something bad that had happened involving them, or, in rare cases, the student having outstanding performance and/or representing the school and want to reward them with something big, but what did I do? I was clueless and worried at the same time. The principal's office is located just next to the teachers' staff room. I myself had never been there before, so I don't know what it's like. I knocked on the door. "Come in," said an unfamiliar male voice. I entered the room. The off

(continued from Part 9 ) It has been quite some time ago since my first face-to-face meeting with Itsuki Hisakawa, not sure if it's just me, but I feel that I am now even more closer to him since we are somehow already calling each other by our given names. Because I found out that my IQ level is surprisingly high (which explains why everyone else seems like idiots), there was also the pressure for me to join the student council. I forgot that there was such thing as their presence seemed somewhat hidden and are not distinguished from students who are not in it except for major school events. On the last day before the summer holidays, Itsuki would want to bring me to his house for the first time. He said that his parents are working quite far away, so they have not been back for many months now. Well, that's good, since having peace and quiet is quite hard to come by at my house: my younger siblings and mom keep bugging me even though I had the door of my room locked. Th

( Originally posted on the updates blog yesterday ) Well, my navigation menu you see on the top of the right widget bar is starting to get messier and uglier that I have decided to do a brand new one from scratch. Actually, it got ugly and bulkier from the last update . Not only in appearance, but also the code involved. They are originally supposed to all look the same, with only the title and type of blog changed. (extracted from an earlier post ) The navigation menu featured here is what it looked like when I first made it. Clean and simple. That empty space there was intentional, but I added random quotes or "Haruka Takahashi's Network". For ones that had the former, it was latter replaced with my latest post from Twitter . Also, hovering over a link there would have a background, but as I found out later on, this also affected other links on the blog. That problem wasn't really fixed until just last month. (From Updates and Anime blog (English version) blogs.)

I don’t really know what is going on, but I had a strange dream: There was a white light that made me felt as though my centre of gravity has been moved from my bottom to my chest. I could feel changes that are taking place all over my body. It felt like it was actually taking place, but it's just a dream, right? I once had a dream of falling of a building or cliff that felt real and woke up from the horrors of it, but it turns out that I didn't even fall off the bed! How on earth can my dreams feel so real?! I have been having too much of it lately. Since I have to get ready for school when the sun rises, I don’t think much about it. ……… The morning sunlight entered my eyes. I was still feeling sleepy when I woke up, but I had noticed that the room that I am in now seems to be somewhat different from what I remember it to be: It is unusually neat with new furniture with concrete walls painted in warm colours. Most of the things I see in this room are mine and are neatly ar