Go cry in a corner, emo kid

I feel like one of those emo kids right now (Aurie: "Go cry in a corner, emo kid!" haha), but this evening was somewhat good. And not so good. I feel kind of gross right now, since despite my daily workout of biking about 12 miles (total to school and back) and the obvious loss of weight determined by my tightened belt holes and loose jeans, this evening I ate a huge amount of junk. So gross, but I couldn't really help it. After Marina and I got out of class (she's in my Practical Asian Society and Culture class), and I raced the bus home (AND WON), we went down toward Jiyuugaoka station, where all of the stores, etc. are.


It's been kind of difficult being friends with Marina, since everyone else has started hating her. She's kind of overbearing and...very Russian. I'm not just saying that. She's got one of those one-upping complexes: she's always trying to one-up whatever you say to her, even if it doesn't call for it. It gets really, really annoying after a while. Despite that, I enjoy hanging out with her, as long as I limit the amount of time I spend with her...and as long as I firmly tell her that I just don't feel like talking about bad things right now. It works, it really does. I told Emily how it's hard for me with everyone I like hating her when she hasn't done anything to bother me yet, and so it feels really awkward for me. But I'm glad that I told her, because she respects the fact that I can deal with Marina, and so I'm not expected to join in on the venting and crap.


That aside, this evening I enjoyed myself. We first went to Mos Burger for dinner. I didn't really want to, but Marina had been craving it, and I didn't have any better ideas, so we went. It tasted really good, since they cook real food, hahaha. Disgustingly unhealthy, though. Afterward, we went in search of a wallet for me (unsuccessfully), and then went into Book Off. Have I ever mentioned how difficult it is to go into a book store here and actually find what you're looking for? I wanted to find a Kagrra, cd, since all the cds in Book Off are super cheap. However, I don't know how they categorize things there, and when I didn't immediately find it under the カ (ka) section, I got discouraged and went back to where Marina was looking at video games. We wandered upstairs so she could get a Russian-Japanese dictionary, and found a Japanese translation of The Little Mermaid in tiny book form. I almost bought it, but then put it back when I found a treasure: a huge volume (combined volumes, I think) of the manga Hana zakari no kimitachi e ("For You in Full Blossoms" is what the English translation is, apparently) for only 400 yen. In the States, they call it "Hana Kimi." Anyway, I flipped through several of the volumes until I found the place where I am in the series, and so now I have it. It's my goal to read the entire thing. So far I've read (and understood)...the first page, without looking anything up, haha. I stuck a post-it note inside so I can continue reading sometime with a dictionary beside me.


After Book Off, we went off in search of other things, and eventually stopped at a bakery/cafe ("Danmark Cafe," haha) and got some yummy pastries before going to Daimaru Peacock (the grocery store). At first I wasn't going to get anything, but then I spotted oranges for 88 yen each, and I couldn't resist buying two. Then Marina helped me find soy sauce (YES!! finally!) and we headed back to the apartment.


Tomorrow I'm going to Yokohama. I'll take millions of pictures. I really hope it's fun. It should be.


So, back to my emo self (heh). I was Facebooking...yesterday, I think?...and I saw pictures my friends had posted of them in their dorm room, and I got really homesick. I can't even begin to describe how much I miss my Marlboro friends right now. Every time my friends here talk about how their friends or parents are going to come and visit sometime before the end of the semester, I get really jealous. For instance, some of Brittany's friends might be coming in March, to see Gazette, and Peter's girlfriend is coming in March, and someone's (I don't remember who) parents are going to come and visit.


In drawing class, I said we're doing the live models, right? Well, on Wednesday, we had the guy model come in, and he wasn't nearly as dynamic as the girl model from Monday. He did too many standing poses, and didn't move his body around as much. Probably the biggest factor was that he was super skinny, so it was just boring when he was standing. Also, when I draw guys from my head, they're usually half manga style, half realistic, if that makes any sense...but usually really guys don't look the way I draw, so trying to draw a real guy who happened to have the exact body type as most of my fake drawings really threw me off, and made it extremely difficult to draw in a realistic style. I don't think I'm making any sense, sorry. It's really hard to explain. These are the ones I like better of the bunch. I especially like the sitting one. Sitting poses seem to be more interesting.


I like the one where he's leaning back and twisting a little.

The one on the left is my favorite, since in that pose you could see his back muscles and spine, and since he was bending over and twisting to one side, they made weird shapes beneath his shirt.


Okay, so I just found out some very interesting information. Emily just told me that apparently really close to school is where most of the Johnny's boys do their recording (we were talking about NewS, and I guess they are one of the bands that do their recording in the building nearby). It's the building with the big NewS poster on it that we pass if we're walking to Azabu-juban station. I honestly can't remember the poster, except a faint memory of seeing it, but I can't believe we're so close to their recording studio! Azabu-juban is maybe...a ten minute walk from campus? Less, if you walk quickly, like me.