My French Hospital Experience

I feel like I've been keeping extremely busy lately. I've just gotten back to the US after spending two weeks in France. My France trip was great although I did get to see a portion of France that one generally does their best to avoid while vacationing, the hospitals. I think the reason I ended up in the hospital are best summed up by the words of Brad Pitt and Edward Norton. "I fell down some stairs." In the end, I blame the Doc Marten's that I was walking down the stairs to retrieve. I hurt one of my toes and thought it may have been broken. Knowing that a hospital can't really do anything for a hurt toe, I simply asked my host family for some ice and maybe something to tape it up. They however insisted that we go to the hospital. After telling them it was really not necessary, I finally gave in a went to grab my wallet and coat. Sadly, I forgot my camera. French hospitals are quite different from hospitals in America.

According to my host mother, this hospital was a quite old and a new one was being built to replace it, even so, it was still rather surprising to me being used to the hospitals in America that are so shiny and clean that you could probably eat off the floor. The first thing that caught my attention was the lack of any sort of parking lot. We parked around the block and walked to a closed gate where we had to page the nurse. The gate was already opened a bit so we came in and the nurse met us at the door. I'm not sure if this is typical of the daytime shifts as well or just the night shift. She escorted us to a room where she asked me for my information. Rather than attempting to explain my life story in French I just handed her my driver's license. She filled out her bit of paperwork and then said the doctor would be in momentarily. Being used to the American system I expected to see the doctor at some point in the next hour...not the next two minutes. I was pleasantly shocked when the doctor really did show up in just a moment.

Unlike the nurse, the doctor wasn't the friendliest of people... I suppose this is typical of American doctors as well. He decided I needed to have x rays. The nurse then escorted me to the room with the x ray machine where there were some chairs to wait in. I started to sit down and before I landed in the chair the x ray technician had already come out to get me. The strangest part about this whole trip was not that that I was not told to use a wheelchair, they let me walk to have my x rays taken, but that the x ray room had thin walls. Here, I believe they need a certain ridiculous amount of steel in the walls, floors, and ceilings of the rooms where the machines are. I was also not given one of those lead aprons to wear. No complaints there ...I don't want kids anyway ...But it was still an odd moment for me when he just turned around to snap the photos. He didn't even have to leave the vicinity of the x ray like they do here. A few moments later he handed me the x rays and sent me back to my room and within seconds the doctor came back too.

The doctor took a few glances at the x ray and told me that my "finger" was not broken in English which was cute considering it was my toe we were there for. He left and sent the nurse in to wrap it up and then sent us on our way without any sort of charge. I must say that I agree with the French medical system. It would be nice if we jumped on that bandwagon pretty quick. From what I understand, government run health care is not as nice in places like England and Canada but if our system would take a few tips from the French I think it would be a huge step up from our current health care predicament. It was nice to walk into a hospital for the first time ever and not have to think about how I (or my parents) will be able to pay for this when its all done and over. Once again, I look forward to the day America can do the same for its people.

Otakon 2009: The Recap

Now that Otakon has come and gone once again, it is time for my typical recap. You can all rejoice.

Day 1

The first day of the con started as the first days usually do. We got up super early and made our way over to the convention center. This year was slightly nerve racking as no one bothered to give us our special passes we needed. Regardless, everything worked out well enough and we got to our spot and began to set up. This year was particularly neat because Eric's spot had a camera looking down on the piece which was a really nice touch. It was definitely a bit of a face palm moment when we found out that they were just doing a live feed instead of actually taking video because of "a miscommunication." Once again though, it was a nice touch.

Perhaps I'm a bad assistant but in the first hours of the con my mind wasn't even remotely focused on the chalk art, but the Brand clothing in the dealer's room. The very moment we had Eric set up, I was off to scout out what treasures there were to be had. I first managed to get a hold of BTSSB's Princess Drop Embroidery Pocket JSK in pink. This is both extremely exciting and disappointing. This is my dream dress in black. I settled for pink because my choices were between that and blue T_T. I also managed to get the Sweet Melody Pochette in pink from Angelic Pretty to match it. ^ ^ Its pretty amazing. ^ ^



Once I had finished my escapades in the dealer's room, I went back to check on Eric and check out the Artist Alley. I wandered around Artist Alley for some time, which was mildly disappointing save for one or two booths who weren't selling the typical drawings of popular characters in cookie cutter poses. I was upset to be unable to locate Morrigan NYC as I wanted to get a look and perhaps purchase one of their raven skirts they just released but Lolitas and Cream's adorable sweets jewelry made up for thier absence. I must say that their sweets jewelry has gotten much cuter since last year. I bought a ring and a necklace this year, which I love. By the time I was done running all over Eric had accomplished quite a bit of work on his piece.

Day 1 was a little uneventful after my hours in the dealer's room. Partly because Travy was sleepy and cranky and because there wasn't a whole lot going on that was relevant to my interests. We made attempts to go play MTG at a store somewhere in Baltimore but that was thwarted by Travy's sleepiness and our single standard deck between the three of us. We ended up heading to Little Italy instead. We found a cute little cafe/restaurant and decided to eat. I had the best cannoli in the world there and then we returned to the Inner Harbor. We wandered around a small mall for a bit then headed back. Like I said, Day 1 was a bit boring.

Day 2

Day 2 started out with us waking up way too late. I wanted to go to the Ultimate Lolita Fashion Show but didn't make it. I got up and got dressed up in my frills and we headed out for the Lolita Swap Meet. We got there pretty early so we ended up waiting for quite a while. In the meantime Travy and I played DS and occasionally stopped to look cute together.

The Swap meet was extremely succesful for me. I managed to get rid of everything I took to trade except for an Anna House cutsew. I ended up with two new brand blouses (AP and BTSSB) and an AP cutsew. It was quite exciting. Poor Travy had to sit through it all but inside I know he was enjoying the ridiculous amount of lace and frills ;p.

Time for Coordinate info!
Socks and Parasol : BTSSB
Skirt : ITS
Blouse : Rakuen
Shoes: Montreal
Jewelry: Meta

After the swap meet, Travy and I went to the Cheesecake factory. I got some wierd potato and salmon thing that I was not too fond of but did not get any cheesecake T_T. The place was kind of nice and on the plus side we got to see an epic battle between a small bird and like 8 pigeons over a piece of pizza crust. I got some video of it so enjoy.

Video to come soon...

After eating, we made a mad dash to get into the Kanon Wakeshima concert line. Which bordered on the line of ridiculous by the way. When we were there waiting for the swap meet two hours earlier there were maybe ten people in line. When we came back this time, there was nearly enough to fill the entire theatre hall. We still managed to get decent seats somehow though. The concert was really good and I am jealous of the dress she was wearing. The end however was a bit hectic. Some poor planning on the side of the people running the concert caused a mad rush at the end of the show to get in line for her merchandise and autographs. Many people were sent out and left unhappy. I myself just left and am glad I didn't waste my time as there was another much less crazy signing the following day in the dealer's room. I took off to the dealer's room once again and picked up her cd for the signing.

Day 3

The final day was a bit crazy too. We all had to get up early and be out of our hotel before we went to the convention. We got out early and took all our stuff to the car and headed in for the last day.

The first thing on the agenda was to get to the dealer's room for Kanon Wakeshima's signing. We got in line outside the dealer's room at nine and waited. I was amazed at some of the bad cosplay I saw. Most notable were the Mana cosplay and a Cami cosplay from Street Fighter. The Mana cosplayer was particularly bothersome because I had to listen to her go on and on about how much of a J-Rock know it all she was. Simply wearing EGL (made of shitty materials no less) with poorly applied black makeup does not make you Mana even if you do have a Moi Dix Mois pendant. My beef with the Cami cosplayer was her disappearing thong and that people need to understand that just because they aren't fat doesn't mean they look good in skimpy clothes. This chick really needed a pair of pants to cover her flabby ass badly.

The signing itself was quick and painless. We were pretty close to the front of the line. Kanon didn't seem too pleased to be there so she made no attempt to be friendly. She took your object signed it and handed it back barely even glancing up to say hi. I have to wonder if she's just not a morning person or if Mana's inability to deal with people has worn off on her.

We made one last run around the dealer's room, I found some cute stationery and Travy got me a Charmmy Kitty Plushie, which brings me to something I've been harping on lately. Its somewhat creepy when you stop to think about how Charmmy Kitty is Hello Kitty's pet cat. Its worse than the whole Goofy/Pluto thing Disney has going I feel. While it is strange that Goofy gets to be humanized while Pluto is a pet, Pluto isn't Goofy's pet which is what makes this so off.

Afterwards, we decided to run around Baltimore one last time mainly to get some food in our stomachs. We ended up at McDonald's where we had our most interesting homeless/beggar experience. Not only did she attempt to push Jesus on to me but in the same breath also asked me to pay for her prescription. Then preceded to argue with the cashier about how she was in line (Which she wasn't) and should be served next. The amount of offended black chick attitude in one room was almost enough to scare me as the three women behind the counter got angry and louder while arguing with the lady who failed to understand that one must actually be in line before they can be the next in line. The rest of our trek was pretty uneventful save for being screamed at by a homeless dude in a wheelchair and being able to express our inner /b/tards.

We returned one last time to the con to help Eric tear down and whatnot. For those of you who have yet to see the finished piece...here you go ^ ^

They helped us hang it up very last minute and unfortunately it was after the con was over. It was still pretty awesome though. We did our typical teardown when we hairsprayed the living daylights out of the piece and sectioned the piece up. It now resides in its tube where it is likely to remain until the end of time.

Overall, it was a pretty decent convention. I think to be honest I enjoyed the smaller NYAF more to it though. I'm looking forward to it in September this year. As Eric is planning on doing another mural, I will see you then and there.

Check out more of Eric's work at www.pepperink.com

Chiller Theatre Memories

With Otakon 2009 coming up, I've been thinking about some of the past conventions I've gotten to go to and have come to the conclusion that a lot of weird shit goes on at these things regardless of what kind of convention you are attending. I started going to conventions about six years ago with the Chiller Theatre conventions in New Jersey. As the name suggests, Chiller Theatre is a horror movie convention, but to me seems to be a relatively calm scene. The first year we (Myself, Eric, and Alexis) went, there were quite a few cool guests. We met Elvira and Linda Blair. Linda Blair was fun to chat with because like most people who live in the Binghamton area, we were familiar with Elvis the Cowboy. Naturally, we had to tell her about him. For those of you who actually read this that are not from scenic Binghamton, Elvis as you should have gathered from the description is a cowboy complete with the holster, (toy) guns, and hat. He is tiny man about the age of seventy that wanders about the places of business calling women by the names Linda Blair and Jennifer Lopez. He once called me Poccahantas. He is a tad crazy as you may have gathered. He calls most men he runs into by Bruce Lee. Linda Blair seemed to be rather speechless when we told her about him. She seemed to think that he must have had something happen that he related to one of her movies. This may have been a decent theory if one of my coworkers hadn't straight up asked him about it one day. He told us that he calls attractive women Linda Blair because they are attractive too. He followed up by saying that Linda Blair is getting to be all washed up and he's been calling people Jennifer Lopez lately. Without knowing these key bits of information though, Linda Blair signed a photo to "The Great Cowboy" which we later framed and gave to Elvis for his 68th birthday. He told us he'd be crazy if he ever gave it away. If only he realized the irony in his comment...

Although not directly related to Chiller Theatre, I thought I should mention how much New Jersey sucks for trying to eat us everytime we traveled through on the way to and from Chiller Theatre. Screw you New Jersey <3 New York.

Another very entertaining moment of the following year's convention was the fact that Peewee Herman was one of the guests. He's gotta be like sixty maybe older by now. Sadly we did not get to meet him, but I did manage to get my hand slapped away by his body guard. That's right people. Peewee Herman's body guard hit a harmless gothic lolita. I blame Alexis 100% though. She REALLY wanted to meet him/hug him/ or squeel at him. I can't remember which. So when we saw him walking though the con we followed after him yelling PEEWEE! He skillfully ignored us though and kept walking. We finally got close and I reached out to poke him to get his attention. The moment my finger touch his suit jacket my hand was viciously slapped away. It was rather upsetting T_T

On a final note - I find it to be extremely interesting that there is usually a huge number of porn stars on the guest list at Chiller Theatre. I wonder why this is. I found it to be even more amusing that most of them that we came into contact with were completely in love with our lolita coordination. This wouldn't surprise me in Japan, but for some reason its rather shocking in America.

R.I.P. - Tiara of Alexis

A Long Past Due Recap of Comic Con '09: Day 1

Hehe....So I fail....Almost a month after the NY Comic Con, I am actually posting my blog about it hehe. Because there's so much to talk about I am going to break it up hehe.... Ok ok.... This is really so I can procrastinate and take more time to write the second half... Here we go...

Day 1
So Day 1 started with us getting up super early to dress up in lolita. As I predicted in an earlier blog Alexis was most def. a grumpy Gary. We'll fast forward ahead to the leaving of the hotel as the rest of that is kind of boring... We stepped outside of the hotel to realize exactly how freaking cold it was outside... We ended up waiting for a bus for pretty much forever... While waiting for the bus some other fellow con goers requested pictures with us.... Being as cute and sweet as we were we agreed....If only we knew how many photos we would be in that day.... We tried to escape the cold by going into this little bakery that the bus stop was outside of and we bought cannoli ^ ^ It should be said here that little kids seemed to be overly happy at the sight of us in our ruffles and lace. This little girl probably thought we we're princesses as she could not stop smiling. So once we got to the con, we had to wait in line.... except not really ^ ^ Because we are loved we were hooked up and got to skip ahead of the exhibitors line ^ ^ On hindsight I really wish I had went to see how long the line for the average convention goer was like... So we got in and went to our booth space....But RockStar Games had kind of overtaken it... Unfortunately these things never go easy I guess.... we ended up getting a much better booth space though... So we got to work setting up Eric's booth until we got distracted.... Whoever thought it would be a good idea to put us in close proximity to a video game booth where we could play FEAR for extended periods of time is either an idiot or a genius...


We started by taking some test thingy where they stuck these things on our heads... Then this dude took notes and asked us questions....



Not to call the dude out or anything but... I remembered WAY more than Alexis and she somehow managed to score higher than me... I think someone's slacking on their job... XD



So FEAR 2 was really fun ^ ^ They had you sit in this cool chair and you had all sorts of monitors that monitored nothing...sigh for aesthetics.... It also had a camera so you could be self concious about whether or not your fake hair looked good while you killed things.



Unfortunately I am awful at FPS.... I blame my lack of experience with an XBOX 360 controller though....


After that we ran around the con for a few hours and accomplished nothing or in my case accomplished a lighter wallet... We spent way too much money on food and got our photos taken over 9000 times... Some people didn't even ask....Like the guy that took this photo...

This guy just jumped down on his knee about 20 feet away from us and snapped a ton of photos and RAN off..... He was referred to as "that one creeper" the rest of the con... We eventually went and signed up for the Conflux sealed event for later that night... We had to walk in front of the variant stage in order to get to the gaming area... There was an awful comedian doing some show... On our way back out... we had just gotten past the stage when we hear yelled into the mic "ARE THOSE LOLITAS!?!?" He went on to talk about how the say that the Japanese people are messed up. Then he corrected himself instead to say that its the entire race that is messed up. We lol'd a bit and continued on before he started to suck again. After a bit more con going we finally decided it was time to retire our frilly butts for the day....I flagged down my first cab ever and we headed back to the hotel. This cab ride was really pleasant and was a positive experience... Had I had my second cab ride as my first.... I would probably never get into another cab for the rest of my life. More on that in a moment...So we changed and it was time to head back to the con so I could be a loser and play in the EPIC! FNM Conflux release party... The cab ride back to the con was also quite EPIC!... He weaved in and out of the ways of other vehicles at speeds you would expect out of an amusement park ride. Every five seconds he needed to slam on the brakes to avoid killing all of us... At one point in time we were stuck at a traffic light long enough for me to fall asleep... wake up.... and ask Alexis "what's taking so long?" Guess what question I learned to never ask in a cab again.... Suddenly our cab driver veered out of traffic.... On to the sidewalk...Now I'm not talking about cutting across the corner... He actually drove on the sidewalk for a good 50 feet and then ran the red light that we had been waiting at... Within 5 minutes we were back at the con...slightly shaken but thankfully alive... We then made our way back to the gaming room...I placed 20th out of 42 so I am quite content with that plus I ended up having a few things to lol about there as well... Me and Alexis drew a lot of attention being the only 2 attractive girls out of the 5 that were in a room of 60 guys -_-' We got there like a half hour early and sat down at a table by ourselves... I marveled at how the chair was able to support this one guy at the table next to me and we were eventually graced by the presence of this kid...



I'll leave it to Alexis to talk about this kid.... I was a bit too busy building my deck but wow this kid could talk. Alexis couldn't have made it more clear that she didn't want to talk to this kid and he just kept going on and on.... He still kept going even after she told him she was a lesbian! Finally he left after what seemed to be an eternity... But back to my awesome pulls... Not only did we get 3 FNM promos...but I opened up a foil Maelstrom Archangel!



My first match was good ^ ^ I owned the kid the first match and barely lost the second. We went into overtime for the last match and the guy was nice enough to forfeit as I would have killed him the next turn anyway had we not had the 5 turn clock on us... The look on his face is what losing looks like as a facial expression.... Make sure you take note of my large but not obnoxiously large D20....



My second and fourth matches were awful to me hehe I was destroyed both times.... My third match was interesting... The kid claimed he got shitty packs but really I think he was just a bad player... I destroyed him both games and I would have taken photos of his fail but we were too busy being told that we looked like we were 16 while he stared at Alexis's tits.... They were calling him was his excuse XD... Alexis was displeased...I however was very amused... Regardless I feel that this deserves a victory pose ^ ^



Anyway... That about sums up the first day ^ ^ I'll eventually post a blog about the other 2 days ^ ^ BTW... This is pressure for Alexis to write her recap as well.....

Stolen from Travy....

25 Random Things about Me

1. I enjoy buying cute and expensive clothing that I will likely never wear and then have a hard time selling it even though I could make a ton of money from it.
2. I am insecure about my figure.
3. I am insecure about my ability to use the languages I've studied
4. I can't really trust people
5. While I have no problem telling someone "no" I have great difficulty giving anyone a straight answer with the word "yes" in it especially when the question has anything to do with me.
6. I am very good at schadenfreude
7. I've never done any drugs
8. I used to be terrified of a red pick up truck that was parked on the other side of the street from me when I lived in Chenango Forks.
9. I had to go to an extra kindergarten because I was too anti-social when I was little.
10. I rather enjoy listening to Britney Spears and am very capable of "rocking out" to Nsync.
11. I love playing FPS however I am awful at them...
12. I can't roll my "r"
13. I once saw a toad play Frogger IRL and lose...
14. I am a bit of a light weight when it comes to alcohol
15. Shower Gel and perfume of choice: Sensual Amber from Bath & Body Works and Paris Hilton EDT
16. Repetition in speech is highly irritating to me.
17. My lucky number is 17
18. I would probably do just about anything to get the Princess Drop JSK in black by BTSSB...
19. I love Mrs. Grass soup but after finding bugs in a box in my cupboard I have had a hard time eating it without obsessively checking for bugs.
20. It is nearly impossible to get me to talk about my feelings as I will dance around the topic and talk about everything but what's actually on my mind.
21. Tentacles = Lullzworthy
22. When I was little I wanted to be a scientist.
23. My first console was the SNES with the Lion King, Pinocchio, and Super Mario World.
24. I don't like to be home alone at night because I am paranoid that someone will try to break in.
25. Mountain Dew is the reason Pepsi trumps Coke...

New York City FTW

So I am in New York City now ^ ^... And we didn't get lost in New Jersey for the second time in my life! We are staying in a Sheraton...Its kinda tiny but it works for our small group of four.... I'm currently typing from my mother's mini laptop therefore typing errors are likely to be abundant in the upcoming blogs. The ride down wasn't bad... I'm quite tired but can't seem to actually sleep... I blame my current 3a.m. lifestyle.... meh... We went to Friendly's on the way down.... See Alexis's blog for stories on that... hehe.... But yeah tomorrow at 6:30 we will be getting up and no doubt Alexis will be quite the grumpy Gary....We will be super cute in matching Alice and the Pirate sets though.... So its worth it... The con opens at like noon I think so we will have quite a bit of time to wander after we get Eric all set up... I need to locate a few booths.... the Squishables booth is a must because I need an octopus.... ^ ^ It should be a good time.... I feel like I'm just rambling now though....So this blog is officially done for the night ^ ^

I'm a high school lover, and you're my favorite flavor
Love is all, all my soul
You're my Playground Love

Yet my hands are shaking
I feel my body remains, themes no matter, I'm on fire
On the playground, love.

You're the piece of gold the flushes all my soul.
Extra time, on the ground.
You're my Playground Love.

Anytime, anyway,
You're my Playground Love

On First Days and Disappointment

Today was my first day back to classes. I started the day sleeping till about a half hour before I had to go like I normally would before French class....Of course I managed to get sick... I suppose these things happen but it doesn't make it suck any less. Today's agenda had 5 items on it.
-French
-Logic
-Japanese
-Refund Check
-Ling Book

French went well. There are way too many kids in the class but that will change I am sure of it. Most of the kids I was forced to talk to seemed nice enough. I had already had the teacher before so there were no suprises... After that I hurried off to Logic because I was super excited for it and wanted to be there on time.

Long story short, Logic sucks. The teacher is quite possibly one of the biggest assholes I've come across in quite some time... This is quite impressive considering I work in retail.... You lose 20 points for being absent. Absent is defined as being absent, late, leaving early, or taking a bathroom break. If this wasn't ridiculous enough, he insists that a lecture hall (150 college students) sit in assigned seating. I'm not going to lie the guy could be pretty entertaining... but for the most part he spewed mostly anti republican doctrine and made some somewhat offensive comments (one of which outraged my mother when she heard about it) Needless to say...I have unregistered from his class and will be attending Turkish Language and Culture tomorrow... It should be a good time....I will be quite upset if it isn't...

I went to Japanese class expecting it to be awful. I even had that nervous sick feeling. Fortunately everything went great. The sad amount of Japanese that i retained after fumbling through JPN203 came back really quickly and the rumors of my teacher being a bitch seem largely untrue... Hopefully she stays this way. I need to work hard this semester because I want to be able to function when I go to Japan next spring...so hopefully I will not screw up.

Tomorrow I have to go to that new Turkish class... Japanese and Linguistics.... Wish me luck... Hopefully I won't need it ^ ^