So, my original plan for these 48 hours; wake up, shower, enjoy BBQ at T.'s place, go home in time, read up on coffee, go sleep, get up again, jedi-mindtrick my way into the job, profit.

This went well until T. dropped me off at my place, where I received a textmessage from my mom saying that grandma wasn't doing well and they were coming home from France. A few short ages and connection-issues later I got a coherent update...
A couple of days ago my last surviving grandma (stepdad's side) fell out off her bed and was carted off to the doctor. Apparently she was cleared there, but something went apeshit and now she's in the hospital and either dead of dieing from some sort of mystery infection.

I'm doing okay, in large part thanks to T. who stuck around to offer kind words and the usual level of good convo on life, the universe and everything, but it's still... I mean, on the dieing-grandparents-scale this whole thing isn't even that badly timed (one granma kicked the bucket while I was away at an anime con), but still... it's like the universe is looking down and going "Hola, Isabel is pulling her shit together again, better fuck something up."

I still have the job interview tomorrow. I'll keep my phone on, and will inform whoever is doing the responsible thing there that I'm having a situation of the dead-relative kind that's probably going to delay my ability to get to work.

Today's T.-involved Creation:
- Emoccino; a cappuccino flavoured with the bitter tears of children/workers
- Reïncanary; a subspecies of the phoenix, this small yellow bird will die and be reborn again

Bed now, maybe then I won't look like a zombie tomorrow.

The fact that dolphins "may act sexual" towards humans really shouldn't amuse me as much as it does, but I just can't help this mental image of people going swimming with the dolphins, expecting Flippers, and these dolphins just going "Hai bebeh! ;D *sproing*"

Unrelated to that; Working on a monster of a wig right now, and learning a lot from it. The base is done, but the final styling will have to be done tomorrow... somehow. I don't think my hairspray left-overs will be able to cope...
BBQ at T.'s place tomorrow, job-interview on Friday... Filled out the airport-security-PDF and my passport will be staying next to the laptop until being packed.
I have to admit, I'm already a bit nervous. It's been a while since I last had a job interview, I've never had one involving (inter)national security papers, I still have no idea how they pegged me for a barista job, and my mom is on a holiday in France so I can't exactly call her for Motherly Reassurance...

And then I had to chase Mana off the kitchen sink again. I swear that cat is retarded sometimes >_< My housemates; one cat who run every time someone sneezes or farts, and one who simply can't seem to grasp the concept of "you + kitchen sink = scary angry mom". I hate to admit it, but she's giving evidence to support that cats may actually be dumber than dogs.
Ten again, Flo got it in one go. Neurosis = smarts? Let's hope any future additions inherit her cause-effect understanding or I'll have to McGuyver up some sort of moving cat-repellent.

Entirely unrelated to all that; if tonight's episode of Earth Investigated is to be believed then Earth must look like a drunk on a universal scale; wobbling around all the time and having climate-flips while at it.

- My plan for today was to go ahead and do some leveling on my wee little MooMooDr00d... sadly, my server kept getting pushed back into extended maintenance until 5 o'clock. Not that I mind having a good spot to finally start watching the original star Wars Trilogy, but by the time I got online my enthusiasm was pretty dead.

- I'm having one of those days where I'm easily annoyed. Do not like.

- I know telemarketers are only doing their job, but so help me gods the next bozo to call me about my energy-supplier is going to get curse-words thrown at their head.
Yes, I get my energy from Nuon, fucking boo-hoo. It also delivers nature-friendly energy, and so long as my parents are willing and able to pay for that it makes me happy. Hell, I'll help pay it if I have to. Stop. Fucking. Calling me about cheap energy.

- Halfway through the download of Gargoyles all the seeders dropped dead.

- I can't figure out whether I want to try and make another wig or if I'll just stay here and grumble in the general direction of my tellie.

"Beste Isabel, Dit schooljaar heb je interesse getoond voor de opleiding geneeskunde bij de VU Amsterdam."

... heb ik dat? O_o

Dutch Television, godsfuckingdammit!

And now to explain that statement; Dutch television (and until recently movie theaters) run on the essence of suck. Things like tv-series always arrive here late, if they make it at all. American cartoon did slightly better than anime, though probably with the exception of Alfred J. Kwak which, while animated in noble nipon, was still produced by Dutch/Belgian tv-things. Either way, getting an American tv-show over at the Netherlands back then went a bit faster, because in those days us kids were capable of reading subtitles.

Yes, I'm pissed off and will get back to that.

Either way, all a series needed back then were subtitles, and they'd be ready to go onto our favorite weekend-morning/evening shows and we'd all be happy. I think I saw bikermice from mars somewhere around 1994/5, which would place it pretty close to it's US release of 1993
Compare; Sailor Moon. From what I gather it took 10 years for it to reach the Netherlands... but in it's defense, it had to be butchered in America before it could take a detour through Germany and reach us so it could be butchered in new and inspiring ways.

Returning to that; I fucking HATE dubs. Seriously. In a distant internet-past it might have started out with star-struck admiration for Japanese seiyu but now it's applied globally. Fact is; when you dub anything, unless you have a) a shitload of resources or b) a shitload of luck, odds are that it's going to look and sound like shit. In the best case the animation won't watch the words correctly, and in the worst case all emotion will be killed off and/or fans of the original will be gunning for the actors (I'm looking at you, David Moo.)
It's just. Don't! Fucking don't! Stop. Dubbing things! If it's a show aimed at 0-5 year olds I can get it because they can't fucking read (well) but fucking Sailor Moon? Cardcaptor Sakura? ANYTHING SHOWN ON CARTOON NETWORK?! If you're old enough to watch Cow and Chicken you're old enough to read!
GODS!
And the insult to the injury of that last one is that Cartoon network in this place started out undubbed AND unsubbed! And we all watched it because, apparently, back then we had the magical ability to read! And we did! And that way we learned what those English phrases meant and for a lot of us it boosted our understanding of the English Language so we could go on to score 9s for our tests!

*deeeeeep breath*

But back to what sparked this; all shows in this place arrive late, and some don't arrive at all. This was all find and dandy, until the internet came along. It is downright weird when people a few years older than you are look back nostalgically on the series of their childhood when that exact same series is band spanking new in your own country, or not even there yet.
One of those series I've heard about that never arrived in the first place was Gargoyles.
I knew them from Brianna's drawings, and that was it. Winged thingies. And Brianna was one of the first artists I ever saw online, way back when Side 7 was still cool. Think roughly 1998.
Now fast-forward a few years to today, when I trundel along the thatguywiththeglasses site and see that the Nostalgia Critic has reviewed this Gargoyles thing.
"Hell," think I, "I don't feel like going to bed yet, let's see what this is all about."
...
My. Fucking. Gods.
First; apparently a response to Batman: The Animated Series, which I loved as a kid, so Darker and Edgier
Second: Produced by Disney, who apparently pulled no punches with the animation quality
Third: Holy shit, is that a continued plot?
Fourth: Holy shit is that some awesome character design?
Fifth: I approve of this Puck.

And courtesy of the Networks of Suck, we never had it in the Netherlands, and just now I watched the first 8 minutes or so at the ripe ol' age of 23.

Fuck you, Dutch TV stations. Fuck you right in the ear. I'm going to youtube/torrent this stuff, and then I'll send angry thoughts back into the past on how this could have saved my entire childhood, thereby forcing you to buy the broadcasting rights, thereby creating an alternative timeline in which I am not on happypills.

TO THE TORRENTMOBILE! o/
And then bed!
For I am sleepy!

Supplies are restocked for both me and the kitties, flat is livable again, and my retro fan is working hard to keep my drink cool and my pennywaffles unmolten, and is probably helping the laptop stay cool as well.
Seriously, even on it's low setting this thing packs a punch XD

Unrelated to that; I recovered a bit from my Wild Social Weekend
On Saturday I went out with T. to eat delish japanese food and just hang out. We discovered that the (to us) infamous porn-store-with-a-McDonald's-wrapped-around-it is a) very small inside and b) overpriced liek whoa... seriously, we found this Rub My Ducky and it cost a fucking 50 euros O_O;
Other than that; lots of talking and walking around, and then we realized it was nearly midnight and we still had to get to our respective homes somehow XD

Sunday was another social day; a trip to the Hermitage with muizenstaartje and Friendly People Whom I Hadn't Met Before. We went to see the At The Russian Court exhibition which had piles of pretty, pretty dresses. And fans. And jewelry. And shoes. *-*
So, uh, yeah... my girly side is once again happy XD It was also really nice to see all the paintings there up close.
Downside; I failed hard at finding everyone and we stood in line for aaaaaages. In the rain D:
Totally worth it, though X3
And I'm a musical box richer *glee*

And unrelated to that; Magic's Price was still standing in the bargain section of the ABC Saturday so I snatched that, but I couldn't find Magic's Promise anywhere in the ABC or the Waterstones (which just fails hard in my opinion right now, no Mercedes Lackey at all but a big Twilight display? *snubs*). Long story short; I just went ahead and ordered it at bol.com. Would've been happier if I had found it in the bargain bin since it would be about half the price, but, well, it just wasn't there. So, with a bit of luck I'll be able to continue reading that trilogy next week. In the meantime, my pile of books gives me the evil eye.
Now I just have to figure out which type of elastic I'll need to restring Laken and how much of it, and then I can order that along with a new can of MSC... aaand I shoulk really take of Evie's last choker. The other one finally snapped the other day, and one green choker just doesn't suit her right now.

But tellie and r&r right now

I'm usually not all that fond of sleeping past noon, but damn did I need it.

Today's to-do;
- brunch
- shower
- groceries
- clean flat

I got off my ass, yay \o/


Profile Picture - Dornen by ~isabel on deviantART

*blink*
So, I went to take a nap. I woke up with a) my telephone alarm turned off and b) my shirts taken off. *scratches back of head* now, I've done the first without really waking up before, but the second is new, I think. Makes sense I did it, though. The sun made a comeback and the couch was toasty.
Next step; fixing a sandwich without waking up enough to remember it afterward.

But for now; glass of cola, and continueing the sorting otu of the livingroom fabric basket I was doing before i went to take a nap

Dreams involved pastures, a trainstation and a doll head

1) I have a passport again, yay!
2) I found Mana's furmouse... in 3 pieces. That makes her tally of Fake Fur Meece Killed 2. Future furmice wil have to be sturdier.

Okay, so, remember when I send an open solicitation to the Schiphol place? I got an invitation today;

"Beste Isabel,
Bedankt voor jouw sollicitatie naar de functie van Barista voor Starbucks."
Dear Isabel, thanks for your solicitation for the function of Barista for Starbucks

...
I don't even know what a barista is XD
But okay, apparently whatever it is matches my solicitation or the e-mail form borked up. Gave a confirmation that I'd attend the Big Meeting (which is one day after the OVcard stops working, nyarg). Gonna go ahead and pick up my new passport today, at least... Was going to poke a jobplace about them needing hotel cleaners, but having second thoughts with this popping up... Odds of getting a job right away Vs possibility of job that doesn't involve hotels, I guess...

Partially related to that; spend yesterday hanging out with sbslink and her girls. Gods... Fairyland a-line body = LOVE. The double joints! The hands! *-*
So, yeah... when I get Yukio and Thyme their big bodies there'll be serious consideration into a minifee XD
But I am slightly miffed at how much better the body of Sbs' shoyo is XD In comparison Evie's body looks REALLY cheap... Though there's not much I can change about that... that said, I'll probably go ahead and do the hand-cooking thing one day. If I can't improve her posability I can at least make her hands look more like hands and less like sausages.

Entirely unrelated to that; Got a pair of neat pants for 15 bucks on Tueseday... and yesterday the first pressbutton fell off. Gotta try and fix that up somehow.

Hrm, right, so, today's to-do;
- breakfast
- get passport
- find out what a barista is
- get yesterday's pictures off the camera and onto the interwebs
- try and fix pants

[edit]
"In English, barista is a name applied to a person, usually a coffeehouse employee, who prepares and serves espresso-based coffee drinks."
.. I was banned from the coffeemachine at the GLA because my coffee sucked, let's hope the starbucks has machines for this stuff XD

So, I got this tour from bol.com... it is fucking awesome!.Seriously, full-blown 3-D animation movie XD

Okay, so my original plan for today involved getting up early and dropping by a job-place before heading to Den Hel for the afternoon, but then I ended up staying up till 2:30 babbling with T., so I've abandoned that plan in favor of sleep.

Good news: I have a coleslawesme fan, the exact headphones I wanted (Skullcandy lowrider in purple/white), and an adorable new protectionbaggy for my DS (one with a baby tiger on it and a baggy inside so I can actually put game in there)

Bad news: I want to pimp about with my headphones, so of course Naoto flips out. I love that iPod, I really do, but sometimes she just... well, flips. I plug her in to Dan for reloading and updating, and she just freezes. Dan won't acknowledge there's an iPod in the first place, poking the lock/unlock switch makes no difference, the only cure is to wait until the battery runs out.

So, no pimping about with my new headphones on the metro today :/
But I'll bring the DS for the trainride. Need to game on that again either way, poor thing is collecting dust. *gives Square the blaming eye*

Today's to-do;
- brunch
- trip to Den Hel
- clean up flat (with extension until tomorrow morning)

Bleh, tired. Wonky sleeping patterns are doing me in, it seems.

Today's to-do;
- shower
- breakfast
- if possible; groceries
- trip to Mediamarkts for headphones and a fan... of course, the weather predictions are now for rain and temps below 20 9_9

After an epic planing-failure on my side, it seems that Mercedes Lackey now owns part of my soul. Long story short; I thought I had an appointment in the city-center which wasn't until next week, and I didn't find out until I was already there. I figured I might as well turn it into something positive and went to raid the Bargains section of the American Book Center, where I found Magic's Pawn for 4.99 euros (4.50 after student-deduction-thingy).
So, Mercedes Lackey. I only heard of her two or three weeks ago when I found out that she's an active member of Den of Angels. She owns a pile of dolls, and that gives her +5 cool points.
Anyway, I found a part one of a series by her hand, and it was cheap, so I flipped through it. Mental conversation;

I: Well, you're a bargain, but I have a lot of books to read, so you'll have to be good
Book: All right. There's a horse on my cover, and here's a pretty, pretty boy, who is totally having a relationship with another pretty boy.
I: Your gay has won me over.

So yes, I am that pathetic. Anynoodle, bought it, dropped by the Tourist Appie Hein for food (Kip Mozarella on sale, yay), went home, took a footbath, and finally opened up that book... somewhere between 8 and 9, I think.
And I finished it just now, which is, well... I don't think I finished a book in one go since Coraline, and nothing 'thick' since The Deadly Hallows. It's not the bestest book ever, and I'll admit that it's a bit fast-paced, but damn, does it ever paint a pretty picture where the important men are handsome and gay, the few women around kick ass, the mean get punished and goddamn magical ponies.
And several chapters worth of massive tearjerker which are probably why I have a mild headache right now.
Though that could also because it's bloody 4 a.m. and by the looks of it the sun is getting up again.

I'm not entirely sure what to do now. The past few days I'd wake up between now and 2-4 hours, and the past two days I'd have then moved to the couch, but I'm already on it... and by now I broke out of yesterday's docu-cycle and am eeing a new episode of Survivorman... and yes, I have my tellie on when reading. I need background-noise for some reason.... I like how Les's headgear has upgraded through the 3 episodes I saw 'today', from a bandana to a strawhat to a leather jungleheadfedorathingholy fuck he just build a fucking flamethrower. AND HE'S IN AFRICA.

Okay, I obviously need food and something resembling sleep.

Another day of WoW. Dornen is now level 61, which means she officially got further in death than she did in life. Kind of a weird turning point. Undead!Dornen has been a very, VERY casual leveling event and I didn't really think she'd ever make it to 60.
For reference, the character was made maybe a month after I made Muirna, who is now a level 80 with a Netherdrake. That was WAY before TBC, and the warlock I made then is now 71.

Well, beddybye now. *yawny* Thusly tired that kingcrab fishing is starting to sound like a sane thing to do.

So, I do my dishes, turn to the left and... ta-da~, nice weather.

It's mocking me. Now I'm contemplating buying that cola after all.

Haha, in your face, summer heat! I managed to turn a 6-hour night's rest into a 11-hour one by relocating to the couch when the heat woke me up. Couch = couple of degrees cooler.
HA!
Slight downside; I also pretzeled up and woke up to a sleeping arm and some interesting-looking marks from my fingers XD

Entirely unrelated to any of that; should I go to the grocery store for a bottle of cola and a bag of crisps, or do I walk down to the tanking-station for the same? Minor conflict of distance Vs price. Part of it also lies in my groceries for this week ending up surprisingly cheap, so even with Tueseday's expensive-assed dinner thing it wouldn't really hack into my cash hat much...
Downside; I have another expensive dinner thing coming up tomorrow, even though my mom went all "Just declare it an mom will pay :D"
I might declare half of it, kinda depends... It's always a bit awkward with these sort of offers from mom, the practical part of me goes "Free food, score!" and the independent part goes "Dammit mom, I gotta learn to manage mah cash! D:"
Makes me feel like a leech... which I kinda start to worry about because right now I'm feeling slightly guilty over planning to pick up a set of Good Headphones and sending her the bill for them. This shouldn't worry me because it's going to be a "Congratulations! You made it through year one of uni and the parents are proud!" present...
I need an income. *sends anxious mindwaves at jobplace*

And when I do go to choose a headset, I'm going to go ahead and pick up a fan as well. Screw the costs on that one, it falls under the 'essential to flat' tab by this point, and we have a seperate account for that.

Probably related to all of that; My stupid bubonic finger plague is trying to make a comeback. Thankfully the stuff I got from the doc is far from gone and still okay to use, so I'm going to salve that little bump into nothingness. Still, that it's back is kinda bad, and possibly weird. I associate it with stress, so apparently my first real vacation in years is stressing me out. Probably the cash-undercurrent. Go go figure. You work for 1.5 years or so, and then you can't get used to living on government money anymore.

Unrelated to any of that; The rubber rings I've been using as chokers for Evie have been cracking for a while, but yesterday the bottom one cracked real bad... It's my favorite one too, pretty purple :(

... This kind of ended up being a whine-post. Blah, I say.
Today's to-do;
- Shower
- breakfast
- Balance finances so I know exactly how much 'fun money' I have right now

Must. Get. Off. Comfy couch.

[1:37 edit] And he weather just took the grocery decision for me. It's dark and thundery, I'mma visiting the tankingstation. Got about 20 bucks left to spend on this and the dinner thing tomorrow, should be enough.

[1:50 edit] And now it's raining D: Fuckit, I'll survive on lemonade and popcorn.

Thought of the day; When I bought those 3 DVDs for 6 bucks I probably should've grabbed Immortal instead of Underworld. I didn't because, well... frankly because I didn't remember anything about Immortal other than having seen it at some point. The trailer for it was on the Underworld DVD and now it looks a lot more interesting than Underworld.
...
The fact that the beginning of the "Fangs Vs Fiction" documentary with Underworld looks like a collection of crackpot theories and extreme goth sub-cultures doesn't quite help.

Entirely unrelated to that; Gained two levels on Dorry today, and most of it came from bonfire quests relating to the Midsummer Fire Festival. She has her own Dancing Naked Flaming Female Draenei On A Brazier now.

Aaaaand I've just come to the realisation that it's possible that Interview With The Vampire is, in fact, the only vampire movie I actually really do like. And I'm not sure if that's a good thing, or even if it's not just because nice costumes and long haired men blocked any faults it may have from my brain.

Also, Appie Hein? More oil in your nasi, the rice is dry.

[2:10 edit] I find out there's a music vid for Revolution Man by The Union Underground, and then it's a softened up version. "burning" instead of "bullet" and "you'll see black" instead of "you'll be dead", what the hell? D:
*sad panda*

So, last Wednesday me, Laken and Evie were picked up by T. for a trip to the Amsterdam Forest where we took lots of pictures.

These will mainly be the pictures that T. took, with a couple from my crappy camera to supplement... something. The pictures he took are a bit larger, so if the quality doesn't give the camera away, the size will.

T's has a deviantART gallery, what I recommend visiting :3



( this way for awesome )
The full batch of pictures can be found here.