I have suddenly become addicted to browsing LJ without actively participating myself (except for commenting when snagging icons ♥).  It's slightly annoying, given that in a few days I won't be able to log on (or at least browse around for hours like I have been) because of my trip to Penn State.  Which I'm still both dreading and looking forward too.  So I'm dreadwarding it?  Yeah.  I'm dreadwarding it.

I'm in the process of trying to figure out how to make a layout for my journal and I'm hating it so far.  I really dislike having to design something while working around preexisting elements and it doesn't help that most LJ layouts all look the same but in varying colors to me.  Guh.  Squarish, minimalistic designs are just not my cup of tea. 

My laptop is still wavering somewhere between limbo and death at the moment.  As usual, I've stolen my sister's incredibly junky and fagtastic Toshiba, whose keyboard is screwed to hell and back and requires the use of an external keyboard.  Anyway - my poor baby is still beat up.  I cleaned the keyboard a few days ago and man, was that thing nasty.  It's a wonder it had even worked at all!  There was so much gunk in there I'm afraid it'll all clump together into some huge gunk-monster of doom, remove itself from the trash, and consume my soul while I'm attempting to put the keys back on and failing miserably at it. D:  Laptop keyboards are so hard to put back together!  The little plastic pieces pop off every single time I try to fix them into their little clips. It's crazy frustrating and also kind of sad that I can't do something as simple as that.  D:

The computer gods have cursed me, as have the gods of gaming.  Why?  My Final Fantasy XII save file was deleted.  I was only at Raithwhal's tomb, had clocked in around 100 hours of gameplay, 99% of which was mindless grinding to level up, and it's all.  gone.  adfjkljklKJASDKLFJ  I'm sure anyone who has put a lot of time into any given activity in vain can sympathize.  ;A;  It's so sad.  This is the third time it's happened.  I don't think I'll ever get to finish the damn game. :<

Speaking of games, I've been trying to find some otome games online but so far have been unsuccessful.   There are tons of visual novels of varying yaoi content, but no dating sims for girls that I can find for download.  And while I do like the ocassional bits of yaoi and shounen-ai, I'm not particularly interested in visual novels of it.

Especially since it tends to be overly gratuitous and cheesy and most times just seems to be PWP.  If there's one thing I dislike, it's sex (or in the less steamy counterparts, cheesy, flowery foreplay) just for the sake of it.  And I can't help imagining that the people behind shounen-ai and yaoi are slobberying fangirls/boys just spewing out whatever they find most kawaii!!1! just to appease their own desires, no matter how silly or unbelievable.   (Then again, maybe I'm just being biased because there's no female character I can identify with to put myself there with the hot 2D guys. ♥ Heh.  Pathetic?  Yes.  But you do it too - admit it. )

So, um.  Otome game search = unsuccessful.  I wish I had the money (or the willpower to save the money) to buy a Japan region PS2 and some Otome games for it.  Oh well.  Maybe someday.

(In the meantime, I need to finish FFXII and then go back and play the rest because I never have.  :A;  Shame on me.)

(I also need to buy and play a multitude of other US-released games before I even think of moving on to foreign ones.  Sigh.)

But I've gotten kind of off track.  Where was I?

Oh.  My laptop.

So, I cleaned the keyboard and have yet to successfully put a key back in, but that's the least of my worries given that it still won't turn on properly.  It powers up for a few second - light's turn on, fan starts to turn - but then it shuts down.  Kapoot.  That's it.  I'm hoping it's something that can be fixed, because I plan on somehow obtaining the money to get it taken to the shop.  I want my baby back. ;A;  And my Photoshop and all of the brushes I have saved, all of the Sims downloads I had...  it's all replacable and unimportant in the grand scheme of things, sure, but it just really sucks if I end up losing it all.  That's a lot of stuff to have to find and download over, assuming I get a new laptop at all. 

Sigh.

Oh well.  Back to my newfound LJ addiction.  I really want to delve right in to joining some roleplays, taking up a bunch of fic challenges and the like, but it'll be useless getting started only to not be able to do a thing for two weeks.  But I don't want to wait.  I'm bouncing off the walls in an LJ frenzy but can't quench my desire for all of these things and it's irritating. ;A; ldsfkalsdfj

Also: money.  Do want.  Need to get a job as soon as I get back from the Journalism workshop.   Need manga, soundtracks, plushies, figures, DVDs, and various other merchandise.  And money.  My materialistic fangirl soul demands it.  :D

I'll try to be a bit more organized with my next entry and have some sort of point to it, but I'm not making any promises.  Rambling about everything and nothing at all is my specialty.

Two hour delay this morning. And I didn't go to school again today. I'm a retard.

Gonna go to the doctor's tomorrow for a check up and to get something done about this... whatever it is. I sound like a man, I'm having nosebleeds like crazy, and my sinuses are clogged to hell and back, yet the inside of my nose feels as though it's been covered in cement. Weird. AND I SOUND LIKE A MAN. Gah.

Need to finish posters for ETC. Whose meeting I missed today...

I'm rewriting an unfinished FullMetal Alchemist fic, too. I've got maybe... 7k words? I'm aiming to make it just a really long one shot instead of a multi-chaptered fic, though. By estimation, it should be around... 40-50k? Eheh. I'll be able to make a better estimate when I get to planning it out more thoroughly. But it'll be long, and um... hopefully good? Okay, maybe I should split it into two or three parts, but it's still going to essentially be a one shot and written as such. Nya. Ed/reader as usual, but... maybe a little Ling/reader just because he's awesome and doesn't get enough love?

I swear to the Anime Gods that if FMA2 doesn't pick up after episode 25 and take the manga route this time... I needs me some Ling, stat! It was a shame he wasn't in the first anime, though I understand/know why, so he should definitely be in the second, in all his squinty, taller-than-Ed glory. Plus, I SO wanna hear him going all, "I'm staa~rving, fee~d me~ D:" And the manga is just generally so much more awesome. I loved the anime and all, but... THE. MANGA. You cannot deny it and its awesomeness. You know, Envy's a little crazier, the Sloth is so much more cuddly, there's more Hohenheim, and... Olivia Mira Armstrong. I'd definitely bend my straight for her. <3 Haha. Oh, oh, and more history between Roy and Riza! Huzzah! There are just so many things, way too many to mention. I guess all I can do is hope~

So: no school, posters, fic, FMA2/FMA manga... what else?

Oh, more fanfiction-y stuff:

I'm writing a Lavi one-shot. A long one. A cliche one. But hopefully still an enjoyable one to read? Not gonna spare any details on that one.

I'm plotting out a Death Note Zombie Apocalypse CYOA. Pretty much complete crack. And I'm making a lot of different paths and options and outcomes. I'm really gonna go all out on this. But the planning... gah. So much planning to be done! But in the end, it'll be worth it, I think. So far, I've planned to include Matsuda, Light, L, Mello, Near, and Matt. Some of the guys are going to have longer routes, more than one ending, etc. But as of now, I can say one thing for certain: It's really, really AU. And not just because of the zombies. I'm screwing around with ages and times and locations so much for this... I almost hate myself for it. Almost. It'll take place in present day, but the ages will be shifted. Mello, Near, and Matt will be the same ages they'd normally be in 2008, but the other three will be a few years younger. I'm thinking Light will only be a year or two older than Mello. L would be 29 right now, technically, but in the story... perhaps only 25? Matsuda would be, accordingly, 26. And... ZOMBIES. Geez.

I want to write a multi-chaptered Matt fic and have a stab at characterizing him. :D

I have nothing interesting to end this with, so... BRAAAAAAIIIINS.

Okay, so I lied just a little. I didn't update yesterday, obviously, but I am now! I'm just... half a day late. But still, it's better than nothing, right? Look at it this way: I'll be able to better reflect on yesterday's events and write about them more... uh, reflectively. Or something. I forgot what my point was halfway through typing that sentence....

• Journaling.
• Be active in a community or two.
• Join an RP.  (Note to self: Don't attempt to create one.  You always get far too absorbed and it never works out anyway.)
• Make icons, layouts.
• Fanfiction.
• Minishop at Gaia that I still have to finish making graphics for...
• Get out of the bedroom.  Even staying downstairs for an extended period of time would be a nice step up.

For my own reference and perhaps for your enjoyment, here is a list of various sites ranging from japanese art sites I like to recommended online communities.