The Symphony to Oblivion

FAnimeCon 2007

Location // Ventura, CA
Time // 7:00PM
Event // None
Day// # - 1

the day begins as I wake up eagerly awaiting going on a trip to Northern California for FanimeCon 2007. So it starts off normally….. Wake up, eat breakfast, run some errands and such, just to kill time and make the time to leave come a little quicker! So the day goes on by, I go and text scsa to see what time he will be arriving. Then as I get bored at home, I go to the mall to kill some time. Go to the EBGames here and hang out with them before I go on vacation. Then as the night progresses, I get a reply from scsa saying that he will not be able to come and pick me up until the next morning around 6am. “well, at least I can try and get some sleep”, I replied to his text. So there goes the night, waiting and waiting to go on my trip.

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Location // Livermore, CA
Time // 6:00AM
Event // Fanime 2007
Day// # 0

So my morning begins waaaay too unexpectedly. I had previously asked my mom last night to wake me up a little earlier than 6am just so that I can get all of my belongings ready. Instead, I get a call from scsa saying that he’s already here. “-___-x;” was my facial expression as I was woken up suddenly as the phone rang >.> 5-10 minutes later I finally make it out to where he had parked. We greet each other again, and all the other stuff that friends do. We then proceed to our wondrous trip.

(Around 1pm; same day)

We arrive at scsa’s hometown of Livermore, CA. It’s quite the nice place to live in, as it appears similar to my hometown down in Southern CA. We go and meet up with several of his friends which are really awesome people to talk to.

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Location // San Jose, CA
Time // 11:55pm
Event // Fanime 2007
Day// # 1

well, my new buddies and I didn’t even go to sleep throughout the night, so I decided that it was time to use my laptop to go online since we were really bored and since my laptop was the only one capable of reaching more wireless access points compared to scsa’s. Lol …. but anyway, we spend the night just doing random things while watching digimon (scsa’s note: Digimon sucks but second season Mimi is cute). Later throughout the night (or morning now I should say rather, michael starts to play Super Swing Gold on the Wii since he likes that game now. Then around 8am that morning we go to the convention center in San Jose to go pick up our badges and go get some breakfast. After we arrive, he takes the honors in showing me around the convention center just so I can get a feel on how/where things are. Then as we’re walking around, we start to get photos of cosplayers! (yay!) After a while of being there we go back to our friend’s place in Livermore to get our luggages ready to take to the hotel room we will be staying in.

As we reach the hotel room later that night, we go in to get ourselves accommodated with the room and set our belongings and then pass out sooner or later. (Finally after 2 long ass days with no sign of sleep whatsoever.)

————————————————————–

Location // San Jose, CA
Time // approx. 6:00AM
Event // Fanime 2007
Day// # 2

I had woken up to the chilling temperatures of the hotel room’s AC. No one else was awake other than me, so I was really bored on not being able to find something to do. Eventually more people start to wake up, but still haven’t talked to one another yet as I am still trying to wake up myself even after writing this (8:30am presently). And now there is some construction going on outside and made us wonder what they were doing…..

Around 1 or 2pm, we are in the Hotel Room playing Super Smash Bros. Melee on my friend’s Gamecube, and began to get owned again (I suck with using a Gamecube controller nowadays) >.> and I was still awaiting the time on when I would go to the Play! Concert.

The time now is about 5:30 and I am in the Karaoke room waiting for me turn to go up. So a few minutes passed by and it was eventually my turn to go up. I had sung Velvet Underworld by Weiss Kreuz. Awesome show if you ask me.

Fast forwarding to approximately 6:30pm the same night, I go into the cafe section of the convention center to once again steal their WiFi Internet.

The time is now 8pm…. And FINALLY can I witness one of the coolest video game symphonies around. Everyone goes into the venue, gets their freebies, and then go to the balcony to get seated. Then around 8:10 the concert begins and greatness is born. The pieces they played were from the Mario, Shenmue, Oblivion, Lair, The Darkness, Halo, Zelda, Chrono Trigger/Chrono Cross, Final Fantasy, and another piece I forget about already.

At approximately 10pm the concert ends and I go outside all happy-like because I really enjoyed it 100 percent. Afterwards I start walking around and eventually get lost somehow (yes I was stupid enough to get lost) so I met this one guy who was also lost, so we walked around together in hopes of finding the convention center… in which we did. I guess we were destined to get lost so that we could keep each other from getting even more lost. Now, around 11pm I finally make my way to the convention center, go up to my room, and begin blogging what you are seeing right now. And now it is time to sleep so I will blog more tomorrow. D:

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Location // San Jose, CA
Time // approx. 11:50PM
Event // Fanime 2007
Day// # 3

Well today, Scsa and I met a friend of mine from the Anime-Expo forums. She was really cool.

Then we went to Sekihiko-san’s panel. Afterwards Scsa and I went walking around a bit more and then went to the Masquerade later on, where we met Lynne again ^^. Afterwards, Scsa and I decided to go to dinner @ a Jack In the Box since we were both starving.

That’s about all that went on day 3. Not too exciting. lol

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Location // San Jose, CA | Livermore, CA
Time // approx. 8:00AM
Event // Fanime 2007
Day// # 4

Well, this morning I had woken up around 4AM due to unknown reasons. Then again around 6AM only to find that Scsa and one other guy were still sleeping. So around 7AM, I finally begin to wake up completely, only to find Scsa reading a manga.

In present-time, which now happens to be 8:30am exactly, I am here writing this out while listening to Megadeth’s ‘A Tout Le Monde (Set Me Free)’ on my PSP since my laptop’s power supply was snapped into pieces somehow last night. But at least I got to fulfill my mission this year… which was to have a picture taken of me “battling” a Sephiroth & Cloud cosplayer. (I was cosplaying as Reno).

The time is now 11:10pm & I am eagerly waiting for tomorrow to arrive so that I can finally go home. So many things have happened in a week’s time frame that even now I am beginning to cry a bit while writing this as I am going to miss my new friends that I have made over the weekend here in Northern California.

Although it was nice to be able to hang out with Scsa and his friends, I really did enjoy their company. I’ll be totally honest when I say this … but I really do like the guy. He is surely a cool person to hang out with once you get to know him.

Another year, another convention attended. Only next year will it keep getting better …

</end of Fanime 2007>

Now Playing —–

Artist // Weiß Kreuz
Album // Die Bleibende Erinnerung
Song // Beautiful Alone

a little note with the words “goodbye” written in blood.

here I am … standing in the darkness.
here I am … surrounded by the night.

it’s the turn of the new year and already I have just about had it with certain people, and am deciding on my own free will to finally break away from them. I’m sorry to say this to certain friends of mine who visit that place, but you know … if only you’d stop treating me like a ghost and shit, this would never happen. so I’d rather just go away and pretend that nothing of this nature never occurred.

the times I’ve spent there were all fun and all at times .. but you know what, it’s over.

1000 times goodbye from teh Turk of Shadows. :d

(this doesn’t affect x111.com people btw xD)

Nintendo Wii and all its greatness :P

well, today I had gone off to the Nintendo Fusion Tour in Los Angeles, CA …. and man, was it a great night! not only did I get to enjoy seeing Relient K live (one of my new favorite bands, now) .. but I also got to test drive the Nintendo Wii!

In case you were wondering what games they had for display … they are::
Wii Sports
Warioware
Excite Truck
(this one shooter game I can’t remember the title of)

now, they did have Zelda: Twilight Princess, but only for media use >__> (which ticked off lots of people)

for the Nintendo DS, they had Elite Beat Agents for play, which is really fun.

the cool part of any event are the freebies that are given away. I got 2 guitar picks (one with the Wii logo, and the Nintendo Fusion Tour logo), these awesome headphones designed for use on EBA (elite beat agents), a disc cleaner … and pins.

I shall uploads pics in a while so just hang on until then.

Randomness of a Dream :: Part One

ok .. so the day started out normal as usual. I wake up, check out the happenings on my laptop, then go downstairs to eat breakfast a few minutes later. as I get ready to leave for work, I turn on the TV for a quick second to see what is showing … and as I turn it on, it begins a “breaking news” broadcast and mentions something about world domination. I look all confused and say to myself “Ok…. oO whatever”. I then head on out to work, only noticing a note on the front door that reads “Hello, I would just like to inform you that this GameStop will explode at (given time) and there is nothing you can do about it. Please have a nice day.” again, I have the oO-like look on my face and I tell my co-workers that since no one is coming into the store, that I might as well leave. then. as I turn around getting ready to go on my way, I feel a powerful gust of wind blowing down onto me and as soon as I look back … . … . .BOOM!! there goes the GameStop. >.>

I then start to roam about the city and all of a sudden I see hordes of people running around screaming their heads off. so then I walk up to a random person and asks them “hey, what in the hell is going on, exactly?” .. they reply by saying “haven’t you heard, all of the GameStops and EB Games stores are blowing up one by one!” so I begin to think to myself if this is what the world domination thing on the TV was referring to earlier. afterwards as the crowd calms down it begins to rain. now, seeing as I am walking about in the soaking rain, I notice my friend sakura sitting on a rock playing around with her umbrella hat. I go up to her and ask her about these happenings, and she just told me to take this umbrella hat of hers to keep myself safe from the rain. I then thanked her as I continued on my way towards who knows what. And as with any new toy I get, I don’t hesitate to play around with it … and I discovered that it has a 20-ft long retractable pole that holds the umbrella portion at the top. then as everything gets quiet, I begin to feel another gust of wind, though much greater than the previous one, and then felt something knock me in the head and realized that the umbrella portion of my new toy was taken away. it was none other than the giant crow from Zelda: Windwaker, though it was 10x it’s normal size, that had taken it away. then the bird makes a quick landing in front of me. he looks down upon me … and that can only mean one thing ….. BATTLE TIME!

(enter ‘Black Mages - The Rocking Grounds [Final Fantasy III]‘ music …)

I quickly jump towards the bird in an attempt to hack away at its facial armor, only to be attacked by its wings followed by massive pecks to the stomach. As I fall to the ground, a shining glow of dark light begins to surround me. it was time to use the limit I learned from out of nowhere, Tri-Attack. I quickly get on my feet, power up the attack, and then send the bird flying into what I like to call oblivion.

*Final Fantasy victory fanfare* (after the battle I just pass out without notice)

The next morning. I begin to wake up a bit only realizing that I have been brought into someone’s shed. I look around all confused……

(end of part 1)

within the depths of loneliness comes a newborn shadow.

Yes, I know that it has probably been a while since I last blogged (and I still need to finish my last entry) .. but I should go out in saying that the Shadow that everyone got to know within these last four years (and counting) .. to say goodbye to it and hello to a new shadow. Now, throughout these past 4 years of being a member of X111.com (among other forums) I have learned a lot in life like being acceptable to others in times of need, or maybe it’s the friendliness that I possess now. whatever is the case. it’s really awesome to see many open-minded people out in the lands of the net who are willing to help with problems we can’t deal with on our own.

As I look back to when I first started coming to the net and more particularly x111.com, I was a young shadow roaming about with no sense of direction and often got so lost to the point of breaking down. As years go by I began to see more people and join communities out there which appeal (some still do). So then I start making friends with some of these people, and that is where x111.com comes in. Now, I did join a then-living community by the name of LunarEB. but it recently went away somewhere to the point of no existence. going back to X111, I have found the best of friends I can always talk to about things. and I have met some AWESOME people there, and I’m really glad to still be here since appearing in 2002.

Fast forwarding to the present, August of 2006 .. A LOT has happened. I am now 20 years old (21 in Dec.), I’m a student at a technical school, and I am a lot more open than I was when I first appeared here 4 years back. I now visit a lot of communities online, making my friend count a lot higher than I expected. Enter AR, my music life, 1st nephew is born (now at 6 months), and many other things I cannot seem to mention at this point in time. But thanks to the many things I have discussed with everyone, be it private or open chat, I have better control on how I should handle myself and many things out there.

people I would love to thank (yes, I’m cheesy)

everyone at X-camp for understanding my feelings towards certain things and always helping when possible.

Ryuji - meeting you at AX was awesome; I’ll never forget that weekend.

Saga No Baka - for being a really awesome friend and understanding how I feel about people at times.

PReaCHeR - upstanding me in every way possible.

Ikawa - much like my friend PReaCHeR, this guy understands everything about me and has helped me tremendously in my times of need. For all that he has done and discussed with me, I truly love him for it.

LegendKiller - a friend of mine I got to know recently. I, too, have shared thoughts with him and such. he’s a good listener and helps out whenever he can.

Zoltrioundz - you know your reasons ..

and to everyone I forgot to mention, I apologize … but I wouldn’t want to make the list REALLY big.
——
And as a little note for all …. thanks for everything. I really do enjoy being with you all.

The newborn shadow within will soon replace the child that once roamed about. let’s just hope I survive the transition…

Anime-Expo 2006

Day 1 (11:59:33 PM PST) July 1st, 2006
Well, I had arrived at Anaheim, CA around 10:30am on July 1st, 2006 … so when I got there, a friend of mine and I decided to stop for breakfast. Also, I had called up a friend of mine to tell him that we arrived and decided to tell Michael, another friend of mine who frequents Anime Reflections, to come and get us so that we could save ourselves the walk. So as Hector and I got there, we went to our hotel room and dropped off our stuff. Afterwards, I get a call by Ryuji, an awesome friend of mine and co-admin of Anime Reflections. It was awesome finally getting to meet this guy since getting to know him in November of 2005, when I had recently rejoined AR, and just so you’d know …. No I did not end up glomping him like I had planned to do so >.>

Afterwards, when we introduced each other and all that stuff, both Ryu and I ran off to the convention center to pick up our badge holders. Quite a long wait it was to just get a simple holder and lanyard, neh? So with that said and done … Rachel, Ben, Hector, Ryu, and myself go and get some dinner at a Red Robin nearby.

Coming back from dinner, we all split up somehow. But first, we go to the 5th floor into the patio area out here to hang out. Afterwards, when a couple of people went separate ways, I decided to go and have a walk around the hotel and then to the convention center to browse about. Ryu and Ben had gone off to a video room while I decided to stay and do things on my laptop for a while.

So now I am here on the Patio area with Ryu and Ben just hanging out since I’m one of the people of the group that has a keycard, and so they’re basically making up for ditching me earlier for the movie, which I didn’t really mind about. It is now 12:07am PST here in Anaheim, CA, Hilton Hotel, Floor 5 hangout area.

~ ShadowTurk signing off (for the moment >__>)

PS .. ryuji is such an AWESOME person to hang out with.

Day 2 (12:22:41 PM PST) July 2nd, 2006
Well, it is day 2 now and Ben, Ryu, and myself are still out here hanging out doing nothing but talking the night away. It’s really nice though because I can use the time to get to know the two of these guys more since I just met them for the first time. And they are really cool people. What we have planned for today is that we go to breakfast eventually, go to more events at the con, and then hangout with some of my friends who work at the EB Games in Ventura, where I come from. So I really don’t know what else is to go on for the day… so I will keep you all informed as to when things go on.
It is now 6:51am PST. Ben had gone off to Michael’s car to charge his phone’s battery, while Ryu and I came back up here to the 5th floor hangout place to, you guessed it, hang out… the both of us have had NO sleep within the past 24-hrs, but I am here typing this on my laptop while my friend here is catching a quick snooze for the while. I, myself don’t know what to do other than to stay here with him, only because he seems to be one of my only other friends at the moment (other including Ben).

10:58pm PST it is now… Ryu and I are once again hanging out in the usual spot on the Hilton. We had recently come back from watching a Showing of the Kamikaze Girls at the Anaheim Convention Center. So we decided to just come up here and rest until we figure out what else to do next, that is… if the both of us don’t go to sleep. Throughout earlier in the day I had chosen to go to a couple of Panels inside the ACC, those panels were the Mick Takeuchi panel, and another one I forget the name of at the moment.
Afterwards I spend the next 7 hours by myself as Rachel, Ben and Ryu decide to wander off somewhere while I was attending the two panels. I go up to the hotel room we are staying in and encounter James. He decides for the both of us to go to enter the Karaoke contest, in which we did. We had practiced a couple of songs from Weiß Kreuz, though one of them did not sound the way we wanted to sound. We decided to change one of the Weiss songs to Gessekai from the band Buck-Tick. I had learned that we had lost in the competition afterwards… but it was really fun in doing Karaoke for the first time.
11:10pm is now the time as I write this… and nothing new seems to be occurring at this moment.

Day 3 (9:28:03 PM PST) July 3rd, 2006
Day 3 of Anime-Expo 2006 has come and is almost near ending as I am currently writing this at 9:30pm PST now. During this day of Con, I have become feeling more sentimental towards people unlike any other time throughout the years. This year has been so much more of a blast compared to last year’s AX since I really didn’t have any friends to hang out with. But this year, even though MY group of friends (excluding Lee & James; noting AR members) was small, it has been such an honor in hanging out with the 3 other attendees of the Anime-Reflections forums.
As I progress throughout the day though, I start to wonder … I love the 3 people in my group to death; Ben is a weird, but awesome person to call a friend, an energetic guy who can usually be of help when needed, and just an overall cool dude. Rachel… well, she reminds me of my sister at times whenever she bursts out laughing.  And last but definitely not least, there is Ryu. Being the one I’ve wanted to meet and hang out with for quite a while now. Quite frankly, just being around him is what made my weekend an awesome one here at Anime-Expo. Had he not attended AX this year I wouldn’t know if I’d be able to enjoy myself for the weekend? I’m just glad that he did attend.
What we had done today (being Hector, Ben, Ryu, & myself) was that we went to breakfast at Carl’s Jr. early in the morning to start ourselves off. Then afterwards, we went back into the hotel Lobby and decided to hang about while. Ryu and I then decided to walk over to Target to get himself a blanket, and so that I could get myself foot-care. Then as we leave Target, the both of us ponder getting pizza for the 4 of us to eat. About an hour later, after we had finished eating the pizza, we go and check out the Console Room in the Hilton.
Skipping a lot of hours later, Ryu and I decide to go to the Sheraton Hotel to leech off of their wifi internet to get in touch with the AR irc channel. After talking to the people in there it was time to go to sleep.

Day 4 (4:42:43 PM PST) July 4th, 2006
Well, Anime-Expo 2006 is now officially over. And I should just say that this year has been a total blast mainly because I had met some AWESOME people along the way. I was really pleased to have made it to this year’s AX because of the members of AR (Anime-Reflections) that had attended. The day had started when Ben had woken up around the early morning so that he could catch the shuttle to the airport and go back home. I was kinda sad when I noticed he was gone when I had awakened because I wanted to say goodbye to him. t.t ah well. There’s always the next year. Afterwards, when I noticed that Ryu had awakened, he went down the the lobby shuttle place to see if he could book an earlier flight back home. In which he did. Then as we parted, I succeeded in holding back to sobbing as we said our goodbyes and such. I just haven’t been the same all day since I kept thinking about it so much.

But for all of you to know, Anime-Expo 2006 was a really fun experience for me, especially with all of the people I will call my friends for life who came and kept me good company. I love you all to the ends of my heart and I really hope it stays that way forever.

Welcome, to the Gates of Tomorrow

well, ever since I’ve taken the helm of managing a group of Anime-Expo attendees (being friends of mine personally or those of AR), I’ve been somewhat of a different person of sorts suddenly taking charge of something like this …. well Anime-Expo is 11 days away (Pacific Time) and I am eagerly awaiting this chance to hang out with my buds from AR.

but there is one thing that’s been on my mind a LOT lately … and that is a visit from a friend who’s going to anime-expo with me. now, before I go further, I just want to point out that I seemed to have fallen for this person for quite a while now. I don’t even know what’s running through my head anymore …. I just hope it’s nothing I will regret doing later on.

and with the visit in mind. I just hope things go well when I talk to him about how I feel and such. just to get the stress away from holding me to the ground.

I just want someone to hold in my arms whenever needed, and I hope this is the one.

happy day to you all.