Kahori’s Neighborhood

already watch Arashi performance at FNS Kohaku 2009
just few hours ago and its already available
sugoii Arashi fans

really love them in Tuxedo
especially Aiba-chan
Kakkoii.... ^_^
Others also looks awesome
Matsujun got really lovely hair

prefer this performance than last year FNS
One Love sounds weird
but they not disappointed their fans with Ashita no Kioku and Fuyu ga Hajimaru yo ()
i don't know much about the second song but they really had fun singing this song

got the video from zomboid and also from ArashiNino (1) & (2)

must thanks and credit them if taking video. thanks also for their hardwork

patiently waiting for other performance in FNS
i really love last year performance by Koda Kumi, Aoyama Thelma & Ayaka
so sweet

i think this is the latest performance that i watch after My Girl at Music Station
always spend time watching anime only.
ahakss.... ^_^

Arashi-sama always look awesome in suit or Tuxedo

i know most of NEWS and KAT-TUN fans were crazy about Yamato Nadeshiko Shichi Henge dorama. first when i know about it, i just like "oo... great". i'm too lazy to read the synopsis about the whole story.

later when i found out that this drama based on manga & anime, its anime also looks like fun, directly seek for the anime.
what can i say is, totally hilarious. BAKA!!!!

Sunako-chan really funny, wierdo, & her mission only want to kill Kyouhei.hehehe..
always having nosebleed when saw beautiful people. also no interest to change. really kakoii when she's going crazy!!
wonder how Kame will act as Ryouhei
waiting to watch Uchi as Takenaga (first time to watch Uchi in drama)
will Tegoshi become cute as Yukinojo
and who will act as Ranmaru, hope he will have playboy feelings

i know that they will not add all character in the manga into drama,but what if there will still have that 2 stupid group that love Kyouhei so much.
that goth-loli group and ganguro group.
i think that goth-loli group is more annoying than ganguro group with their weird hand gestures.

the anime was ok but i do not fan of its illustration (is it the right sentence)
but love their action when they really scared
still watching the anime. will look forward for its manga.

aa..... how i miss soo much with Ouran High School Host Club.
i really love Ouran. i think i of the most craziest anime ever. Baka Tamaki-senpai
wonder when they will make a drama based on this comic.

who is suitable to act as Haruhi. not like a girl, and not look like a guy either.
i think many people want Horikita Maki after Hana Kimi but nowadays, she's more looks like matured women than cute girls.

cute Haruhi as a guy

cute haruhi as a girl

i think the most important thing is who is the most actor for Tamaki-senpai roles.
he is the most BAKA OJISAMA on earth. but he's totally lovely, and Baka also.

Baka time Tamaki-senpai

then, goes to Hiitachin brother. Hikaru & Kaoru. which twins actor that suitable for these part. i only know 2 pairs of twins acted in ant Jdoramas, Saito Keita & Saito Shota, and also Takagi Manpei & Takagi Shinpei. else, maybe i'm not familiar
and what if Chiinen-kun acted as Honey-senpai. both are too cute. but Chiinen looks too young. but Honey-senpai also. ahaks... ^_^

Honey-senpai, Hikaru& Kaoru, & Haruhi in baka mode.

cute senpai at the age of 17-18

evil twins

for Kyoya-senpai & Mori-senpai, it think it is easier to seek for an actor but wonder who will look great as mysterious Mori-senpai & Perfect-and-Money-Lovers Kyoya-senpai.
will look forward for it. ^_^

Mori-senpai in "refreshing mode"

money-maker Kyoya-senpai

hope Yamato Nadeshiko Shichi Henge will be huge. waiting for scary and weirdo Sunako-chan.
watching this anime really heal my pain of spending too much time reading about WiFi, WiMAX, CRDF, WiWi, MIMOS and others as my first assignment after 2 days of practical training.

キタ━(ﾟ∀ﾟ)━！!!
Amid dreading the horrible impending doom and busyness that awaits me in my last stretch of presentations, papers and finals for the next two weeks, this announcement was like a ray of divine light in my life!  I cannot express how incredibly happy this makes me...I plan on pre-ordering it as soon as possible!  I can't wait to hear what they've been up to all these past months!

I usually don't go shopping during Thanksgiving sale weekend because the crowds are murderous and I normally spend the holiday at home with my family, but this year I finish the semester so early it wasn't worth the trip back (since I would come back and then leave again in a week for X-mas break) so I've just stayed put in my apartment.  I went out on the dreaded Friday, but the crowds weren't so bad, probably because the rainy, windy weather put some people off.  I also popped out again today to get a few things I had my eye on yesterday...I ended up spending yesterday mostly on clothes, today on shoes.  Despite the dismal conditions outside, I managed to get some really awesome deals.  I bought some dressy collared shirts, a cute Silence & Noise strapless dress in blue, a pretty black sequined tank, and a pencil skirt that was almost 70% down from the original price.  Oh, and I replaced my favourite little clutch-sized umbrella that broke while I was in Japan.  I was excited to see they had it in silver this year, so I went for that instead of getting the black w/ polka dots like I had before. : )

I finally got a few pairs of shoes I'd be looking at for a while but hadn't been willing to take the plunge on because of the price.  Despite things being reduced, I try not to fall for that alone and always consider whether the final price I pay is really worth it for the item.  I'd been wanting to get some more adventurous, stylish shoes for going out in, so when I saw the deals on these gorgeous booties I grabbed them right away.  I seriously waited to the last minute on these.  They've been hot this season and selling like crazy, so I barely managed to get my size while they were still available.  I also got these super cute, versatile heels 50% off (I looove the 80's flair...I adore anything glam ^^).  And I didn't pay more than $65 for any of them. :D

Abi

Savior 27

Auteri

I've been feeling so tired this week and I don't even know why...I'm just fed up and want a vacation for real.  I can't bring myself to focus on work at all, so I've been wasting most of my time going online, watching some stand-up comedy, and basically spacing out.  This always happens every year around this time when it's close to the holidays and the end of the semester.  Hopefully I'll manage to pull myself together enough to do a decent job on my next paper about mental illness that's due next week. -_-;

By the way, something disconcerting I've become more aware of recently is how many people find tattoos objectionable.  Of course most people from older generations who aren't used to it aren't too enthusiastic about them, but increasingly I've come across a lot of people from younger generations, even some my own age, that find them totally unappealing.  I get that not everyone finds them attractive, and that's perfectly understandable, but to go as far as saying they're disgusting or grotesque is very extreme and I found the fact that some people say such things pretty disturbing and shocking.  I suppose it's because within the social circles and scenes I'm part of tattoos are pretty common and considered a beautiful way of expressing oneself and embellishing one's body.  I mean, most of my friends and I find them very attractive when done in a nice way.  I think really cliche tattoos just picked out of a book without thinking much about it can be ugly and stupid, but if you get a tattoo that means something special to you done by a skilled artist, then it's a very beautiful thing.  I don't know, that sort of negative sentiment about them really threw me off because I usually think of tattoos as enhancing a person, not negating their other positive physical features and general attractiveness.  The same can be said of piercings, though I'm personally more picky about them.

Then again, I don't consider my values or preferences on most things anywhere near mainstream sensibilities, so I guess it's to be expected that I can't relate much.  But that does make it harder to carry on those sorts of conversations with the average person, especially in this country, because we generally have very little in common.

First, we're happy to announce that the team has identified and fixed the issue with the YouTube conduit; you can now find and add videos from YouTube to your library and posts. As always, thanks for your patience!

The other news we have today is about a new addition to the Six Apart family: TypePad Micro, a new free level of TypePad that is streamlined for microblogging. We see a new form of blogging emerging that lives between the quick status updates of Twitter and Facebook and the long-form posts of "classic" blogging; TypePad Micro is designed to meet that need. You can read more about TypePad Micro in Chris Alden's post on the Everything TypePad blog.

TypePad Micro

4 comments

A lot of the new capabilities we've added to TypePad this year were actually inspired by some of the best things about Vox: favoriting, member profiles, a dashboard to follow other bloggers, and easy ways to post content from other social media sites. But the things that make Vox different from TypePad are still there: Vox has always been -- and still is -- the best place for "friends and family" blogging, where you're in control over who sees what. TypePad, on the other hand, is built for the blogger who wants, no, craves, attention.

Do you have a passion or interest you want to share with people beyond your Vox neighborhood? If so, we'd love it if you tried out TypePad Micro. Maybe you've always wanted to start that obsessive blog that's just about waffle restaurants. Or want a place to share videos of your favorite band (Jonas Brothers, anyone? Anyone? ...). TypePad Micro's great for those topic-specific blogs. Take it for a spin and let us know what you think.

On the Vox front, our designers are working on some cool new themes (coming soon!). We'd also love to hear your thoughts about where we should take Vox in the coming year. What are the key things you'd like to see for Vox? If you've had a chance to use TypePad this year, what are the features there that we should bring over to Vox? And, if you're thinking big thoughts, how could we connect the Vox and TypePad communities in order to bring together bloggers and their shared passions? Your feedback is really important to us, so please leave a comment here, or shoot me a message.

And again, thanks for your patience as we found and fixed the YouTube bug!

~ daisy

i think my sister  really got something
she complaining something about this sensei and her bad services to my mom
pretend not to listen but kind of understand about it

then, she ask me...
i act dumb
keep asking me "do you hear anything?"
i'm just like "what???" acted dumb again
"i know you understand it
"ooo.... really. THAT THINGS!!!!" i asked again
"yup"
"really...omedetou"

if it is true, hope can create more arashi fans...
hehe...
if it is true, new people in our family next august 2010.
same month as my mom and Matsujun.
i realize that my mom just a day after Matsujun with 33 years differences

002xqx5x

Aiba-chan say yay to me

As many of you have noticed, the YouTube Conduit is not working. I am so sorry about this; I know how frustrating it is.

The team is looking into how to get this fixed and I will update you as soon as I hear something. In the meantime, not all is lost... There is a work-around for posting videos.

When you're in the Compose Screen, just click on "embed." Ignore the fact that it says "Widget" before everything because you can definitely use this to embed videos as well. You'll just need to input the embed code from the video, enter a title (if you want) and hit OK.

It might not show up perfectly in your compose screen, but when you hit "Save," your video should appear just the way you wanted it to.

Hopefully this will allow you to keep posting videos while we figure out what's happening on our end.

As always, thanks for your patience.

~daisy

Haah, the last few weeks have been pretty crazy...I've been in the process of preparing applications, making sure recommendations are done on time, and writing a ton of papers.  So many deadlines to deal with...it's rather stressful. >_<  But now I'm almost entirely ready to hand in my application, which hopefully if I get in will mean I'll be heading back to Japan for another year, perhaps longer.  I'm really keepin' my fingers crossed on that, cause I know for sure that Japan is the place for me, at least at this point in my life, so I'm determined to find some kind of work there.  If all else fails, the only other place I'd want to be is NYC, or maybe the UK.  It's a tough world out there right now though, so naturally I'm a bit nervous about the prospects.

On another note, we watched the very interesting documentary 'Paris is Burning' in my gender class last week.  It's about drag, ball culture, and the gay community of 1980's New York.  It obviously deals with issues of gender and sexuality, but also poverty, racial discrimination, and inequality.  It's a really touching look at how these people dealt with the prejudice and hardship they faced in their lives by creating the balls and "voguing" as a way to express themselves and be who they wanted to be, imagine they could achieve all that they wanted, even if only for a little while.  I think the idea that fame lives within, that despite the limitations of the real world you can feel just as fabulous as any celebrity without the money or having people know who you are is something that can resonate with a lot of people.  It's also extremely interesting to see how certain aspects of gay subculture worked their way into the mainstream (e.g. Madonna's 'Vogue') and now influence the fashion industry that the voguers at the balls admired and emulated.

I know it's been said before, but I really do believe that the LGBT movement and women's rights are among the most vital issues of our time.  Fighting to improve women's rights would also do so much to help alleviate poverty all over the world, and finally surpassing the hurdle of equality for all genders and sexualities would help push many other equality movements as well.  It's so sad and hard to understand how people can be so close-minded, intolerant, and downright despicable to other human beings sometimes, especially when it's a dispute over something like who we love.

Moving to the music front, I can't stop listening to 'LORELEI' by DELUHI!  I love how they mix in that arabseque acoustic solo and the Middle Eastern influenced sounds...it's really beautiful and goes surprisingly well with their metal style.  Although incorporating that kind of aesthetic has been done to an extent by various groups before, I think DELUHI is the only one so far to continue drawing the theme through their music more consistently, rather than it being just a phase.

In other news, the Lady Gaga's video for 'Bad Romance' is out and causing quite a stir.  It certainly has some impressive visuals and outrageous fashion...it could take a while to deconstruct all of what's going on here.  I like how she injects intelligence, serious creative direction, attention to visual elements, and avant-garde style into the cesspool of mainstream pop.  She also has good sensibilities, is level-headed, and represents values and a female presence I find far more relatable and real than the sugary, vapid plasticness of most other normative women in pop.  Although she works in pop, she does have a sort of rockstar-ish, dirty and tough atmosphere that's very appealing.  People always give dance, electronic, and pop music a bad rap, but I don't think that comes from a problem with the medium itself, but rather is the result of misinterpretation, lack of knowledge, and the uninspired way it's used by some artists.

Across the pond, Patrick Wolf has put out a video for 'Damaris' off his album "The Bachelor" that was released just this summer.  It's quite surprising, although the concept and presentation is fairly simple, because most of his music videos thus far have been either solitary or with groups of dancers/characters, but never featured such an intimate two person relationship.  The parallel between Patrick alone at the grave and the scene with the two of them lying together in white was particularly beautiful and well done.  It's at once sweet but heartbreaking, and we get to see yet another vulnerable side of Patrick that's very different from the other two videos from this album.  In 'Vulture' there was vulnerability in a physical sense, while 'Hard Times' focused more on strength and overcoming difficulties.  Though his work has always been eclectic, I was quite happy to see him bring a bit of the traditional English aesthetic back into his videos visually, because I will always be enamored of his 'Wind in the Wires' period with all that great imagery from Cornwell.  The video for 'Damaris' also has a definite mythical quality to it that goes perfectly with lyrics.  I can't say it's my favourite video by him, but it's certainly another wonderful addition to his body of work.

OH what is this?  A non-Japanese review?  Yes, in fact.  I should be reviewing AIC, tbh.  But I just got my grubby hands on this new album that again, I didn't realize was even out, lol.  These guys are from Finland, but pretty much sing in English, which makes them unique among my Finnish loves.  I generally like my Finnish bands to sing in Finnish.  I have a sort of...love/hate relationship with Sonata Arctica though.  When they're good, they're really good, but when they're bad, they're epically annoying.  So Idk.  Let's see how this one rubs me.

The Days of Grays

Sonata Arctica
The Days of Grays
Genre: metal, power metal
Release Date: 09-16-09
Language: English
Label/Distributor: Nuclear Blast
Tracks: 13

01. Everything Fades to Gray (Instrumental
02. Deathaura
03. The Last Amazing Grays
04. Flag in the Ground
05. Breathing
06. Zeroes
07. The Dead Skin
08. Juliet
09. No Dream Can Heal a Broken Heart
10. As If the World Wasn't Ending
11.The Truth Is out There
12.Everything Fades to Gray (Full Version)
13.In The Dark

The cover is certainly awesome.  It would get five stars only for that if that's how I was judging things.  Everything Fades to Gray (Inst.) is the first track.  Starts very ominously with a swelling string section, then some piano and it moseys on for about 3 minutes before segueing into Deathaura.  Which, begins almost the same way, but gets quickly heavier, and oh, this is a surprise, a woman starts singing.  According to the Wiki article this song is broken into "scenes", but I can't say I really feel that, though there is a brief tempo change around 4-smth, and then again some 30 seconds later.  The women come back in at that point too.  Typical Sonata song, really, in spite of the extras.  The Last Amazing Grays is next.  It starts out suitably heavy, but ends up more melodic.  I like the crunchy riffs mixed with strings about a minute from the end.  From there we go to Flag in the Ground.  The beginning is a bit Celtic in flavor and the rest is fairly epic, but nothing special.  Breathing starts out quietly, turns into a ballad.  Fortunately it's short, I don't really like their ballads all that much.  Zeroes starts out kinda screamy and is less stringy than the rest of the album so far.  I like the emphasis on the machine-gun drums in parts.  Probably my favorite song so far.  The Dead Skin comes up next.  I like the contrast between the heavy rhythm and the piano at the start.  It continues the darker, heavier vibe of the previous song, with the exception of the chorus parts.  I'm all for the yelly parts, lol.  And there's even a tiny bass solo about a minute from the end.  Juliet starts with a similarly pounding rhythm section and vocals that are noticeably accented.  It gets ballady after that, or rather has a ballady section before marching back into metal territory.  It basically keeps that switcheroo up for the entire song and works pretty well.  No Dream Can Heal A Broken Heart is next.  Harpsichord or a mandolin starts this one out, along with some nice bass.  Later on the female vocalist comes in again.  This is a short one, but it's effective and continues the streak of goodness that started with Zeroes.  As If the World Wasn't Ending follows up with a soft keyboard intro and singing.  It jumps into power ballad territory about a minute after.  It's better than the first ballad song and just as short.  The Truth is Out There is kind of a lolarious title, but the song kinda goes back to the first half of the album.  Everything Fades to Gray is probably a continuation of the starting track, but it's a bit disappointing.  In The Dark is some sort of bonus track, and it's another one those power ballad things, albeit much longer than the other two, and well, not terrible.  It's got a nice rhythm breakdown two minutes or so before the end.

To be honest I was starting to get bored right up until Zeroes, but then the next five songs were truly glorious.  Dark, heavy, great musical atmosphere, the kinda stuff I really like from them.  Unfortunately it backslid a bit with the 11th track and I didn't feel like the final track did anything to improve on the instrumental.  In fact, it was probably more boring.  The bonus track helped dull this a bit, but overall, I can't really say this is an amazing album.  Though about five songs are, lol. 

FINAL WORD: good, but also typical.  ★★★☆☆

_______________________________________________________

Key:

★★★★★ = Excellent, flawless, perfecto
★★★★☆ = Very good, has some minor flaws
★★★☆☆ = Good, maybe a few boring moments, but overall enjoyable
★★☆☆☆ = Fair, bad outweighs the good
★☆☆☆☆ = Poor, possibly offensive to your ears