Time of Eve

Time of Eve is a 6 episode anime set in a time where androids are a household commodity. One day, Rikuo discovers his android, Sammy has taken a detour in her daily activities and decides to check the place out. It ends up being a cafe called, Time of Eve, where their only rule is to not discriminate between humans and droids. There are the themes of humanity vs. technology and the discrimination of droids. "Ignorant" youth who treat their androids like people are called "android-holics". But, the best part is the cafe. In the cafe, you really can't tell humans and androids apart. The androids turn off their halos and if someone leaves, you can't open the door for a few minutes so if an android does leave and their halo turns back on, there's no way of knowing. So far, only 2 episodes are being shown on Crunchyroll, but so far so good. Can't wait to see how everything unfolds between Rikuo and his droid and his droid-o-phobic friend.

Henry Fool & Fay Grim

8/10 for both. Too lazy to type out a review but amazing plot and acting. Good use of angles, especially in the sequel. They turned a story about a mysterious man and his influence on others, specifically on Simon, who he inspired to become a Nobel Prize winning poet, into a gripping tale of espionage in the sequel. Very interesting. Parker Posey is still cool. Oh and nice typography in the opening credits.

The Girl Who Leapt Through Time

Loosely based on the novel, The Girl Who Leapt Through Time is about a young girl named Konno Makoto who discovers the ability of time leaping. Rather than using it for anything significant or worldly she spends her time making her daily life what she wants it to be by going back in time to do such things like ace a quiz or eat the pudding her sister ate. Later she finds that her choices create a string of events and consequences. She receives advice from her aunt, Aunt Witch, that if she must be going back in time and is happy that there must be someone else that is suffering and this theme sort of plays throughout.

Like any other movie on time travel I was left with questions and analyzing what I thought were loopholes and inconsistencies. In the end, I just decided to let it be what it is, and that is a great movie. It intertwines excitement, comedy, romance, and most importantly, science. It's like the geeky love story of the 21st century. Fortunately, the love story was not sappy at all. It was very raw, delightful, and hopeful. One blatant message to take away from this movie is: Time waits for no one.

They are starting to show this movie in theaters in the US so I recommend catching it if it comes to your area. The animation is amazing. Simplistic people moving in detailed backgrounds.

Photo Project #1 - 10 words - SF

Objective: take a picture for every word in a list of 10 words. List provided by other person.

We pretty much walked around the park for two hours. I was sad because about 45 minutes in my card crashed or something and I lost some pictures... including one that I REALLY wanted to use for twenty-something. Oh well. I just shot with my 50mm on the d70. It was way too foggy to bring out our film cameras. We were originally planning on using some expired slide film but it was 100 speed. This was really good practice & tons o' fun. After I was done taking pix I said I didn't even really have anything for my words, but as I was uploading them I realized that I had stuff that worked. So ta da!

Bucket List

1. visit every continent
2. backpack in Europe
3. go to Tokyo & the Akihabara district
4. tour Southeast Asia
5. walk the trail to Mordor in New Zealand
6. see the Northern Lights in Alaska
7. visit the old 7 wonders of the world
8. skydive
9. spelunk
10. learn how to scuba dive
11. learn how to surf
12. publish a book
13. drive across the US
14. visit all 50 states
15. go on a safari
16. ride a hot air balloon
17. murder mystery dinner
18. ride a paddle boat
19. learn how to screen print
20. visit all of the Hawaiian islands

I'll keep building on this list as things come to me.

Tadaima!

I'm home from my 1 week Mexican Cruise! I still feel like I'm on the ship... I'm sitting in my computer chair but it's like I'm rocking back and forth. Too tired to blog in detail but here are a few pix I liked from the trip. More to come manana! Click on the panoramic to see a bigger one... it's composed of 6 pix.

Edit:

Mexico was a lot o' fun. Thanks again to the parentals for funding this vacay! <3

Day 1 & 2 - out at sea. had a few drinks. lost money in the casino.

Day 3 - Cabo San Lucas
Almost yacked while tendering to the pier. Those little boats are rocky & it does not help when you are a wee bit hungover. Walked around & checked out the shops & the mall. Ate at a restaurant which took the waiter over 30 minutes and reminding 3 times to bring me a Coke. He let me have it for free after that :] If I could do Day 3 over I'd definitely hit the beach and the beach only. Shopping was way too expensive.

Day 4 - Mazatlan
Took a Trolley Tour which brought us to the Historical Center where we got to check out the market & cathedral. Then, we caught the Cliff Divers. So crazy... they jump so many stories into what looked like shallow water filled with rocks but they do it 60 times a day so I guess it's not so scary to them. Then, last stop, the Golden Zone. More shops & we ate at The Shrimp Factory. Mazatlan is known for their shrimp catching. It's also the home to Pacifico & Tecate.

Day 5 - Puerto Vallarta
We did the Jungle Tour which is up a mountain outside of PV. It's also where they filmed Predator. It was about a 40 minute drive from the pier and a 40 minute hike to go from the restaurant, up the mountain, & back down to the restaurant. The restaurant is over a river which we were allowed to swim in. The water was SO cold but SO refreshing. We had a lot of extra time afterwards to check out the city/beach which we should've done but my stomach was feeling iffy & queezy from the bus ride & the quesadilla. Needless to say, when we got back to the ship, I was in bed all day & night.

Day 6 & 7 - Out at sea
More drinking, eating, & sleeping. Karaoke night was fun. There was this cute little Venezualan girl who dedicated "Sweet Carolina" to her husband. She could not sing for sh*t but she got the crowd going by dancing around the room and yelling to her hearts content. The comedy show was semi-funny. I believe the comedian's name is Darryl Jones. The jokes he had about the cruise ship and the tv channels was funny. But, the racial jokes were so played out. How many times do we have to hear about how white people talk to their kids like adults & how non-white parents spank their kids? So played out it's not even funny anymore.

My uncle and I sat with 6 other people for dinner time. They were all very nice and had kids all my age which was a bit awkward :D I'd say a majority of the cruise attendees were over 30 and those that were my age all had their significant other's along or were newlyweds. And EVERYONE assumed my uncle and I were married. Bleh! It got to the point where we'd introduce ourselves and straight up say, "She's my neice" or "He's my uncle". It was fun though. I am still feeling like I'm rocking away on that ship. I hope it goes away soon.

ALL pix are up!

Next stop: LAS VEGAS!

N2020 w/ 50mm lens

I just got the best early bday present... well, it's right up there with my parents deciding to pay for my Mexico cruise as my gift :D... I just got this amazing N2020 SLR with a 50mm lens AF. Best part is it attaches to my D70! And I've been wanting this lens for a while now so hurrah! The cool thing about the N2020 is that instead of doing the +/- feature for over/underexposure, it just tells you what shutter speed you should be on depending on what your aperture is. Also, for the focus, there are arrows and red lights and you just focus, focus, focus 'til you get the green light. Adrian gave me a quick tutorial on all the features and in that 10 minutes I feel like I learned more about cameras than I have in the so many years I've been trying to learn photography. hahaha.

Here are some quick shots:



Yesterday was a great day. Got this camera. Got a mustache. Went to Daiso for the first time! Had really good lechon kawali (kawawa!). Had amaaaaaazing, mouth-watering Fondant Au Chocolat from Beard Papa. Went on a long photo excursion in downtown (will post pix hopefully tonight). And managed a night of King's Cup without drinking a lick o' liquor. Mmmm... just thinking about that Fondant. Words cannot even describe how delicious it was.

Quick update on Xam'd. Finished watching all 9 episodes. It is getting very interesting. Can't wait to see how the story develops. I'm kind of seeing how this is going to be a theme of what does it mean to be human and who are we to judge who lives and doesn't.

Some of my fave pix from yesterday w/ the 50mm (rest can be found HERE):

Most of my pix from the actual photo excursion are on my Pentax & I haven't finished the roll yet. I'm going to make it a thing to go on photo excursions once a week. Hopefully it works out.

Time to pack for the cruise!