The Winter Court of the Insane, Philosophical Ladybug

Christmas was basically very nice. I did manage to capture the feel of a Christmas from my childhood, which I had so desperately longed to do. It made me very happy. I also discovered cutting many dolls and figures out of their packaging can really hurt the thumb. My skin is dry and it cracked a lot there.

One of my favorite gifts is the Encanto doll set I've been wanting for a year! I was so thrilled Azalea542 got it for me! I have them set up on a metal tray right near my bed. They can stand on their own, which is so cool. I also got the Bruno and Dolores dolls so I'd have all the released dolls. I hope they will make the other characters too.

Another lovely gift was a gift card from Ladyamberjo so I could get Sylveon. I was sick of missing out on the Eevee family plushies at Build-a-Bear and I wanted to grab her since she's a favorite. That outing was a time. Almost everything that could go wrong on that outing did. Thankfully, we managed to return with Sylveon or it would have all been pointless. It started precipitating. I objected. Dad insisted we keep going, for some reason. We had to stop and get something from my sister. We had to get gas and had a hard time getting the locked gas cap off. We got stuck in a ditch for which there was no warning sign posted. People were very kind and helped us get out, but it took an hour or more. When we finally got to the mall, some mysterious thing had gone wrong and the store was temporarily closed?! I waited a bit, left in discouragement, then tried calling before leaving the parking lot. They were open again, so I went back for Sylveon. There was already a line forming, so I had to wait a bit more. Driving home was a nightmare as the precipitation continued. But at last we made it!

I got some more Eevees and watched The Rings of Power. I loved it and named Eevees Merry and Pippin. ThickerThanLove sent me the Lord of the Rings bear from Build-a-Bear, squeee! He looks like Frodo, with brown curly fur and blue eyes. I need something to name Sam next.

I am still furious at Nintendo cutting off eShop access to 3DS and 2DS tomorrow. I spent most of this past week looking for things to snap up. There was a big sale on Capcom games, for some awesome reason. I got Mega Man Legacy Collection. Mega Man games are hard. I can't jump on the bad guys and they swarm me really fast. I can't blast them all. I'm really happy to have the games, though. I'll figure it out. I was disappointed I couldn't seem to find anything else. I already got most of the awesome stuff I could afford in the months prior. Then I finally thought to look up Phoenix Wright. Those games were also on sale, for an incredible $2.99 each! Even the trilogy set! After spending much more than I really intended or wanted to (especially on DLC), I have many Phoenix games. I wasn't going to get Apollo Justice, but NinetalesUK finally convinced me I should. If I happen to take to him and the other characters from his games, I probably would be upset to not have the first game with them. I am notorious for balking at things and then loving them when I finally try them. For $2.99, I figured I'd better get it.

I got Investigations for the iPhone, since that was the only way to get it. (Yes, I have an iPhone.) But apparently I will only get the first case and have to drop a lot more to get the rest. I don't know when that will be, since I've already spent a lot. I'm enjoying the first case. Miles is still my favorite; playing as him is wonderful.

I still wish someone could use Radley's sprites from Over the Nexus to make a video game with him. I wish I could do that. I have no skills and would have to learn.

I got my dad's HP laptop working again and downloaded Steam onto it. Then I got The Disney Afternoon Collection, which was on sale for $5. I have always wanted to play those games. Darkwing is hard like Mega Man. The Chip and Dale games are the easiest. I am enjoying them all, even though I'm having trouble getting very far in them. I'll figure it out.

I had plans to get the Leafeon plush at Build-a-Bear, even though I'd have to do the online bundle with unnecessary clothes. I still want to try to make it work even after needing to snap up all that Nintendo stuff before it's gone. I have tried for days to convince my brain it is foolish. My brain will not listen. It's the only way to get him. I'm hoping I can re-sell the clothes, at least the sleeper. I might like the cape enough to keep it, but the onesie seems very silly. I don't want to cover up all that beautiful fur. If he hasn't sold out yet, I plan to order him tonight. He will make a lovely Easter gift. I'm tired of missing out on the Build-a-Bears. I wish I'd got him and Glaceon when they were briefly in physical stores last year, and Umbreon when he was online again briefly.

Some family members wanted me and Dad to get on their Verizon phone plan with them and we'd get iPhones. Mine was free! It's 13. The camera is glorious and I've taken videos of the kitty. The space is also glorious. I have 128GB! And there's not a lot of bloatware. It looks like I can delete whatever I want to, too. I like using the iPhone as a gaming device, mostly. I see both pros and cons of it. It's much harder to type on; if I need to correct a mistake, I can't even go right to the mistake. I have to erase the whole word! There's no headphone jack. Clearing caches is much harder. Apparently I'm supposed to hit offload app, but the description sounded much more complicated than a simple clearing of the cache. It sounded like I would have to redownload the app any time I clicked offload! Some of those apps are big. I don't have time to keep redownloading them! I got my dad's Motorola Android phone since he didn't need it anymore. It has 64GB, which is also good. I like to use it for most other Internet activities since Google devices are easier to manage in a lot of ways. Two of my tablets have been dying a lot, leaving me with the Amazon Fire tablet and these phones. I am happy to have them all.

I found someone called ZakuraRain who will do beautiful pictures for only $3, $6 if it's colored! They call them doodles, but they're definitely higher quality than mere doodles. I've got four pictures from them so far.

Fanfiction writing is slow at times, but still going on. I'm writing some enjoyable Kalin and Radley stories. Sometimes inspiration flows.

I also finally put the collars and lapels on the Kalin and Radley plushies' coat and jacket. I need to take pictures. I was going to get silver snaps for Radley, but I couldn't find the right kind and then I wondered if even the lightweight duster kind would weigh the light material down a lot.

For the last several weeks, I've known that MoonlightTyger would be coming out here for a day trip to a favorite theme park. I was invited to come with her and her sister and her friend, but wasn't sure until a few days ago that it would work out. And me being me, I stayed skeptical still worrying it wouldn't work out right up to the end and finally allowed myself to get excited the night before.

The rides to and from were very fun. We all have a lot of common interests, so it was neat talking about them and listening to the music they had brought. It took less time driving than I thought it would too, only about an hour instead of closer to ninety minutes! That was great for arrival times, but I was sad when it was time to say Goodbye so soon!

I've honestly never been to a theme park. The closest I've ever come is the state fair a couple of times and some carnivals for various holidays. It was a pretty amazing experience! It was all decked out for Halloween with hanging pumpkins and Jack-O-Lanterns and pretty lights and silly fake gravestones everywhere. I get motion-sick on almost any rides and sometimes still in the car, so I knew coasters were not a good idea. But my main deal was wanting to go in haunted houses, since due to Dad being a chronic Halloween Grinch, that's also something I've never done. And I kind of hoped I might find something awesome on the midway, since I know licensed character plushies turn up at the games on those.

I saw the licensed character booth on our way in, with Pokemon and Mario characters. I immediately wanted a big Daisy I saw hanging there. Ironically, I don't think I've ever played a game with her, except maybe Mario Party. But I love her personality, and of course I'm tickled her name is Daisy. We decided to do the attractions first.

There were several haunted attractions and I chose a couple that sounded creepy but not uncomfortable. Like one I rejected said it featured the devil. No. So MoonlightTyger and I tried a nice mansion. There was a hallway with those silly, creepy pictures that look normal and change to skeletons or zombies, lol. Then there were various freaky rooms. My favorite was a library with a fireplace and a kitty. At first it looked like a dead end, but MoonlightTyger finally saw the dark hallway to go down. There was eventually a mad scientist and a weird elevator operator. There was some disgusting imagery along the way, but I'd figured long ago there likely would be since a lot of people seem to like making Halloween gory. So I had managed to brace myself for that. It was fun and over all too soon, lol. (Of course, I'm sure MoonlightTyger was relieved it was over!)

I had also wanted to try a haunted ghost town. The website made it sound like it was outside and walking around to different buildings that were haunted, but it was all indoors. It was longer, being a whole town set-up, and to my surprise it was gorier than the regular haunted house. The outlaw ghosts were fun and very plunnying. There were freaky animatronics, like one floating over a cemetery, and something that looked like a scarecrow wielding a scythe. The church had ghosts rocking in the pews. So creepy! I got some nice imagery from both houses to use in fics, and I hope to get on that right away.

We walked around the regular town set-up, which had restored buildings from pioneer days. So cool! I love things like that. There was a church, a house, some cabins, and a main street of businesses. One had a miniature circus and lots of dolls on display. Some super old plushies too. It looked like the images were painted onto a cloth body shaped like the animal. Fascinating!

On the midway, MoonlightTyger and I played Whac-a-Mole. She was amazing at it! I don't know whether I was doing something wrong or if the machines just weren't registering me so well. I was hitting every thing, but it consistently gave me low scores. But since MoonlightTyger was getting a perfect score, we won and she won the Daisy for me! Squeee. Daisy is so soft. I should have brought my Disney tote bag along from my backpack just in case of winning something as I had hoped, but I hadn't been sure it would fit in the smaller red bag I had decided to carry through the park and left it in the backpack instead. So I just carried Daisy in my arms for the rest of the trip.

Throughout all of this, MoonlightTyger's sister and friend wanted to ride a particularly scary coaster twice and go on a water ride. Then we all regrouped and all three were able to go on MoonlightTyger's favorite ride when the lines were short! I knew I didn't dare try a coaster, so I watched their stuff and texted with Crystal for a bit.

To finish, we went in the gift shop and I found a hilariously adorable bookmark and pen set of a gray kitty holding a sword. LOL. I almost freaked when I saw the manufacturer name looked like Kalin, but then I saw it was Kalan. Oh well, still close!

All in all, such a lovely experience! I love meeting dear friends in person and it was so neat to get to do something like this at long last and for it to be so close to my birthday. I'm so happy it all worked out!

With things still upsidedown here, I haven't been sure Dad would even be able to go out and select anything for my birthday, and I certainly didn't want to impose and ask, so I decided the best idea would be for me to get a few things for myself when I was getting groceries and such. I still wanted a nice birthday, and knowing everything I'm getting (aside from friends' gifts) is better than getting nothing. I bought a couple of things a few weeks ago and put them away for that, and I got a bit more this past week. I'm also, of course, hoping to be Radley for Halloween. I've had the most horrible time finding any fake leather jackets in American sizes that I can afford. There were only two real options: one in the right size that said it would ship in 1-2 months and might not even come in time, or one a size smaller than my usual. Of course, I took a gamble on the latter. It came yesterday! It is very soft and I hugged it. It fits if I don't close it, and Radley always wears his open anyway, so that works.

I also learned almost too late that most Disney Stores are closing. My main one was already gone by the time I was told. My uncle managed to take me to the other one last week on the very last day. There was barely anything left, and even less that was of interest to me. I finally got The Rise of Skywalker on Blu-Ray and Digital. I can use the digital code, and this will be more incentive to get a Blu-Ray player. I saw Target's mini Disney Store and was underwhelmed (but at least I heard a beautiful song, You Carried Me With You, on their screen). JCPenney has a better selection of stuff, though, honestly. And they're closer. I came home and signed up for the Disney Store website, but the prices are abominable! $20 for one doll when it used to be $12! They sent me a free shipping coupon and I was having trouble finding anything to use it on. Finally they randomly reduced the price of a Cinderella plushie and I got her. She came yesterday too! So far she's still in the mailer, as I was hoping to save her for my birthday. I might have tried to do that with the jacket too, but I felt I needed to test that immediately since the size was not my usual. (And since I was so excited by that I didn't think I could wait, lol.)

I also ordered some of the YGO 5Ds manga and it came this week too. I'm also trying to save it for my birthday. Volume 4, which is one of the ones I want most, has become mysteriously hard to get. Aurgh! So I thought I should hurry and grab the others I most wanted. 4 may come back in stock for Books a Million on the 4th, so I'll be watching that closely. I may get all nine volumes eventually.

I had a strange but nice dream of shopping in a store and finding Radley-related merchandise. Weirdly, in the dream he was a Frozen character, lol. I woke up before I fully checked out, but at least I was checking out. Many shopping dreams have me unable to complete purchases because of the stuff mysteriously disappearing. The dream felt rather true to life, as with my Halloween shopping, I do rather consider I'm buying Radley merchandise, lol. I got the wig last night with an eBay gift card and I associate the jacket with him so strongly, it felt like he was real and the jacket was an actual connection with him. Yes, I know that's nonsense. No, I don't know why this particular comfort character makes me feel that way, as I haven't for any of the others, even Marik. But there you go.

I saw a lovely top someone was wearing at the park that said "Only God can judge me." I immediately knew I had to draw Radley wearing a jacket that says that. I hope to do that today.

So I finally saw the Japanese version of what Lawton did to Radley.

MY HEART.

I definitely understand why the dub cut it; it was extremely painful to watch, especially when I'm so nuts about him. And it probably would have been upsetting to kids and got parents upset. First you really see Radley hit in the head with Lawton's gun, instead of it being implied in the dub with the impact not actually shown. And that's just for starters. It actually showed Lawton's Gatling Ogre blasting Radley over and over with 40 rounds of effect damage ammo, one for each 100 lifepoints. He was clearly in pain and screaming; there is something weird going on in that town! When it finished, he said, "That was dirty; how could I have stopped that?!" and collapsed unconscious. Not showing the physical assault in the dub made his collapse look cheesy. Also, I loved that Radley called Lawton out on the unfair one-turn kill in the original.

I promptly cuddled the plush, lol.

I know it's weird to be so disturbed by the scene considering all the hurt/comfort scenarios I put characters through, including Radley, but it's worse actually seeing it. Plus, some scenarios can definitely be more upsetting than others. I would definitely be hurting the same way to see my fic scenario of Radley shocked to death by Malcolm's shock collar brought to animated life, though. (Yes, he comes back from that.)

Since Radley is technically part of the problem in Crash Town, I do struggle a bit with liking him/feeling like he isn't as bad as Malcolm and Lawton/etc. But canon clearly presents compelling evidence in favor of him: he and his group are not actively terrorizing the town like Malcolm's Crew is, we never see their part of the mine, so it's possible they don't even abuse their labor, Radley seems friendly and even tried to reach out to Kalin but was brushed off, he treats his gang like equals and doesn't talk to them like their boss, his gang all seems very nice the few times they say anything, they hang out at a diner in the Japanese and I need to change references to a saloon in my fics.... They just seem like nice young kids caught up in a big mess.

I've been working on a lot of oneshots and a multichapter cross with YGO Classic. Things are mostly going well. The plunnie explosion has been an immense help over the past month; real-life has been dealing a series of blows that I long to escape. I've also drawn some stuff and requested more amazing pictures from ElfBean.

I did finally watch more of seasons 3 and 4 of 5Ds and found a lot I liked, especially Bruno/Antinomy. I've also watched some of 5. I don't like the Japanese ending for the series. Everyone going their separate ways and Yusei being left all alone ... that isn't satisfying at all. It felt contrived and unnecessary, just yet another addition to the current line-up of things that want to show people can still be close friends even when apart. It's a good lesson, but I'm sick of encountering it everywhere. Just let the friends stay together in fiction, for Pete's sake. Is that really going to hurt anything? I bring everyone back together in my fics. I think the dub ending is much more satisfying, even though it eliminates the Ark Cradle arc and tries to have the WRGP tournament as the finale. But I acknowledge season 5 in my fics because I wanted to revive Bruno. He's an adorably precious character and his bond with Yusei is probably my favorite Yusei friendship in the series.

I have the DVD set of the dub 3 and 4. Had to get that set first to have the Crash Town episodes, heee. And I often look up scenes on Crunchyroll to see how they went in the original. I'll be getting the other DVD set soon.

I also finally got the Over the Nexus game. I thought I wouldn't have trouble getting a spin-off game, but wow, was there trouble. It's apparently the most sought-after of the 5Ds games, I suppose because a lot of it takes place in Crash Town and that is a fan-favorite arc. I could have tried to find a ROM, but after the trouble I had with the Nightmare Troubadour ROM I really just wanted a physical copy of the game. I kept following auctions and losing out. The price would always go sky-high. I finally accepted that I wasn't going to be able to get it for less than probably $40 something, so after losing both an auction and a Buy It Now listing in the same day, I sought out someone who was selling a copy apparently more expensive than people wanted to buy and made my highest offer on it. I thought it would probably be too low to be accepted considering the Buy It Now price, but it was accepted, squeee. I was able to pay for some of it with eBay gift cards. It's shipped now and should be here this week. I charged my 2DS to be ready for it. If it's anything like Nightmare Troubadour, it will take a while for the plot to really get underway and I'll have to duel OCs and minor characters for a while. But I'll get to see a lot of Crash Town and Nico and West, so that will be fun. I don't think Radley shows up until around chapter 5. There are 7 chapters. After I beat the main game, I can challenge Radley any time I want, like with the Big Five in Nightmare Troubadour. I do wish the game wouldn't have screwed up his personality, but I'll try to ignore that. Nightmare Troubadour did very well with the Big Five; I'm still giggling over Nesbitt's insult of "You look about as threatening as a water pistol." **snerk.** I have got to use that in a fic. Also, Over the Nexus has a much-needed gender function when picking your OC! Nightmare Troubadour did not have that and my character kept getting called "he" in the script. I wonder which YGO game first acknowledged that girls like it too. Most of the YGO fans I've ever known are female, honestly. Although I have met some guy fans too.

Duel Links has been really fun this month, and the topper is that I think we're finally getting Duke! Ohmygoshsqueee! A new character is coming with the catchphrase "Go Dice Roll!" I'm unaware of any spin-off characters who like dice. If it's not Duke, it will be too cruel!

It has been extremely stressful almost from the time I last wrote anything here. I discovered the worst pain I have ever had in my life, which seems to have been caused by rupturing ovarian cysts, and I'm still trying to get my body back to normal. There's other cysts that may or may not be cancerous, although the doctor doesn't really think they are. He didn't even see the ultrasound pictures, though! He just read the hospital's report! We're waiting to see if the blasted things shrink on their own while I try some natural remedies and foods that are supposed to help. The doctor doesn't think food has anything to do with it, but I've found that my problems and the pain seem to pivot around foods. I've mostly felt a lot better and I discovered standing and walking are very helpful. I racked up a horrific bill just from the tests they did and I'm trying to qualify for Medicaid. I just thought everything was okay and now they seem to be demanding I redo all the information again?! WTH?! Aurgh! I tried to call them on Friday but couldn't get anyone and I'll have to try again tomorrow.

My birthday was peaceful, at least, but low-key. I still haven't had my outing. We were hoping to try for this coming week, but now we have a new house problem to deal with, as our bathroom light fixture decided to bork and now we have to light it with nightlights. We've been having so many house problems the last few months, mostly plumbing but also some electric issues. Our water pressure is horrendous. It's been wrecked ever since the city forced new pipes on everyone last year, and it's gotten worse for us in the last several months.

To compensate for no outing, I bought a lot of things online to have for my birthday. It was fun, but it doesn't take the place of physically visiting a store. It's the whole experience that's so fun, not just buying things. Although the irony is that I likely wouldn't be able to find much of anything I want in a physical store. It seems like what I want is either cheaper online or only available online.

Some other, more minor stressful things happened the past week, but because of my emotional state dealing with my health problems they tipped me over the edge. It's ironic and frustrating that I really try so hard to control myself online, but the few times I just can't take it anymore I get branded as some kind of horrible thing. Also ironic is that while they're thinking how awful I am, I'm emotionally tearing myself to pieces for weeks afterward because I said or did something that hurt someone. I have a lot of problems with anxiety and have for years. I've never been officially diagnosed, but reading up on the symptoms certainly matches my states of mind when I go into those ways and I fully believe I have an anxiety disorder. I would love to talk to a therapist, but we can't afford that either. And I certainly can't think about that when we're not sure the Medicaid went through. If I can really qualify for ongoing Medicaid and not just temporary, maybe then I can consider a therapist. I only really realized how badly I needed one two and a half years ago when I sank into a really bad depression and self-loathing state. A friend who is a therapist in another state really helped me a lot to be able to pull out of it. If only she lived here. I had a small-scale setback into such a state this past week because of those stressful things and what happened because of them. That friend plus other friends have been helping me pull out of it again and helping me see that I'm not the scum of the earth, which is how I was feeling.

I also lapsed into another frantic "Buy, buy, buy!" mode this past week, like I did in April when the lockdown started. Apparently that's going to be a thing with me now and I've developed full-blown retail therapy problems when under extreme stress. Although at least I'm not buying up everything under the sun; I still study things out for days to get what I really want. This round I wanted YGO things and I bought an official YGO coloring book and one of the Scholastic character guides, this one focusing on the villains. I wish I'd known about all these wonderful YGO things Scholastic put out at the time. I was looking and looking for things like that and could never find them. Apparently they did a whole line of character guides in 2006. I wonder why they waited until then. That was when the show ended!

I wrote all of the Whumptober prompts into a connected storyline and am posting them. I was delayed for several days when the worst of my physical pains were happening, but I've got back on track and am posting on the correct days again. I'm trying to do the Comfortember ones too, but they aren't plunnying me as much, so I'm not sure I'll do all of them. But I don't have any other story ideas other than expanding one of Nesbitt's hallucinations into a full fic really happening and taking place in another verse, so I want to keep trying. I love to write and feel like to not be able to is to lock part of my soul away.

The hallucination I want to expand is for Dartz to trick Nesbitt into using the Orichalcos. For some reason I've been wanting to write a storyline similar to Mai's season 4 arc. I don't know why, really, because that was gut-wrenching. But I finally figured out how to work it in a way I like. Nesbitt is feeling horrible because of his weakness in almost abandoning the others in Noa's world, so Dartz preys on that and tells him the Orichalcos will make him strong. In Nesbitt's state of mind, he believes that and thinks it will help him be a better friend, so he accepts it and then it corrupts him. He has no idea about soul-stealing or swallowing the world with a giant sea snake until after it corrupts him, which seemed to be the same with Mai in canon. In the dub, at least, Dartz most certainly doesn't tell her any of those things until she agrees to accept it. You can see in her face that the corruption is instantaneous. Very chilling.

As much as I love and adore Lector and have given him some of my personality traits in how I write for him, I really went to town with Nesbitt and base him on me even more. His insecurities, his struggles with his weaknesses, blurting things out he shouldn't and beating himself up over it, his asexuality, is all based on me. In the Japanese he doesn't seem to have some of his issues, like wanting to pretend he's a machine, so I deliberately write him based on the dub version because I find his manias so interesting and a writing goldmine. I do, however, use his Japanese backstory in how Seto treats him, which was even more appalling than in the dub. He tells Nesbitt not to get underfoot when the new engineer arrives, aurgh. So cruel when Nesbitt was the top engineer! (And semi-related, I read a short fic on Crump based on the Japanese version where Seto said something horrible to him when he brought the idea of a penguin sanctuary and theme park, something about crushing Crump like a soda can if he didn't drop the idea?! If that was really what he said in the Japanese, horrible! And of course, Seto learned all that kind of behavior from Gozaburo. So sickening how Gozaburo poisoned that once-innocent mind.) Honestly, aside from them letting Pegasus take Mokuba, I'm more on the Big Five's side than Seto's, up to the point where they first start messing with virtual reality. As horrible as Seto treated them, that wasn't justified. I wish the dub hadn't inserted a murder plot in season 1 that didn't exist. I can't even watch that episode in the original dub anymore because that sickens me so. I always watch it in the uncut dub instead. I'm glad that was one of the few episodes that made it into the uncut dub.

I'm still getting pictures from ElfBean. Her latest is from my fic where Lector is a vigilante and I just adore it so much!

I feel like drawing a picture of Lector laying on his bed in his dress shirt and pants and tie, looking up at the ceiling. Usually it's Nesbitt I depict without his suitcoat, but after an RP scene I feel like I really want to show Lector like that too, squeee. He would look amazing! (Of course, he always looks amazing, heh.)

I had a really awesome and fun dream the other day about playing a video game where the player is interacting with the Big Five. Their memories have been mysteriously wiped and the goal is to help them find something they're looking for and restore their memories. It would work great as a visual novel type game, and apparently there are sites where people can make games like that without years of programming lessons! I definitely want to try it out! I have the sprites from the Nightmare Troubadour game that would be perfect to use in it! They looked so amazing in that game!

This is the checklist of everything I've bought for my birthday and a bit afterwards:

- Set of the first four Anna & Elsa chapter books set after the first Frozen
- The most recent Frozen 5 Minute Stories collection, the red cover one
- Frozen Blu-Ray and DVD combo (if we ever get a Blu-Ray, I can see all the cool bonus content!)
- Star Wars Qui-Gon Jinn 12 inch figure
- Star Wars Obi-Wan Kenobi from episode 1 12 inch figure
- Yu-Gi-Oh! Twisted Nightmares double deck set of Yami Bakura and Yami Marik (sooo awesome and perfect for my Yami Bakura memorabilia collection! There's a game mat with characters on it, and Skill cards with them on them, and cards at the beginning of the decks with them on them.)
- Halloween face mask that says Trick or Treat in an eerie font, perfect to use with my recycled Yami Bakura costume this year
- Yu-Gi-Oh! Duel Chaos coloring book
- Yu-Gi-Oh! uncut dub volume 2, The Insector Combo (the only volume of uncut I don't have, and I finally decided I wanted it)
- Yu-Gi-Oh! character guide to villains
- Autumn socks

From now until the 22nd is Azure Week, a celebration of the Seto/Tea pairing from YGO organized by Azurite! I've already written a fic and plan to draw some too! If anyone wants to participate, it's going on on all platforms! FF.net, AO3, dA, Tumblr, Reddit, Dreamwidth, and more! Check out the Azureshipping community on Dreamwidth (http://azureshipping.dreamwidth.org) and Azure Week forum on FF.net (https://www.fanfiction.net/forum/Azure-Week/229387/) for more info!

Got some survey cash-outs and the concert refund around the same time and ended up going a little berserk with most stores closed and not usually being able to find what I wanted around here anyway. I felt like having some fun online.

eStarland hasn't updated their site and it's left looking like they still have the old Final Fantasy VII figures in stock to buy. I stopped getting them because I got so discouraged when Zack showed up with legs that weren't the same length, but I was craving to get Tifa and Aerith. I fell for it until I looked closer and saw no Add to Cart buttons even though the listings said "ships within 24 hours." When I realized I couldn't get them, I kind of snapped. I started looking up many different things I'd wanted for years on eBay and debated for days on what I wanted most. I ended up deciding it was time to get more 12 inch Star Wars figures and proceeded to buy Luke, Lando, and Han. I also found classic trilogy Obi-Wan on Amazon for the same price as on eBay and bought him with a gift card. Now I'm trying to get Qui-Gon, young Obi-Wan, and Mace Windu. I also would like Boba Fett, of course, but of course he's one of the most expensive ones. I've had a gorgeous Leia for several years, part of Disney's Elite Series. She doesn't quite fit in scale with the guys, but I love her so much I can't quite think of getting another Leia that would fit better.

I'm thrilled with all of the purchases and that definitely calmed me down (although I've been getting restless to buy again and I wish the other Amazon gift card I earned would get here). I suppose my favorite is Lando, though, as I've especially longed to have a figure of him through the years. (I remember wanting to get a small one when I saw it at the antique mall some years back, but I didn't because I wasn't sure Dad had ever forgiven Lando for the betrayal thing and I thought he might complain for me to get him. Didn't know how to get it without him seeing.) They're all amazing, though! Luke especially blows me away. Such gorgeous facial sculpts for everybody!

I did a rewatch of Magic Knight Rayearth. I think after YGO and Sailor Moon, it's the next most special anime to me. I had thought I liked season 2 best because of the character development, and I still love that, but there are still those episodes where the story drags and it's mostly fighting, and season 1 has the most friendship squee. Season 2 mostly focuses on the girls interacting with other characters. So now I think I like season 1 best, lol. And I know CLAMP already extended season 1 compared to the manga, but I wish it had been extended even more. They could have had episodes of the girls traveling to villages and meeting people and having more friendship squee. It was just wonderful and made me want to levitate, hee. The girls have the special kind of friendship like I portray with the Big Five.

I wanted figures or dolls of the girls, but it's almost impossible to get all of them and always has been, so I decided I'd rather make plushies of them. I also still want Lumis and Umbra plushies. I realized fake fur would be good for Umbra's hair, so I'm trying to find some in the right color. It's very difficult, as the same shade will show up looking like multiple shades on eBay and Etsy. I wish I could find it locally, but I don't tend to see exotic fur colors like teal or turquoise in stores.

Still working on Big Five fics. I finally finished the fourth New Orleans fic and it was a 20 chapter mammoth fic. It felt good to do one of those again. I wrote some oneshots about them and about Lumis, Umbra, and Arkana, and now I'm contemplating a Duke hurt/comfort fic. Or maybe he should just get hurt in the next ensemble fic. Vivian Wong and the Paradox Brothers will be returning to find the missing medallion, if I can craft a whole story around that concept.

I also drew some more, but I had to mark a couple as Mature Content because of violence and apparently non-dA members can't see such pictures. http://meromeroyui.deviantart.com

Also, I hate Eclipse (the new dA site, not the supernatural mush book). Can't find my way around at all. I'm enjoying the last little bit of time with the old dA site and I eagerly await the website ArtSpacious, which unhappy dA users are developing.

ElfBean continues to be awesomely amazing. Squeee!

I also eagerly await things opening up again. It's become more normal shopping lately, except for no hand wipes.

I have a RedBubble store. http://LuckyLadybug.redbubble.com Text-only, YGO-only for now. But some people like text shirts, so why not. There's an official fanart program for a few categories there, and maybe I can try to draw something for Steven Universe or We Bare Bears to get in on that sometime, because that's awesome. I wish they'd add YGO, though. I would be absolutely over the moon to design official YGO shirts!

Still writing YGO/Big Five-centric fics and loving it. Just finished the latest and will be doing a fourth New Orleans fic. Looking for names for Lector's parents for this one. I didn't want to bother before, but now I think I'll need to show their names. I'm debating between Amelie and Desiree for Mrs. Leichter and I'm not sure at all for Mr. Leichter. I suppose, since most names have very positive meanings and he's a creep, I'll have to go with an ironic name. So far the only ones standing out to me are Gerard or Jean-Louis. Also not sure if I want to go with Desiree for Mrs. Leichter. It fits really well, but I knew someone by that name and I try not to name characters after people I know. It usually ends up feeling too awkward in the writing, especially if the character isn't very nice.

Yami Marik has finally met Zorc at the end of the current fic. Zorc, however, will convince him they should wait a while to start wreaking havoc together, since everyone will be tense and on guard and they should be caught off-guard. (Thanks, Crystal Rose of Pollux!) It makes sense character-wise and plot-wise and also for the fact that I'm not ready to tackle that dark story yet. I'm planning more strongly for it, though, and I probably will write it this year. It will start with Shadow Games and Neo-Orichalcos coming back in full force everywhere and the gang getting overwhelmed and trying to figure out what's with the influx of evil. Eventually they track it to its source and the battle will begin. I hope Yami Bakura will be ready, since this is the battle that will decide whether he gets a second chance. I of course plan to keep writing stories after this one, although this one probably will end up feeling like a changing of the status quo.

I'm already starting to do that, though. I introduced a little Azureshipping in the previous fic. Don't know how much it will advance at the current point in time; in the past the Azureshipping didn't happen until stories set further along in the timeline, but the ways things ended up going in the current timeline, it turned out that it made sense to introduce it in the present-day.

Still getting pictures from ElfBean, squeee. I have 12 now. I want to print them out in a binder. They're all just so beautiful and she captures the characters' expressions so well! http://www.elfbean.com I thoroughly recommend her if anyone wants to be blown away by quality commissions!

A friend sent me three Ponies! So excited. I haven't been able to get them here because they sell out too fast. She got Starflower, Pinwheel, and Trickles. I'm thrilled Starflower is really blue! So many times they look blue on the boxes and then they're green or turquoise in person. Seems like there actually aren't many Ponies that are outright blue. Pinwheel looks like a cake Pony, with the pinwheels as lighted candles and the deep pink the shade of cake frosting, so I think of her as a birthday Pony. Trickles is totally an April girl! Beautiful yellow with multi-colored hair and watering can symbols.

I went to the antique mall that has two buildings to hold everything and had fun browsing everything. I haven't been there in a long time and it was nice to catch up. Saw some things I was interested in, mainly Trolls, but didn't get anything yet because I'm not in a good place for money at the moment. (Plus I still like buying things new in box the most. I keep hoping I can get some Trolls that way online if I get in a better money position. I just don't care much for the Dreamworks versions and I want the Dam or Russ Trolls.)

Mom and I finally saw the LOTR films again and I kind of got the urge to make Hobbit plushies. But I don't know when that will happen; the latest plushie base I got I still want to use for Mokuba. Even though it will be weird for him to be the same size as everyone else, it's just too sad not to have Mokuba. I also want to make Lumis and Umbra. Still trying to figure out how to replicate Umbra's fun hair. I also want the LOTR figures I'm missing. I used Amazon gift cards to get Eomer and Eowyn (squeee), but most others I don't have I can get cheaper on eBay. I thought it was neat and squeeable to be able to get the siblings together. I'm amazed Amazon had good prices on them, since they're out of print.

Still drawing. http://meromeroyui.deviantart.com Mostly YGO, occasionally other things, especially if it's a giftpic or a request. I finally got commission info up. I forgot I hadn't put it on dA. Two people wanted requests and then I realized I didn't have commission info up, and since their requests were nice, I did both of them for free but said future requests would have to be commissions.

Hulu has Yu Yu Hakusho. I only ever saw four episodes of that, but I remembered the show fondly, so I decided to watch. I'm to episode 12 now. Definitely enjoying it aside from Yusuke's disgusting perverted moments. Hoping he doesn't do that now that he's back. The episodes I saw years ago were still just as exciting and Kurama is still just as easy to like. Still don't like Hiei, but he must get a ton of character development since he ends up joining the good guys. I expect I'll end up liking him. Interesting that the anime was so old, 1992, but they only brought it to America ten years later. I remember the excitement of it coming out, and my friends seeing the new episodes. I couldn't because I didn't have access. I think the four episodes I saw were the only ones the library had. How things have changed.

Despite only having seen four episodes, I remember debating many times on getting figures. I especially wanted Botan and Kurama. Looking at them now, the prices on eBay for those old out of print figures aren't too unreasonable. Kuwabara, on the other hand, is apparently really hard to get hold of, which is frustrating because he's freaking adorable. I adored episode 3, with him being so protective of his friends, and he loves kitties, as shown in episode 5! Squeee. I also loved that he wouldn't steal when that possessed bully tried to make him do so, and he bought manga instead. Wow, though, I wonder how the voice actor ever managed to do his voice. Seems like he'd make himself hoarse by the end of every episode!

I absolutely love how anime has become more of a mainstream thing now and it's so easy to find so many series and merchandise for them officially! But on the other hand, I'm rather sad that it seems like there aren't a lot of new anime series to get excited about these days. I still need to try My Hero Academia, but aside from it, nothing that's currently out seems that exciting or interesting. I imagine there are niche gems out there, though. But I miss the excitement of everybody being into the different anime series and how fun it was being in on that. It kind of feels like those days are long past. I feel old remembering back to those years. I still long to recapture that excitement about the series I still love, like YGO, and there are still some who are enjoying it with me. Definitely happy about that! But I still miss everybody I used to hang with. There are a lot of people I'd like to look up and check in on, but I have no idea how to go about it.

Also thinking that the YGO dub, aside from changing or removing a line or two, actually seemed to take a lot more care with the Big Five in season 3 than the original did. (Which is ironic given what a train wreck the dub made of their Duelist Kingdom storyline, having them plot to murder Seto when that wasn't what they wanted to do at all!) I mean, Noa's arc doesn't even get its own opening in Japanese! They're stuck with the Battle City opening and song! The dub made a whole opening just for that arc, and each Big Five member got his own unique and thoughtfully written theme.... Lector's gets used many times after that arc, because it was just too awesome for them to give up, heh. Although I wish they wouldn't use it as background music when Yami Marik's up to no good sometimes. The Big Five also get mentioned one by one in the English character guide, and I'm not sure the Japanese character guide did likewise. I watched a video of a guy looking through it, and I only saw them in Duel Monster form. No human form pictures, no lineart.... I almost wonder if the animation was so inconsistent for some of them because the animators didn't bother to do lineart for them! I long so badly to see character sheets for them, full-body illustrations and practicing different expressions on them, that kind of thing. Then the dub eliminated Crump being a pervert, which certainly made him a nicer character in some ways. (Although he was still totally sadistic, ugh.) The dub also made Lector more justice-driven and added that lovely Southern accent, so I and Vivian Wong can both swoon, lol. (Yeah, Vivian is bothering Lector in the fics....) I find it very intriguing that the dub did so much with the characters like that.

Puzzle & Dragons did a YGO event last month and I was able to download the game and get in on it. I got several characters, even the one I wanted most, Yami Bakura! Also got Yami Marik, whom I didn't really want, heh. But I'm glad I got any of them, and I hope they'll hold the event again. I love the team I have with Yami Bakura, Tea, Kuriboh, Mystical Elf, and Blue-Eyes White Dragon.

Sometimes I have characters I'm working with who fascinate me personality-wise but whom I'm not exactly swooning over. What usually tends to happen is that sooner or later, after writing for them and developing them for a long time, I end up crushing on them and then do the fangirl squee.

Like with Lector, I'll admit I didn't find him so physically attractive at first, although I was intrigued by his complex personality and found it fun to work with. Somewhere along the way, I ended up finding that he had my heart and then it was "Ohmygoshsqueeehe'scute!**glomp**" And (silent) fangirly squeals watching him in episodes. At the moment I'm in one of my states of wanting to leap over the moon because I'm so thrilled with him. LOL. (And maybe also because I was looking at somebody's YGO Tumblr who sounds like she's open for possible RPing and I'm excited at the thought of maybe asking her if she would RP with me. I only have one RP going in my life right now, but I used to have as many as half a dozen at once! I would love to get another one going.)

I have to admit, when I wrote the ficlet of Lector being bothered by Vivian, it opens with her just being fangirly and I was channeling my feelings for Lector into that scene. LOL. (I would love to stroke his hair and beard!) Of course later, when Vivian got gross and wanted Lector as a love slave and hurt Gansley to try to force Lector's hand, that was all her and not me.

I also scraped together some more money because I just had to get another picture from ElfBean right away. I am eagerly awaiting the results.

... And in one of my silly explorations of random stuff, I looked up an episode guide for OK K.O. (which I have never seen beyond a clip from the Sonic episode) and completely snarked at one called Let's Not Be Skeletons. The title is hilarious, and the plot is, some new device people are excited about starts turning them into skeletons and the main character has to let everyone know it's a dangerous device. Gee, you think?! **snarks.** ROTFLOL WTH.

Squeeeee, so last week I found someone who still draws YGO who has commission prices I could afford in sketches/lineart! I've been looking for weeks for someone I could commission from, because it gets lonely being the only one drawing cute friendship stuff with the Big Five and there's just a special thrill from seeing someone else draw it too. I requested something hurt/comforty with Lector and Nesbitt. She finished the picture today and sent me the private link on her site. I'm hoping she'll post it on dA after getting my reaction, because I want to Favorite it there too, lol. (And it's so awesome that it must be public to get more Big Five works out there!) And I love it so much it's going to be hard not to immediately request more from her, but I should probably wait until I get some more money. At the moment, though, I sort of feel like I'd rather buy more art from her than buy anything else! This only cost $11!

http://www.elfbean.com/big5.png

EDIT: Or try the dA link: http://fav.me/ddf8ot9 Give more views and favorites and get this more exposure! Squeeee.

... Yeah, I don't think I can wait. After she replies to my reaction, I feel like the urge is too great to request at least one more from her right away. This is gorgeous! **wriggles and squeees!**

Well, the Noa arc in the game was revealed to be virtual reality after all, so I'm relieved. I guess I can say the Big Five didn't really want to blow things up since it's a fake world, or maybe I could even say that Noa was controlling them, as it's revealed he was controlling Pegasus and the Paradox Brothers (WTH, Noa?).

I have to say, it's hard to really get close to the characters or feel sympathy for Noa, as things move awfully fast and the arc is very condensed. Of course, I do have sympathy for the Big Five since I remember their more fleshed-out scenes in the anime, but it was hard enough for me to forgive Noa in the anime. In the game, it's even harder to swallow his sudden switch to wanting to do the right thing. Also, Johnson seriously annoyed me, heh. It took a lot of writing for him to help me be able to like him at all. Johnson in the game reminded me why it took so long.

Meanwhile, I'm trying to ponder on Lumis and Umbra's personalities. I really thought Umbra was a jerk to Lumis in the manga, honestly, because it's one thing to just throw insults at each other in utter frustration, but then even after Umbra calms down he has a hard time restraining himself from again calling Lumis a shrimp. I suppose that was the main thing that made me doubt they really care about each other in the manga. In the anime, Umbra is more mature and there really did seem to be a closeness there in spite of what happened when they started arguing. The way they interact during the Rock Paper Scissors scene made them come across as old friends, and their interaction during the long duel often seemed the same.

I have the feeling that Lumis may have some serious trust issues in both verses. He seems to doubt Umbra more than vice versa, to the point of practically raging when he thinks Umbra would turn against him. And then he has those issues about his height in the manga. I suspect he was probably often bullied in the past, and possibly he even had false friends or partners who turned against him. He also seems insecure, such as how he thinks that Marik likes Umbra better (although that may be dub-only; not sure).

I think Lumis is needy to some extent. He's lonely and desperately wants someone with him, and he clings to Umbra as that person. In spite of their arguments and possible trust issues, Umbra being hurt seems to cause Lumis to fall apart. It's possible it was the horror of having to face Obelisk by himself, but that might not have been the only factor. Of course, I also like to think that Lumis genuinely cares about Umbra and it isn't only a matter of need.

I don't think Umbra clings to Lumis that desperately, but he does care about his friend and want to stay with him, and if Lumis were hurt I think Umbra would be very distressed and might even fall apart more than one might think he would. Anime Umbra, at least; I honestly don't know how the manga one would feel.

I prefer Umbra in the anime, but I like the bit of fleshing-out that Lumis had in the manga, so with him I like to combine verses ... but probably leave the crude side of the manga one's personality with the manga version alone, LOL.

Also, I wonder why their robes are black in Duel Links. From studying the anime, it looks to me like it's the lower level Rare Hunters who wear black, while the more highly-ranked ones wear purple. Marik and Rishid wear purple in the anime, as do Lumis and Umbra.

I sketched a cute picture of Lumis and Umbra dozing on a couch and Lumis is using Umbra as a pillow while Umbra is somewhat aware of that and has an arm resting across Lumis' back. I'll probably ink it, but I wonder whether to color it, as that would be some serious wear and tear on my purple pencils. Also, Umbra's hair is weird, lol. (Which is certainly not unusual with YGO characters!)