To the Author of The American Otaku Master's Thesis

Hello.

You do not know me, but I found a copy of your thesis, The American Otaku: An Ethnographic Study of Anime Fans in the U.S. online, and I wanted to let you know that there is no name attached to this work. If there was a coverpage, it is no longer there, and there is no name even in the margins. The website that I retrieved it from gave no indication as to the origins of this document, and I wanted to warn you that your copyrighted work is floating around on the internet, nameless, and it would be easy for anyone to steal your hard work. I am also hoping to locate you because I would like to cite this piece, but without a name it is impossible. If you are the proper owner of this thesis, please let me know and I can track down the web address and give it to you. I just wanted you to be aware of your work being available without proper credit.

~ SailorAlphaCentauri

And for the rest of my readers:

This is finals week for me, and I am trying to put together a project, a class paper, and my conference presentation between now and Friday, so I'm of course very busy. I've hit a snag with the airline ticket situation because my credit card's limit was reduced unexpectedly, making it almost impossible to pay for my flight to Florida, but I figured that we could finagle some things and make it work. Since I only got 3 hours of sleep due to staying up all night working on my Japanese Philosophy exam, I'm very tired. But before bed, a Devi moment:



...oh, okay. Two Devi moments (these will have to get you all through until I get back from my conference):



Photo one was when I was failing to get her to go to sleep (she was more intent on grabbing the camera), and photo two was the end of her first day of eating squash.

Later, gators.

Two Weeks to Go

I'm feeling the pressure now.

I have two weeks before the quarter ends, and I still have a paper due on Wednesday, two projects due at the end of the quarter, and a paper due for my conference in Florida. How is my progress going? Not too well. I want to e-mail the professors I have the projects for to let them know what it is I am going to do. I was supposed to do it this past week, but life got in the way (Devi decided to try this new 3a.m. wake-up call) so I have to do it today. To say I'm feeling a bit stressed just doesn't quite cut it. I don't know how I'm going to get it all done, and do a good job of it to boot, but I have to try.

Anyway, since I have so much to do, I'm sticking to the spartan posting schedule, at least until I get back on March 23rd. I'll be back in town by then and on Spring Break. This is going to be the first time I'm going to be apart from Devi for this length of time (the longest to date: 12 hours), so that's going to hurt. But now that I'm pressed for time, hopefully my focus will return because it's been shot lately. At least I don't have choir rehearsal this week, so that's more time for my projects as well.

Well, until next time...











Oh, did you think I forgot something?


Nope.

Hammer's got nothing on her!



Stop! Devi time!

...Better late than never

Happy (belated) Valentine's Day, everyone. I hope it was spent well.

Oooh, who's that!?!



She's not this small anymore :-( but it's okay :-)

I'm already a superhero...but this second identity works, too

I stumbled upon this little gem at Uncle David's blog, got really, really giddy, and gave it a shot. Other than being a Sailor Scout, here is my new, North American, superhero identity:


You know, I think this could work. Yes, I objectified myself, but if I had a body like that, I would dress like that every day. *Giggle* This was exactly what I needed to get me in the mood for my Comic Arts Conference in Florida. Now if only I would write that paper...

Stop! Devi time!

Crap!

Sorry, everyone. I didn't realize a month had gone by since my last post. But since I have a crapload of homework to do, I'll give you the highlights.

- An esteemed member of my church passed away on January 21st. He was a social worker who was highly involved in a number of church councils and interfaith fellowship organizations. His obituary was almost an entire newspaper column long and there were some things left off of it. I was glad to know that he lived long enough to see Obama inaugurated as our first African American president. The man was the closest thing to a grandfather I had, so I was sad to see him go & I was glad to have the chance to sing with my choir for his service [out of respect for his family, I'm not using his name]. A.H. will be missed.

- A woman in my church gave birth to a baby girl that Saturday before A.H.'s death, and while I can't remember the child's name, I know that it means "moon" and it's an African name, but I'm unsure of the country of origin. I'm really bad at these things, but it's because I've been busy...

-...getting accepted to present at my first academic conference! I got the e-mail telling me the good news a couple of weeks ago, so now I have to write the paper that went with my (apparently) good abstract; except for the fact that I'm freaking out because I can't even remember what I wrote in that thing (see the New Year's eve post for details), I'm very happy to have my first chance at interacting with colleagues. Now how I'm going to get to Florida is another story.

- My new friend is a keeper. She's a really nice girl who is studying Japanese as a graduate student and we have a lot in common. We're interested in Japanese culture and just have so many things that we talk about after school that I'm glad that the fortuitous circumstance under which we met happened (we were sitting next to each other in class and she took notice of me when we did our introductions on our particular areas of interest). She's currently at New York Comiccon and I hope she was able to find a lot of good stuff (I'd be more jealous of her if I weren't so slogged in work).

Other than that, I've been very busy trying not to let school get the best of me. Sometimes I feel like I'm never going to get this stuff, but I just have to keep plugging away and hope for the best. This week is going to be murder because not only do I have two papers and an exam due this week (Tuesday, Wednesday, and Friday, respectively), but I also have a ton of reading, two projects that I have to get started on as well as the paper for the conference (and what I'm trying to do is find ways to incorporate the conference paper into both projects) and pick out classes for spring quarter. To top this whole fantabulous mountain off, my husband is going to be working from Sunday through Thursday because he's being trained for a position which should enable him to get the promotion he's been seeking but hasn't gotten because his attention to detail needs a lot of work. And while I'm happy for this opportunity for him, it came at a piss-poor time for me because now I have to get my work done in a time crunch since he won't be home to help with her at night and he'll be too tired during the day to take care of her in the morning. Greeeeaaaaaat.

Oh well. I've just got to do it and not lose what's left of my mind in the process.

And we just started feeding Devi rice cereal two days ago and while she spat out a great deal of it, we think she actually swallowed half of what she was given. I'll have to post those pictures once they're available. But until then, this one will have to do. My hope is that I'll get to post again next Sunday. A beintot, everyone.



P.S. I forgot to mention that my church finally has a new pastor after nearly two years of searching. He seems like a great guy who is non-judgmental, open-minded, and willing to work with the University instead of bellowing about how much we suck as a church (true story: one of the pastors that the committee looked at blamed the church's problems on the fact that our last two pastors had been women(!) and felt that we were bringing sin into the church because we wanted to work with the students instead of telling them (especially the gay ones) that they were all going to hell. I only know this because my husband was on the search committee and was the only one who disliked Mr. Usuck until he opened his mouth for the phone interview). He was voted in unanimously(!) and he's having to leave his wife behind in Indiana until their youngest child finishes college (2-3 years) to start his career with us. And he's going to be Pastor Tommy, which I think is rather cute for someone with kids in their 20s. Let's hope he'll work out ;-)

So Far, So Good

Winter quarter started Monday and, so far, I've made a new friend who has studied Japanese and is a really cool girl, I don't feel overwhelmed by the school-workload (yet), and I feel a little better about trying to participate in my classes. The only thing that isn't so great is that I'm back to getting very little sleep because I have to study when Devi's asleep (and she doesn't go to bed until really late), but I'm sure I'll get used to that again in a couple of weeks. I didn't get to upload my new photos yet (they're on the computer, but not on the web), so I'm adding a photo of Devi from Christmas as penance. What I'm glad about is that I won't be complaining for awhile, because I was getting tired of the Debbie Downer routine. I'll post when I can, but since the bulk of my studying has to be done over the weekend and the front-end of the week, I'm not sure when I'll be posting again. Have fun, all you people in Internet Land. Here's Devi!

Happy New Year!

MyNiceSpace.com


It's 2009. Boy am I glad 2008 is over. I hope everyone will have a blessed new year full of love, success, and hapiness.

For me, 2009 marks a turning point for how I'm going to handle the way I deal with loss. I had to make my peace with '08, and I found a way: Every year, I say goodbye to all those who passed away. I see the closing of the year as marking when a person is left in the past; they are no longer here to experience things and see the future, so while I can try to imagine what they would think of things, it helps me to accept that they are only in my heart. For my issue with my grandmother's death, I found a (somewhat macabre) connection that makes me feel just a tiny bit better. My grandmother and my daughter are connected by 2008. Grandma managed to make it six days into the new year, and I didn't even know that my first child was [finally] on the way. They were both here at the same time, but didn't know of each other. The important thing (to me) is that there was a time when they were part of my life, and it's the only connection I have. I can't focus anymore on how much it hurts, or how difficult it is to see the aftermath of my family's collapse, but this has given me something that will help me to start moving forward. I will do my best to help them, but I won't sacrifice my husband and daughter's welfare. And Devi loves her family (she really likes people), so I'm building that bridge up so that they know that I'm always going to be there for them.

2008 brought me some good things as well: My daughter, acceptance into graduate school, a fellowship & a scholarship, self-esteem, and a reconnection with old friends. My baby was dedicated, I survived my first quarter of grad school, and I worked on an abstract for my first academic conference as a possible participant [Long-freaking-shot]. I spent so much time in anguish and sorrow in '08 that I almost missed all the good parts. I met awesome friends on my blog (but I keep on not putting up photos; sorry!) and I got to air out all my grievances and share my joy. I even have a follower. I got to see the first black president get elected...I can't think of much else.

Anyway, I was supposed to be drugged up by now (long story, was supposed to be posted in '08 but my computer hated me, so it'll get posted later but have the time it was started and not when finished), but I want to say, again, Happy New Year.

Okay, I'm done with this happy crap. I've got to get back to being me. Where are some videos of people falling down...



"If you're going to fall down, you've got to get up"

Enjoy '09! I'm out!