One of JYJ's Lotte Duty Free free wallpapers for December!
First off, I hope those in America enjoyed their Thanksgiving break and holiday!! Thanksgiving for me was a little hectic this year, with plans changing last minute...once again. It was good to see some of my family though! I actually spent pretty much all day Wednesday cooking. I ended up making two pumpkin pies, two cheesecakes and my Aunt's recipe of twice baked potatoes. I really enjoyed cooking all day, although I just love cooking anyways. Especially when it's for a large group of family (or friends)! Also, my Mom was pretty happy because all she had to do was pack things Thanksgiving morning before we headed over to my Grandma Brown & Aunt Mary's place. Although, since I didn't help her, she forgot quite a few things. She's so EVIL sometimes! Anyways, it was fun, although I was pretty exhausted by the time it hit 2pm, and by then I was very close to being in a food coma.
The Cheesecakes and 1 of the Pumpkin Pies I made for Thanksgiving!
Continuing on, I went Black Friday shopping again. It was at least the 7th year I've gone, but now that I think about it, maybe it was the 10th. Anyways, it's something my Mom and I usually do every year and make a big thing out of it. This year the stores kind of screwed us over. In previous years we've been able to come home around 10pm and go through the ads and make a plan on where we want to go and what we want to get at each store. Then we'll usually head to bed around midnight or 1am, get one or two hours of sleep, and then head back out to be in line for the store to open at 3/4am. This year though, a lot of stores opened at midnight, with some opening at 9 or 10pm Thanksgiving night. This year, by the time we quickly went through the ads, it was time to leave and head to Target to stand in line. It was crazy, and a lot busier this year. It changed the whole day, and I'm not sure if they really got the results they wanted. Before, people were able to get a bit of sleep before hand, so people would show up around 3 or 4am and then spend the rest of the day shopping. This year, each line was a lot longer and busier, but because of the time change, people were done shopping pretty much before 5am. It really emptied out pretty quick. We ended up being home around 3am and just heading to bed. I saw an interview with some store manager person, and he was talking about the time changes. He said they made the times earlier because customers had mentioned that they wanted the sales to come earlier. My response: "I'm pretty sure by earlier they meant as in days or weeks, not hours." Anyways, I spent about $120 and didn't really find any Christmas presents or anything besides DVDs. I ended up with a pretty good load thought for that price. A small list to show the great deals I found were particularly for the TV Shows on DVD. Beside the 10is movies I got, I also got X-men, X2 and X3 for $5 on Blue Ray (Yay for PS3), and the first 4 seasons of Psych as well as the first season of True Blood! I was pretty happy with my spoils, but it's a little sad that I was only really into the movie sales again.
One of the True Blood Season 1 ads!
The only other really big even that happened since Thanksgiving, was the weekend I spent up at my Dad's house. I love going up there, and this time I went up to house and dog-sit. I was a little sad that Dad and Diane weren't there for most of it, but they weren't on vacation as long as I thought they would be, so it was nice to hang out with them a bit. Plus, Jack (the Puppy Monster) was pretty excited. I'm pretty sure he thinks the only reason I came up was to play with him. If he wasn't sleeping on me, he was trying to get me to play with him. Such a freaking Puppy Monster, but he's so cute! Anyways, I always love going up to their house. I don't really have phone service and they don't really have much for Internet service, but it's nice to be able to escape from everything for a bit and relax. Plus it's absolutely gorgeous up their. Especially since it snowed the day I went up, everything was covered in white and really pretty. It was freezing though, but they have a fire place, so it was nice to keep that roaring away! I always love the smell of fireplaces. Especially when there's some good smelling wood in there!
Jack a.k.a. Puppy Monster!
Before I get started on fandom related things, Christmas is coming up! I'm pretty excited to head home later today to get the tree and Christmas decorations. I'm just hoping that I can find them easily in the doom that is my Mom's basement. I'm super excited for Christmas though, it always puts me in a good mood. Plus, I have a good excuse to do a lot of baking and cooking for people (which I love to do)! I'm almost done with my Christmas shopping, I just have one more present left to buy and then the ones I make. I'm also going to get Christmas/Holiday cards soon, so hopefully I'll be sending those out by Wednesday next week! So, if you would like me to send you a card, just contact me in any way (comment, twitter, fb, email, etc.)! I'll probably upload pictures as I decorate and finish on my twitter, so you can check that out if you want! Hopefully as Christmas comes, I won't fail as much in posting. I'm thinking I'll have at least one more post around Christmas. Possibly one more before New Year's, we'll see!
Santa Claus, Is Com~ing to To~wn!
Now on to fandom related things! First off, I'm not really a Kiss Me, (U-kiss fandom), but I really enjoy their new song. A lot of Korean bands have been moving over to the Japanese market lately, so there's been a lot of Japanese singles sung by Korean bands. Most of them have been Japanese versions of songs that were originally in Korean. Some of them have sounded odd, but I'm pretty excited with U-kiss's Japanese debut song. Not only is it a song that wasn't one of their previous Korean hits, but really good and addicting. The choreography for the dance is also done really well. The song is called Tick Tack and has a lot of clock like movements. The song is really addicting, but I also really enjoy the dance. The only problem I have is that I keep wanting to call it Tick Tock. Do clocks in Korea go Tick Tack (is that how they sound out the noise since things like that differ between countries and languages)? I don't think the Japanese sound for clocks is Tick Tack, but I could be wrong. When I was in Japan I didn't really learn a lot of onomatopoeias. Anyways, check out the MV here. I think it's the best Japanese debut single to come out of a Korean band so far!
One of my favorite dance moves from Tick Tack!
I have found myself dragged into another fandom. I watched season 1 of the Korean Variety show Sesame Player and it featured MBLAQ. Well I stumbled across season 2 a couple weeks ago, only this season they featured Infinite. I had listened to a few of their songs before a liked them, but watching this variety show, I got hooked. They quickly became one of my favorite Korean bands (behind Super Junior and TVXQ/JYJ)! I really do enjoy their sense of humor and cohesiveness as a group. They also have really good choreography that's usually pretty in synch. Also, in BTD (Before the Dawn) they have this really cool scorpion dance. I find myself really getting drawn into their choreography and songs the more I listen and learn about them. Also, they aren't too young so I don't feel like a pedophile in saying I like them. Plus the leader is born in 89 and before me, so I'm not older than all of them! Anyways, check them out! Here is where you can find their YouTube channel. I'll like you to their debut song Come Back, BTD, and their latest promotion songs for their first album Be Mine and Paradise. Just a heads up though, I'm linking to a live version of Paradise not the MV because I really like the dance and the MV doesn't show it. Also, if you just want to check out the scorpion dance, here's a compilation made by a fan!
Scorpion dance move from the BTD MV!
Okay, so switching gears a bit, we're moving from music to manga. So the new Chapter of Skip Beat! came out a bit ago! Chapter 183 picks up after Yashiro-san's phone hangs up on Kyoko. She keeps trying to call him back, only to realize that he probably touched his phone with his bare hands. Kyoko, wanting to get more information ends up calling President Rory!! Yay!! Not only do we get to see Yashiro again after a while, but Rory too! Rory is pretty serious in this chapter though (no crazy antics). Kyoko talks to him and explains that she's worried about Ren. In the end, Rory tells her that he won't tell her any details about what's going on because it's not his place, but that Ren's going through an inner battle. He convinces her that she just has to be there for him and not really do anything in particular. We also find out that Rory put Kyoko with Ren on this assignment not only to help Ren get through his issues, but to try to get him to be a "man" and make a move on Kyoko. His ulterior motives are to Ren put Kyoko's trust in men again and regain what she had lost (due to Sho)! About two thirds of the way through, we see back on set for the movie. A couple of the actresses are afraid of Ren and hiding behind Murasame-san. He tries to calm the girl by saying that "he's just a human," but then he makes eye contact with Ren and he freaks out himself. We then cut to Kyoko freaking out because she was sleeping and it's now Noon. She's trying to hurry to the studio to catch up with Ren, but she's also trying to stay in character and walk slow acting like she doesn't care. Anyways, the chapter ends with Kyoko coming onto set with a lot of people bleeding and hurt. The last frame has Ren holding Murasame-san in what looks like a choke hold, possibly over a ledge of some sort. I'm not sure if it's part of the movie or if Ren just kind of snapped again. I'm hoping the first. So the next chapter comes out January 4th, so we will have to wait a bit. Although, with the holidays I think the time will go by a lot faster!
Kyoko's reaction to finding out she slept until noon!
Another small update about Skip Beat! the drama, SM released a preview teaser thing on their site. You can watch it here! I'm pretty excited to watch this and see how they are going to play the different things. I'm also really interested to see how they are going to do Kyoko's little demons and angels. Anyways, it'll start airing here in the next couple weeks, so they'll probably be spazzing happening within the next few posts about that! Oh, and going back to the teaser, you can also hear a bit of the song Super Junior - M sings for the drama! I'm also excited to hear the song Donghae wrote (his first in Chinese) for the drama and his role! Overall, I'm just pretty excited about all the new Skip Beat! happenings!
Donghae gif from the Skip Beat! promo video.
Well, switching gears back to music fandoms, I'll start with Super Junior (since they were mentioned with the Skip Beat! rants)! There's actually been quite a few happenings with SuJu that I want to rant about. First off, the SS3 DVD has been released for pre-order! It comes out on the 21st! I'm super excited, but at the same time a little confused by SM. I think it would've been a better idea to release it a little earlier, so that people can get it for Christmas, both in Korea and abroad. Anyways, it's exciting because it's only going to be like $30, which is so nice. I love Japan, but why are their DVDs and CDs so expensive? The SS3 in Japan DVD is like $80 before shipping. And speaking of Super Show things, it's time for Super Show 4's first world tour stop. The boys are in Osaka, Japan (and I'm really jealous because I really want to go to Osaka again) and the concerts will happen in the next couple days. I just hope that they release the dates for if they are going to come to the US. If not, I would seriously consider flying to a different country to see them. Especially before Teuk starts his military duties. Continuing on with the association, Donghae's solo song from SS4 (with Eunhyuk) will be released as a digital single. Him and Eunhyuk are forming their own unit and going to promote the song next weekend on two of the music shows. If I remember correctly, it'll be Inkigayo and either Music Bank or Music Core (I always get them mixed up).
Eunhyuk (yellow) and Donghae (red) during SS4.
Before heading on to my last rant, there is another small Super Junior update I would like to talk about. On December 4th, Leeteuk and Eunhyuk temporarily said goodbye to their DJ spots on Sukira (Super Junior's Kiss the Radio). They've been the DJs for over 5 years, so it's really sad. I've only been listening to Sukira since I was in Japan (over a year), but it's sad that I won't be able to listen to my two biases every morning. Instead of getting other people to replace them (there were rumors it would be Infinite), the producers I guess decided to keep it as Sukira, so Ryeowook and Sungmin are the new DJs. EunTeuk said that it was better for them to quit since both of their schedules are getting hectic and full lately. As much as it's saddening, I think that it's good for them to cut back a little bit. I hate it when they look so exhausted and like they haven't had any sleep in years. It's a different Sukira with RyeoSung, but they are both such cutie pies, especially Ryeowook. When he gets so hyper I just want to grab him and shake him (I don't know why it's shaking him & a little violent). Anyways, they are super cute and it'll be fun to watch them develop some DJ skills. EunTeuk have said that they are planning on coming back, so I'm sure we'll see them DJing again!
New Sukira DJs! Such cutie pies!
Okay, so on to my last rant, this time switching continents to Japan! There actually isn't too much news about Arashi. Just new dramas and starring in each other's shows and specials. Anyways, to finally explain the title, it's Aiba's Month among Arashians (what I call Arashi fans)! His birthday is the 24th, but Arashi fans tend to dedicate the entire month to the member. Aiba is my second bias, so all the Aiba things being released are pretty exciting! Anyways, one of the fansub groups I follow (AST) has dubbed December AIcemBA! So, that's why the title is Happy AIcemBA! In other small fangirlisms, this means that next month is my Arashi bias' month! Yes, that's right, we see Sakurai Sho's birthday next month (as well as Jaejoong's, my new JYJ/TVXQ bias [Sorry, Sorry Yunho])!
The rare serious side of Aiba-chan. He's so pretty!
Okay, so sorry it was long, but a lot has happened since I last updated! If you made it this far, congratulations! I hope I didn't bore you too much! Anyways, I'll leave with a gif as always! This time I'll leave you with Aiba-chan, our dear birthday boy! This is a popular gif from Himitsu no Arashi-chan (one of their variety shows) where he falls off his chair from laughing!
Ja ne~
Stasi
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