Mirvana's Amazing Adventures

Sewing/costuming

nobody@vox.com(Mirvana) — Sat, 19 Jul 2008 11:52:50 -0500

What I've made recently:

Hippari (Japanese field jacket) in cotton camo.

Regimental jacket for American Revolution reenactment (unfinished in the photo). I'm hoping that my client can send me photos of him wearing it in action.

Kosode with simple wrapped cloth for skirt, as in this photo.

Kosode with mo-bakama skirt, as in this photo.

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Reminder:

nobody@vox.com(Mirvana) — Fri, 11 Jul 2008 10:17:18 -0500

Birthday party woo tomorrow. :)

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A firehose of Mirvana...

nobody@vox.com(Mirvana) — Tue, 08 Jul 2008 14:54:07 -0500

http://friendfeed.com/mirvana

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Hint:

nobody@vox.com(Mirvana) — Sun, 06 Jul 2008 16:50:56 -0500

http://www.amazon.com/gp/registry/wishlist/2YVLQ85XMJ3I

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B-day Party UPDATE

nobody@vox.com(Mirvana) — Sat, 05 Jul 2008 13:46:36 -0500

To accommodate my friends with youngens, I'm having a little pre-party get together earlier on Sat. July 12, starting at 4 pm. So we are having "the early show" at 4 pm and the "late show at 7" so to speak. You are welcome to arrive any time after 4 pm, with or without youngens, and BYOB if you drink something other than beer or wine. Please RSVP. Hope to see you!

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Three albums I can't live without

nobody@vox.com(Mirvana) — Fri, 04 Jul 2008 22:12:46 -0500

For some reason, today, I was asking myself what my favorite albums of all time are, or which albums could I not live without. The first three that came to mind are as follows:

Blackwater Park

Opeth

Opeth: Blackwater Park

My BF turned me on to this band, and it makes sense that I would love them, because I already liked bands like Fear Factory and My Dying Bride. But I absolutely can't live without this album now. It has all the elements that I like about melodic death metal, or progressive metal, blended into a perfect landscape of guitar, vocals, drums, and effects. Some of the songs are 10 minutes long, and I just lose myself in them. I never get tired of this album. It could play on a continuous loop, and I could die listening to it.

Origin of Symmetry

Muse

Muse: Origin of Symmetry

Let's see...I think I first heard this band on the Yahoo streaming audio thing that I don't use anymore...it was great for learning your taste and then playing new stuff you would like but maybe never heard of. I would actually take notes while I was listening, and Muse happened to come up a few times and I really liked what I heard. Origin of Symmetry was the first album I bought and I couldn't get enough of it. I pre-ordered Black Holes and Revelations, but ended up not liking it as much as OoS. I still listen to OoS in it's entirety.

Citrus

Asobi Seksu

Asobi Seksu: Citrus

Pegritz gave me this, right when I was becoming more interested in the whole shoegaze genre, and this really did it for me. It had shoegazey sounding guitar with amazing, happy, cute, pop female vox on top, making it very easy for me to digest, anyway. And I love that she sings in her native Japanese sometimes. The song, Thursday, is one of those I can listen to over and over again, but I love the whole album. Also, the Glass Factory remix of Strings is one of my all-time favorite remixes of a song. It's everything a remix should be: recognizable to the original, but completely different in sound or genre.

Ok, so what do these three so completely different albums have in common, besides that I love them? I think they all have an "epic" quality to them---they all have heroic end-all be-all types of songs on them. You could also say they are all strong on the guitar, too.

Honorable mention:

Obsolete

Fear Factory

Fear Factory: Obsolete

Before I found Opeth, this was the album I would have to put up there at #1. I like a lot of Fear Factory's earlier and later work, but this was the pivotal one for me. The song, Shock, is a permanent fixture on the ipod.

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Origins Game Faire, Columbus, OH

nobody@vox.com(Mirvana) — Thu, 03 Jul 2008 19:40:14 -0500

Terrorworks: a live-action first-person shooter game with airsoft rifles. Players choose to be one of several different character classes: space marine, engineer, executive, medic, synthetic, etc., and then go on a mission to investigate what's happening at a mining station. Who knows what kind of alien or supernatural life forms they may run into! Actually, it was great fun playing an NPC in the simulation.

1) Dressed to "kill" for Cthulhu Live: Ride of the Valkyrie, set in 1938 on a German airship. That was fun. Most of the players dressed in period. I had the Cthulhu Live book, but had never played the game before. It has a very different dynamic than TerrorWerks (the only other LARP I can compare it to.) However, they gave me a character I could really sink my teeth into---a famous actress/former burlesque dancer. Basically, my motivation was to be the center of attention, and flirt with everyone. Not a huge stretch for me. 2) Posing with Mac, in our space marine loadouts; Mac is one of the authors of Cthulhu Live III and he is an awesome guy.

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Even more awesome: I got to meet Feedback!!! Winner of season one of Who Wants to be a Superhero?

2008-06_Origins 100

"Lily" character from Ride of the Valkyrie. She was hot.

2008-06_Origins 009

Looks like one of the Byakee on his break...

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Anyone for Origins?

nobody@vox.com(Mirvana) — Tue, 24 Jun 2008 14:56:02 -0500

Anyone going to Origins Game Faire this week?

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For sale:

nobody@vox.com(Mirvana) — Thu, 19 Jun 2008 18:37:36 -0500

Vintage c.1950s China cabinet and buffet/server, $95 for the set. Details on Craig's List - http://pittsburgh.craigslist.org/fur/725843126.html

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QotDs

nobody@vox.com(Mirvana) — Tue, 17 Jun 2008 13:25:06 -0500

Three for Tuesday:

There's a whiff of the lynch mob or the lemming migration about any overlarge concentration of like-thinking individuals, no matter how virtuous their cause.
- PJ O'Rourke

For a list of all the ways technology has failed to improve the quality of life, please press three.
- Alice Kahn

I have a new philosophy. I'm only going to dread one day at a time.
- Charles M. Schulz

***
That first quote is totally true.

So that middle quote is especially poignant because today I had to make a lot of phone calls and wade through a maze of phone menus.

And that third one is my "motivational" quote of the day. :)

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