July 4th Weekend
Currently Playing: Taking Back Sunday - Slowdance on the Inside...
Okay, so...July 4th weekend:
Friday, July 2nd. Tiffany and I were supposed to go to Warped Tour, but when we looked up the bands, we realized that more than half the bands we wanted to see weren't even going to be playing! Matchbook Romance, Motion City Soundtrack, The All-American Rejects, Rufio, Allister, Sugarcult (for Memory), even Good Charlotte...all ditched us for the East Coast. This discouraged us greatly, and we at first decided just to not go at all, and go to Anime Expo (AX) in Anaheim instead. We had already planned to go to AX, which runs from Friday until Monday, but we were going to miss the first day because of Warped Tour. But, I had signed up for the text messaging service where band times for Warped Tour get sent to your phone, and we found out that Yellowcard and Taking Back Sunday weren't playing until 8:00 pm and 7:30 pm, respectively. We planned to just go see them so we wouldn't completely waste our tickets...but we ended up going to IHOP with Lien, Jean, and Julian instead (which is also good). Although I swear the prices at that IHOP were jacked up just because it was next to Disneyland. I paid nine bucks for a sourdough melt burger thing! Anyway, after eating, we went to Downtown Disney to walk around for awhile. We saw some of the Disneyland fireworks, but we missed the end because we tickets to see Spiderman 2 at the movie theater there. I thought Spiderman 2 lived up to most of the hype, and it was significantly better than the first. Maybe just because I like Doc Ock more than Green Goblin, but meh. I would definitely recommend the movie to pretty much anyone.
Saturday, July 3rd. We woke up at around 11:30ish because we wanted to get the AX by 2 to see Yoko Ishida's concert. Oh, for those of you who don't know what AX is, it is the biggest anime convention in the United States and it takes place every year on July 4th weekend. This year, there were over 25,000 people attending. There are concerts by Japanese singers (usually anime music), anime screenings on a big screen, many cosplayers (people who dress up as anime or game characters) and a Masquerade where they present skits and show off their costumes, and of course, lots and lots of anime merchandise. Anyway, the Yoko Ishida concert was pretty good, and lasted until 3:00 pm. After that, we went to the exhibition hall to look at all the anime merchandise that we shouldn't buy. We found Lien and Jean, who were working for one of the dealers there, but they were just leaving for lunch, and we didn't want to infringe on their eating time. So Tiffany and I just walked around the hall until it closed at 6:00 pm, buying some random stuff along the way. Tiffany bought me an Al (from Full Metal Alchemist) cell phone fastener (yay!).
We then went to one of the screening rooms to watch what we thought would be episode one of Full Metal Alchemist. But when we got there, no Full Metal Alchemist was to be found. They had changed the programming, and instead, showed an unsubbed version of episode one of the new series Samurai Champloo. The episode was pretty good, I mean, besides the fact that I couldn't understand anything that was said. I had already intended to watch this series, and had already downloaded the first four episodes (which ended up being a good thing because when we got back later that night Tiffany and I watched all four of the episodes). The series is made by the same person who created Cowboy Bebop, and so far is pretty good. I would recommend it to anyone who either 1) likes sword fighting, 2) liked Cowboy Bebop, or 3) just likes anime in general.
We really went to the screening room however, because right after the supposed Full Metal Alchemist episode was the movie Tokyo Godfathers. Tokyo Godfathers is the comedic story of three homeless people(an old bum, a transvestite, and a teenage runaway) who find a baby in a trash heap and then try to return the little girl to her mother. The film follows the trio as they traverse Tokyo, following clues and leads left behind by the baby's parents. A nice string of luck is their constant companion, ensuring that they find what they need and that the plot keeps moving despite the apparent hopelessness of the quest. What makes this movie so good and so funny is the depth of the characters. All the characters are equally as interesting, and you want to find out more about each of them, though admittedly being a transvestite makes for much more comedy. Anyway, I would definitely recommend it as a fun movie to watch. I think I have seen it available at Blockbuster for rental, so go watch it!
After that, Tiffany and I went to Del Taco to pick up food and just relaxed at home for awhile, where I promptly fell asleep at 12:00 am. My family didn't come back until 1:00 am, and apparently they even came in and talked to me for a bit, but I remember nothing of the sort.
Sunday, July 4th. Oh, I forgot to mention that Tiffany, being the silly girl that she is, bought me an iPod mini. It's the green one and it's the coolest thing ever. I converted all my songs to AAC format, and after I put all the songs that I wanted on there, I still have almost a gig left of space. And there is a click wheel Arden. Stupid. I don't really deserve such an extravagant gift, but I love you and thank you so much! Anyway, I was playing with the iPod pretty much at any spare moment of time I had the whole weekend.
Back to AX. After eating lunch with my parents, we left for AX at around 1:00 pm. We got there and basically just walked around the exhibition hall for a couple hours. Oh yes, and I also forgot to mention, many of the anime licensers (including Bandai and ADV), were all there in the exhibition hall. And yes, I wanted to firebomb every one of their booths. For those of you who don't know who anime licensers are, they buy the license to an anime to release it on DVD in the U.S. What this means to us is that usually groups who fan-sub anime episodes stop subbing them after an anime is licensed, which means we have to wait until the DVD is released before we get to watch the anime. For example, Bandai waited until the last few episodes of Gundam SEED to license it, leaving many people in a state of panic. Luckily, some rogue fansubbing groups took up the project and I was able to finish the series, but not before an intense hatred (shared with Kevin) of Bandai began.
That night was Masquerade, which sadly meant that we would miss the fireworks. But Lien, Jean, and Julian were able to score VIP seats because they were part of the "industry". So not only did we not have to line up to get a seat, we were able to sit in the fourth or fifth row! Good stuff. Now, Masquerade is very very long, running from 8:00 pm to 12:00 am. They started forty five minutes late, so we ended up staying there until about 1. There were a total of 55 acts, the most memorable to me being the big Gundam cosplayed by a guy from Japan, complete with weapons that had different configurations, and a huge 8 or 9 feet tall Optimus Prime. The Full Metal Alchemist group was also pretty good. Overall, I thought the Masquerade was interesting, though a little long. The seats weren't that comfortable so my butt hurt a lot after.
Some pictures of the mechs (stolen from Jean's LJ):
Monday, July 5th. Tiffany and I didn't leave until 12 because we kind of woke up a little late. We wanted to get there a little earlier because it was the last day and the exhibition hall closed at 3:00 pm. It ended up being okay, because we still had plenty of time to walk around and buy a bunch of stuff. I wound up buying a Naruto pencil board for myself and two for my brothers. Tiffany bought this cool bag with chibi Kenshin on it. She also bought some Naruto stamps and these two posters drawn by some independent artists that had a booth at AX. Near the end, some of the booths started throwing out random things that they couldn't sell. The ADV booth was throwing out t-shirts, but I was off to the side and couldn't get one, though I did let one slip through my fingers. Some of the other booths were just throwing out random figurines and things I didn't really care to get.
Anyway, this is too long already, so I'll end it there.
Randomness: iPod mini's are so coool.
Okay, so...July 4th weekend:
Friday, July 2nd. Tiffany and I were supposed to go to Warped Tour, but when we looked up the bands, we realized that more than half the bands we wanted to see weren't even going to be playing! Matchbook Romance, Motion City Soundtrack, The All-American Rejects, Rufio, Allister, Sugarcult (for Memory), even Good Charlotte...all ditched us for the East Coast. This discouraged us greatly, and we at first decided just to not go at all, and go to Anime Expo (AX) in Anaheim instead. We had already planned to go to AX, which runs from Friday until Monday, but we were going to miss the first day because of Warped Tour. But, I had signed up for the text messaging service where band times for Warped Tour get sent to your phone, and we found out that Yellowcard and Taking Back Sunday weren't playing until 8:00 pm and 7:30 pm, respectively. We planned to just go see them so we wouldn't completely waste our tickets...but we ended up going to IHOP with Lien, Jean, and Julian instead (which is also good). Although I swear the prices at that IHOP were jacked up just because it was next to Disneyland. I paid nine bucks for a sourdough melt burger thing! Anyway, after eating, we went to Downtown Disney to walk around for awhile. We saw some of the Disneyland fireworks, but we missed the end because we tickets to see Spiderman 2 at the movie theater there. I thought Spiderman 2 lived up to most of the hype, and it was significantly better than the first. Maybe just because I like Doc Ock more than Green Goblin, but meh. I would definitely recommend the movie to pretty much anyone.
Saturday, July 3rd. We woke up at around 11:30ish because we wanted to get the AX by 2 to see Yoko Ishida's concert. Oh, for those of you who don't know what AX is, it is the biggest anime convention in the United States and it takes place every year on July 4th weekend. This year, there were over 25,000 people attending. There are concerts by Japanese singers (usually anime music), anime screenings on a big screen, many cosplayers (people who dress up as anime or game characters) and a Masquerade where they present skits and show off their costumes, and of course, lots and lots of anime merchandise. Anyway, the Yoko Ishida concert was pretty good, and lasted until 3:00 pm. After that, we went to the exhibition hall to look at all the anime merchandise that we shouldn't buy. We found Lien and Jean, who were working for one of the dealers there, but they were just leaving for lunch, and we didn't want to infringe on their eating time. So Tiffany and I just walked around the hall until it closed at 6:00 pm, buying some random stuff along the way. Tiffany bought me an Al (from Full Metal Alchemist) cell phone fastener (yay!).
We then went to one of the screening rooms to watch what we thought would be episode one of Full Metal Alchemist. But when we got there, no Full Metal Alchemist was to be found. They had changed the programming, and instead, showed an unsubbed version of episode one of the new series Samurai Champloo. The episode was pretty good, I mean, besides the fact that I couldn't understand anything that was said. I had already intended to watch this series, and had already downloaded the first four episodes (which ended up being a good thing because when we got back later that night Tiffany and I watched all four of the episodes). The series is made by the same person who created Cowboy Bebop, and so far is pretty good. I would recommend it to anyone who either 1) likes sword fighting, 2) liked Cowboy Bebop, or 3) just likes anime in general.
We really went to the screening room however, because right after the supposed Full Metal Alchemist episode was the movie Tokyo Godfathers. Tokyo Godfathers is the comedic story of three homeless people(an old bum, a transvestite, and a teenage runaway) who find a baby in a trash heap and then try to return the little girl to her mother. The film follows the trio as they traverse Tokyo, following clues and leads left behind by the baby's parents. A nice string of luck is their constant companion, ensuring that they find what they need and that the plot keeps moving despite the apparent hopelessness of the quest. What makes this movie so good and so funny is the depth of the characters. All the characters are equally as interesting, and you want to find out more about each of them, though admittedly being a transvestite makes for much more comedy. Anyway, I would definitely recommend it as a fun movie to watch. I think I have seen it available at Blockbuster for rental, so go watch it!
After that, Tiffany and I went to Del Taco to pick up food and just relaxed at home for awhile, where I promptly fell asleep at 12:00 am. My family didn't come back until 1:00 am, and apparently they even came in and talked to me for a bit, but I remember nothing of the sort.
Sunday, July 4th. Oh, I forgot to mention that Tiffany, being the silly girl that she is, bought me an iPod mini. It's the green one and it's the coolest thing ever. I converted all my songs to AAC format, and after I put all the songs that I wanted on there, I still have almost a gig left of space. And there is a click wheel Arden. Stupid. I don't really deserve such an extravagant gift, but I love you and thank you so much! Anyway, I was playing with the iPod pretty much at any spare moment of time I had the whole weekend.
Back to AX. After eating lunch with my parents, we left for AX at around 1:00 pm. We got there and basically just walked around the exhibition hall for a couple hours. Oh yes, and I also forgot to mention, many of the anime licensers (including Bandai and ADV), were all there in the exhibition hall. And yes, I wanted to firebomb every one of their booths. For those of you who don't know who anime licensers are, they buy the license to an anime to release it on DVD in the U.S. What this means to us is that usually groups who fan-sub anime episodes stop subbing them after an anime is licensed, which means we have to wait until the DVD is released before we get to watch the anime. For example, Bandai waited until the last few episodes of Gundam SEED to license it, leaving many people in a state of panic. Luckily, some rogue fansubbing groups took up the project and I was able to finish the series, but not before an intense hatred (shared with Kevin) of Bandai began.
That night was Masquerade, which sadly meant that we would miss the fireworks. But Lien, Jean, and Julian were able to score VIP seats because they were part of the "industry". So not only did we not have to line up to get a seat, we were able to sit in the fourth or fifth row! Good stuff. Now, Masquerade is very very long, running from 8:00 pm to 12:00 am. They started forty five minutes late, so we ended up staying there until about 1. There were a total of 55 acts, the most memorable to me being the big Gundam cosplayed by a guy from Japan, complete with weapons that had different configurations, and a huge 8 or 9 feet tall Optimus Prime. The Full Metal Alchemist group was also pretty good. Overall, I thought the Masquerade was interesting, though a little long. The seats weren't that comfortable so my butt hurt a lot after.
Some pictures of the mechs (stolen from Jean's LJ):
Monday, July 5th. Tiffany and I didn't leave until 12 because we kind of woke up a little late. We wanted to get there a little earlier because it was the last day and the exhibition hall closed at 3:00 pm. It ended up being okay, because we still had plenty of time to walk around and buy a bunch of stuff. I wound up buying a Naruto pencil board for myself and two for my brothers. Tiffany bought this cool bag with chibi Kenshin on it. She also bought some Naruto stamps and these two posters drawn by some independent artists that had a booth at AX. Near the end, some of the booths started throwing out random things that they couldn't sell. The ADV booth was throwing out t-shirts, but I was off to the side and couldn't get one, though I did let one slip through my fingers. Some of the other booths were just throwing out random figurines and things I didn't really care to get.
Anyway, this is too long already, so I'll end it there.
Randomness: iPod mini's are so coool.
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