Cavalia

Jan. 1st, 2011 12:57 am
velessa: (Horses - Calgary & me)
Yesterday evening my friend Kim ([livejournal.com profile] greenanimal) and I went to see Cavalia in San Francisco. It was fun and full of surprises!

ExpandRead more )
velessa: (Sailor Moon - Seiya singing)


The concert was amazing! It was awesome to be so close to the stage, and I got a ton of great pictures and souvenirs out of it. Brad Paisley is one of my very favorite country artists, so it was fantastic to see him in person. If you don't know who he is, I implore you to watch these couple of videos from him. He's known for doing a lot of really funny songs, not just your typical country fare. These are hilarious, even if you don't like country, please give them a chance!

Online: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UE6iAjEv9dQ

Celebrity: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B9mpDAJOPac

ExpandConcert in detail with photos )
velessa: (Sailor Moon - Seiya singing)


The concert was amazing! It was awesome to be so close to the stage, and I got a ton of great pictures and souvenirs out of it. Brad Paisley is one of my very favorite country artists, so it was fantastic to see him in person. If you don't know who he is, I implore you to watch these couple of videos from him. He's known for doing a lot of really funny songs, not just your typical country fare. These are hilarious, even if you don't like country, please give them a chance!

Online: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UE6iAjEv9dQ

Celebrity: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B9mpDAJOPac

ExpandConcert in detail with photos )
velessa: (Sleeping Beauty - Aurora smiling & blink)
I've learned I talk way too much when I videotape things...anyway, pics and videos Expandhere )
velessa: (Sleeping Beauty - Aurora smiling & blink)
I've learned I talk way too much when I videotape things...anyway, pics and videos Expandhere )
velessa: (Bleach - Ichigo taunting Rukia)
Is AX freaking kidding? Konishi Katsuyuki AND Morita Masakazu?? Who the hell am I supposed to line up to see?! D= Oh please oh please let their panels not be close together...
velessa: (Bleach - Ichigo taunting Rukia)
Is AX freaking kidding? Konishi Katsuyuki AND Morita Masakazu?? Who the hell am I supposed to line up to see?! D= Oh please oh please let their panels not be close together...
velessa: (Skip Beat! - Kyouko stressed)
Ack you people write too much!! I'm already 300+ entries behind because I had to spend a couple of days doing an accounting project, and now I'm going to be away from the computer until next Tuesday. I don't know if I'll ever catch up! O_o Let me know if I missed anything major!

I hope you all have fun long weekends planned. I'll be at Fanime the whole time; wish me luck remembering all the Japanese vocab I've forgotten so I'm not completely incapable of communicating with the guest I'm working with. =p I'm spending the rest of today and tomorrow studying my old textbooks!

Stuff

Apr. 23rd, 2010 04:48 pm
velessa: (San Jose Sharks)
Had my 90 day evaluation at work today. I hate evaluations, they are so scary to me! I don't handle criticism well, even when it's minor. Oh well, just got the same thing I always get: "You're doing a great job, but smile more!" Dude, my face just doesn't work that way; believe me, it's been like this my whole life. I'm just not a smiler! I don't sit around grinning for no reason, my face is just sort of neutral at all times. At least it feels completely neutral to me, people tell me I look like I'm frowning or something. And apparently my idea of smiling must be on a much smaller scale than everyone else. Sigh. This is how I smile, just deal with it! =p

Went to the Sharks' fifth playoff game of the first round with my brother last night, and they KICKED ASS!! It was SUCH an awesome game! They absolutely dominated and were finally able to get the puck past Colorado's goalie, clobbering them 5-0. Woohoo! So glad I got to go to that one! It was the first game in this series where they've led by more than one goal. One more win and they move to the next round of the playoffs! GO SHARKS!! =D

ExpandPics from the game )

Then last night as I was driving home, I saw a freaking big spider crawl across the INSIDE of my windshield!! D= Aaaaauuuuggghhh! Spiders freak me the fuck out! Normally I don't mind them, as long as they stay the hell off of me and out of my space! And inside my truck is definitely my space! I was nearly home when I saw it and had to stop for gas anyway, so I pulled into a station to fill up and try to get the damn thing out. Well it FELL off the windshield, and I had no idea where it went! I looked all over with a flashlight trying to find it without any luck. So then I had to get back in with the mysterious missing spider and drive the rest of the way home (about four blocks). >_< I damn near had a panic attack on the way, thinking about it coming crawling out of my steering column or something and was driving with one finger on the wheel and jumping at every movement out of the corner of my eye. I'm such a freaking sissy. I made it home safely, but the spider is still missing. ARGH.
velessa: (Horses - Bo & me)
Today Bo and I went on a nice long three hour ride, which is the longest one I've done with him thus far. We went with [livejournal.com profile] greenanimal and her new friend Kathy from the barn across the street, an endurance rider with two Arabs. We walked pretty much the entire time, did a teeny bit of trotting on the way back home. We went out in the park to an area I'd never been before, next to a small lake.

We went through a cattle grazing area to get there, and Bo gave the cows a distrusting look; I don't know if he's been around cows before or not, but I kind of thought he had since he was a ranch horse. He especially looked askance at the bull we passed close by, but the bull was too busy grazing to care anything about us.

Out by the lake there are some pretty steep hills, and it's also an area hang gliders and para gliders use. The first time a para glider came in for a landing near us, Bo was quite startled! Thankfully his idea of spooking is to sort of jolt in place and take a few steps away from whatever it is. After a while he got used to all the things sailing through the sky near us, though he did keep a close eye on them. We went partway up one of the steep hills to one of the jump off points for the gliders, and we hung out while a few of them got ready to go, letting the horses graze and chill. There was a very nice view of the lake up there.

ExpandSome photos here )

And now for ExpandTHE MOST DISGUSTING THING EVER )
velessa: (SpongeBob - eager)
Just got back from seeing Wicked in San Francisco. LOVED. IT. I can listen to a Broadway cast recording of a show a million times, but it simply doesn't compare to seeing the real thing in person. Definitely one of my favorites, up there with Phantom of the Opera and Avenue Q. And the musical is SO much better than the book...the musical is much more like what I *thought* the book was going to be and never was.

Also went to the Horse Expo up in Sacramento on Saturday, which is basically like a giant fair for just horse-related things, with tons of vendors and clinics and demos etc. I picked up quite a few things for Bo and myself, spent way too much money. ^^; I went with [livejournal.com profile] greenanimal and [livejournal.com profile] donnajean2277 and her husband and hung out with them for most of the time. It was a lot of fun!
velessa: (Batman - Joker clapping)
Just got back from seeing Star Trek. I really enjoyed it! I thought it was fun and funny and has just enough action and really did a good job of introducing the characters. I thought all the new young actors did a great job; Spock and Scotty were my favorites. Overall a very entertaining movie.

Thank you to everyone for your opinions! I'm not big into the Star Trek tv shows or movies and would have passed this one right up if I hadn't heard so many great things about it. So thanks for that! =)
velessa: (Batman - Joker clapping)
Just got back from seeing Star Trek. I really enjoyed it! I thought it was fun and funny and has just enough action and really did a good job of introducing the characters. I thought all the new young actors did a great job; Spock and Scotty were my favorites. Overall a very entertaining movie.

Thank you to everyone for your opinions! I'm not big into the Star Trek tv shows or movies and would have passed this one right up if I hadn't heard so many great things about it. So thanks for that! =)
velessa: (Squirrel - did I leave the gas on?)
I LOVE EDDIE IZZARD. He's the most amazing and intelligent comedian ever. I'll even put up with driving through San Francisco to see him. Needless to say, his show tonight was fantastic! ^_^ I'm SO glad I finally got to see a live performance, worth every penny!
velessa: (Squirrel - did I leave the gas on?)
I LOVE EDDIE IZZARD. He's the most amazing and intelligent comedian ever. I'll even put up with driving through San Francisco to see him. Needless to say, his show tonight was fantastic! ^_^ I'm SO glad I finally got to see a live performance, worth every penny!
velessa: (Horses - Jackson pretty)
It's fricking HOT here. This heat wave is breaking temperature records and everything. I haven't ridden for the last four days because it's just too hot to move; I barely have the energy to clean Jackson's stall. The power went out at work for about an hour on Thursday probably from all the increased energy demand for A/C. Our townhouse is actually too warm upstairs even though it's almost always too cold in here, although the downstairs stays cool no matter what. Unfortunately both bedrooms are upstairs, and the master bedroom has a vaulted ceiling, so there's no good way to cool it down. We put out A/C unit in the much smaller guest room and have been sleeping in there.

When my friend and I were getting ready to leave the stable on Friday, I heard a loud screech and turned to see Duchess, the barn cat, running by with a struggling bunny in her mouth. We followed her into the barn where she had dropped it; apparently it was still alive enough to run and hide. We caught it behind some feed bins and were going to give it to our office lady since she likes to take in needy wildlife, but she wasn't home. I took the bunny home and figured I'd bring it to her the next day, assuming it survived the night. It was alive early the next morning, but when I was ready to leave later I found it had died. =( The cat must have landed a good bite, in which case it had no chance to begin with; we'd been hoping maybe she'd just grabbed it but didn't break the skin, since we couldn't find any fang marks. Poor little thing.

Saturday night Josh and I went to see Iron Man. I was hesistant, although I'd heard nothing but good things about it. I didn't know what it was about really other than some comic book movie, which for the most part I am not a fan of (like the Spiderman movies? Ugh). I didn't know what the Iron Man comic was or what it was about; from the little I'd seen of it I thought it looked sort of like Robocop. I was pleasantly surprised to find out it was actually a very entertaining action movie! I love action movies. It had a lot of amusing parts as well, which was cool, because I didn't expect it to be funny. Robert Downey Jr. also turned out to be a great actor, another surprise to me because the only thing I knew about him is that he's some drug addict who's been in and out of jail a lot; I'd never seen him in anything before. I'm now looking forward to the sequel. The next movie on our list is Indiana Jones; I just seriously hope George Lucas didn't fuck up another great movie legacy like he did with Star Wars.

The movie turned out to be pretty long, so I didn't get much sleep last night before going to work early this morning. It was hot and awful, but at least that meant we weren't busy. And we were having a vaulting show, so there was something to watch. Also, there was a lady from a magazine called Horse Connection there who was doing an article on wine and horses, so she came to a pretty appropriate place considering we're both a stable and vineyard. Anyway, she wanted to get some pictures of someone riding by a plaque we have next to one of the barns (I've never read it, actually...I think it says something about the history of the farm maybe). All the other staff were already out on trail rides, so I agreed to do it. I jumped on our most "photogenic" (i.e. spooky; his ears are always pricked forward!) horse and posed for a few pictures. Don't know if they'll use any of them, but she said she'd let me know if they did. So maybe I'll be in a magazine, haha. Later in the day she came back again to talk to us and took a few notes. I'm curious to see what she writes.
velessa: (Little Mermaid - Ariel - shrug)
What's your guilty pleasure? I indulged in mine today while I stayed in bed sick with a cold: Project Runway.

I find it difficult to rationalize why I like this show. I have no interest in clothing design, fashion, sewing, modeling, or anything else related to these.

So why do I find it so damn entertaining? The fact that the contestants are all crazy characters? That the challenges are so ridiculous? That the clothes they make would almost certainly never be worn in real life? (although I suppose you could say that about all fashion shows). How they complain when they have to design clothes that will fit "real people" and not models? That they get into near catfights when they have to work together and don't agree with each others' ideas? Then comes the fun at the end when I start shouting at the TV because the judges inevitably choose some of the lamest/ugliest clothes or worst designers to win. Or the fact that Heidi Klum is a judge and her outfits are always hideous.

There's all this and more, and when it comes together I find myself glued to the screen. And then I feel embarassed for having not only watched it, but having thoroughly enjoyed it! I guess I just like all the drama involved in finding out who will be IN and who will be OUT. Thanks a lot, Bravo! =P

So, go ahead and fess up! What's your guilty pleasure?
velessa: (Little Mermaid - Ariel - shrug)
What's your guilty pleasure? I indulged in mine today while I stayed in bed sick with a cold: Project Runway.

I find it difficult to rationalize why I like this show. I have no interest in clothing design, fashion, sewing, modeling, or anything else related to these.

So why do I find it so damn entertaining? The fact that the contestants are all crazy characters? That the challenges are so ridiculous? That the clothes they make would almost certainly never be worn in real life? (although I suppose you could say that about all fashion shows). How they complain when they have to design clothes that will fit "real people" and not models? That they get into near catfights when they have to work together and don't agree with each others' ideas? Then comes the fun at the end when I start shouting at the TV because the judges inevitably choose some of the lamest/ugliest clothes or worst designers to win. Or the fact that Heidi Klum is a judge and her outfits are always hideous.

There's all this and more, and when it comes together I find myself glued to the screen. And then I feel embarassed for having not only watched it, but having thoroughly enjoyed it! I guess I just like all the drama involved in finding out who will be IN and who will be OUT. Thanks a lot, Bravo! =P

So, go ahead and fess up! What's your guilty pleasure?
velessa: (Josh & me 11)
Yesterday was my dear husband's birthday. Happy 27th, [livejournal.com profile] ibanix!!! ^_^

Anyway, a long time ago he had mentioned how he would like to have a surprise birthday party sometime. I've never planned a surprise party before, but I thought I'd give it a try. How hard could it be, right?

He had already asked to go out for sushi for his birthday dinner. I thought "well that's easy, I'll just invite a bunch of other people to dinner and be at the restaurant to surprise him!" So I made a reservation with the sushi place next door to us we haven't been to yet and sent out a bunch of online invites a little over a week before his birthday. Unfortunately I don't really have any email addresses of his friends, so I had to see what I could hunt down off of lj/wedding guest list/past evites/his cell phone. I think I managed pretty well, except a number of his friends either don't have their email addresses anywhere or he doesn't have their phone numbers. So it was kind of a crapshoot as to whether or not they'd even see the invitation/I could call them up. Most of his friends were unable to come. =( But I did manage to round up 8 people (friends/family) to make it on Friday night.

But then! Two days before his birthday he emails me at work and says "hey let's go to this other sushi place I like instead"! So I have to rush email/call everyone and let them know that the location has changed!! Thankfully they were all able to get the message in time, so they knew to go to the new restaurant. But it doesn't end there.

On the day of his birthday, he emails me again to say he'll be working late, "I'll meet you at the restaurant right at 8." Okay...no problem, I had told everyone to get there by 7:45 in order to be early enough to surprise him. And since I didn't want to drive all the way home then all the way back up to the restaurant if we weren't going together, I just stayed at work late as well.

I left work a little after 7 so I could get the restaurant really early and have plenty of time to make sure things were taken care of before he was supposed to get there at 8. But then disaster strikes! As I'm driving over there, Josh calls me and says "hey traffic wasn't as bad as I thought, I'll be there in about 10 minutes"!!! What?! It was only 7:20!! And since I'm completely incapable of lying on my toes, so the only thing I could think of to say was "ummmm...okay..." We were both already on the road, and I couldn't think of any excuse that would delay him long enough for the guests to get there before he did.

I ended up getting to the restaurant a little after 7:30 and was shown to our table set for 10. I put my present down and went back to the entrance to wait for Josh, who got there about 5 minutes later. So it was only 7:40, and I tried to stall around by saying our reservation was for 8, but he could easily see that there were plenty of open tables and there shouldn't be any reason why we couldn't be seated. Finally I gave up and brought him over to our table. Of course that was when the light went off when he saw all the chairs "Oh!!" That was also when our guests started arriving and he was surprised and happy to see who all came. So it was a sort of success in that he was definitely surprised, just not in the way I had wanted! Oh well. =/

The food was delicious! And they had all kinds of awesome rolls to choose from. I had my favorite, a catepillar roll, plus their calamari roll and tamago roll. Josh had the crispy dragon roll, tuna roll, and then one of their specials, the Pirates of the Caribbean roll. This thing was HUGE, and by that time he couldn't finish it. The chef also made a sort of "birthday cake" out of stacked California rolls to share with everyone. It was all really yummy! All in all I'd have to say the dinner was a success. =)

ExpandPictures! )
velessa: (Josh & me 11)
I met with the florist this morning to re-do the colors for the flowers now that we HAVE colors (changed around things to ivory instead of white, dark purple and lavender mix, pinks instead of blues). I was late and I took the wrong exit on the freeway, so I called to let them know. I was told they had a walk-in customer anyway, so I had plenty of time to get there before they'd be done with her. It turns out she wasn't a walk-in, someone had double-booked the 10am time slot. The other girl was also named Christine (or some variation), so the florist thought it was me and was confused when I arrived, thinking she had already finished that appointment. So when I got there I ended up waiting around for 10 minutes or so, not really a big deal.

Then this afternoon Josh and I went to Santa Cruz to see a movie and go to the Tea House Spa (you get a private room where you sit in a hot tub and drink tea and the scenery is sort of Japanese-ish). It's very relaxing, and the jasmine tea was good (better than the spearmint tea we tried last time, I thought). The movie we saw was Pan's Labyrinth (although the real title in Spanish was just "The Labyrinth of the Faun," so I don't know why they bothered changing it to "Pan's Labyrinth" in English). It's a Spanish film (English subtitles) that takes place during the Spanish Civil War in 1944, and it's pretty much a portrait of a young girl dealing with the horrible life she's having to live with her mother and new evil step-father (a Captain in the army and the guy in charge of the base where they're living). She's obsessed with fairy tales, and there are these weird ruins next to the base (it's in a forest), and she kind of creates her own fantasy world as a sort of escape from her real life. In it, she's the reincarnation of the long-lost princess of the underworld, and in order to return home to her kingdom, there are three tasks set to her by a faun in the labyrinth (the ruins) to prove her purity (non-mortalness) before she can be allowed back.

I will say this: the fantasy creatures and settings are truly stunning to look at. But aside from that, everything else about her fantastic adventures is rather, well, SCARY. The creatures, both the good and the bad ones, were just plain creepy looking. So I was both fascinated and horrified watching this movie. I was wary of it from the start, as it is rated R, and with GOOD reason! Only some scenes here and there are the actual fantasy story; the rest of it is quite a horrific war story, and violence (including gory scenes) abounds. I ended up shutting my eyes through a good chunk of the "real" story. So while this movie is very creative and interesting, bizarre even, it's also quite graphic. If you have a weak stomach for violence (like me), I don't think I could recommend it. Otherwise, I'd call it a twisted new spin on an Alice-in-Wonderland-type tale and worth seeing.

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