Well since my last entry, the state shutdown is almost definitely going to happen. It's not so bad though. My mom will be able to get unemployment which is good because even all my checks could cover all the bills we had. We don't know how much everything will come to yet so I'm thinking I'll take $160 a week out. Eighty will go for saving for the trip and the other eighty I'll give to my mom for the bills.

We now have 6 three week old kittens at our house. I'd post pics but I can't find my camera cord right now. Yesterday we got a call from our aunt and she said she found eleven kittens that we abandoned. On top of that she doesn't spay or neuter her pets so she also has two females with kittens too. We went to her house to bring her some kitten formula and see them. She sounded like she was going to take care of them so we had no plans of taking them until we talked with RPAW about placing them. However when we got there we found a lot of starving kittens. We put canned food for them and they were standing in the food trying to eat it. Some of them were shivering. We ending up taking the younger batch of 6 from the 11.

They have to be fed every 2-3 hours and are always hungry. Ami has been doing most of the work though I'm going to be feeding them tonight so she can get some much needed sleep. I do worry about the other kittens at her place. I hope they'll be alright. None of this would happen if people fix their pets.

On memorial day I wake up from a nap and Ami says our cat Black Baby might have had a stroke. She held her head to the side and couldn't walk straight. We brought her to the vet and she thought it was vestibular disorder. After awhile she got better though she rarely ate and lost a lot of weight. We brought her to the vet on Tuesday and the vet said everything looked fine but maybe something had happened to her neck. She gave her a steroid shot and now she seems to be doing much better.

It's been awhile since I updated. I was doing so good for awhile too.

I've started saving up for the trip this month. I decided to take $80 out of each check. However the trip will likely be canceled. My mom works for the state of Minnesota. If an agreement between the democrats and republicans by July 1st the state will go into a shutdown meaning that the majority of state workers will be laid off. It sounds like it will happen too. My mom has been stressed out about it and even started sobbing earlier. So I'm going to be helping with the bills and groceries. A trip is not needed although it would be nice. It's far more important to help my family out. It sounds like our family will be okay through July but she was also told this could shutdown could last 6 months. Maybe I can find other ways to earn money too so Ami won't have to use her savings for anything.

I'm also going to apologize for my absence pretty much everywhere except for occasionally twitter. I come home from work and I'm usually so exhausted, it's hard for me to get the energy to post to my blog and I spend the rest of my day relaxing. I'm trying to get over that and be productive too so maybe I'll try to be online more next months.

Look at these cute shirts I bought:



I got them from Macy's on clearance like a month ago. I also got another shirt but I can't find my camera cord right now so I can't post it. I really like them. I think they're cute though I won't get much of a chance to wear them now that the warm weather is here.

I ordered SNSD's two version of their limited edition albums and right now they are at customs in Chicago. I'm really excited to get them. I've been listening to the album preview at least once a day since it was released.

I had other things I wanted to write about but I better get to bed. I'm too tired to proofread this so sorry for any errors.

Today has been such a weird day idek. I get to work at 10 AM this morning and Darrin (front end manager) calls me over and says he needs to speak with me. I start getting nervous thinking I'm in trouble until he grabs the schedule book. I have every Tuesday off and this week I also had Wednesday off so I think he is going to ask me to work either of those days.

He tells me I'm the first person he asked and he wants me to be out in the garden center from 6:30 AM until 3:30 PM. I'm honored since everyone always wants to work out in the garden center. There are always a bunch of people who fight over spots out in the garden center and I do enjoy working out there. I was originally going to turn it down since I HATE morning shifts. Then he had to go mention I'd be getting more hours (43 to be exact) and I took it without hesitation after that. I wanted more hours but they are weird about overtime at work. I'd expect to get 38 hours at the most without taking this job. Obviously I would prefer to work a 50 hour week but I need to realistic.

I was trying to find other ways of getting more money for the trip without getting a second job and there are not many options so I'm very glad. Plus my hours will no longer be all over the place. I'll know exactly when my breaks are and I get to spend all day outside.

I'll keep my originally scheduled hours for tomorrow. I'm not sure when they want me to come in on Saturday. They changed my hours to 6:30 all next week and were trying to find people to fill my shifts. I'll for sure be out there on Sunday but I wouldn't be surprised if they have me out there tomorrow.

I will need to get used to the hours though.

Since I'm determined now to travel to Japan, I decided I'm going to try to lose a lot of weight before we go. Luckily I have plenty of time to do so. I spent most of Saturday and Sunday walking. Today I was assigned to do returns. My legs hurt so bad. It felt like someone took a hammer to the front of them.

It makes me miss college where I could use the exercise equipment and trail.

I was really excited though because I went to the bank and put the first money for the trip into savings. It was only $20 right now since it's a little paycheck this week but it was still exciting to do.

I've been looking into more of Matthew Santos' music since I heard him in Lupe Fiasco's Superstar. I love his voice!

I want to go work out some more but idk.

Since my last entry I have been seriously looking into the costs of traveling to Japan. It's odd, usually when I have thoughts like this, I think about it for an hour or so and then just forget about it. This time though, I'm very serious about it.

This Saturday we were short staffed and work so I said I'd stay late and help out. I ended up staying over 2 hours. Amber and Sam bought me lunch the next day and afterward I felt kind of bad. I mostly stayed for the extra hours especially since we get paid more on the weekend. I would have helped out regardless of pay but I did feel greedy. Yesterday too, we were short staffed and I stayed another 2 hours. Everytime I see a chance to get a few more hours in, I'll probably see if I can.

I was originally going to only take out $20 a week from my paycheck and put it away in savings. However, I saw how expensive airfare and rooms are so then I bumped it up to $40. Now I'm thinking of taking out $60 a week. I want to have as much extra money in case something either goes wrong here while I'm saving up or if something goes wrong in Japan. I also want to pay for most of Ami's room and food since I'm kind of forcing this on her (not that she minds). I also don't think I'll get any of that money my dad was talking about in the previous entry, so I want to be able to go even without that money. If he does give me the money, even better, but I don't want to strictly rely on that promise. I also want to have a lot of spending money. I'd like to get to spend money freely there without worrying too much about budgeting.

This makes me a little envious of rich people. There was a story posted on Arama where this girl goes to Japan 4 times a year and here I am wanting to go and it will take me a year of saving before I can travel there.

I haven't really told anyone yet, only my sister. I figure it's too far off. Plus with all this stuff going on in Japan, it will only worry people.

I've been thinking of going through my room and finding things I can sell. I'm sure I can sell some of my otome games that I didn't like or something.

On Thursday it was so nice so we had the windows open in the house. Our cats were oddly interested in something outside Ami's window. When we looked, we saw what looked like a baby squirrel. Up close I thought it looked like a little chinchilla. It was injured so we went out and got it. We brought it to an animal rehabilitation center where we found out it was a southern flying squirrel. I've never seen one before (I was told they are nocturnal) but omg was it cute.

Also, this weekend I found something amazing! We were hitting the thrift stores like we always do on the weekends to look for stuff to sell. At this particular Saver's I love looking at the CDs. I've found a Watanabe Misato album here and also and older Chinese one too (which sadly turned out not to be in it's case). As I was going over there I passed the records and saw one I have been looking for years.




It's Sakamoto Kyu's Sukiyaki record! I've even gone into record shops looking for it. I was a really big hit in the 60's so I thought it would be easy to find. Man was I wrong. I LOVE Sakamoto Kyu so finding this made my day. In fact, on my bucket list would be to visit his grave and museum if I ever get to Japan. He is definitely my favorite Japanese personality. I also found Yuzu's Yuzuen album for $10 at a used book store.

Speaking of Japan, my dad is getting his last part of a settlement check from an accident and he said he would give both my sister and I at least $1,000. I feel bad taking it though tbh. I was thinking that maybe I should save up and take a trip to Japan. I've wanted to go for years. He won't get it for awhile so it would have to be next year which would give me plenty of time to save up. It would probably be in a year from now since I'd get taxes back and get my ips check. I'd really like to go. I feel like I'm one of the few people interested in Japan that has never been there. Ami would need to come with me though since I'm to scared to travel alone especially to a place where I don't fluently speak the language.

Sorry for the kind of emo post last time! I think it was hard for me to watch the footage pretty much all day everyday knowing there was nothing I could do. I went back to what I used to do and stopped watching the news on it (mostly because it's all only about the possible nuclear meltdown).

Anyway, it was my birthday today! I took the day off work and got to spend the day with my family. It was actually really nice!. So I'm just going to do a pic post.

( Onto the pics )

I had a lot of fun!

I'm going to try updating LJ more often. I feel like I almost never update this thing.

There are probably millions of spelling mistakes in this post but I'm too tired to go over it now.

Watching all this coverage of Japan is so sad. I wish there was something more I could do to help other than just donate some money. What happened still doesn't feel real.

I've been averaging about 5 hours of sleep a night since the earthquake since I stay up late watching the coverage. I get home from work and immediately start watching the coverage. My schedule has been thrown so out of whack. I took the next 3 days off work so I could finish working on painting my room. I have a feeling this will not happen.

I don't know where I was going with this entry. I'm going to try to go back to doing the things I normally do. I haven't been working on my blog, haven't been listening to music nor watching movies or dramas. Maybe going back to my old schedule will help me cheer up a bit.

Finally an entry!

I really didn't have much exciting things going on between entries so I didn't really update. It's been pretty much work, music, Asian dramas, repeat.

But I do have something new to talk about. I started a new music comm here on LJ! I'll be posting my Japanese music. It's kind of what I do on my OLDIES BUT GOODIES blog but instead of strictly Japanese oldies, I'll be posting whatever I want. I might even post some non-Japanese stuff.

portablepop


Please join if you are interested. It's the first LJ comm I have ever run by myself. It's a little sad being the only member lol

Other than that, I'll be turning 25 in March. Usually I get a little depressed around birthdays but I keep thinking I'm already 25 instead of 24 anyways lol

I also have got back into idol groups, namely AKB48 and Momoiro Clover. There is something about both their music that is just so fun especially MomoClo's music. idk I can't really explain it.

I've also been looking for new music lately and am discovering a lot of great stuff especially Sekai no Owari. I can't wait to order some of their CDs.

And yeah, that's pretty much it.

Today's weather is insane. It started snowing around 11 PM last night and is still snowing like crazy.

I'm at my dad's house and we decided to go out since being stuck in the house all day would drive us crazy. Right now, the snow is up to my knees.

We left around noon and the roads were kind of bad but we had no trouble getting anywhere. Then we get to Burnsville and it gets crazy. Up until then we had seen no stuck cars but then we started seeing them in the ditch and stuck in the snow all over the place.

We had things to mail and we wanted to look for items at thrift stores. Every place was closed so we decided to head home and that is when things got bad. We got stuck after a huge gust of wind came and completely blinded us and my dad pulled over to the shoulder where it wasn't plowed. Luckily we were able to get out since a nice man stopped and helped. Then we got stuck again trying to go up a ramp to 52. My dad got out, of course. We took the long way home and made it, for which I am very glad. We saw 5 Semi trucks in the ditch and 30 or so cars.

We stopped at Walmart to get a snow shovel and for my dad to get winter windshield wipers (and we picked up some food for later).

I'm glad we bought the shovel since we went into the lot where he parks to find it unplowed and we got stuck. We were able to dig ourselves out. The lot by his apartment has a train tracks though and there was a train stopped that said, "Canadian Pacific Holiday Train." It was decked out with green and red lights and with bells and reindeer made out of lights. It was very pretty and I had the chance to really admire it while we shoveled out a place for him to park lol

Now we're home and I feel very glad we made it home safe. I'm also glad I got the Netflix code from Ami so now that we're snowed in, I can watch movies all day and post auctions to eBay. So now I'm going to relax in my pajamas, eat cupcakes and watch a movie.