Rollerskating......

I´ve become quite interested in rollerskating recently. A friend of mine, who had been MIA since November-December, recently suggested that several friends (basically people I don´t know but I expect are nice, if they´re friends of a friend) get together.

Get together and do what, you may wonder? Eat? No. Chat? Not exclusively. Surely you must see where this is going.....yes, she said that we should get together and rollerskate in one of the biggest parks in Madrid. Of course, this had to come from the girl who recently gave up all manga and anime in favor of hiking. Hiking. God. She is mad.


Naturally, this led to comments from the whole group of people who had been tagged on the photo on facebook.
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A very nice photo of an old-fashioned pair of rollerskates, much like these.

Needless to day, the general gist of most of the comments went along the lines of "My goodness, I haven´t skated in X years." (X>5 in all responses), "Are you sure it should be skating?" and "I don´t want to die a bloody horrible death after I lose control of the d*mned things".

Personally, I haven´t touched a pair of skates since I was....13. Meaning my total is 11 years of an inactive skating life. I was never a very good skater to begin with, anyhow. I still remember the feeling of satisfaction I got while skating down the street, though. It appealed to me. So I decided that I wanted to re-learn how to skate, so as to not embarass myself (too much) in public if we ever actually get around to actually having a "skating meeting".

In my whole life, I have owned 2 pairs of skates. One of them was a pair of fisher-price quad skates, from when I was little. The other was a pair of inline skates, quite nice, a gift from one of my favorite uncles when I was twelve.

Aaaah, Fisher-price adjustable skates. Seriously, who hasn´t owned a pair of these at some point of their lives? I still have mine in the garage, somewhere.

I read up on skates. the kinds, the types.....I even discovered that, contrary to popular belief, inline skates have been around longer than quad skates (skates with parallel wheels). 

I figured that in order to re-learn how to skate, I might as well get a pair of secondhand skates. First, I asked around in my family. My Dad´s inlines were approximately.......5 sizes too big for me? No way I could make them fit. Another friend of mine commented that she used to own a pair of quad skates in my size, and she´d ask her parents to look for them for me (since she´s living away from home). Unfortunately, they had thrown them away a mere two weeks before I asked about them. Talk about frustrating. So I ended up buying myself a pair on Ebay.

 

Meet my new skates. Skates, people. People, skates.

They are secondhand,  cheap (cost me only 9 euros), of an undetermined brand and the wheels and laces aren´t really in a color I´d want (blue or red, please!). Also, I´m not quite sure whether I´d prefer quad skates or inline skates. But they roll, they´re my size, and are perfect for someone who´s still not quite sure if she wants to start skating and continue said activity, or start skating and stop. Just stop. "STOOOOPPPPPPPP! *CRASH*"

Stopping is important. I must learn to brake soon, grabbing onto lightposts and trees just won´t cut it (it´s quite undignified, hahaha).

So, do you own a pair of skates? If so, what kind, inline or quad, like mine? 

Why anime figures?.... (Part I)

I have recently become interested in the world of anime figures. Before, I couldn´t fathom why people would spend massive amounts of money on figures that would just *stand there* looking pretty and decorative. Well, decorative and otaku-ish. Or decorative, otaku-ish and perverted, depending on the figure. My friends and I have a longstanding joke about an anime figure at our local comic store that never gets old: the character is a scantily-clad girl whose "assets" are held up by her semi-tansparent side bangs in the shape of hands (yes, her bangs have large groping *hands* for goodness´ sake). Her name is "Melona". Which means "melons", as you have no doubt deduced. Yes, they are the equivalent size of melons. Don´t pretend you don´t know what "they" refers to. Why would anyone want to have that in their room and on display? You´d inevitably be branded as some sort of pervert with a wierd fetish by your friends.

However, a few months ago--oh, alright, half a year ago, a particular figure came to my notice. Now, I haven´t the foggiest idea what series this figure belonged to, except that it had to be samurai-related. What brought it to my attention? The fact that the figure´s plastic-or-resin-I-have-no-idea-what hakama actually had texture. It was so insanely detailed that it had resin looking like real cloth. It was then that I thought: "Hmmm, anime figures might have a bit more to them than I initially thought...". I mean, that´s some mad modeling/sculpting skills right there.


When I traveled to the Expo in Barcelona in late 2010, my fate was sealed: I saw one of my favorite characters of all time, and not just as a cheap plastic gashapon, but as a real, actual figurine. My wallet whipped out of my pocket so fast that I´m lucky it didn´t leave scorch marks as I shouted "I want THAT one!!!" while waving at the vendor frantically. I´m talking about this lovely bit of art:

 Sesshoumaru, a full Inu-youkai from the Inuyasha series. He´s Inuyasha´s half-brother.

He´s nowhere near as detailed as the one I saw that made me interested in figures in the first place (and about a third of the price), but the fact that it´s Sesshoumaru just makes it worth it to me.

Not happy with just that, I also went ahead and bought another figure, but this time something on the other end of the spectrum. I swear, the vendor looked at me strangely for being a girly girl but buying this:

It´s a Gundam Model Kit of Wing Gundam Zero Custom, from the series Gundam Wing.

Is it some sort of unwritten rule that only guys can buy model kits? The saleman made sure to repeat "but you have to build it yourself, are you sure?" not just once, but twice, while maintaining eye contact with me. Fortunately, I was too overjoyed at finding this hard-to-find gundam to make some sort of cheeky remark. Which he would have totally deserved, in my opinion.

Gundam Wing was my first Gundam series, and it will forever be my favorite Gundam-universe, not only  because it was absolutely plagued by cute anime-guys. Which look even better when cosplayed (or sadly, cross-played):

Aaaaah, what a shame that they´re all girl cosplayers.

The only catch to buying this second kind of figure? It´s a modeling kit. Which means that you actually have to build the thing yourself. Daaarrrrrn. Fudge, even. I bought it knowing this, but still....

When I got back home from Barcelona, my brother promised to build it with me (strangely enough, he looked excited. Go figure. Must be a guy thing. I´m only interested in the final product myself). He used to build Gundam model kits. Had the Deathscythe and Nataku, as well as Epyon and a few other Gundam chibis. They were lost somewhere when we moved.

Needless to say, six months later it is still in its box. I think I shall have to start pressuring him. I want it looking pretty and on display, darnit!

First blog entry

Well, this is going to be the first time I edit and publish something on this blog....I really hope that I will be able to post with lots of news, about fashion and about cosplay. >.<!!

I was sent here by people on Myasianfashion.com (check it out, it´s a great website), where I have my own little blog as well. I hope this will be fun, and maybe not as limited, as soon as I get things figured out here.

Just as inspiration for today (seeing as how it´s so late), I´d like to post my favorite Alice and the Pirates coord:

Now isn´t she just lovely? The colors blue, white and red are prefectly balanced, and the RHS are a cute touch.