Rant: A Serious Discussion About the Politics of Abortions & Capitalism

     Before I begin, please look at this cute picture of Nendroids (face cases) with the varying expressions of how I have been feeling these past few months since the election.  Perhaps, you too, have had these expressions and feelings as well.  If you have, instead, had expressions of relief, excitement, joy and pleasure, than perhaps you may not want to read any further into this blog.  Instead, if you have had feelings of fear, sadness, rejection and anger, than perhaps you'll understand what I've been feeling and get a gist of what the following blog will be covering.  Maybe you just want to get a better idea into the inner workings of my brain, and if that's the case, feel free to read on.  However, if you are close-minded, bigoted, or a troll, please stop now and save us both time and resentment.  I'll understand and won't hate you in any way.

     Now, for those of you who are still reading this, please keep an open mind.

     I mean it.  OPEN YOUR MIND.

     I am a Liberal.  I am also a Born-Again Christian.

     Yes, they can co-exist, but I also believe that my kind is the quiet minority who are afraid of speaking up because we will be drowned by the majority of non-religious Liberals or the majority of Conservative Christians.  We keep our mouths shut, we plod along, we try to do what's right when the circumstances call for it, but we don't do it loudly out of fear that we will be squashed by both sides that we represent.

     It's darn scary to be someone that is hated by both sides.  Doesn't matter that I'm a white female, because I enjoy rights and also have inherited the problems that all females endure.  Being raised a Christian means that women are to be seen and not heard, are baby-factories who cannot think for themselves, who should not be educated, who cannot be feminist, should stay at home to raise children and cook dinners for husbands.  I was raised by a mother who worked, but then was able to raise her children from home.  She didn't have many hobbies of her own, her whole life revolved around being a wife to her husband and a mother to her children.  That was how she was raised and that was how she lived her life.  (Don't get the wrong impression, I was told that I could be anything and do anything that I wanted, so I wasn't raised as conservatively as I could have.)

     I will not say that is a bad thing, because it's not.  It's sort of the "American Dream of Woman" that came to be after World War II when the men came home from the war.  The women had been busting their butts working in industry so that their husbands could go and fight in Europe.  They scrounged, they saved, they did what they could to keep the country afloat.  When their husbands returned, I'm pretty sure they all wanted to just relax and go back home and allow their husbands to make money and take care of things.  Every person, man or woman, after working for many years and having it rough would want this at some point.  Sure, they might get bored of it after awhile, but I'm pretty sure as the men needed something to do after the war, they probably said, "Nope, it's our job to take care of things now, you just stay home and we'll do the heavy lifting."

     Sure, those women who marched for suffrage, those women who worked hard at the factories and in the war, I'm sure they didn't want to be shut down, but I have a feeling the vast majority of the country probably said, "Oh well, let's just give ourselves a break."

     Now, I didn't live in those times, but you can see a direct shift in the 1950's and 1960's when this mindset occurred, and then Vietnam happened (and hippies) and there was another shift to the idea of women staying at home having babies when we returned to the 1970's and 1980's.  I was raised in that time period and know for certain that was the mindset of the American Conservative Male in that time period.

     We are not here to complain about the "American Dream of Woman".  I had it too when I was growing up because no one told me that I could go into engineering, no one told me that technical school could have been an option, no one told me that women could work in the computer field.  We could 'do whatever we wanted,' but we were not told about everything there was we could be. Women  in the work force were nurses and teachers.  I didn't want to be either one of those, I wanted to be a writer and I wanted to be a historian.  I actually really wanted to be a Paleontologist, but the guidance counselor I was issued didn't know that was the study of dinosaurs.  She never investigated Science, she just simply followed her path.  Either you go into nursing or teaching, get married and quit - or you keep on doing those things and never get married.  Whatever, that's how it was meant to be.

     We are also not here to complain about women having children.  I think my distance from children really came simply from not being around them as much as my mother and many of my friends were.  I didn't get into a serious relationship with a man until well into my 20's and didn't get married until I was almost 30, so by that time I accepted that children might not be something in my future.  I only babysat for one child because the neighborhood I grew up had all children my age and then all that was left were the older generation.  I simply didn't know enough about children to actively aspire to be a parent.  But I know that there are many young and older women who want children but cannot have them are out there and also many young and older women who simply do not wish to have children.    It really shouldn't be an issue.

     What we ARE here to talk about is that it still IS an issue because recently it overshadowed a very important event that happened this last weekend (I'm speaking of the women's marches that happened all over the world).

     Abortion.  Or rather, the choice to have or not to have children.

     It seems simple enough, so let's look at the sides:

     Christians follow one simple philosophy:  Go forth and multiply.
     (King James version of Genesis 9:7 "And you, be ye fruitful, and multiply; bring forth abundantly in the earth, and multiply therein.")

     Okay, so we're talking, we need to have children and we need to spread over the Earth.  Okay, that makes sense even to the non-Christian counterparts in the world.  By even an historical standpoint, when this was written there could be a plague to wipe out a quarter or even a half of the population at a time.  Whole cities could be killed off by a single disease.  This makes sense whether you are talking about God or if you don't believe in a deity at all.  Let's continue the human race because you never know when some war, plague, etc, could happen.

     Springing forward to 2,000+ years later however, and we have medicines, we have hygiene, we are spread over the world to every corner, even parts that our ancestors would never have imagined.  And many humans are predicting we may need to expand outside of every corner of our world into others.

     My question today is, so why is it that we still believe we must continue to multiply?  Is it because of our intimate fear of being wiped out as a species?  Or is it a fear of our blood lines being ended by one infertile child?  If these new DNA testing methods show us, our blood lines are so intermingled now that you can find every single race spread throughout the planet (except, perhaps, for a few small tribes out there).  So is it instead about the fear of our ancestors still spreading down through us that our species must continue on?  Or is it instead the fear that we will displease God if we don't continue multiplying until the Earth can't support us any longer?

     Why would God choose to do that to us?  Why would God tell us to keep having children until the planet He created for us couldn't support us any more?  Is that truly something a loving God would do?

     Okay, so now you're starting to wonder, "What's your point?  Are you a Pro-Choicer?"

     Well, maybe.

     But not for me.  I'm Christian, after all, and if I became pregnant or would become pregnant in the near future, I'd keep the child.  But I'm not going to tell someone else that they can't make the decision for themselves.  That wouldn't be fair to them.

     And for the record, Liberals don't call for Abortion.

     We call for CHOICE.

     So stop acting like every single Democratic Liberal is out there picketing hospitals telling pregnant women to have an abortion because IT DOES NOT HAPPEN.

     And if you've read this far, you should probably continue on reading because I'm about to make a really MIND-BLOWING point here.


     It is FREAKIN' EXPENSIVE to have children.


     Liberals see this, we're educated in this and understand, so let me drive it home to you as well.

     If you, who read this, are a die-hard Christian who believes that God wants everyone to have children, and they voted for Trump because he's a Republican and he's going to stop all of this money from the government from paying for abortions, please hear me out.

     Why are you telling women 1) you can't have birth control and 2) you can't have abortions?

     Because they are "killing babies" right?  Both kill babies.  Am I right?

     However, if you've raised a baby, you know how expensive raising a child can be right?  Maybe you're wealthy and you never had trouble with feeding a child or sending it to a private school.  Or maybe you've always wanted a child but can't have one and there's not enough babies in the adoption system so you can have one of your own.  Or maybe you did have children when all you could feed them was Kraft Mac & Cheese and you barely ate anything but it was worth it because someday those children will grow up to take care of you someday.

     But isn't that selfish?

     Okay, I've been called selfish for not wanting children.  "You're being selfish, because you could give your love, attention and money to a little child instead of keeping it all for yourself."  Yes, sure, maybe it is.  But am I also selfish for not wanting to bring it into a hatred filled America where people can't decide on what's wrong and write and the education system is declining into oblivion and the prison system is filled with people and jobs barely pay for food and shelter because no one understands building, farming and basic need-fulfillment anymore?  And an American where we're about to have another economic collapse at any moment?

     If you have a baby this year, you will spend between $3,000 and $30,000 on medical and hospital bills if you have insurance.  You'll probably spend a few more thousand dollars are feeding and caring for that baby.  You'll spend nearly a quarter million dollars to raise that child until it is of the age to go to college.  (I can't even imagine how expensive it would be to go to college in 18 years so I'm not even going to guess at that right now.)

     Minimum wage is $8.15 where I live.  IF you were able to actually make that full time you'd make $16,000 or so a year before taxes.  (NO, I'm not going to talk about taxes being lowered so stop - America is already where it is because of the tax situation.)  An inexpensive apartment in a decent size city might cost $400-$600 a month to rent - let's say with utilities and insurance that's rounded up to $1,000.  That would leave someone with $4,000 to pay for food, autos/transportation, clothes and other necessities.  Where would a minimum wage person get the money to pay for that kid after all that?

     I'm not talking about raising minimum wage either, so stop whining.

     I'm talking about women living under these conditions and getting by without a child to worry about.  Maybe they try to find someone else to live with so they can share that burden together.  Maybe they make a mistake in that man they find and they have sex and she becomes pregnant and he leaves her.  First these Conservatives say she can't have birth control (or should avoid sex all together) but they also say, but that's your duty as a woman to have children - so now she's pregnant and now she's facing this burden of that child and the money it will cost.

     These Christians won't pay for this woman's medical costs, will they?  Maybe if the woman is lucky she will find someone who wants to adopt and will help her out, but I'm pretty sure that mostly happens in the movies.  I don't have actual numbers on that one, but I feel it's probably pretty rare.  But also, now that it's happened, why can't she abort it?

     An abortion costs less than $1,000.  It's usually a pill and it's done.

     I'm not condoning abortion - so STOP YELLING AT ME.

     I'm just saying, if you were in this situation, you know you'll never find someone who will help you pay for all of the medical costs associated with having a baby, you don't want to be in debt with the hospital for the foreseeable future, and you still have time to take a pill and be in debt for a shorter amount of time, would you really go through and have the baby if those were your choices?

     Oh, and Planned Parenthood is out of the picture because the government wants to stop them from helping women actually plan to be parents, because they're too afraid these places are abortion factories.  FALSE.  These places actually give formula, birth control, and advice to women no matter what side of the issue they are on.  They help women get through having children as well as helping them prevent, but no matter, that won't be around much longer if the Republicans have their way.

    So, again, remember, I'm a Liberal Christian.  I feel like I can believe the way I believe but also believe that everyone else has their right to believe the way they want to believe.  I'm quiet because I know that being vocal would mean someone is going to think I'm trying to impose my belief upon them and that's not how the world should work.  But Christians also believe on spreading their belief to others.

     Where should I draw that line?  I believe that women should have the choice whether they can afford to have children.  I believe a man should not be the one who dictates this.  I also believe that another woman should not be the one who dictates this.  And if one of them feels they should, then maybe they should put their money where their mouth is and help said women have said child and if they can't afford it either, they should probably shut their traps and let the woman do whatever she feels is best in her situation!

     Wouldn't that be much easier than spreading hate and anger?  Wouldn't that be the Christian thing to do?  Wouldn't that be like Jesus wanted in loving thy neighbor?  How about the story of the Good Samaritan?  Have us as Christians gone backwards so far that we're willing to ignore all of the Bible's teachings just to focus on one thing: multiplying?  Or maybe the other focus, "Thou shall not kill."


     That's the brunt of it, isn't it?  Murder?


     I won't argue that stopping the life of a child from being born is a questionable topic.  It could mean murder.  Maybe it doesn't.  I'm not sure.  I won't know for sure until after I'm dead and I can ask God directly what His thoughts are on the subject.  Doesn't say in the Bible anywhere because they didn't have abortion back then.  It does, however, say that life begins with the first breath, (Genesis 2:7) which could be interpreted as soon as a baby is actually born.

     I'm not going to argue though.  Look it up for yourself and decide.  If you've read this far than I'm sure you're intelligent enough to make decisions on the topic for yourself.

     However, keep in mind that what is happening in the United States right now is scary for some people.  They are worried about the future of women and their rights.  We have made many strides forward to getting women equal rights.  We have called out the fact that women make less in every field than men do.  But more women are starting to get into the fields that were typically for 'men only'.  But chefs in restaurants were always men once and now women are there.  So eventually women may get into scientific and engineering fields that men have dominated and we can make the pay they do and the playing field will level out.  Men are already starting to get into the jobs that were once dominated by women - teaching and nursing - so maybe it will.  But should we really take a step back now that we're getting this much closer to equality?

     Wouldn't God want us all to be on equal footing?  He made man and woman.  

     So, in these times as I watch so much hate on all sides, I have sit back and cried.  I know something bigger is going on in this world and something is about to change.  I'm not sure if it's for the better.  We already had one recession in the past ten years, and they're calling for another.  I can feel it happening already as people march on Washington, D.C. and around the world.  As everyone is focusing on Donald Trump becoming president - they are so focused on what he's doing, they either focus on the good or bad to the extent they aren't seeing what's really happening.  Trump, perhaps, is taking our focus off what's really going on in the U.S.A. right now.  Maybe the whole election between him and Hillary Clinton was to stir up Americans to the point of riots (which happened) and point their focus away from what's really going on.

     After all, the subject of abortion has been a hot-topic for over 60 years.  It hasn't gone either way yet, so what's going to say that something will change in four?  But maybe putting that topic at the forefront will stop us from looking at what's really going on.


     Even ignoring the wars and terrorism that are running rampant through an over-populated planet, let's go back to the heart of American Capitalism for just a second.  (And then I'll be done with this rant for today, I promise, just bear with me a bit longer).

     Capitalism, which is what Americans focused on after World War II, making America work for itself again, bringing industry and advancing our country, that's really the focus that Trump made in running for office, right?

     So, if that's his real focus, why have so many business started folding in this new year?  What's really going on then?

     The balance of money has started to tip too far to recover without consequence.

     It's the reason these poor women can't afford to have these babies, after all.  The 1% may soon become the .5%.

     When that happens, when the monopolies have taken over, we will see a huge falling-off that we didn't see in the past recession.  The lower-middle class suffered during the last recession.  Now the upper-middle class/lower upper class will suffer even more.  We're already seeing this in the closures of stores across the country.  Those who have the money are putting the squeeze on companies to pull back the reins.  I've seen this already in two companies in Ohio: The Andersons and Bob Evans.  In the case of The Andersons, the retail side of the business was suffering so they pulled back to focus on production.  Same for Bob Evans, however, they're managing to sell off their retail restaurants as opposed to closing them.  Both of them had investors who wanted to go another direction.  Maybe this is part of the Trump plan, get people back to production - but where does that leave those who have come to rely on retail as a means of supporting ourselves?  (Those wait-staff and cashiers whose livelihoods exist only because of jobs since spending money was always the focus?)

     Well.  I'm not sure.  I do feel, however, that this is not the end.  More businesses will shift their focus, many will shutter doors and shut off the flow of jobs.  Maybe new businesses and jobs will arrive as these businesses change focus, but will it be fast enough?  Only time will tell.  But it's majorly scary for someone who has worked in retail her entire life.  I like selling things.  But I also like making things, so perhaps things will start to shift for that again, who knows?

     All I can say for a fact, is that Americans, whether Liberal or Conservative, Christian or Atheist (or Muslim or whatever religion or not) need to come together and help one another.  We need to look out for one another.  We need to stop criticizing one another.  We certainly need to stop bending the details to our side and start focusing on the truths.  We need to start helping to build up one another so we can withstand this storm that's coming.

     Americans will be nothing if we cannot start helping each other and stop hating one another.  We need to focus on healthcare, education and rebuilding our infrastructure.  We need to buckle down, every single one of us, to build a garden, create a business, work on rebuilding and teaching those children that we do have how to take care of themselves when things get bad.... and they WILL get bad, and soon, unless we stop focusing on these petty differences that haven't been solved in 60+ years and start focusing on things we can make a difference.

     {And for damn sure: stop focusing on stupid inane shit!}

     
Feel free to comment below if you've actually read this far.  And if you DID read this far, I really appreciate you as a human being, because now you know a bit more about me than you probably knew before.  Thanks for being cool.  ^_^  Here's an adorable picture of a cat:

tl;dr:  Women's rights and abortion issues are hiding bigger problems that are growing in our Capitalistic society. 

Last Day of 2016

So, 2016 has been a roller coaster for most of us (including me).  Some really great things have happened, and there's also a lot of things that were bad.  I'm not entirely sure if 2016 was exactly bad for me though.

At the beginning of 2016 I had been in my 'new' position at work for about six months, doing the same work I had the year before but for almost 2/3 less pay.  I was miserable.  I didn't have to deal with the regional manager as much, but things were falling apart at work and I was on a job hunt, trying to find something else that might make me happier.  I was depressed for a good portion of the beginning of the year.  Eventually spring hit and things got a wee bit better and I spoke to my doctor about the possibility of taking medicine.  What I discovered though, was that a lot of my bad mood was between medicine I was already taking and the lack of creative things to keep my mind busy.  So during the spring/summer I was still sort of miserable, but learning to cope.  I got into following the political race and watched the news regularly and started to learn more about things that were going on around me.

Mind you, I was also stressed out about a ton of things and it was still mostly miserable, but I coped, I got through, and even though my candidate lost the election, I felt like I tried and that was good.  On the plus side, we still had Obama through 2016, so in reality, 2017 will probably be worse.  But I digress....

Life did get better or maybe worse at the end of 2016.  I got my 'old' job back, but with less pay, but with the option of eventually making that same amount again given enough time.  I lost a bunch of co-workers (including the regional manager) so things changed quite a bit.  The stress of Christmas and the holidays still weighs on my shoulder as we try to get over the hump and get going on our next season, but I've found I can work at fighting my depression a bit better than I had at the beginning of the year.

Looking on the bright side of things, since Pokemon Go came out I've walked a whole lot more.  The summer was a pretty fun time for me and I met a lot of people out on the streets.  Not so much now, but that's okay because I got out and walked.  Even now that it's cold outside, I'm still walking.  I'm down 16 pounds from spring and I can see a definite change in my photos from a year ago.  I still have a long way to go, I'd still like to lose another 20 pounds and see what it feels like to be 'skinny' and I'm planning on starting up my exercise routine again come the new year.

I'm not making it a resolution though, I'm making it a 'health decision' as 2016 has thrown a number of things at me such as sore wrists (from something like carpal tunnel) and also a bad elbow (most likely arthritis) and a bad heal (bad shoes...can't seem to get that one right yet) and a hernia in my lower intestine (which I have a plan to talk to my doctor about in the next couple of months) and this strange heart murmur thing when I have gas buildup in my stomach (thanks acid reflux!) so I'm not even 40 years old and it feels like my body is already saying 'enough is enough!'  So that's why I think getting into something low impact like yoga and my Pokemon Go walks is the right way to go.

Where will I be a year from now?  I'm not entirely sure.  I hope 2017 will find me in a good place, but I may have to just drop off from following politics for awhile and sort of ignore the world for awhile.  Maybe 2017 will be a time for ME and getting myself centered as a person.  I felt that I was always a happier person when I'm creating things, so working on that might be the way to go.  At least giving myself meaningful projects (I was given a dollhouse to work on this year) might be something that I can work on to keep my mind busy.

As the sun sets in about an hour or so, and the last few hours of the year draw closer, I do hope that I can make a good attempt at enjoying my year in 2017, and I will wave farewell to 2016 and hope that it doesn't prove to be a better year than we had thought.

My Life With Anime Figures - Part 9 (Nendroid Snow Miku 2014)

My obsession with Nendroids started a few years ago when they first came out with a few characters from Sword Art Online (Kirito and Asuna).  After that my husband and I started collecting random ones from other series that we liked, only here and there, because even though these little characters were cute, I wasn't quite taken with their chibi looks and giant heads.  If you look at some of the early Nendroids on the Goodsmile website, you'll see that they have gotten cuter with more detail and more possible poses.  We had about five or six of them by the time I got my first Hatsune Miku.  Actually I got a set of mini Nendroids pretty early on, and then a friend of mine ordered me a Miku in a kimono for a birthday, and suddenly I wanted more of them.

Hatsune Miku (a Vocaloid) has really captured my attention over the last few years.  She doesn't really have a 'story' she's really just a computer generated diva.  And there are so many Hatsune Miku Nendroids that I started finding myself wanting to buy one after another.  The first one that I took great pains to get was the Halloween Miku from 2014 and ordered her straight from Goodsmile.  And I passed up getting Snow Miku of the same year but ordered her from Crunchyroll.  I regretted that decision after I didn't get her until July of the next year (2015).  I was really looking forward to getting some outdoor shots of her with snow and flowers in the late winter, but seeing as though I got her in the middle of Summer, there wasn't much I could do with this little gal without setting up an indoor stage.

But, I can't stand putting so much effort into staging when I have a perfectly wonderful backyard!  So winter of 2015 finally came...but the snow didn't.  It was finally in late winter, in the new year of 2016, that a light fluffy snow finally fell and I had time to take this sweet little Nendroid out for her first snow photo shoot!

This photo to the right is one of my favorites since you can see her clear pigtails, and the snow is just light and fluffy and fresh.  I also got to take her base out and bury it in the snow, so that was fun.

The trees were coated too (although this snow would literally last one day and be melted off the next morning by a warm rain), so I had to act fast that morning.  The sky was bright enough that her pigtails just glowed in the tree and the snow glittered.  I wish that were better captured in this photo, but I liked it anyway.  This Hatsune Miku, after all, is supposed to be something of a snow fairy, so having her up in a tree was sort of a natural setting for her!  Her bunny friend didn't make it up into the tree though, he was waiting patiently below!

Now, unfortunately, even though it snowed so late in the winter that it was getting close to spring, I don't have access to snow drop flowers.  Actually, if you Google "Snow Drop" flowers you'll notice there's a problem with them...they don't look like Miku's flowers!  However, if you look up "Lily of the Valley," the flowers are actually closer.  But...unlike snow drops, lily of the valley don't bloom until the middle of spring.  So, I had to wait longer.

My patience finally paid off!  I planted lily of the valley years ago, probably about four to be exact (long before my Miku was created).  The first few years I barely got any blooms, but this year the flowers sprung up in a big way and had tons of little blossoms!  I was super excited to see them and hurriedly rushed my Miku outside today to finally get her photos with these pretty little flowers.

I decided to take her leaf umbrella out with her today and since she has little water droplets everywhere, I did a little staging and squirted the area down with the hose so there would be other water droplets around.  Unfortunately it didn't make a huge difference in the final photos, but the idea was solid.  This first photo I tweaked only slightly (a few stray water droplets I didn't want) and you can see her clear pigtail.  And the lily of the valley are so cute and small.

For giggles I got a few more shots and decided to tweak the colors a bit.  (Above is in the original colors)  This photo I just liked how green the lilies looked when Miku's hair was blue.  I also liked how tiny she looks hiding among all of the flowers.

Miku's shawl is removable as well, so it fit for the warmer weather and giving her a chance to walk outside in the spring without overheating.  I debated tweaking the snowflakes off of her since there isn't any snow, but it was cute nonetheless.


I will finish up today's blog about anime figures with the last photo from today's shoot.  I really liked this one, and tweaked the color up to show the yellows a bit more.  Hatsune Miku just looked very sweet hiding in the grass as a little winter fairy will do.  She seems pleasantly pleased by the weather and her work on the flowers! I hope you enjoyed today's blog!

Walking the Cat (Short Story)

Walking the Cat
A Short Story

     Mraow!  Mraow!  Meeeeoooowww!  The sound reverberated through the house and the small cat bounced off chairs and over the couch and landed squarely on the rug in front of the door.  Out!  Out!  It seemed to say, no, she did say, as she bounced back the way it came as I walked toward the back door where her leash was.  I'd had the windows and back screen door open all day and after just a few attempts to scale the screen mesh, the little bouncy creature had mostly left the door alone.
     But now, now that I had my shoes on, she wanted out.  I reached for the leash and then went through the motions for the next few minutes of chasing the little cat around the kitchen until I could finally grab the thing, little gray hairs flying all around us as I scooped her up and wrestled the harness over her head.  "Gotta put it on if you want to go outside."
     The rules were the rules.  Too many idiot drivers out there to let the cat go out on her own.  First moment she'd step into the street and she'd probably become a cat pancake.  Just thinking that thought, and it was punctuated by one of the insane drivers out front barreling down the street with an engine that sounded like it came from an old Army Jeep that had too many miles on it and not enough oil changes.  It passed around the corner of the house and I could see the Jeep in question, covered in mud, revving around the neighborhood just to make noise.  He came to a sudden stop, turned around, and sped off down the road again.
     "See?  You could have been a pancake just now."  I plopped the cat, newly harnessed, onto the floor and opened the screen door to the back porch.  MRAOW!  Freedom!  She took two steps, plopped down onto the paver stones and rolled around.  Got up, moved another few steps, plopped over, licked the harness, stared up at me as I closed the back door and meeeeeoow!  I'm outside!  Yay!
     And I followed the little shedding beast through a similar routine for the next five minutes or so around the back patio.  Plop, lick, meow, roll, walk, plop, lick, meow... over and over until she finally decided to venture into the dead winter grass.
     Only on days such as these where it reached over sixty degrees, and today it had gotten to at least seventy, only a week into March... no, global warming...never.  El Nino, maybe.  My mother kept quoting the one newscast she heard sometime early during winter, "It's a strong El Nino this year," she mused, "Didn't even get much snow up here in Michigan until January, 'cause of El Nino."
     Didn't matter much to the cat though, she just wanted to be OUT.  Didn't matter what the temperature was, but I didn't like to stroll along behind her when I could lose the feeling in my nose after a minute or two.  We didn't exactly cruise around the yard at top speed or anything.  A leisurely -5mph maybe, if she didn't decide to backtrack.
     Already she was headed around to the gate, so I headed her off, opening it before she'd slip through the slats and we went up to the front yard.  Quiet night thankfully.  Trains and loud cars tended to cut our walks short.  Didn't the first year, she didn't seem to mind the train at all, but something spooked her on year two and since then she'd stare out the windows of the house at the first sound of the train horn and just stare and stare... like at any moment that loud beastie would come right off the tracks for her and get her.  Nope, on days when we walked and that train would blow its horn, I'd have to dash after her as she high-tailed it to the nearest door to the house.
     Quiet today.  She only stopped about five or six times to roll around on the driveway before making it to the sidewalk, then only another ten or so times down the sidewalk until we made it to the long stretch around the house.  Eventually cutting over and walking back down the fence line to the back of the house.  Made it, only had one or two people notice that I was walking my cat on a leash.
     Kid on a bike said something like, "Nice," and another car passed by, but I don't think he even noticed the cat.  I would have thought after two summers of regularly walking my cat around my yard that someone would have said something about me, that maybe I'd be mentioned in the neighborhood social group that there was some crazy lady who walked her cat.  But, nope.  Not a word.  A few kids noticed from time to time, either welcomed by my cat for pettings, or shunned as she would poof tail and head toward the nearest exit, aka. the back yard.  No one walks cats, right?  Dogs, sure, tons of them, every breed in this neighborhood, but not one cat, except mine, of course.
     Safety of the backyard again and we cruised the patio, watched the birds at the feeders, trailed off to sniff at the cat poop in the backyard - from one of those neighbors who didn't care if their cats became pancakes - and then down the other fence line.
     At first I didn't even realize what I was hearing.  A few neighbors screamed at each other regularly, so I was rather used to that sort of thing, I suppose.  Screaming.  Maybe a loud TV.  Maybe something... my cat stopped dead in her tracks and so did I.  I came out of my thoughts; which weren't a whole lot seeing as though you can't really think about much while walking a cat.  Screaming.  A woman's voice.  Then dogs barking.  Babies crying.  My eyes lifted from the fence line and my cat, the foot I'd just stepped down onto the pricker plant that I'd have to weed from the lawn, I stepped on it with my foot and was thinking about when I came back out again, and oh I needed to scrape the bird poop off the fence too, it was piling up in little hard mountains where they'd sit between raiding the bird feeders.
     "OH MY GOD!!!"  And then it came again, "OH MY GOD!"  And again...again...over and over.  Screaming.  Blood curdling baby cries.  Dogs barking.  Some out of fear of the screaming, some from something else...were there two dogs?  My attention snapped up to the house next door to ours.  They were always quiet, always calm, barely making any noise or even talking to us much at all.  We'd seen the husband, and seen him with his wife.  He used to have a dog, a pretty spotted thing, white and black.  But then they'd had a baby boy, and the dog disappeared.  And then they had another boy.  And then someone, not sure who, moved in.  And then a regular visitor who had scrubs.  And a black dog that she'd throw his poop away in the trash container that now permanently resided between our houses.
     More screaming and I picked up my cat and thought to walk back into the house.  Didn't need to hear this...did I?  Yes, sort of, I did.  I hear more screams, baby crying, and suddenly the voice turned into, "I need help!  My dog bit my baby!"  An address, oh, called the squad or 9-1-1.  The dog's barks had calmed down but the baby still was crying.  I knew now why, but how?  I wasn't sure.
     It was an odd situation, these neighbors.  They seemed to be our age, but not very friendly.  The first 'wife' we'd seen with our neighbor was definitely different than the one with the babies, and this one just looked different.  But who owned the dog?  Couldn't have been the one with the baby...or were their two babies?  A second one from the woman with the dog?  I wasn't sure, I'd never be sure.  I went inside and told my husband about what I heard.
     We waited to hear sirens.  A paramedic showed up and two men went in to attend to the baby.  I thought about what I would have done with a baby bit by a dog.  I unharnessed my cat who MRAOWWWW'd her dissatisfaction with our short walk.  She followed me around the house as I watched to see if they'd send out animal control or something to take the dog away.  I realized that if my dog bit my kid, if I'd had a kid, I probably would have just taken him to the ER rather than calling for a paramedic.  Just imagine the bills...  No one came, no dogs were taken away, but no one else showed up either.
     I sat down at the window, wondering if the guy who was watching someone down our street would show up again.  He was there yesterday as I sat at my computer with my cat in my lap, then off my lap, then on my desk, then plop, lick, mraow, back down on my lap again, fur everywhere, and I wondered about this man out in the car in front of our house.  I could only see his hands and occasionally a phone and then a notebook.  That was yesterday, and today there was a different truck out front, that one had tinted windows and I couldn't see anyone in that one, but when I opened the windows I could hear the engine running.  It drove away and was replaced within a minute by the original guy.
     The first guy had shaggy blondish hair to his shoulders.  Did he have facial hair?  Maybe.  I wasn't sure, the glimpse I got of him was brief.  He did the thing with his phone again, grabbed his notebook out, and then sat with his hands on his legs as he watched someone down the street.  I hoped it wasn't my house.  I wouldn't know what it would be about, but ever since my own brother had been the object of surveillance outside my mom's house when we were still living there, I was paranoid about stuff like that.  The government wants you to think that they can't watch you and dig into every aspect of your life, but they can.  I remember seeing that dark car parked across the street with that little red light and ever so often someone would light up a cigarette and flick it out the window.  And I wondered why the heck someone would be watching our house because we were the whitest straight family...
     At least until I'd moved out and the year I got married the FBI busted down my mom's door and dragged my brother off to prison for 25 years over child pornography.
     I was still paranoid that something could be happening under my nose and I'd never know it.  So what was this going on now?  Drug ring?  Pedophilia?  Illegal immigrants?  Something else? They guy drove off long before I was willing to take the cat out for her walk.  If I were a different kind of person I probably would have gone out to ask him who he was watching.  Maybe he even would have driven away before I finished approaching the car.  But I didn't take the chance.  I wasn't that kind of person.
     I was the kind of person who would rather have cats than kids.  I was the kind of person who freaked out when my cat fell down off a shelf and limped for a week, and took her to the vet to have her checked over.  But I was also a person who probably would have blamed the kid for stirring up the dog to bite him.  I would have scolded him, wrapped up his wound, and taken him to the ER myself if, and only if, it was deep enough I would have thought it needed stitches.  But that crap is expensive, insurance or Obamacare or not.  Band-Aids and Neosporin, that was the way of it.  And if the kid would be afraid of dogs for the rest of his life, good!  At least then he wouldn't stir the stupid thing up into biting him.
     My cat looked up at me solemnly from the rug by the front door.  "Not going back out there again tonight, too dark," I told it.  She MRAOWed, not happy, made some kind of meow-grumble sound as she walked out of the room and I grabbed a cookie out of the container on the counter.
     I was the kind of person who took my cat for a walk outside on a leash.

My Life With Anime Figures - Part 8 (Nendroid Kitchen)

     I'll be the first to admit, I'm pretty jealous of some of these figure photographers I've been following online.  If it weren't for the fact that I just don't have the funds (or time) to do the amazing stuff they do, I'd probably start my own Facebook page and try to get a following like they all seem to have.  And maybe eventually I'll have enough photos to try to do it myself.  Perhaps even enough to produce a book and try to get it funded.  Nah...  Well, a girl can dream, right?

     Anyway, today's "My Life With Anime Figures" surrounds the creation of a little kitchen for my Nendroids.  Why a kitchen?  Because I could get decently sized furniture from the Calico Corner toy series, and the kitchen set was adorable.  Plus, I love miniature food.  Today you won't see all of my collection of tiny food, but will probably bring out the rest eventually in the upcoming months as I try my hand at more of these.  I also have more Nendroids to photograph and will probably do more changes to the furniture itself in the future too to make it more unique.  But for now, these are mostly test shots as I decided to build a 'stage' for my figures.

      

    So I had furniture, food, and figures, but I didn't have a room.  I considered making a room out of a cardboard box but I realized over time it might break down from use and I also wanted something stable enough that I could move it out of reach from my cats.  After some hunting I found a sturdy unfinished bin I was able to cut the front off to give myself two corners of a room.  I've seen some setups with only one corner, but I wanted to have some opportunities to switch sides of the room (which you'll see in the photos to come.

     Now that I had a blank room, how to decorate it?  Paint it?  Cut holes for windows?  I finally landed on scrapbook paper since I could tape it on and remove it as I pleased.  I found an adorable set of paper called "Olivia's Kitchen" at Hobby Lobby that had plenty of old fashioned food themed papers and also had some types of repeating patterns that would look good for flooring.  I settled on the checkerboard design because even though my Nendroids aren't in the old days, I like the old fashioned style look in kitchens.  Plus the furniture, especially once I get it painted, will probably look more old fashioned anyway so it will all fit in.


     Unfortunately I don't have any photos of the room by itself with just wallpaper and the window, or with furniture installed but no Nendroids.  But I'm sure you came here to see photos of the figures anyway, so here's one of the first setup photos as I was testing lighting.  I realized pretty early that because of the three walls there wasn't going to be a really good way to get natural lighting in this space.  The flash washed it out terribly, and closeup photography kind of needs natural lightning.  I tried turning it to the window, but the shadows appeared in strange places.  So I pulled out a couple random lamps, one from IKEA which gives a sort of natural glow and another LED spot lamp that was just too focused.  But I do think perhaps it might be of some use in the future.

     As you can see in the photo of Umaru on the right, the soft warm glow on the right side of the room was from the IKEA lamp sitting inside the room.  The light focused on the fridge is the LED light that was just too hash and pinpointed.  I think maybe it'll be useful for the glow from a computer screen or something, so I'm keeping it nearby just in case.  Unfortunately no matter where I put the soft light of the other lamp it just didn't light up the room as I wanted.  So I snapped various photos while moving it around to different positions and then headed to bed that night.  During a bout of insomnia, it finally hit me that I could 'float' the lamp above the box if I built a strut-like system on top.  (Again, I'm glad that I splurged for the wooden container as opposed to a cardboard box which wouldn't have held the weight of the lamp and strut system).

     Here's an unedited photo of what the room looks like lit with the lamp from above.  I also added a fun window and painted clouds and gave it a night shine.  Attached it using double sided tape, so again, I can change it and move it where I want.  The lighting it sort of like you'd see in an old kitchen like this where they really didn't put many windows and there was usually only a little tiny light above.  I'd love to add upper cabinets someday, but we'll see.  I also added a second "wallpaper" to the right side of the room to make the seating area a bit different.  Eventually I'll fix the seam, but for now it does the trick.

So now that I've got half-way decent lighting, I have a kitchen, if not completely finished, and I've got some Nendroids hanging out, I thought I'd have a little fun with it.

Umaru raids the kitchen!

Hanging out by the cool fridge on a hot summer day (with Nyanko-Sensei)

 Snow Miku (2015) Hangs out in the Dining Room.

Tsukiko is munching on steamed buns she brought over.

And finally... Umaru raiding the kitchen in the middle of the night!

     This finally photo was actually my favorite because I got to play with Photoshop and do some color changes to make it look like it was night.  I'm very excited to be able to do more with this kitchen as time goes on and hope to expand it by adding photos and curtains and other fun things as time goes on.

     I hope you enjoyed today's blog!  Please feel free to comment below and follow me!  ^_^

My Life With Anime Figures - Part 8 (Room for Improvement)

I wasn't exactly sure if I'd have enough topics to keep this series going more than a few parts, but in today's installment of "My Life With Anime Figures" I decided to cover a question that I know any collector will normally hit upon from time to time.  It's one of the most important questions, second only to "Should I take a figure out of the box?  Or should I keep it pristine in the box?"  And obviously this question will only arise if you have taken said figure out of the box:

"Should I modify my figure in any way?"

Today's installment will go over the three main questions that I hear about figure modification:

1.  Should I glue my figure together?

2.  Can I modify or paint a small part to fix it?

3.  Is it okay to completely remake a figure into something else?

In the spirit of pros and cons, I'll first cover a few brief points on whether you should even take a figure out of the box.  Here's a few points you should think about before you take a figure out.

Will you want to re-sell the figure at some point?

Do you want to play with your figure?

Are you only collecting or are you enjoying the figure?

How will you store the figure in the box?  Do you have room?

Can you even see the figure inside of the box to enjoy it?

Okay, mostly people who keep figures inside of the box plan on selling them some time in the future.  Most likely they are perfectly content on just owning the figure, and are too worried that dust or handling will somehow diminish the value of the figure.

To those of you who are in this category, this following blog is not for you.  Most likely you will cringe with what I'm about to show you because to me, figures are not about re-selling, but playing with, enjoying, etc.

Okay!  Now that we have that out of the way and your figure is out of your box, what will you do with it?  Put it on a shelf, or a desk, or somewhere you can look at it and smell the plastic of your new treasure.  Maybe you bought a cheap figure that you had to put together (like a gatchapon) and you're having trouble keeping it together.  Mind you, most well made figures will not have this problem, but sometimes figures like Nendroids and Figmas will have parts that loosen after being played with for a bit and you might find yourself asking this question:

1.  Should I glue my figure together?

        No.  Well, that's the short answer, because most of the time you're going to get glue everywhere and all you'll see is glue everywhere and you won't be happy with your figure after that and it'll get stuck up on a shelf somewhere because you glued it to the point where you can't play with it anymore.  Now you can't re-sell it even if you did want to get rid of it because no one's going to want to look at that icky mess you just created.

       Yes.  That said, there are times you might have to glue it.  For instance, you may have played a bit too roughly with that Figma and an arm fell off.  Oops.  Okay, pinning and gluing might be necessary to make it fine to play with again.  Watch videos on YouTube and practice gluing without getting the glue everywhere - use tiny amounts!

       Maybe.  Occasionally I say you may just want to glue the whole bugger together if it won't stay together long enough to even stand on a shelf.  If, for some reason, your figure was one of those less than ten dollar figures that came in a bunch of pieces, most likely you'll need to glue it at some point just to keep it together.  Just watch how you do it and be careful you glue the pieces together correctly or you'll get something that looks like it's out of a Picasso painting.

2.  Can I modify or paint a small part to fix it?

        Possibly.  This question also goes back to whether you feel like what you're doing to the figure will make it better or not.  I've had a few figures over the years that bothered me to the point of 'fixing' them with paint.  Below I've included a couple of pictures to show you a Vash the Stampede (from Trigun) figure that I bought and 'fixed.'

        For those of you who have only seen the Trigun anime, you'll probably wonder why in the heck Vash has black hair.  Without going into too many spoilers from the manga to the anime, between the original Trigun manga and the Trigun Maximum manga, some of Vash's hair turns black.  I'm a fan of Trigun Maximum, and the image this figure comes from has Vash's hair black in the back.  The original figure did not.  Because of this inconsistency, I took it upon myself to fix the figure to correct it.

      As you can see, it didn't really diminish the look of the figure, it just changed it to look more like the original image.  And really, if this figure is going to be yours forever, or as long as you care to own it, why not like looking at it?  Why not do something you think you'll be proud of?
     Sometimes you'll also see problems in painting that you could fix, or perhaps a part of the figure has been scratched, or broken and can be fixed by a slight modification.  Always be prepared before you attempt to do something like this, watch plenty of videos (there are a lot of them out there) and make sure you've got all of the correct supplies.

3. Is it okay to completely remake a figure into something else?

     I've seen this particular thing done on various levels.  Most of the time those who do a modification or complete re-do will start with an inexpensive figure.  I worked on some smaller collectibles first such as My Little Pony Blind bags.

     Then I worked my way up to complete over-hauls (although this one could almost fall under the 'fix' category.  Princess Celestia appeared the first time as completely pink in pony form, so I completely repainted all but a few key areas (namely her eyes and cutie mark).

     Of course, now you're going, but what about anime figures?  Should I not touch those?  Well, it all depends on you.  Have you had experience painting in miniature?  Do you have skills with molding?  Start with a garage model first before you try to start something from scratch, otherwise you might regret something and you'll have ruined your figure.
     I have a coworker that re-makes POP! figures into other figures that they don't make (although I'm sure that's hard to do since there are so many of them) but giving them different color hair, clothing, etc, sometimes will improve a figure that you otherwise were "Eh" about.
     Take for example, my newest figure acquisitions which happened to be cheap, "backpack charm" figures of Hatsune Miku.  I don't have a picture of them before, except to say their hair colors were wrong, way more blue than aqua.  They were cheaply painted and I got doubles on accident which really got me angry seeing as though there are 6 varieties, I bought three, so dangit, I should have gotten at least half of the different types, right??  I spent a absurd amount on them - $7.50 a piece (if they'd been open package I wouldn't have spent more than $5).
     However, being enterprising and already out the money, I decided to fix them up.  The two below are cases where I did little tweaks and decided to slap a bunch of pearl glaze on them to shine them up a bit:

      As you can see, I used my manga for color reference.  Originally their hair was way more to the blue side of turquoise than it was aqua.  I fixed up some black splotches of paint on the right one's hand (from a bad paint job) and gave stripes to the left one's panties (because I'm obsessed that way).  I didn't do the pearl coat quite as smoothly as I should have, but now I think I'd be willing to go outside with them strapped to a bag or purse.

     The last figure which was a duplicate of the left figure, I decided to do a complete overhaul and completely take the backpack strap off of her and make her into a mini figure.

      I was a bit too heavy-handed with the paint on her face unfortunately, but I just didn't like having duplicates.  I completely sprayed a base coat on this figure and painted her from scratch, top to bottom.  Took a few days thanks to cat interruptions and the fact that I was working with such a small figure and had eye strain.  She only sits less than 2 inches high.  But, I think it turned out pretty cute, even if the only clear glaze I had at the moment was glitter glaze, so now she's sparkly, but Miku looks okay sparkly in my opinion.  I need more practice at painting faces, but I don't think she turned out too poorly.


THE VERDICT:

How much or how little you feel there's room for improvement in your figures, make sure you plot out your plans in advance.  Do you feel that you'd be happier with a changed figure than the original thing?  And will you deal with the consequences of not being able to sell it (unless you modify figures for that purpose and sell them in which, go you!)  Think about your choices and then stick with them!  Sometimes we all need a little improvement to make us feel better about ourselves.

The Reality of Fantasy (Short Story)

     I've realized lately that as a writer, I haven't written much in the way of anything creative.  In the past I used to fill journal after journal with short stories and even tried once to collect them and sell them to publishers.  That didn't happen.  I got discouraged and no one ever asked to read what I had to write.  Eventually I just sort of stopped writing all together.  That's not to say that the stories aren't in here somewhere, but they rarely make it to print.  Anyway, today's blog is actually a test of whether I could write a complete story and get it finished in a little over an hour.  I'll give Stephen King his due because after reading some of his newer short stories, I realized how much I just like writing short stories myself.  Here's an attempt at something new for my own sake.  If you like it, I'm glad.  If you don't, don't tell me, I don't want to know about it!  *smirk*  I just think that it's time I write something of my own once in awhile.

The Reality of Fantasy

     It hardly felt worth getting on the computer anymore.  She would sit down and scroll through the endless feed from her Facebook account, or occasionally Reddit, and eventually realized how much time she had wasted looking at all of the fake ads and the numerous silly photos of cats.  Not that she didn't like looking at cats, that wasn't the point, but the original reason she had started into computers all of those years ago was so that she could write.
     Writing had been an early love, since she started out learning cursive in third grade, but unfortunately for her, she realized just how much she copied her favorite books  No one had even suspected when she'd written a brilliant tale about some unicorns and dragons in third grade that it had been almost a direct ripoff of a book she'd read over and over from the school book fair.  Originally she had told lots of stories about unicorns and the such to the point Miss Williams even bought her a specially made book with unicorns on the cover since she figured that's what she'd be writing about.  But when the time came to fill the empty book with stories of these fantastic creatures, her mind drew a blank.  She couldn't write an original story, so she took a story she liked, changed it just a little bit, and passed it off as her own.  Miss Williams didn't even know the difference.
     And so it went from early on; she was always better at writing reports than writing original stories.  But eventually they came to her.  Eventually she could focus her attention on fantasy, and even though years later she would see resemblances to certain novels she no doubt read at the time, they were more or less her own.  But those feelings resided in her for years because the more she read others' work, the more she thought everything that she wrote was also a rip off of something else.
     It got really bad once she started writing fanfiction.  Because fanfiction was something that blatantly took someone's work and made it into your own.  Sure, it could be written very creatively, and she could put her own characters into the world and make it however she wanted.  But at the very base of it, she was taking someone else's work for her own and that discouraged her from writing.
     Once she refused to write fanfiction anymore, the writing stopped completely.  Well, she admitted to herself that as long as she wrote about her own life, in her journals and personal blogs, that possibly it was her.  She wasn't ripping anyone off because it was actually her own story.  And for a short time this made her happy with herself because she could feel free.  But the idea of imagination and the idea of creativity, it felt far away and sad now.  She would start to write something that had been inspired by someone else and she realized that this was just going the same way as how things had been before.  She wouldn't, no, couldn't allow herself to get this way again.

     It was a shame really, what happened next.  At least, that's what she felt when she opened her news feed one day and looked at the local television station's Facebook page.  Fantasy... it had to be an early April Fool's joke...right?  There it was, printed in full color, but the revelation that there really were fantasy creatures.  They'd discovered a unicorn in the ice in Greenland as one of the glaciers started melting.  Here was proof.  Sure, there were plenty of skeptics online and plenty more stupid people who thought it was absolute reality, but this wasn't one of those online ads.  At least it didn't seem to be one of those fake hoaxes because they had sent some of the top researchers out and started testing the DNA already.  Apparently it was an anicient breed they assumed had been the originating species of both horses and deer, even though they did admit this wasn't what scientists had thought originally.  More tests had to be run, but they were even thinking perhaps the DNA could be used to recreate the unicorn using horses to birth them.
     The news was so sensational for the next few weeks she really thought that it would turn out to be a hoax.  But eventually things wore down and as the years went on, they really did bring a unicorn back to life and eventually even started raising them and selling them.  The unicorns weren't magical, of course, but they grew horns just like in fairy tails, and they used them to break ice to get to water, fight for mates and gather food from trees.  After the winter months passed, however, they shed the horns and would regrow them again in time for winter.  The first few years theses horns were scarce and the Chinese tried to sell them as herbal remedies which made them even harder to come by.  Then some naturalists got hold of the unicorns and decided that they should put them in sanctuaries and raise them in wildlife preserves.  After that a unicorn horn could be found in just about every hunting shop alongside the antlers of various other animals.
     Sooner than not, people went on to the next awesome thing, the next gadget, and girls didn't dream about unicorns in the way they used to when she had been growing up.  The unicorns were just another animal.  Albeit now, instead of pony parties, there were unicorn parties.  The beasts were just about as fragile as a deer or small horse, but for the most part they could be tamed and it made for better entertainment than a clown for most girls during those years.

     Was it ten years, or twenty?  She couldn't remember now, but she hadn't written a unicorn story since that time, nor had she picked up her writing tablet for anything.  She went to work at her retail job, she loathed the coming of the holiday season again, and she didn't try to write something creative.  Her husband tried to encourage her from time to time in attempts to help get her writing, but because he didn't spend any time asking to read her old stories, or even attempt to read her journals which she left lying around the house, she didn't feel any real need to write.  Fantasy for her had become reality.  It was depressing.  Although, when they added a unicorn run near the bison park ten miles away from her, some days she would go out and take pictures of them.  But the stories and fantasy of these magical creatures never once came back to her during this time.  It was as if something inside of her had gone away.
      So, it was a complete surprise the morning she got up early one November morning and the sun was still dark, and there in the backyard was a large, white shadow.  At first she thought it was the reflection of herself in the patio glass in the dark she saw, but then she turned out the light and went over to the window.
     Standing in her backyard, helping itself to seed from her bird feeder was a unicorn.  It looked young, a small horn was peaking out of its head, so it was definitely not a deer.  Perhaps one of the young from the pen at the park got out?  Or perhaps someone having a unicorn party didn't get it locked up again?  She wasn't sure, but when it noticed her looking at it from the patio, it turned and walked up toward the porch.
     "Tame then," she murmured to herself as she bent to retrieve the wood bar from the patio door so she could open it.  The unicorn stood, harmless and quiet on the back patio stones and waited as she opened the screen door.  "What are you doing out here?  I'm sure you aren't wild... someone looking for you?"  She slipped on her Crocs and slid out onto the porch.  It was briskly cold that morning and she could see her breath as she closed the patio door behind her.
     The unicorn came up slowly, timidly, snuffling for food, an apple or something.  She couldn't remember what unicorns ate, but probably all of the same foods as horses or deer.  Turning, she looked over at the fence gate and found it open.  "Didn't think you could jump as high as a deer," she murmured, realizing she must have left it open the other day when she was doing yard work to finish up things for the winter.  The unicorn snuffled up closer to her and she held out an empty, flat hand.  It lipped her fingers, searching for food and then snorted and backed away, realizing it wasn't getting a treat.
     "Hold tight, I have apples inside," she said finally, and backed away, hoping not to spook the animal.  Perhaps if she kept it in one place for long enough the owners would drive by looking for it and maybe she could find out the story of why this unicorn had wandered into her backyard.
     Getting inside without spooking the animal, she went into the fridge and pulled out an apple. Thought twice, grabbed a knife and sliced it in four, and then also took her coat off the hook and pulled it on.  With the apple in hand again, she returned outside and the unicorn looked at her expectantly.  "Here you go, sweety, I hope you eat these."  She put a slice of apple in her opened hand and the unicorn huffed it once and the slurped it down with teeth and tongue.
     "Oh good," she said under her breath, "Guess you were hungry, want another?"  The unicorn came over and knelt down before her at that moment.  Her heart started to pound at that moment, because all of those stories from her childhood came rushing back to her.  Were some of those unicorn stories true?  Were they all just made up from real stories in the far distant past and just handed down until all of the unicorns were extinct?  She could feel her heart pounded out of her chest and she hurried to sit down on the porch step to give the creature another apple slice.
     No one had mentioned this in the articles about unicorns on the web.  They were pretty much just like any other wild animal who gets tamed for humans.  They were a bit more like deer than horses, but overall they didn't do anything out of the ordinary.  Except for this one.  Maybe it was trainable.  It was young, after all, the horn was quiet short, she noticed, as it ate down the third slice of apple and licked its lips.  She supposed perhaps they could be trained, but maybe like a cat, they did what they wanted when they wanted and perhaps this was just an effect of giving it an apple slice.
     "Here's the last piece," she said as she mulled this over and the unicorn huffed in the cold air and crunched down the last of the red delicious.  "I wish I knew where you came from though, it would make for an interesting story online.  Might even go viral if I were to video tape you."  She shook her head at that and lifted her hand toward the unicorn.  "Can I pet you at least?"
     The unicorn, at this move of her hand, lowered its head into her lap.  She gasped slightly, and then stroked the forelocks and mused at the small spiral of horn on its head.  It was like all of her childhood dreams come true.  All of those stories and all of those moments where this, this, was what she wanted to have happen when she was young, when she was just a virgin, when nothing else really mattered.  But unicorns weren't real.  These weren't just beasts you could rent for the day... at least, not then.  But now.  Now they were real and here was one with its head in her lap and almost purring as she petted its mane and ran her fingertips over its soft furry ears.
     How could she not write about this moment?  This was it... she was so much older now, in her forties, but this was the moment she had waited for since she was a little girl.  She wanted to share this lovely moment with everyone.  It was a shame her camera wasn't on her.  She wasn't like her husband, carrying around his smart device with him everywhere he went.  That watch of his probably could have taken the photo at a quality almost as good as her five year old smart phone.  She sighed, oh well, this memory was better than any photo, even if no one believed her.  She smiled and stroked that soft mane and realized that it wouldn't be much longer and she really did need to be getting going to work or she'd be late to open the store.
     The twitch of her leg at this thought brought the unicorn's head up.  It stood abruptly and she held out her hand as if to say, don't go, but she couldn't get the words out.  Or maybe she did, she couldn't hear them at any rate because at that moment a shot rang out.  She saw a small red circle form on the unicorn's chest, the blood filled the white chest moments later and the animal dropped to the stone patio.  It twitched, legs convulsing as the hot red blood spilled onto the ground.
     Staring in disbelief, her mouth hanging open, it felt like an eternity, watching this beautiful creature die in front of her.  She couldn't move, couldn't breathe, her hand still stretched out in front of her.  What...why...how?
     "Oh hey, thanks for that.  I've been chasing him down for over a mile now."  The voice came from the fence line over her shoulder and the guy in the dark camouflage walked down the fence and into the backyard.  He'd been sitting on the opposing neighbor's porch moments before the shot and had waited for the unicorn to get away from her.  "Rabies, you know...  Can't be too careful around these things, they catch it like wildfire."  He slung the hunting rifle over his shoulder and proceeded to grab the unicorn by it's back legs.
     "Sorry about the blood, didn't mean to scare you, you okay, lady?"  He started to pull it toward the fence.  "My buddies are bringing the truck around, they'll help you clean up the blood.  Thankfully the fresh stuff washes off patios like this in no time."
     "Oh...okay..."  The words came out of her mouth with a whisper and she finally lowered her hand and realized just how cold it was.  The light was getting brighter, the sun was starting to come up.  The unicorn's blood steamed in the cold air off the patio stones.  "You were tracking it down for rabies?"
     The hunter lifted his head from his task and then looked over his shoulder.  Two guys in a big-wheeled truck of some sort pulled up alongside the curb.  One of them waved to him and rolled down the window, "Oh you got him!  Terrific!"  They came out of the car and helped carry the unicorn and lift it into the back of the truck.  The one driving came over to the back fence at the word of the first hunter and excused himself, said he was going to borrow the faucet on the back of the porch to clean up.
     "Sure... there's a bucket..." She sniffled, her nose was running from the cold.  Not quite believing what she had seen, the hunter proceeded to dump buckets of water across the patio until she couldn't see any trace of what had happened.
     "Sorry about all of this, miss.  Hope it didn't hurt you... nasty buggers these.  They get real fiesty during mating season.  Thankfully this one was young so no worries.  We were worried he might have rabies though.  Someone reported him a few miles away busting through a house.  Thank goodness he stumbled into your yard though, they're awfully fond of the ladies."  He waved at her and closed the gate behind him, hopping into the truck his buddies said something about getting a reward and they drove off into the morning sunlight.
     Numb in both mind and body, she walked back into the house.  Her husband was coming down the stairs, rubbing his eyes, holding his robe around him.  "Did you hear that bang a bit ago?  What was that?"
     She shook her head, rubbing her cold, probably red nose.  "Nothing...  Nothing at all."

My Life with Anime Figures - Part 7 (Indian Summer)

It's November now, and yet, for this part of the country, it doesn't really feel much like it.  If you're like me, you probably know that things aren't quite the same as it was when we were younger (unless you're young and you remember winters coming later in November and sometimes not getting hardly any snow at all) and even though I live farther south than I did as a child, it's still weird when on a November afternoon I could go outside in short sleeves and bare feet.  I'm not living in the Southern states, I'm in Ohio.  At this point in time we usually could have gotten a snow, or at least a good hard, killing frost that takes out all of my flowers in the front garden and I'm forced to pull in all of my plants off of the front porch.

This year, however, my tomato plants got the small frost that hit, but not the front porch and so I have flowers in my planters on my porch one wouldn't normally see in November.  Take, for example, the perfectly happy petunias you see in the photo to the right.  I kid you not, even though I did take this photo over a week ago, the same plants are blooming like crazy still in their red planter and actually a second round of flowers sprung up in the planter from seed and started blooming as well.  Remember, I'm in Ohio.  It's November.  Let that sink in a bit.  Normally I keep geraniums all year round and I tend to bring them in after the first frost, but it was so brief this year that they're actually doing better than in past years at this time inside the house.  Now, tell me that global warming is not a thing.  Tell me that climate change does not exist.  Maybe you think it's El Nino (which, I heard today, may make this winter the lightest one since our almost no-winter in 2011 where we got less than 12 inches of snow) but no matter what your take on it is, this isn't normal.  I'm not growing these plants in a greenhouse, I haven't taken them inside once, it's just sitting on my porch being happy.

Nevertheless, I won't dwell on that as my topic today because the real reason I'm blogging this evening is to show off my new Nendroid, Noel.  She's from Sora no Method (or Celestial Method if you're looking on Crunchyroll) and she's quite special.  But before I get into her photos, let me do a little setup for you.  Basically I've been starting to collect fairy garden things for my Nendroids.  Not all of them are quite the right size, so you have to be picky about it.  I know that some doll accessories out there will do the job too, but I've been more concerned with finding items that I personally like in order to post photos with my Nendroids.  Some of the other photographers online have entire setups with rooms and accessories, but I'm more of an outdoor kind of person.  So in the photo you see to the left, there's a few pumpkin accessories I spotted at a fairy garden store in Frankenmuth, Michigan.  At the time I didn't buy any of them, but later did when they went on sale (in fact, I found them today at a local garden center that had them on clearance).  It's past Halloween now, so I didn't want to pull out the Jack'o'Lanterns or anything, but I thought since in one scene of the first episode of Sora No Method, Noel is waiting for her friend Nonoka and Autumn passes.  She happens to play with a fox she makes friends with, and I set up my photos thinking of that first Autumn she waits for her friend to come back.

The Nendroid Noel is a pretty awesomely cute little character.  I had to wait an extremely long time to get my hands on her though as I'd ordered her online through Crunchyroll and we're pretty sure they lost our order.  After waiting over a month past her release in Japan, we still had no sign of her showing up.  After finally sending an email about it, she showed up with two other figures we were wondering about.  But the wait was well worth it since she comes with a load of extras, but if you want to see those, go online elsewhere, there's plenty of photos showing what she looks like with all of her accessories.  As for me, I'd rather have her living her life as she waits for Nonoka.  Today she discovered some pansies still growing in my garden out back.  I love how in the Autumn I can cover up her base using a leaf and you don't even know I'm using her stand because it disappears!

Oh hi!  It didn't rain today, but after watering the flowers I realized that some of the drops had gotten on Noel.  Oops.  But it didn't get her down because she found a leaf big enough to use as an umbrella!  This is her largest accessory (well, that and the space ship) and I'm actually looking forward to posing her later with my Winter 2015 Miku figure because they both are holding leaves and looking like little nature spirits.  But that will come later as I think it needs to get a little bit closer to the winter months to do that.  Noel waits quite a few years for her friend returns, so I wonder just how many winters, springs, summers and autumns she has to wait for Nonoka?

No worries this year though, it appears that Noel discovered a pretty cool thing - pumpkins!  Now you get to see a bit of the accessories that I discovered at the garden center this year (and a few other fairy garden places) and even though it's past the time of year where people normally think of pumpkins (mostly) I thought it would still be a good time since we're still in the month before pumpkin pie season.  Hee hee.  I'm not sure whether Noel would pick up the kobocha in front of her, or the others that are around her.  She seems pretty excited about her find though.  I wonder what she's going to do with them?  I almost tried getting her to sit on one of them for a photo, but that's when I discovered one really odd thing about this particular Nendroid...she wears no panties.  This is the strangest thing I've discovered (and others have noted it online as well) because even for other figures that have no 'panty shots' in their respective anime... at least they painted the tushies white!  But for Noel, maybe it was a rush or maybe on purpose, we're not sure, but she was left skin color below her dress.  We'll probably never know why this was, but it basically has stopped me from putting her in any 'compromising' poses.

More fairy garden accessories came to play in this photo, but I still love how the leaves cover up any sign of her stand.  And what's that in the background on the right?  Is that her fox friend?  I couldn't quite find one that looked as anime-ish as I would have liked, but I did find a fox that was just about the right size for her.  So at least Noel had a friend to hang out with while waiting for Nonoka to return so she could grant her friend a wish.  She looks so happy out in the garden on a nice Indian Summer day.  Maybe she'll even grant me a wish?

There is something to say about these adorable little Nendroids.  I enjoy their compact size, the fact that they really take on the characteristics of the anime using their various expressions and props.  I did leave one face out of these photos, there's a pouty one that I couldn't quite figure out how to work into these shots, so maybe sometime in the future.

One thing that I do enjoy, is that she came with a background cardboard stand that shows the observatory.  Unfortunately it had already gotten dark outside by the time I realized I wanted to do this shot, so the glare made things a bit odd.  But I liked playing around with it in photo shop and you get so see her fox pal a bit better.  As I said, this one is a bit too realistic for the anime character, but it turned out to be a neat addition in the photo shoot.  And completely by accident as I'd forgotten about the fox until I re-watched the first episode of the anime this evening!  This photo also was something of a mistake because I moved the camera at the last second and it gave sort of a blur effect.  BUT, it came out a lot better than I would have imagined and it fit in together really well.

So, as the last few hours of our Indian Summer wind down to a close, do I regret anything?  I know that now will come winter, now will come the hectic shopping and plans for Christmas, and I really will miss Autumn because it's my favorite season.  These few photos represent my hopes to cling to that season for just a few more days.  I was extremely lucky to have two of the three really beautiful days off to walk around in my bare feet and short sleeves.  One last day in November to pretend that it was still the beginning of Autumn or the end of Summer, because I have a feeling that the Winter, no matter how mild it's supposed to be, will be another hard one on me.

Hopefully my next post won't be all doom and gloom and depression.  But at least I can look back on today's post and smile and remember spending my day outside with Noel.