What made you smile today?

Getting to visit my old college dorm was incredible. I'd feared that it'd make me feel melancholy, and indeed I felt a certain wistfulness when I stumbled across the pivotal points in my life, but my sadness was outweighed countless times by the recollection of all the fun times I'd had here. I stood before the room where I'd discovered Lewd and my talent for writing, the stairwell window where me and an old friend used to talk for hours on end, and even swung by my "little slice of summer", the southern study lounge where they kept the heat on full-blast.

It's my habit to wonder: Would these little landmarks guide other people through personal journeys? I can only imagine so. c:

13 days later
gtswaifuism wrote

-snip!-

Man though, that editing is incredible. I've seen those sorta tricks before in some of my favorite AMVs of all time, but this would be borderline fanime if it wasn't for the gag dub.

This one comes close too. If they had a voice cast, it'd literally be a fan-made crossover between Cowboy Bebop and Trigun. ^^

7 days later

With the defeat of eight out of sixteen characters, the first half of the 1-on-1 tournament is finally over within the span of a year and half a month.

>Bellona of Smite controlled by @loki~ @[deleted] Scarlet and @[deleted] Izayoi from the PC Touhou series, @[deleted] as Megumin from KonoSuba, @moeki as Misaki from NHK, @[deleted] as Yuzuhara from ToHeart2, @[deleted] as a female samurai warrior, and most recently today @[deleted] as Misaka, the legendary Electromaster of the Index series are all defeated.

>Bellona was barely spared in the fight against the princess Lucia Mochizuki in Mitakihara City, with Mochizuki having only 5% HP and Bellona K.O. on the ground next to her. Too bad, she was not picked for the elections that year. Within the span of only a few days, Lucia Konohana, the then Empress of the former empire and now a constitutional monarchy months later has defeated both Remilia and Sakuya by a large HP margin. Had it been the work of extensive use of magic against her, she would not have attained both victories to continue, and upon Sakuya's defeat, declared Gensokyo a province of the planet. By around summertime, Houki arrived, quickly defeated Megumin at a castle in Germany, and fled the place before it burnt down by her magical misfire.

>Genji was the Empress at the time when she arrived in the Black Forest of the same country to meet up with Misaki and having bested her opponent in a hide-and-seek game; she got to Lieseltania, but she wind up too late and was forced to return home. Prior to the prefectural elections, she meets up with Yuzuhara, hired by Remilia who was defeated by Lucia Konohana a few months earlier to eliminate her in an attempt to foil any chances of continuing the tournament but was stopped by Genji after successfully and repeatably able to foil her opponent's attack rhythm. This however makes the citizens of the socialist, alternate United States not as pleased and she was forced to leave, and finally admitted her resignation of the throne over to her heiress, Lucia soon after.

>The last two opponents, Seel's avatar ended herself after putting up a very serious fight with the current Empress initially started in Japan but ended in China via switching stages mid-battle. And finally yet importantly with Misaka Mikoto, well-known Electromaster of Academy City and her clone army though spared, her revolution in an effort to save the very place she protects ultimately failed by a small team of anthropomorphized castle girls along with morale fatigue. The heavy losses sustained by the Sisters is all it took for them to rout into the countryside, and after the storm moved away, the Lucian armies ecstatic at such a pyrrhic victory, took over without incident and installed Lucia Mochizuki, the one who defeated Bellona from last March to rule the city. Since the defeat of Walpurgisnacht and the immediate eradication of the magical girl system, she is no longer considered a magical girl, and has gotten a little bit older than she used to.


Above: She was 16 in 2218 when she fought Bellona, now she's 24 in 2226 upon taking the city's seat from Kuruko.

My journey is not quite over, I still have to face eight more opponents in the near future, I am satisfied to conclude the first half of my tournament. 😃

5 days later

I had the most genuine smile today and it was because of Chicken Nugget. Tumblr sucks, so some of the images are resized to hell, but heres the post.

It's so good.

6 days later

Finally took a trip upstate and picked up all my graduation stuff, including my Bachelor's diploma. Gotta say, for all the congratulations people have given me, I never really appreciated my achievement till I held it in my own two hands.

Sakuya Izayoi wrote

Jumping a 6 foot gap with a injured knee while parkouring

That's quite some dedication to escaping being grounded!

Sakuya Izayoi wrote

New thread idea "What made you :l today"

Don't let your dreams be dreams. :3

Finally selling the remainding houses I flipped. Now no more stress \o/

So excited to win my provincial election for my provincial seat, first round of speeches will come tomorrow morning for me.

12 days later

Sometimes on my brightest days, I enjoy striking up short conversations with random service-people I meet in my errands. Today I hit it off with my dry cleaning clerk and the florists in my local supermarket, while I was getting groceries, I asked the middle-aged lady behind the counter:

Me: "What it like being a cashier?"
Her: "Lotsa standing all day, but I don't mind. I've actually got a day job, see, that involves sitting down all day. So I don't mind at all."

I've gotta admit, I know the feel. If they paid her anything near what she deserved, I'd be happy to trade spots with her.

Texting's dandy, and the phone's okay, but seeing them in person makes my brightest days. ヾ(＾-＾)ﾉ

5 days later

I can't believe I'd forgotten how much I loved to dance. Hour and a half later, and I still feel like bouncin' off the walls. 😃

14 days later

Well, that was something! Today, I happened to chance upon a conversation while browsing manga at Barnes and Noble. It was an older Indian gentleman in work clothes, whom had always been curious about the medium. I remarked that it was interesting how they read from right to left, and that we keep traditions despite time.

We ended up hitting it off! He actually was a software developer back in the day, and now serves as a sort of mentor for people who wish to become an entrepreneur. He's in my contacts now, Biran Patel. Yes, surprisingly he didn't have a professional email for me.

I also told him about my hobby of visiting stores just to spend time around other people. He smiled, called it a "good habit", and upon reflection I realize I did not truly grasp the weight of his words. In his eyes, I found neither judgment nor dismissal, only the characteristic gleam of genunibeine curiosity. 

We spent the latter half of our encounter looking for a book for his five year old son who had just started reading. I'd suggested Nichijou earlier, but he told me he'd probably just draw all over the pages. Then I suggested some picture books and board books, and he very well might've bought some had his wife not shown up outside with his ride. 

Unfortunately I don't have any capital, so I can't say I'll enlist his services, but I'm nonetheless glad I met him. It's transient, no-strings-attached encounters like these that give us a glimpse of humanity in earnest. If only everyone aspired to be as open and amiable as he made himself in that moment, I daresay this world would be a much warmer place.

a month later

Lightning bugs are easily the best part of a summer night. I don't know if they live anywhere outside North America, but everything about them seems like it was taken from the pages of a high fantasy novel.

Seldom do you see the actual bug. Instead, all you notice is a point of light drifting across your vision. Some disappear in the blink of an eye, but many gracefully fade in and out of observation in the span of a second. These latter ones drift lazily through the humid air, and oftentimes ten or a dozen of them will light up in concert. If you're particularly lucky, you might even find one crawling on your clothes. I've always considered that good luck.

I can't even imagine what it'd be like discovering them for the first time. Me? I could watch these things for hours.