1. THREE DAYS. CANNOT FATHOM THIS. Even though work is starting to fall in my lap again, and I really should do some of it because so much of it is due to my sitting around doing a whole lot of not much, right now my only concern is to keep from falling ill before I have to take off for the trip. Being barred from entering the US at this point is really NOT at all high on my list of priorities, nope. OMG CAN'T BELIEVE I'LL BE SEEING WONDERETTES IN LESS THAN FIVE DAYS ALSDHSADHASLDSA ♥

2. Also, I find it hard to focus these days because all I want to do is be a huge enormous dork and curl up in a corner with my stash of X-Men comics and devour them like the good little nerd I am. Today I tried to explain to my boss why Wolverine doesn't age and has apparently been through a litany of world wars in the recent past. Nerd extraordinaire, that is indeed me.

3. Cheno is a ball of cute, I just had to say. I love that the pay-off to that interview is a nice, long, glorious stretch of Over The Rainbow. Also, I SEE HER IN CONCERT NEXT MONDAY. \o/ The excitement, it is EVERYWHERE!

4. Speaking of which: native New Yorkers, where is there a good place to snag free internet? Do I have to start living in Starbucks? (Is there even free wireless there?) I have my perfectly portable little netbook, so that's fine, but I still need to know where I can go to get net access... in case the friend I'm living with has maxed out her internet time (entirely possible). I'm also trying to figure out what the weather's gonna be like: I'm sure I can easily buy anything I'm missing, since it isn't the absolute dead of winter this time. But I'm guessing I'll need an umbrella at least...

5. MORE of alphabet meme, I intend to FINISH this before I go to NY!! ( F - em - L )

6. I LEGIT TALK TOO MUCH. How is it 2am already!?!? Okay okay OKAY. Bedtime... if I'm not distracted by comics, that is. XD

1. Another day spent being sick in bed. God, don't even ASK me how sick I would be if I weren't already on antibiotics. Because, when I went back to the doctor at noon (part of the two hours I spent awake all day, I only got up for real at about 7pm at night), I was running a slight fever. Still coughing up green a few hours post-antibiotics. My nose is still completely stuffed-up, my back aches, and I fall asleep at the drop of a hat. This SUCKS. Not that I don't appreciate it, but I can't believe I've been on medical leave for three days now, and will be on MC for another day yet. Other than chicken pox in 2007, this is the LONGEST I've ever been out sick, at work or at school... as far as I can remember, anyway.

2. This doctor - a sleepy-looking woman - said no changed meds for me though. Apparently I'm on pretty strong antibiotics already. If I don't kick this and SOON, I have this nagging feeling that I'm going to spend all my time in NYC/DC indoors when I'm not in the theatre or travelling to the theatre. BUMMER.

3. Today, I decided to blame my current illness and suffering on this epic day of immense suckitude. That was a soft deadline, made because one of my (usually sensible) bosses was going on holiday on Saturday and wanted to clear the draft on Friday. So I busted my ass with it, worked 'til 5 in the morning, and drove back into work by 10 to make sure everything was okay. Clearly, assuming that I could do this as I HAD done this for days on end for a couple of months back in September/October was the WRONG assumption to make. *grumbles*

4. Did manage to get a little flailing in once I struggled awake, however. Just watched two more episodes of 30 Rock, which were HILARIOUS - that whole Jenna as a werewolf-lawyer on Night Court thing cracked me up SO much, even though it totally made me cough right after.

5. Also finished Book 3 of the Stravaganza series, City of Flowers. OMIGOD GUYS. SAKDALDLHDLHALDALDHLADA. Such an epic EPIC fantasy series. I kind of want to go and visit Italy now that I've read these books... I guess I should count myself lucky that I HAVE visited so many of these places, in fact so recently - back in December 2007, when my family took an epic tour through Italy and went to Venice, Siena and Florence, the places all referenced (so far) in the series. (My Goodreads review)

6. Then, while browsing my flist, I came across this on merylstreepfans:



Geez. As if it isn't depressing enough how talented she is, being, y'know, the most Oscar-nominated actress in the history of EVER, Meryl was more accomplished at the age of 18 then I think I ever will be, EVER.

7. I was debating whether to be shameless and decided, what the heck. I need some cheering up. Play along with me? But only if you want to, of course:

THE ICON TESTIMONIALS MEME
MY THREAD HERE!

8. And now, back to bed with me. Please god let me heal faster than this. PLEASE.

9. ETA: ARGH. I don't have photoshop on this computer. BUT. HAPPY BIRTHDAY, lfae, WHEREVER YOU ARE. I hope you have a great one. And I know I should have connected the dots earlier, but HEY. You share a birthday with my brother! XD Can't wait to see you in just over a week!!!

1. POOL OF FAIL. I somehow managed to finish all my work at a perfectly respectable hour of 6.30 in the evening, and drove down to the pool all ready to, you know, actually EXERCISE again. I didn't, unfortunately, as I was informed that there was some kind of 'chemical imbalance' that meant the pool was under maintenance. BAH.

2. I wound up driving home and taking a long walk instead. (What's up with me this past couple of weeks - I can't bear the thought of actually going RUNNING. I think I'm just lazy.)

3. Good thing about walks though - and I suspect this is why I've started to prefer walks to runs - is that I can read while I'm walking. Well, technically, I SHOULDN'T, because the path is hardly well-lit at the best of times and I will either go blind or smash into something. Bah, I didn't let that stop me though. I raced through Rebel Angels, the second book of the Gemma Doyle trilogy, and actually finished the WHOLE THING FASTER THAN I EVER THOUGHT POSSIBLE. OMG OMG. I WANT TO TALK ABOUT IT. AND I WILL, UNDER THE CUT. I'll white out the spoilers, just in case, and people might want to avoid comments if they don't want to get spoiled. Also, people who come flail with me: I haven't read book 3, though I will be correcting that SOONEST. SO NO SPOILING ME FOR BOOK 3, MMMKAY.

( Rebel Angels - a twist in the tale )

4. Busy week planned ahead - family dinner tomorrow night, yoga trial on Wednesday, EVITA on Thursday, and a play and IDINA on Friday. FUNTIMES. XD At least they're GOOD plans, rather than, you know, the ones I usually make i.e., no plans so I can be back at work at a moment's notice. :P

5. BED! Before 3.30am, perhaps! Gasp!!

1. You know you're addicted to LJ when you haven't posted in... what, a day? And even then, it feels like forever. I'm behind on email and comments and posting, I know, but my internet connection at home has been screwed up for a while. Two nights ago, it wouldn't log onto the internet for a heart-stopping hour (INORITE!), by which time it was late even for ME, and then yesterday EVERYTHING worked except LJ. ASKLJDALDJLA.

2. I was so tired, anyway, from sleeping next to no hours over the last week, that I went and caught up on a bunch of sleep. So much so that I only got up at 2.30pm today. And only because I got google-pinged by weazel_luv.

3. You know why? EVITA PICTURES, ZOMG!!! Oh god. I want to be in Sacramento SO BAD. In other news, I have spent the last two hours making five billion icons from four photographs. If that isn't sad, I'm not sure WHAT is. :P

4. Anyway. Yesterday was... kind of a sobering day. It was the last day for one of my best friends at work - and geez, she's only the one who trained and taught me everything I know. So we had the requisite rounds of celebration: a big lunch out, a tea party that took up the rest of the working day... as befits the sadness that is both our lives, however, and surprisingly fitting given how we spent so much of the last six years, we wound up staying at the office later than everyone else. She had work to finish (SHE's CRAZY - ON HER LAST DAY?!) and stuff to clean out, and I didn't have any plans so hung around to wait and take her out for one last dinner. We left at close to 10pm (!!!), and wound up eating all manner of unhealthy things at Chomp Chomp (mmmm, char kway teow and oyster omelette and a glass of lime juice LARGER THAN MY HEAD), then having a huge rum-and-raisin ice-cream mudpie at a teenybopper hangout nearby. I'll miss her so so much - and it's ridiculously sad, because now I am officially the OLDEST person in the desk. Well, in terms of number of years stuck in the same place, not age. (She was there a month before me.) ARGH, WTF.

5. Only upside? She's going up to New York for her masters. I'LL SEE HER IN JANUARY. :D

6. Lots and LOTS of birthdays today! :D



7. I'm so amused by all the pretty on this entry because of birthdays. XD

8. Oh, also! Happy birthday, Singapore. DUH. Totally forgot. ;P We turn... (oh god I had to check) 43 years old today. Clearly I'm not going to be anywhere NEAR where the crazy crowds and my brother will be. He's actually marching in the parade this year - leading a contingent, if I'm not mistaken. I think I'll just go book-shopping and lazing around instead. MUCH preferable.

9. Since I haven't posted in SUCH ages, a meme! Snagged from curtains: ( one word at a time )

10. Pia Douwes!! ♥ lfae, thank you SO MUCH for the songs. SHE IS SO AWESOME. AND SO SASSY. And she sings all these songs I KNOW, except in a totally different language. *weeps from the awesome*

11. It's RAINING. Really hard, and god. I love it. The sound, the feel, the smell of it. ♥

1. Hai, so I have essentially had breakfast - cereal - and it's now 7am. Except, DUH, I haven't gone to bed yet. Fail fail. Same goes for yesterday. It was a bit ridiculous, in fact, because I went to sleep at almost 9am and then got woken up by a phone call at quarter past. I DID think it felt like a ridiculously short time to be asleep... no wonder! It was a call from my boss, suggesting that I might want to go back to work for the day. Sigh. I sort of mumbled yes and fell asleep again, fully intending to just do so for an hour. That didn't work, of course, and next thing I knew it was almost 1pm and said boss had called back to say that all the work was done. (GOOD.)

2. So I took mirime out for Japanese at J8, came home and slept until dinner time - which was a crab dinner for everyone except me, as I was lazy and didn't feel like working my way through a crab pincer just to get at the (admittedly abundant) meat therein.

3. Spent the better part of a night trying to track an audio and not getting much out of it. I swear - if musical theatre EVER goes the route of the recent Tommy production in LA (piped into headphones), I might have to kill myself. Because even Alice freakin' Ripley couldn't sing above the orchestra, a lot of the time. *grumpy* I sure hope it sounded better live, because this audio occasionally makes me very very sad indeed.

4. I also be newly addicted, I think, to Elisabeth. *eek* This is all ENTIRELY lfae's fault. I've been listening to Wenn ich tanzen will (a song of epic epic AMAZINGNESS) a LOT since she introduced it to me a few weeks back. But it's suddenly hit me: I want MOAR. Check out its awesome:



Great, musical theatre is EVIL. Now I want to learn German. Anyway. I have SOME Elisabeth crack just now - an audio recorded on Pia's birthday, and also the Elisabeth (Essen) cast recording. I'm asking the two crazy Elisabeth fans on my flist - Sal and sepulchralice - for help. Do you guys have the full English demo of Elisabeth? (Cat: a subtitled DVD?? *I say hopefully*) More Pia crack?

5. And I think that XF2 DOES indeed open here on 24 July, based on the 'coming soon' info on one of our local cinema websites. YAAAAAAY!! No waiting an extra week to flail!! ♥

1. lfae, Wenn ich tanzen will is a crazy kickass song. CRAZY KICKASS. God. Pia Douwes is awesome!

2. BED BED. It's 6.40 in the MORNING, FAIL.

3. I am the spammiest person ALIVE today. I so did not need to spend WAY TOO LONG making new Julia icons, bah. Here they are regardless. I am henceforth banned from making icons. NO MORE UNTIL POST-TRIP.

Teasers
[20] Julia Murney icons

( la la la la la la, guava? )

1. EIGHT. DAYS. TO. GO. How can this flail be contained! And I've discovered that the prospect of this trip is doing wonders for my ability to just be all Teflon-like and allow shitty working hours and other random annoying things to slide off my back more easily than they otherwise would. I CAN'T WAIT.

2. Had a rather sobering experience today, however. My godmother - I'm not religious in the least, but my mom had recruited godparents for all the kids in the family to take care of us in case something happened to our parents - has been suffering from cancer for the better part of the last few years. She's been an amazing trooper: every time she's licked it in one part of her body, it returns somewhere else, and now she's back in ICU for another bout of chemo. Visited her with my (extremely tardy) younger brother tonight, and it was... terrible. She'd lost so much weight since I last saw her, which can't have been more than three or four weeks ago. And really, I can't imagine doing what she does - getting up after being knocked down so many times, and still she's fighting with every breath she's got. Gah. Amazing.

3. It's at times like this that I wonder - why am I doing, well, anything that I don't really want to do? Life's too short. Even if I crash and burn doing something stupid but which makes me happy... better to have crashed and burnt than stayed safe indoors, no? Sigh.

4. Onward to happier things: I have a Friday 5 for you guys today! And be proud, I've managed to whittle it down to two Julia songs out of five, as opposed to four last time. :p And hey, if you're wondering, isn't it still Thursday? NO. It's 1.06am here and I've been itching to spam everyone with these songs for a week now, at least. ;) Plus, you guys get ready-to-play samples AND downloads! :D

1.  It is near the end of another week. Which means, TWO WEEKS UNTIL I LEAVE FOR LONDON. CANNOT. WAIT. ASJDLSJFDLASKLDA.

2. Work has been made of fail, and will be made of fail for the week(s) to come. Emphatically NOT looking forward to it. Sigh.

3. Honestly I have no idea how I'm supposed to be watching all the shows I have to see. But now I MUST see I Love You, You're Perfect, Now Change - since it's closing in July and it's always come highly recommended to me by a friend who shares my theatre tastes (well, mostly, she doesn't like musical theatre quite as much as I do *ahem*).

4. My iPod continues to be the death of me. I've been importing artwork all night - and have decided to lay down a couple of ground rules. Artwork only for official albums and cast recordings, which I can just copy and paste from Amazon or something, artwork only for Julia, Alice & Emily, and Idina. THAT'S IT. NO MORE. I swear it. HONEST.

5. I've been listening to Jason Robert Brown all night in anticipation of tomorrow's concert. I really hope the singers do JRB's songs credit.

6. HAI. I LOVE YOU SHERIE RENE SCOTT. In that vein, I promised teh_maskmaid spammage of one of The Last Five Years, one of my favourite musicals ever - which I think I've spammed before, ha ha, but I'm spamming it AGAIN. Babbling and fangirly flail, plus Brian d'Arcy James' Christmas album, beneath the cut...

1. As usual, I be a lemming. Marching ever more steadily towards my death from sleep deprivation. JOIN ME. SLEEP IS OVER-RATED.

2. I FAIL AT WATCHING HOUSE. FAIL IN EVERY WAY. I haven't even watched last week's, for one thing, and was planning a double bill tonight after dinner. But my download took SUCH ages that by the time it downloaded - about an hour ago - I didn't have time for both if I wanted to live through tomorrow. So I can't see it... and I can't see it until Thursday (my time)! *CRIES* YOU MAY TELL ME HOW MUCH I FAIL. NO MORE SPOILERS BEYOND 'SWEETSAUCE', GUYS, LOL. ;) I swear, that word is everywhere on my flist today. Insanity!!

3. And the reason I can't watch House 'til much later? I'm going to Elton John's concert tomorrow night later today. Which is crappy timing, but I AM dorkily into Elton so I'm gonna just have to live with not watching new House for another day. Epic FAILURE. But! Let me know what your favourite Elton songs are, if you have any, and if my *ahem* recording works out, I'll upload tracks for everyone! I'll probably share anyway, if the boot comes off clearly enough.

4. OMG. ALICE RIPLEY SINGING (NOT) GETTING MARRIED TODAY FROM COMPANY. FLAIL TIMES A MILLION.

5. Also, lfae, what are you DOING to me, OMG. EVIL. I so do NOT need a new musical obsession. DO NOT NEED. But but but. Willemijn Verkaik! (whose name I can finally spell!) She plays German!Elphaba, which means she is one half of the possibly-hotter-than-Murney/Arcelus ALAYM! <-- Yes, this is sacrilege, but close to the truth! Her voice!! This is one of the loveliest versions of Somewhere Over The Rainbow I've seen/heard in a long, long while...

6. BEDTIME BEDTIME BEDTIME.

7. BUT. ONE LAST FLAIL FOR THE ROAD. OMFGJM. I LOVE JULIA'S NEW SONG. I listened to it for, like, four hours straight at work after I downloaded it, LOL.

Well, not really. I should be in bed as it's 2.35 am and I anticipate tons and tons and tons of work tomorrow. *sadface*

But!!

1. It was a good day at work, even with, you know, the actual work. Because I'm still hyped up on my New York flail, OMG. alexia88 and I have been chatting for ages and just being all flaily and happy. (Plus, Alex, BIRDLAND = OMFG, AMIRITE?!) Seriously, this trip is the best thing I have ever done for myself and for my mental health. I was so down just a week ago about my whole work situation, and now I'm in a ridiculously good mood all the time. Thank you, Alex m'dear, and also lfae, for flailing with me and making life all good again.

2. Also got my performance bonus today! For once, I felt genuinely rewarded for all the crap and hours I put in at work. Plus, it'll pay for my June holiday, whoo hoo!! Turns out staying 'til 3am? Might have been worth it after all... ;)

3. And of course my fellow Julia Murney fangirls - welcome to all the new friends I've made because of Julia flail, hee! You guys made my week. Actually, EDUCATE ME. Tell me random factoids about Julia! I know she makes a mean pancake, lol, and that she's a native New Yorker. Did she get classical training the way Idina did? Or is she just naturally amazing? SPAM ME WITH JULIA LOVE.

4. And I shall return the favour. You WANT to be clicking on the cut, oh yes you do... yes, especially you Julia virgins out there. Because man I love this woman's voice and there's proof right here.


5. I really don't want to be at work tomorrow. I just want to flail online. Can you tell, LOL?

OMG I APOLOGISE FOR SPAMMING YOU GUYS. BUT I HAD TO SHARE.

1. Eventually - eventually - I will move on from Wicked. But I got stuck on another loop this evening, to check out Julia Murney as Elphaba this time, and crappers if she isn't one of the best actresses I've ever seen for the role. Whatever you might have to say about her voice - and if it's bad, don't say it here! - she's a freakin' powerhouse live, and she makes Elphaba just... deliciously, darkly real. It's incredible. Her Elphaba is very different from Idina's and Kerry's - I'm not sure what the difference is exactly. Maybe it's what lfae said when she summarised her Elphabas, that Julia's is very bookverse i.e., more dark and complex, while Idina is most clearly the almost entirely different Elphaba of the musical (which is only natural since she originated the role). IDK. I just know that Julia singing No Good Deed blew my mind into a thousand little pieces so I had to flail.


2. Still on the subject of La Murney: I've read somewhere - and I think it's true - that she doesn't bootleg too well. I've heard some audios of her that definitely sound a bit strange and which just don't capture the richness of her voice or the way she is just so wonderfully emotionally expressive in all the songs she sings. She's best live or on a proper studio recording, I think: so, to spam all you guys, please to be downloading my favourite song off her solo album, Misery and Happiness. It's just such a gorgeous, well-written song to begin with (written by Susan Werner, who I am now spamming on her official site and damn I think I need to visit HMV stat), and Julia sounds fantastic on it. I love the lyrics too.

3. Bah, I can't resist. My other favourite song, Perfect, written especially for her. Can I just say the lyrics are fantastic and, for some reason, come across as so very very House/Stacy to me? (In a perfect world/You'd hold me forever/In a perfect world, our love would stand tall/But I'm not perfect/And you're not perfect/Cause if you were/I wouldn't have loved you at all) Now there's a prompt for you House/Stacy shippers. I'd write a fic myself if I had the time! ;)

4. In other news, I got up too late to go to work, but I did watch August Rush - and what a waste of time that was. Really. Just a dire dire movie from the start and I don't know why I didn't walk out except that it's not something I do, I guess. Even Freddie Highmore couldn't save it from collapsing into its own charisma-less, totally predictable black hole of boredom. SIGH.

5. And I was a lazy bugger and didn't go running though I was supposed to. I FAIL. FAIL. And must go to work tomorrow. Sigh. Will thus cease being spammy now and maybe go watch some Bones. (I saw the fallout shelter episode the other night and LOVED IT, OBVIOUSLY.)

6. It's been a long time since I've used a vaguely positive mood icon, y/n?

1. 27.5 hours at work - how's that for scary? Except for one hour when I fell asleep on my bed just now after answering a text message (yes, I'm that tired, I guess), I've been awake for 34 33 hours straight. Duuuuuuuude.

2. That said, this is one of the times when I feel kind of glad for putting in the hours I did, and feeling proud of what we accomplished. So, you know, go me and my colleagues! It was insane but we did good. :)

3. And that being said, I'm completely broken. I'm sitting here feeling like - IDK, I just walked into a wall or something, because I'm achy and spazzy and feeling just... a bit nauseous and tired. When I was driving home just now, after random giggly dinner at Blooie's, I literally almost drove into a parked car because I drifted off to sleep. BAD, Y/Y? So yeah, obviously, bedtime - even though it's barely 11.30pm!

4. That means no flisting today, except to say, THANK YOU, lfae, ILU!!! *points at current music*

5. In the meantime, wanna cheer me up a little? :) Here's a meme snagged from lissie_pissie:
Smiles are good. Smiles can change a day around. Giving someone a reason to smile is a gift and then some.

Using anything you can, any way you can, through the power of the comment box, make me smile. Look at my interests, past entries, anything, pictures, fanfic, facts, links, drabbles or even just a cool word, anything to pass on a flash of a smile!

Post this in your own journal so I can pass on the favour :)