Jeremy, my webmaster, and I are pretty bored with the layout and trying to make it different.

I do have tons of photoshoots coming up AND a video make-up tutorial for at least one of them, given my camera doesn’t shit out on me.

My Valentine’s Day was amazing, I have the best boyfriend in the world. However, early that morning there was some problems concerning my chronic nosebleeds.

The day started off slightly meh as Wayne (my boyfriend) had to work graveyard from 7pm-3am.
So I just played The Sims 3 World Expansion pack, like I usually do when he’s gone.

As anyone who knows me knows, I’ve had chronic nosebleeds since I was born.
I was supposed to have my nose cauterized when I was younger, but we didn’t have enough money and I’ve just learned to deal with it for the most part.
I accidentally SLAMMED my fist against my nose while trying to open a drink (the bridge is swollen and bruised) and was like “Ah, shit. Nosebleed imminent.”

Little did I know.
This was by far one of the worst and longest nosebleeds I’ve ever had.
It went on for 3 (yes 3) hours. And not only was blood gushing like a faucet out of one nostril, it was coming out of both.
I started to panic, naturally, after about 45 minutes of blood flowing out of me.
So I called my mom freaking out.
Not that she could do anything from where she was, but it calmed me down a bit instead of just being alone in the apartment with the kitty staring at me.

And also for those who know me, I have a very weird…”thing” about taking photos of my injuries (like when I got my wisdom teeth out, broke my toe, fell off a 10 foot ledge and almost broke my ankle, etc…) and amidst the carnage, I decided to break out my camera and document it.

This is all real blood, straight from my nose.




(I decided to put my hands in the picture as proof I was actually there, haha.)

Needless to say there was blood ALL OVER the bathroom, my clothes, my face, the walls, that towel you see in the last picture is no longer pink, it got drenched.
I was in the middle of trying to make the bleeding stop/trying to clean up what I could when Wayne came home.

I walked out looking like I had just come from a murder scene and to my surprise, he had 2 HUGE bouquets of roses for me. I forgot I was bleeding and covered in it for a minute and was just lke “Oh my god!!!” cuz no one but my Mom has ever bought me flowers before.

He dropped everything and was like “OH MY GOD, WHAT THE FUCK IS GOING ON?!” Haha. Then I was like “Oh, yeah, there’s kind of an incident happening.”

He came to the bathroom with me and stayed with me until my nose stopped bleeding, then we both cleaned up everything.
Which took a while.
And he helped clean me off because I was super weak at that point (a super anemic person losing all that blood is not a good thing) and I must have passed out after that because I just woke up around 2pm in bed next to him wondering if that had all actually happened or if it was just a dream.
I got up to go to the bathroom and there was still some blood on the underside of the toilet and some dried blood under my nose, so I was like “Wow. That DID happen.”

I lost at LEAST a pint of blood.I It was absolute insanity.
I have been so weak and dizzy ever since it happened, I almost fainted yesterday but I had him with me and he made sure I was ok.

But onto the happier things, the flowers he bought me, oh my god, they’re so pretty. Red and pink roses and lilies.
And yeah, they really are that vivid and colorful.





(I’m so in love with him, it’s stupid.)

Then he took me to dinner at Il Vicino’s which is one of the best Italian restaurants ever.
Then we went to see “The Wolfman”, which wasn’t as good as I was hoping it would be, but we still had fun laughing at things that weren’t funny to anyone else and snuggling.

Then, since he has to work for a few more days, I came to see my Mom and she had gotten me presents too. HELLO KITTY PRESENTS!


And she got me a really sweet card.
The mushy kind of cards Moms get their grown up kids.
I loved it.

So aside from the blood loss, I had an amazing Valentine’s Day for once!

How about you?

Friday night was also a lot of fun, but kind of bittersweet as Wayne’s best friend and one of the usual people in our circle of good friends, Ian, is leaving to be the touring guitarist for Koffin Kats for quite a long time.
Friday night was the last night we’re all going to see him for a while.

Here’s us being stupid a few weeks ago at Atomic Cantina while a DJ/fake rave thing was going on.


(me, Ian, Wayne)

And his girlfriend is one of my best friends, so he better be good or I will beat him up.

I’m friggin’ exhausted so I’m going to watch a movie and pass out.

MANY new photosets for VanessaAlexandra.com (and other things, we’re messing with the format again) coming soon.

Love and Bunnies<3<3<3

I went last night with my boyfriend,Wayne, my Mom and aunt.
Wayne had never been there before so he was like “Oooooh.” once we got there because there’s millions of twinkly, sparkly lights everywhere and reflecting in the water and IN the water. It’s beautiful.

I know they do a similar thing in Tokyo this time of year and since I can’t be there right now, this is the next best thing.
And I was with my boyfriend so we had a blast (although it was FREEZING).

We hit up Old Town, which is down the street, before the sun went down to buy some presents for my friend that is coming into town and I made nice with the Rocky Mountain Chocolate Factory Bear who was dressed like Santa.
That seat was metal and as soon as I sat down, all my genitalia froze.

My Mom kept telling me I looked like one of the characters from Andrew Lloyd Webbers’ “Cats, so I kept threatening to break out singing “Memory” in the middle of the store.

When it got dark, we met my boyfriend at the Botanical Gardens and proceeded to have lots of fun and took about a million  pictures. Here’s a few of them.
The funniest picture is me and Wayne going down a slide meant for little kids and he came down behind me and almost knocked me off it so my limbs and his limbs are flying everywhere and I’m almost on the floor. But it’s on my Mom’s camera so god knows when that picture will surface.

There was a lovely snowman neighborhood full of glitter and fiber optics at the entrance:

Here’s Wayne and I being attacked by a giant spider inside of a giant pumpkin.

There was a pegasus outside…

I LOVE these pictures by the river, I love how they reflect in the water. And I like the yellow submarine, that was a new addition.

This “wind-up” T. Rex was my favorite new thing.

I challenged him to a duel.

Then Wayne and I posed for some lovey dovey pictures at the request of my Mom.
Our 8 month anniversary is January 2nd. That makes me happy:)

Then she made us smile.

As you can tell by my red nose, it was soooo cold. But so fun:)

So, I don’t know if you all know this, but being I have their lyrics tattooed across my chest, you should.
30 Seconds To Mars have been very good friends of mine for 7 years and their new cd, “This Is War” came out this paast Tuesday.
There’s 2,000 different covers with the faces of tons of different people, including yours truly.

Apparently, all the cds with pictures of me and all my friends have NOT been sent to anywhere in the US because all o fus who are friends and who are on covers have been looking for eachother and NOBODY can find eachother. It kinda sucks. I would like a copy of a cd I’m on the cover of.
But nonetheless, I’m super happy to be on there.
Oh, and when you listen to the song, all those voices singing in the background? Yeah, I’m one of those voices too.
I was at the bands Summit they had in Hollywood in April and my voice (and thousands of others haha) is on all but 3 tracks.
Pretty damn cool, huh?

So being that these fools are my buddies and I needed to get the fuck out of ABQ (due to being sick all the time, I haven’t been out of town since the late summer) I flew out to Denver November 30th (fittingly enough) to stay with my friend Maria, our friend Tonya came in from Nebraska and I got to see all my wonderful friends from Denver at Dave and Buster’s that night, then even more AND my buddies in 30STM the next night at The Ogden.
Pictures, you ask?
Oh, indeed.

After taking about 5 double and over or whatever they’re called shots, Maria and I had a Dance Dance Revolution competition rematch. Thing was, we were both kinda a tad drunk and neither of us could keep up and we were dying by the time the first song was over, haha.

Then I discovered how much I suck at Guitar Hero (I had never played it before that night).

The concert was the next day but before that was the fun part, which is waiting in line with all my friends (for those that don’t know, we all happen to enjoy waiting in line together and being silly, even in freezing temperatures).

Tonya and I went own the street to Rave’s clothing store where we purchased our matching kitty hats and then we hung out and got snockered until the show started.

Once inside, Tonya and I went on a photo taking spree of eachother.

And yes, there is concert pictures. There all belong to Tonya (TongaLH) who graciously let me steal them, hehe.

Jared was complaining it wasn’t snowing, then after the show it was snowing like madness and the guys turned into pussies and took off for their hotel without talking to anyone because it was too cold.
And we laughed.

So then I flew home the next day and here I am.

This Christmas will be insane, my brother will be here from Portland, OR in less than 2 weeks and so will my friend, Mie (my good friend I went to Japan with last year and who I’m going with again in May of 2010). She’s coming to visit from from New York City.
So I’m excited!

Unfortunately, Wayne has to work on New Years Eve , but my good friends Anna and Toby are having a party at their new apartment so I get to be around good friends at least.

I will for sure update with a video journal before the new year!
AND some new photosets!
The reason for the lag in this is because all my local photographers are either out of town, their wife just had a baby or are, like me, having health issues.
But they’re coming soon, I assure you…I need to dye my hair first though, my roots are ridiculous.

But until then, Love and Bunnies!

**Vanessa**

But first, my Halloween was kinda lame.

I went to a “Monster’s Ball” at one of our local gay clubs (one of my favorite hangouts) with my fellow Apaches Anna and Toby.

Being I was Hello Kitty, I was probably the least “Monster”-like there.

It was COMPLETELY boring, aside from Toby and I keeping up our tradition of making fun of the terrible local “goth” dancing.

So I had as many drinks as I could afford..which was 3…and I semi-knew the bartender (and she thought my costume was cute) so she made them extra strong and with extra cherries.

Then for Devil’s Night and Halloween I just stayed home and wrote some new music.
My boyfriend was working, my friends were all working, so I didn’t feel like trying to do anything.

But that weekend, my boyfriend Wayne and I had our 6 month anniversary which was soooo much fun.

We watched a ton of movies, had lots of alcohol and did a lot of…that.
Haha.

I watched Cannibal Holocaust for the first time (I have been wanting to see it since I was about 14 but I REFUSE to see animals being hurt) and luckily Wayne knew when all the scenes I didn’t want to see were coming up so I could close my eyes.

Aside from those parts, I absolutely LOVED it! I want to get it, but the “animal friendly” version.

Then, of course, I got sick earlier this week.
My Mom, Aunt and god knows who else has been having a really bad flu bug that’s been going around and I thought since I just recovered from the flu I had LAST MONTH I would be fine, but oh no. Of course not.
As I sit here typing this, I am feeling like total shit.
I’m just waiting for H1N1 to hit me…but I don’t really have an immune system so I might die. So maybe not.
Ah, whatever, another adventure.

Anyway, to get to what I was talking about at the beginning of this entry, I have decide to make my list of the top 10 vampires.
But this is a different list.
Since there are so many to choose from, good and bad…

This is the list of the 5 most whiny vampires ever and the 5 most bad ass vampires ever.

(according to me, anyway.)

And we begin…

The Top Most 5 Whiny Vampires Ever:

#5- Stefan Salvatore from “The Vampire Diaries”

First of all, I’ll be the first to admit I think the TV show adaption of these books is atrocious so I may be a bit biased, but even in the books, this character does nothing but brood about his oh-so beloved Katherine and then broods over Katherine look alike Elena who is his new oh-so beloved girl.
And fight with his brother.
A lot.
…no, really, A LOT.
That’s pretty much all the show consists of.
And his brother Damon isn’t so great either.
The books are so much better than the show, but in both, this guy is just incredibly boring and the actor cast to play him in the series…yeah, I’d rather chew off my foot than have any “vampire” that looks like that vying for my love.
I refer to him as a “Jockvire”.

#4- Kei from Moon Child

Ok, I know a lot of you are thinking “WTF is Moon Child?” and if you’re asking yourself that question, that means you NEED TO SEE IT.
It’s a Japanese vampire movie written by Gackt and starring him, along with Hyde (who plays vampire Kei, above) and Leehom Wang.

Actually, Kei starts out pretty kick ass at the beginning of the movie, but as the movie progresses and he stays with Gack and Leehom as their characters grow up, he turns into one of those “Why am I cursed with this? WHY?!?” kinda vampires that make me cringe.
He turns into a bad ass again for about an hour in one scene then pretty much gives up on everything and just waits to die.
I don’t want to give away the plot, but at the end he ends up becoming a sort of wishy washy protector who could be wicked if he wanted to but chooses not to and eventually, he and Gackt both turn into weenies and disappear.
I absolutely adore this movie and I adore Hyde and Kei is, for once, a well thought out character who actually doesn’t whine about EVERYTHING, but still enough to be on this list.
So many people want to be vampires.
BE HAPPY ABOUT IT.

#3- Vincent Valentine from the Final Fantasy series

Ok ok ok ok ok ok ok, he’s NOT a vampire.
But goddammit, this is my list and I’ll add him if I want.
I am admittedly a hypocrite for having any ill will towards this character as he and Sephiroth are my favorite characters, but just accept what you are and the power you have!!
There’s so many whiny characters in this series I want to smack (like Cloud…), and much like the aforementioned I want to smack, Vincent is just sooo sad all the time.
He’s like the FF version of Eeyore only not a donkey, gorgeous and the same blood type as me;p
I love it when he just decides to kick ass, but when he holds back EVERYTHING and hides in the shadows, it’s…just….ugh.
And yeah, I know it’s supposed to be sexy to be a loner, but this guy has so many friends that he just constantly pushes away it’s ridiculous.
There’s a fine line between being a loner and being a hermit.

#2- Louis de Pointe du Lac- Anne Rice’s The Vampire Chronicles

Despite the fierce photo above, Louis is just one of those figures in literature and pop culture that has come to embody the definition of “I was sad in life, I am sad in death and I’m so depressed. Pity me.”
If they could give vampires Zoloft, he would be the prime candidate.
First of all, Lestat made you, was in love with you and wanted you as his companion…wtf is wrong with you for not reciprocating that?
Then Armand was in love with you and wanted you as his companion….granted he burned your adopted daughter into dust, but IT WAS ARMAND.
But noooo, you chose to wander the world seeing nothing but gray and telling your story as if it’s a warning tale instead of something enthralling.
Right.
Even after IWTV, he’s with Lestat AGAIN and still not happy.
I wonder if anything woulda made that boy happy.
Claudia did for about 5 minutes but then that went to hell, too.
Poor Louis.
Forever screwed and depressed.
And whiny.

#1- Edward Cullen from the Twilight series

Do I really need to say anything…really?
(yes, I am going to see the new Twilight movie and I’ve read all the books, including the leaked Midnight Sun, but there is really nothing to say. It’s Edward. The only person worse is Bella, but she’s human until the last book and then she’s actually cool when she’s a vampire.)

The Top 5 Most Bad Ass Vampires Ever

#5- Asher from Anita Blake: Vampire Hunter

Unfortunately, there’s no picture for him, but his description is this: “Anita describes his hair as the color of metallic gold and his eyes as the pale blue of a Siberian Husky. Although the left side of his face and body is angelically beautiful, his right side is hideously scarred; Asher has become an expert at using his hair, posture, and shadow to present only his left side to viewers until an opportune moment arises to reveal his scars, if desired.”

I personally find scars attractive, so I don’t care about that in the least. And he gets plastic surgery to fix it…be that on his foreskin, but still.

But what is it that makes him so effing awesome?

“Asher’s bite is literally orgasmic, to the point where his victims (including Anita) may become literally addicted to his bite, and may experience orgasmic flash-backs hours or days after being bitten.”

As my friend Tracy would say…”UNF.”

#4- Akasha-Anne Rice’s The Vampire Chronicles

Yes, I know Queen Of The Damned was a terrible movie.
But I love how the late Aaliyah portrayed one of the most amazing vampires ever.
I love this character and always have.
I thought her idea of a 90% female Eden with her as Queen would have rocked.
I love that she killed her husband and drank his blood cuz she didn’t need him anymore (don’t ask me why, I just find that empowering. Call it the serial killer in me).
This character was just pure evil.
And I love her for it.

#3- Jane from the Volturi-The Twilight Series

When I first started reading these books, I immediately liked the evil group of vampires, of course, and Jane was my favorite because I think she has the coolest ability of them all.
She’s just…great! I don’t even have words for it. And I enjoy that she tortures Edward;)
When I heard Dakota Fanning was cast as her in the movie, I was like “Oh, please don’t ruin my favorite character.”
But after seeing her in “Push” and in the previews for the movie,I think she is going to be excellent.

#2- Lestat de Lioncourt-Anne Rice’s The Vampire Chronicles

…It’s Lestat. As I’ve said before, do I REALLY need to say anything?

Oh, but I know what you’re thinking. “If you love him so much, why isn’t he Number One?”

Well…

#1- Vlad Tepes aka Vlad The Impaler aka Vlad Dracul aka Dracula aka The Whole Reason Anything To Do With Vampires Exists.

Somehow, I think he was a bit better looking than that as that image doesn’t really fit with the descriptions written of him, but he is THE MAN.
He is one of my heroes because he did everything of his own accord, never backed down and though brutal, his ways worked and the people of Romania love him for it.
And so do I, I have been obsessed with him since I was 16.
Every vampire on earth (or wherever else) is based on him and therefore, everyone owes him gratitude.
Without him, your sparkly vampires wouldn’t exist (and they still don’, but you know what I mean).

Wow that list took a long time.
I was going to include Angel and Spike from Buffy The Vampire Slayer in there but I had too many options and they didn’t make it.
So, sorry Buffy fans.

This is quite the long entry, ne?

I am having a hard time taking photos lately because all the photographers I work with all the time here are all either sick, having babies or out of town already for the holidays.
But there’s at LEAST one that is happening in the extreme near future and I’m excited about it.

Although, for the shoots, I wish my hair would grow.
It’s eye length right now.
And the back is at that point where it’s falling into the back of my shirt and driving me insane.

But anyway, to end this, I bring you Asian Music Corner!

I am a HUGE LUNA SEA fan and though they got back together for a few minutes, they all had really good side projects, one of them being Tourbillon, which included Ryuichi and INORAN from LUNA SEA and H. Hayama from D-LOOP.
This video kinda pisses me off cuz the sound is off from the video, but this song is beautiful. It’s called “Heaven”.

Until next time, my lovelies!

Love and Bunnies,

**Vanessa**

By the way, i have a brand new wish-list

PPS-Don’t worry, the Q&A video blog will be in the next journal entry!!

Read the rest of this entry »

So I’m sure some of you have seen the 2 I posted on Myspace but here’s all the pics from the Doty Clothing Shoot from the 2nd week of December last year. (Happy 2009, by the way.)

You have no idea how far I have to hyperextend my back to make it look like I have a butt. But it works!

I was SO sore after this shoot because I was demonstrating for the other ladies how to do the “extend the back, make your butt cheeks look good” thing.

I love that sweater.

This is what happens when a person I’ve been friends with forever is the photographer. He catches me doing silly things.

Nickie- “Pull the shirt up more so we can see the underwear!”
Me-”…what?”
Mike *click*

I hate smiling pictures, but these 2 are ok.

I spent NYE with my best friends Nickie (Nickie Jean, in my top friends on Myspace) Jess (aka Vestige, also in my top Myspace friends), Nicole (Heart Attack, also in my top Myspace friends. Well, we kind of got to see her. She left at like 11:30) and all the rest of the art people I surround myself with….speaking of, our group needs a name.
I’ve just been referring to everyone as “The cool model girls I hang out with.” and that just sounds lame.

Anyway, we got VERY drunk. Jess included. Nickie and I had to changer her into pajamas and walk her to bed because she was out, haha. It was so cute<3
I texted all my friends and family with some form of “I LOVE YOU!” after midnight while I was dancing with everyone in the room with the dj and breakdancers.
I wore one of the kimonos I bought in Kyoto (it’s a VERY BRIGHT orange, yellow, red, white, gold, green, and blue pattern 7 year old boy’s kimono that miraculously fits me to a T as a short dress) and had red flowers in my hair and my sakura perfume on and it basically was like Japan threw up all over me.

For some reason, NO ONE got pictures except Nickie’s polaroids.
There’s some great group shots of us and one of me looking like Hugh Hefner on New Years Morning (I slept in one of Nickie’s silk robes), which I felt like crap during.
Not because I was hungover, but because my period conveniently decided to start.
2 weeks early.

So I’m waiting for Nickie to scan those and pot them because they’re hilarious.

Some weird chicks were trying to dance all up on my shit (and I mean WEIRD, they looked like Polly Pockets come to life in NYE garb) so Nickie’s friend Cassie saved me.
I like her, she’s cute. And she’s a lesbian. Yay.

Other than like…4 bottles of pink champagne, a rum and coke, some weed and some other clear drink that I couldn’t identify but was good, I shared a capsule of X with Nickie…and it didn’t make me cry this time, thank god.
(the first time I tried X early last year, it made me cry my eyes out for hours)
But I don’t think I gave it much time to work because we all went to sleep shortly thereafter.

Since then, everyone in this house has been sick and quarantined.
I haven’t left the house since New Years Day except to help my aunt out yesterday because she had to get surgery and needed help getting around and getting her meds (I wore one of my Hello Kitty face masks so she wouldn’t get my germs).
But I’m venturing out to the dollar movies tomorrow to see “W”.

I got my incredibly obnoxious gold zodiac hoop earrings (Cancer, thank you) and peacock bangle from Fred Flare today.

And the domain (Register.com) that hosts my site has been calling mt AT LEAST 5 times a day for a week because I need to refresh my registration IN 3 MONTHS.
I wrote them an email and told them to stop calling me because my webmaster and I are going to refresh it but if they keep calling me 5 times a day I’m going to host it somewhere else.
They called 3 times today and on the 3rd call I picked up and screamed “STOP CALLING ME!!!”  They haven’t called back since.

Oh and Christmas was ok.
My brother’s girlfriend is really cool.
She’s a year younger than me which is kind of weird.
She brought us all presents from Dubai/Istanbul (that’s where she’s living right now for her architecture degree).
I got a really pretty beaded clutch purse from Dubai and an Evil Eye pin from Istanbul from her.

I also got a new camera (FINALLY. My other one is 3 years old and the battery compartment is being held together with masking tape), Hello Kitty Jewelry and hair things (and little barrettes with cute Chinese girls in traditional dresses on them), the Twilight saga (I read Book 1 when it came out but that was many years and many drugs ago and I forgot most of it, and it was good to read the rest of the books) lots of socks since I tore all the toes of mine walking furiously around Tokyo and Osaka, Harajuku Lovers Baby perfume to add to my HL Love perfume, a cute shirt that I didn’t even think my Mom would remember I said I liked and knee high white and black converse boots.
I already have 4 variations on the black converse boots so I needed a change.
Oh and Animal Crossing:City Folk for my Wii, which is a blast.

But anyway, sorry for the super long entry, I haven’t updated in a while.
I’m going to go back to reveling in “Armageddon Week” on The History Channel for the rest of the night (I love anything having to do with the end of the world and Satan and all that. Don’t ask me why.)

Happy New Year!!!

PS-The rest of my hair is coming off soon. My hairstylist Sarah Chang is in China (where her family is from) but once she’s back, we’re chopping it all off. Mainly because I want to fauxhawk it again (look at pictures from summer of 2006 to see what I mean. No half black, half white this time though).

Ladies and Gents, at long last…the most epic and long journal entry EVER.
(I am warning you now, there’s at least 200 photos in this entry.)

While I’m still not used to being on USA time, I flew to Japan October 21st and I returned from Japan on Halloween night around 8pm.

Here’s photos from the airplane:

The night I arrived, my very good friend Mie met me at Narita airport. Where the following were all taken:

Then we took the Skyline Express into Tokyo, then took a cab ride to our hotel in Asakusa.

Mie’s friend Ma-chan met us at our hotel and we went out for food and drinks at a cute little restaurant. And I toko some drunkenblurry pictures from the bridge afterwards (and stole a totally adorable poster of an anime geisha and salaryman from a streetlight, but I don’t have a picture of it).

The time change was a bitch so I couldn’t sleep very well the first few days.
So we got up at 7am the next morning and since I had no meetings/networking to do that day, we decided that we’d all go shopping.
But first, let me show you our hotel room…and my bugbites…and the rain that started the night before and kept following me everywhere we went…

Our hotel was right by the headquarters for Bandai(!):

So of course, I had to take pictures with all the statues that were outside.

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Then a short metro ride and a delicious Chinese meal later, we ended up smack in the middle of Tokyo.
We walked out of a tunnel and BOOM, there’s Hachiko and Shibuya and neon signs and huge screens everywhere.
Needless to say, I was thrilled.

Ma-chan and I at Hachiko Memorial (I suggest looking this up if you don’t know what it is. It’s such a sad and sweet story. And it’s part of NANA so I was like “AAH!!!” haha)

Mie and Ma-chan took me to Shibuya 109, which is where the following videos are from.
The staff was giggling because I was violating one of their mannequins.
Hey, she was hot.

Then I chased Mie and Ma-chan around…

Then after some shopping and looking at the cute gyaru in all the stores, we got hungry and went for some gelato.
Mine had alcohol in it, haha, so I was a bit tipsy by the time we were done.

And we came back outside…to POURING rain.

So after I got drenched, I went and bought the most obnoxious hot pink umbrella, which you will see in nearly all the rest of the pictures.
And it became one of the big jokes of our trip.
It was “That STUPID UMBRELLA.” by the end of the trip;)

We walked around for a while in Shinjuku then went to Tower Records because Mie wanted to buy some Kinki Kids DVD’s and  what did I see? Posters for The GazettE and girugamesh, who would be doing an in-store the week after I leave. Of course.
So I just took a picture with the posters.
(but my luck with that changed as the trip progressed, just keep reading…)

We came out and it was dark already (it got dark around 4:30 the whole time I was there)and took a walk to Harajuku (no, I did not see any of the typical Harajuku kids, it was a weeknight and we didn’t go close to the Yoyogi park area) so I had to take pictures and video of how beautiful it was.

We found a mirrored object to take pictures in…

(this picture always cracks me the fuck up. I was in the middle of yelling something and Mie took a picture, but it captures the complete joy I had while I was in Japan….and shows how damn pale I am. So we took one with the flash off next.)

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Then we went to meet Ma-chan’s boss in Ginza (or “Giiiiinnnnzzzzaaaaa” as we called it) for a tempura dinner.

We ate some flowers (which were really good) and had a lot of drinks…that’s a plum floating in there, by the way….

Then after we were good and drunk, we went back to our hotel and passed out.

I had crap to do the next day and it was boring so I won’t write about it. Lots of networking in Engrish was done.

The next day, we got up super early and went out. It was still raining, o course, and they had put rain coats on all the statues outside Bandai. How fucking adorable is that?

I wanted to play pachinko and they wanted to take me to a shrine that had healing smoke (as we all know, I have about the worst immune system on earth and a bad stomach to boot. And my stomach was upset nearly the whole time I was in Japan so they took me there to be healthy).
Here we are walking in the market leading to the shrine and the gods guarding the shrine, the smoke and all the various things around.

The healing smoke seriously worked. And I think the gods had pity on me and my bad stomach because this was one of the only days my stomach wasn’t upset.

Then after the rain got even heavier, we literally RAN into the shrine, where I threw a couple hundred yen to the gods and prayed….and the prayers worked.

Then we went to eat some lovely soba:

Then…PACHINKO!!!
Where I don’t know HOW, but I won the equivalent of $400 (I didn’t know how much I had won in this video, I was WAY off. They didn’t tell me the exact amount until after because a load of my pachinko balls had gotten stuck in the machine.)

]]> http://vanessaalexandra.com/?feed=rss2&p=101 0 http://vanessaalexandra.com/?p=99 http://vanessaalexandra.com/?p=99#comments Thu, 20 Aug 2009 06:36:05 +0000 admin http://vanessaalexandra.com/?p=99 There was an arcade around the block and since I had a load of extra money, we went in and I don’t know how I did this either because I’m terrible at claw machines, but I won a bunch of stuffed toys and trinkets and candy.

Then we went outside and found these….the 2nd picture is by far one of my favorite pictures probably ever.

Then they took me on a boat tour of Tokyo so we could get to Odaiba in Tokyo Bay.

(this is my favorite picture of the 3 of us)

(we called this “the poop building”)

I was trying to get the Tower of Tokyo in these next 2 pics:

The big ball is a TV station, the rest is Odaiba:

So we got there, had some beers and took some pikura (all of those pictures willbe at the end of the entry. They’re hilarious.) and I got to see the ferris wheel all lit up but we didnt have time to ride on it because we had to go back to Shinjuku to an Okinawan restaurant by 7.

(this is the beautiful Rainbow Bridge)

(yay fake Statue of Liberty!)

My good friend Taka came and joined us at the Okinawan restaurant. I hadn’t seen him in 6 months, so I was extremely happy!