On turning 30

To continue my yearly tradition (ongoing for 16 years!) of taking a mirror selfie wearing this shirt:

The twintails are a statement. 😈

Ya girl turned 30 years old last month!!!! Wao.

I hate it. Two months ago I genuinely considered never letting this number leave my lips or fingertips, barely mentioning my birthday and letting my age become vague this year... But I also hate that I thought of doing that. In the end, this is a page of my book so I'd like to archive it and talk about my aging worries honestly in a world where a lot of people prefer not to (almost including me lol).

I've been determined not to change anything, unless it comes naturally or responsibilities leave no choice. I won't become a different person just to fit the mold of society's expectations for a 30 year old adult woman. In fact, I'm gonna try to lean in harder to become comfortable with all those aspects of Me that may not be a model 30 year old!

But even if I try to stay unshakable, I hate that people's expectations and connotations will change nevertheless... The judgmental things I hear will only get worse. The nagging will only gain more ammo. My excuses for my incompetences will be gone. 😞

It kills me that I'm always expected to be a presentable working professional despite my awkward social and verbal skills; it's embarrassing how little common sense I have in many basic areas and lack of life experience, no interest in cooking, all my cowardice and little confidence in most things I do — it was always my youth I'd shield myself with as an excuse... so now I'll just feel like a deadass loser at times I guess!

I've got childish tastes; I just have to accept that. Thinking that there might one day be a version of myself that outgrows Water Pixie makes me sad... Let me be cringe. Who the fuck actually cares!

And I really don't want to hear: "Aren't you too old to be wearing that?" Fashion is hard. Self expression is hard. It's not fair that we're somewhat expected only in our teens and twenties to wear fun styles, be vibrant, be a little unordinary, unpolished, be cute and expressive... In our teens and twenties, we may not have the financial freedom or confidence to find our style ;; In my self consciousness, I literally purposely dressed plainly in my teens to avoid standing out — so I'm in that period now where I want to take joy in exploring different styles! Dress cutely sometimes, dress cool sometimes, embrace my inner Wednesday Addams sometimes! Only last year did I just start getting interested in pastel colors! I want to become okay with sticking out like a sore thumb sometimes!

All of us should be free to live at our own pace. As a lifelong late-bloomer, there's a lot I haven't experienced yet and that's alright! Never have I had real dreams, nor the optimism for longterm goals and I wish that were okay too. Any timeline for life milestones is fake and I hate all this unnecessary pressure over such an inconsequential construct. Every day is just a block of time in which we experience each day's emotions and celebrate our little accomplishments, try to secure our happiness and survival for the next day, for the next week. I don't know why this suddenly went existential and idk if it's related anymore. 😆

Anyway if you ever look at me and try to tell yourself, "Whoa that's a 30 year old adult woman" — WRONG!!! I'm just an Eva out here doing her best to not implode under a splatter of pressures.

Milestone years! 15 ⇒ 20 ⇒ 25 ⇒ 30

Good Parts

I'm feeling better now, but both my mental and physical health took a huge dip last month. 😞 It was really disappointing considering I'd been doing fairly well before then; I was surprised by how much I could suddenly regress and it made everything feel all the worse...

Hasn't been confirmed but I'm convinced that different cases of medications were involved in causing both issues and have been diligently taking steps to combat them! My mental is thankfully feeling normal now <3 and physically I'm still always somewhat tired but not as lifeless as before and much more tolerable.

There was one particular day I just felt so........especially empty. I absolutely didn't want to do anything and felt I was too lethargic for anything to be worth trying to do, though it's not like I didn't have things that could be done.

I started contemplating my own version of the chicken or the egg — whether it's when I'm in good spirits that I'm able to let go and find joy in whatever it is that I engage in (or alternatively not be disappointed if time goes by "meaninglessly"), or if it's when I have things I feel somewhat passionate about doing that puts me in better spirits.

My self esteem had been worsening through this period and that voice in my head that says terribly mean things about me was unfortunately winning, I'm not proud to say... Things kept happening that made that voice more and more and more convincing. ;; In hindsight, it's ridiculous that I'd succumb to such horrible thoughts but that's how vulnerable you are when your mental guard is down I suppose. I hope that the true Me in a healthy state would never listen to such things.

On that day, I was reminded of the song "Good Parts" by LE SSERAFIM and how in the past, I used to often sing as my emotional outlet — and express my feelings in songs or writing lyrics. This was something I completely stopped doing after my throat/vocal issues got bad, but I thought... maybe I can try to revive that? 😭 Something that used to feel fulfilling but I was forced to let go of, something that I might enjoy doing on a joyless day, and a productive use of my negative emotions. Very glad I pulled through! Looking back, I'm so happy I kicked myself off the ground and did a spontaneous cover again. ;u;

felt like singing a bit of le sserafim's "good parts" 🎶 pic.twitter.com/l9akMfkomo

— Eva ❖ CODEX // Gemini (@waterpixieva) April 25, 2023

KICK BACK

Helloooo friends, I completely fell out of blogging because I spent about two months making a website! Not coding, just using a site builder—but what I did included trying out 9 different site builders, designing the site which I'm obviously dreadful at, writing about half of the copy, editing and refining endlessly, researching and consulting friends, manually linking hundreds of things......... and then completely remaking the site because I wasn't happy with my first website builder of choice, heh. Basically taking up the exact same reserve of energy that would go into posting a blog. 😂 It's been done for two weeks now and we're waiting on something else to be able to launch. Happy to say that in these two weeks I swung the complete opposite direction of my workaholicism and have buried myself in video games. :D

Literally the first thing I did with my free time as soon as I completed my part for the site was record a little cover snippet of a fun song I've been obsessed with! "KICK BACK" by Yoneshi Kenzu aka the opening theme of Chainsaw Man 🔥

no i'm not late for #SingingMarch, maybe april just arrived too early!!!

Yonezu Kenshi - "KICK BACK" pic.twitter.com/eneq05JXcO

— Eva ❖ CODEX // Gemini (@waterpixieva) April 1, 2023

[Direct link to the tweet if embed breaks]

[Box link if twitter breaks...]

Catching up on NOISZ STARLIVHT!

Wowie... it's already been a year since the launch of NOISZ STΔRLIVHT—the rhythm game x visual novel x bullet hell mobile game that I have the honor of singing for as Asuka of idol group SUNRaiSE. ☀️

To celebrate, both groups SUNRaiSE and STΔRLIVHT came together for a collab track called "Clash of Twilight!" It's a cool song filled with cryptic lyrics referring to the game's story, which btw really keeps me on my toes and after every chapter I just want to find out more. The devs have poured a lot of passion into this fantastic game. Also love that all of the vocalists, plus Malcolm who's behind the videos, are all from the youtaite community. ❤️

STΔRLIVHT: Grace (k*chan) / Sera (Angela) / Sumire (KT) / Hakuno (Leon)

SUNRaiSE: Shion (Niko Vargas) / Asuka (Eva) / Hikari (Phoebe)

We're actually running a Kickstarter right now where you can buy some merch including a CD of the entire game's soundtrack! It's super freaking cool how many members of the youtaite community have participated in it—beyond the idol group cast there's also chiisana, fome, and Miyolophone in the song credits! We're all on an album together!!! Too cool!!

Clash of Twilight (Lyric Video) / STΔRLIVHT vs. SUNRaiSE 
(prod. Shirobon & MegaSphere)

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SUNRaiSE has two songs which you can check out below!!
Both are bright, hype-inducing, uplifting songs! The notes in "Parhelion" were crazy high to sing haha. To be fully honest I'm not satisfied at all with how I characterized Asuka's singing voice and wish it were more unique. ;;

Rise Above (Music Video) / Soleily ft. SUNRaiSE

Parhelion (feat. SUNRaiSE) / Reku Mochizuki

I actually uploaded a playthrough/reaction video of the first time I played Rise Above in the game... 😳 Been meaning to film again while playing Parhelion, combine the two parts, and upload onto my vlog youtube channel, but...yeah my backlog of things to do is huge lol...

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NOISZ STΔRLIVHT Release Celebration Live

Finally, here's the official VOD of our livestream that we did one year ago for the launch of the game! I wrote about it in-depth in this post, but the entire idol cast went on stream as vtuber models of our characters—a huge challenge for me to conquer due to my stage fright and throat issues. But it was fun. And we did it. We did that!

This VOD was also edited by me! I added the subtitles and song names and tried to smooth out some of the technical issues we had. After the stream I just couldn't bring myself to listen to what I'd sounded like (EMBARRASSING!!!) so you can bet... much screaming and cringing happened while editing this .....

PS: Wait omg, I can start an "original music" tag for this post... Still going to tag it as a collab cover though even if that's inaccurate heh.

2023 New Year's Resolutions

Hello!! Welcome again to the new year! Ignore that it's February!!

For a long time it's been my personal tradition to conjure up with 100 "New Year's Resolutions" ranging from serious goals, things I'd like to work on, faraway ambitions, to silly castaway thoughts—then do a full retrospect on how I fared. It's interesting looking back at my different priorities each year and what I'm most proud of accomplishing!

Not much to review this time since I decided to skip resolutions at the beginning of 2022:

"There's too much uncertainty about whether/when my throat will recover and the other health things preventing me from working on projects or my skills much—I've been set back so much that I don't want to think too hard about distant goals. This year I really just need to take care of myself by staying disciplined and extremely careful about my lifestyle, appreciate the small things in life, and keep my pessimism in check believe that everything will get better soon!"

I think 2022 for me could be called a "good year" in that nothing majorly bad happened, progress was made, challenges conquered, I grew as a person, created and nurtured a lot of great things, made some new friends, my loved ones are well, and I'm grateful for that. It was also a rather dark year that challenged my patience and was spent thinking a lot about my own health and mortality... This year had so many ailments one after another. Plus grasping at copium as my best friend moved to another country haha.

For the most part I succeeded in my goals of focusing on my health, discipline, making some recovery (albeit not enough), taking many hard looks at what's happening, the potential reasons behind them, how to improve things, what next steps could be made.

Sadly it was also a year of constantly compromising: all of my hobbies, things I enjoy, food, motivation, comfort, freedom, companionship, my time, energy, mental strength, one branch of health in exchange for another. Probably brings home the prize of The Most Frustrating Year I've lived thus far. 😂

Going into 2023, it seems it'll rather be a year of Exploring Solutions—my situation is no longer as uncertain and my goals are much more defined. I have a pretty good idea of what I need to do, which is promising! But unfortunately all serious things which probably will make for a dreary and boring post, sorry lmao.

We shall see if I make it to a hundred or give up early, here we go... ✌️

Bold for especially big ones for me this year.

Quick thoughts... (+ bass !?)

 ...because these days I feel like that's all I have the energy for. TT

Lately I feel more than ever like I can only handle things in bite sizes. So many things I want to do or need to finish that feel overwhelming... Things that have been on the backburner that are difficult to bring myself to work on—when will those ever be done? It's going to take so much time. And as they're "bigger" projects I feel more pressure to make them up to...some kind of standard.

I wonder why this is significantly more of a struggle for me now than before.

Perhaps an unhealthy need for instant gratification I've developed? Reduced attention span and ability to focus for long periods required to make a satisfying amount of progress? My creativity running dry fast and in bursts and not wanting to waste that inspiration? Too many interests, thoughts, and ideas I want to move on quickly to?

Always feeling like I have to deliver to a high standard? Not that I really deliver but I definitely feel the burden and paranoia of those expectations... Even for small things, I'm still expending a lot of time overthinking, reviewing, redoing, feeling pressure, feeling guilt... I can't just do things once or halfheartedly and call them done—but it's more handleable in bite size!

Definitely could also be having less time to spend to work on hobbies as well as having multiple interests... There are sometimes periods where I have little free time, but that's not true right now. But even with my time, I think that now more than ever there's more things to spend it on? Dividing my time between a lot of different desires or needs, and especially now with prioritizing exercise for my health.

Actually, it's ironic because I certainly feel frustrated at how many singing projects I'm in that are still stuck in the pipeline unreleased (though to be clear: this post isn't just about singing projects) and part of it probably is wanting to experience that dopamine of finishing things or putting them out for the world to see—releasing small projects has been super fun! The irony is that I myself in my state of overwhelm am taking forever to finish my part on certain big singing projects... One that I'm mixing, one that I'm animating... Giving those up and commissioning someone else I've contemplated yet I don't want to let go ;; Although I may have bitten off more than I can chew, they're both things I greedily want to get better at and should practice! (Both of those projects are still missing other components so I'm not the only bottleneck but it absolutely weighs heavily on me nevertheless...........)

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Oops so much for quick thoughts LOL this turned into a much longer post than expected! Irony.

Recently with me considering if I need to find a hobby that doesn't contribute to my eye strain (which I always have thanks to my job) one idea was learning to play bass guitar which I'd wanted to do back in high school? Absolutely inspired by K-On! and the most iconic anime bassist Akiyama Mio. 👑 Then this idea was enforced from watching Bocchi the Rock! last season and encouragement from Fome and other friends who either also play instruments or just started learning themselves.

So as part of the noodling process I went to look at basses at a store, learned about the different models, held one for the first time, tried out what it would feel like to hold down and pluck the strings.........

of course picked out the one most similar to Mio's hehe

I'm not sure! I think a dealbreaker for me is finding an instrument that I'll want to spend time with—that suits my specific visual preferences and physically feels comfy. But also don't want to spend too much money and I like the idea of owning secondhand (more eco friendly as well!) which would even further limit my choices lol.

And of course, I just don't think I'll be very good at it, being musically and rhythmically more challenged than you'd expect for someone who enjoys singing. Struggling is not fun. 🫠 Who's to say whether I'll end up finding instrument practice to be a cause of stress or a relaxing pastime as intended?

But the part that's relevant to this post is that...I don't know if I can justify starting a whole new hobby when I feel like I still have so much to finish or should do to get closer to my goals. ;; I'm going to keep thinking, well, if I have time to practice the bass then I probably have time to do any of the 8451854 things demanding my attention!!! Aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaah.

So stupid but even for posting this inconsequential rambling I was like, "Screw it I'm just going to publish without proofreading!!" but still couldn't resist temptation and went back and rewrote a few things because I used too many em-dashes and it was bothering me. lol perfectionist insanity

Truth or Dare

I've a few longer posts in progress, no time lately to sit with them, so a quick update for now!

New fandub new fandub ✨

My friend Mii suggested we do a Genshin voice acting collab together and we thought this fanmade MMD skit of Mona and Layla was hilarious (it's sooo good) so we got permission from the animator Monolithia to dub over it. 🙏

I believe this is the most viral tweet I've ever been involved in...? It was so shocking to wake up to—as of posting, it has 400 retweets and 1700 likes. 😳 Though judging from the replies from randos, I think most viewers are simply fixated on how amazing the animation is (rightfully so) rather than admiring our voice acting but welp.

#GenshinImpact fandub with Eva!

Mona » @waterpixieva
Layla » here o/

» We were given permission from the animator to post « pic.twitter.com/Rcb1shjpx6

— MiiTang @ comms open (@miitangwu) January 12, 2023

(also on TikTok)

A fun little project! Mii is such a wonderful match for Layla—I'd always described her voice as soothing, smooth, and pretty... Soft... I could listen to her speak forever.

I'd never tried doing a Mona voice before so this was an interesting challenge; my first fandub with such a nasal tone. Not totally satisfied with the "Go to sleep!!" because I had to choose between shouting to emote the line correctly, or maintaining the somewhat soft and textured timbre I wanted to emulate from Mona's Japanese voice (I'm not experienced enough yet to shout while controlling that) plus keeping in mind the character's levelheaded personality... In the end I chose the take that sounded more "Mona" to me, sacrificing projection and emotion, but it's okay—it's a reference point for when I improve one day, right?!