For You ♥ Cover

I FINISHED AND UPLOADED A COVER!!!! ^___^ My first full song solo and first K-pop (that Let It Go doesn't count man) solo since "Tonight" which was in December 2013!!

falls over.
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crawls to bed . .

please enjoy!



【Cover】 Lovelyz - For You (그대에게) 【Eva】 

Criiiinging @ myself, but I'm a huge Lovelyz fan and this song (ok the group too) owns my soul. ;u; Such an uplifting and meaningful message!! Please support them and check out the gorgeous original MV too~ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hyKBa3RNo4M

MP3 of my cover: http://bit.ly/1MXNw0E
The video is just me filming myself being dumb on a beach. :'D Continuity is not a thing and neither is grace.

Many thanks to Fome for teaching me most of the harmonies! And to Kazou for shipping a package to my house which gave me a box to film with LOLOL. (Let's just pretend that's the right album because my copy of Lovelinus hadn't arrived at the time..)

All vocals belong to me—except for the bgm around 2:37, which is the only part I haven't found a clean, official instrumental for yet. ;_; When I find it, I'll update my mix MP3!
Feel free if you'd like to use the instrumental I edited together~ You can dl it here: http://bit.ly/1OU7t9W

Thank you for listening! Keep your head up. You'll be just fine, friend. ^^

[Fan Account] Apink Concert in San Francisco

Today I had the honor of attending Apink's concert in San Francisco for their North American tour, Pink MEMORY!! ^^ I'm exhausted now, but I had a blast at the show.

I'll be posting all about the experience I had~
There may be some "well, duh" things though because I went in not having read about anything from previous legs of the tour, and I also haven't watched all of Apink's shows so I'm not an expert on their personalities?

Scene 2016: Take 1

I read somewhere about the lead actress of a drama whose part was the most strenuous as she was in most scenes of the show. She'd relieve the tension from all the stress and exhaustion by crying her eyes out in her trailer, and then would go out and nail her scenes.

Now I want to think that I'm like her. I'm just crying so that I can shed all of my stress, sadness, anger, loneliness, irritation, contempt, and mental and physical exhaustion. So that I can now feel burden-free and go forward doing my best!

It's a new year. A new scene to nail.

When I get back from my Hong Kong/Taiwan trip, I've got lots to do--including my yearly resolutions review.

rad

Today I thought I'd try to color my roots since the last dye job left them pretty dark.

HONESTLY IT JUST LOOKS THE SAME/NOT NOTICEABLE .......... but in this specific angle in my bathroom my hair looks really red and I like it LOL. That's all, thx.

FINALLY.. Let's Catch Up!

I feel like blogging today~ ;u; I still haven't continued the Lovelyz MV with subs for fear of crying again HAHAHAHAHAHA but I'm feeling much better now! Something great happened already in the past hour since I wrote that post.

My laptop—which I only bought a year ago—decided to die after I brought it back from my Disneyland trip 2 weeks ago. I was pretty angry and offended (COME ON TECHNOLOGY WTF YOU DOING????) but I had hope that my files could be recovered at the very least. My dad who works in tech support was unable to do anything and ended up taking it to a computer repair shop. This is where everything goes to even more shit. The repair guy says there's apparently no data to be found on my harddrive. Ok fine. I made it clear that I wanted the laptop back if that were the case, and that they shouldn't reformat my laptop or reinstall Windows, which would wipe out all my files for sure. AND THEN my dad calls me while I'm at work.. to tell me the repair shop called.. and said, bad news...... that their software automatically reinstalls Windows if the repair fails......
Needless to say I was pissed as hell?! I had to put down my work and run to the bathroom for some angry sobbing.

Anyway, the rest of the story goes:
Repair shop ended up failing to reinstall Windows. (wao lol)
My dad refused to pay them. (thank god I would've been even more pissed)
My coworker was able to restore my files!!!!!!!!!!
My coworker is a miracle maker.

As I type, I'm copying all my resurrected files over! ^^ Waaaaa this is my one stroke of actual good luck this week!

So now I'll jump back in time to my "Let's Catch Up!" photo post that I had started a few weeks ago and will now be able to continue. :>

~timewarp~
~tacky animation effects~
~i saw what u had for dinner~
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What the, I haven't been on my blog in well over a month..?! LOL.
If only there were some extra hours in the day, I would certainly dedicate them to blogging. There's so much I always want to post, but then I'm either busy or too exhausted, and I reach this point where I don't even know where to start...........
A month is a long ass time....

This is basically a selfie timeline lol.

I guess for starters! On November 1st, I went on my very first business trip!!!!! :DDD It was to San Diego! I had my own huge hotel room in the Grand Hyatt! I got to eat nice meals all paid for by the company!
In exchange, there was some stress and I was tired as hell, which I suppose is to be expected. We were creating videos for the event that happened (which I endearingly call CEO-con, or Annual CEO Speed Dating Event) so I was helping with handling audio during interviews and also edited little clips for the social media team to post.

The entire trip was spent with middle-aged folks who are experienced in the creative content production industry, so obviously I was awkward, couldn't fit in, and wasn't as competent. But honestly, it wasn't as bad as it could have been ^^ or would have been if it were me from years ago. Although I spent the trip without much confidence, now I'm believing in myself a bit more. ;^; I received some really kind words!! My colleagues said I did good work and that I'm smarter than the well-paid clients we worked for! And two people said that I'm very wise beyond my years.... ;____; I'm so flattered heee.

My hotel room, mug shot, yum but expensive sushi HEHEHEHE

Obligatory selfies because paid video editing in a seaside hotel room.

Funniest thing happened on the way back though. I booked a late returning flight so that I'd be able to hang out with Chiisana who goes to school an hour from San Diego. Before she took me to the airport, we were able to stop by New Port Beach, and that was incredibly pleasant and fun albeit short ;u;

So my flight's booked for 9:20 PM. Due to it being a smaller, non-isolated airport, there's a curfew at 10 PM to prevent noise complaints. .....
.........
You'd think they'd learn by now not to offer flights so close to their curfew.
The flight got CANCELLED because we couldn't take off in time LMAO. Our pilots were on an incoming flight that got delayed so much that they couldn't make it onto our plane before 10.
So I had to take the next day off from work, and generous goddess Chiisana came to pick me up, let me sleep over, and took me to the airport again the next day ;u; ... There were tons of stressful factors at the time but in hindsight, it turned out well!



Two Halloweens ago, friends and I walked around a mall giving out candy as a "reverse trick-or-treat," which unfortunately couldn't happen again. xD But I took charge of giving out candy at my house for the first time, which was cool! (My parents can't be bothered and I was too shy, so we usually avoid the holiday altogether.)

I couldn't think of an appropriate costume to wear to work so I ended up just wearing a tie and my dad's blazer and shoes, and called myself a businessman looooool.



I also dyed my hair again! My roots grew out a ton since June. Ended up going with Garnier Nutrisse Color Foam: 3UR Deep Ultra Intense Red for Dark Hair, which surprised me as a non-Asian brand bubble/foam dye.

(Not a good comparison because I didn't know lighting would change that great a deal from 2 PM to 4 PM lol)

Easy to use, very little run (or scent) after the initial rinse, didn't damage my hair, overall pretty good experience and I'd use this dye again! Only it didn't color my roots all that well, which could have been my fault. It's k.



Two weeks ago was my company-paid trip to Disneyland!! (This is the accounting job; not the video production one.) That was the greatest weekend ever, man. I mean since I'm an only child who lives in a very quiet and sometimes lonely house, I was pretty excited about the fact that a bunch of coworker friends and I rented a house from Airbnb to live in together ^___^ It was such a nice house too!!! I've always wanted to live in a house with stairs! I've always wanted to have a bunk bed and try sleeping on the top bunk! The carpet was so comfy I even fell asleep on it! And how nice was it to get to stay up playing board games with friends! And have late night pillow talks ;w;! I FEEL LIKE I'VE FULFILLED SO MANY CHILDHOOD DESIRES.
My body felt like death afterwards, but Disneyland was a blast! The upgraded Hyperspace Mountain IS SO FUCKING FUN. The weather was beautiful! Take me back. Take me now.

Here's me at my 'regular spot' on the stairs because I'm like 5.

I actually don't have any obligatory selfies from this trip. My only regret is that I wish I took pictures while at Disneyland. D: But on the road trip returning home, my coworker did take a bunch of dumb pictures on my camera LMAO.

 I got a push-pop at the gas station and loved it.

For You

This could be the first of possibly many posts about this song because it pretty much owns my soul right now.



Lovelyz released their new For You (그대에게) MV this morning and I'd been watching it over and over without subtitles. It's so perfect from the music, to their vocals and belting(!), to the styling, to the MV direction, to the meaningful story, to the cinematography. How could anything get lovelier than this? And I just love that the story is that they're giving warmth and hope to a friend beset by wintery grey loneliness, through jars of beautiful remembrances. And these girls are so sweet, so talented, so hardworking, so strong despite obstacles, that they deserve the recognition that I'm sure they'll earn through such a wonderful release. ;u;

So I finally watched the MV with English subtitles. After the first two lines, I had to pause the MV because I suddenly got emotional. I ended up crying and I haven't even watched the rest of it yet ;_; ...

The first two lines go:
"Did you have a long/tiring day? I see a bit of sadness."

Yeah. These days I've only been having those. ..When did you notice, Lovelyz..? ;________; How could you make me cry just with two sentences? Then again I shouldn't be surprised because I've been crying a lot in the past couple weeks. Mostly from stress, I think. Sometimes I don't know why.

I had started a big "let's catch up!" post for this busy month, then had no time or energy to finish it, and now my laptop died so....... I'll probably still put it up later.. someday......

This past weekend was my company-paid trip to Disneyland! It was a lot of fun, but I guess my laptop couldn't handle the 7 hour drive home because it would not boot up when I got back.. At this point I'm just praying all my files can be recovered. :/

What a gloomy day. All this cold rainy stress and loneliness in contrast to sunny carefree times in LA with friends by my side day and night. I might be in yet another slump. It's hard to even find motivation to get out of bed.

5 Minute Morning Challenges ??

Last week at my video production job, we had our first creative meeting! Basically show-and-tell LOL.. One coworker shared an article he read recently about how changing up your morning routine can stimulate creativity and give you more drive throughout the day. ;u;
I was pretty much inspired, since I've been thinking to install some positive changes. I've been unmotivated. I'm tired all the time. I don't wanna do anything. Especially, I can't and don't want to get out of bed. Even with work everyday, I wake up much later than I intend to every morning. And with just work 5 days a week, life does become routinely and soul-sucking. :c

So!!!! I'm gonna try something I thought of today: 5 Minute Morning Challenges.

I'm going to come up with 31 short challenges, throw them into a random order generator, force myself up every morning not knowing what the challenge of the day is, and fulfill it before going to work.

So far, here are some things I've thought of.. They're easy, but they're challenges to me because I never exercise and can't cook, etc etc HAHAHA.

• Jumping jacks and maybe other stuff
• Ab exercises (this blogilates video?)
• Butt exercises??
• Some cardio dance video
• Cycling machine
• Practice a k-pop dance
• Cook an egg for breakfast
• Learn a new Korean word and tell someone about it
• Learn a new Japanese word and tell someone about it
• Take a walk to the basketball court and back
• Take a jog? to the basketball court and back
• Practice playing keyboard
• Learn the chorus or verse of a k-pop song I've never sung before
• Do something extra to my appearance

Please let me know if you might have any suggestions~ And feel free to join me? :>

We'll see how this goes!

Renewal

"Now I'm feeling super hyped because I intend to have a productive winter break! I'll be increasing my work hours, but I'll try to find the time nevertheless. There's a lot I want to do! And I'm going to try chasing after some opportunities! I'm gonna have some fun while at it. I'll do my best. I want to become a more impressive version of myself. I can do it. :)"

Uh, who hacked my account because I don't recognize this person LOL.....

Y'know, at the end of the day, I'm pretty glad that I blog, and get to chronicle my ups and downs and beliefs and griefs. ^^;; What stronger motivational voice than your own?
Last night I ended up staying up late rereading my blog posts.. through my new years resolution review.. til the semester of Fall 2014. It's interesting when you feel like you're reading the words of a completely different person.
Man, one year ago, I was on top of the world. I wasn't as learned as now, nor was I even as able to socialize as much as now, but because I felt confident in myself and my potential, I was happy. D: Because I was trying new things and surprisingly liked it, I wanted to try more new things.
What happened in my last semester of college that stomped on my confidence and courage..? ;;; How did I gradually become more and more unmotivated, and started finding less and less meaning in everything... :c sigh
I kind of want to find that person again. That kind of thought itself is a good sign!!

;u; Today I already feel like I'm bouncing back a bit, from the moment I woke up and my first thought wasn't, "Fuck I hate everything why do I have to get out of bed when there's no point."

And a few days ago! I started practicing keyboard again despite not having touched it in probably 6 years. ;A; I'm shocked~
Then yesterday! I cleaned up and finally put away all the shit I failed to unpack from .. AX in July.. and my Alaska cruise trip in May.....

Now today! I spent all evening working on this year's AX vlog which I haven't touched since a few days after AX. :'D Slowly kind of picking stuff up again. Little steps, but I think it's okay to be proud of them.

Power / Coco

A part of me had dreaded writing this post for certain reasons, despite the vehemently small voice that urges me through every crack in my subconscience haha.

Finally got the push today as I received this email. ;u;
Two days a week, I work at a video production start-up that does media for mostly corporate companies. In July, we headed over to Google HQ for a video shoot for a lovely organization that helps girls learn about science, math, and tech. Although I didn't do anything related to producing or camerawork, I did work the live audio recording, and then I assisted with the video edit, and did all the audio mixing and color correction. My first time having such a big hand in a project for the company ;u;! You can watch the video here if you're curious.

  

Hearing these kinds of things makes me really happy! I'm glad to be helpful.

I had a moment of realization last month that I can actually affect others' lives and move them by making videos. It's a fascinating thing—the power of a camera, an editing program, and a mouse—turned into the form of media that speaks most volumes.


During the shoot, one of the girls we interviewed really stood out to me. She was the youngest—a bright-eyed one, 12 years old, but spoke with more thought and articulation than me tenfold. A mature, but optimistic, obviously passionate young girl! I remember when we finished her interview, I thought to myself, "Man, so kids these days can be smart. Did I just meet a child prodigy? This girl's gonna do big things one day," and wished her good luck with her pursuits while I helped her take off the microphone.

Flash forward to last month, when I stupidly.. agh, so stupidly decided to check my work email on my iPad while I was in bed, before falling asleep.
And I found out she passed away in a car accident...... ;;;;;;;;;;;;; Needless to say, it was hard to fall asleep that night... And now I will never check my email before bed again.

When I went into work, they put me on the assignment of making a video for her family. Or well they asked me to put together all of the footage we had of her (since we really only used a nibble of it for the video) but I was more than willing to edit together a nice memorial video for her.. ;; I think she deserved at least that much. She was so charming, so smart, so passionate, so spirited. I don't know how she made such a lasting impression on me when I only met her once, but I had such big hopes for her already. Actually, I stayed really late that day to make a nice video to send her off with. A lot of deliberate editing. All of her smiling and laughing shots because they need to know how happy and bright she was. Video ended with a slow motion shot of her smiling warmly and nodding, because I think her loved ones would want to hear her say, "It's okay."

I don't know how her family reacted to the video, but the words of my coworkers and our friends from the organization (through whom we passed the video) really touched me—because of how I was able to touch them. ;; It was sad, but also felt a little.. miraculous? That I can do something that might help or comfort other people? Make something that invokes emotions?

Art is really such a powerful thing. ^^ I guess that's how I might find motivation to work on gifts for friends when I'm otherwise mostly unmotivated.

Honestly, I've had the thought before that my film classmates might look down on me because most of what I've been doing professionally so far have involved "simple" interviews, and I'm not pursuing fancy Hollywood-bound things and complex cinematography like most of them are. But today I feel like I'm not losing in any way. Interviews are personal; through them, people can share their stories and passions, and connect and strike a chord with the viewer. Right?

After that email today, I wounded up on the organization's website and came across their News page which talked about how the recent mentees went up to Google in SF (not HQ; it was a prior occasion) and one girl even wrote an essay on her exciting experience. I clicked on it out of curiosity. Fuck. It was Coco.... Just like what she said in her interview, she wrote that she dreams of working at Google someday. Emotions stirred again.
I hardly knew you but I miss you. ;n; Rest in peace, Coco.

A New Journey

【小さな•Kazou•Eva】Phoenix Ash - A New Journey「HBD Fome!」

Vocals:
　- Chiisana (Blossana)
　　http://www.youtube.com/ChiisanaChanx3
　- Kazou (Butterkaz)
　　http://www.youtube.com/soundmutation
　- Eva (Bubbleva)
　　http://www.youtube.com/waterpixieva

Script: Kazou
Mix: Eva
Harmony Guide: Chiisana
Video: Eva


YAAYYY!! A COMPLETED PROJECT! Chiisana, Kazou, and I surprised Fome for his birthday by doing a cover of one of Fome's band's songs. ^^ Actually it's the first song he wrote for Phoenix Ash. It's also appropriate given that he's got exciting changes ahead, but that will probably be announced in due time. Congratulations and happy birthday to Fome!!!

Hope you enjoy what we made ;v; All three of us struggled singing this song since it's nothing like what we're used to doing LOL.... Admittedly I rushed the mix so sorry about that part.. and also for my still developing sense of aesthetic.. but I did really work very hard on this video!! orz I'm no videographer, but I have been wanting to make an MV ever since my Tonight video, so I'm glad I got to do that for this heh. Took a lot of work but it was fun.

Also look out for the Easter eggs in the video hehe. A lot of the footage was shot on the day that Fome took pictures of Kazou modeling for the band's new t-shirts. So beyond the blatant shots of them and their feet, if you look carefully, you might see Fome and Kazou in the corner walking ahead of me.. Just look for the brown messenger bag :'D

(based on our representative colors)
[12:50:40 PM] Kazou-kun: we look like the powerpuff girls
[12:51:28 PM] Eva: THE FOAMYPUFF GIRLS
[12:52:34 PM] Kazou-kun: Blossana, Bubbleva, and Butterkaz
[12:52:42 PM] Eva: YOOOOOOOOOO
[12:52:45 PM] Eva: it's official

[12:58:21 PM] Eva: adsfjlkdslfkjdslkfjdsfksad
[12:58:25 PM] Eva: AND FOME IS PROFESSOR
[1:00:24 PM] Eva: this is perfect
[1:00:30 PM] Eva: old man mad scientist fome
[1:00:40 PM] Eva: creates friends in his laboratory
[1:00:42 PM] Eva: to sing him songs
[1:00:55 PM] Eva: that's the plotline

[1:41:45 PM] Kazou-kun: Can I invite Siri
[1:41:57 PM] Eva: Bunny is not allowed to play
[1:42:01 PM] Kazou-kun: PLEASE
[1:42:06 PM] Eva: we killed Bunny remember

Heart Pangs

Hurhur, tried out heart bangs~ Such a silly but cute trend #하트앞머리

A photo posted by Eva (@waterpixieva) on Sep 25, 2015 at 1:10pm PDT

It's been mostly better lately but busy ;u; Today was the first time in a while having the entire day to myself so I didn't get up til 5 PM eheeehh~ So nice catching my breath, just relaxing in bed all evening watching Red Velvet and Lovelyz on variety shows.. I think I do get extra stressed out because I've been missing this 'me' time lately to be spent with no worries or responsibilities. But also some things are just objectively stressful and dreadful tbh.

I almost had a chance to feel sad about summer officially ending (and friends leaving again..), but then I got food poisoning again earlier this week so that was  o<-<

Why  o<-<

And then digestive issues for the rest of the week  o<-<

babybird

Yooo it's been busy.

I did have a fun weekend though! I surprisingly had energy on Friday and Saturday before I went back to being my lethargic self xDD But not as bad as before~

On Saturday, I saw the Love Live! movie at its premiere in San Francisco, which was fun. It was a good movie, full of laughs and feels. o^o They gave a free picture board and SR card (for the game) to each person; so nice~ Afterwards, friends and I had afternoon tea and took purikura!

Also more selfie because for whatever reason my appearance was kind of okay on Saturday. Normally I look 2000% messier and more zombielike, I promise LOL. My skin and hair suddenly decided to cooperate after being ugly for so long!!! And I even liked the make-up I bothered to put on eheee. That was a nice day :'D

Also Kotori hair because it was Kotori's birthday. (Ugh I love all of the LL members so much more now after seeing season 2 and the movie. Proceeds to devote more of my life to this quicksand of a franchise.)

Dangerzone

Complex

[I started writing this post about 2 weeks ago—actually scribbled on my iPad in the back seat of a car during an emotional moment—and I just kind of left it.. Clearing out my drafts I guess to get it off my chest. But it's kind of hard once the moment has already passed ^^;;]