Laruku concert anniversary

Mina is hopefully safely on her way to/or arrived at the land of the rising sun.  Good luck girl ^3^  Things will be just fine ^____^  If all goes well Kia and I will hopefully be seeing you next summer ^^

As 4am_secret mentioned, it's the anniversary of the Laruku Otakon Concert \^0^/ 
Re-reading my concert report I just realized the restaurant that Laruku ate at that evening was McCormick's & Schmick.  There's a chain of that restaurant right underneath the firm at which I'm interning.  And when we're able to find a partner to take us out to lunch, we usually go there!  How cool!  Reading back, I also realize that I lived the concert not only through my personal experience but through others' reports--how much their reports made up what I remembered of the time.  Just thinking how I met most of you online shortly after the concert makes me quite nostalgic. It's been a good year ^-^

Cleolinda, famous in LJ land for her m15m, has published a new book.  Don't know when it will be published in the US, but with it selling well in the UK, it can't be far behind. 

Hung out with Coco and Wenping last night.  This will be Coco's last weekend in VA as she'll head back to NC to finish her masters.  Today my parents and I met Coco at Il Mee Buffet - a cook-it-yourself Korean barbecue with sushi on the side.  My mom said she wanted to meet Coco since I always talked about her and since she spoke Chinese it sounded like a good idea.  Coco has also been feeding my mother a healthy dose of Chinese dramas, mainly Meteor Garden.  They got along very well.

You know how people show different sides of themselves when they are with different people?  Not that they intentionally do so but just different parts come out.  I feel I learned more about Coco in this 3 hour lunch than during the whole internship.  Or maybe my mom asks the right questions *shrug*  It's official, my mom loves Coco, as much as she loves Amy and Tricia *squishes you girls* 

I finished Haruki Murakami's Sputnik Sweetheart this morning.  I came to the conclusion that I don't understand this novel ^.^;;;  It was as if I came out of a period of meditation.  I loved it for its simplicity and its ideas on our ultimate loneliness--how people can never really connect and are forever orbitting around each other like the Sputnik of the title. 

Quote: I have this strange feeling that I'm not myself anymore.  It's hard to put it into words, but I guess it's like I was fast asleep, and someone came, disassembled me, and hurriedly put me back together again." (71)  Certainly not the most profound quote of the novel but beautiful in its minimalism.