Wow! A blog! What revolutionary technology! This is just a way for me to put out some of my thoughts on miscellaneous topipcs. Don't expect there to be any unifying theme. Hah, I don't even need to spend 5 years writing, recording, editing, and publishing a full-length video essay! Hope you stick around...
When I was a young child, I concluded that the way to have my own personality was to have a list of favorites, like favorite color or favorite shape. In fact, that is actually how orange became my favorite color; I decided blue was too cliche, so I sat down at a list of colors and decided that orange looked nicer than the rest. But another thing I "needed to have" was a lucky number. Again, I (for some reason) decided that numbers related to my birthday were too basic, and I settled on the numbers 4 and 7 because I noticed that '4' showed up rather often and '7' was just an all around lucky number.
As a teenager, I was really into JoJo's Bizarre Adventure. Definitely one of my favorite shows to this day. When I was watching Part 5, seeing Mista and his obsession with avoiding the unlucky number '4' eventually got me thinking that actually, maybe the number '4' isn't so lucky after all. So I have started treating "4" as an unlucky number and avoiding it when I can (ex. avoiding the 4th option when picking from a bunch of options).
Of course, now, I don't really believe in all that "lucky/unlucky" stuff, so I don't go out of my way to avoid every possible instance of the number 4, but I have started to notice it come up a lot more. Like, last year, me and my classmate were taking turns doing the college assignments (to be done by pairs), and I noticed when it was my turn I was doing the 4th assignment to be passed on the 4th day of the month. Another time, I had to take a number to wait in line for something. I realized my number was '4' (or at least had a '4' in it, I don't really remember), and they were going to call me to the 4th counter. And guess what? I was sitting there trying to listen for my number but somehow missed it anyway and had to go to the counter myself to ask if I had been called!
Now it just seems like the number 4 is trying its best to be my lucky number, and I am NOT having it!!! I'm not even that big on the number 7 anymore, either, since it's not a number that really matters much to me.
So for now, remember that the best things in life comes in pairs. Sometimes trilogies. Except trilogies are dead to me because the the sequel movies are NOT canon, no matter how much Disney says they are. Don't fall for their lies! And no matter how neat and organized the number 4 seems to seem, it's all a ruse by Big Number to get you to buy their tetra packs!
Fourever yours,
- ash (14/6/2025)
I arise from the grave! Allow me to tell you a tale of adversity and triumph, doubt and determination, despair and perseverance. A tale of two brave souls against the universe, overcoming all odds to finish what they were set out to do...
The Hatsune Miku movie ("Colorful Stage! The Movie: A Miku Who Can't Sing") released this year, set in the world of Project SEKAI (PJSK), otherwise known as the "Hatsune Miku gacha game". Having gotten into PJSK myself (only this year!) and being strengthened in my devotion to Miku, I of course had to go and see it. And what a movie it was... The journey to get here was a perilous one, and the odds were stacked against us, but me and my friend who went with me surmounted all obstacles in our path in our quest for Hatsune Miku.
The story begins, of course, with the announcement of the movie. Now, I don't know how it is abroad, but in our country, movie theaters reside within malls. If you wanted to watch a movie, the mall is where you went to. And in our country, it was announced that the movie was only showing in specific malls under a certain company. I had never gone to one of those malls since the ones I frequented (and were overall more convenient for me to go to) were under a different company. It doesn't matter, in any case. I would travel to the ends of the earth if it was for Hatsune Miku. Anyway, the friend I planned to go with lives in a different city from mine, and that city apparently had none of the malls where the movie was showing (or, at least, we couldn't find one). We instead settled on one of the branches near my city down south. It wasn't a hassle, anyway, since the railway system went directly from his city to mine. So, sure, it's a bit of a distance, but we're settled on a place! Great!
The next part of this story involves the reserving of the tickets. Now, malls with theaters generally allow walk-ins, but the mall website indicated "reserved seating" for the movie, which I took to mean that only those who reserved tickets in advance could enter. I knew walk-ins would probably still be allowed, but I didn't want to take any chances. Me and my friend decided on the 3:20 PM showing, as he would be leaving to commute around 1-2:00 PM. I reserved the tickets online, and as the payment was being processed, it... did not stop being processed. I waited a good 10, 15 minutes just looking at the screen, eagerly waiting for it to take my money, but it did not. Instead, the transaction timed out, and I had to repeat the process again.
At this point in time, I had to leave the house because my family had plans to go out. Mind you, this was the day before we were meant to go out for the movie. So, I tried again on my phone, navigating through clunky mobile web UI to get our tickets. Eventually, the payment made it through, and I got a text message on my phone:
Wait... 5:40 PM!? That can't be right... I frantically go through the website again, trying to figure out what went wrong. And then I see it, in the drop-down menu where I am meant to select the time of showing. Attempting to tap "3:40 PM" instead selects "5:40 PM" right below it, and I have to tap a little ways above the choice I actually want. I am in dismay, frantically messaging my friend, figuring what to do, seeing if there's a way to change the schedule. For a moment, I considered contacting the mall/theater to see if I can get the schedule changed, but I decided against it. It would be too much trouble, and me and my friend agreed that it would at least give is us time to meet up, get some lunch, and go around the mall before the movie.
And so, we finally arrive at the day of the movie. The day we would finally get to meet Hatsune Miku herself. Then, at around 12:30 PM, I receive a message: my friend informing me of a wrench in our plans. His mother had apparently booked a vaccine appointment for him that day and forgot to tell him. To put it simply, chaos ensues for about the next few hours. We are frantically messaging back and forth, trying to guesstimate times and schedules. At some point he resorts to sending voice messages because he was busy walking in the sudden rain that almost comedically started pouring in his city, heavy winds and everything. He now has to commute from the clinic all the way to the nearest railway station, and it would take way too long for him to wait for public transport to arrive.
That is, until he decided to make a sacrifice, one that I could never dream of making: GrabCar. Basically, our country's Uber. And it is EXPENSIVE. Remember that, right now, we are on literal opposite ends of the metro. A GrabCar for a normal person under normal circumstances would cost maybe 100-300 PHP, but a cross-region trip totaled at over 700 PHP (which is a little over 12 USD, and maybe it doesn't sound like a lot, but it is for us). Yes, it would be the fastest way, much faster than having to wait for public transport in the rain, but that's a lot of cash, cash that he apparently didn't even have because he didn't think to bring more. Despite this, he was ready and willing to make the sacrifice, if it meant doing it for Miku. A true soldier. I was the one who booked the GrabCar because he didn't have the app, and we eventually found a driver. I, too, left my home, on the way to our rendezvous point.
And so, we arrive. I got there before him and looked for the theater so I could tell him where to go. In a few minutes, he arrived as well, sopping wet from the rain and arm burning from the vaccine. It was finally happening. The fabled Miku Movie we had heard so much about. I went to the counter to claim the tickets while he went to the stalls to get us some snacks. As I got our tickets, they also gave us some codes for PJSK for us to claim some in-game rewards. I was honestly pretty shocked that we got codes because I thought it was only for those who went to the special advanced screening, along with other freebies.
It looks like my fat finger worked out, because there's no way in hell we would have made it if we stuck with the original plan of 3:20 PM. We finally get our snacks, and I look down at my watch to see that it's... 5:45 PM. We immediately rushed inside the theater and found our seats. Thankfully, we didn't miss much.
The movie itself was unironically really good. It had been ages since the last time I actually went to see a movie in theaters, and this was the perfect way to return. Taking place in the PJSK universe, it also deals with themes of motivation and determination present in the stories of the original game. I heard of others who enjoyed the movie despite not knowing anything about PJSK, but I still feel like knowing the game and its characters does a lot to put everything into context and make it overall a more enjoyable experience.
The funny thing about going to see the movie was that the theater was basically empty. I don't know if it was because it was the last few days of the movie showing, or that Miku is just more niche in our country, but there were like, maybe 3 other groups of 2-3 people each scattered about the theater. The guy sitting directly behind us was a bit of a yapper, to be honest, but he at least kept his voice down. The point is, at the end of the movie, there's an after-credits "show" where Miku and the rest of the Vocaloids would perform a song and dance around, and moviegoers were encouraged to bring glowsticks and everything so that it would feel like an actual concert. But because of how empty the theater was, no one was willing to make any noise (admittedly, except for me who went "yeah!!!" when Miku said something like "are you ready"), and there were awkward pauses clearly meant to give time for the crowd to cheer. Even then, there's nothing to regret. The show was fun, it was a hilarious experience, and most importantly, the movie was absolute cinema. A strong contender for the best piece of media I had ever consumed.
After the movie, with the songs stuck in our heads, we went to have dinner at McDonald's because our wallets couldn't take much more. We also redeemed the game codes together, though there was some confusion on how to actually use the rewards. Out of a pool of 26 characters, we were given some tickets to redeem 6 of them. I found out much later that apparently, it was announced that watching the movie initially only got you 1 ticket, meaning you had to watch the movie 26 times (or otherwise somehow obtain 26 codes) to collect all the characters. This was of course met with backlash, and they reworked the system so that you would get much more.
And that ends our tale. Overall, one of the best hangouts I've had so far, even if it meant only eating grass for the next month. I can't think of a grand conclusion for this post. Man I love Hatsune Miku.
Sekai De,
- ash (30/5/2025)
P.S. You'll see I added some previous/next buttons to make the blog a little easier to navigate through while I work on the site overhaul!
Hi! It's uhh... been a while... Blah blah blah, college hits hard, all that stuff. I am happy to announce that I have in fact gotten my life in order. The semester ends soon, so for the next few weeks I'll be locking in and studying like my life depends on it (because it does). But after that I'm free and have many things planned and should be making stuff soon!
... Now, where have I heard that before?
I've made a lot of promises on when I would finally make that thing or do this or finish that, and I know that I have basically no audience who cares, so these promises were mostly to myself. I've been thinking a lot recently about this whole "content(?) creation" thing I've been doing and where I want to go with it. I've decided that I do want to do it more seriously. And "seriously" means I actually need to take it seriously and not just do stuff whenever I feel like it. I've also watched a lot of videos recently about the creative process as well as managing projects/productivity, and more than applying it to my studies I also want to use it in my creative works so that I can actually get things done and not feel guilty about calling myself an "artist" or a "programmer" etc.
The point is, I've learned a lot. And this time, I have a plan. For now, of course, I still have to focus on my studies, but I want to share a sneak peek of my personal to-do list to be transparent about my backlog of works:
- More blog posts: I have a lot of blog post ideas, some of them already written out. I want to get better at writing in general, and I want to use these posts as practice.
- Videos: I made a video about how I initially developed this site, and it is about 90% done. I just never found the willpower to finish it, and I don't think I ever will because I plan to redo the whole video from scratch. I know I can do much better, and I want to do the video justice before publishing it. I also want to take this mindset into future videos, and not half-ass any part of the process to produce an output that I can actually be proud of.
- The website: I want to completely overhaul the site. I've mentioned before about how I built what is essentially my own static site builder just so I wouldn't have to update the files myself. I am still very proud of it, but I find it quite limiting. I find myself spending more time tweaking the program, and I just know it's going to become an untangleable mess if I keep at it. I've been thinking a lot about what I want my online "aesthetic" to be, I want to redesign the site from scratch to actually represent me and who I am. I will still push a few more updates to this version of the site, but they will be minimal QoL things just to keep it afloat while I work on the overhaul.
I have so many more things I want to do, but I have to take things one step at a time. I won't waste this chance!
I'll see you when the time comes.
With resolve,
- ash (11/5/2025)
There was this "Pokemon Fun Day" event not too long ago at our local mall. I have no clue if it was officially licensed or not (it probably was, given how big it was). They set up a bunch pop-up stores that were selling the games, cards, figurines, plushes, and other merch. The highlight for me was seeing an Oshawott plush that I couldn't buy because I'm broke.
And that's, like... the only Oshawott merch I've ever seen aside from another plush I saw abroad. It's my favorite Pokemon and yet the only "merch" I own is the Oshawott Pokemon Tretta Chip a friend gave me some time ago. I haven't even seen a Tretta machine in forever! I wonder if they still exist...
That being said, hey Game Freak, what's up with that!? I will literally give you my heart and soul if you release more Oshawott merch! It's preposterous, I'll tell you that much. All we ever see are Pikachu, the Kanto starters, Mew and Mewtwo, Gengar, Eevee and the 'lutions, and maybe some other Kanto mons If we're lucky.
Look at me, I'm complaining about being a forgotten Pokemon fan when the Pokemon in question is literally a starter in a mainline game! What about the Klinklang fans, huh!? Have you forgotten the Stufful and Pumpkaboo lovers who are dying for content!? And the lone Cryogonal and Bruxish advocates who will die on their hills???
You've done this to yourself, John Pokemon. Shame on you.
With spite,
- ash (26/2/2025)
P.S. (11/3/2025) Super late edit but I realize I forgot to show the actual Oshawott plush, so here it is:
For some reason, I felt like it looked a little dirty? Makes me wonder if most of the stuff there was surplus.
Another update!? Wow, I've been working hard this month...
This time I drew up some banners for my social media links in the social tab, along with other minor edits and improvements. I also updated the blog so that each post has its own link I can share so that I don't have to keep scrolling down to view old posts as I write more stuff.
I also ran into an issue a few days ago when I was working on the portfolio section where the site wouldn't properly update on Neocities. Apparently, it's because my browser keeps trying to load the outdated files from my cache, and when I searched up how to solve this problem, I found a post on r/Neocities called "daily reminder to clear your cache". Uhm... Anyway, I will try to look into cache busting to get around this, but it doesn't look very easy to do. In the meantime, if it looks like the site hasn't properly updated, remember to hit Ctrl + SHIFT + R (or Cmd + SHIFT + R on Mac) to hard reload the site. But from what I hear, the browser cache refreshes on its own after some time, so hopefully it shouldn't be too problematic.
I plan to make a video soon on my initial experiences and process developing this site. I hope I can finish it fast enough before my college requirements start piling on!
Sincerely,
- ash (18/1/205)
Happy New Year! I finally updated the site today. Aside from some additions to the hobbies & interests tab, I now have a portfolio of my best artworks!
Implementing images in HTML is usually as simple as making an img tag, but my own actions turned it into a full day endeavor... By the way, I built a custom (and incredibly scuffed) static site builder from scratch in Python to make my site for me, but I initially didn't account for images because I had none yet, so that's what I did today. After several hours of work, I can implement images in a gallery-like format (as seen in the portfolio tab) by just writing down the image file paths in a text file. There are probably better ways to do it using actual professional tools made for web dev, though...
In any case, I'm proud of this Python program that I will probably never release anywhere and I think the final product looks really neat. I didn't even know you could do those hovering transitions without any Javascript! What a wonderful time we live in!
Next on the to-do list... make icons for the social media tab... finally get around to working on the resources tab... use Javascript for smoother loading!? Oh well, I guess I can figure it out as I go.
Regards,
- ash (13/1/2025)
Dear diary, today I am mustering up the strength to finally write a real blog post...
I was thinking for a while on whether or not I should continue doing a blog here. The setup is pretty scuffed and I'm typing this on a notepad to be integrated into the HTML file later. For a moment, I considered moving the blog elsewhere, maybe doing it on Tumblr or Wordpress or literally any other site that was actually made for blogs, because that way maybe I could put tags and have more reach. Then I thought to myself, why do I need reach? It's not like anyone actually sees my content in the first place.
It got me thinking about my social media presence as a whole (or lack thereof)... Trying to optimize my searchability and game the system to get my numbers up, quite frankly, sounds like a nightmare. Unfortunately, the internet is just a big competition for who can get the most attention. And it gets really tiring. I just want to make the things that I want to make, and if someone happens to come across them, maybe even enjoy them, wouldn't that be something nice?
Maybe I was born a bit late, but I still remember the days when my mom would let me go to an internet cafe and I would immediately get on Club Penguin, Poptropica, and Moshi Monsters. I remember the days when I wasn't doomscrolling social media or mindlessly grinding Clash Royale and I was actually having fun playing whatever new game I had discovered. I miss the days when people did things for fun and not for profit.
Hopefully, I want to keep that mindset in whatever I do. It sounds pretty pointless, creating things with no audience, but I can always be my own audience.
If someone somehow found this and is reading this, advanced happy New Year! I will be sure to create many more things for fun and not for profit!
Cheers!
- ash (29/12/2024)
This is what a blog entry will look like. Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet. The quick brown fox jumped over the lazy dog. Supercalifragilisticexpialidocious. According to all known laws of aviation, there is no way a bee should be able to fly. Its wings are too small to get its fat little body off the ground. The bee, of course, flies anyway because bees don't care what humans think is impossible.
- ash (9/10/2024)