MEGA POST: Moving && Everybody, Everybody Wants to Love… Dina!

July 13, 2011 at 10:54 pm (Song Cover)
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Oh, my God, it’s been like… a month since I last wrote a blog post. I was working on one about Vintage last month, but then a lovely and horrible thing called LIFE got in the way. Not the board game. Actual life. So what happened is that my family, after months and months of anticipation and me not being 100% sure of what exactly was goin on, has finally started the moving process. As in, moving. It’s funny and awesome because what’s going on is that my family is moving in with my mom’s sister’s family (my Auntie Mel). It’s crazy because we are now rearranging a house that previously held five people into a home that must now accommodate ten. I tend to describe it as being like the Brady Bunch, because now there’s three girls and three boys, but there’s two sets of parents, no maid, two dogs and a box turtle living in a four-bedroom house.

Suffice to say it’s going to be packed when everybody’s here. That’s the main reason I’m like… a month late in typing up a blog post. When we started moving, the first person to move into the new home was *trumpets and fanfare* me. Which was great, because I got to start helping the girls reorganize our room and start sorting clothing and such, but the downside to that was that my uncle’s Internet had been down for almost a month, so… no internet. No ‘net, no YouTubeing, no roleplaying, no Facebooking, and no blogging. T_T But now it’s back, so we’re all good. ^_^

Anyway, to recap my last month… *clears throat, and then, speaking very quickly* Well, I finally finished final exams at college so I get to have my summer break, like, a full month after everybody else has started their summer breaks, and then the day I had my last exam, during which I had two performance finals (I’ll post them here at some point; I did “I’m Not That Girl” from Wicked in my Solo Voice final, and then a scene from Othello in my theatre class)…

Anyway, the day I have my last exams my mom and I start packing and the next morning at like… 6 o’clock we go to camp with a lot of people in my family and it was just going to be the weekend but we ended up extending it into Monday because it doesn’t feel like camp unless you sleep out there at least two nights.

And then we all went home and then that week we immediately started the moving process and halfway through that week I started sleeping over and it was kind of uncomfortable because I was sleeping on the floor but then a couple days later we moved my Grandpa’s chaise that he slept on when he was living with us into the girls’ room which had the bunk bed so we now all are able to fit in this room. Quite a feat… three girls all sharing the same room & closet space.

And then that weekend we went to Monterey with the Tantingco’s and splished and splashed around in the ocean. And then last week we continued organizing the rooms and such so now all the girls’ clothes are put away and the computer room’s nearly empty so that now we can start thinking about moving the boys into the house. Except JT has summer school and Mommy has work and Kevin has to stay at home because Daddy needs to be driven around since he can’t really see well enough to drive anymore, and he can’t drive without Dad anyway because he hasn’t gotten his license yet.

And on Wednesday we went to the Library but I couldn’t get a card because it’s a different Library provider than the one I had at home and I don’t have proof of residence yet. But it was okay because Auntie Mel’s card could hold 100 items for borrowing.

And then we went to Great America with Hanna and Kevin tagging along on Thursday and we all got season passes which was really cool. And then we went again on Saturday because we went to the Kababayan Fest at Great America and we stayed there all day because there were so many great Filipino performers there, including ANAK, Legaci, Andrew Garcia (even though he’s not actually Filipino) and AJ Rafael. Did I mention he’s amazing? His latest music video is called “Without You”.

It makes me really proud to be a Filipino. =D And then this week we’ve gone to check out Gavilan ’cause it’s closer than De Anza, but I’m not 100% sold yet, even though it is closer and more convenient. I’m already attached to several people at DA, and I did try out for the Foothill Conservatory even though that’s really far away compared to a lot of other schools. (I finally heard back from them… they said I’m still in consideration… Fingers crossed…) And then today we went to the trail where I biked 8 miles and then we did a TON of laundry. *exhales* Whew! Glad that’s over with.

Anyway, when I finally got back on the internet, I noticed that that lady I covered in my last blog post, Dina, had left me a bunch of comments, one here on the blog, and one on my YouTube, which I thought was really cool, since I’m still relatively new to the posting-videos-regularly-on-YouTube people. She posted on my aforementioned video taken during my final-final in my Beginning Singing class. (I tend to call it Solo Voice, though, because it sounds more professional, and because there are plenty of people in the class who have plenty of experience singing.)

I LOVE it. You have a fantastic voice and so much spirit. I like how you represented “the green girl” with a green sweater.

thirtycats 1 week ago
I followed the link to her channel and was surprised to see that it was the lady who’s obsessed with Australia! I haven’t been able to follow her as well over the past month for the above reasons, but I was really happened to see that she had covered more of the Blair family while I’d been away. Makes me happy because I LOVE Stewie, my character. I knew she’d had to have seen a little about him because the title on her July 10th post was: Maggie, Stuart’s Kid’s, Siany’s Goals, and Michael Dawes. There’s only two Stuarts on Tally, which I know she covers once a day in her blog, and only one of them actually goes by Stuart. Stuart Jr, of course, is Stewie. Here’s her little excerpt on the Blairs:
11. Started to read Stuart’s post.    He’s the single father to five kids.   Who are they?   Tamarah’s one; then the boys I suppose (Tom and Tim).   I think Stewie’s another song.   That leaves one more.   Is it Jezabel?I’ll read Stuart’s biography in a minute   I glanced at it, and I’m pretty sure I haven’t read it yet.12. Started to read Stuart Blair’s biography.

He’s the Minister of Magic for Victoria.

I think I already knew that.

He’s easygoing, except for the occasional moments when he’s angry.   He wears nice clothes at work, and when not at work.   He keeps fit by working out a lot.

…
14.  Learned that Stuart’s past love interest was Tanya.   I may have already known that; but I sort of forgot.Tanya and Stuart split up.   Stuart had a little fling.   This all sounds familiar to me.   I may have read it before?   Maybe on someone else’s biography?15. Saw that the fling resulted in Jezabel.   Her mother is Adele.   So when I read about Adele, I probably read about Stuart’s fling.

Stuart and Tanya raised Jezebel.   The biography says Adele was going to do something rash otherwise.   Would that be an abortion?

Tanya got pregnant with the triplets.   So then the couple ended up with four kids.   There’s Jezebel.  She’s half-siblings with Tamarah, Tim, and Tom.   They’re connected through their father.   Then Améa is half sisters with Jezebel via their mother (Adele).   I think I’m FINALLY understanding all of this.

Améa and Tamarah are not siblings by blood; but they’re connected by the fact that they’re both sisters to Jezabel.

16. Read more of Stuart’s biography.   He had challenges with Jezabel.   She did her weird dreaming stuff, and she had different personalities.   But it seems he managed to be a good father through all of this.

Then another baby came along.  Stuart jr.   So, that must be baby #5.   His role-player is Megan, the singing girl.

And then I went, WHAT?!?! Megan, the singing girl? Wait, she talkin’ about me? o.O I knew that she’d posted on my YouTube, but if she was referencing me as that, and not as “Camryn Adiarte”‘s roleplayer, that meant she’d covered me in a previous post. So of course, I needed to investigate.
*insert Pink Panther music here*

Turned out she’d covered me in her July 4th blog post, titled Google Maps, Yarri Road, Reunions, and Talented People. I’m very flattered. She posted not one, but three of my videos, including my final-final from Wicked, my “Tally Makes me Feel Bubbly!” vid (did I post that here already?) and then, of all things, my cover of Leonard Cohen’s “Hallelujah”.

24. Followed a link on Statcounter and found that someone from Tallygarunga wrote a blog post about me.   I’m so incredibly honored.  HappyOrganist has been talking about crushes lately on her blog.   I’m thinking my current crush is a collective one.   I have a crush on all the Tally-writers.    You might think that’s weird.  And it is.   But it’s not my weirdest crush.   My weirdest is when I had a crush on the Bulgarian person appearing on my Statcounter.    I don’t know if it was male or female….or what age he or she was.  I knew nothing except the person was coming to my blog from Bulgaria.  They kept coming to the same post, and the mystery intrigued me.

The Tally crush is more about talent than mystery.

Megan, the Tallygarunga writer with the blog has multiple talents.  She writes, she sings, and I’m betting she does other stuff as well.

Here’s a video of her singing I’m Not That Girl from Wicked.

[[I won’t post it again since I already linked it up there… ^_^ ]]

She has a beautiful voice.

What can I say but thank you? o.O !?!?!? (Oh, and did I mention she talked about me in #24 again? Sa-weet! … lol.) But then, she kept going…

25. Found another one of Megan’s talents.  She plays the ukulele.

That video gave me a little tear….for multiple reasons.   The song itself made me cry.   My dad played it for us a few months ago when I was in the car with him, Jack, and my nieces.  He asked me if I knew of it.   I didn’t recognize the title; but when he started playing it, the song was familiar to me.    I think maybe hearing it made me emotional.   I don’t know if it’s the song itself, or if I subconsciously associate it with something.   Maybe it was the song combined with the family bonding moment?   Or maybe I had a prior association?

The other thing is Megan reminds me of Alex (my Magic is Might character).   Although Alex Caucasian….as far as I know.   I would change that fact if I still wanted Alex to become a character in Tallygarunga.   Would that be crazy to use a Tally writer’s face as my character’s face claim?

Probably…yes.

It always makes me feel good when people notice my work, and to hear that my singing made someone tear up… it… it fills me up. It’s a feeling like no other. It’s the reason I continue singing and performing. It’s for the audience, for that adrenaline rush you get when you hit the stage, the spotlight’s on you, and you’d better get it just right. On a side note, I think it’s funny that she considered using me as a face claim, because I had to search high and low for a face claim that looked like me. And then, BAM! Tiffany Espensen, from Disney. I swear she looks so much like me at 13. It was so perfect, I couldn’t have written it better myself.

32. Wanted to listen to one more Megan video.

I love this song.

The first time I heard it was an Australian singer….Sarah Blasko?

I should have it on my Australian Music playlist.   I’ll go look…..

I was wrong.   It’s Clare Bowditch.

I personally prefer Megan’s version.

I listened to Clare Bowditch’s version. It’s interesting. I’m not 100% in love with her phrasing, but it’s a unique spin on it, which is great, since the song’s been pretty much done to death, a fact which I was not aware of when I recorded my version, which was actually mostly inspired from Jason Castro, from American Idol,’s version.

Oh…and add piano to Megan’s talented. She’s getting a bit annoying. Is there anything she can’t do? Let me guess. She juggles knives, speak five languages, and has puppeteering talents.

Don’t worry. I’m joking. I love talented people.

I had a good laugh at this little bit, because I’m completely flattered and mildly embarrassed… and she’s not that far off… I don’t juggle knives, but I do sport stack, sort of. I just started last month. I also do the rubik’s cube in under a minute. I don’t speak five languages, but I do know American Sign Language. And while I don’t actually do any puppeteering, I do like to imitate lots of different accents. My favorite is the British accent, and somebody once placed me to South London. It’s probably all the Libera videos that I watch.

Anyway, as a big thank you for featuring me in her blog like… three times and being so sweet about everything, I decided to cover Ingrid Michaelson’s song, “Everybody” in her honor. ^_^

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Tallygarunga & That Weird American Who’s Obsessed With Australia (Spotlight!)

June 15, 2011 at 6:58 am (Spotlight)
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Decided to go ahead and try this out, because this actually is my first non-video related post. Anyway, for the past year or so, I’ve been on this wonderful roleplaying site called Tallygarunga. It’s a role playing site that’s set in the Harry Potter universe, but instead of in England, where the series is set, it’s set in Australia, so it’s a completely different world. (Almost!)

Anyway, recently it’s come to my attention that there’s this blogger on Blogspot called “That Weird American Who’s Obsessed With Australia” has been blogging about Tally quite often, which is understandable, seeing as she’s obsessed with Australia and (to a lesser degree) Harry Potter. This corresponds well with my interests, seeing as I’ve been obsessed with Harry Potter since the fourth grade (circa 2000) and ever since I joined Tally, I’ve been fostering a growing interest in it. So anyway, she blogs every day, it seems, around 9 PM my time, and since she discovered Tallygarunga, she’s been reading one thread every day and recently she’s stumbled across one of my characters. [Which is totally awesome! (and yes, I did just reference A Very Potter Musical; it’s totally awesome!) =p]

So she’s stumbled across Camryn Adiarte, my brand-spanking-new character on Tally. Cammy’s based primarily on me, with her name borrowed from my cousin Camryn (whom you saw in my spotlight of my cousin Vanessa’s version of Baby). Her last name is Adiarte, borrowed from Patrick Adiarte, one of the “children” in Flower Drum Song, a Roger’s and Hammerstein’s film which I watched because my cousin Angel recommended, but didn’t particularly like myself. I used it because I was pretty sure he’s Filipino, and that’s always nice for me to find. But anyway, I found it rather exciting because she’s not even especially prominent on the site yet, or even very well-known, the way Stewie is. (That is, Stewie Blair, Jr, my second character on the site. The first was a man named Esras, but he’s in the repository now, so he doesn’t really count anyway.)

And now, she’s covered Camryn’s first thread, “I Thought Wands Were For Make-Believe!“, in which Cam has entered Solvarnon’s Wandcraft to purchase her wand for school, and she gets scared out of her wits by a free elf named Fendareniel. (And yes, it is a long name that’s hard to spell and hard to try and pronounce, but it’s also wicked cool.) And she’s featured it in her blog not once, not twice, but three times! o.O That’s pretty crazy! She first covered it in her June 6th post, “Pizza, Peter Combe, Animal Products, and Tamarah” (On a side note, she features Tamarah, Stewie’s older sister, in that post.)

50. Read about a new student Camryn Adiarte.    She’s at the wand store to get her first wand.   She didn’t know until recently that she was a witch.   Will she find a wand?  Will she find a friend?  Will she like school?   Will she adjust to the boarding school life or will she miss her mum too much?

We shall find out soon….I’m sure.

Then, she featured it again in her post, “Pain, Turtles, Slaves, and Personality Tests”, when the thread had been answered once:

21.  Decided to read an update about Camryn Adiarte’s quest for a wand.   She’s new to the wizarding world, and she’s new to Australia.    Not so long ago, she was a Californian Muggle.

Today there’s a new post from Fendareniel, the guy who owns the wand shop.

He’s working with cherry wood.   I wonder if Fendarenial’s role-player knows a lot about wood.   Maybe it’s her/his thing?

Anyway, Fen comes out to greet Camryn.  Then the scene ends there.

And finally, today (or probably yesterday, since this post is taking a while to write), she covered it in “Seeking Donations, Popularity, Abattoirs, and Death”, and since it’s had a few more updates from both myself and Peter, who plays Fen, she had a bit more to say this time around:

24. Went to Tallygarunga

25. Decided to return to the story of Camryn Adiarte buying a wand from Fendareniel, the free elf.

This story thread takes place in the Solvarnon Wandcraft shop which is located in the Murrigal Bushlands.    According to this page, the Murrigal Bushlands lie between Tallygarunga (the school) and Narragyambie, the town.

26. Realised I’m not 100% sure where I left off last.   I’m pretty sure I read at least one post from Camryn and one post from Fendareniel.   So I think I’ll start with post #3.

Camryn sees Fendareniel for the first time.  She’s a bit shocked and scared because she’s never seen an elf before.  But she recovers quickly, and is then polite.

27. Liked that Fendareniel didn’t take offense at Camryn’s initial reaction.  He’s understanding that this is the first time she’s seen an elf and it’s a bit shocking.

I think this is very different from Reade’s attitude toward the waiter at the burger restaurant.   He’s much less tolerant than Fendareniel.    The thing is people do not always know how to react when they encounter something they’ve never encountered before.   This doesn’t mean they’re hateful or cruel.   It just means they’re new to the situation, and therefore ignorant.    What really matters is how the person responds once they understand the situation.   If Camryn kept screaming, ran out of the store, and refused to do business with Fendareniel, then she wouldn’t be that nice of a little girl.   If Reade wrote his food order on a piece of paper, showed it to the waiter, and the waiter continued to ask questions of Arti instead of Reade, then he would have been very rude.    Well, the exception would be if the waiter couldn’t read.   Then I’d have to be understanding of him ignoring Reade’s writing.   Although if Reade could admit to being mute, it would be nice in turn if the waiter could admit to not being able to read.    It would be a fair exchange of confessions.

28. Learned that Camryn’s dad likes Lord of the Ring movies.

29. Learned that before Camryn officially knew she was magic, she got angry and made her brothers hair grow longer.

On a side note, she started reviewing it on #24, which just happens to be my favorite number. ^_^

Good night, sleep tight, and see you next time.

~ Megan Nacionales

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