Dearest Diary

Good evening, friends! The date is July 30, 2022. It is currently midnight as I am writing this entry. Since it is finally the weekend, I decided for myself to write a report of the first full week of school! So, due to a new law in the state of California, we must start our first period classes after 8am. And, my school had the bright idea for minimum days to start later into the day, at 9am (albeit still ending at the same time as a regular day). So, having a chance to sleep in on a Friday was an interesting experience. Actually, being able to wake up later in general has been an odd experience. Ever since eighth grade, I have been waking up at 5:30, so suddenly being able to sleep in more has created some bad sleeping habits such as going to sleep at midnight because "I could handle it if I pushed my sleep schedule by an hour, no biggie." Yet, the reason why I always felt sleepy was because I would always sleep no earlier than 10pm. So, I hope that I can work around this odd, new class schedule and make room for rest.

Now for actual school, I've been enjoying my classes so far, although I do have to put more of my brain into my AP classes along with my Law class. Other than that, things are fairly easy so far, but I can't let my guard down now. Today, I was supposed to go to my school's dance, but I did not. After all, I do not have much people to socialize with. Somewhat, I feel as if I have a social problem. I am very good at speaking clearly and well, but when it comes to conversation with others, I am terrible at it. It is mainly because my interests are a bit unpopular for my school. Unfortunately, I do not think that there will be a current high schooler (perhaps a college student, but not a high school student) that even likes The X-Files, the most popular of any of my interests. There is a DetCo fan at my school, but his favorite is Shuichi Akai, while mine is Sherry. It is the same as having nothing in common.

So far though, there has been nothing alarming in my grades. I have been doing fairly well in my classes, except for the fact that I have a B+ in my history class due to my mediocre scores on my quizzes. I am slightly hoping that the upcoming unit test will raise my grade, although I don't think I should rush it too much when I have the rest of semester for reflection. I am terrified for my Pre-Calculus grade, however. It turns out that this year, 80% of my grade will be based on tests. Whoever suggested this grade for math classes must be out of their mind.

Anyway, today's "song discovery" is U-ka Saegusa in dB's song "Tears Go By." I found it not enough to only know their song "June Bride ~Anata Shika Mienai~" if I were to list them as one of my favorite bands of Being, and U-ka Saegusa is one of my favorite songwriters ever (Also, any song composed by Aika Ohno will always be a good song!). If you have any song (or artist) recommendations, please write to me in my guestbook, or through my email if you'd prefer!

Also, recently I've been into the pop group ABBA! I figured that since their music is really my style, I should probably listen to them more often, and I have! I've got multiple of their songs in my playlist, in fact. Right now, I'm really liking their song "Gimme Gimme Gimme," one of their most popular songs!

Good afternoon! The date is July 30, 2022, but it is not midnight, it is now the afternoon of the same day. Today, I went to Handel's, an ice cream store that just opened a new branch in South Bay! Being a curious ice cream lover, of course I went! And let me tell you, it was super delicious! My family said the same thing! Anyway, I wanted to take the chance to tell you all why I got into the X-Files, because I just LOVE telling people the story of how I got into it! But, first I'd like to address today's "song discovery." It is Hikaru Utada's song "Flavor of Life!" The ballad version of the song was used as an insert song in the second season of the popular Japanese drama, Hana Yori Dango. That show frustrated me a bit, but I can tell you that the love triangle in this version makes you more confused than the Korean version. Because, although Domyoji was super irritating at first, I think he was able to redeem himself later in the show. I'm sorry, Rui Hanazawa. I still love you though. Back to the song, I think it will take me a while to get used to tempo of the original version of the song because I'm so used to listening to the ballad version :P But I actually like the beat!!

Now for my X-Phile origin story! We have to go back to when I became a B'z fan, because it will later explain my slight interest in the show. Their song Love Phantom is a huge fan favorite, and that song was used as the ending theme in the TV Asahi airing of The X-Files! Being a new fan and all, I was listening to their discography on shuffle on Spotify during school, and this particular song popped up. I was very intrigued with the beginning monologue ("You must know who I am, I must tell you what I've been loving...") along with the transition from a slow, long intro into an energetic song. So, I searched for the lyrics on B'z wiki and found out that it was a theme song for the first season! I was a little interested, but I was not very big in scifi. So, that slight interest was not acted upon once I found out how long the show was. I mean, it wasn't like I had a tape of the Japanese dub on hand, so I couldn't even watch it just because of a song.

Then, one day I thought about American manga magazines, and rediscovered that Tokyopop published a shoujo manga magazine back in the late 90's called "Smile" (I do think I knew of its existence, but I eventually forgot about it). I decided to look through the first issue through a translation site. As I was looking through the pages, I came across an advertisement for The X-Files: Unrestricted Access, an old game with a bunch of info about the show. Being slightly interested in it, I decided to read the contents of the advert. The part that caught my eye was when the author mentioned this scene of "Small Potatoes (4x20)." If you don't wanna click the link, basically she mentioned the part where fake Mulder almost got Scully to kiss him but real Mulder barged in on them. That piqued my interest in the show more than before, so I did some digging.

I discovered that Scully was a doctor with red hair, and that she was not just Mulder's assistant, she's his partner. At that point, I. Was. Sold.

I couldn't suffer hopeless longing for a ship that will never be canon (Conan and Haibara), so I decided that if I had to focus my energy onto watching a show, it would be this one, because the slow burn would be worth it in the end. And that is how I became an X-Phile. I can't call myself a Babyphile, though. My mother is more of a fan of Bones. Speaking of which, she threw away all of her fanfics of the show (she wrote them on paper, as she is a terribly slow typer), so I can't even translate it for you all (My Tagalog is terrible, but I promise I would do my best). It would be cool if I could, though.

So, to say the least, today has been quite crazy! Today is August 1, 2022, which also happens to be Odaiba Day. Right now, I just speedran an MEP part in only 40 minutes. I forgot that I even had the part to be honest with you. I only opened my laptop to continue writing "The Brand New Infatuation Situation of Zanya Kisaragi" like I have been focusing on for the last few days. Then, I opened my Discord to see that I have been pinged and DMed to finish my part. I was like "Oh my gosh!" and then rushed over to SVP to get the part done. Thank goodness I already had the media I wanted to use in my files. To some people, finishing a part in 40 minutes may not seem like a big deal, but you've got to remember that I usually take like, 2 to 3 hours on a regular raw MEP part, so seeing that I was able to get it done in 40 minutes was a miracle. This kind of proves one of my points in this essay I had to write at school about my talents. I talked about editing, and how I was pretty familiar with the program I use, so I'm able to navigate the different parts of the program with ease. I demonstrated that today because although I was under stress to get it done before Odaiba Day was over (It still is not over, thankfully!), I did it without really thinking. You can watch it here. Now, I'm just relaxing after doing all that and my homework.

Earlier in the paragraph, I mentioned a story named "The Brand New Infatuation Situation of Zanya Kisaragi." Yes, it is my fic! I am currently writing a 14 chapter long story about Zanya falling in love with Kuguru. I do mention that Zanya has loved Tasuku before though. The narration style is kind of based off of the Netflix series Never Have I Ever, which is actually releasing its third season on Netflix on the 12th of this month! I have never been so excited before! I fell in love with the show earlier this year, so I hope I can enjoy this season thoroughly as the other seasons! I wonder which team are you on? Are you on Team Daxton or Team Bevi? Or Team Devi x Mental Stability? (You can respond to this in my guestbook, if you'd like) For me, I was on Team Bevi at first, but when I watched the second season, I became a Daxton fan! Anyway, back to the story, I hope my portrayal of Zanya won't be too cringy. Actually, I should be more worried about if I'm making the narrator annoying or not. I can't believe this is how I'm deciding to do a self-insert! I'm already like, 1500 words in now, so there's not really any chance to turn back.

Anyway, for today's "song discovery," I present to you, Ihojin by Saki Kubota! I think it is my favorite version of this song (I'm very sorry, Tak Matsumoto and ZARD. I still love you). The lyrics are so very beautiful yet very sad. I think the first version I've heard of this song was actually Miyu Takeuchi's cover, which was a really nice cover! I think her voice really fits these types of songs the best!

Hello, friends! This is Alice. It is August 11, 2022. Sorry I haven't been writing on my diary here for a week. I did post two fics ("Intense Curiosity" and "Much to the Annoyance of Ju Dingyo," which are both Tobot fanfics) this week, which is an accomplishment, but I still have some homework to do. I still wanted to write, because I came up with something [that's probably very silly]. So, as you all know, I am quite the fan of the Mysterious Benedict Society. So, I decided to make nonsensical parallels between TMBS and the X-Files (Because I am just that bored)! So, listen up, everyone! First, we have Reynie, who we'll say is Mulder. This is because his name Reynard means "fox" and the last name "Muldoon" is awfully similar to "Mulder." Then, we have Kate, who we'll say is Scully, since "Kate" can be short for "Katherine." As, for Sticky, we'll say that he can be Skinner, because they are both bald and have glasses. And... um, Constance. I have no idea. If you have any ideas on who Constance would be, please tell me ASAP.

Other exciting things are the release of Never Have I Ever tomorrow. So, that's gonna fill up my entire Saturday schedule. Or maybe I'm gonna finish it all on the same day it comes out, which is actually more ideal because I heard that it's better to do your homework on Saturday rather than on Friday or Sunday. I'm super looking forward to all the drama. I might edit this season if I have the time. Anyway, today, I can't really do anything after school because I have to finish all of my procrastinated classwork, which is why I'm writing this now.

Now, for today's "song discovery!" We have "Kanashimi no Jody" by Tatsuro Yamashita! It's such a beautiful song. If this song was sung to me, I'd leave the room though (Depending on how the person treated me, actually). Well, now is not the time to be petty! I've got things to do!

Hi, again! This is Alice. It is August 14, 2022. I finished all of Never Have I Ever season 3 in one day, again. On Friday. And I haven't done my homework yet. So, why am I not doing it right now, you ask? Well, good question! It is because I'm busy obsessing over Taeyang x Yuri from the webtoon Random Chat! This is why you don't expect much from me! Anyway, they make such a good couple, and it's a relief that they do, because I have to edit them for an MEP part :P But don't worry about that! The deadline isn't anywhere soon! I might edit a few seconds today for good measure.

Anyway, today's "song discovery" is "I'm Only Me When I'm With You" by Taylor Swift. I first found it on YouTube where someone used Taiora for an MEP part. And I was like, hey it fits! And now it's in my playlist! Now that, I think of it, it also fits Taeyang x Yuri, doesn't it?