#but it was on screen for approximately 40 seconds anyway so who cares lol

[guardian-angle22]

911 lone star fashion -> every paul outfit

↳ 3.01

[blessthejets]

1. Put your music player on shuffle. Give me the first 6 songs that pop up.

1. One more light - Linkin Park

2. Love story - Taylor Swift

3. Thunder - Imagine Dragons

4. New man - Ed Sheeran

5. A thousand miles - Vanessa Carlton

6. Treat you better - Shawn Mendes

2. If you could meet anyone on this earth, who would it be?

Rick Rypien, that’s for sure. If he was still on this earth, though...

3. Grab the book nearest to you, turn to page 23, give me line 17:

“fuckin god, wis aboot aw ah could pick ootay the horrible sound. She collapses oantae the threadbare couch.“ - Trainspotting. In English. I mean, “English”. haha

4. What do you think about most?

Overthinking things I can’t really do anything about.

5. What does your latest text message from someone else say?

My ex boyfriend from the USA: “nope not at all”

6. Do you sleep with or without clothes on?

With my clothes. It’s so COLD!

7. What’s your strangest talent?

I think my facial expressions. People say they like it haha.

8. Girls…. (finish the sentence); Boys…. (finish the sentence)

Girls are equal to boys. Boys are equal to girls.

9. Ever had a poem or song written about you?

Nah. I don’t think. I mean I can relate to a LOT of songs or poems, mostly about brokenhearted girls or depression, but that’s not directly about me.

10. When is the last time you played the air guitar?

When I got the guitar at the age of eight? I think? So it would beeee... about thirteen years ago now.

11. Do you have any strange phobias?

Spiders. Clowns. Heights. Tiny holes. Balloons. Slugs. Insect. Yes, nothing strange.

12. Ever stuck a foreign object up your nose?

WTF lol

13. What’s your religion?

SCIENCE.

14. If you are outside, what are you most likely doing?

Walking my dog ♥

15. Do you perfer to be behind the camera or in front of it?

Behind.

16. Simple but extremely complex. Favorite band?

Imagine Dragons, hands down.

17. What was the last lie you told?

“Sorry I didn’t reply, I fell asleep.” hahah

18. Do you believe in karma?

Of course!

19. What does your screen name mean?

blessthejets? It’s just my blog dedicated to the Winnipeg Jets. And it rhymes which I like hehe

20. What is your greatest weakness; your greatest strength?

Weakness - dogs. Any kinds of dogs. Strenght? Courage, I guess.

21. Who is your celebrity crush?

There’s million of them. But my favorite of all of them will always be Mr. Kurt Cobain.

22. Have you ever gone skinny dipping?

Naaa. I’d love to though.

23. How do you vent your anger?

I don’t really get angry very often. When I do, I try avoid people because I don’t want to hurt them by saying something inappropriate.

24. Do you have a collection of anything?

Yup. Ice hockey stuff. Cards, scarves, jerseys etc.

Do you perfer talking on the phone or video chatting online?

mhmm.. probably talking face to face. 

26. Are you happy with the person you’ve become?

I’m suffering with serious mental health issues. So I’m trying to be a better person every day. So far so good.

27. What’s a sound you hate; sound you love?

Hate - morning alarm haha. Love - my dog barking out of excitement when I get home.

28. What’s your biggest “what if”?

What if I realize I didn’t live my life as I wanted? And now it’s too soon to do that?...

29. Do you believe in ghosts? How about aliens?

YES. YES. 

30. Stick your right arm out; what do you touch first? Do the same with your left arm.

Right - Coca cola zero. Left - nothing.

31. Smell the air. What do you smell?

Um. Air

32. What’s the worst place you have ever been to?

Psychiatrics at Prague, Bohnice.

33. Choose: East Coast or West Coast?

Of where?

34. Most attractive singer of your opposite gender?

KURT COBAIN! 

35. To you, what is the meaning of life?

FOR ME - it’s definitely dogs. Shelter dogs. Helping shelter dogs, teaching people to adopt and not to support backyard breeders.

36. Define: Art.

Everything. 

37. Do you believe in luck?

Yes.

38. What’s the weather like right now?

End of the February. Sunny but god damn COLD.

39. What time is it?

12:33 pm

40. Do you drive? If so, have you ever crashed?

No I don’t drive. Because I don’t want to get in a car crash :P

41. What was the last book you read?

Trainspotting by Irvine Welsh.

42. Do you like the smell of gasoline?

Yash!

43. Do you have any nicknames?

Yeah. My name is Adéla. I get called Dee, Dede, Adel, Ady, Addie. Also a giraffe. haha

44. What was the last movie you saw?

The Gift. It was well wrapped..

 45. What’s the worst injury you’ve ever had?

I don’t know if it’s considered as an injury. But probably when I overdosed with pills on purpose. Spent 13 hours in a coma, woke up in hospital, was transferred to psychiatrics. 

46. Have you ever caught a butterfly?

Yes, when I was a little. Now they kind of scare me.

47. Do you have any obsessions right now?

Ice hockey, dogs, travelling, dogs, ice hockey, Swedes, blondes, dogs.

48. What’s your ?

What’s my what?

49. Ever had a rumor spread about you?

Yes. But no fucks were given during any of those times.

50. Do you believe in magic?

Yes. Harry Potter for the win.

51. Do you tend to hold grudges against people who have done you wrong?

Just for a while. I always try to give a second chance. And the third. And fourth. Until I’m fucked up again.

52. What is your astrological sign?

Gemini.

53. Do you save money or spend it?

Trying to save. But usually just spend. :D

54. What’s the last thing you purchased?

A lunch at my lunch break at work.

55. Love or lust?

Both.

56. In a relationship?

No. Who would be with a psycho like me?

57. Are you a virgin?

No.

58. Can you touch your nose with your tongue?

I can.

59. Where were you yesterday?

At work and outside with my dog. Also at home.

60. Is there anything pink within 10 feet of you?

Yeah. My hand cream on my desk.

61. Are you wearing socks right now?

Yes. I’m AT WORK!

62. What’s your favorite animal?

Fox, dog.

63. What is your secret weapon to get someone to like you?

Hahaha haahha if I knew I would actually had a boyfriend by now.

64. Where is your best friend?

She moved from our street just a little bit away. She’s with her newborn babygirl and her husband so she does not really have much free time.

66. What is your heritage?

Czech and Bulgarian. But I prefer saying just Czech because my parents got divorced when I was three. I have never even been to Bulgary. I don’t really want to, anyway.

67. What were you doing last night at 12 AM?

Doing a birthday card for my coworker who has her birthday tomorrow.

68. What do you think is Satan’s last name?

I don’t know what’s his last name but I know his kid. It’s my dog.

70. Are you the kind of friend you would want to have as a friend?

Sometimes yes. I laugh a lot and I have a great sense of humor I think. I love to laugh. But on the other hand I suffer from depression. I’d probably want to help myself and get caught into this infinite circle.

71. You are walking down the street on your way to work. There is a dog drowning in the canal on the side of the street. Your boss has told you if you are late one more time you get fired. What do you do?

I help the dog and call my boss. If they tell me that I’m being fired anyway, I don’t care. I wouldn’t want to work for someone who doesn’t care about a dog’s life.

72. You are at the doctor’s office and she has just informed you that you have approximately one month to live.

Well... I’d say thanks? Or what am I supposed to do? I tried to kill myself three months ago so I don’t really know what’s going on with my life right about now.

a) Do you tell anyone/everyone you are going to die?

No. 

b) What do you do with your remaining days?

I would try to find a new lovely home for my dog. Make sure he’s okay. I would probably just won’t talk to any of my friends. I wouldn’t want to talk to my family either. I would just be stuck inside my brain, my mind. Thinking about what it’s gonna be.

c) Would you be afraid?

No. Not at all.

73. You can only have one of these things: trust or love.

Trust. I have trust issues so... that would help me mentally a lot.

74. What’s a song that always makes you happy when you hear it?

All Star by Smash Mouth (;

75. What are the last four digits in your cell phone number?

4373 (:

76. In your opinion, what makes a great relationship?

Trust. Communication. Tolerance. Laughter. Dreams about future spent together.

77. How can I win your heart?

Make me laugh. And understand please that I have some issues I need to deal with. You don’t have to, but once you win my heart and we are dating, you would have to deal with it whether you want it or not. It’s not my fault. Please understand it.

78. Can insanity bring on more creativity?

Yes. And depression brings the most beautiful thoughts - ironically.

79. What is the single best decision you have made in your life so far?

Adopting my dog. We rescued each other.

80. What size shoes do you where?

39 in Europe, 6 in UK, 8 in US.

81. What would you want to be written on your tombstone?

"Offline” lol haha. No. Probably something like “I told you I was sick.”

82. What is your favorite word?

Probably “cencúl”. It means icicle in Slovakian.

83. Give me the first thing that comes to mind when you hear the word: heart.

Broken.

84. What is a saying you say a lot?

Everything happens for a reason.

85. What’s the last song you listened to?

A world alone by Lorde from Pure Heroine.

86. Basic question: what’s your favorite color/colors?

Blueee

87. What is your current desktop picture?

WINNIPEG JETS. Both on my PC at work and my laptop at home.

88. If you could press a button and make anyone in the world instantaneously explode, who would it be?

I wouldn’t. 

89. What would be a question you’d be afraid to tell the truth on?

I’m pretty open. I would answer anything. Truly.

90. One night you wake up because you heard a noise. You turn on the light to find that you are surrounded by MUMMIES. The mummies aren’t really doing anything, they’re just standing around your bed. What do you do?

Mummies don’t scare me. I would just ask them what to do to become like them.

91. You accidentally eat some radioactive vegetables. They were good, and what’s even cooler is that they endow you with the super-power of your choice! What is that power?

Telekinesis. That way, shit will still get done when I’m having a lazy day. 

92. You can re-live any point of time in your life. The time-span can only be a half-hour, though. What half-hour of your past would you like to experience again?

When I saw my dog for the first time. When we met. When we went for our first walk outside the shelter.

93. You can erase any horrible experience from your past. What will it be?

My very first relationship.

94. You have the opportunity to sleep with the music-celebrity of your choice. Who would it be?

Well, since Kurt Cobain is not here anymore, I would choose... Lorde. Or Avriel Kaplan. Or Daniel Platzman.

95) You just got a free plane ticket to anywhere. You have to depart right now. Where are you gonna go?

Gothenburg, Sweden.

96) Do you have any relatives in jail?

Not relatives. Just my very best friend. 

97) Have you ever thrown up in the car?

Yes. But it wasn’t caused by the ride. It was caused by alcohol. And it wasn’t really in a car, I told the driver to stop, then I opened the door and threw up there. Hahahahah

98) Ever been on a plane?

Not yet.

99) If the whole world were listening to you right now, what would you say?

Step 1 - Breathe in

Step 2 - Breathe out

Step 3 - STOP! HAMMERTIME!

100) Give me your top 5 favorite blogs on Tumblr.

Nah I don’t have any.

[canaryatlaw]

So, today for the first time in a few weeks, I would say was a good day, and that's something worth celebrating to me. It probably actually means the new antidepressant I'm on kicked in, but hey, I'm not gonna question it. It wasn't really good for any specific reason, I just felt better about everything. So often it's hard to actually tell you're in a depression when you're depressed. I would always just start questioning my life choices and if this is all really worth doing (which is truly a far cry from a suicidal thought, trust me, but it just somehow feels wrong). But then there are better days like today that just make you feel better about just about everything. So, today. Woke up at 6:40 to my early alarm in my attempt to get to work early, thought about it for approximately 2 seconds before going "nah" and resetting it for 7 (because nobody saw that coming). So I got to work at my normal time and started reading the latest interview form, which gave me most of the info I needed to change up my questions. Just as I finished that the attorney who gave me the hearing, who sits across from me, asked if I wanted to go over them, so we did so and I was like oh how much do you just want to get on the record about like services etc and she crossed out a few questions that didn't apply (I had already changed the parents section since they were no longer involved here) but then basically added stuff to promote the goal of the hearing, which was to get the judge to extend the wardship until her 21st birthday. It's an uncontested argument, and it's not like the judge is just gonna not do it to be a dick, but it's an argument you still have to make. So we talked about different services she's in or will need in the future, she has a 2 year old son who's currently with her mother under a short term guardianship (since her parents were never actually found to be abusive because they got a dependency finding at trial, something I'm not certain I agree with but it was a much different circumstance and it wouldn't make me doubt their ability to care for this child) but she could hopefully get back after she finished high school, which would require day care services, etc and she would need college services or employment services, so it's obviously worth staying in the system till 21. It's not perfect, but it really is SUCH a better option than dumping the kid out on the street once they turn 18. So around 9:30 we go down, and things kind of go haywire for a while in the courtroom because a bunch of people didn't show up on time so they were doing cases all out of order, and the lawyer I was with ended up getting stuck with an emergency motion (but more on that later). It was set for 10:30, the worker arrived a bit after 11 (she wasn't the latest one, by far) so we talked to her outside since she was a new one just about the case and such. I was talking to the state too since they typically take the lead on permanency hearings, but they were totally fine with letting me do it, and we had to figure out how to get a current service plan into evidence since apparently nobody had one, lol, so we ended up (or the ASA did) telling the court the worker would print it off at the end of the hearing. The hearing itself went fine, I just need to get used to being up at the bench and asking questions, and learning to adjust when things don't follow your perfect question pattern. The trial ad books tell you that generally beginners will use exact question lists but the more experienced attorneys will just have a list of points to cover, which allows them to explore each answer the proper amount and cover all the ground needed depending on what comes up. Well, I'm not experienced yet, lol, but I'm learning to adjust to when the answer doesn't come out as expected and not getting flustered when that's the case. And I'm sure that will just come with practice. And I mean, this is a perfect environment to do it in being that we never have a jury and there is still a lot of uncontested stuff. So I was overall happy with it. Afterwards I went back upstairs and worked on the TPR prep that I worked on for the rest of the day. The real fun of the day ("fun") came from the attorney I was with when she returned on her emergency motion that had been called by mom's atty at 9:30 but then mom didn't show up until like 11:30 or something ridiculous like that, then told this ridiculous story that she said her son told her about his father leaving him and his two year old brother home alone (kid is 12) and somehow weed got on his pizza and he ate it and he knew what weed looked like from watching a movie and ???? It was truly bizarre, but the weird thing is this case isn't actually screened into the system, meaning DCFS doesn't have custody of them, which severely limits what remedies they can implement. The kid is supposedly on an order of protection to live with his father, but apparently dad doesn't really live there and just comes and goes so he's actually really living with his (paternal) grandma. So mom wanted the order of protection vacated and the kid sent home to her of course, but it got continued until our office could interview the kid. So we send one of our interviewers out to his school who reports back with word that the real story was his little brother had apparently sprinkled loose tobacco on the pizza, not weed, and his dad was in the other room smoking, not leaving them alone. But more important than that was that he was now saying grandma had been beating him and he's scared to live with her, which necessitated us to call the hotline and obviously he can't return to the placement, so they're scrambling to figure something out, because they can't stick him in a foster home without screening him into the system and nobody wants to do that unnecessarily, but they didn't know if they could get a relative placement by 3:30 when someone needs to pick this kid up from school. So they basically decide he's gonna go back to mom until court on Wednesday when he can talk to the judge. The whole thing is this case came in because mom could never get the kids to school and they were like, all failing all their classes, and the kid now has 17 tardies on the one day a week mom was bringing him to school and flunking all his classes, so we really don't want him going back to mom when at trial the judge specifically made neglect findings based on those facts, but at this point it was mom or the shelter, and in that choice it's hard to not say mom. So that ends up being the pick, but then the issue is telling grandma she no longer had custody of the kid and was now the subject of a DCFS investigation. Mind you I'm watching this all play out over hours through phone calls with a ridiculous amount of people trying to figure it out and the atty ranting about it. At one point I managed to slip in something about if DCFS would be stepping up their investigations on already open cases in response to the recent child deaths, which I was hoping would lead to a conversation about the child death case I was working on that she was the previous atty for, which provided me with the opportunity to ask what her thoughts were when the kids were getting returned home, and I was really surprised by what she said. She said mom had done every service asked of her, had always visited the kids, and had fully cooperated with the agency the whole time. Like, what??? That's a far cry from what ended up happening. She said she was really surprised by the death, and spoke about meeting with Manny and how bright he was. She made some comment about how they had apparently killed a dog by neglect, and she felt like Manny had become the replacement dog because they moved him into the back room where the dog lived and basically treated him like one. Idk it was an interesting perspective to get. She seemed to blame the boyfriends influence, which I thought was interesting because of course he's trying to play that he was manipulated by this older woman. But back to the main story, suddenly the agency is trying to get her on a conference call with grandma and she is like uh NO I can't do that, there's this thing called atty client privilege and her client specifically said he didn't want grandma being told what he had said. But they just kept calling on repeat, which was funny because she had been fielding calls all day from all different people, and they end up calling the lead attorney on the calendar in an attempt to get to her lol. She talked to them later not with grandma on the line and was like yeah NO but then the issue was picking the kid up from school, because apparently the mom and grandma had called the police on each other a lot in this case, and she was afraid if mom picked up the kid without any documentation saying she had the right to do so grandma would call the cops who would see the legal custody order dad still does have and return the kids to her, but the agency was totally unhelpful and now nobody wanted to pick the kid up because they were worried they'd get in trouble so she had to convince the caseworker to go get him and it's like 3:40 at this point and this poor kid is probably so confused. She did end up picking him up though and he's at moms, until Wednesday anyway. The icing on the cake was the voicemail she got at the end of the day from grandma, which was fucking hilarious because she was clearly VERY offended she hadn't immediately told grandma about the allegations, like she's the client here, and she's been taking care of this kid for all these years (except she really hasn't) and YOU KNOW WHAT YOURE REALLY NOT THAT SPECIAL, YOURE REALLY NOT (I kid you not she said that and I was cracking up). So that was at least somewhat humorous. But I found the entire situation at least somewhat comical just because of how ridiculous it was, and it's the kind of thing you have to laugh at in this line of business. At 4:44 I checked the bus status to find that the 5:13 bus was currently listed as "delayed" to which I responded "shit" and basically packed up all my stuff in a rush and left to catch the 5:03, because I've learned when it says delayed there is no telling when it's actually coming (I think it did end up coming on schedule, but not the point). By the time I got to the bus stop I did have a few minutes, and the homeless guy that hangs out at the median right by there came over, idk if he remembered I gave him an energy bar last week or it was just random, but upon seeing him I said oh hey I have another bar and produced one from my purse, and he did seem surprised about that so maybe it was just random. But we sat and talked for a few, he asked about my day and I said it was good because I got to do a court hearing, he wanted to know what kind of court and when I said child protection he started talking about "seeing some things" in "the hood" that made him glad he wasn't the parent of those kids because he'd be in trouble if he was. I just said well if you ever do need it, the hotline is 1-800-25-ABUSE (that's for Illinois anyway, I have no idea if it would work outside this state) and he seemed to appreciate that before going back to his median. Got on the bus and went home, had time to make dinner quickly before watching the supergirl finale, which I won't elaborate on too much just because I've already written so damn much about my day and I can get into details about that easily. But I was pretty satisfied with finale being that my only real hope going into it was that Meh-El would die/get banished/be gone from the show in whatever method they came up with and that was achieved, so I was happy about that. I mean, at this point I was pretty confident that's was what was going to happen, the writers had to know the backlash they were facing off his character and their bending the season around his whims, and his whole plot really never felt sustainable to me for longer than a season anyway, so maybe he was never supposed to be more than that to begin with. I thought Kara's plan to duel it out with Reya with the fate of the entire planet on the line, like if I lose everything is over, was pretty goddamn stupid, and really just a distraction before knowing that the Daxomite banisher thingy (official name of course) would have to get turned on. I'm pretty sure I laughed out loud when Lena looked at Supergirl and was like "he's dating Kara Danvers, you know" talking about Meh-El and I was just like okay you cannot tell me that Lena has no romantic interest in Kara after the way she delivered that line, even if it was just the actress' spin on it, it was quite obvious and it cracked me up. I think I'll stop there, those are most of my thoughts, though I'll say a few words on the return of Superman since I am so fond of his character. He obviously took a backseat here because it is Supergirl's show and her fight, but I take issue with them making Zod his "mortal enemy" when anyone who's ever read or watched anything Superman knows Lex Luthor is his mortal enemy, but I bet you anything they didn't want to cast a Lex now in case they want to bring that out at a later point (I wasn't really a fan of carrying the Smallville universe into this one because they are fundamentally incompatible in so many ways, but I'm not sure I'll ever be able to think of Lex Luthor as anyone other than Michael Rosenbaum and I would die if they had him do it). Okay, now I'm done. After that I started watching the new season of Unbreakable kimmy Schmidt which was as highly enjoyable. On my commute and through the evening I had started a new long fic I've been waiting to get a chance to start for a while now, and it started to go the calling CPS route with the Snarts and I kind of braced myself for the really cringeworthy narrative that calling them is the worst thing ever to do for an abused kid because I think the shows have, even if it was subtly, encouraged that line of thinking when it came to them and like, it pisses me off so fucking much because that stuff has real life effects about people not calling CPS when they see abuse and that's how kids die (if you see child abuse, please, please call CPS/DCFS. I'm begging you, you may be that child's last lifeline). But then it took a totally different turn and I wasn't subjected to that at all and I was actually really impressed with their handling of the system and what they wrote so that just made my day that much better (the author doesn't have a tumblr, I wasn't sure so I mentioned it in a comment and they said they didn't but they should get one). And yeah, I think that was all I wanted to say for the day and I'm gonna shut up now because this post is way too long already and I need to go to sleep. Goodnight friends. Stay lovely.

[greatplanettahoe]

Japan Log Day 1

I kind of want to create a log of my time in Japan. I think it’d be fun, and from what I’ve heard, I’d be able to remember my trip better! There may be a day delay for me, at least for day one because that was all flying and lemme tell you, after a 13 hour flight, a 3 hour flight felt like NOTHING, haha. I felt like I played on my DS for a half hour and it was over. So, I don’t know when entirely I’ll post these, or if anyone cares, but I don’t. Because it’ll be fun for me to look back on and remember ;)

Day one - The day of insane travel

Our journey began as most other journeys do, of sitting at home, counting away the hours and having panicked thoughts of what you still need to do and what’s been done. My way of coping was to blast music - sorry Tegan - and stare blankly at a wall. Not productive when packing was half done. Luckily, I got everything ready about an hour before my friend came to pick me up. About ten minutes before, I began to stress clean. I guess that’s exciting? Lilia’s parents graciously took us to Vancouver In'tl Airport (YVR)- Canada. The car ride felt short. Shorter than I thought it was to get to the border. Right before we hit, we got to see the tiny little peace arch. Cool! Going in, the border guard is looking over our passports, doing the routine questions. 

Then, he leans in and goes “Alauna?” and I sheepishly correct him as he clearly wasn’t quite sure how to pronounce my name. He informs me that I need to sign my passport and I need to do that before I check in at the airport otherwise they may not let me fly. OOPS! Luckily Lil’s dad had a pen that I could use otherwise I’d have to hunt for somewhere to sell a pen at the airport at MIDNIGHT! Getting into the country, I receive a text from my mobile provider. CONGRATS! T-Mobile works in Canada text/data free, call 20c/min. Neat! 

After a pretty good wait in line - China Eastern is apparently a very popular company - and chatting with the nice lady in front of us we reach the airline official. Neither of our passports scanned into the computer. Probably because Lilia’s is 9 years old, mine’s 1 month. He was very kind, making sure that we knew our layover was between two different airports in Shanghai (more on that later, ugh) and asked us if we had any illegal items to which we both said no. He smiled and said “I trust you two, you both look very trustworthy”. He then noticed that we were seated at least 10 rows away from each other. With our permission he changed our seats to be together. Once he got our tickets, he pointed out what information we needed to know. Lilia got seat C, he was going to be in seat B, I in A …. wait. There is no seat B! :P With a very heartfelt thank you, we asked where the gates were and said our farewell.

Getting up to security, was a very small line with a long wait. It looked like the officer’s battery had died on his scanner and had to get a new one. Oh well. After that, it took about 2 seconds to make sure our tickets were valid - phew! and go onto phase two with the bag screening. They instructed us to put laptops in a separate tray. Confusedly, I ask the man why. He mentioned because laptops could be bombs. Which, I never thought about and by the look on my face, he must have understood and had a small smile as we thanked him. Lilia got through security fine. The metal detector beeped for me. Contrats, I’m wearing a bra, because that was literally why the detector beeped for me. Past that, we walked through a small mall with a bunch of stores, and very glittery flooring. Our gate was easy to find, and had a subway near us. We just got chips and ginger ale as we both weren’t feeling fantastic.

There’s not much meant to be said for the flight. Although, as it took off, Lilia looked at me and said; “I regret every jet I crashed in GTA 5” 

It was nearly 13 hours and insane. Neither of us slept much, which sucked. But, at least it was quiet as pretty much everyone else did sleep. Except for one guy in the row beside us whose entertainment screen wouldn’t turn off and he was trying to sleep so he had his jacket backwards to cover his face LOL. I did kind of feel bad for him since it was legitimately malfunctioning. Their movie selection was pretty bomb. Lilia and I synced up our screens so we watched Furious 7 together. The airline provided us dinner. I accidentally got shrimp noodles, which thank you that my medicine works, and Lilia got some sort of beef patty and rice. There was also some sort of custard that was similar to cheesecake, but not entirely. It was delicious. We both tried to sleep for a while. Gave up. We got breakfast which was two adorable hash-brown patties, an omelette, and a very undercooked, disease sausage link which neither of us touched. At that point, Lilia started up Day After Tomorrow, and I started Secret Life of Pets … which got interrupted a total of a billion times. I managed to finish SLoP right before they cut off entertainment for landing purposes.

The drive after landing and getting to our gate was probably half the time of our flight. We get another text from T-Mobile. Welcome to China! Your phone has free texting, call 20c/min, and 2g unlimited data! AWESOME!

Immigration was easy, whom also informed us that our connecting flight was in a separate airport, security was easy (they have thermal screening, so that was definitely interesting!), and getting our luggage was SUPER easy. Customs, we had nothing to declare so went through that line no prob, and exited the airport into a throng of people all shouting ‘taxi!’. One guy dogged us for a long time and we eventually rolled with him as the bus to take us to Honquaio was in another hour and we only had four before our other flight. Driving in Shanghai is terrifying. Our driver nearly creamed 2 people on mopeds, and almost hit countless other cars. I never want to drive in Shanghai. As nice as the city was, there was no telltale building style, and all the buildings were insane colors. I saw an apartment complex that was hot pink. OK. We arrive at the airport, to where the cabby swindled us out of a little more money than what we agreed on, but both of us were tired and didn’t care at that point. The line in this airport was about two times longer than YVR, but went quickly enough. Again, getting to our gate was super easy, and we had about an hour of downtime before boarding.

Second flight felt way too short, and they provided us with spaghetti and another of those delicious cluster squares! Hell yeah. I think I played my DS for the entire time, but it was hard to tell since the flight felt super short.

Getting into Japan, immigration was NUTS. The line was insanely long, although it went quickly. Got fingerprinted so if I crime in Japan, they’ll know it was me. Shucks. Too bad I wasn’t planning on anything anyways. We both had our first experience with a Japanese western toilet which I’m now convinced they all have bidets since our hotel toilet has one too. FYI, the seats are very warm when you sit on them, and the one in the airport played gentle music to mask the fact that I had the best racehorse pee in the universe. Sorry, TMI? We get ANOTHER text from T-mobile. HOORAY! Your phone works! Free text, 20c/min call, 2g unlimited data! WHAT?! I wasted $40 on SIM cards before we left, and now we don’t need them! Oh well, lol.

Hitting up the international ATM, my card was declined. WHAT!? I had called my bank, so they should know I’m here! I managed to get the attention of an airport lady who graciously tried helping, but it declined for her too. Lilia was able to get out some cash. What the heck?! We asked the airport lady where the Keikyu line was and if Pasmo was over there, and she instructed us what to do. We thanked her for her time and assistance. Meanwhile, there was another American having the same problem as I. I noticed his card had a chip. Lilia’s didn’t. Ding ding, it’s the chip. We got sodas and some Japanese candy and a fruit cup, got Pasmo’s and went to the station towards Kawasaki - after a little help as we didn’t see our stop. 

The train wasn’t too terribly crowded. But, went approximately the speed of a fighter jet. My shoulder and back is still sore for hanging on for dear life while making sure my luggage didn’t go anywhere. There was a lady I kept bumping into and I kept apologizing whenever I did though she just smiled and told me it was OK. There was also a nice man there who watched us to make sure we were OK and whenever another train passed us, make a slight thunking noise, probably had a great internal laugh at my face whenever I had a slight panic about it.

Getting off the station and heading down some steps, there are apparently designated sides which you move. We went down halfway the wrong way, realized, and moved over with our luggage. Sorry! Walking here is definitely interesting. There’s people crossing the streets, not even really looking. I think we saw 1 personal car on our walk to the hotel.

Getting into Noanoa was easy. Manager was SUPER nice, got our luggage taken to the room, and let us stay in the spa room while we waited the last hour before the official check-in time. While there, Lilia opened up her fruit cup, which has jello instead of juice, and I had my candies which were DELICIOUS, and apparently limited time, so guess what I’m buying more of once I get cash? Because Japan is a very cash-heavy type of country.

Our hotel room is a little small, but nothing we can’t handle. I’m sure Lilia feels weird actually being on par or taller than most the people we’ve passed walking to the hotel. We spent half the day exploring the tiny room, seeing what was on TV and being very confused over a child’s show before turning it off. We figured out google translate, and have translated pretty much everything in our room. We still need to figure out the unit on the wall, but we at least know lighting, what the controls are on the bidet, and how to work the mechanical nightmare that is the shower. We put on a Youtube show that we both like, and I crashed just before 7PM after roughly 24 hours of travel and not sleeping. Lilia poked me awake and we officially went to bed around 7PM. 

We have not eaten since at least noon on the flight, and it’s going on 14 hours. Yeesh.

Our plans today, as I’m finishing this up around 2PM, is to visit an actual bank so I can hopefully withdraw cash, find somewhere to eat, and hit up a couple parks and museums. There’s also the Keihin Fushimi Inari shine that we’ll probably explore. Today is slotted to be a low-key day as we’re both pretty tired even after sleeping for a solid 12+ hours.

Note: Edited for easier reading