Monster Beats by Dre – Solo HD in white

First of all – hi! I’ve been gone for a few days. Feels like a little while, but I’ve been trying to get some work done. What else is new? I went to the dentist today and was told that I possibly was looking at surgical removal of wisdom teeth. Funnnnnn – not sure how that’ll go down, but I have time to think about it – most likely after uni is over.

I had a bit of time to kill before my appointment, so I went and did some shopping.

So for those who remember not along ago, I wrote this post about wanting a pair of headphones by Monster from the Dr Dre range.

I basically was saying how I wanted to sell my old headphones first -

Hey, these are not cheap. They retail for $179.95AUD at Apple Australia. And they’re BOSE too, which means they’re not bad. It just sucks because I don’t like them since they were given to me by someone who will never ever be named. Even moreso than Voldemort.

I had a pretty miserable start to selling them off since my first buyer bailed out on me just hours before I even got to sell them. A pair of mint, pretty much unused, always kept in soft case headphones without a single scratch in sight. STILL SMELLED LIKE LEATHER DAMN IT. Luckily for me, a smart guy (emphasis on the smart, unlike the guy who cancelled, who is NOT SMART) bought these off me. Enjoy your new headphones dude! Even he was surprised how good they were. At that price, damn, all music just got a million times better.

Anyway, that money went into my imaginary “Monster Beats” fund I set up, and I started to look at my options again.

I have heard all sorts of different stories about what type of Beats were actually available in Australia. Half the time what I heard made me raise my eyebrows and think “ORLY?” but I thought that people were probably right since I know nothing about headphones. Turns out though, my common sense isn’t all that bad.

 

Img src: http://beatsbydre.com/int/products/Products.aspx?pid=B5800

I ruled out the Studios. They’re too expensive and I can’t justify killing 2 AAA batteries each time I want to just muffle out some environment noise, and having them not function without new batteries once you run out (so no, they don’t work without batteries). I wanted the solos because they’re small. I admit the Studios are nicer looking, but I don’t have that sort of money to go around. I didn’t want black headphones – I wanted white. Having everyone tell me that white Beats only existed in just solo form (not HD) made me really sad considering you only need to pay $20 extra for HD. I was prepared to wait.

But fear not, they did exist. They should – because every single type of Beats (solos, solo HDs, Studios, Pros) all should come in black or white – any other colour would be limited edition or whatever (like the red solo HDs). That’s what I thought anyway – it’d suck really bad if there was only one colour choice, right?

Were they available in Australia? Actually, just maybe, these were a new addition? I doubt it. I just know these are new to Australia in the sense that they just probably started stocking these lately. I noticed that Apple Australia had these in their online store, and curious to find out whether or not it was true, I made a trip to the Apple Store.

Last time when I looked at the Apple Store’s dismal selection of Beats headphones there was only a pair of white solos and a pair of red solo HDs (which Ramille bought in this post here). This time I was shocked to see them have like 5 of the red ones in stock and even the Studios in both colours.

I noticed a box with the black solo HDs and just a bit hopeful and with a bit of wishful thinking, I took out a box of red solo HDs to see what was behind it. More red solo HDs, or…?

THANK GOD. The white Solo HDs were sitting behind the red Solo HDs. They were hidden, and I’m so grateful they even had it in stock.

I just grabbed it. Walked around a bit and thought about it, and then prayed that they’d work well for what I needed them for.

I went downstairs to pay. Some guy pushed in line. If you were that guy who pushed in line, hello, you are a jerk. LINE UP YOU LAZY ASS. Just because there are three counters doesn’t mean there are 3 lines – there’s just ONE. I hate people who push in line like that – it’s obnoxious, rude, and shows a lack of upbringing. I’m a bit sad that the people at the Apple Store were completely oblivious and weren’t attentive enough to even notice who was lining up first or not. If anything, this will probably be my first and most likely last buy at the Apple Store. Sure, they’re “busy” but they’re not that busy. You’re just collecting payment. I’m pretty sure it’s not that hard to keep an eye on things while you’re collecting money =_=

I went somewhere to sit down and wait for my appointment, but I also opened the box, and tried the headphones.

They’re awesome! They are pretty much the same if not better quality than the Bose ones I sold – they’re not noise eliminating headphones, but they’re close to it. The bass is strong and the music is vibrant.

Now I have a set of white teeth to match the headphones. Just kidding.

I’m still happy for the fact that these even exist, let alone manage to buy them. They were what I wanted! And I didn’t have to buy them from eBay or whatever where lots of dodgysauce sellers lurk and sell fakes! Authenticity 250% guaranteed!

So cutting out the unnecessary images of unwrapping the headphones, basically this is what you get. A bunch of papers with miscellaneous info, a cord to connect your headphones to whatever it is you want to squeeze sound out of, a cleaning cloth (not pictured), and a padded carry case. Oh, and the headphones, of course.

Not to bore you with the specs, it has some feature where you push the button on the cord so you can talk to people (on the phone of course) but it’s only compatible with mostly Apple products (namely iPhones), so it’s a fancy feature I’ll probably never need to use in my lifetime.

One of the best things about these is that you can fold them up so they don’t take up that much space. I think it’s a really neat and handy feature. Not sure how often I’d fold them but it’s a good idea.

… and worn.

They’re fairly comfortable when worn. They are on-ear headphones, so it will press your ears down and might hurt if you wear glasses – but it’s okay – just adjust your glasses so they sit above the headphones. I find these really sit on my head well and fit well.

And for anyone observant enough, yes, that is Big Bang in I think the Lollipop 2 campaign in my text lol.

So, I can now go to sleep knowing that I’ve ticked yet another thing off my wishlist.

Do me a favour and please don’t get the white ones lol – these also come in red and black – I recommend the other colours – simply because white headphones has a bit of significance to me – and I help to complete the “missing” colour in the Lovigan circle.

Monster Beats by dre Solo HDs retail currently only at the Apple Store in Australia and are RRP $299.95 AUD.

But if it makes any difference, I sold my Bose headphones, so it means I got a bargain.

Until next blog! Probably tomorrow night – I think I need to put up a hiatus notice. Some time soon – don’t want to flood y’all.

So, my ad made it into the magazines

So most likely I should be putting this onto my online portfolio, but I decided to do it here as well. (I said I’d update the design blog but I still haven’t for the flyers. Guess I need to just be bothered lol).

I bought the wrong issue of Wealth Creator a few weeks ago because I was under the impression that it was already “out”. I guess not, because it only came out just now :S

To learn more about the magazine, visit www.wealthcreator.com.au

This is the right issue! Sept/Oct 2010

Just look for the black and white issue with the gold $1 coin!

If I thought that the flyers were printed many many times (my final estimate is somewhere like 5000 flyers, 10 000 tops though I doubt it), Wealth Creator magazine has apparently a readership of 55 000 readers Australia-wide. I’m completely overwhelmed. I’m stoked! And if that’s not enough, it’s an entire page! Not a quarter, not half, but one entire page!

Luckily for me this time, I didn’t mistakenly buy the magazine, because this issue isn’t sealed in plastic. That means you can flick through it beforehand and actually have a look at what’s inside.

So that’s exactly what I did at the newsagency – picked up a copy and flicked through it – and BINGO. It really was smack bang in the centre of the magazine, where the staples are!

*sighs* <3

I can’t believe I bought the wrong magazine but it’s all good because I got it right this time lol.

So for interested readers who want to see the ad in the flesh, you don’t need to buy the magazine – just flick through it and find the centre and have a look <3 Haha – that’s only if you’re super bored or something. I’d be so happy if I actually went out with someone at the time – I would drag everyone to the newsagency be like to all my friends, “hey, I designed this!” Most likely they’d think I’m just pulling their leg, but I actually did design it. So if you guys just check it out or something, I’d be super grateful that my work is reaching you guys!

It’s so stupid that CS4 InDesign is incompatible with older versions. So so so stupid. Screenshot taken on my laptop.

It wasn’t really that easy because (I know I shouldn’t really be saying this but) I had to make the design in a very short period of time. By that I mean… an hour or two. It was mostly because the magazine had certain expectations of their ads, and they preferred something cleaner like that ad above. Originally I had the magazine ad corresponding to the flyer design because consistency is good, as it stirs up your memory upon seeing it. But it doesn’t matter, keep my life nice and simple and just keep it to a minimum as such

Here’s a closeup!

That image is actually large enough to read D: But anyway, the top two images are of Sydney’s Basket Brigade 2009 Packing Day. Magic Moments Foundation gets a warehouse or a large space donated and they dedicate a day to gather all their volunteers and they wrap up presents and even customise the Christmas cards. Hand written!

Here are the details again for anyone who’s interested in helping out:

For those who are interested (this wasn’t on the ad), there is an event hosted by MMF – it’s in Brisbane though, it might suit Queenlanders!

Leadership & Finance Summit for Today’s Youth

Leaders of Today, Life Investors of Tomorrow 

When: Mon 17th Jan to Fri 21st Jan 2011

Where: Brisbane, Queensland Australia

Who: 14 – 17 year olds who love to have fun while being inspired.

Contact:  youth@magicmoments.org.au

Magic Moments has an event called “Packing Day” which is where you help packaging presents for families in need. Be sure to email MMF at sbbpackingdayvolunteers@magicmoments.org.au for more information on Packing Day 2010.

If you’d like to help in any other way, you can make a donation with the following details:

Magic Moments Foundation Limited Sydney Basket Brigade
Bank:  National Australia Bank 
BSB: 082-140 | Account: 47-874-7437

Any donation over $2 is tax deductible. MMF also accepts pretty much anything from canned food to clothes, toys, anything to fill up someone’s Christmas hamper and brighten up their Christmas.

Thanks once again to MMF, Michelle and Nikki for giving me the opportunity to do the ad. It was a pleasure to do it!

Solfine Professional Hair Dye

I’m gonna make this a quick post for my readers – I will NOT be doing the instalment of Freaky Friday today (it’s 12:51am so I can call it “today”). Instead, I’ve got a beauty review for you all here. I’m not too sure how well I’d be able to do Mazel tov Monday either as a regular segment. Blogging has become too demanding as I’ve been pushing my own expectations pretty high recently. If you haven’t noticed, they are getting detailed and long just about one topic – this post itself is almost 1500 words. They’re mini-essays, even though they don’t look it. 

I also take a mass of photographs and it’s really time consuming (taking photos, processing, uploading, writing). If I disappear for a bit, it’s because I’m on temporary hiatus. I certainly do not want to lose any readers, so I’ll aim to blog maybe once or twice a week from now on, but nothing fantastic. I have to put my priorities straight – my priority should not be blogging, but studying – so just bear with me. I only need to be away until early November – and after that, believe me, I’ll have all the time in the world to write even better posts. Until then, I’ll be publishing whatever stuff I have in my drafts. Sorry and thanks for reading!

For those who follow my blog, you would have known that I got a haircut. Once you get a haircut you’d want to also dye your hair.

So also for those who follow my blog, I had this ridiculous gradient running through my hair; it was because I got it dyed at a salon – then the next time I dyed it I think it was with Palty (which did work but didn’t lighten my black roots enough so you could see a gradient instead). This time I decided to go for these professional hair dyes. I admit, C tested the waters out first and verified that it actually worked, so I decided to try it.

I wanted to play it quite safe  by choosing the 20 volume (6%) peroxide developer.

For those who have been complaining about colour not showing, it’s most likely because your standard developer in your hair dye box (Revlon, L’Oreal, Palty, whatever) is probably too weak. The standard developer is only 10 volume (3%) which means you want to add a bit of a tint or colour to your hair. 20 volume is for lightening 1-2 shades, whereas 30 volume is lightening 3-4 shades. 40 volume I think should be available but I don’t remember seeing it on the shelf. It’s for really making your hair blonde and it’s not healthy – you’d most likely use a bleach rather than a 40 volume developer, I think.

You can buy these at Priceline. I got these at the World Square Priceline.

The developers and the colours come separately, so you buy them separately. The developer was only $6, but the colour was about $12. Still a bit cheaper than the “Professional” kits, but bear in mind you don’t have a conditioner, bottle or a pair of gloves.

I really tried to play it safe and I got a colour named “Tobacco” which appeared to be a darkish ash brown. I didn’t want anything too light because I didn’t want my hair going orange – if it’s anything I hate most, it’s the idea of having orange hair. I don’t care if my hair is brown but not visibly brown – as long as it’s even, one colour and not orange, it’s all good.

What I did was recycle an old hair dye bottle which came with a hair nozzle applicator. If you don’t have one of these, you can probably use a plastic cup, paper or foil bowl and mix it. You don’t need a bottle. I kept this bottle because these applicators were new at the time (this is a Korean hair dye) so we decided to keep it. It seems fairly common for Asian hair dye. I haven’t bought any hairdyes from the supermarket in quite a long time so I don’t know what they’re like.

You can see I’ve been doing drawings and I even drew up a schedule – needless to say, I’m behind on my own schedule because of some things happening beyond my control U_U

What I did was get a jar, measure 65ml of water (the colour tube is 65g, which needs to be mixed with 65ml of developer – note that this bottle of developer is 200ml, which is good for about 3 applications for medium length hair like mine). I’d tell you to mark a line on the outside of the bottle, but luckily for me, my bottle already had lines (if you look on the left of the bottle) so I knew where to fill up to. Usually it’s the bottom line.

If you are using a plastic cup, make sure that you do NOT squeeze the  cream into your cup unless it’s a very big one, because there is a LOT of cream – it filled up the entire bottle of the one I used.

The bottle was pretty useless though, and soon we just took the lid off and scooped out the dye from the bottle, because it was so thick it wasn’t really coming out of the nozzles well ^^;; This started to happen about halfway. So my verdict is the best way is probably a bowl or something.

With 20 Volume developer, you only need to wait 30-35 minutes total. I probably left it for 35-40minutes but it didn’t matter because I was dyeing it a dark brown, not a light brown. I probably should have left it in for longer so it’d probably go a bit lighter, but it’s alright.

The  “Tobacco” colour was really strange as it started to turn purple (it’s a good thing – it means it has blue hues in it, which emphasises ash and counter acts any orange or red tones – so no orange hair!)

The formula is thick, so it doesn’t drip, and it doesn’t smell too bad. I didn’t get a fruity smell, but overall it wasn’t a bad smelling product.

Rinsed it out and added a treatment to it. I am not very good at drying my hair, and my hair is naturally frizzy. For the record, it makes your hair quite dry. I’ll be doing plenty of treatments in the weeks to come.

The best part is that the colour appears not to bleed after it’s rinsed, which is pretty amazing if you think about how when you dye your hair it seems like no matter how much you wash it, colour’s always coming out.

I was freaked out that the colour would turn out purple, but it was just a nice brown. The images look a bit red, but hey, I have black hair. This was as ashy as I could get it. If I knew about colour correctors I would have bought a tube of blue and added it like mad to the dye. So the brown I got wasn’t terribly ashy or distinctively ashy, but it was a solid brown. I could tell the dye tried to not leave anything orangey behind. Overall, I’m impressed. 40 minutes ish and I get a good brown. That’s not too bad considering my hair doesn’t colour well.

Overall there was PLENTY of dye for my hair. There was still even a bit more in the bottle. My hair is now evenly coloured so there is no gradient. My hair is dark brown, but who cares? I just didn’t want the gradient.

I’m keeping the developing cream for another 2 applications further down the track. It means I need to go buy the colour but who cares – it’s a good quality dye and it’s better than the ones in the boxes since it actually works. If you need something even lighter, go for the 30 volume developer!

Other things to note:

• My hair is generally the colour of the “Indoor with Flash” colour. I woke up the next morning and I could see that my hair was definitely brown and not black. It’s really nice colour – I’d probably use it again, if not I’d go for one of the lighter ash colours since they won’t make your hair orange (they contain blue hues).
• I experienced no stinging, burning or itching on my scalp. This is amazing because Palty made my scalp itchy/ burn a bit, but this stuff didn’t do anything to my scalp. Do a patch test though (I didn’t but you should) in case if you’re not compatible with this product.
• Best dye I’ve tried so far! Definitely will be using this in the future. Forget Prettia or Palty. This stuff doesn’t smell that strong, doesn’t burn or itch and dyes evenly and colour comes out. What more can I ask for? Oh – perhaps for them to start releasing a colour that’s blue purple, not red purple

Until next blog!

Is your blog prone to plagiarism? PS: Things should hopefully resume to normal

Hello everyone!

Sorry about any hectic notifications last night and all. I think I possibly have found the key to solving the problem – but as you can probably notice there have been some changes to this blog.

What happened last night was that a website took my latest Gmarket post and posted it up without my permission, and without linking back to me. All my images were used and everything was copied word for word. I wouldn’t be so sensitive if it weren’t for the fact that it had plagiarised maybe 50 000 posts on wordpress and I’ve stumbled across a fellow wordpress blog, which you can read her post here: http://byanushka.wordpress.com/2010/08/09/plagiarism/, which suggests alarmingly that they take every single post from a particular category and duplicate it onto their site. If you’re reading this Anushka, do edit the category name (as you have done – if I remember correctly, with a hyphen in between the two words, as I noticed on said website, they have plugged the ENTIRE wordpress feed of particular categories. So they’re not targetting your blog specifically, rather, it’s the category [the one they are following is one word, no hyphen]). Sorry I was a bit hysteric commenting like mad – I forgot to compliment your work and lovely photographs

Anyway. Originally I thought that “pfft – who the heck would steal my content and images anyway? *watermarks them anyway*” but now more than ever, I am still going to continue watermarking them. I know it’s not very attractive to say the least, but I have to do it or else the same thing will happen again and I will receive no credit for the work I do.

There is a copyright notice at the bottom of this page. It has been there for some time. It means something.

Plagiarism is a very serious issue whether it be academically or morally, and I will not tolerate it.

Onto other matters, I’ve been having a good run today in terms of awesomesauce – I received my clothing yesterday and also my bag this morning (super awesome, stuff to come later).

For those who haven’t realised, a particular category of mine has been deleted and all relevant entries have been moved to the new one. This is to prevent any further plagiarisation of my work. I’m hoping (and testing this out) that this will work and fix the problem.

This has seriously been a complete and utter waste of my time and I don’t understand why anyone would go against their conscience and do something as useless as what I’ve experienced last night. Seriously, it was a big inconvenience with a capitol “I”. In bold letters. Size 72. Font Arial Black. With a full stop on the end. Cherry on top.

Just to spell it out, this is what it should look like.

What to do to cut down plagiarism:

• Watermark all your images. Yes, it’s ugly. It’s annoying. It’s extra effort. Your photos will look like crap especially if you don’t have a nice watermark (take my advice, you can’t go wrong with CAPS LOCK and your blog url typed – logo not required). But do it and keep proof that you were the original creator of images. It’s not something new; it’s common sense.
• Shorten your RSS feeds to show summaries, NOT entire posts. You can do this in your “Reading” settings on wordpress.
• Name your categories in a unique way unless you are really wanting exposure. For now, I’ve changed a category name from something popular to something obscure. Do I give a  damn? Well people can’t get to my posts via wordpress categories, but that essentially doesn’t bother me too much. I will have readers who will come and make sense of what I’ve done. That’s all that matters.
• Delete and reupload stolen images, renaming them. A lot of the time images are hotlinked, so while it might take some time for the wordpress server to update itself, you can cause a few broken images here and there later on.
• Display a copyright notice on your blog. It doesn’t do jack to be honest, but have it there anyway.

Hope y’all don’t become a victim like me. For now my job’s done and I’ve done all I can for the meantime. Fingers crossed this totally works (and it should very well work with my genius – hehe I kid ) – and things should hopefully resume to normal. I’ll make a post soon later today to make up for it.

Again so sorry to everyone I’ve been inconveniencing – email bombardment, comment bombardment and just being annoying overall going “what do I dooooooooooo” – this is why I don’t tag my posts. Ding! That’s something right I’ve done by being lazy.

Until next post!

Gmarket Haulage 6.5

Hi – if you came here from the Gmarket Top Bloggers page, Gmarket made a mistake and linked to this post instead. For the ankle boot heels, belt and brown boots (as you can see on  the page), please go to http://kmisa.wordpress.com/2010/08/31/gmarket-haulage-6/. This review is only one pair of heels. For my other reviews, simply search up “Gmarket Haulage” as a search term in the search bar.

I named this Haulage 6.5 because this was a small order. So small it only consists of one item.

I was randomly looking for shoes because I need a beige/ cream coloured pair for a dress I’ve been expecting in the mail for a photoshoot, and I found these shoes for a really great price. There were 2 I really liked, and I jotted down the numbers (naming one “lace” since one was lace and the other wasn’t – it was mesh) and looked for it in the drop down menu. One of the numbers were missing (it means it’s not available or out of stock) so I opted for the other number. I didn’t mind either shoe as they were both in my heel height range and both came with front platforms (this reduces the impact to the ball of your foot – or so I’d like to think).

Put the order through and the seller shipped within like 2-3 days. Gmarket wasn’t shipping it out and I found it strange since I didn’t get emails in my gmail (Gmarket doesn’t really like hotmail much, so change your mail address to something not hotmail if possible for Gmarket), and it turns out I owed 5600Won in shipping costs.

Honestly speaking, I wasn’t really happy about having to pay an extra 5600 Won, simply because the package was 1.1kg. On second thoughts though, it doesn’t matter, because you couldn’t take these shoes out of the box. They weren’t wrapped in plastic and it would have been disastrous. Perhaps then it could have come in a smaller box instead? Anyway, I rather have perfect shoes than shoes that aren’t nice. I’ll think of it that way instead of $5 for a box

While the shoes were really cheap, the shipping made the shoe cost overall normal. Still cheaper than retail, but standard for Internet prices. They are unique (well not any more, since lace shoes are the rage now), but still substantially cheaper than retail. I guess I can only say I’m happy that Gmarket offers discounted shipping. If I had to pay the actual amount I’d be paying an extra $8. (That is, about $30AUD just for shipping – ooft!)

Messenger Post Woes

We have a new Express/ Messenger Post mailman. He is lazy.

I know this because the first time I had an express parcel delivered he delivered close to 5pm (ie. the last of all the parcels) because his excuse was he “didn’t know where we were”. He did call me though, and my mum collected it for me. My mum told him to look at the numbers on the mailbox *shrugs* I thought that was common sense for a mailman.

This time, I’m assuming, he knows where the mailbox is, but has still no clue how to ring our doorbell. Sigh. So we got carded.

That’s alright though. I don’t mind picking up boxes from the Post Office. But it was such a light box. It was only a pair of shoes. Seriously?

When I collected it from the Post Office I noticed the EMS box was really empty and there was a rattling noise inside.

Let’s get this party started

A knife is always your best friend. The bigger it is, the better.

Inside the EMS box was this really pretty box. It was a bit of a worry because it was only sealed with some tape around ONE axis, but then again they use courier services in Korea to transport their stuff so it’s pretty safe. You wouldn’t want to do with with your normal postal service though.

I’d love the keep the box, but I’ll think about it. I might not keep it, since I have my shoes on my shoe rack. Hmmm.

When I opened the box, I literally said out loud, “… I didn’t order these shoes.”

I remember I ordered the mesh ones - but probably I made a mistake while I was writing down the “lace” bit next to the number. Either way, I got my first choice (though I’m not too sure about my choice) so I was pretty thrilled. I honestly didn’t expect to get these. Glad to know there’s still stock!

These shoes were stuffed with foam and tissue paper to retain  its shape (can be seen in the shoe on the left in the above photograph). It was not wrapped in plastic (usually each shoe is wrapped individually to stop colour transfer) but there was a sheet of fabric to “separate” the shoes. Unfortunately, there’s a small pink smudge on the back of one of these shoes. The red sole colour transferred over.

The seller included a pair of the heel replacements. This seller didn’t include the foam inserts like in my previous haulage, but that’s alright. The general shoe construction is solid. The lace is also quite thick, a bit like mesh, so it won’t rip. My only concern is that these shoes are going to get dirty fairly easily and that’s not going to be fun to clean. I guess it’s “cheap” enough for me to throw away if it gets too dirty. After all I did that to a pair of lace flats I used to own, and they were more expensive than these heels.

Click for a slightly larger view.

Worn, they look pretty good. Also even though this is a 235, it fits a lot more snug than the other 235 I ordered in my previous order. It’s possibly because the heel of this one seems to be a bit taller – or it could be because you zip the shoes up at the back of the foot, so there’s less room for movement (the other pair I bought were like socks so they’re a bit loose).

Shoe sizes on Gmarket are true to size. Repeat, they are true to size.

Koreans don’t use size 6, 7, 8 etc – they size it in terms of the length of the insole so it will ALWAYS FIT YOU EVERY TIME. I’ve ordered 5 pairs of shoes now and they’ve all fit me well. There was only one pair which didn’t fit too well, but they were a pair of heels and the front is pointed – so make sure you do look at the stock and make your own judgement. If the front is pointed, size up! If not, it will definitely be true to size.

One thing I noticed was that the heel is really really thin. It might not really occur to you, but it’s quite small. I got used to the black ones from last time (I could run in them – or well, trot in them), but with these ones I’m not too sure about that. I felt myself losing a little bit of balance every now and then when when I was trying to balance on one foot. It’s not the shoe’s fault – it’s more to do with the fact that I’m not used to heels (especially something like this). There aren’t many situations where you need to stand on one foot or whatever anyway, so it should be fine. I need to probably just wear them out for a day and see how it goes.

Overall, looks exactly like the stock. I think they should be reasonably comfortable (I had tired feet already because I was walking around the city before this) but I’ll test it on another day.

I suggest you use a silicon shoe insert for these – the insole is this slippery plastic, which could be blisteristic.

Oh – not everything was perfect about this order though -

Remember the rattling noise inside the box?

For some reason the silica gel packet was ripped and it spilled the contents all over the place. I’m pretty sure there’s a ball or two of silica under my bed. It’s not a big deal, but I don’t understand how it even happened.

Either way, I’m pretty satisfied. It was shipped on Saturday from Korea and it got to be in Sydney on Tuesday. That’s really really fast. Hopefully I’ll be able to have an awesome photoshoot with these shoes. This also teaches you all to buy lots and lots of shoes and to buy in bulk from Gmarket to lower shipping costs. I really should have ideally bought maybe 3 pairs of shoes to make it more affordable. But that’s alright – I can do that one day – though not any time soon. My mum is complaining I have too many shoes, when I feel like I don’t

Until next Gmarket Haulage  post!

Mazel tov Monday – only, on a Tuesday.

Alright, I’m back into business but I’ve not a lot of time. I just didn’t want to flood email subscribers’ inboxes – not that I don’t flood them anyway – but hey, prevention > cure.

So I’ve been a bit busy lately with the whole opening the online shop kind of thing. Meh – that’s that – if you see something you like – go for it – if not, wait and we might post something else that might tickle your fancy. Who am I kidding?  Buy plzzz k thx. But anyway, Monday posts aren’t for that – I’ll write about my past week instead.

Weekend = working consistently

So I worked well during the weekend. Slow, but still alright. I’m still like “hur hur hur” over the fact that GO! (ie. Channel 99) is so awesome and is the only channel on TV to air The Nanny, Seinfeld and old episodes of the Big Bang Theory. There’s apparently another channel named “GEM” but I don’t know what number it is. If anyone knows, let me know – I’m hella curious.

I’ve been full of bloatsauce even though I’ve just started to work out again (yeah, I did sort of… stop and do it at highly irregular intervals), and I’m paying the price for it. I can see that the water content in my body is fluctuating like mad. I don’t really know why my body tends to hold onto so much water. Note to self: I drink water okay – stop retaining it ;_;

I couldn’t get my hair cut because of a bizarre calendar prediction, but it’s all good. I think.

Monday was just making food – so that was one day which sort of went down the drain.

Tuesday aka today, I went to get my hair cut (separate post), my shoes from Gmarket arrived (separate post), my ad got published in the Sept/ Oct magazine of Wealth Creator (separate post) – by the way for those who are interested in my ad, open the magazine SMACK BANG in the middle where the staples are. This issue has NO plastic wrapping, so if you drop by to a newsagency, you can flick through one – just have a look please! You don’t have to buy the magazine You’ll see it in the middle – bought another magazine with a bag included to replace my lost one about a year ago (separate post – you can see I will have a lot of posts queued for this week and the week ahead). I have hair dye which I will review – when I dye my hair at some stage.

And not to mention I still have stuff coming in the mail. \o/ I think I need to start working full-time for blogging at this rate.

…and the weight is…

I’m not really caring. I gained 200grams, but what do you expect. My legs went back up like half a centimeter in circumference (thigh only). Whatever! It’s all water. Once it’s summer and I finally finish uni and get a job, all of that will be gone. BEGONE!

I don’t expect miracles overnight, and I’m almost willing to bet like, in 2-3 weeks time I would have lost like a kilo again. Measuring just PLAIN SUCKS.

====

Sorry for this short post. I just don’t want to write too much because I have about 70 photos to process (not like I’ll be doing them all, but it’s a substantial amount of thinking to do) and given that I have a lot of stuff to do (uni work, and blogging), I can only just go by the premise that I’ll promise to give you all bigger and better posts in the days to come. Yes? For those who haven’t realised, my posts have been getting progressively detailed along the way. My poor fingers which do the typing – I kid

Here’s a photo I’m gonna spam the Internets with and to burn your eyes. Just kidding. It pretty much explains 2 posts I’m gonna post later this week.

And I wish that was a wig that I’m wearing. It’s not.

I can’t be bothered with blurring my face because the photograph is so damn grainy to begin with (sorry, that’s the downside of using a camera which doesn’t know how to focus on manual when you get into the frame – and auto went nutcrackers on me. I bet this was ISO 1600 or something stupid :\). I think P jinxed me because I ended up getting a fringe. Not that I didn’t have one to begin with, but it’s been a loooong time since it’s been THAT short. Guh.

Till next blog!

I am off to read the October 2010 issue of Sweet Magazine - IT HAS AYU ON THE FRONT.

C&M Shop Official Launch; Grand Opening Sale!

You can visit us at http://camilleandmisa.tumblr.com

For those who have been clicking onto the C&M Shop link and finding nothing on the shop, thanks so much for your patience – we’ve finally launched today! As in, we’re actually selling stuff now!

We’ve put our prices quite low for now, and we are going to probably let it stay like that for a few months. This is so that we promote the shop so that you and your friends can get clothes discounted. The more people we have following or buying from us, the more we’ll buy to supply for demand – and we’ll be offering these at discounted prices too.

We’re not too sure how long we want this sale to last, but I’m guessing it’ll be for the next few months. We only hold one of each item in stock unless the description says otherwise or if it’s an accessory (again, read the description). Get it before it’s gone!

We’re releasing less than a handful of items each day. We actually don’t have that much stock because we’re not too sure how it goes – but rest assured, there’ll be lots more to come if all goes well!

SHOP: http://camilleandmisa.tumblr.com
TWITTER: http://twitter.com/camilleandmisa
FACEBOOK: http://www.facebook.com/pages/Sydney-Australia/CM-Shop/159848667359232 (or just search “C&M Shop” and look for the logo!)
EMAIL: camille.misa@gmail.com

Sorry to email subscribers who get several emails from me in a day; I’ll be posting Mazel tov Monday later today – so you’ll get 2 emails today. But rest assured, I won’t be updating again until later this week to keep your inboxes breathing

Thanks!

Pet Peeve 07: All for nothing – and how to (sort of) read a Chinese calendar

So you’re going to meet up with a friend. Perhaps you’re not meeting anyone – but you need to go out and do something. You wake up early, groom yourself. BB cream? Check. Filled in eyebrows? Check. Spritz of perfume? Check. You’re even wearing something nice so that you don’t look like you’ve just stumbled out of a jumping castle filled with zombies.

Suddenly your phone beeps – or perhaps you check the calendar. Your friend cancels on you/ your calendar forbids you to go.

All that effort wasted! So you change into your “at home clothes”, mumble and grumble, switch on your computer (or whatever you usually do to occupy time/ do work), annoyed at the BB cream on your face you don’t want to wash off, and at the lingering smell of your own fragrance, too overwhelming in your room at home.

Well, I’m sure everyone has felt this way before. I certainly have just experienced it today and I’m not a happy camper.

Rewind a bit – what do you mean by calendar?

Chinese people generally own one of these calendars, unless if they are using one of those larger ones that you rip off each month (imagine a wall calendar). Possibly Vietnamese and maybe Koreans use something similar – but I don’t really know.

Img src: http://dailyapple.blogspot.com/2009_01_01_archive.html

For those who haven’t seen one, it looks fairly complex, and it is complex.

The top half of the calendar usually is just the date (number of the day) – in some cases, if it’s a festival or some particular day, there’ll be an illustration. On this example, it’s the ”big snow” (I don’t really know what this is but I’m assuming it’s probably either the first day or snow or a predicted very very snowy day – you get my gist anyway).

Down the bottom however, will be all of the stuff that is interesting and actually is of concern.

How to read one of these labyrinths

To be completely honest I don’t really know how to read it all that well – but I know how to read the bits that matter.

The format can be completely different depending on who publishes the calendar, but all the sections should be more or less named with the same headings. The boxes might shift.

First off, this is the easy bit. This is the lunar date of the day. On this calendar it is the 7th December 2006, but it’s actually October the 17th on the Chinese calendar.

Why is this important, you may ask? Well, it’s important for birthdays. If you want to check up a particular date in a fortune telling book, a lot of them would go by the Lunar date – this is why the Chinese (and pretty much a whole bunch of other Asian nationalities) tend to have two birthdays. Interesting fact – Chinese and Koreans have a Chinese or a Korean age, which is one year older than the one that appears on the birth certificate, since they count the time from since they were conceived. Makes us all just another year older. Sucks Haha – I kid.

This is the part I call “lucky hours” – I usually have arguments with my parents over this, but one hour (Chinese) is equivalent of TWO hours (Western). By this, I mean 120 minutes. My parents are adamant that one hour (Chinese) is one hour (undefined), but this calendar simply proves I am right.

To read this, you read this from top to bottom – strangely it goes from left to right. The first hour (23-01, which is 11pm to 1am) is UNLUCKY. You know it’s unlucky because of the character (looks like a square U with a cross in it). You don’t need to be able to know Chinese to know – you just need to recognise the character. The next hour, from 1am to 3am is lucky (the character has a box at the bottom, which is generally characteristic of a happy person’s mouth ready to eat). If you then look at 5am to 7am, it’s neither lucky or unlucky (characterised by the character “middle”, which is a box with a line right down the centre – so neither this or that).

Why is this important? Traditionally, people would get married within lucky time periods. Not only does the hour have to be lucky, the day has to be lucky too (which is actually fairly infrequent – it could be a month or so sometimes before a day is considered lucky – or it could be next week). Once it has passed (bride or groom fails to show up, other things happen along the way – whatever), it means it wasn’t meant to be.

In a modern day context you could interpret this as a good time to be meeting your client or something like that.

Lol, I named this “stuff you can do”. It literally is a section listing a bunch of activities which are okay to do during the day. This part you will need to know Chinese for – but on this day it’s okay to meet a friend, have a wedding, and wear new clothes. There are more, but I don’t want to translate them.

What is “stuff”? There’s generally a list of things like “getting a haircut”, “wearing new clothes”, “having a wedding”, “paying tribute to someone at a memorial”, “having a funeral”, “planting seeds for your crops” – these are all things considered to be significant changes in a Chinese context. They all need good or lucky days so that things supposedly go smoothly. The list actually isn’t that extensive – it is limited, but I think you know what I mean.

This is the section I named “stuff you can’t do” which is really self explanatory. You should avoid these activities because this day is NOT a good day to do them. I think (I can’t really read it because it’s a bit blurry and my translation might be off) on this day you can’t do hunting, do something to your roof or building/ house, or lay (or draw in) a net. Note that Chinese culture is largely agrarian, so a lot of these have to do with farming.

So what is my point?

I woke up, I had my breakfast, and as I was about to get dressed my mum was like “you’re not going to get your hair cut today are you?” – I said “of course I am!” and got dressed and prepared.

Then I went outside to look at the calendar and under both “stuff you can do” and “stuff you can’t do” it says “you shouldn’t do anything significant today”.

=_=

It’s my mum’s fault for not saying anything! Afterwards she was like “I thought you saw the calendar” – in response I said “I’m not that stupid – you should tell me next time, because it was a waste of my time”.

I hate it when I prepare and then find out I can’t do anything!!

But then again, for those who didn’t know how to read a Chinese calendar, you know now how to do so

Do you believe in it? Is it REALLY true?

I think there’s no harm in believing it. I think that if I follow the calendar it means I have less chance of screwing up things – but that’s only because I’m psychologically reassured of that. Whether or not you choose to believe in it is up to you – but I’d hate to think that if I got my hair cut on a day I shouldn’t have, it could reflect badly upon myself.

I have no idea how accurate these calendars are – possibly each different published calendar might even be different – I haven’t ever compared 2 calendars before, but I assume they’re all the same. As you know, there’s a lot of other stuff on the calendar I haven’t explained and they can be contributing factors to who these predictions would apply to more.

Or your friend cancels on you via a text message.

This will do too, lol.

That’s my pet peeve – comment sharing any similar experiences – by this I mean the friend cancelling via a text message – I hardly expect many of you to allow a calendar dictate what you should do lol.

Until next blog!

Magic Moments Foundation 2010 Flyers

Magic Moments Foundation – yes, a charity snippet -

I think two months ago I was asked by C to help design a double sided A5 flyer for Magic Moments Foundation (MMF) - I was so excited to do it because I haven’t designed a flyer since I was about 17 years old and that didn’t really get printed to the degree I had expected it to be.

So about a few weeks ago, my flyer got printed! I did a lot of back and forth consultation trying to get the flyer right (keep the ‘client’ happy and all with what I was doing). If I remember correctly, there were meant to be about 5000 copies of my flyer to be printed! I’ll try to dig through my emails now to see if I can find the exact number (if it was even mentioned), but  I heard from C was that there were boxes and boxes! Yay! Couldn’t find the exact number :\ But these are the 2010 Magic Moments flyers! I designed them! Yay!

C generously included 10 flyers for me to slip into whatever I needed it for *teehee* – thanks so much! It was printed on semi-gloss coated paper – hmmm – love shiny paper.

Front and back of the flyer

I had to design both sides you know *laughs nervously* – but the only way to show it was to put one facing up and another facing down teehee.

And here’s a screenshot just to prove I did it lol.

I did the illustrations – actually, all of them minus the logos and the photographs. I had awesome fun making the flyers – a big shoutout and thanks to C, M, J and N for giving me this opportunity I still have a magazine ad to post, but the magazine seems to not be out yet – lol.

For those who are interested (this wasn’t on the ad), there is an event hosted by MMF – it’s in Brisbane though, it might suit Queenlanders!

Leadership & Finance Summit for Today’s Youth

Leaders of Today, Life Investors of Tomorrow 

When: Mon 17th Jan to Fri 21st Jan 2011

Where: Brisbane, Queensland Australia

Who: 14 – 17 year olds who love to have fun while being inspired.

Contact:  youth@magicmoments.org.au

Magic Moments has an event called “Packing Day” which is where you help packaging presents for families in need. Be sure to email MMF at sbbpackingdayvolunteers@magicmoments.org.au for more information on Packing Day 2010.

If you’d like to help in any other way, you can make a donation with the following details:

Magic Moments Foundation Limited Sydney Basket Brigade
Bank:  National Australia Bank 
BSB: 082-140 | Account: 47-874-7437

Any donation over $2 is tax deductible. MMF also accepts pretty much anything from canned food to clothes, toys, anything to fill up someone’s Christmas hamper and brighten up their Christmas.

Hope you guys enjoyed this post! If I ever get another chance to design flyers, it’d be awesome fun Thanks once again for letting me design them!

Freaky Fridays – so so so freaky

Love/ hate  relationship with Friday

So there’s this kid who’s in my class, and her name is Friday, and she is like sooooooo annoying. All she talks about is how awesome her life is and how her boyfriend showers her with gifts – plus she tells me all the details of her PDA – I mean EWWWW.

JUST KEEDDANG. Everyone in my classes are super nice and I adore them to bits. I dunno anyone named Friday. I know know Friday as Friday.

I cannot reiterate this more – I loathe Fridays.

Every single Friday has been a stress rollercoaster. And now I am more stressed. Need to do lots of work. In fact, if I make half a disappearing act, don’t be too surprised. From now on I am going to dedicate at least one day per weekend sitting at the labs at uni, I think.

Starting either this weekend or next weekend – not too sure yet.

On a positive note however, today during class, my classmate L surprised me by giving me this badge. Apparently she was selling them (along with some adorable felt-tastic goodies – all made by her and her siblings!) at SMASH! and Animania. If I went, I would have seen her! DAMN!

Zomg it’s Totoro! Thanks a million!

That certainly brightened up my gloomy Friday. And today was so cold! Oh so so so cold. I thought it was going to be baking so I threw on a thin jacket. BIG MISTAKE. I was freezing on the southern side of the building.

/me needs haircut and hair colour

I feel like getting a haircut and dyeing my hair. Did I mention that I *really* need to dye my hair?

It’s okay if I use this pic, considering I put it in the sneak peek/ preview collage – teehee.

I have this ridiculous gradient running through my hair. Well okay, I did dye it in April (WOW WUT SO LONG AGO), but it looks not cool at all. Because it was so err – intentional. Obviously not :\ So I need to colour my hair! I’m planning to do all my hair things this weekend so that I can get it all over and done with. I really need a fresh start so I can put my head down and just concentrate. My philosophy is that the more hair dye and bleach seeping into your skull, the brighter you are (lol geddit??) – no, I’m just being silly now Please don’t try it at home

94US cents. NINETY FOUR!

So I’m really tempted to buy lots of stuff online because of the excellent exchange rate. I am currently craving a pair of beige, suede plaftorm wedges. I CAN DREAM ON. I’m so stingy when it comes to shoes unless it’s branded or I’m getting a really damn good deal – (or I really really want it). I’m thinking of replacing my military boots since they have a cracked sole… maybe I’ll wait a bit longer since the military boot is going to mutate soon to peeptoes and a variety of amusing poke-forms. Why do Koreans not design their wedges with platforms? It makes me sad because I really want to buy their shiz but there isn’t enough variety within my budget.

EDIT: CRAP I JUST BOUGHT 2 CDS. I’m currently feeling sad now, because I thought I could combine the orders – guess not I ended up having to pay EXTRA – FUUU

Oh well. Such is life. No more spending for me until I get free money or something!

This post is going to be short because I’m publishing another one right after this one.