Vox

This will be my last post here; I think its time to leave this blog.

T3-97 Ray of Light/Love is...

AI is awesome. And so is Madonna.

T3-96

I was planning on a new blog, and actually started one, but since the end of the year is near, I gave up on it.

MUST FOCUS FOR FINALS.

T3-95

After a solid 6-7 hours worth of sleep this morning, I felt much better, though far from regular.

Last night I was working on my memory book at 3 something, after going to IC's house for STI Fair. I couldn't think of anything to right, so I went to the bed for a quick rest because I was just so tired. Then I woke up at 10:00 or so the next morning. It felt so good though.

Our play yesterday was pretty good, I think. I was surprised at how we all pulled it together. I personally almost didn't do anything until the last week. There were just so many people who spent so much time on the play and dedicated their heart into it.

In the past four days, I've slept at 4, 3, 1, and 12 am. Pretty bad, I know.

By the way, sales of Heart Station in Japan have officially surpassed ULTRA BLUE's sales!!!! That is the first time that any of her albums have sold more than the preceding one. Then again though, Ultra Blue was at the lowest point of her career since her debut, so sales weren't sky high. Heart Station also has some pretty consistent sales due to the drama tie-in of 'Prisoner of Love'. The sales of PoL are consistent, but they're the lowest of her Japanese career. Nevertheless, for a recut single in Japan, its pretty good. Digitally though, its an entirely different world, and PoL is doing pretty well.

T3-95

Everytime I blink my vision stutters for a bit.

T3-93

Tired tired tired.
Non-drowsy allergy medicine actually does make you very sleepy.

T3-92

Let's talk about nothing.

T3-91 Final Distance

Eason Chan's pretty good.

I would like to spend some time during the summer to refocus, and of course look at priorities and make plans. I've never really done that before during the summer, I think.

T3-90 60s 70s 80s

Namie Amuro is considered one of the three royalty of female J-pop. She was at the top of the charts before Utada and Hamasaki even debuted, and earned the title 'Queen of Hip-Hop' (or was it J-pop?). Then, because of several hiatuses from the industry, her career started to decline (but not super giant decline), and rebounded slightly with the release of her awesome album 'PLAY' in 2006. Her latest single, which I've talked about before, '60s 70s 80s', was released earlier this year, and became her biggest hit sales-wise in a long time.

She is also of the three 'Queens/Empresses' of J-Pop, the best dancer, the one with the best hair, the one with the most risqué image, and the oldest (at 30 years old). For '60s 70s 80s', she chose three songs, one from the 60s (New Look), 70s (Rock Steady), 80s (What a Feeling), redid them, and for the music videos, partnered with Vidal Sassoon and Patricia Fields. Vidal Sassoon made 30 second clips of her videos and used them in commercials for their VS hair products, and Patricia Fields was the costume designer for them all. Fields was the person responsible for 'The Devil Wears Prada', 'Sex and the City', 'Ugly Betty', and a couple of other stuff.

The PV's are pretty good. By the way, 'Stay Gold' was used in a commercial for Ascience, Kao's competing hair product.



60s-New Look-Namie Amuro



70s-Rock Steady-Namie Amuro

Namie Amuro - What a feeling [MTV,30fps]
by yo4ever

80s-What a Feeling-Namie Amuro



Asience (Jeon Ji Hyun)- Stay Gold - Utada Hikaru

T3-89 Final Distance

I was pretty late to school today. Our science teacher wasn't there, but I missed a test and she didn't mark one of my assignments.

My brain is just a jumble of things now, I don't even know what I'm trying to say.

By the way, for the English album, I used 6 Utada Hikaru songs, 5 of them Japanese. They were Hikari, Final Distance, Take 5, First Love, Kremlin Dusk, and Passion.

The other ones were Say My Name (Destiny's Child), Hung Up (Madonna), Unity (Kelly Rowland), and Wake Up Call (Maroon 5).

T3-88 Passion

For our English project, I'm doing a CD where we have to have 10 songs about a character among other things. I've done 9 songs, but now I can't think of the tenth song!

By the way, Koda Kumi has done a collaboration with Fergie called 'That Ain't Cool'.

But most importantly, word of a Utada Hikaru collaboration with superstar producers Stargate has appeared! On the BMI website, who handles licensing for some artists, a track registered under the name 'Apples and Cinnamon' has the Stargate producers and Utada listed as the composers.

Honestly, though, I don't really think that this will become a hit in the USA. Timbaland did several tracks for Exodus, and they weren't hits.

T3-87 Better In Time

I must learn more about computers.

Stupid viruses and file conversions.

I also read the sunscreen blog of wisdom on the website. Life experience really is very important. I'll try to follow what you said, particularly about living in New York. I wonder how long would it be until I'm 'hard'?

T3-86

I must get to work.

T3-85

I've been pretty uncoordinated recently.

I kept on coughing on water recently, such as the time when I had a coughing fit in the middle of the Children's Foundation's YPI presentation (for which I am sorry for).

By the way, lots of work, as I'm sure you already know from the blogs you've probably been getting.

T3-84

tired and bored.

T3-83 How crazy

CS and I went to IC's house today. I get the feeling that he thought I was a creep.

I hate it when people come over to my house and act pretty inconsiderately. There was once where a classmate and I ran over to my house during break to grab something that was due that day. I let him come in, and I went upstairs to grab my stuff, and when I came back down, he had his greasy fingers over the keyboard and was searching through my documents.

Now, obviously, I didn't do that at IC's house.

But many times I do things subconsciously, or things that I do without thinking and don't think of until much later that might seem offensive and inconsiderate to other people.

Generally, I don't give hints, I tend to be pretty upfront, or at least it would have to be extremely obvious.

I try not to, but I don't think things completely out before acting upon it.

By the way, Prisoner of Love is still second on the Oricon charts! Even a recut single from Utada could defeat Ai Otsuka, but is still no match for the power of boyband singles (Hey!Say!Jump!'s Dreams come true).

T3-82 Prisoner of Love -Quiet Version-

Sometimes it takes someone to be a total jerk to appreciate other people's virtues and realize that you may be pretty mean yourself.

Anyways, Prisoner of Love was released as a recut single.

In Japan, singles come before the album, whereas in the western world, there's a lead single, then the rest of the singles come afterwards to promote the album.

There's also a -Quiet Version- on the single that isn't on the album. Its pretty nice, better than the preview on the EMI website, but all that much better than the original version.

Its also right now at number 2 on the daily charts. Pretty good for a recut single.

T3-81 How crazy

I am tired and undependable.
We should expect the English play to die if it is left to my organization skills.

T3-80 JEWEL/How High

I still have bits and pieces of the flu left over, topped off by an extremely sensitive throat that threatens to cough so much that I throw up if I don't shut my mouth up, drink water and take throat candy.

I was reading some Jpop forums, and some people tend to confuse commercial decisions with the artist his/herself. Just because somebody's music video wasn't so good doesn't mean that artist was lazy. The artist doesn't always have much of a say in his/her music videos. A success for branding, I guess.

T3-79 Get Together/Isaac

While everybody else has already set their sights on 'Hard Candy', I've just started listening to 'Confessions On A Dance Floor'. And I haven't even heard 'Ray of Light' yet.

Anyways, I've been listening to Confessions, and it is an awesome album. Obviously, anything Madonna does is practically incomparable, but if I have to compare it with its closest Utada counterpart, EXODUS, then Confessions just...obliberates its competition.

By the way, in the last couple of days I have been watching TV like crazy cause I can't do anything else, I watched MuchMusic's list of 20 most powerful musicians or something like that. The top three ranking was Justin Timberlake, followed by Jay-Z, then Madonna. I personally think that Justin Timberlake is in no way more powerful than Madonna. Heck, none of Timberlakes' latest singles or album is even comparable to the success of Hung Up, or Confessions. And there isn't anything else Timberlake is better at. Dancing? Songwriting maybe, singing? Selling power? Business sense? Powerfulness?

And now, I must talk about Utada. I read a German article (somebody on a fansite had translated it), which said that Utada earned $216 million USD (140 m. Euros, I didn't convert it). Now, I'm not really sure if this figure is correct, but if it is, well, that is a huge huge huge number. Madonna is said to be worth $860 million herself, and earned $72 million last year (but she's signed a deal with Artist/Live Nation for $120 million) Oh, and Utada has one of the largest houses in Tokyo.

I saw that number, then wondered how in the world could she have earned that money. She has sold about 41 million records world wide, and in the world of global mega superstars, that isn't too much. But she's sold 34 million in Japan (24 m. albums, 15 m. singles, and 3 m. VHS/DVD). Yes, I know those numbers don't add up, that's why I'm confused. Anyways, in Japan, albums and singles sell for more. For example, a Utada album in Japan would sell for about $30, while in Canada, it would sell for $10-13. A single in Japan would sell from $7-10, while in Canada, it would sell from $2-4. Digitally, the difference isn't large: $2 versus $1.5 for a track (almost all downloads are per track). Now, she's also sold anywhere from 15 million to 25 million digital downloads.

I've read a little little bit about royalties, but not in Japan, so all of this most likely wrong, but hopefully somewhat close to the real number. Perhaps in the same magnitude?

Anyways, Utada composes, writes the lyrics, sings, and most of the time arranges the music herself. I don't know about composing royalties, but singing royalties would probably be about 15% of sales, because EMI is very nice to Utada. Digital royalties are much smaller, about 5% of sales.

She doesn't get too many endorsements, at least, not much that I know of. She has had only two full-fledged tours, Bohemian Summer and Utada United, and one five-date tour (Hikaru no 5). All were sell-outs, and I think in two hours. Bohemian Summer had 19, and Utada United had 11 (later doubled to 22), and Hikaru no 5 had 5 dates, so a total of 46 performances. She only performed in the largest stadiums, so I'm guessing about an average of 20000 seating capacity per stadium (this is a big estimate), so 920,000 in attendance. She also had some small stuff here and there, but I'm pretending its part of the 920,000. I have absolutely no idea about ticket prices. However, I know that Bohemian Summer was crazy. It was right after First Love and a couple of Distance singles, so there was a huge demand. 16 dates were announced, all sold out, then 3 dates were added, but there were 900,000 entries for the seats (they were sold in a lottery system). I don't know how much from this tour goes into Utada's pocket, though.

In comparision, Madonna's Confession Tour, the highest grossing for a female artist, sold $194 m with 60 shows and 1.2 m people attending.

I don't think Utada Hikaru got the ticket prices Madonna got, but I'm not sure.

Okay, I give up on the math. Somebody else go do it.

I also read that in 1999, she became one of Japan's 100 richest people after the release of First Love at the age of 16. However, that same source said that she paid the most tax in 2005 in Japan (roughly equating to being the richest person). That I'm not so sure. 2005 to her was a year where she practically didn't do anything, except release 'Be My Last', which wasn't such a success. Perhaps she was given an advance on her record deal with EMI which we don't know of? Even so, I don't think EMI gave an advance worth several billion dollars.

T3-76-78

76

Hello.
I am sick.
I have a fever, the flu, and a stomach ache.

77

I have the flu.

78

I'm feeling much better now. Which means that I probably won't get to miss school on Tuesday.

T3-75 Take A Bow

I think that I have complained enough for my entire life already. I should think of those who have much more to complain than me when I want to whine and drown in self-pity.

Somebody has been promoting 'Take A Bow' by Rihanna by writing on various surface. I have a temptation to write 'Devil Inside-Utada' right over or on top of it.

T3-74 Do You (feat. Utada)

I need to be quiet and shut up sometimes.

I just finished studying for Science. Well, not completely. I thought I had all of it down pat, then I looked at the review questions, and I could only do 40% of them without going back through the textbook.

T3-73 This Is Love

I complain too much.

I don't want to hear about politics in China.

T3-72

HEART STATION is now number one on the Oricon daily charts.

Wow.

It's now 8 weeks since the album's release, and for an album to do that in Japan is unheard of for the last couple of years. Sure, it is a slow sales week, but considering that she hasn't reached number 1 ever since the first week...

The power of drama tie-in's.

Prisoner of Love is the drama tie-in for 'Last Friends'( ラスト・フレンズ), and drama tie-in do wonders for a song's popularity/sales. By the way, its on every Thursday at 22:00 on Fuji TV (which I think is on channel 8). That is, if you're living in Tokyo.

And, HEART STATION has shipped one million copies! She's also sold 20 million albums already. Quite wonderful, isn't it? At the rate things are going, she'll definetly get number one female studio, perhaps female overall, and maybe break one million sold in Japan (definetly she'll get one million globally).

T3-70/71

70

Still not happy.

71

I was talking to my mom about her Utada Hikaru experiences. There were a lot of stuff I missed/forgot the first couple of years I went to Japan, actually. Heck, the first time I heard of Utada Hikaru was watching her UH3+ clip collection, and I thought she was just some small artist back then.

T3-69

I can't say I'm happy right now.

I'm quite disappointed with our YPI results actually. However, the only person I can really blame is me, because I had made so many wrong decisions, and I didn't give this project my full effort. Heck, I can make an entire list right now of all the things I could have done better.

Even so, I think I still feel a trace of bitterness.

T3-68

JC: Hahaha I know. I was going to put it on my personal message or something, but then I realized that he would see it, so I was afraid and didn't put it there. I'm hoping that he didn't read that blog.

I was watching the second last episode of 'The Hospital' (白色巨塔 ), and it was still as good as ever.

Then, later on I watched Reba and Hope and Faith and laughed so hard I almost threw up (it was right after dinner).

T3-67

I remember that at the Japanese Bunkasai festival, there was a singing competiton. A girl sang 'Time After Time' by Mai Kuraki, and to be honest, it was just as good as Mai Kuraki's original version.

And Joy won Churchill Idol singing a Hairspray song. There was a judge who said how that song showed us a different side of her, but I think it would be much more interesting if she sang 'Devil Inside' by Utada.

Okay, maybe not.

That song, though did hit number one on Billboard's Hot Dance Play, and 57th on the Hot Singles Sales.

I don't know why, but sometimes when other people tell me I'm acting weird or something, I usually have one of Utada Hikaru's English songs ('Devil Inside', 'Kremlin Dusk') or Prisoner of Love in my head.

T3-66 Fly Me To The Moon

I procrastinate so much that I am truly scaring myself.

It seems that I have lost the resolve to not procrastinate. Or really even work hard.

T3-63-5

63 Me Against the Music

I procrastinate so much I wonder why people still choose me to be in their groups.


64 Weird Fishes/Arpeggi

I feel content.
I am now addicted to Tetris, except I'm not very good at it. But, practice really does improve your skills!

65

I feel the need to 'reevaluate' my life.

T3-62 Green Light

I've been listening to Beyonce's B'Day again. The last couple of times I heard it, I thought it was quite boring, but now, it sounds much better for some reason.

Oh, and we had a track meet. Like always, I am the worst person in my category. At the very least in our school team; I am dead last at every single event I do.

Then again though, I don't really care.

T3-61 タイム・リミット (Time Limit)

I've been reading the blog on the website today.

I love blogs or songs where the artist/writer just had a huge creative break or was pouring out all of their emotions.

Anyways, back to that post. I don't know why, but I felt that I truly understood what that person was talking about, whether or not I actually did. Reading that blog did give me a couple of epiphanies/breakthroughs.

After reading that post, I feel that every word I'm typing here requires so much thought and is so...not fluid. I can't think of a better word.

This morning I was listening to the radio, and a caller phoned in and talked about how the seniors at the senior home where she was working (she was a nurse) were just absolutely full of compassion. She talked about one man who died 48 hours after his wife died, and she attributed his death to 'heartbrokeness'. Obviously, that isn't really what happened, but what she meant was that he lived for her, and how people there do things not out of selfishness, or think about themselves first, but for others first. The radio hosts themselves remarked on how they wish that we could all learn to be compassionate earlier.

Bringing that to MY, there is something going on that very many people aren't happy about. (Also, by the time I'm aware of some gossip, usually more or less everyone has heard of it. I'm the last one on the grapevine.) I'm going to take a step here and say that the reason there is this unhappiness around is because of jealousy and a sense of feeling cheated. If we were truly compassionate, we would genuinely care for the people involved, and try to help them, instead of choosing to be upset (which doesn't help anybody, especially the person who's feeling upset). Instead, this feeling of jealousy is rooted in our selfishness. Now, of course, I'm not saying that everybody that felt upset is a super selfish person, because that's not true at all, because just because we feel jealous about one thing doesn't mean we're selfish overall. How we express that jealousy is also another factor.

Of course though, I can't claim to say that I know every single detail about the issue. No matter what, the underlying ideal is still there, if not for this then for something else.

T3-60

I don't feel like writing much today.

Well, I can't really think of anything at this moment.

T3-59

I have finally reached a point where I'm listening to one Utada Hikaru song for every non Utada Hikaru song.

Except its tipping very favourably for Utada Hikaru.

T3-58 Sweetest Goodbye

I think I've said this before, but I was a Maroon 5 fan once during the summer. Of course, though, it never reached Utada Hikaru-porportions.

T3-57 神奇女俠的退休生活

Another nice Hong Kong song I came across some time ago.

I've been trying my best to listen to music that is not Utada Hikaru related, but its not going very well.

On my list of Top 25 played songs in my iTunes, there are only two songs that aren't sung by Utada Hikaru.

Sigh.

T3-56 曾經太過年輕

If any of you remember, a long time ago I was raving on and on about the Taiwanese drama 'The Hospital', which was absolutely awesome. I still think its the best drama I've ever watched. Then again, that's not saying much, but still.

But the lead song and the insert song are both pretty awesome. The title of this post is the ending song. Pretty nice, I think.

I heard some of the other songs (the best ones) on the OST, and they were pretty good too.

T3-54/55

54

After track, I went home, ate something, played a bit of piano, then slept because I was just so tired.

So, since I don't really have comprehensive to talk about, I'll just blog about some snippets of things I thought about.

The space centre on Wednesday was a wonderful idea to me. Perfect day not to do anything, because otherwise I would have been dead since I slept at 5 the night before. So, I spent some of the time resting, and in general not doing too much. I loved the Hitchhiker's Guide to the Solar System, because the views were just breathtaking and the chairs were absolutely perfect for sleeping in. I didn't really sleep, I just closed my eyes and listened to the speaker talk.

My dad sometime ago mentioned to me how outsiders don't really understand what's happening; therefore, their assumptions and ideas on what should happen don't necessarily apply. I have forgotten about that, and now coming to think of it, I do think its true. A single event or a single thing is different to everybody; everybody reacts and is affected by things in different ways that sometimes other people just can't comprehend. Sometimes I should just let others be, because that in many cases is usually the best thing to do.

I haven't followed my principles as much as I used to; I wonder if that's because the principles don't reflect who I am, or I'm just a different person as time evolves; or that I just don't try hard enough, or is it that I don' think they are so important anymore? I think its a mixture of the above, except the latter two play a larger role.

55

Today was Bunkasai.

Nothing much happened, except it was in general a pretty relaxing day. Last day of debate though.

T3-53

I have some sort of a brain freeze right now.

I'm not thinking straight for the science project.

T3-51/52

51

After I got home from Sun Run, I ate something, then slept and woke up the next morning at 7, so I didn't write a blog.

52

I can't really think of anything to write.

T3-50

Kelly: The festival's on the 24th, I think.


I don't want to go to the sun run. Don't know why.

T3-47-49

47
Slept at 4:30 today because of a combination of (mostly) two essays and a tiny little bit of insomnia.

By the way, the stress hasn't seem to be affecting my sleep much!

48
Went home, ate something, planned to have a short midafternoon nap, then woke up at 8:00 the next morning.

49
I was watching the SMAP x Utada Hikaru medley on YouTube the other day, and wow. SMAP's only purpose was practically to be backup dancers; Utada's songs were WAY out of their vocal range. They did out-sing (I don't htink that's a word) Utada on their SHAKE song, but that was just because it was four against one.

Oh, and you guys can all go to the Japanese festival at lunch now! There is a fee of $1, though.

T3-46

I've reached 300 posts. I do feel an increasing need to switch blogs.

Anyways, we had a debate tournament today.

Actually, it was much more relaxed that usual, cause our only real competition were ourselves. There were 12 Churchill debators and 8 Britannica debators, and that was all. The junior categories were completely dominated by Churchill people, lead by VD and MSa.

Not surprisingly, I didn't place in top 3.

On a good note, there wasn't much stress at all. VD did most of the script, and a couple of us just helped her. Some of the other people did their own too.

So now I have tomorrow to finish both essays!

I'm now contemplating which essay to do first; socials or English.

T3-45

Everytime a debate tournament comes around it gets really stressful

for two-four intense days,

sometimes as bad as science fair (or even worse)

Then it gets better really quickly.

T3-44

I made a schedule today, and I followed it until I opened the computer.

Anyways, looking at what I have to do this week, I'm not very happy.

Tomorrow I'll be working on Mentorship and Debate for teh entire day, on Tuesday I'll get home very late, so won't be able to do anything.

Then, on Wednesday, I have to do both Social and English essays, which I have barely started in one day.

Thursday would just be preparing for French, and hopefully no new homework comes up during the week...

T3-42/43

Makeup blog for Friday!

42

Today was quite busy, I went home at around 3:00 at something and then slept (okay, not very busy), then woke up and went to see the dentist at 5:00 and came home around 6:00, ate something, then left for my piano teacher's house at 6:40, then we went to see a concert by the UBC Symphony Orchestra at the Chan Centre (for free!)

Then I came home at 11:00, and by the time I finished everything, it was 12:30.

So I never got around to writing a blog.

By the way, to those of you that are sick and tired of reading about Utada Hikaru: sorry, I didn't mean it when I said I won't be talking too much about her after sales of HEART STATION die down.

Because of the Prisoner of Love single and 'Last Friends', there's still going to be lots of promotions left, so I will be blogging about her.

43

Back in MACC, there was a classmate of mine, JN, who demonstrated a very high level of self-discipline. Whenever there was free time, she would sit a bit away from everyone else, and work for the entire period without ever once being distracted. Every single time.

Needless to say, she was a top student.

It's not like she was a one-dimensional academic student either; she still had an active life aside from school.

On another topic, I think it would be nice to keep my blog free of opinions.

Keeps it lighter and not so dreary that way.

And I sort of don't like politics; its too annoying.

I'll worry about that kind of stuff when I don't have anything else to do.

T3-41

To Kelly: Yeah, that and Utada Hikaru always seems to be drunk nowadays.

By the way, my dad, who is in Tokyo, told me that he saw Utada Hikaru drunk on the front cover of a magazine in the magazine's advertisement.

Does that make sense?

T3-39/40

I forgot to make up for the blog I missed on Monday.

39

I feel smug.
But then there's sort of a sting in the tail.
Not good.

Anyways, Oasis has shut down all operations. I'd like to say I TOLD YOU SO!

Well, honestly, everyone that knows a tiny little bit about the aviation business would know that Oasis wouldn't have survived for long. Start-ups, unless backed by huge financial investors (or airlines), like Virgin America, in highly competitive markets don't go well.

People still don't get the idea, and always make start-up after start-up after start-up. And airline CEOs don't get the idea either. They always want to compete in 'prestigious' markets, regardless of actual profits.

For example, United Airlines operates (or operated, I don't know now) one daily JFK-NRT and JFK-LHR, which are two of the most 'prestigious' routes in the world. AA/BA and a couple of other airlines have more than 20 flights per day with the largest equipment on the JFK-LHR route, and UA thinks they can beat them with 1 flight? They probably could make more profit by using those 'prestigious' landing slots for another US-LHR flight.

However, the worst part of this is that my brother had a round-trip flight booked on Oasis, and now its gone. We most likely won't be getting our money back.

40

I've heard Utada Hikaru's songs on the radio here in Vancouver actually. However, it was on the Cantonese Fairchild multicultural radio channels, and it was only a small clip of 'Time Will Tell'.

Also, I heard that there was a picture of Utada Hikaru's knees on the local 'Ming Pao' Chinese newspaper.

What happened was that Utada Hikaru got drunk, and then woke up the next day with bruises, and posted it on her blog. Ming Pao then used that as a story, I guess.

Oh, and the guy on the 'China Drives' show on China Radio International (or something like it) is actually from Vancouver! He's also a Canucks fan, apparently.

The Billboard Japanese correspondent is also from around here, and there was one woman who now works at CBC Radio 3 who used to work at Radio Television Hong Kong.

T3-38

To Olson: Well, there were some exotic sports cars and there were some vintage cars (I couldn't tell really, I was looking at it from a distance) on the sides of the walk leading towards the entrance airlock.

Utada Hikaru is releasing Prisoner of Love as a DVD single!

There's a 'Prisoner of Love -Quiet Version-' on the single.

Apparently Mika Nakashima had something called 'Yuki no Hana -silent version-'. I didn't listen to it though, so I don't know if it was silent or not.

T3-37

I went to the auto show today, and then came home and watched the Junos, so didn't do much work.

It was fun.

I'll talk more later, I'm pretty tired right now.

T3-36 POP STAR

To anon: Haha Oh really? Prove it! When I read peoples blog, though, I don't read for gossip; I read for pure entertainment from daily happenings and events that aren't necessarily classified as gossip.

To Kelly/Vivian: Yep!

For Japanese, we have a Bunkasai Festival on the April 24th, which is apparently a 'cultural festival' that is going to be hosted in the cafeteria.

Basically, we're taking the cafeteria, locking Kozuki and Wakaybashi's Japanese students in there and everybody out, and hosting our own 'fair', pretty much.

Although I understand the purpose is more to enrich ourselves rather than to show everybody what Japanese culture is like, I don't really like that idea.

Personally, I think that such a festival should be open for everybody to enjoy and engage in cultural interchange, but whatever.

Its only Churchill.

And it makes organizing stations and whatnot so much easier, so I shouldn't complain.

Now, back to Utada Hikaru.

I really am obsessed, aren't I.

Its so easy to be a fan of Utada Hikaru, if you understand what I mean.

Okay, I'll explain.

First off, she has such success in the Japanese market that its fun and easy to compare her to other people and point and say 'she's popular! More popular than yours!'. What I mean is that its much easier to convert other people.

I was a fan of Ayaka Hirahara (平原綾香) once, and although she was by no means unsuccessful, she wasn't exactly a chart-topper.

Her debut album managed to reach 2 on the weekly charts, but even her compilation album (and compilation albums sell really well in Japan) just released a couple weeks ago got #4 and sold only 87,292 sold far. Heart Station, released several weeks later, sold 480,081 in its first week.

Ayaka Hirahara's best-selling album:
Odyssey (debut album) Chart: number 2, 720,165

Utada Hikaru's worst-selling album:
as Cubic U (English) Precious Sold 702,060
as Utada Hikaru Ultra Blue chart: number 1, 910,000

Ayaka Hirahara's best-selling single:
JUPITER (debut single) chart: 2, 922,720.

Now, this is a huge hit. Except Ayaka Hirahara only had one. None of her other singles were anywhere NEAR that number.

This single became 3rd best-selling single of 2003 and 42nd best selling single of 2004.

In comparision, Utada Hikaru's COLORS, released earlier in 2003, sold 893,720
Dareka no Negai ga Kanu Koro, released later in 2004, sold 365,206.



Jupiter/Hirahara Ayaka

I'd encourage you guys never to base an opinion of an artist just because of one song.

And now there's Ken Hirai.

Awesome male Japanese singer.

Has had his peaks and valleys.

Valley=debut, peak=Utada's valleys.

His peak was having number 1 album of the year in 2005 with his compilation album Ken Hirai Utabaka 1995-2005 or something like that. It was also the 20th best selling album in the world that year, and hit number 1 on the world charts.

He's also had his share of successful singles, such as Hitomi wo Tojite (number 1 of the year) and POP STAR.



POP STAR/Hirai Ken

He's the guy in all those costumes.

T3-35

I wish our teachers would continue the practice of mandatory blogs after Grade 9.

T3-34 Flavor of Life

(Flavor of Life isn't one of my favourite songs, but I like it today, for some reason.)

To Vivian: Wow...

Now, to work!

T3-33 Lost

To The Dude (Buddy's name for you) : I haven't thought about that...

Work Work Work!

I should stop going on the computer that much.

T3-32

To Vivian: I sort of agree, I think Hung Up and Sorry were both much better. I don't like most of the song, but there are some parts, like when Madonna sings 'the road to hell is paved with good intentions' which are awesome in my opinion.

I'm glad there's collaborative day tomorrow.

T3-31 4 Minutes to Save the World/ Simple and Clean/Colors (UH Dai 20 wa Ike Ike! Live Streaming)

Listening to beautiful studio lives...

T3-30 Prisoner of Love

Today started out pretty good, I was task committed for most of the morning, and then I turned on the computer.

After that, aside from homework due tomorrow, I didn't do anything.

T3-29

I participated in Earth Hour today, which was actually a pretty good experience.

It was calming in a way to have all the lights off. I think I'd enjoy it if we spend some time once in a while to just turn off all the lights and unnecessary electronics.

T3-27 Prisoner of Love/T3-28 4 Minutes to Save the World

27

We're debating Kosovo for our upcoming tournament, and we have a Serbian in our debate club!

That's pretty awesome, cause she can just go home, ask her parents, and give us so many arguments of why Kosovo should remain a part of Serbian.

Come to think of it, being Chinese-Canadian, especially one born in Hong Kong, does have its advantage. For one, nobody can really complain (well, there are some, I guess) that we've somehow oppressed them in anyway, because, well, we were always under control of somebody else historically.

Being Canadian, I can argue that we are, well, generally not that bad of a country, so they can't go on and say how China's communist. Even better would be Hong Kong, but not necessarily because its a better place, but because we can blame everything Hong Kong did on the British.

Of course, I don't believe nationalities should get in the way of anything.

By the way, looking at my iTunes top 25 playlist, it is almost completely made up of Utada Hikaru songs.

Only Bleeding L0ve (7th at 27 plays) and 2 Hearts (21 at 12 plays) are the non-Utada songs.

Oh dear.

Well, I do listen to a lot of stuff not on my iTunes, so its okay...

Number 1 is Prisoner of Love at 44 plays
2 is Celebrate at 39 plays,
but if you add the single versions and album versions together, it would Heart Station at number with 55 plays and Stay Gold second at 52 plays.

28

On Wednesday, I threw up in the morning, so I had to clean up and was late for school.

After that, I felt like throwing up every morning when I was eating something, and sometimes during the school too.

Anyways, I went to the doctor today, and she said it was the stomach flu.

I remember I had it a couple of years ago, but it was much much more serious back then.

After I got back from the doctor, I slept for 5 hours.

Oh, and I also didn't touch Chinese for the entire spring break, so I should go to and study for the test tomorrow and finish all the homework.

T3-26

Hope for HEART STATION to become number one album of the year seems bleak.

EXILE, who somehow had the largest first week sale last year with studio album EXILE LOVE (~670000 units), debuted with their first of three compilation albums to be released this year, with EXILE CATCHY BEST having a daily index of ~120000. In comparasion, HEART STATION's first day sales were ~67000. That is not good.

But whatever. Utada Hikaru is still going to get number one female album of the year.

I'm not holding out much hope for getting one million units this year either.

HEART STATION might end up as digital album of the year, who knows.

Honestly though, if HEART STATION was never released digitally, it might have cleared the 500000 units first week sales mark.

Quite a few of her competitors don't release digitally, so I guess that might be why she has relatively low (although in reality extremely high) physical sales.

T3-25

I was reading a Chinese article about Utada Hikaru today, and it was written back in August of last year.

On her blog, Utada talked about how she always gets nightmares which include vicious dogs, kitchen knives being used to kill people like her friend and her parents, and so on and so forth. (She said that there was actually a lot more, but she just didn't feel comfortable in talking about that on her blog.)

Within a week, a sleep doctor of some kind came out and analyzed Utada's mental 'environment', for lack of better word, based on just what Utada wrote on her blog. It was even reported in Chinese press...

Sometimes Utada Hikaru seems so famous and successful that its kind of scary.

T3-24

The actual data hasn't been released yet, but an article from Oricon (Japan's premier chart provider) has stated that HEART STATION has sold more than 480000 copies in its first week, becoming this year's highest first week sales so far.

Well, that means that Utada Hikaru's 5 consecutive 500,000+ opening week sales record has been broken.

That doesn't mean much though, because very very few people are getting 500000+ first week sales nowadays, and nobody has done so this year, even though we've already had new releases from Ayumi Hamasaki and Kumi Koda.

Nevertheless, there are many more weeks to go before we get any idea of Heart Station's full sales numbers, though I don't hold out much hope for it being the best-selling album of the year. Utada Hikaru's albums tend to stay on the chart for quite a while, but to beat Kobukuro's 5296 would be quite a feat, even if you don't count their first week sales of 390884 (last week of 2007).

There are also other chart providers, such as SoundScan Japan, and Billboard Japan, but they do weekly charts only, and they haven't been released yet.

T3-23 Celebrate

My favourite Celebrate performance. Actually, the only Celebrate performance.

Here's the entire performance, but it takes some time to load.

If it doesn't work, here's the link: http://www.veoh.com/videos/v6494270bK2bBAPj

T3-22 One Night Magic

Oh, I was watching half of Reba and a little bit of Hope and Faith last night, and I was laughing so hard. It was the episode where Van and Reba have an appreciation party for their clients, and Reba takes Cheyenne's nausea-inducing-when-you-drink-alcohol pills, thinking that they were vitamin pills.

Ah...

I've been listening to PLAY, the last album by Namie Amuro, and it really is a very solid album, may I dare say better than some of Utada Hikaru's work. But then again, I shouldn't compare the two, as they both have different roles, different talents, and are in different genres.

T3-21

I was reading some of the comparisions between ULTRA BLUE and HEART STATION on a fan forum (which was one of the better ones actually, a couple other ones were just...terrible), and I was actually quite surprised by the comparisions.

To me, it seemed that everybody had just outrageously high expectations, expectations like that every single album has to be absolutely PERFECT, diverse, interesting, not using synthesizers, not in her upper vocal range, and that she shouldn't have hurt her vocal cords, songs have to be more 'emotional (aka not happy, must sound depressing (doesn't matter about lyrical content, even if its top notch these people dont care))', have absolutely wonderful promotional videos that only her ex-husband can make, and so on and so forth. By the way, it CANNOT be simplistically nice, it MUST be complex and EVERY SINGLE TRACK must be thought-provoking.

It also doesn't really matter to these people what Utada Hikaru as an artist really feels when she's making the album. They all assume things, take what they think as the absolute truth and reach conclusions based on conjecture.

Most people don't seem to care that her album is about what she feels, and if she's not feeling it, then she's not going to do it.

Of course, there are still many people who understand that (and for some reason their posts are almost always short, unless if they're ranting against the other posters).

Sometimes I'm confused when other people say that 'all the pop princesses out there who are at the top of the charts have no talent, etc.' Well, sure, they might not have talent bursting out of every single pore, but they MUST have had SOME talent for some A&R person to choose them (I'm not talking about Asia, I'm talking about North America). They may not be a lot better than the average person, but they're definetly NOT average.

T3-19/20

19

Sometime ago, on one of those days where I would usually go on a whining tirade on my blog or to people around me, I was reading a blog quite late at night when I should have been doing something else.

It was by someone who I've never really thought about, and I do admit I've had quite a bit of preconceived notions about this person.

There was just one blog I was reading, which just seemed to be perfectly matched to the song I was listening to (Utada Hikaru, and live, of course), and that post was a very... I'm not sure how to describe it, but it was thought provoking and definetly from the bottom of that person's heart, you could just tell.

And reading that, I reflected on my thoughts of that person, and I cannot believe how extremely stupid and idiotic my notions were.

For some reason, there are some people that, subconsciously, I think are just somehow not capable of much reflective emotion. I never realized that, it was buried underneath the surface.

Obviously, now I have learnt from it, and will try very hard to not let those notions ever appear again.

20

I was doing a plan yesterday for what I have to do this week, and I realized that if I wanted to accomplish everything, I would have to do 6 hours of work every day.

Then, I gave up and played games.

I also stumbled upon some of the billions of reflections that I had to write in MACC.
Reading it, I realized that the writing at the same time used words that seemed advanced, and very casual ones at the same time.

I don't dare to look at my writing nowadays and compare the two, as I know how much my vocabulary has worsened over the past two years.

It truly is disappointing.

T3-18

HEART STATION has been released. And you guys can all check out the preview clips on her website (www.emimusic.jp/hikki). They said that there were preview clips for all tracks on there, but the website didn't load for me.

Give me some time, after the sales of HEART STATION has died down, the official figures have come in, and before news of her English album starts cropping up, and I will wind down on the HEART STATION/Utada Hikaru obsession.

T3-17 Prisoner of Love/ Niji-iro Basu

I'm listening to the album right now, and I have to say it is ABSOLUTELY AWESOME.

Honestly, averagely, the album tracks are actually slightly better than the single tracks.

That's because she wrote the album tracks after the singles were released, so she didn't pick the best ones and release them as singles.

I remember the first time that I was exposed to Utada Hikaru was way before I became a fan of hers. My dad came home from work one night (we were in Yokohama, Japan), and brought UH3+ home, which contained the making of videos and the music videos for FINAL DISTANCE, traveling, Hikari, SAKURA DROPS, and Deep River. I don't think I was amazed by the songs, but I thought they were nice songs.

Then, in 2006, still before I started loving her songs, ULTRA BLUE came out, and I listened to it. Back then, I didn't think it was awesome, I thought it was above average, but the songs seemed kind of bland to me.

Now, of course, I don't think the same way.

And my feelings for HEART STATION reflect that, I think the album tracks are truly awesome.
But, when I first heard Flavor of Life, I was not impressed. Even though it was a huge hit. Beautiful World/Kiss & Cry were nice, but not super wonderful. Stay Gold was amazing, Heart Station was a bit.

Meanwhile, I will be waiting patiently for the sales numbers to come in on the 19th.

T3-16 HEART STATION album tracks

HEART STATION has *finally* been leaked.

I've been listening to YouTube videos of it.

If you want to listen to them, just search 'Celebrate', 'Prisoner of Love', 'Niji-iro Basu', 'Gentle Beat (Interlude)', 'Take 5', 'Fight the Blues', and add Utada Hikaru's name in the search also.

I like this album.

T3-15 Reverse Blog

I have to say I was a surprised it happened, even though I think we all knew that something was going to happen sooner or later (and that it would be crushed eventually by Beijing).

Anyways, there was unrest in Tibet for the last week.

If anybody enlightens me on how to do a proper reverse blog, I do one next time.

I'm guessing you read at the end go to the beginning?

Mr. Olson told me to do a reverse blog, except I have absolutely no idea what that's supposed to mean.

T3-14 Deep River/Fight the Blues

I guess was actually worrying about the pre-IB applications last night, except subconsciously.

Either that, or there was something bothering me that I didn't know.

Its worst when you don't know what's wrong with yourself.

After getting the envelope and checking it, I was still...the same, I guess. I didn't feel like a huge burden was lifted off my shoulders or anything.

Later on, I discovered that somebody else didn't get in, and they were very upset with it. I was upset for them too, I don't know why. Its also pretty bad when every single person around you seem to have such control over your mood, even thought you don't want to happen.

On the good side, 5 days left until Heart Station.

T3-13 With or Without You

6 days until Heart Station is released....

KB pointed out to me that while everybody is worrying about the Pre-IB results tomorrow, I'm waiting for Heart Station.

Well, it accurately reflects my priorities.

No, I'm just kidding.

Anyways, I don't worry that much. Worrying too much is useless, and it just makes everything stressful.

Actually, I might be worrying subconsciously anyways.

My blogs tend to be about me, Utada Hikaru, or school. There's hardly ever anyone/anything else...
Just to let you guys know, what I blog about usually is probably the furthest thing from what I'm thinking about.

T3-12 Pocketful of Sunshine/Hung Up

I am right now looking around for another blogging service.

Apparently LiveJournal had a Basic account which had less features than the regular free account but with no advertising. However, yesterday was the last day to sight up for it...

For now, I'll keep Blogger.

Anyways, I have a lot to do today, have to go now.

T3-10/11

I put yesterday's blog back at my old Windows Live Space, but it was only a couple of lines.



Blogger didn't let me type anything yesterday, and Windows Live was just as slow as I remembered it to be. I will get a new blog sooner or later, because I've been having lots of trouble with Blogger.



Today wasn't such a nice day.



I found out something that disappointed me. Anyways, usually I would rant about how poorly I did (I remember back at the very first term I was supposed to get an I in the film studies unit), but this time I did so bad that I hope nobody will ever notice.

Well, actually, I don't think I should care what other people think, but I do.

My first reaction was shock, and I didn't feel that happy.

2. I thought how other would think, and I got a little unhappy.

3. I thought of the actual consequences of this mark, and I was actually content, because there seemed to be lots of advantages

4. I forgot completely about if for a long long time

5. After I got home and worked on some stuff, I remembered what happened, then I became very very unhappy.

Throughout this entire process, I realized how much I cared about how other people think. There was also one person later on who I talked to, and that person dropped some not-so-subtle hints of what he thought about me, and that made me want to never ever talk to that person again.

It was partially his fault, but I shouldn't care that much. I thought I wouldn't care that much honestly, but apparently I do.

There will always be some jerk who thinks he/she deserves something (almost always marks) better than me, and make it clear, and there will always be some jerk who thinks that I am a total retard/jerk/(insert derogatory adjective), and I need to not let them affect what I feel.

Anyways, I had some sleep problems again. I slept at 4:00 on Monday morning even though I went to bed at 11:00 on Sunday night.

However, it didn't feel like stress so much, because I wasn't anxious or depressed like I usually am when that happens. Good thing was that it lasted only for one night.

Now, on to the good things.

I got my piano tuned, and it sounds so much better now.

Last week I got a mark back which I was pretty happy with. And I also got two term grades back which I was very disappointed with. Both were 85%'s. One I do not know how high, the other was between 85.1 and 85.5 %, apparently. In both cases, the teacher didn't tell me.

T3-9 I Try

Utada Hikaru's HEART STATION has reached 1,067 radio plays, becoming the number one song of this month, beating her previous record with 'traveling' at 1,02something.

At the very least it proves that the disappointing (for her, that is) physical sales of HEART STATION/Stay Gold don't mean that much.

Well, her album is dropping quite soon...

I don't feel that well for the last two days. Its not uncomfortable like I'm sick, its just that I don't feel like eating, and I want to throw up everytime I eat something. But I haven't thrown up yet.

T#-7/8

7 Potential Breakup Song

Just to clarify about the post before, its actually not abnormal for people like Utada Hikaru to get drunk all the time.

In Japanese culture, many businesspeople go get drinks after work, but they are very responsible, and don't drive.

Oh, and the marks for school have already come in for most classes. I was sort of disappointed in one class, I guess. And another class. And another class. But oh well, I don't think I care that much anymore. Which I do believe is a good thing, and anyways, its not like I don't care at all.

Though I do have to remind myself not to compare myself to other people. I don't like it when others do that, but sometimes I do that subconsciously.

8 See You Again

I was reading the book for our Decisions project, and I came across the section on 'Secrets 4: Get on your Teacher's Good Side' for decision 1. There's a part which says that you should sit in the front row to change their perception of you.

The first person that came to mind was AD. If you haven't noticed it yet, he sits and the front and centre of EVERY SINGLE CLASS. And it doesn't matter who was supposed to sit there, he just takes your seat. In SS, he took MSh's seat, who then took my seat. And then I sat at the back. Which I sort of enjoyed, cause there was nobody around me who was rattling my desk.

Oh, and apparently there's something called 'extra-credit'. I have never ever seen anything like that in my classes. I do honestly wish we had something like that, it would certainly make life easier for all of us.

By the way, I do hope Utada Hikaru hurries up and releases her next English album soon, that way I'll have more advertising material to throw at my friends. Preferably before the year ends, but that's impossible.

The earliest she can finish up all her PR work for her Japanese album would be April. And I bet you that she hasn't finished half her album yet, which would take another couple of months. By then, it'll be October if she works quickly and the record label does everything fast. (Actually, I know absolutely NOTHING about these stuff, so all this is speculation.) Which means that by the time the lead single is released, it would be November/December, and the album would drop by the turn of the year. That is, IF she doesn't have anything like a tour, or some other work (ie another Japanese single in the middle of nowhere). Honestly, I think that the album would be released mid-2009. Which is a long way to go.

T3-6

Just to tell you, my attempt at not listening to Utada Hikaru has failed miserably.

Sigh...

Anyways, just to let you know, Utada Hikaru can be very weird sometimes. Like rolling around on her studio floor or wearing pyjamas to work.

I guess that's what happens when you have such success at a young age and nobody seems to dare want to upset you, because you have so much power.
That way, you don't have to worry that much about how people think about you.
And her public image of her is pretty innocent-yet-not-very-innocent, if you understand what I mean.

And she gets drunk a lot. And I mean a LOT.

Once she was talking about the production of ULTRA BLUE, she was probably extremely stressed, and got into a fight at a bar. Among other things.

T3-5

I have always had had a sneaking suspicion that bossa nova was my favourite genre of music.

Now I know it is.

I liked bossa nova ever since I first heard it, but I never knew it was called bossa nova. I did read some things about bossa nova, and I guessed that was what it was called, but I was never sure. After listening to some songs that were definetly bossa nova, I finally connected the two.

If that made any sense.

T3-4

Kelly: Hahaha I know.


I was reading a book about Asian American literature for my Japanese literature project, and the prejudice and stereotypes against Asians really surprised me. Sure, I knew that Japanese Americans and Chinese Americans always had had some prejudice against them, but to what degree I was really surprised. And it wasn't just the whites, though (although it mainly was), many Japanese and Chinese both were pretty prejudiced.

I don't think I can accurately portray the types and the degrees of discrimination against Asians, so I won't even bother trying.

Anyways, because none of my full-length blogs ever seems to stray from Utada Hikaru, I will be talking about her.

First of all, I sort of realized that I'm overplaying her songs way too much, so I'm trying to go for a Utada Hikaru's music-free week. That doesn't include news, though.
Anyways, the Recording Industry Association of Japan's prestigious (it is, because the rest are all flawed) Gold Disc Awards were presented, and not surprisingly, Flavor of Life became single of the year, and was in the top 3 or top 5 of all download categories, and took PC downloads of the year.

T3-3

I believe that I'm pretty naive when it comes to relationships, especially with friends.

I've never had any complex problems with friends in my life.

That's a good thing, I believe. For now.

T3-2 The Utada Hikaru HEART STATION singles blog

Ha.

Here are all the singles from Heart Station (not including the ones that I posted earlier, or Boku wa Kuma and Stay Gold). By the way, these are all from EMI, and they might not be the entire song.

Fight the Blues isn't actually a single, its only released to radio to promote the album.

Term 3 Blog 1

I've finally caught up on Utada Hikaru news lately.

Anyways, her latest album HEART STATION will have its Canadian debut on April 8th!

At a MUCH MUCH cheaper price than the Japanese version.

And Billboard has finally launched their Japanese chart. And now Oricon has a competitor!!!

Billboard now counts radio airplay in ADDITION to single sales, so now HEART STATION is second weekly rather than third weekly. It also has its second week at number one on radio charts.

However, it doesn't seem that digital sales are counted. If they were, I bet you that HEART STATION would be number one, even though Step and Go has some pretty showstopping sales.

88

Finally Done EVERYTHING.

Oh, and I saw the Vienna Boys Choir on Wednesday.
Those boys just opened their mouths and it sounded like they were nightingales.

Wow.

87

I now know why some people cry from too much stress.

For me, I don't.

I don't cry when I'm depressed either.

I just go and sit in the corner, like a stereotypical emo kid.

86

I don't really have anything happy or nice to say.

So I won't say anything.

85 SAKURA DROPS (performed by the Warsaw National Philharmonic Orchestra)

To Kelly: Yeah, I never knew that before either. I think they did it only because avex was paying them too, though.


Work work work work work
whine whine whine whine whine
complain complain complain complain complain

I don't want to work, but I don't mind whining and complaining.

84 First Love (performed by the Warsaw Philharmonic)

I like to whine on this blog. I can do so without any fear of people labeling me as a person who complains every second. Okay, fine, they might still so. But its completely voluntary to read this blog!

And no, I'm not trying to make you stop reading this.

But anyways, I had the worst math test ever so far. Well, at the very least in Grade 8/9. Its probably not as bad as the 60 something percent I got the second time I wrote that chapter test back in Grade 7.
I completely guessed 4 questions, and about 10 I really quickly 'completed', as in look at the answers, see which one was most probable, and filled in that blank.

Oh well.

Oh, and I'm just starting to study for English.

I spent the entire day doing two pages worth of French. Don't ask me how, it was just excruciating.

And I discovered that the Warsaw Philharmonic performed about 12 of Utada Hikaru's songs as part of a 13-disc collection on a Jpop collection by avex, I think. Which is surprising, considering that Utada Hikaru isn't an avex artist.

83 Kimi wa Su.te.ki.

A tiny little bit of the stress is coming back, but it isn't so bad right now.

Oh, and by the way, you probably realized that my blog is where I complain and whine all I want and nobody is allowed to say that I'm a whiner because if you read this it would be completely voluntary.
This is just so that I won't whine and complain all day to people in person.

Does that make sense?

Anyways, I am 'trying' to complete the Grade 10 piano exam, but, well...
Yeah.

I think I'll do it.

82 Glow

I think I had to worse piano lesson to date yet.

I was playing my Bach Prelude, and I was WORSE than the second week that I played it. And I've played it for 4 months now. I don't know what happened, my fingers seem to have no energy, and even now it is.

My piano teacher, at the end of the lesson was like 'Wow, keep up the practicing, Michael! How much do you practice, 30 minutes?'

She didn't sound sarcastic. Which meant that she was lying.

(And by the way, I practice 1 hour and 30 minutes, but usually only three times every week. Which explains why I'm so bad at it. But this week was exceptionally worse, but I practiced more than last week.)

81

I handed in my memory book today, and it was really really bad, come to think of it.

I can't exactly say it was creative at all, and it REALLY wasn't on topic, and I didn't even edit it. All of the entires are just a recorded version of my thoughts, and my thoughts don't tend to be organized, so some of them were quite confusing.

And the cover, well... More on that in term 3. If you see it now, you would probably be shocked, surprised, and you would probably have a huge paradigm shift. That is, unless you know the whole story, which at the earliest would be done in Term 3.

Oh, and the daily rankings for HEART STATION/Stay Gold are in.
HS/SG are in second place:
Step & Go - Arashi - 107,689 + 39,384 (x1.75) = 257,377
HS/SG - Utada Hikaru - 8,504 + 6,898 (x1.75) = 26,953

Those numbers are the index numbers, and then the multiplier shows the actual amount of units sold.

As you can see, there is no way HS/SG is going to take weekly second.

Then again, Utada Hikaru usually sell very consistently, and doesn't have such a sharp second week drop off. Plus, she has huge digital downloads, and Arashi doesn't have any. HS is at second and SG is at third place on iTunes Japan, so I'm not worried.

But her physical sales are spiralling down...

Then again, she has an album next month with both the tracks, so not much of a incentive to buy the single.

Also, Ken Hirai is in the same position, except I'm not sure about his single sales. They're weaker than Utada Hikaru's.

But, today, HS/SG has dropped to third. Now, all I'm hoping is that it ends up second weekly...

80 Jet Lag

Hong Kong is a very small place, yet socially has been quite isolated from other places in its region because of its language, culture, and China.



That's why Hong Kong has one entire entertainment industry all to itself.



Hong Kong is at the same time big enough of a market to support many different artists/actors/etc. and small enough to have all of them known by almost every member of the public.



There aren't that many media outlets, so everybody has to appear on one or two outlets that everybody is exposed to.



It's also why that there are some people that have been in the industry for so long they are part of the public consciousness, and when they leave us, the entire city seems to be in morning.



And that is what has happened with people like Roman Tam (died October 18, 2002 of cancer):

Wikipedia: Roman Tam, known by the stage name Lo man (羅文), nickname Law Kee (蘿記) was a renowned cantopop singer. He is regarded as the "Godfather of Cantopop".[1] In the far east, he is equivalent to the western world Frank Sinatra.

BBC: http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/asia-pacific/2342029.stm

Leslie Cheung (died April 1, 2003 from suicide due to depression):

Wikipedia: Leslie Cheung Kwok-Wing (September 12, 1956 – April 1, 2003), nicknamed elder brother (哥哥), [1][2][3][4] was an actor and musician from Hong Kong. Cheung was considered as "One of the founding fathers of Cantopop," and "combining a hugely successful film and music career". [5]
In 2000, Cheung was named Asian Biggest Superstar by China Central Television, and voted as The Most Favorite Actor in 100 Years of Chinese Cinema in 2005.[6][7]

Anita Mui (died December 30, 2003 of cervical cancer): Anita Mui Yim-fong was a popular Hong Kong cantopop singer and actress. During her prime years she received numerous awards and honours. She remained an idol through out most of her career and eventually became a music legend after her passing.

And on February 19, 2008, two days ago, Lydia Shum Din-Ha (沈殿霞) died.

Wikipedia: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lydia_Shum

Lydia Shum also has a daughter, Joyce Cheng, that was born and raised in Vancouver. Lydia Shum herself will be buried in Burnaby beside her mother, who died just weeks before her while she was still in hospital.

Leslie Cheung was also a Canadian citizen who lived in Vancouver.

79 Jigsaw Falling Into Place

Utada Hikaru's latest single, HEART STATION/Stay Gold has been released yesterday (or was it two days ago?), along with the tracklist for her HEART STATION album.

Oh, and some people are really upset with her HEART STATION, because 'all the singles seem to be clumped together', 'Niji-iro Basu is probably a children's song because its right next to Boku wa Kuma', and 'WHAT?!?!?! ANOTHER CHILDREN'S SONG? WHAT IN THE WORLD IS SHE THINKING?', and also 'WHAT?!?!?!?! Flavor of Life as a bonus track????'

And the album hasn't even been leaked yet; nobody has heard it.

And Utada Hikaru stated herself on her blog that she believes this album to be her best to date.

Some people are really pessimistic. Or, in other words, ignorant, stupid, and too narrowminded.

I was at Reach for the Top practice and the game today, and what I noticed was that everybody was very defensive and always thinking 'sheesh, how come that guy/girl didn't get that', and generally thinking that they're better than everybody else.
Not so with debate however, we're all much more nicer.

I guess it has something to do with the nature of these two activities and the people they attract.

78 Break The Ice

Come to think of it, these days have been better for me, in terms of sleep and ability to focus.

Anyways, I need to work on the memory book. I did some of it, but I still have quite a bit to do.

77 Kremlin Dusk

Apparently exercise can help you use up the adrenaline you produce from the regular stress you face from day to day. However, even after snowshoeing and tubing, I think I still have quite a bit of adrenaline left.

Anyways, the first airing of Utada Hikaru's HEART STATION promotional lives was aired today, on HEY!HEY!HEY! Music Champ. Its a music television program.

In Japan, all the major broadcasting networks (except for NHK which is government run) have a weekly music program where all the most popular artists in Japan go and perform, promoting their latest single/album/etc. They usually have very extravagant-looking sets, all for just one song, then they switch it all up for another song. Music Station, is, in my opinion, the most extravagant of them all. Her performance this time at HEY!x3 is not the most extravagant, but I guess is the norm of HEY!x3 performances.

Back in 2006 on her Utada United tour, she hurt some of her vocal chords, but opted not to do surgery because it would have changed her voice. Instead, she sang a different way, which, according to her easier, but sounds more raspy and less 'full' (I don't know which other way to describe it). She sounds better when she sang HEART STATION (however, I have a sneaking suspicion (keyword SUSPICION) that she just MIGHT have been lip-synching SOME of it. Not that parts she ad-libbed.)

76 Tokyo Nights

I opened my email today and there were 40 emails about tomorrow's rides.
If it was handled by my elementary school teacher, or even by a student, there would be one email, and everything would be done.
Simple, quick, and effective. And done in a much more polite manner.

Instead of bickering Grade 9's who were more immature than the Grade 4's.

Oh well, it was quite amusing to read the emails actually.

75 Nichiyou no Asa

I'm having trouble thinking of things to write today...

74 Nichiyou no Asa

I've been listening to Utada Hikaru's (who else??) 'Nichiyou no Asa', which translates as Sunday Morning.

It's quite a relaxing song, and not so upbeat.

I was listening it with the lights off and nobody around, and I felt more relaxed and in tune with myself.

Oh, and from now on, the blog titles will show which song is my favourite of the day. Since I gave up on the weekly top 10 anyways. And I do miss having blog titles.

73

Usually, when you're talking to somebody like a counsellor, you're supposed to feel really good afterwards, right?
For some reason, after talking to one, I felt terrible. However, on the other hand, I thought that the counsellor was awesome, and told me much more than what the other doctors and counsellors had told me.

Anyways, Amy Winehouse was the star of the Grammy's a couple of days ago. Which I didn't watch.
Oh well.

And from now on, I will finish all my work and start getting ready for sleep at 10:30.
I didn't really do anything I said I'll do before, but I think this is more easily acheivable.

72

Utada Hikaru's new HEART STATION music video!

This is considered somewhat of a landmark moment for some of her fans, as it is considered her first 'real' PV (promotional video) after her divorce.
Her husband, Kazuaki Kiriya, used to direct her music videos, but stopped after their divorce early in 2007. His videos were known for their creativity, and seemed like abstract art.
Since her divorce, she has had 4 PV's before Heart Station. Boku wa Kuma had a completely animated PV starring her teddy bear, Flavor of Life ~(Ballad Version)~ was a live PV of her recording the song in the studio, and Beautiful World/Kiss & Cry both had PV's that were just clips of the 'Evangelion: 1.0 You Are (Not) Alone' animated movie. So, none of them were considered 'real' (aka bearing some relevance to regular PV's) until HEART STATION.
Then, they still complained.
Quite a bit said that it was uninspiring, and boring.
However, some said that it was uninspiring and boring, while being deep, emotional, and touching at the same time.

Anyways, its only 7 days or so until her single is released, and a bit over month before her album hits the shelves!!!!

________________________________________
Yesterday, for the AMC 10 math contest, I filled out the scantron in pen. (I lent my pencil the day before to HLa and I didn't get it back.) Oh well. It's not an important contest anyway, since it probably won't have any affect on my eligibility for Math 10E.

And I really should start taking notes for debate...

71

Hm...

I dont know what to say right now.

Well, anyways, my iTunes play counts have been reset, and right now Leona Lewis's Bleeding Love and Utada Hikaru's Heart Station are the top two most played songs. They're both pretty good.

70

To Kelly: You're right. I haven't been able to do any of those things yet....

I WILL do it tomorrow!!!!

Now, I need to work on homework.

I sort of slept for 5 hours in the afternoon, so I didn't really get anything done...

69

I cant find anything to express my disappointment, sadness, and anger right now.

Anyways, the gist of it is that we ran out of ink. Then, the ink toner that my mum bought in Japan could not be 'recognized' by our printer.

!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

68

All of the things I mentioned on yesterday's blog will be done by Monday.

67

From now on, I will:
Do 30 minutes of meditation every morning
Do 30 minutes of yoga/other exercise every day
Complete a daily timetable
Complete a weekly to-do list
Create a list of priorities
Create a policy regarding distractors (such as games, Wikipedia, U*Blog, etc.)

66

From now on, I will stop talking about my science fair project and its progress to anyone.
For some reason, it seems that other people care about it way more than I do. And not in a good way at all.
Some people think that I'm very lucky to get an extension, and I'm sure they're quite jealous. Even though I haven't got an extension yet, and it doesn't matter me.
And some people think I just procrastinated, and that's why I didn't finish it.
One person went up to me and told me that if he was in my position, then maybe, just maybe, he would have worked harder. After that, he chuckled.
Yes. Exactly. Like I didn't consider that.

Okay, so that's the last you'll hear of my science project this year!

65

To Kelly: Actually, I haven't gotten an extension. And I highly doubt I will ever get one.

But, to be honest, I don't really care.
The project's only worth 20 percent, and I'm going to get 30% off if I hand it in on Monday, which I absolutely must, so that's only 6 % off the term mark. I'll probably be able to pull a B, albeit a very low one. Hopefully.

And I feel very very lucky to be just able to hand it in late. Later on in life, I probably won't be able to.

64

Everybody seemed to be more worried about the fact that I haven't handed in my science project than me.

I do appreciate the attention, but it makes me feel like an attention grabber. Well, I guess I am. Especially in my blog.

I talked to Miss Hu, she might give me an extension, but that is based on what Mr. Ehrmantraut says.
And I'm way way way WAY worse now than when I last saw him.
Last time I saw him, I was only having sleeping problems.
Now, I don't have that much sleeping problems at all, because I'm tired to a very high level 100% of the time, and I have difficulty concentrating on anything really, except for simple tasks like blogs. For example, I find it very hard to do conclusions, and actively listen and comprehend.

My head still feels so heavy....

63

Well...

Not much different today is from yesterday.

I'm probably going to hand in the science project a day or two late.

Or not at all.

62

I am sorely tempted to see if I can pull a B and not hand in my science project.
That would be a blessing...

Well, anyways, I'm not really in a position to work.

I can't think straight.

I can't even keep my head up.

I don't think I'll go to school tomorrow.

I didn't do anything for a full three hours because I couldn't concentrate at all and felt extremely weak.

I like to whine.

I like having a blog. It gives me a place to complain all I want.

I'm dizzy.

Okay.
I'm finish complaining now.

Well, all I have to do is my entire science project write up, which I'm not even anywhere near starting.

That's nice to know, isn't it?

61

I went a little bit crazy last night.

This morning I felt I was being tortured alive.

I honestly don't really care whether other people think I'm a whiner or not, because I'm still going to whine and annoy everybody who reads this blog.

(It's your fault. Except for Mr. Olson's.)

60

I predict that I will not be able to sleep well from tonight until at the very least Monday night.

I'll probably be too stressed to sleep well.

I tried doing some yoga this week, and it helped the first two times I did it, but even though I do feel slightly relaxed now after doing it, I'm still pretty tense.

59

I think I have some kind of 'stress multiplier'
Only I seem to be having sleep problems. (not that I just discovered this yesterday or something)
Hm.

The numbers are in.
http://www.emigroup.com/Press/2008/press9.htm
Utada Hikaru's Flavor of Life was the second best selling digital single this year, right behind Avril Lavigne's Girlfriend.

Still, it is the best selling single ever in Japan, and best digital seller from an Asian artist.

For a single to sell like that and not be popular in the anglosphere is practically unheard of.

58

This is probably going to be one of the few blogs where I talk about an artist other than Utada Hikaru.

Its The Last Goodnight!
I've blogged about them before, and there latest single, "Stay Beautiful" (I presume), is awesome.

57

I couldn't resist yesterday.
I listened to Utada Hikaru's Hayatochi (remix) from her Distance album.
Well, I only listened to it twice, so it was okay. But I still couldn't sleep because I slept in the afternoon.

56

I've learnt that I cannot listen to any popular song for the last two hours before I sleep.
The day before yesterday, my head kept on playing Utada Hikaru's 'Can You Keep A Secret?' and 'Movin'on without you'. Then, yesterday, it kept playing Lily Allen's 'Littlest Things'.

Radiohead's In Rainbows should be okay though.
I really like it, although none of the tracks seem to jump out at me and scream 'single material

Utada Hikaru's second English album, Exodus, at first was very very unappealing to me. I sort of hated it'. But now, after giving the songs a couple more listen, I've begun to like it, especially Kremlin Dusk and Devil Inside.

Her latest album, due to be released on March 19th, will also be called HEART STATION.

55

I don't know what to write.
...

Well, I'm listening to Radiohead's In Rainbows.

54

(Its blog 54 because I forgot to name yesterday's blog)

Today I had pretty much the worse piano lesson of my life.
I'm pretty sure it was because of lack of sleep, but my teacher had to spend 15 minutes teaching me the F sharp minor formula scale. 15 MINUTES!!!! And I'm in grade 10 piano. Usually, only people learning it the first time would need to, so that would be like in Grade 6 or even lower. UGH!!! And even they don't need 15 minutes!!! Last week she planned to give me 5 scales to practice, which is really little, and then she had to reduce it to 2 because I wasn' t doing so well. And now today she was going to give me the rest, which was three. And I couldn't even do 1.

...

Well, today I went to the Cannery restaurant (I forgot the name) by the Port of Vancouver (at least, that's what I think it was).
It was quite nice to eat there, I enjoyed it.
I don't usually go to western restaurants often.

I couldn't help it, I started listening to popular music again.
This is the commercial for Recochoku downloads, which is a mobile downloading service in Japan., featuring Utada Hikaru's HEART STATION.

And she's dressed up as Kuma Chang, her humongous teddy bear.
I'm not sure if I said this before, but a while ago, she posted a video on her blog. In it, she is dressed up as Kuma Chang, and visits the EMI Music Japan office. Obviously, movement inside that suit is very very hard, so it was a bit of fun to watch her try to move around, especially when she tried to push the elevator button, but the garbage can was blocking her and her hand was too big.

She paid for the entire video, the suit, and all the staff herself.

52

I tried my best not to listen to any popular music for the last three days, but I sort of failed.

On the first day, I listened to Utada Hikaru's Kremlin Dusk.

The second day, I listened to Utada Hikaru's You Make Me Want To Be A Man.

And now I'm listening to Sarah Bareilles' Love Song.

51

Pre-IB testing was today.
I think I did okay.
Except that not sleeping does have its disadvantage; I couldn't figure out one math question, and was stuck on it for a long time.
Oh well.

And I did talk to Mr. Ehrmantraut already.

Augh....
I feel sleepy and tired and I don't think I can sleep and I have quite a fair bit of homework due tomorrow!!!!!!!

50

I think I'm very pathetic.
Yesterday I went to the doctor about the sleep problems that I have, and apparently they were all related to stress.
I don't understand why I'm really that bad.
First of all, almost everybody is feeling very stressed in this period (even though I started to not sleep well by the end of December). I know realistically I won't be getting marks that are too low. My family is so normal there's not a single bad thing about it. Nobody has been giving me any pressure at all.
And I know many people who are going through the same thing at school, except with much worse circumstances.
Sigh.

Oh, and I think Mr. Ehrmantraut has some sort of misconception that I am a very good student who is not yet a perfectionist but seems to get things done on time but chooses not to do some homework. Its not that, really, I don't do my homework because I don't seem to have enough time and procrastinate.
He might also think that I have some deeper inner problem that I'm not telling him that's causing all this stress.
Well, I don't.


At the very least, the problems aren't that bad.

49

To Kelly: Thanks!!! But you're still like way better than me in practical... And more advanced than me in theory...

I do have to go do my work very soon, as the social project is due tomorrow and I haven't really done much, but just a quick question to Mr. Olson.

About how many Middle Years student have had some kind of problem relating to too much stress?

Thanks!

48

I'm so addicted to HEART STATION and Stay Gold now that even without the internet and radio I'm still not doing work. Well, at the very least, they don't distract me from doing so much work.
And now there is no way I'm going to forget what 'shitte iru' means in Japanese (it means 'to know'). It was in the lyrics of HEART STATION.

By the way HEART STATION/Stay Gold is currently my favourite single, and definetly my favourite from her latest album. I'm not sure if it can hold out against Hikari, though.

But 'Distance [m-flo remix]' is an awesome song too, from her 'Final Distance' single.

As of now on my iTunes, Stay Gold, of which I have twice on the list, is tied for second with Rosette's Crushed (of which I never heard of) at 34 play counts.

I'm trying to remember which songs I listened to the most in 2007, and which were the best.

Number 1 definetly has to be '2 Hearts' by Kylie Minogue, it was for sure number 1 on my iTunes list, on twice on the weekly charts I did, and once it was the song of the week.

Number 2 would probably be Do You by Ne-Yo featuring Utada. It was also on the weekly charts once, and second on my iTunes list.

The rest would all be a tie for third.

Artist number 1 would be Utada Hikaru. Not much doubt about that. She had at the least one song that was in my top ten of the week.

Second would be Corinne Bailey Rae, which had the most played album on my iTunes, and at the very least three appearances on the weekly songs list.

Third would be Esthero because she is just awesome.

Fourth would be Maroon 5 for having the second most played album on my iTunes, and one appearance on the weekly songs list, and having one of my favourite songs, 'Sunday Mornings'.

Fifth would be Bran Van 3000 because they are just awesome.

47

Yesterday was another crazy sleep day.
I slept from 5-9 pm, and then slept from 5-9am.

This is really not working well...

46

Anonymous/Vivian: Haha, no, it was Nicky. Is that how you spell his name?

Oh, I just realized that today is Utada Hikaru's birthday.

Sometimes I feel guilty listening to Stay Gold and Heart Station...
Anyways, it appears that the leaks were from the promo CD sent to radio stations throughout Japan.

I'm sleeping very late every day now. Although sometimes I do sleep in the afternoon, I usually don't get enough sleep. Its mostly due to homework and piano, and I don't even finish my homework and piano practice.

And I'm really beginning to hate Chinese homework with a passion once again. I remember that when I was very young, in those homework free days of primary elementary school, I absolutely dreaded doing Chinese homework, and my parents and my relatives sometimes would have to sit me down, watch me do it, or 'ground' me until I finished it. Well, my parents never ever grounded me.

Oh, and I just checked my theory mark after forgetting about it for a couple of weeks. I got 98 on my Grade 2 Rudiments, but they still haven't scanned it yet.

45

For some reason, a classmate of mine in PE and I felt just exactly the same thing about PE. We both used to really really like it, then because of today we didn't like it, and it wasn't because our teacher came back, or anything like that. And he didn't eat anything the entire day, and I didn't sleep well last night (I slept at 1:00, although I went to bed at 11:00).
He wasn't the kind of person that I'd thought I'd be close friends with, though.
I do admit that this conversation changed my image of him somewhat, and he did pay me back 20 cents for 17 cents which he owed me a long time ago.
I know that 17 cents is a small amount, and with close friends I would just let it go, but if I did expect you to give it back, you better give it back.
And if you were in that category of people, I would make it clear that I wanted you to pay it back. I usually don't bother with nice formalities and words like ',Oh, its no rush,' or things like that.

I said 'yeah, me too', like I regularly do. Sometimes people might think I'm just not listening and doing that to keep the conversation going, but I wasn't.

Oh, and when I don't say anything, it does not imply that I agree with what you're saying, it either means that I know you're not going to change your mind no matter what, or its just annoying. This only applies if you're one of my peers, though.

And now for the inevitable part about Utada Hikaru.
I've read her translated 'HEART STATION' lyrics, and they are awesome. They are just in another league compared to popular music in English.
However, I would say that's because of language differences, because UH's English lyrics are... different. And she herself said that Japanese is more of a flowery language, and if you just directly translate English lyrics to Japanese, it would end up very vulgar.

Those lyrics are just really really nice. They're like a poem, except one that doesn't take too much thinking to understand what they mean.

Darn, I can't paste things onto this blog.

44

These couple of days actually have been quite tough for me.
I'll get through...there's worse coming up. Maybe not tomorrow, but soon.

I've been so focused on Utada Hikaru that I've forgotten all about Ken Hirai.
Anyway, he has a new album and a new single coming out around the same time as Utada Hikaru's.
Heck, I even forgot the names, and release date.

Oh, and apparently somebody got a hold of HEART STATION (UH's new single) before it was released on radio. Its been posted on YouTube. Don't worry, its already been reported, but as of now, it hasn't been taken down yet. Its nice, I think. A bit more lighter than Stay Gold, or any of her singles so far, but not including 'Boku wa Kuma' (I am a Bear), which was a children's song.

43

Yesterday was a bit disappointing for me.
I had science first block, and we had a test. There was this one question where everyone else I asked got right and I got it wrong.
It wasn't exactly something I could study for though; it wasn't really covered.
Basically, the question was whether or not HCI or H2O was an ionic bond.
In our notes, it stated that an ionic bound was between a non-metal and a metal. None of the options included a metal. Apparently, though, the answer was HCI because they don't share electrons in the Bohr diagram.
HCI is hydrochloric acid, so that makes it an ionic bond. On one of the worksheets, though HOH (which is H2O) was called hydrogen hydroxide.
Oh whatever.

I wasn't feeling all that well that day either.

At the end of the day, though, in English, I got a pretty good mark on the presentation we had before the break though. I can honestly say I was very surprised.
Oh whatever.

42

Yesterday was crazy.
I woke up at 12:00, took an afternoon nap from 5:00-9:00, and then slept at 5:00AM, and woke up at 9:11 AM (sorry, I missed your class!!) I couldn't sleep again!
Now I'm, tired, sick (cold), and stressed (probably because I didn't sleep enough).

I've also realized that I act very weirdly when I don't have enough sleep. I won't say what I've done, but its definitely not something you'd expect me to do.

41

My mom came back today!
Now I need to go study for science.

39/40

Blog 39
I feel that I have failed to apply the lessons I've learnt from the last couple years of my schooling into my life, particularly with time management and goal setting.
I resolve to do that tomorrow.
Or maybe Sunday.
Or maybe next week.
Sigh.

Blog 40
I really didn't do much today.
And the Chinese test was disappointing. Well, it wasn't disappointing, but I really didn't do that well.
However, I don't think I really care that much anymore.

EDIT:By the way, Utada Hikaru's latest album will be released on March 19th. Its not official from EMI, but its official from Tower Records, which is pretty reliable.

EDIT:Okay, nevermind, EMI updated their website.
Sometimes it seems that Utada Hikaru is carrying the success of the entire Japanese branch of EMI on her shoulders.

38

Last night there was a lot of homework I had to do, and I finished most of the important Japanese ones. Except that I forgot to bring one.
I am seriously wondering whether or not I can get an A in Japanese this term...

Okay, I really better go now.

37

The IB info session was sort of intimidating...
It'll be pretty hard to get good marks.

Anyways, I am really really far behind on Japanese...
Missing one day makes a LOT of difference.
Same thing with math, but I don't care that much about it.

36

Have to do a lot of work today and tomorrow and the day after.
That's what happens when you procrastinate bit by bit and then it turns into hours.

35

To AS teacher:
Sorry I wasn't there for class today!!!!
I woke up at 9:30 today, either because my alarm clock didn't ring, or it rang and I pressed it down and went back to sleep with no memories of it ringing.

And the day before that was even worse. I went to bed at 11:00, couldn't sleep, so woke up to get something to eat, slept after 12:30, woke up at 4:00, ate something, couldn't sleep, ate something again, then slept after 5:30. The alarm clock probably rang, but I woke up at 10:10, immediately fell asleep again, then woke up at 11:30.

My Japanese teacher was surprisingly sympathetic when I told her I had sleeping problems. She even went on to recommend something for me. Her husband also had sleeping problems too.

By the way, Stay Gold has managed to surpass all the other songs that I added on the iTunes chart within two days. Its now at 28 plays, beating out Kylie Minogue's 2 Hearts.

34

Maybe I'll figure out those Whistler blogs once I get my hands on some pictures...
Probably not, though.

By the way, on my iTunes, the radio rip version of Stay Gold 18 plays practically overnight. That's a record for me, even Rihanna's SOS only got 11 plays in one day. Now 'Stay Gold' is at 21 plays, tie for third with Maroon 5's Can't Stop and Sunday Morning, but behind Ne-Yo and Utada's 'Do You' and Kylie Minogue's '2 Hearts'.

Maybe one of these days when I can't think of anything to blog about I'll say which songs I liked the best for the last couple of months.