Longest. Day. Ever.

Forget about the whole “days get longer in the summer” deal. I just experienced the longest day ever… Quite literally, it was well more than 24 hours. I’m too tired to count it all up, but a quick estimate shows it to be around 40 hours in all. How did I pull this off, you may be asking? I’ll tell you, the International Date Line, she is a bitch. Our plane left Hong Kong at approximately 10:30AM on March 30th, and, after a 5 hour layover in Tokyo, Japan, we landed in Honolulu, Hawaii, at 7:00 AM the same day… OW.

So, what did I do with my extra big day? Quite a bit, of course. Waking up early sucked hard, especially since I’d stayed up until about 1 that morning. It was worth it, however, because in the extra time I had in Hong Kong’s airport, I picked up the one, the only, the tape-deck that is far superior to 6 construction trucks, SOUNDWAVE. WAHOO!!! Oh, and Lazerbeak, or Condor, as the Japanese box declared. WHEE! I’m pretty sure that I can’t pick this guy up in the States, so he was well worth the $505HK – about $65US – at the time. He is an absolutely awesome Transformer, even if he is just a reissue from the 80’s. He can fit Lazerbeak, or any other Transformers Cassettes I have, in his chest compartment, but that was to be expected. The big surprise for me, actually, was that his guns, both the shoulder mounted thing and a cylindrical missile launcher, both “transform” into AA batteries to power Soundwave as a tape deck. As a tape deck, the only way I can describe his form is ‘tight’, both as a synonym for awesome, and as in, not loose. He just sits there, you know, like a little box, being awesome. It rocks.

Anyway, after the short hop over to Tokyo, we meandered around for a little bit. Little Clara took to walking like she’d been doing it all her life, and apparently the only thing holding her back was the tight spaces of the hotel rooms we had been staying in. Also, at the gift shop, I picked up another Transformer I didn’t recognize at all, actually: Skids, so now I have an Autobot to bow before the majesty of Soundwave. Er, I mean, heroically defeat him, of course! I also managed to pick out the one thing I had been unable to locate in China: manga in English. It’s a bilingual edition of Love Hina 1, the story about a 19-year-old HS graduate who is trying to pass the entrance exams to Tokyo University, where his true love was supposedly waiting for him. He has failed for almost 2 years now, with his abysmal grades making it seem hopeless for him. His parents finally got fed up and kicked him out, and here the story begins, with him arriving at his grandmother’s hot springs hotel, hoping for a little charity, only to discover that the hotel is now a girl’s dorm! Full of very good looking young ladies, too boot! After a series of misunderstandings, the lucky guy (who I’m too lazy to look up the name of right now) is given the job of caretaker or the facility while his grandmother is off on a globe trotting adventure. Yep, you pinned me, I’m a sucker for Girls Manga, it seems, though this one is a lot more male oriented than Chobits was, plus I read Megatokyo and .Hack//Twilight, so I’m not ALL girl, or w/e. Anyway, that’s enough of that.

The plane ride from Tokyo to Honolulu was aboard a nice 777, complete with personal view screens, and so on. I got to watch a couple of movies. Loony Tunes: Back in Action was alright, as was The Rundown, though neither was “Oscar Quality.” Who wants to watch Oscar Quality on an airplane, anyway? Actually, I did watch Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon on my last trip to Hawaii. It was n the way back actually, and the movie really wasn’t easy to follow along with. Subtitles plus tiny screen equals no good. Meanwhile, the two today were just stupid fun. I didn’t even pay much attention to The Rundown, actually, because I found Zelda to be more entertaining, while The Rock did his thing as a background to my Hyrulian adventure. On further evaluation, though, I need to stop passing up the complimentary head phones, and claiming that “I have my own. While it’s true that I do, they hurt more than the old ones did, because they clamp onto your earlobes with springs… They’re not that bad, and I like them because they will easily fit into a pocket, unlike most hard-form head phones. The ones I got are the Sony “W.EAR” ones, or “H.EAR” or something. They’re round, and have detachable covers to make them look schnazzier. “Yay” for non-endorsed plugs.

Anyway, I got to Hawaii safe and sound, and somehow before I had taken off that morning. It was odd to know that after all that traveling, I had to live out another day still. Oh well. I did manage to get in a shower, a nap, a trip to the beach, another shower, and still some time to chat on the computer. Oh, and for those of you interested, the time difference between here and Texas is four hours, New York is 5 hours, and California is 2 hours. I have yet to meet anyone online who lives in the Mountain Zone, though, which is odd… someone had better move there.

Ah yes, I told you this was something I considered to be the best day of my life. I got Soundwave, and successfully completion of my goal for the Japanese airport (getting a manga book). Being in Hawaii is another plus, but the REAL big news, I guess, is that… I GOT ACCEPTED INTO COLLEGE!!! Texas Tech, to be precise, among others, but TT is where I’m going. I’ve currently got Matt researching what all needs to be done to make me his roommate next year, which will kick ass. We will have quite possibly the 1337357 dorm out there, and definitely one of the most sleep-in-iest. O.0 W00t.

Oh, and a quick note on hotel accommodations, the one thing dampening this otherwise perfect day. I’m stuck sharing a room with my grandfather and Uncle David. First off, having my own room in Hong Kong after PJ and Danny left was a very nice thing, even if it was just for 2 nights, and now I’m jammed into a room with two people again, and stuck on the rollaway again and this time, they’re both older, and more uptight (although PJ could be a little annoying on his own, riding my ass about how I’m always on the computer, and how I couldn’t get into college. On the one hand, I’m glad that he can’t make fun of my non-college-ness EVERY DAY anymore, but on the other hand, “Can you spell ‘COLLEGE’”, which he said at the dinner table, was really quite funny. Sorry PJ, if you’re reading this, but the joke is only funny in moderation.) And the worst part – Uncle David snores. Ugh.

Okay, here’s a trivia note, this is the second blog I wrote in Word instead of just in the Blogger page like usual. The reason? The stupid guard downstairs didn’t want me plugged into the wall there, and that’s where the internet is in this damned hotel, so I’m only getting one hour bursts on the ‘net. Oh well… See you guys later!