Uh oh.
It may or may not be a good thing that I’ve learned how to animate my own images, as you will probably be seeing my blog flooded with these types of shots pretty soon (much to the dismay of those who get easily annoyed by pictures of yours truly — just another conveniently accessible form of torture for my biggest fans! XD).

Here’s this zombie board game that I convinced myself into picking up about a month or two ago.  I have yet to play it!  Which sucks because it’s a game that you’re supposed to play with a bunch of people, right?  And I keep telling myself crap like, “Yay, I’m in San Francisco now and there are nerds everywhere! Everyone will totally want to play this with me!” But my dumb ass keeps leaving it at home.

… And also, I just keep thinking that if I bring it out with me, people will look at me like I’m crazy.

“Cheri, we’re at a party, and you want to play a zombie board game? … Uhhhhh.” Hahaha-haaaa. Sigh.

Cheeeese!
If you didn’t know already, I am very much a PS3 gamer.  I personally believe that the PS Online community is much nicer (and definitely more mature) than the XBOX Live community.  In my experience, gamers on PS3 will actually make an effort to talk to you versus cursing at you, throwing around racial slurs, or making rude jokes & comments like they typically do on 360.  This isn’t to say that all of XBOX Live is full of douchebags, but c’mon — you have to admit that the majority of players on that system are fairly rude.

Before moving to San Francisco, I basically had no one to play with (as I come from a very small town where “gaming” isn’t a huge part of the area’s culture).  PSOnline was basically the only place where I could make friends who were into what I was into and not feel like a total dweeb for preferring to play Call of Duty rather than go out drinking.

It’s different here in the city where I am obviously surrounded by tech-loving and geek-culture-embracing folks, but I still prefer my PS3 for my online friend-making, heh.

Trucker hats!  I feel so gangsta when I throw this on.  It’s my only “baseball cap” type of accessory, as I normally feel like these don’t look very good on me, haha!

XD!! These are just shots from yesterday of me showing off my makeup (since it’s been a while since I’ve done anything as colorful as this — waddap, MakeupByCheri YouTube fans!!).  I am typically neutral with my eyeshadow colors, as I don’t like to look too “unnatural” and shock people when they see me without a fully painted face, ha.  So throwing on a little pink & purple was a fun experiment!

Also, I totally realize that this entry is completely scatter-brained and not at all up to par with the typical posts here on my blog. Sorry! XD

Rich and I seriously hang out, like … What — 3 or 4 times a week?
Which is amazing, actually, because I am such a freaking hermit that I almost never leave my apartment.  I don’t care who’s calling me or inviting me to come out — I typically refuse to leave the comfort of my room.  And there’s actually only a few people that I do go out with now and then, and it’s only because I’ve hung out with them enough to feel more comfortable & safe around them.  But other than that … If I don’t know you very well, and you’re not persistant?  I probably will never hang out with you unless we’re in a large social situation. -_-” I suppose I enjoy my privacy?

Anyway, since moving to the city, Rich has quickly become one of my best friends and is definitely the first person I think to call if I need company, or if I am feeling gloomy (I wonder if he’ll be completely embarrassed by this entry, haha).  Which is nice because, well, moving to this huge new world three months ago, I knew practically no one.  I felt uncomfortable, I felt unsafe, and I was definitely nervous about exploring the city on my own.

Rich was the one who showed me around when I first got here.  And actually, he’s also the person who’s really helped me to reconnect with all of the geeky, nerdy shit about myself that I pretty much kept as my dirty little undercover secret back when I lived in Stockton (for fear of being ostracized in a tiny town).

Rich is even the one who introduced me to Death Note which, if you’ve been keeping up with me, is my obsession.  I’ve seriously watched the entire anime series with him from start to finish (god, we sound so lame, LOL), and I’ve just now seen the live action movies (totally cried my eyes out, by the way).  Now I just have to read the entire manga and watch the spin off series, which Rich happens to have collected and never seen himself. LOL!

I. Love. Death Note.
And I’m sure he feels like he’s created a monster.
Lmfao.

He’s also the person who has really helped motivate me into getting back into my art.  He’s a huge comics and art fan (seriously, you should see his collection of stuff — everything from figurines to prints to entire collections of graphic novels and comics — his apartment is like freaking geek heaven, and I could seriously spend forever there just going through the amazing junk he probably hasn’t touched in I don’t know how long), so we’ll sit there and spend forever just critiquing and talking about it (we flipped through James Jean’s book of 75 Fables Cover Art Illustrations, and pretty much thoroughly discussed each painting).  And it doesn’t feel like a competition, y’know?  Like, it’s not this “who knows more” verbal battle or anything that I’ve experienced with other know-it-all-artists in the past.  It’s just this mutual appreciation for a subject that we’re both passionate about, and it’s incredibly freeing.

He’s also introduced me to the world of comics shops.
AND IT’S AWESOME! There are so many comic book shops in the city!  Holy crap!

Check out these horrible cellphone pictures I took while out and about with him:

Harleyyy! My favorite villain ever.
If you didn’t know, I’m not so much a Super Hero fan as I am a Super Villain fanatic.  I would totally collect villain figurines! This one is particularly amazing.  Heh. But uh … Just a bit expensive. :3

Poison Ivy!!  Also freaking awesome.  My second favorite villain and, coincidentally, also from Batman. Heheh.

CUTE MINIATURE THINGS, AAAAAAHHH *Geeking out*!! I want them all!!
They’re so freaking adorable!! I didn’t know they had these things in comics shops! I’m obsessed with tiny shit. X_x Omg. Lmao. Want.

There’s everything from fingertip sized chocolate cakes to full plates of sushi rolls as small as a marble. I WANT!! I’m seriously going to start collecting these, hahaha! XD Can’t help it. Just want them. Don’t know why — just do. Tiny things … So … Cute … No one will stop me! BAHAHAHAHAHAHA!

… Calming down, now.

Hanging out in comic shops, talking nerd smack with Rich, surrounding myself with people in the tech and games industry, putting all of my effort into pursuing a career in some sort of related field — It feels good to just be myself, y’know? It feels good to not feel like a loser for digging anime, or manga, or video games, or art, or be obsessed with the internet, with social media, technology, with networking, or any of the other dopey crap that I used to be ashamed of liking back home. :/

I never want to go back.
I feel like I don’t fit in there.
I don’t feel happy in that environment.

But here … Here, I can be myself, and no one makes fun of me.
In fact, I can actually be successful for being a geek here, ha! Amazing how that works, right? Opportunities galore. I love San Francisco!

So yeah.  If you’re not following Rich on Twitter, you should.  Because number one, he’s awesome sauce.  Number two, I just told you to.  And number three … Uhhh. What else. He’s the shit? And I adore him?  And I just wrote a ton of crap about him because I appreciate him to death?  And if you do follow him on Twitter by my recommendation, be sure to tell him I had you do it! XD I’m sure he’ll love that.

Anyhoo, here ya go — have a few more vain pictures of me.
I seem to collect them in my cellphone. :3

Yeeeeah.
This is a fairly picture-intensive post, isn’t it? :3

And finally, some of my recent art for your enjoyment.
Can you tell I’m left handed from my anatomy practice sketch? Ha.

Oh! And I made Vodka Gummy Bears last night by following the instructions on this website! And uh … They were pretty strong. Lmao. I can see myself liking them if I actually liked the taste of vodka, but uh, I don’t. So … Maybe these aren’t for me. Lol.

Luckily, there’s also a Skittles Vodka recipe that I plan on trying next. ;)

One of my best friends from back home also came up to visit me recently, and I miss her so much! Having her up here definitely helped remind me who I was (I miss all of my amazing, gorgeous, and crazy friends), and it sucked so hard to have her go. :(  Fortunately, she’s almost as camera-obsessed as I am, so naturally we took a bunch of pictures together to commemorate her visit, haha.

The exciting thing about learning how to animate things (I’m sure I’ll get more creative in time — these are just little test examples of me experimenting with it) is that I can now probably make simple animations for my artwork as well! Won’t that be exciting?! Can you imagine what I’ll come up with?!

… Knowing me, it will probably be something perverted.
O_o … *Whistles innocently*

Don’t mind me,
XOXO Cheri XOXO