aoi_no_neko

Since I'm in the thralls of moving, I thought it would be good to note it's a busy time.

But I do have something someone might be interested in.  Remember that book I won?  Well if you want to try to win one, there is one more chance.  Just go to Serge the Concierge's blog for the details.

http://www.sergetheconcierge.com/2009/11/cooking-and-manga-on-menu-for-our-everyday-harumi-book-contest-part-3.html

From what I can tell, he's looking for cooking related manga?  All I can say is if I could enter again I might mention Yakate!! Japan...

I don't know if this has been posted anywhere and I didn't see an announcement on the site.  I just figured this out by poking around.

Now at the top of the site there is a web search bar.



Well according to this help link  http://pupe.ameba.jp/cute/help?code=ribbon#searchStampHelp
we can now spam  help poupee get lots of money from google lots of hits for searches on google

Basically you can click on one of the little "hot words" under the bar and it opens a google search page.  Each time you do that you get a number in one of the flowers.  This goes up to three which turns into a flower "stamp".  I guess you do this three days in a row and you get ten ribbons.  Just like a mechanical turk except you get ribbons instead of cash. 

I think I've been on the internet too long.  I'm becoming cynical.

http://www.sergetheconcierge.com/2009/11/julie-is-the-winner-of-crepes-in-japan-everyday-harumi-book-contest-part-2.html

But take a look at this, something did happen the other day.

Funny, me winning a Japanese cook book.  There is synchronicity in the world. 

No this isn't going to be a rant post.  It's more me trying to put my thoughts into words about how eBay is failing to handle things to make it a better site for sellers.  I'm going to attempt to put these into points because I do want to develop this further elsewhere.  I do think the issues I am seeing affect not only sellers but buyers.  Because of the way sellers have been treated, there are far less and they are less willing to work with buyers. 

There are several issues that I see not only myself but others discussing.  One has been talked about but I've yet to see it from the end result of the change.

My first concern is something I've realized over time.  For a long time now a vocal number of people have been knocking eBay sellers claiming they are bad.  Now I will be the first to admit there were people selling on eBay who were not good.  But I believe the majority of eBay sellers did not fall in this group. 

I realize that there will always be someone who bitches, and with the internet they can get lots of attention.  What is the real problem with this is that eBay took up this belief and promoted it.  They went on and on about how since sellers are bad they are not going to let sellers leave negative or neutral feedback.

Did this solve the problem?  I don't think so.  First, bad sellers will continue to make up fake accounts and build up positive feedback so then they can rip off sellers.  Also many of these people also use other venues like Live Journal and bulletin boards to continue to rip people off.   As someone who never ever used feedback to manipulate others, I found it offensive to see the number of people who claimed sellers did this.  And even more troublesome that eBay was also saying this.  I don't remember ever as a buyer having a seller do this to me.  So I do not think it was the major problem that was claimed.  There were better ways to deal with those sellers than punishing all sellers and putting out negative information that ruined the ability for many to sell on eBay.  I still wonder as a company how could they have afforded to do that?  Why are they as a business putting down those who are the backbone, the source of income?

This leads to the second problem created by eBay.  The inability to tell anything from Feedback any more.  I won't get into troll buyers who purposely bid in order to cause problems for sellers.  Yes this is a real problem that is not being dealt with.  But the thing I want to write about is the fact that there is no longer a way to tell if a buyer is a flake or just someone who might be having a problem at the moment but normally pays timely.  This was expected but I don't think I realized just what a problem it would be.

This is the outcome of the lack of negative and neutral feedback.  As a seller, it helped a lot to be able to see it.  If there wasn't any I was more willing to attempt to communicate with the buyer in hopes they would pay me.  I would delay filing unpaid bidder disputes.  If I saw they were a flake I had no problem blocking them from buying more, relisting my item and proceeding to collect back my fees.

Right now I have an item that has not been paid for.  It has been four days and according to eBay rules I should be able to start filing for Unpaid Bidder.  But their system isn't letting me even though it says I have to wait till 11/2, which is today.  Beyond this, the guy's feedback is 100% and I have no way of telling if he is a flake or is having problems.  This makes it much harder for me as a seller to do a good job and treat customers well.  I guess this is the outcome of the very bad decisions made by eBay.

Thank you for reading this.  I've been wanting to speak about these things but it's taken till now to do it in a fashion that made sense and was not a rant.

Eh, pretend those are little skeletons below.  Some day I will finally get a paper mache' one.



Continued my tradition of going to Target the day after Halloween.  I should have probably looked at the Halloween stuff when I was there before the holiday, because I would have passed the day after then.  Last year's designs were better.  Although the monsters were kind of cute but not what I was looking for. 

So I got a couple of the Skelanimals figures.  Was suprised they are hollow and thin plastic.  Hope the paint lasts on them.  That and some "gourmet" malt balls were the extent of my discount items.  It was a little funny that there were piles of bagged candy by the scanners in the aisle.  Seems it wasn't marked down and people were not happy about it.

Oh the mug is a Fiesta mug, one of the few pieces I am keeping.

Laughing at the Poupee Girl contest, sooooo many black and orange outfits. I don't usually write about the site here any more, but just have to pimp out mine because I put her in the Halloween Contest.

  Turns out she is in Block A if you can get past all those ones in the same outfits.  Let's just say it's my shout-out to VW and Ai Yazawa.  Rock on!

While things here may be inbetween, there is one thing for sure, somewhere there is always a little Halloween.

Would have posted this earlier but had to do the shipping packages things. Trying to figure out why I feel like eBay has been partially responsible for the "sellers are bad" stuff that has been floating around for some time.

Anywho, this may not be the most exciting photo ever. But it's the start of what went into my pasta the other night...



The point being is the Presto Pasta Night blog post is up and hee hee, my pasta is up near the top!

Presto Pasta Night at Girlichef 

Take a look if you want, there is some good looking food in there!

Young brag about all they have now, all they had when they were kids.

But I had one thing they didn't.



Irreplaceable.

Well, for some strange reason I feel the need to post that Black Phoenix Alchemy Lab has their Yule Scents out now, plus some Eldritch Misatonic Valley Yule scents (funny after all these years I still know how to spell Eldritch. Darn Old Ones never leave you, they are like ichor that never ceases.)

Black Phoenix Alchemy Yules

Paging Ms. Laragoth aka Dany, if you scroll on down that ol' list you might see something that would make the perfect Christmas gift for Redd.  Yup, it's back!

Thus is why I felt the need to post this list of sniff o' fun.  And to make this totally worthwhile, here's a photo again of my boyfriend *cough* doing his best to advertise for the BPALian Folks.



Damn I love that soap, hope they have it this year.  And all this makes me think I really need to unburden myself of the mass quantity of limiteds, prototypes and such with a post of doom here since a few other things are crawling along too slowly right now.  Blame my two weeks of critical insomnia on this insane post.  I may follow it up by letting the imps loose.  You have been warned.

 



















Last night went from this...
to this!
Squash, onions, roma tomatoes, mushrooms and spices with a bit of cheese top Hello Kitty pasta. Hey, it's good pasta. I don't know where I got this recipe but have been making it for a few years. Squashes are in season and this is a great way to fill up when the weather starts getting cooler.

 

















I'm thinking of entering this into the Pesto Pasta Round-Up for the first time.
Presto Pasta Nights
Will update with a link if I do!

Thanks to all the nice compliments I received for my recent food posts, I decided to attempt something.  A Bento Challenge.  Now everyone is into bento lately, which is funny to me since I was making this type of meal ten years ago to take to work for lunch.  Just wasn't with all the cute stuff that people use.  I think what I use to do influenced me as to what I did for this one.  I didn't want to buy stuff so I used what I have here at home.  And I wanted it to be a bit more natural, no cheese or luncheon meats or candies. 

Okay, attempted a cooking challenge last night even though I was dead tired. Haven't slept much in a week but did a little better last night. So the challenge was to cook at least two vinegar based things from the Washoku cookbook by Elizabeth Andon. Now I love this cookbook because after having experienced a few authentic Japanese meals I realized there is something more to real Japanese cooking. While I discovered on my own the use of fresh local foods is important, I didn't know the full story. Ms. Andon's book explained it to me, the concept of Washoku, balance in a meal. There is the idea of cooking each dish in a different way, having different colors of food, and having different tastes to each dish served.

It's a challenging but fun way to cook. This isn't the first time I've cooked something from this book but it's the first time I've attempted a challenge. The food turned out quite well. What the dishes were for the challenge are Tangy Seared Chicken Wings and Tart Miso-Mustard Sauce which we ate on romaine lettuce. I paired this with rice and a few sauteed vegetables. I would have had a fifth dish but being so tired I decided this was enough. I could have added pickles but with the vinegar in the dressing and with the chicken it would have been overwhelming. As it was, as good as all the dishes were, pairing two dishes which have vinegar as a component was a bit too much. I would have rather had a ginger dressing on the salad with this chicken or perhaps fish with the salad I made.

My other challenge was to get a decent photos. Well, it's not the best, I need to work on lighting since I don't like the way flash looks on food photos. But at least the meal turned out well and was quite enjoyed!

Full Moon Viewing Udon.  Harder to make than it looks.  But very tasty!  Made with green onions, oyster mushrooms, fish cake (kamaboko) and of course that egg!

I have to admit that full moon viewing didn't work out.  But I still wanted to try putting the egg in the udon and getting it to set right.  It was difficult to get the water to swirl and put the egg in at the same time, but for me it turned out okay.  I can say that having an egg in udon in this style adds a nice richness to the soup!

I'm wondering, do you guys think I should post this and some of the other food posts in the Asian Foods community here? 

I've tried to give it as much positives as I can.  Such as getting out of a city that's crime rate is scary.  Hoping to find a place that has more to offer at lower rent.  But in the meantime, I really have to bite the bullet and let go of some stuff I've had for a long time.  I know a couple people on my Flist collect Fiesta and maybe others know someone who is looking for pieces to add to their collection.

I've been collecting Fiesta Dinnerware for almost 30 years.  Times are tough and I've had to make the hard decision to let go of a good portion of my collection.

So I'm using my eBay account again to set-up a store and will probably have around 300 pieces in there when I'm done.  Vintage and Contemporary, some harder to find pieces including Medium Green, Vintage coffee pot, a few Warner Brothers pieces that I have left and a vintage round tray with the inserts in yellow.

My eBay store is here:  http://stores.shop.ebay.com/Dolls-Dishes-Designs-and-More__W0QQ_armrsZ1
My feedback was 100% except I got a troll bidder.  Other than that, 933 happy buyers.
I use both USPS and UPS for shipping and everything will be insured.

So if you are looking for something, take a look or contact me since it's going to take a bit of time to get everything on there.

Thanks for your time!



Okay, back to reading Gantz.

But this makes me rather happy.

(Darker than Black Gemini Meteor, not bad for being away for a bit)

I wonder why these dolls weren't actually released in October.

  Because we have Nosferatu

  and Ende (not sure how that is a vampire name but maybe it's something I've missed)

 and Elizabeth, who I am going to guess is a reference to Elizabeth Bathory.

  I'm rather partial to Elizabeth for some reason or other...

Alexander McQueen for Paris Fashion Week, SS10





The show is on his website   www.alexandermcqueen.com/ 

Yamaha's amazing Vocaloid singing robots or Alexander McQueen's Environmental Atlantis Amazing Fashions.

Um, well no one comments any more so here's a little Hatsune Miku since I think we are now in the Valley...