peaking

Weekend tea, my most commonly photographed subject. I've finally learned to increase my f-stop.

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In other news, made cheesy gochujang pasta. They are a perfect match *u* Cast iron pan is also getting more uses, this time for browning mushrooms.

lab colors

I've forgotten how long post-processing can take... but at least I can make up for my crappy shooting skills in post. Though I should really do so by practicing shooting more.

Anyways, as I was editing through my photos from a brief walk out on Peachtree, the before and after of this particular picture really shocked me. Can I blame it on the cloudy weather for bad lighting?

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In other news, I've gone full circle on my camera selection and is back to lusting over the Leica Q. This was the camera that originally got me interested in wide angle lenses.

My current decision is just to wait until I can afford this and use my X10 in the process. I've been mulling over Sony a6000 vs. Fuji x-t10 for the past two weeks and both systems aren't perfect for me. The Sony is definitely the more practical choice in terms of both weight and price, but I really love Fuji's abundance of manual controls. I had a whole bunch of saved searches on ebay and was thissss close to buying 2 used Fuji lenses. But alas I realized that $1000+ is too much money to spend on something I'm not completely in love with.

I'd love to say that this is money saved, but I've found 2 pair of boots that I did fall in love with:

• Mercer from Cord boots + shoes (local Atlanta shop! Planning on visiting their workshop)
• Grace from Crockett and Jones (this is just swwooooooon, will visit in NYC)

More on this topic in a later post.

Fire Emblem: Awakening - end

 image via.

I've finally finished FE:A! Actually I could've said this more than a month ago, but I was putting off finishing the final chapter because I have a tendency to stop playing the game right before the end (which is what happened with FFX)

Playing the game on easy (aka no perma death) did detract from the experience, as normal campaigns are just too easy once I got my children units. The focus of my gameplay became unlocking support diaglogs rather than optimizing my army to defeat the enemy. I'm okay with that, because the dialog really are great and I would not be able to stand to permanently lose my units (see the Gaius episode). The paralouges were also sufficiently challenging, especially the mirror one and protecting unit ones, to offset the campaign chapters. I'm looking forward to FE:fates's Nohr route with it's mix of objectives.

I racked up about 73 hours on this game spread over 4 month, which is a good return on investment. Actually every game I buy has a good ROI (once I get around playing it) since I'm a decently obsessive completionist. That said, I'm no where close to 100% support dialog since it just takes too many hours to reach A. It's good enough that I got all my children married. Overall I'm really happy with my character pairings in terms of dialog suitability and children stats.

Speaking of character pairings, I think the game would be stronger from a plot perspective if the gender of My Unit is not up to the player's choice. I played with female MU and many of the cutscene dialogs, and especially the ending ones, don't fit MU x Chrom, they're written with MU not being paired with Chrom in mind. I'm also angry that Sumia is the canon mother for Lucina when Cordelica's backstory is that she has a (not-so) secret crush on Chrom, that's just not cool bro. My final complaint is that the children units are flat, all of their support dialog is about their one defining trait (eg. Severa just goes insulting everyone).

Now if only Bravely Default would have a price drop...or maybe a bundle when Bravely Second comes out in NA?

fragrant moonlight

Making up for my cancelled hiking trip with the best tea that I have, it is tasting better now that it's aged a little bit.

Thinking of switching to gaiwan for all my yancha brewing. The faster pour helps a lot, and I don't need to fill the cup so I can conserve my precious leaves (this tea is obscenely expensive...$1.60/g, its what happens when you don't ask for the price before buying). On the other hand, the allure of yixing pots is hard to resist. Ideally I would like a 60-80ml flat pot with a very wide opening, no I really shouldn't be thinking of another pot.

Went back to flash brews for this one, because I want every nuance out of this expensive beast. Worked well today, mostly because of easier brewing in a gaiwan. The first couple of brews were interesting, it was first sweet, then savory, before settling into the characteristic mineral taste.

Kodomo no Omocha

I swear I read at least half of this series ages ago since I clearly remember a couple of scenes, but I am glad I picked it up again.

image via, it shows off the characters personalities well.

Kodomo no Omocha is probably the best school-life/rom-com shojo I've read. It was perfect for the majority of the story, with none of the usual annoyances that come with this genre. It kept me up reading for two nights despite the fact my body was screaming at me to go the fuck to bed because I was most definitely still sick. And even when I did finally oblige, I ended up thinking of Sana and Hayama and not being able to fall asleep. Their interaction is so...pure and wholesome (am I too old that I'd be thought of as creepy for using those adjectives?), it's the innocence of childhood that you lose when you grow up and replace with cynicism.

The point to take away is how great the manga is and not how terrible I am at taking care of myself. Lessons learned is not to start new mangas on Sunday night.

Anyways my only two complaint is with the latter two arcs of the love triangle between Sana/Hayama/Fuuka and then Sana'a mannequin disease. I wish the manga showed more of Fuuka and Hayama's prespective on their breakup, because it seems inconsistent that they don't immediately part, but then do so very easily. The last arc with Sana's disease just seems unnecessarily dramatic. 

And the ending, another case of it was a good fit for the story but I really want an overly romantic end :( There was a side story/cross-over, but that didn't scratch the itch unlike Basara's.

tiles

Battling the remnant of a nasty cold over the weekend, ugh. How I've underestimated thee, Atlanta weather.

But look, pretty colors from leaving work late:

autumn/winter 2015

So the Atlanta weather didn't turn out to require drastic wardrobe changes, mainly because the office is air-conditioned to the max.

What I did end up buying:

• This first shirt dress in the S/S 15 post. It's been very useful, my default going to a client meeting outfit because I don't have to worry about shirts staying tucked in.
• Ugh regrets of not buying the Club Monaco trench, because all the soft trenches this season have no buttons! Wrap coats look fantastic in still images, but are not very practical (as I've found with my caramel one, but it is damn beautiful).
• B/W patterned pencil skirt from BR. Got good mileage out of this since it matches every top, but busted a seam already smh. Will repair. 
• White blazer from BR. Am not getting good mileage out of this, a white blazer is harder to pair than I excepted, but also because my office isn't formal enough to wear blazers regularly.

As for this autumn / winter, the list fluctuated a lot. It was rather ambitious at the beginning, then I realized how much money I needed to save, and then how hard it was to find a piece that fits all my criteria. So now it's these three:

• Duffle Coat: I agonized over coat choices for the longest time, still unable to find my beloved green coat. In the end I settled on a duffle because there's not many more years left before it's becomes age inappropriate. I ended up getting one from ASOS, 73% wool for a good price but I almost dislike the toggles enough to change them out. 
• Everlane striped tee and card case: surprisingly I can wear a striped tee fine to work, falling in love with them yet again. The card case is because since losing my old one, my purse has become increasingly disorganized and now it takes several tries to pull out the right card. Also watching their launches of silk tee and heavy weight wool, might get some items from there too.
• Black, over the knee boots: taller boots = block more wind, also doubtful that my old leather boots can survive another winter. Which particular boot will depend on sale prices in January. 

Some inspo images to complete the cooler weather, all pulled from my pintrest:

really digging variations of blue + red / orange

every year I'm tempted by turtlenecks