blood red, cherry red

slipdress and blazer, vintage. clutch, ninewest. boots, rubi by cotton on via zalora (similar). ribbon tri-strand choker, verano ph via zalora (similar).

Happy hearts day, y'all! 

I'm settling down to music videos and stage performances by my favorite men/boys tonight. It's uhmn...well, more than my traditional Valentines' day tradition along with watching Da-iCE concert/s here and there to name one (or catching up to Kamen Rider Build as I left it off at episode 13 or so a couple nights ago...), it's an every night sort of thing since the MVs and stage performances are in a playlist on my windows media player. LOL. Anyway, I think this is the best way to cap the Hearts' day celebration with. I'm just missing organic/healthy dark chocolate eating somehow. The sad thing is that I don't have any of these at hand. Hmn...a strawberry zinfandel would be nice to have tonight, though, while on this MVs and stage performances marathon watching. I'm pretty sure I'll move on in a bit and play catch up with Kamen Rider Build and the kdrama, Radio Romance anyway. I've only finished 2 episodes of the latter. The reason I picked up said kdrama is thanks to Yoon Doo Joon from Highlight but that could have easily been very predictable as Highlight is my favorite kpop boygroup after Da-iCE from Japan.

For tonight, I have two tracks I love that are more about self-love and freedom than they are about dreamy romantic love:

I think these are perfect for winding down, chilling to tonight, especially when one has been out say, working or attending classes. AAA's MisaChia's MV for Jewel is cut short at 4 minutes or so but the whole track is beautiful on the Way of Glory album. It is, no doubt, my favorite so far from AAA after years of them volleying from multi-genre-d AAA to purely EDM AAA and back to being multi-genre. 

I love, love, loooovee really positive, cheerful songs (Jpop has a lot of these but Kpop is catching up as well) and those especially about self-love. Really freeing bops are also my thing so Faky's Somewhere We'll Know is an eternal favorite where that goes. I'd also add E-girls' Kitakaze to Taiyou (The North Wind and the Sun) here but I sort of remember posting that one just a few days or a week ago or so, so I'm going to leave that out in this one this time. Such songs help keep my head above the water, cheer me up some and help me fake it when I feel like needing to fake it. I guess there's nothing like girl power where pop music goes. I'm usually more into the male idol group side of things: Da-iCE, Magic Prince, PrizmaX, Choutokkyuu/Bullettrain, Flowback, Infinite, Highlight and Golden Child but tonight I will let those men/boys rest and go with the girls since it's hearts' night anyway and I need a friendly reminder that I love myself more than I love those males in the idol groups I mentioned. Haha. Oh, and even music. Though usually it's music first for me over self. They can co-exist well together in my book though,if you catch my drift here. That's the beauty of the self and music. 

friday weekend

(photos by Candice Calonia, collages by me)

Me thinks you'll have to click on the photos to enlarge. Outfit details are already on the first collage.

Today was afternoon chai tea latte with the best girl friend; frolicking around SM...well, outside of it, anyway, and tonight is for just chilling to music.

Music talk here (this corner might've been missed...lots...well, I miss it anyway): Has anyone listened to the new record from Jpop boygroup/boyband/dance and vocal group, Da-iCE? Next Phase is a really solid album, by the by...I could say it was even better than their previous two. Paradive, Bond and Two as One have become my favorites off of it and news is (as told to me just now by a good friend on twitter), the full music videos for the latter two are out on their Universal Music Japan channel. Inner me just went 'yay!' I'll check those two out in a bit. I've been bopping to those three, especially the former two (and Fantasy) for the past few days now. Here's Bond's full version to bop to, tonight:

 

....and I am probably off to watch an anime or two tonight. I have yet to finish a Kindaichi Shounen no Jikenbo movie/episode special based on a light novel (Opera house murder case 3, if I'm not mistaken). It's that or I'll binge watch any anime of the horror genre I can find on a streaming site tonight. It is Friday. I've been...uh...reconnecting with my inner aniota (anime otaku) recently that I've kept at bay for eons now. I'm still really picky on animes to watch lately and often times, I just keep away from it because, like in the case of Kindaichi, it doesn't really follow the manga to the t anyway. I usually only watch classics though, except Sailor Moon's because I can't stand its 90s anime---I am of the opinion that Sailor Moon Crystal trumps the 90s anime because it follows the manga closer than the 90s anime ever did and I'm a known humongous fangirl of the manga...effectively owning a copy of its first volume bought from Barnes & Noble around late 2015 to early 2016. As for the newer manga serializations and hmn...animes...I'm only interested in Twin Star Exorcists...but more the manga than the anime. I'll get to reading this shounen series when it gets closer to its end. I don't think the manga artist and writer has started with its climax/last arc anyway. It seems to already be midway however. But for the record, I don't really consider myself an aniota. I just watch these things casually: just when something interesting of this sort comes into my radar. I don't cosplay---halloween costuming-up, I'd do, however---nor attend anime expos either.

If all else fails and nothing of the anime variety ends up piquing my interest tonight other than the Kindaichi special/film...I'm going to get into one or two indie or indie-ish movies I've been keeping on storage for a while now. This is to rectify the failure of the bff and my plans to watch a movie in the cinemas this weekend. We wanted to watch Asa Butterfield's The Space Between Us but only one cinema is airing this and what's even more disappointing is, it's sharing the same theater with Jackie Chan's Kung Fu Yoga which I have no interest in watching. ....not really a huge Jackie Chan fan here. Also, The Space Between Us, only airs twice, from 5 p.m. until almost 8 in the evening and around 9 until 12 midnight. We really can't be bothered to stay so late to catch this one. Maybe next time...