Looking back: Jul '25, Week 5

What a week this one turned out to be! Everything went as planned, except that I'm physically more spent, and my heart's a lot more full. 🥺💖

✨ Forever home -- Did a lot of packing, felt sentimental, and realized that I have way too much s***

The movers that I engaged provided 20 boxes that are now fully loaded up with items, and I still have quite a lot of items left unpacked! 😫 It didn't take very long to fill them up because quite a number of items were still wrapped up from when I moved back to stay with my parents 2.5 years ago. This turned out to be a good thing because that allowed me to confirm what items were too fragile and precious and needed to be moved over personally or with the help of my mother's car. 🤔

This was half of the board games we own... and 1 spare 27" monitor for scale. 🥺

After 2 trips by public transport and 2 trips with my mother's car, I think we still have enough unpacked items to warrant 2 more car trips. 🥺 I will try my best to find more boxes and pack as much as I can for the movers to assist with! 😫📦🙏🏻

Also, all the cleaning the past few weeks has left my hands really parched, especially my finger tips and cuticles. So I bought some cuticle oil to try! It seems to be doing something? 🤔 I'll continue to diligently apply it to keep my fingers looking moist, and hopefully they won't crack anymore! 🥺

Over the weekend, I gathered up all my plushies that I've kept over the years. I can't believe that I've already let go of so many because they couldn't survive the humidity at my parent's place, and yet I have so many still. I will need to clean every single one after they've moved, which I'm guessing will take 1 whole week to complete?! 😫 I just hope that those that have been sitting in vacuum packs haven't gotten moldy or smell musty...

Or should I keep her looking like this? 🤣

Like this Dancing Hello Kitty Speaker that one of my aunts gave me for Christmas when I was still a child. My mother kept this in the store for so many years that it had mold growing all over it. I wasn't too keen to bring it along to my new place anymore, but my mother felt that it was such a waste to toss it out and decided to adopt it instead -- except she did not want to clean it. 😱 So I took it upon myself to give this Hello Kitty a new lease of life by emptying her out and turning her back to Kitty White. I had to toss out her innards (I mean, fluff, speaker and motor mechanism) because they were not in working condition anymore, but I'm hopeful that once I stuff her, she will look as good as new. 💖

The most problematic items that I had to go through were my certificates, files, and books. Not only were they mostly moldy and severely needed cleaning, some had loose items lodged in them, like bookmarks and letters. Of course, most of the items were of sentimental value because I went through them once when I moved back, but I never had the time to reorganize them because I was rushing to move out of my rental apartment before the lease was up.

Sifting through my documents, one card stood out to me:

Had to blur out the photo of us and her name! 🤣

This was a card from a classmate when I graduated from high school. We knew each other through art classes for about 4 years, and eventually became homeroom classmates for our last 2 years. She was the one who made me feel that maybe it was cool to be different, and that I should not fear being more vocal about my interests. We were so vastly different in character and background, but maybe that is also why she was so charming to me.

We kept in touch a little in college, but life's tribulations eventually lead us away from each other. When I tried to reach out to her a few years back, she left me on read. It hurt a little, but I couldn't hate her -- it seemed that life was still tough on her, and I just sincerely hoped that she would be alright.

But recently, she reached out to me (Minerva), realizing that I was her friend from high school. I prompted her to talk about herself, and she started sharing what she's been up to. It seems that she has started feeling a little more in control of her own happiness, and I was glad. I low-key hoped that she would ask me about my activities as Mimi so that I could let her know what my life is like now, but like old times I just listened and smiled as she went on and on. Like old times, I looked at her and she adverted my gaze, but I'm content with just having shared a moment amidst her chaos.

I am just so happy that being Minerva gave us the opportunity to reconnect, even if just for a bit. But I wonder: Would our past selves be alright with her becoming a tattoo artist, and me becoming an anime girl who does music covers on the internet instead? Would she feel equally sentimental if she learned that by pure coincidence, I (Minerva) chose to have a tattoo as part of my key visual? 🥹

Knowing her, she'll never read this post, so let's keep this as a secret between us, okay? 💜

✨ Touched grass -- Went to a homecoming event at my alma mater

I can't talk too much about this without making it too easy to give away where I used to study, and potentially my real identity, but I really enjoyed the evening spent at my alma mater. 🥺💖 Saw many familiar faces, got many names wrong, but I had a great time reconnecting with some of my friends.

When I first RSVP-ed to the event months ago, I was fretting over what to say about myself when asked: Am I between jobs? Am I planning a career jump? Am I just living in the moment and doing what feels right every day? Am I unemployed? Am I a caretaker/ homemaker? What do I have to say for all the high flyers to understand what kind of person I am now? I don't regret my life choices, but there has always been a lurking feeling of shame for not taking the path that most of my peers did.

What I learned was that most people were just happy to see a familiar face. 🥺

My ex-roommates whom I met at the event happened to live rather near me, so we all took a long bus ride home after a stroll around the campus. One of them reminisced that in her eyes, I was always THE cool kid who did whatever I wanted/ was passionate about. When we were almost at my stop, she asked, "Did you get to do what you wanted after high school?"

And I asked in response, "What DID I want to do?"

"Actually, I don't know," she said.

"Exactly -- I don't think I ever knew what I wanted to do with my life. One thing I did want to do was to study Physics in college, which I did. But after that I got swept up in a series of events and now here I am. I regret none of it, and I'm okay with where I am now." I then shared that I currently do vocal covers on YouTube, shared my socials, got off at my stop, and waved goodbye.

I just hope that in another 10 years time, if and when I return to my alma mater again, I can proudly say what I do -- even if not everyone can see the value in it, hopefully at least I would. 🥺

✨ Gaming -- Finished Like A Dragon: Infinite Wealth and Storyteller

Alas.

Surprisingly, I did not feel withdrawal from finishing this game. Maybe it's because I am hopeful that the story hasn't ended yet? 🤔 It feels weird knowing that I poured hours into building up characters so late into the game, only for the end-game equipment to be used for such a short while. But that's just how RPGs are, right?

I remembered to take a screenshot of (my) Team Kiryu! 💜

Overall, I had a good time playing and streaming this game. Thank you, game! 💜

I spent quite a few evenings after focused on packing, so I only had time to pick up Storyteller. Streamed it for friends as well. It was a simple and fun "puzzle" game! I'll try to 100% the achievements another time, but for now I've completed all the puzzles. :)

Spent a bit of time hunting for armor spheres in MonHunWilds, and doing daily Allied Society Quests in FFXIV. Looking forward to tomorrow's FFXIV patch! It's time for more MSQ! ⭐️ (and for me to return to PLD frfr)

✨ Random interesting thing -- A fluffy sparrow!

Touching grass has its benefits! The last time I saw a sparrow this round was in Estonia! Well, actually the sparrows in Estonia are way larger and rounder, but this one's the roundest I've seen in Singapore. 🥹💜

Please perceive this cute birb!

~💜~

Hopes for this week

♪ Do some vocal practices 🤔

☆ Appreciate my last week living with my parents

☆ Enjoy Ari's Anniversary stream on 8/8! 💕

☆ Forever home: That all goes smoothly 🙏🏻

Hope I'll have lots to share when I'm back in a fortnight! ❤️

Thank you for reading! 🌙🐰