Redundancy Review: Day 77, “Not Quite There Yet”

(for context on what this series is, please see my Day 1 post here: Redundancy Review: Day 1, “A New Beginning” – Rosalia’s Rambles)

Good morning knights and bards, welcome to Day 77 of Rosalia Rambles Redundancy Review.

So despite a good day yesterday, my mental state is still in a severe amount of flux over cosplay shenanigans, which led to me having a bit of a breakdown over lunch due to cosplay stress compounding with work stress which shattered the thin veneer of mental stability I usually present with leading me into a bit of a spiral until I had some ice cream.

In the midst of the breakdown though, my mind started having a thought about what my problem is, and, I think I found something I need to change.

I am… extremely bad at giving myself time to properly process things, usually due to the pace my life moves out, and this lack of time means that I often rush past any attempt at healing, instead trying to find solutions or working on something else to distract myself from what hurt me initially.

Again, this can be seen as an admirable trait in some instances, but a common running theme in what people admire me for is that it comes at a great cost to my personal sanity and comfort.

Losing my job back in June hurt, and it still hurts today. I am working towards building myself up as a writer, a freelance software tester, and whatever titles any of the other hobbies I am exploring right now could bestow upon me… but the sense of self and belonging that came from that job is still gone. 

And with this cosplay, I am working towards getting a backup plan sorted, and even when it comes to stumbles within that backup plan I need to be kinder to myself, because whilst I consider cosplay a big part of my identity; the actual act of putting together cosplays is something I am still inexperienced on even coming up to almost a decade since my first time cosplaying.

In general, the idea of “being kinder to myself” is something I struggle with a lot anyway – in both my career and personal life. I often fall into this trap of needing to make myself perfect in all I do, finding my stride within the first try or else I consider myself a failure, all the while preaching a gospel about how mistakes and imperfections make things interesting.

Hypocrisy is fun, especially when it comes to needless self flagellation… getting in all my big words today too.

Anyway, I want to go play Helldivers after dinner, so, I am going to try wrap up this Redundancy Review with a quick Hololive Tuesday segment, which today is going to cover a rapid fire review of all of the items inside my mini Ninomae Ina’nis display on my big Kallax configuration.

For a brief bit of context, Ninomae Ina’nis (or Ina for short because god that is a mouthful) is a VTuber within Hololive English 1st Generation “Myth”, and is one of my main oshis. I absolutely love Ina, her streams always give comfy & cozy vibes with delightfully fun tangents, and her sleepiness speaks to me on a personal level.

As such, I have a fair bit of Ina merch, which I can happily say was all bought directly from Hololive via Geekjack without the need to go to scalpers on eBay like an admittedly-not-insignificant portion of the Hololive collectibles I own are.

Up front on the left we have “SmolMyth” Ina Plushie, one of the first pieces of Hololive merch I ever bought because it was right around the time I had discovered Geekjack was an option for shipping to the UK. She has stuck with me ever since and now forms the cornerstone of my little display.

On her right we have “Friends With U” Ina Plushie. Friends With U is a series of plushies that tend to be in stock more regularly for fans who might not be able to buy plushies as part of limited-time made-to-order milestone drops that talents usually do. Admittedly I am not the biggest fan of the halo on this plushie, it feels a little too flimsy and hard to position correctly.

Sitting in the lap of both of these plushies is a Connect the World Penlight. When it comes to the headline Hololive English concerts, I am unable to attend due to the fact they are A. in the USA which I do not massively feel safe going to right now due to being trans and B. The travel costs are prohibitively expensive for my current situation. 

So in lieu of attendance, I make an effort to buy the made-to-order/leftover merch from the concerts themselves, having done so for Connect the World, Breaking Dimensions, and the incredibly recent All For One. The penlight from Connect the World is actually the only penlight I own as well, something I hope to change given my upcoming convention but this one will definitely get mileage there as well in both the opening and premium concert.

And finally, looming behind all of them, is the large Takodachi Plushie, specifically being the rerun version from Myth’s third anniversary merch in 2023… I absolutely love this thing. Whilst a lot of Hololive plushies are made more for display than cuddling, the Takodachi plush is absolutely one you can cuddle and it feels amazing to do so. 

The outside is incredibly soft but the stuffing holds up to being squeezed amazingly, making it perfect to hold tight on lazy days where all you want to do is lie in bed, relax, and watch silly videos on Youtube.

For someone having a bad day, the fact I managed to write almost a thousand words makes me happy, especially as it was quite easy to find my flow for this. Thank you for reading today’s Redundancy Review, I hope you are able to find relaxation and happiness wherever you are. Myself though?

I am diving feet first into hell once more.