Hi! It’s me! Lily!!!

Today is Diana’s birthday!!!

As I said, we’re celebrating it this weekend.  She has plans with her mother today, and that’s how it should be, I guess.  Besides, I think it’ll be more fun on the weekend anyway.  Beth is actually over with her and her mother – Beth is her best friend, but I’m not.  That’s okay! I’m her best friend’s older sister.  Just like Liz is Beth’s older sister’s best friend, not hers.

Though we all do get along really well.

She’s… I think 16 now.  But I’ll have to ask to make sure.  They’re getting so old now!  I mean, I’m eighteen and Beth’s almost seventeen, so…  wow.

Maybe that’s how Sabby feels.

I guess I don’t talk a lot about Diana here.  She’s usually mentioned in passing along with all the other girls.  But that might be because she’s the most normal of all of us girls, well, except for the ones in California and Dallas of course.  She’s hispanic (Mexican) and she’s really proud of her culture, but she’s also just average.  She has average grades, average body, average life, average food tastes… and far, far above average cooking skills.  There’s a reason why whenever I mention Diana, it’s usually right next to the word “tacos”.  I swear we should hire her in the shop.  In fact, now that she’s sixteen, I should see if we have a trainee job for her.  I bet she’d work well with Baker.

She probably would have refused before because of cat-girl, but… maybe it’ll be a little different now.

Speaking of Anathema, I guess she and Joe had a long talk.  She told him that she knows she’s only known him for a week or two, but she can’t get him out of her mind, and she’s just asking for a chance.  He countered that she seems very nice but she has only known him for a week or two, and she’s carrying proof of the fact that she’s… got a bit of a checkered past.  She asked him if that meant he wanted her to get rid of it, and that actually made him angry.  He said that of course he didn’t, the baby wasn’t to blame, and why would she say something like that?

So they had a fairly civil but somewhat heated argument, which ended with her bursting into tears and telling him she didn’t want to lose the one good thing to ever happen to her, and he said he just wants to take some time for both of them to make sure it’s the right choice, and, well…  they ended up in a rather intimate hug (but only a hug) right in the middle of the shop…  Sabby had to tell her to get back to work.

But she wasn’t really upset.  She’s happy for Anathema.

I think she’s right, and I think Joe’s right, and I think they’ll be really good for each other…  someday.  Joe won’t let her get away with anything, and she’ll help Joe to see there’s more to life than military stuff.  I guess it all works out.

Let’s see… what are all the girls up to.

Miki’s off doing idol stuff today, apparently there’s a handshake event coming up.

Yuki’s still kind of recovering from the Japan trip.  It was emotionally draining for her.  She’s happy she did it, though, even though her being in Japan was all over LINE and now the news started to pick it up, and there were a few rumors about her seen coming out of a strange hotel room with me and Miki. Which the producer, to his credit, promptly squashed in an uncharacteristically blunt rebuttal.  He seems to take care of his girls when the situation calls for it.  Something like “Don’t you have better things to do than following a teenage girl around, hentai?”  (Miki’s fine.  It wasn’t against the rules by any means, nothing happened, and the news agency was just trying to stir up crap.  They got smacked down enough that they did one of those groveling apologies Japanese folks are famous for).

They also did an expose on “train onee-chan”, but I didn’t care.  All they really know is my name and that I’m a gaijin from Texas.  I don’t have the same kind of embarrassment a Japanese person would have about the situation, so they’re mostly leaving me alone, I’m not really worth it.  They just posted a few photos and some speculation that was about 50% wrong.

Liz is practicing for her own concert, and she and I need to start rehearsing too.  Where am I going to find the time?? She’s also starting to see about going to college.  She’s got a few really good ones in her sight.  She’s probably not going overseas, though.  Her parents don’t want her going to an ivy league one, though…  apparently now they’re more of a liability.  Oh well.

Crystal’s still practicing furiously.  I’m so surprised she’s stuck with it this long, but she seems to have a knack for it.  She’s still got some mental health issues but she seems to be working through them slowly, and her parents are starting to realize how much damage she suffered.  Guitar seems to be helping, and that’s why we all agreed to form a band with her.

Beth’s still practicing singing,  It gets a little loud sometimes, but I can hardly complain, practicing piano for hours a day like I do, with a concert coming up.  She’s got a pretty powerful voice, when it’s trained up she’s going to be a force to reckon with.  Not surprising, considering how she shouts down Sabby when she gets going.  I’m taking a little time and teaching her Japanese diction.  After all, she wants to sing “idol”, and…  that’s certainly ambitious.  But that’s Beth, she doesn’t do the easy stuff.

Rebecca’s, well… being Rebecca.  She and Becky and Larissa have become inseparable and they’re spending all sorts of time at Larissa’s ranch learning how to take care of animals.  Maybe Rebecca will be a veterinarian someday.  She loves the horses the most, and they seem to love her too.

The girls over in California are…  well, being California girls.  Ever since Rebecca left, Britni kinda took over as the leader of the group over there, and now she’s driving them to get better grades.  Who’d have thought?  Yu loved the trip to Japan, and has now become something of a weeb, and Chelsi, well…  she’s still surfing her little buns off.  She’s so happy she got to surf in Enoshima, she still thanks me for that.

Apparently she was changing into her wetsuit on the side of the road and almost caused a car accident.

Been done, ask Anathema.  Haha!!!

On the Japanese side… we know about Minami…  Ai is just doing her thing over there, she’s a little disappointed I couldn’t come to see her but she understands that I was there on business.  All the other aidols are getting a little enhanced access to Minami’s idol group, so they’re having fun weebing out that way.  And the real idols think it’s absolutely hilarious that Ai and her friends all have the same name as idols themselves, they kind of like it when they hang around just for the novelty.

Aika and Mika are, what… 11 and 12 now?  They’re turning into young women, and causing Emiko no end of grief, but… that’s what happens!  Haha!!!  But when we see them, they’re a little more like little sisters now, and we can include them on stuff we couldn’t before.

And we can’t forget about Allison.  I haven’t seen her much lately, she made a bunch of new friends and she’s spending all her time playing with them.  I’m happy for her.

I think that’s all… but maybe I forgot someone here and there.  I hope not!!!

Well… David, I guess.  He’s not a sister but he’s a brother so he gets a mention.  He’s still, surprisingly, got his “girlfriend”, but they’re still long distance and that will probably not change.  He’s still got a wandering eye with some of my sisters, but he knows he’ll get it from both sides if he tries (his “girlfriend” told him he’d better dump her if he plans to cheat, because if he doesn’t, she’ll make sure no girl at his camp ever goes near him again.  She doesn’t really care if he dumps her, strangely enough, she just wants him to make sure his priorities are straight.  And, she’s like, eleven!!!), so he’s mostly keeping to himself and playing online games with his friend.  I’m honestly shocked that’s lasted this long, I mean, they’re like eleven or so, but…  well, more power to him I guess.

I did catch him with some naughty photos of Japanese girls, though… Ai seems to have impacted him.  Hah!!!

Sabby also caught him, and… well….  he doesn’t have those photos anymore.

And the adults, well… this is long enough, I guess we’ll leave that for another post.  Everyone’s fine and doing their thing.  Little Sabrina is crawling now!!!

Love you all!!! ❤️