117/365

pic081907.jpg

Faux J-rocker at the anime festival this afternoon. (Glam rock didn’t die; it went to Japan and changed its name to “visual kei.”) I took over 300 pictures this weekend. I’ll post more of them over on my other weblog.

Just because you’ve gone digital doesn’t mean you can’t do black and white.

Character Death Bingo

Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, the condensed version:

CHAPTER TWO: DURSLEYS’ HOUSE

HARRY does some room-cleanin’, some bleedin’, and some reminiscin’. He picks up the newspaper and gets a nasty shock.
RITA SKEETER: (in the interview) I’ve just completed a 900-page book on Dumbledore!
READERS: 900 pages? Jeez. She must have the same editors as Rowling.

By the same author: The Two Towers and The Return of the King.

Update: another condensed version.

Quirky, cutesy, strangely dressed

The only kind of “moe” I really understand is Moe Howard. I’ve been trying to get a handle on moe as the term is used in the otakusphere, and I have been following Avatar‘s reporting on this year’s Saimoe tournament, but I’m not sure that I grasp the concept (or that there is a concept there worth grasping). Let’s see if I have this right.

oedomoe03.jpg

Moe.

oe20.jpg

Not moe. (From Oh! Edo Rocket)

Let’s try a subtler distinction.

yasokomoe.jpg

Perhaps.

dennoisako02.jpg

Probably not. (From Denno Coil)

Isako is possibly the most interesting character in any current series, but I think that she’s probably too intimidating to be truly moe.

Let’s see how far we can push the concept.

Continue reading “Quirky, cutesy, strangely dressed”

113/365

pic081507.jpg

The camera I used for all the daily pictures through 89/365. It may be a toy with relatively modest capabilities, but it is a surprisingly capable picture-taker. It is also small enough to conveniently take everywhere. Even though I finally have a DSLR, this one will remain in active use.

Words, words, words, and pictures, too

All my old websites will soon be disappearing. They’ll be gone in January, if not by October. I recently spent some time browsing my retired weblogs, copying posts that might be of interest to visitors here. I sorted them into sixteen categories and posted them as static pages. You can find the categories listed as “ancient texts” under the “more” heading in the sidebar. And here:

Briefs
Critics and other idiots
Culture
Haruhi and Haruhi
Japan
Kid stuff
Mahou shoujo
Miscellaneous — mostly anime
Just plain miscellaneous
Music
Personal notes
Sailor Moon
Silly stuff
Osamu Tezuka
Why watch anime?
yoshitoshi ABe

I also rescued the “boy or girl?” quiz and added a few more pictures, bringing the total number of questions to twenty. Those who know their traps should do well; the rest of us — well, the average score among my friends was two right out of fourteen in the earlier version.

(I may be experimenting with different themes in the near future. I don’t like the way the current one, “Gemini,” handles static pages, and I couldn’t find an obvious way to fix the problems.)

Request

I just a note from my brother:

I’m getting a laptop tomorrow. Any recommendations?

I don’t use laptops, and if I did, they would be Macs, which I don’t think he is interested in. Does anybody have suggestions for him?

Request

I just a note from my brother:

I’m getting a laptop tomorrow. Any recommendations?

I don’t use laptops, and if I did, they would be Macs, which I don’t think he is interested in. Does anybody have suggestions for him?