Just a random plug for goodreads, that social network I use for tracking books (...since I have a site for everything).
goodreads is awesome and I wish I had more friends who actively used it so I could stalk their reading behavior I mean discover more awesome book recommendations. Ever since Eric randomly convinced me to start writing reviews there (because "stars are meh"), I haven't really done book posts on this blog in a while since it'd probably be redundant, and I don't really foresee it happening again in the future, unless I read a book that triggers such emotion that it ends up overflowing onto here or something. I like reading friend's impressions of books though, even if they're just brief one-liners.
I usually go on book binges during family vacations because we end up having a lot of downtime (or my family is just lazy), and this trip has been no different. 4 books down, how many more to go...
This post is already a week old in writing, but eh, what else is new.
Nothing like an average conversation with friends to make you realize you don't feel like you've grown much in the past year.
Well if you want to be technical, I guess you could say there's been some change, but it's not really the kind of sudden-in-your-face-growth that people expect an answer for whenever they ask you how you're doing and what your goals are in life. I sound like a parrot repeating those all the time even though I actually don't get asked them that much either, but maybe such phrases are enough to put me on edge now that I probably should be addressing them for once and not in the tone of a chronic procrastinator.
what else is not so new:
- Early on last year I went through a panic attack phase that stemmed from social anxiety, a fact that surprised one of my friends this year who told me that he would never have gotten that impression from me whenever we hung out. I guess I'm good at hiding it from the right people. But regardless, the fear doesn't feel so real anymore and I'm more comfortable now around people I'm not as familiar with... but I can't really describe why that is, though, other than perhaps that I don't really take a lack of proactivity from people so personally anymore. Maybe once in a while the sentiment will linger, but it's become more of a fact of life for me now that I recognize my vulnerability in this area and that it's really just okay to not be as naturally engaging as whatever average you perceive to be the norm all the time.
- I also recognize that I spend a lot of time and energy exerting myself on manners of little consequence. I doubt most people who ever get around to reading this entry actually care about anime, and yet the subject of the post below this one actually preoccupies my head for hours sometimes and I can't get it out unless I write it, and then share it with the world!- because a backlog of lists on Evernote (oh god that phrase sounded horrible as I wrote it) isn't as mentally fulfilling. The music of the openings I like in particular is my guilty-pleasure or fodder for music I like to listen to when I'm working or driving and don't feel like paying attention much, compared to podcasts or new music which I only prefer when I have the energy for them.
Ironically, I don't like the full length versions of anime songs so much as their bridges and second verses tend to incorporate elements that turn me off. It's the same dilemma I have with Christian music that sounds good in church but horrible to my ears when performed by their actual music artists. But lately I haven't been enjoying modern worship music much either, compared to the older hymns and stuff. I take it as sign that I'm growing old...der. and possibly more than that.
- I frequently worry in the back of my head about becoming irrelevant and retreading over the same thoughts again, like for example on this blog where I'm paranoid that half of what I write has already been said by me on a previous entry on here. It's a blog-world problem that occurs when you realize that you've been consistently writing blog entries every month for the past 10 YEARS what the heck (livejournal counts as 2, and no, I am not linking to that crap on here).
I forget sometimes now that the original reason I started blogging was for myself, and that I am the heaviest consumer and harshest critic of the words that I write. I would probably have bolded that sentence or something, except that frequently bolded phrases (as well as excessive hyperlinking) in blog entries and articles on the internet are one of my biggest pet peeves.
- If I sound looser in this entry than I usually do, it is probably because I am not filtering my written thoughts as much as usual... for no particular reason other than the first line I wrote. All I've had in the last hour [edit: as of the writing of this sentence] is milk that I don't expect to finish before I leave town for Hawaii in a couple of days, and I hate wasting food so I will be imbibing as much [lactose-free] milk as possible before tomorrow.
When I was younger and lacking any symptoms of lactose intolerance, I used to drink reduced and later fat-free white milk everyday for breakfast and dinner. I never grew sick of it, just like I can never grow sick of rice and freshly baked bread and other plain foods. I love being vanilla!
- I'm not really anywhere near the markers I subconsciously established for myself as goal posts for personal growth around the time I finished college, and part of me also questions whether those markers are actually markers in the first place because one of them was quite literally "figure out what you want to do for the next five years," which isn't really much of a goal in retrospect. I have trouble visioning that far ahead because I tend to care more about the immediate future in general, and from years of planning schedules that I never actually adhered to or finished can attest that I don't practically work well with long-term visions... unless it has to do with making small to-do lists, because I do tend to finish those... just years after the fact.
- One of my friends asked me how long I'll continue to let my company abuse me, and after having a decently productive work day today and reflecting on what I liked about my job, part of me just wondered, "is it really abuse if I enjoy it?" and the other part of me just realized how horrible that sounded after typing it. But honestly, I feel like I have it easy compared to other people I know, so I don't generally find reason to complain much beyond little nitpicky things like the fact that it took a year for me to finally get a sit-to-stand desk configuration approved by the ergonomics department.
(This stems from a company policy to avoid situations that they could become liable for, except that allowing my back and wrist pain to worsen from a lack of action on their part ought to be considered just as bad as accidentally making it worse from an action taken.)
- To summarize: help, I'm aging and I can't stop myself.
Because I haven't done a list post in a while. More relevant if you watch anime or are open to it.
Favorite Anime Openings:
I know they say not to judge a book by its cover, but sometimes a good opening is enough to make me want to watch a series- especially the less conventional ones. The main criteria for this list is that I have to like the song at least, and then the visuals, but in this case I tried to prioritize visuals that didn't look too overused or familiar and so wound up with a bit more variety than usual. This could probably be taken as a recommendation list if you're looking for something to watch, although I actually haven't gotten around to watching a few entries yet. :P
Anime sometimes gets a bad rep for being immature and catering to unrealistic fantasies or stereotypes and the subculture that it represents, and I'll admit that there is a lot of shit out there... but just as with any other medium, there are worthwhile series to watch if you look around enough. I think anime in particular has strength in its ability to convey creative settings and scenarios that often can't really be captured anywhere else. Of course, some of the titles on here will still come across as weird to people, but what can I say, I have a higher tolerance threshold for these things now.
Also, the order in this list doesn't really matter, but I'm counting down just for the heck of it.
Angel Beats feels like the darker reverse cousin of Clannad After Story and is even sung by the same person, Lia. I like how it mimics the style of a visual novel opening without fully going there.
Disappointing Anime Experiences:
I usually try to avoid watching series that probably would end up in this category if possible, but sometimes it just happens.
5. Sword-Art Online
Premise had potential (it's like dot hack, people trapped in a MMORPG, but less emo), but wound up being way too cliche'd and tropey for me. This isn't always a problem if the series is fine with acknowledging it, but in SAO's case, it felt like it was trying to pass off as something more substantial when it wasn't. They just had to make every girl fall in love with the main character, who isn't really that interesting to begin with, and the villain in the second half was laughably pathetic compared to previous one.
4. Eureka 7
So to be honest, it wasn't really that bad, but I think I watched this a decade too late. The themes are more high-school age oriented and aren't really interesting to me anymore, and the only arc that really drew me in was the one in the middle with Charles/Ray, which by online consensus happens to be the main high point of the series anyway, as it dealt with issues such as foster parenthood and loyalty to a cause in the midst of war. Most of the rest of the cast came across to me as either annoying or forgettable, and I couldn't really stand Renton's whininess... nor Eureka's even once she started developing a personality for once.
3. Code Geass R2
I enjoyed the experience of the series overall... but the second half felt a lot weaker compared to the first. The show took itself seriously as if every character's story mattered, but the stories themselves towards the end relied largely on arbitrary mistakes and unfortunate coincidences (essentially Murphy's Law) to create suspense and tension to the point where it felt like half of the plot didn't need to happen at all, and only did so because everyone (including the most innocent character, Nunnally... wtf) happened to be hot-headed and stubborn and failed at communicating with each other.
It was one thing to create a huge plot changing twist out of an innocent mistake in the first season; it was another thing altogether to continue in the same vein of creating scenarios out of unfortunately timed coincidences up to the point where the rest of the series started becoming laughably predictable. Not to mention, the animation style overall tended towards the bombastic and exaggerated in order to come across as epic. Well technically, the series has always been over the top like that, but I was really growing tired of it this time.
2. Umineko: When They Cry
I love the Umineko sound novels (although they do have their own problems), but I don't think this series really adapts well to the animated medium to begin with. A story meant to be a metafictional narrative about detective novels doesn't really make sense as much in an animated medium- particularly the red text battle sequences, which fundamentally would cause a lot of confusion to an anime-only viewer. The lack/butchering of music from the sound novel also really killed the mood, in addition to the unnecessary fan-service and excessive amounts of creepy Maria moments even by Umineko standards.
To be honest, though, I think the only adaptation that Studio DEEN has ever really done decently well was the second season of Higurashi, and that was after listening to the fans when they fumbled up season 1. But at least the overall creepy atmosphere of Higurashi was able to carry first season along well enough; strip Umineko of its epic atmosphere and you don't really have much else left.
1. Tenchi Muyo! Ryo-Ohki OVA 3
The Tenchi Muyo series probably isn't actually that great relative to other anime today, but the first two OVAs at least somehow managed to pull off an impressive genre bending combination of sci-fi and traditional Japanese slice-of-life... while at the same time serving as a quintessential example of the comedic harem genre. And it's one of the few such examples from that genre that I'm not turned off by (as opposed to say, Love Hina), just because it did the sci-fi and everything else well enough- I mean, how many other series can you think of that uses giant trees and cat-rabbit hybrids for spaceships? It had a surprisingly decent amount of character development for everyone in the cast as well (aside from maybe Mihoshi, who's such a ditz that she doesn't really need it anyway).
All of that is just to say that OVA 3 totally butchered that formula. It pushed in too many new characters all of a sudden and meandered about aimlessly while focusing on them over the main cast... until the last episode, where it suddenly pulled off a massive plot dump (without any exposition to explain what was happening) that attempted to resolve all of the questions left over from the previous two series. In other words, it turned into a rushed, almost incomprehensible mess, which was disappointing considering how much potential the three goddesses storyline had. I guess for now there's still a possible future for a Kagato story as hinted at by the last episode and the Shin Tenchi Muyo novels, but considering how the author's handled all of the newer Tenchi OVA universe series... oh well.
Apparently there's a new Tenchi series coming out this fall, but with the five minute shorts style, it sounds more like something in the style of Teen Titans Go! without much substance. I don't really expect much anymore anyway.
So some of you are probably aware that I have a bit of a phobia when it comes to being poked. I'm really sensitive in my side area, so nowadays any motion that people make towards me that even remotely resembles a poke there is enough to put me on edge or in defensive mode. A lot of this has largely stemmed from a history of being poked since middle school... some of which was in jest, and some of which I still feel bitter about sometimes.
Exhibits:
A. In fifth grade, people in my class used to make fun of me for using the word basically, because apparently that's not a word fifth graders normally used and it made me sound nerdy or something. One of my classmates took made a point of this during PE by yelling "BA-SIC-LY" while poking me in the side with each syllable. And I was a bit miffed because I'd helped this person in class before, and it hurt a lot.
B. In seventh grade, during math class and either history or geography or some sort, both of which were held in the same room, both of the people sitting behind me in class would get bored and decide to poke me in the back with a pen. If you've never been poked in the back with a pen before, it stings a lot more than a finger poke does.
In a fit of anger I used to retaliate against the second person, a girl, by whacking her in the head with a planner, and for some weird reason that would just make her laugh. The more times I whacked her in the head, the more she kept on laughing... and she just wouldn't stop. -__- I never understood her.
C. Also in seventh grade, during lunchtime my friends and I had wars that pretty much reduced to me and my lunchpail vs. an army of pokers (at this point it was more in jest than really hurting me persay). It was like freeze tag except tags were pokes in the side, I was the only person who could get "tagged," and I could fight back by whacking attackers with my lunch pail.
One person managed to successfully catch me off guard with a poke so sudden that it caused me to collapse and lie down on the ground for several minutes. Probably the "best" poke I ever got, although it worried everyone else haha. I also broke the tupperware inside my lunchpail once after whacking an attacker with it.
D. In eighth grade, one of my friends pulled off an arbitrary poke into my side, and I instinctively swung my arm backwards at him and my fist made contact with the inside of his mouth. He wasn't hurt, but ugh, saliva.
E. Sophomore year of high school Spanish, the girl sitting behind me decided to poke me in the back with a pen cause she was bored. Ironically this girl had no knowledge of my history of pokes, but I didn't retaliate because this was high school and I didn't feel like getting in trouble (also I have no idea how we got away with the things we did during middle school). But ugh, she was incredibly annoying, and I'd forgotten how much more painful pen pokes were.
F. In college, my apartment-mates got wind of my poking weakness and I distinctly recall one incident that resulted in me grabbing a trash bin filled with firewood (...I don't think it was the axe) and marching towards his suddenly locked room. But nothing came of it luckily.
G. A few of my church friends today like to greet me by poking me, although one time I was holding a cup of hot tea that I almost reflexively splashed on him. I don't get poked as much anymore, but sometimes... Bush...
And that is my history of poking. I'm not generally a violent person, but this is one area that has been able to rile me up in the past and I would caution anyone considering approaching me in this fashion to tread lightly.
