Ningen to ha, gakushuu ikimono na no da naaa

Err... just random stuff. It's from the My HiME CD drama. One of Tokiha Mai's (the starring character) girl friends tries to tackle her in the classroom. Mai dodges and says something like "do you really I'm going to fall for the same trick again?". And thus her friend replies the above line, meaning something like "human beings can learn by observation... very interesting".

Yes, "gakushuu" means "to learn by observation". Blame the Japanese for having a word for every single nuance.

Now, what was I going to talk about? Oh yes, my uni project. It's so silly. Since in my uni there's no first, second or third year for the CS major, I've got to complete the minor and then switch. That includes the end of degree project, gah.

It's about a postprocessor for the output produced by an interactive theorem prover called ACL2. It's based on Common Lisp, and I believe the program itself is written in Lisp. There's some really advanced work being done on it.

I've got to make a Perl backend to turn ACL2 output into XML code which can then be easily accessed by a Java application. Interesting it is, but complicated it is too, young padawan. More than anything, ACL2 is COMPLEX.

Thank the Kami we're going to start with lil' prototypes and then build up from there. It's a software engineering thing: the development process is organized in a life cycle according to a model. Mine is called the prototype building process and it's pretty much a cycle: develop something simple, test it, improve on it, rinse and repeat.

Yep, the whole process is to be documented using software engineering methods. Oh well, it'll be good practice.

"Quidquid latine dictum est, altum sonatur", (Highlight the line below for the translation)
Anything said in Latin sounds profound.
~Zio

Purdy circuit!

Well, actually, it's nothing special. It's just that I'm going to make my first circuit ever for that Microcontrollers project. It's pretty simple. Ever heard of the game Simon? You know, the one with the buttons and the lights, where you have to repeat the pattern displayed by the computer.

It's just that. Last Friday, my teacher helped me place the components on the board. Half the stuff I bought didn't work in the end =|. We desoldered some buttons from an old printer's control panel, and then added the LEDs I bought (red, green, yellow and orange), 4 resistors from some odd box in the lab (got to look up their resistance, but they're prolly around 1k ohms) and a pin strip my teacher brought.

Then basically, solder, solder and solder. Looks purdy now. Next Friday we're going to connect everything. We might in the future add its own CPU and power supply (i.e.: batteries) so it'd be autonomous, but that's just a possibility.

Soldering isn't all that hard, it just takes some getting used to. That, and watching the soldering alloy melt like *poof* is a little unnerving. It's good to know it's actually because it's made that way.

Well, that's it for this post.

Spirits are always with you,
~Zio

Sing Ho! for the life of a Pooh!

Another silly quiz - heh.
Not sure I quite agree, but then I guess we all have felt like one or another Pooh character every now and then in our lives. I tend to identify myself with Pooh in my cheeriest and with Eeyore in my gloomiest (and whatever the appearances, that is quite gloomy). Here we go!


Take the 100 Acre Personality Quiz!

Did I say Rum-tum-tiddle-um-tum? I'll take the chance and do it now!

p.s: Just remembered I have an appointment with the dentist tomorrow. Oh dear.

My birthday pressies

So I thought I'd chat a bit about my birthday pressies, which I've loved. I've even made piccies for the curious XD!
First pressie I got was a jewelry box from Carmen two days ago. It's beautiful and actually makes a set with my two other j. boxes (a big square one and an hexagonal one) - I'm not sure she knew, but it was lucky, wasn't it?




My mom woke me up this morning singing Happy Birthday. So we had my birthday cake (nice chocolate and cream one) for breakfast - I would have taken pictures, but I had dinner early yesterday and ... well ... I just wasn't in my right mind and ate it before considering actually capturing the mo for the future. Tut tut. Base human instincts. Then came the pressies.

Yay! Exactly - a Kakashi and Pakku keyring! This was from the little brother, who knows what a great Kakashi fan I am (he is my fav Naruto character, with Naruto himself, Rock Lee and his sensei). I love the weird hairdo, the drooping eyes, his laidback attitude, but also his great judgement and fighting skills. And I love it when he blushes and giggles while reading his favourite book (included and painted with full detail in my keyring), Icha Icha Paradise. I also love his one-sided rivalry with Gai-sensei, and how the latter complains about how cool Kakashi always looks. Heh. Oh what a lovely series Naruto used to be! Thank you thank you thank you for the gift, otouto!



Somewhat related with Naruto is the other pressie I received from Zio. My very own cute Tigger bowl for eating ramen! I had a smaller sort of bowl (an Eeyore one - I don't see clearly about these things, they do me in at first sight!) but I can hardly pour any soup in that one - and that would make it noodles rather than ramen, uh? (the glories of having had an oriental supermarket open locally :P). I'm using it in brief - it's almost time for dinner and anime watching.



And my parents got me loads of pressies too. A lovely pyjamas and dressing gown in shades of my favourite colours (blue and lavender), heart-shaped bath salt, and scented body milk and gel (orchid, rose-raspberry, orange - I'm also done in with fragant things, cute and/or fragant are the keywords for me). And a loooovely Pucca metallic coin purse! (isn't it cute or what?)




Two friends (Carmen and Gema) and my sister phoned to wish me a happy birthday. All in all, a very pleasant day. I've spent it having fun around - playing Neopets, updating my blog, writing reply emails one should have written ages ago, reading and watching "Murder She Wrote" on the telly (yep, oldie but goodie, I love detective fiction)! Not much else. Like all good days, peaceful and nice.

Gory stuff which goes thu-thump - Inuyasha

Zio [a.k.a the otouto, or the little brother] said:

meesa no like gory stuff which goes thu-thump and is squishy.

I just had to laugh at this one - it sounds so dreadfully like my own idea of Naraku! Just the sort of villain I wouldn't find one inch appealing. He's so yuckie and so...!!
So... shall we switch the topic to Rumiko Takahashi's Inuyasha?

Naraku went squishy and th-thump all the while. I'm so happy the manga is now focusing on his alienated heart and now rebel minion, Moryoumaru , who goes thu-thump and all squishy quite often, but not quite as much. And there's lots of new interesting stuff - like Seshie-sama developing actual feelings towards another creature (about Kagura's death) and his sword having been forged into a fighting (rather than healing) weapon in consequence. And Inuyasha's Tesseiga has new powers (yet more powers, I meant!), and he's finding it hard to control them without hurting himself. And he needs them if he's to do something against Naraku/Moryoumaru. So he's been to a friend of Totousai's, a powerful youkai, and has had a sort of informal training lesson when he thought he was saving his sensei to be from an evil youkai. Great fun and better art as was to be expected from Takahashi sensei. I have mentioned I'm a huuuuge fan, have I?
If you folks are for her works and you still haven't visited Ear-Tweak, what are you waiting for? The webmistress translates the weekly installment from Shounen Sunday quite punctually ( it's usually up on Thursday) - not only does her translation sound natural and smooth, also her editing is great, very comfy to read. She also writes notes to clarify aspects of her own translation and on top of that, her art is also wonderful. I love her weekly parodies of the installment - I so wish she'd put them all together somewhere, because they are so good. Do spend time on the site, she's got all sorts of very interesting info on Inuyasha and she updates often. Yup. A 10 out of 10.
Those are the two mangas I'm following closely online (as they are far from that advanced here in Spain) - Inuyasha and Fruits Basket. More on Fruits Basket when they release next chapter at Soul Society scanslations!

Kanji fun

Kanji are lovely. Always are.

See, the starring girl in Full Moon wo Sagashite is called Mitsuki, which is written like this: 満月. I originally thought it was 美月, in fact. Both are read みつき、"mitsuki", but the first one means "Full Moon" and the second one means "Beautiful Moon".

Actually, the word for full moon is indeed 満月, but it is read まんげつ (mangetsu).

Anyhoo, so 満月を探して, transliterated by fansub groups as "Full Moon wo Sagashite" is actually ambiguous: it could be

1. mangetsu wo sagashite: (Please) search for the full moon. (there's references to it in the anime)
2. Full Moon wo sagashite: (Please) search for Full Moon. (Mitsuki transformed)
3. Mitsuki wo sagashite: (Please) search for Mitsuki. (well, she DOES run away now and then)

The -te form of any verb in Japanese can mean either a light order, the way something is done or addition of orders. By itself, it's a light order, used in informal situations by girls.

Yeah, don't you love homophones? Kind of explains why the Japanese haven't gotten rid of the kanji. Plus, it's easier to read if/once you know the kanji. MUCH easier, as they don't use spaces.

Quiz and some ideas

Keh. If I've ever seen a short quiz, this is it. Pretty superficial and just kind of gave itself out. I wonder if they couldn't just do things a little better? It's nice anyway, I do think I fit Dr. Wakaouji's personality the most.

Except for the doctor part: meesa no like gory stuff which goes thu-thump and is squishy. Oh yes, and the funny clothes and long hairdo he wore when he was in Route L.

Anyhoo, it'd be OK if the author weren't too good with making questions if they're already done, for example. This sounds silly, but it's like this: you could have a _big_ archive of already-made questions. Every question would contribute towards determining a certain attribute: likes, dislikes, personality traits.

They would be normal questions, with no reference to the anime itself (which makes sense in a PERSONALITY quiz).

The author would then just fine-tune the results based on a definition of the personality required to obtain the result. Then, the problem would only be in defining correctly their personality (which is more or less easy for a fan of the series).

I remember RPG games which made your character using such a system. The questions didn't really have much to do with the game. They were like "you find a purse lying on the floor, what would you do?" or "Is the glass half full or half empty?".

And what's better: once you filled in your data, _all_ the site's results would be available. Though I guess you could always retake some parts if certain necessary attributes of your personality weren't defined (because they weren't used in the quiz you wanted to take) or you wanted to fine-tune a little your data.

Wonder if there's already such a site... hmm... and besides, would there already be a basic quantifiable personality model anywhere I could use?

You are Doctor Wakaouji!

(With Pics)What Full Moon wo Sagashite character are you?[selene_scans]

brought to you by Quizilla

Birthday neopets

So, here I am, turned 27. In any case, my first online surprise of the day was to log in to my Neopets account and finding a different sidebar, birthday themed, with a beatiful cake with a Bloomaroo in it! XD They also had a different one yesterday - a very spooky one I loved! Unfortunately I didn't take a cap of that one, but I do have one of today's!

It was such a nice event yesterday, too. They had treat and trick places all over the site - you could get up to six goodie bags with nice Neopets items. I even got a gruesome spider wardrobe for my Neohome (which is in my deposit box now, in any case, I'm saving to get the 1000 items safety deposit box, heh). I quite like it - it's always something nice and unexpected to look forward to during the day, it is very entertaining, and you can devote it as much or as little time as you want. It is little in my case, but I like playing games every now and then - my favs are Warf Rescue and Hasee Bounce! (I'm also for Pyramids and Sahkmet's Solitaire). But it's good for busy people. Your pets will only get hungry every two or three days, and your dailies can be done in less than a quarter of an hour. And they always have new events and surprises coming on.
More on my bday pressies in a different post.

Full moon wo sagashite (Searching for the Full Moon)

We have just finished watching this series. We only have the OVA left to watch - that made 8 eps in a single day! (that also explains why I'm still up so late). The story was getting rather exciting, as it was affecting all characters that actually had grown into you. So I just thought I'd write a few lines about it.
It is basically the story of a girl who has been living for her grandmother two years, after being recalled from the orphanage where she spend her first ten years, and where she met her best friend and now beloved, Eichi. He wanted to be an astronomer and was adopted by a couple living in America, which is the reason why the promised to work towards their dreams until they met again. But the girl, Mitsuki, has developed throat cancer, and when two shinigami (Meroko, who is a bunny in her plushie form, and Takuto, who takes the form of a cat plushie) turn up she learns that she only has a year to live. Her dream is a singing career which will lead her back to Eichi. The shinigami pity her, and, so that she can actually audition, they turn her into a 16 year old, becoming the pop idol "Full Moon". This is the story of her singing career, of her will to live, of how she relates to other people. It is also about Meroko and Takuto's feelings. As an antagonist to these two shinigami there's a third one - not so sentimentally scrupulous as the former, and still in love with Meroko, who will do his best (or rather his worst) to win her back. I don't like the design for this character, Izumi. By his odd hat I assume that his plushie form would be a dog, but does or does it not like a bullfighter's hat?




It does, does it not? XD. But there was Ogata Megumi voice acting, so I couldn't have asked for anything else. I find her impressive - she's believable both as man and as woman, though she'll always be the voice of lovable Yukito from Card Captor Sakura (most of the cast was in love with him at some point of the series, so I guess it wouldn't be odd if I fancied him myself, a little bit at least!). I'm trying to listen to a few of her songs. Yes, I'm a classical music person, but I still feel curious and I enjoy a good tune as much as anyone else. What I've noticed with "popular" music is that it feels tiresome or boring sooner, just that. Which reminds me to say that, though the main two songs ("Myself" and "Eternal Snow") are repeated a bit too often, I quite like them. Especially "Eternal Snow", when sung by Full Moon (I like Takuto's too, certainly not Madoka's!). Though gosh, such a mixture of languages gets on my nerves - what's that of singing "I love you", "Hold me tight" so on and so forth in the middle of a song in Japanese. Hmm. I know it's common. But I still don't like it. It often does not even make sense!
Now, about the art. The little brother is just right. It is really average, but now I've been looking around for illustrations from the manga I realise its rather the studio's fault, not the author's, Tanemura Arina, whose art is definitively shoujo (all girly), but is rather beautiful. See Takuto, Meroko and Mitsuki in the illustration from the artbook. It is nice. And this is one of the simplest ones in the volume.
I've also enjoyed the end - it's as open-ended as one is used to expect from anime, but at least is sufficiently satisfying, it leaves threads resolved, you sort of know where characters stand as the action closes. Yup. Thumbs up for whoever decided not to frustrate fans!
More on what's next tomorrow - besides my 27th birthday, that is!
Oops, and here are my results for a Full Moon quiz. Hmm. I'm not sure I identify myself fully with any character, but I suppose Meroko would be first - she's loud and clumsy, too...

What Full Moon wo Sagashite character are you?[selene_scans]
brought to you by Quizilla

Banner (II)

Well, how could the little brother ask what a Neopet is doing in the banner of our blog? I mean - as if he didn't know I'm quite a fan, and try to visit daily and all. Tut tut, you traitor. It's ok if you are busy and can't pop in, but ooooh dear, what's that of denying it thrice before the cock crow??? Alas! Hmm, no, wait, I got it wrong. It was just once. I'll spare you this time. There.
I hadn't noticed Suzaku in the manga - was too busy looking at all the beautiful men around (mainly, but not exclusively, at Soryu). Yep, even that strange image of a half-naked Toda while imprisoned for his rebellious, violent behaviour. A very strange, albeit amusing image - I'll see if I remember to scan it one of these days. I mean, it must have been cold at that place, phew. I've recently bought the last volume and am still flabbergasted at the idea of being left SO in the dark about everything. Where's Muraki? Is he really human? What's Tsuzuki - a demon, a scientific experiment, a remarkable human? And what about Hisoka? And his exquisite dad? And his mum's twin? and her mysterious, monstruous, two year pregnancy? And Wataru's sex change formula (lol)? And what did Hisoka really mean by "Baka, if you have nothing to live for, then live for me!" *watery-eyed just from remembering* Hmmm. Aren't we getting any more fluffy confessions? Oh dear.
I feel so frustrated. Adieu to Matsushita's sensei delightful artwork. *Sob* And the story was getting soooo interesting!
So, okies, expect a summary of my fav scenes one of these days. I should find the time to choose them first. But I really should. A homage to one of my greatest fav mangas ever.
Oh and yes, I'm so keen on Yuu Watase of late. And yep - I loved "beautiful man" Hotohori. I mean, yikes, crivens, ye gods. He was awesome. Or he would be, if he were real, of course (surely you thought I had forgotten the fact, uh?!). Koyasu was the voice actor too. He's quite good too - very pleasant voice, great acting. Yup.
About Full Moon wo sagashite - more in a few days. I know it's going to end a real tear-jerker. Nice story - art not bad, only somewhat average for so popular a series.
So far so good. I really, really should be in bed. Have lessons to teach tomorrow, and lots of reading (not manga, mind you, Ph.D, but just as amusing, me being such a textual omnivore).
And there goes a little illustration. Hotohori is that dark, long-haired beauty on the left. Not his best, but it is a favourite piece of art of mine.

Fitting, I suppose?

You're Nagi Naoe!

I don't quite know the guy, but he seems the Local Computer Weirdo.

I guess it's fine then.
:shrug?:

The slightly dysfunctional Weiss Kreuz Quiz
brought to you by Quizilla

Banner

Oh, almost forgot to tell about the banner. Sis made it, actually.

Let's see... there's:

• Guu from "Jungle wa Itsumo Hale Nochi Guu". Watch it if you can, it's hilarious.
  
  
• Shippo from Inuyasha. It's from Rumiko Takahashi, after all.
  
  
• Sakura from Tsubasa Reservoir Chronicles, who is really from CardCaptor Sakura. Which is a pretty good series, along with X 1999. Too bad Tsubasa is more like "Here Comes Syaoran The Cool Hero". Keh, I say.
  
  
• Rezo from Slayers (and Slayers Next? or was it Slayers Try? Wait, that was Copy Rezo...). I really miss those Dragon Slayer thrown away for good measure (and great justice).
  
  
• Edward Elric from Hagane no Renkinjutsushi (AKA Fullmetal Alchemist). Best plot I've seen yet.
  
  
• The five Inner Senshi (let's see... Minako, Ami, uhhhh... Usagi, Rei, and Makoto, yup) from Sailor Moon (and Sailor Moon R... and Sailor Moon S... and Sailor Moon SuperS... and Sailor Moon Stars...). Japanese names are Bishôjo Senshi Sailor Moon and all that. Yes, Pretty Soldier Sailor Moon.
  
  Sue them for having horrible taste with names. Especially attack names like 'Lovely Punch' or the worst I've seen yet, 'Gentle Uterus'. Who the *bleep* made them up!?
  
  The opening song is evil. It sticks to your head.
  
  
• Hotohori (Mr. I'm So Beautiful - yes, 'beautiful') from Fushigi Yuugi (see if you can find him!). Sis has gotten a liking to Yuu Watase's works lately, especially after having read Alice 19th. Too bad I'm not too much into manga.
  
  
• Oscar from Rose of Versailles. Surprisingly good series, really. A classic as well from the 70s. Shôjo Kakumei Utena's author _must_ have watched it.
  
  
• An o-nigiri (rice ball). Probably the one from Fruits Basket: y'know, what with the game where everyone had a fruit's name and the loser had to be the onigiri. Or something like that. Very nice series. Though the manga seems to be even better. No umeboshi there though. The seiyuus rock.
  
  
• Tsuzuki from Yami no Matsuei: good art, characters are good too. Wonder why it only reached 12-14 eps? There's just a wee bit of shounen ai in there, but c'mon, even Naruto or Hunter X Hunter has more than that. And Suzaku's human (and female, mind you) form just looks so fine :). Sorry, she only appears in the manga.
  
  
• Kakashi-sensei from Naruto. All hip and cool, like Gai-sensei'd say. His face is covered, as usual. Just in the wrong way. Sis got trigger-happy in a way with the transparency. XD
  
  
• And uh, what the bleep is a Neopets petpet doing there? Don't ask me, I didn't put it there. Honestly.

Oh, and today was my favourite day of the year. Why? Simple! A 25-hour long day. See, today we were supposed to set back our clocks 1 hour. Too bad I wasted most of it tinkering around blogs. Tsk tsk.

At least I made a little program for a microcontroller we're working on this semester. I'm really curious. I'd love to make something to move around and roll a few wheels, but prolly I'll end up having to do something simpler. Don't think we have enough time for that.

And we're watching "Full Moon wo Sagashite" (Search for Full Moon). It's so fluffy and kawaii and all at first, it kind of made me want to puke. But it's getting interesting, and it's quite entertaining. Nothing impressive on the artistic side though. It's quite standard.

Tinker tinker little star...

Yes, tinker tinker. As you can see, we've been doing a bit of a facelift to the site around here. Not much really in the ways of design, but blogs are blogs in the end. But of course I have to spill the technical beans somewhere, so I'll do it here.

Originally, the polka-dotted template we used had a navigational bar on the left. All fine and dandy, but well, you can't just keep on adding things without it becoming excessively long and tiring to scroll through. So sis over there thought about adding a navbar to the right, with other assorted stuff like the chatterbox and the list.

Doing this the CSS way (that is, with floating elements instead of tables) was instructing, and certainly I think I can do a few more tricks now with CSS than before, but geez. I just hate IE and all its quirks, bugs and non-standard behaviour.

Doing stuff for Firefox is quite simple: the left navbar is a div with 'float:left' as a CSS attribute, the right one has 'float: right', and both are 20% as wide as the viewport. Then the main section is twice as wide, and the two navbars have 5% margins to the sides.

You just have to be careful and add 'margin: 0 auto' to the main section so it'll center properly. And that's it. The heading banner uses 'clear: both' so it stays out of trouble. And that's it. Nothing else, right?

Wrong. Apparently IE's CSS is broken in some aspects. According to the CSS standard, any floating element should just ignore the 'display' attribute: Firefox does it, IE doesn't. 'display:inline' to the floating elements and it's fine though.

Oh yes, and IE really _hates_ auto margins. I ended up specifying them myself. Also, the 'width: 40%' part for the main section worked funny in IE, so the margins acted their part as well (after all, 30% margin on both sides equals to 40% width, hm?).

Saying it like this sounds easy, but geez, finding the little bugs and workarounds was annoying. Also, Blogger's latest update broke our floating elements as well. Glad they added an option to take rid of the problem. In the worst case, I guess that some 'div { clear: none !important }' kludge could've work, but it'd have been so ugly.

And while we were at it, we changed around the colors. I actually did take my time to make the polka-dot background work fine with the percentages and all, though. Sis should've told me earlier. But oh yes, my solution would only work in Firefox.

The 'background-position' attribute allows you to shift around the upper-corner of the image. That way, you can sort of fake PNG-like transparency a little. Have a normal intensity background and a dimmed version. If you're careful and do it right, you'll be able to have the dimmed background in the navbars and main section fit the main background, just like the Blogger guys did it.

Of course, this only works in all modern browsers if you use fixed sizes everywhere, which is what they did. Actually, the site's contents' width was limited to 900 pixels, and everything was calculated from then on. But, I wanted to use percentages. But it turned out a little more complicated than I expected.

Why? 'background-position' works fine shifting around absolute lengths: it just moves it around as much as you want and that's it. But with percentages, they're calculated according to the padding box. And in a navbar, that's the navbar itself, NOT the viewport, which the margins are calculated in regards to. Thankfully, you can change this by setting the background to a fixed position, and THEN percentages work fine.

But in the end, percentages weren't even necessary. It was actually quite easy. Something like this:

body { background: #fff url('normalversion.jpg') 0 0 fixed; }
#main, .sidebar { background: #fff url('dimmedversion.jpg') 0 0 fixed; }

If you look at the code, it's easy to understand: both the dimmed and the normal version are fixed in the same position, it just happens that the dimmed version only shows up in the main section and the sidebars. So it fits just fine.

Bu~t, and there had to be one: once again, IE messes up and fixed backgrounds are fixed there according to the ELEMENT they're in, not the screen (as they should per the CSS standard). At this point, one can't help but think, "if some IE guy has a problem, just go and install Firefox for all I care". Is it REALLY so bad to implement an open standard properly?

Maa, in the end we just ditched the background, so it's all fine now. Hope you like the new look!

OMG - Weiss Kreuz quizzes

I was having lunch on my own in front of the computer. I was checking my best friend's blog - and somewhere in an old post were these two quizzes. I don't like Weiss - however bishie the men are said to be - weakest plot in town, etc, but you know how mad I'm about quizzes. So there. And I got the same result in both! I can't believe it - he's the one I like least. And what's that about killing my girl and having all town in my bed!! MIND YOU, there's only me in my bed - and that's more than enough for the space I have!
I might be one for silly puns and innocent teasing, but that is such a faint resemblance to that guy indeed. Tut tut. Someone tell me I'm like Aya, whom I like much better. But then I'm not mysterious, secretive or blatantly brooding. I'm loud and often intentionally silly. So well... okies. But I have moral principles! *blushes*
Pffff...
Now I'll laugh at myself, having a third thought, or a second one (in Tiffany Aching's words - that's from The Wee Free Men by Pratchett - my current reading) and then I'll paste results in here. See what you made me do, Carmen! Weiss, spare me! XD

I'm Glühen Youji.
Which Weiß Kreuz Glühen Character Are You? @ Shakunetsu no Honoo.

You're Yohji Kudou!

The slightly dysfunctional Weiss Kreuz Quiz

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Andreas Scholl - Arias for Senesino

I received it some time back, and I have been entranced by this jewel of a cd since. I keep putting off writing about it, as some impressions are always a bit hard to express. After all I'm just a music lover, so I hesitate in anything like commenting in any sort of definitive (i.e, written and public) format. On the other hand, I really need to tell the world how much I'm enjoying this music! And we are among friends, aren't we?

Anyone who knows me is already aware of the fact that I've been said to be a die hard Scholl fan. This cd proves that I have plenty of reasons to be one. He has talent and one of the most strikingly beautiful voices you'll ever hear. This wonderful sound of his is also very flexible and expressive - possibly one of the cleanest examples of singing around (all so immaculate and clear, but still transmitting such a sense of ease all the while). I had been thinking of late his voice had gained in power, expression and volume, had acquired an increasingly manly edge by losing some of his former purity and sweetness of tone. That was not meant as criticism - he's awesome as he ever was, but I did notice that change. Forget about it. In this new cd you get all Scholl voices, past, present and future, and it is enough to stop anyone's breath, no matter how many times you play it. That sweetness is still there - in the subdued tones seeking for the sorely missed beloved in "Dove Sei" (Handel), or in the plea for merciful release from disquieting thoughts in "Discordi Pensieri" (Lotti) - such moving, despairing appeal! So it is present in "Selvagge Amenita" (Albinoni) - a delightful illustration of the Beatus Ille topic, made by the very sweetness of the voice into as peaceful and contented a refuge as any you might ever have wished for.

So is it sweetness everything Scholl has to offer in his singing? By no means. Are you one for agility and vocal fireworks? You can enjoy the finest examples to your heart's content in here, starting with "Stelle Ingrate" (Albinoni) . Not a single feature missing - be it speed or detailed note-by-note embellishments, Scholl will go through them with his characteristic perfect ease. You might suffer in hearing others sing "Al lampo dell' armi" (Handel) at such a breakneck pace - as if they were just about to commit a mistake, as if they couldn't quite reach their goal. On the contrary, you find yourself thinking whether it is really that hard to achieve such clear articulation. You need to stop and listen carefully to realise that it is his voice that makes it sound so roundly effortless.

I had doubted his choice of repertoire - I thought (oh faithless me!) what was he thinking about in recording yet another typical cd for countertenors with yet more castrati arias. He was even re-recording some pieces ("Dove sei", "Al lampo dell' armi", and "Aure, deh, per pieta", and their recitatives). Now everything seems clear. However unbelievable it may sound, the man has surpassed himself - his previous performances of these pieces, finest examples yesterday, sound so raw side by side with the new versions. Amazing. Now there seems to be no shade in the widest range of human feelings he cannot express - be it fury, pity, defeat, despair, love.

I'll take my hat to him. My wig as well, if I wore one. There's hardly anything else I can say. This has become my official favourite of the year. Dear friends, beware, you already know what you're getting as gifts on miscellaneous occasions!

I only regret I did not take the chance to go and listen him live his new repertoire. As you know I am seeing Magdalena Kozena and David Daniels at the Barbican in November. Of course I'm really looking forward to it - but a small part of me wishes it were Scholl and Arias for Senesino. I might have to stop listening to it a couple of weeks before the concert if I want to enjoy it fully! I've always avoided comparing Scholl and Daniels - so I'm not starting now, am I?
So do get focused, Tonks. David Daniels it'll be, David Daniels!

HP Quizzes

Yep, I do agree with this one. Not about being a genius or intimidating people, but certainly Herminone is the character I mostly identify with. The fanart is lovely, btw.

Which HP Kid Are You?

They had also quizzes for relationships in HP. It is disturbing I suppose, but on the one hand they are teenagers already, aren't they? And do never underestimate the fact that the two things that move the world are love and money (and a couple of physical laws I learnt back in secondary school and forgot not long after, of course). In any case, as what regards heterosexual relationships in HP, my result was that I'm for the canon, innocent (the quiz said so - I might or might not agree), couple, Ginny and Harry. Now hold on to your seats - they also had a quiz for slash! I suppose they meant gay couples - I thought slash could include both straight and gay, but I'm not into fanfic, so I'm not that very sure. My (predictable) result was Remus and Lupin. Something romantic between old friends. Well, and so what? That is much my concept of a nice relationship. And Lupin is so sweet. I was so disappointed in the choice of actor for the film - I expected someone somewhat faded, but still with a sort of delicate, elegant beauty come to less, you see. I actually found the actor a bit rough, especially his body language - not saying I didn't like his acting, but he was not Remus Lupin to me.
I can't believe I'm discussing HP in these terms!

Neopets - A triumphant day! XD

Okies, what I'm going to relate in here might not seem of much importance to anyone - and of course I know the difference between getting an article published and this, but it surely gave me the goosebumps when I found out yesterday. You know in the virtual pets community Neopets you can take part in like groups, which are called Guilds. Well, I belong to a very friendly and active one called Neo Grownups (the very name explains it all). They organise events very often, and they have a game of the week, which is different every week. This week it consisted in completing a paragraph. And I won! :) I was so happy that I thought I'd put it somewhere. Life's simple pleasures, your average cynic would add. Right, but where's the harm anyway! It makes me happy!
So, this is it. In italics, my own addition. Above, my treasured virtual prizes, a bottled light fairy and a sweet. Heh.

Joey the Purple Uni went to the Soup Kitchen to help stir the pot. Suddenly the door get's smashed open! Felicia the Spotted Wocky comes running in, pointing towards the outside and saying with loud voice:

-Oh dear, this is the end! They opened a Zillion Soup charity just in front of us! They've got ALL varieties! And they are not only free, they have a free take away as well! If only they weren't rivals... - Felicia added mournfully, picturing herself in her cosy armchair later that evening watching her favourite TV show while enjoying a delicious bowl of warm cream of Tchea soup.
-Not to worry, not to worry, dear. I've just been researching on my last invention in nourishing food at low costs for the impoverished Neopian. What better than a wholesome bowl of Fairy lumpy porridge? What healthier?
-.... ... ....
-Whatever are you doing on your knees, Fliss?- said the Soup Faerie looking at her furry friend in astonishment.
-I'm on a pilgrimage to Coltzan's Shrine. On my knees, yes!
-How sweet of you indeed. How well you know what this little stand means to me. But do you really think it will be of any help after all?
-Might or might not be, but with a bit of luck I might even get some decent breakfast tomorrow - maybe slightly overcooked, but at least nothing you can build a Neohome with!

Tonks' Highway

Another very silly Internet thingie. This one made no questions, so its purely random, but I found it very funny, as it shows me so close to the Study Hall. Very appropriate indeed, as it is what I'm spending all my time in. Not complaining, it's more like excusing myself. I know, I know, the little brother also studies a lot, and still updates often...
Should post what I'm messing about these days. I certainly will. At some point today. Hopefully. I also added an invisible visitor counter in here, so beware, we are watching you! LOL!

ymphadora Tonks Highway Study Hall 8 Mt. Happiness 21 Family Farm 43 Tower of Commitment 105 County Jail 308 Please Drive Carefully

Username:

Where are you on the highway of life?

From Go-Quiz.com

Quack.

Hee hee, a ducky. And I'm almost like my sister, a Lamb. Oh well. It just feels strange to be compared to a duck. =/

You Are A: Duckling!

The cutest of the cute, these baby ducks are often spotted in the spring following closely behind their mother. As a duckling you will grow up quickly, becoming one of the adult ducks seen commonly in ponds and streams. Playful and timid, charming and vulnerable, ducklings are nature's very definition of innocence.

You were almost a: Lamb or a Pony
You are least like a: Monkey or a TurtleWhat Cute Animal Are You?

Naruto Manga #278

Hmm... seems the Naruto-Chuushin people are getting sluggish these days. They didn't even post last week's manga, neither the raw nor the scanslation.

Oh well, I just grabbed the one from Naruto-Uchiha.es (or was it .com?), which has very high quality scans (sadly, no raw).

The story is getting more interesting than ever: Deidara explodes in tiny bits and Kakashi takes care of the explosion... taking her away to a different dimension?

Didn't know the Sharingan could do that... thought it was just a normal (well, high-level, especially the Mangekyou) doujutsu.

Apparently: yes, Gaara is dead, but he might be revived by Chiyo, with that life-exchange jutsu of hers. And.. that's it. Hmm. And I still wonder why they must butcher the story in the anime with so much horrible filler. Gah.

Another silly Quiz

A lamb, me? Hmmm... I don't quite agree, but I was honest in answering, really!

You Are A: Lamb!

Peaceful and gentle, lambs have been used in religious imagery for millennia. Lambs are baby sheep, an animal tended by shephards since the dawn of history. As a lamb, you tend to stay together in a flock and graze on grassy land. Lambs don't mind being led and tend not to go off on their own.

You were almost a: Bear Cub or a Pony
You are least like a: Parakeet or a MouseWhat Cute Animal Are You?

Almost There

Well, it seems like I've finished configuring everything important.. except the printer, of course, but hey.

The last update DID break my scim installation, but I got it working again, better than ever. Also, I found out my router only allowed 256 connections at a time using NAT, so having reconfigured eMule and Azureus considering that, browsing and everything works like a charm.

Oh, and got Samba reconfigured as well. Now even the CD will remount itself when necessary, and security is a wee bit more finegrained.

愛でたし、愛でたし！

Testing...

I'm trying posting to my blog through a blogging applet for GNOME I just found today. It'll be nice if it works.

Anyhoo, it's just too bad I'm writing in English and not in Spanish. If I were, I'd have some nice spellchecking integrated with the posting app, but as of now, I just get a whole bunch of underlined words. Annoying.

Somehow, the last package update broke my dear dear SCIM Anthy plugin. (Wonder if that's a reference to Utena?)

RE: Naruto #276 manga

I just had to post something following the little brother's comments on Naruto. Mind you, the anime. He is just so right - he still watches it faithfully, I think. I don't seem to find the heart to of late, whatever are they doing with one of my most favourite series ever? I can hardly think of anything more painful than that arch with the bulky Konoha ex-ninja guy, whatever his name was. Come ooooon, all that mess and Orochimaru had already done him in ages ago!! I'd have any of those cracking fillers any day, Kakashi reading his Icha icha Paradise, Ero-sennin following women around - or best of all, Naruto tachi trying to see Kakashi's face, ooooh dear!
Now I should be off for my daily walk. I know I should have said more on the subject - well, I'll certainly do so when I remember!

Finally, a decent setup!

Well, almost.

I downloaded the Ubuntu 5.10 preview release the other day. Setup was smooth and simple, everything worked to a charm and I got a good system up and running in no time.

Except for a few kinks.

-> Java: Ubuntu 5.10 includes a free alternative to Java, whose compatibility must be real good, as it loaded Azureus without a hitch. However, uh... it's still to be optimized a bit. Had to switch back to the J2RE, adding a repository I found on the net. Somehow, Sun's package didn't work off the bat.
-> Printing: Blarg. Don't get me started here. It's just horrible. I spent a day looking for drivers (GOOD drivers that WORKED). Guess what. No luck. I'm thinking about going and buying TurboPrint, but it's unnerving having to PAY for something I've already paid for. Darn those EPSON people.
-> Japanese input: The Breezy repositories are still on the low, so this was quite annoying. I built scim with a few extras I wanted on my own. But it took me a darn good while until I could actually use it, as there wasn't much info on how to configure it. Google helped, though.

But now, it's really nifty: unlike before, I can perfectly type in Spanish, then switch over to Japanese. Oh well, it doesn't work in Emacs, but hey, it's not like I need it, and besides, that'd mean I'd have to switch to UTF-8 in there (and gcc does NOT like utf-8 encoded input files, no siree).

Also, the Anthy SCIM module is much better than the UIM-Anthy I was using before, it's pretty much the Windows IME ported to Linux. I also have a character pad and a handwriting tool (which is not too good, but hey).

The one thing I still have to get working is printing. I dunno, I just don't have the heart for it now. I think I'm going to work maybe on the recursive equation solver for a while.

Ja ne!

Naruto #276 manga

Gaahhhh. I CAN'T believe they're going to do one more filler arc. They're just going to shoo away everyone in the audience will all these fillers. I don't mind one arc, like the Morino Idate one, but... four? Let's see:

- first arc: Jiraiya goes to look for Sasuke with Naruto. Fake Orochimaru (or not?) and fake Kabuto... and the sad, sad story of a clan who nobody cares about and no luck in the world.
- second arc: Mizuki arc. Mizuki just fizzles away after being an idiot.
- third arc: Hinata arc. Seems Naruto blows it up by farting on the Bikouchuu.
- fourth arc: On a mission with Gai-sensei's team. Oh well, this one might be funny.

I think this is the anime with the biggest filler period I've ever watched. Sailor Moon had, what, 12? You know, that Doom Tree part. This one's already got 13 or so, and the fourth arc will surely take 2 or 3 more eps.

On a happier note, the manga is getting very interesting. On the just released #276, Naruto and Kakashi show new moves. Kakashi somehow activates the Mangekyou Sharingan (though starting it up takes a good while), and Naruto uses, apart from his usual Kage Bunshins and the Rasengan a new move, Ikari no Kobushi - Sakuretsu Shishi (Fist of Fury - Exploding Lion). It looks like a normal punch though... but it if WERE one, it wouldn't have the name in _big_ kanji around, would it?

Oh yes, Kakashi let Deidara blow his own right arm up by using the Mangekyou Sharingan. So the poor guy doesn't have either of his arms (remember, Gaara blew up his left one) and can't use jutsus. I don't think this fight will take very long at all. Just a hunch. They DID make Sakura's fight incredibly long.

And Naruto found Gaara, seemingly dead, inside of Deidara's clay bird's head. Naruto has indeed changed: actually took an Akatsuki by surprise.

.... hold on a sec, I've just realized something. Didn't the second part of the Naruto story start on February? That means... if we get 4 chapters a month, and we're on the 9th one, that means (9-2+1)*4 = 32 freaking chapters ahead of the anime. What the bleep are the people from the anime waiting for?

Firefox: Thumbs Up.

Well, I've just finished my first Firefox extension. A pretty silly one, but hey. There's places in Neopets.com you can only check so often - and keeping track of when you did it is a big hassle.

So I made a program which would keep track of it automatically. No more, no less. Don't want to make a cheat program, it's just a handy extension. Hope the Neopets staff realizes it and doesn't ban it when I try to announce it in the guild. :sweatdrop:

Sent it to the UMO (addons.mozilla.org) service. It's pending approval by a rewiever now. Hope it's anytime soon.

I've spent the last 4 days on this, they BETTER approve it =D. I'm actually glad, as I've had to use most common aspects of extension making while building it: making a sidebar, opening new tabs, keeping track of preferences (and observing their changes made in other windows), handling Greenwich times properly, and so on.

The chrome:// approach is really smooth, a great idea from the Mozilla guys. And support for localization is quite good, though I wish some of the online tutorials were a bit more updated. Especially the part about the chrome.manifest. It took me several bangs against the wall till I found the official packaging instructions, which pointed out the mistake in the tutorial.

It was a big surprise when I found out all of Firefox's GUI was done using XUL (a derivative of XML), CSS, DOM and JavaScript. XML and the rest are stuff you'd normally find in a website. The part that needs compiled code (i.e: connection-handling routines and the like) is glued to the scripted GUI through XPConnect. Nice, isn't it?

Link here (not available yet, warn you):
https://addons.mozilla.org/extensions/moreinfo.php?id=1239

Touch...ed by a car

Well, Touch DID end up getting interesting. After they got into high school, everything started to move. Both brothers declaring, Kazuya getting into the baseball club and Tatsuya into the boxing club, and Kazuya's team reaching the Koushien finals.

Geez. I've heard of sharp turns in the story, but this one takes the cake. The author(ess?) just "dispatched" Kazuya to the other world courtesy of the loving caress of a truck. While saving a child, of course. Killing such a character is like hitting Kasumi from Ranma, tsk tsk. Like kicking a puppy.

Style bonus for the driver for NOT hitting the guy's pretty face. That means the inner organs must be pretty messed. Ouch.

It'd be funny though if instead of a car, it were like this:
"Poor boy, lying like that on the street."
"Yeah, what with all the blood around. So messy."
"Some maniacally laughing mangaka just whipped out a bazooka and blasted him through a shop window, see."
"My, and I thought Japan was a safe place. That's too bad."

Or:
Doctor: "Sorry, Kazuya. You won't be able to become a Shinobi anymore."
Kazuya: "Huh? Shinobi?"
Doctor: "Err... I think I've got the wrong se-"
Gai-sensei: "LEE!!!!!"
Kazuya: "GAI-SENSEI!!! No wait, why do I know your name?!"
Gai-sensei: "NO MATTER, YOU WILL HEAL FOR THE POWER OF YOUTH IS BURNING IN YOUR SPIRIT!!!"
Kazuya: O.o;;

Sutte Hakkun

Yep, yet another unreleased in Europe Japanese game I've tried lately. There's several possible translations on the title, actually. The problem is how to translate "-kun" which is a suffix used for subordinates (at the office) or teen boys (everywhere). "-chan" is easily "Lil' BlahBlah" and "-san" is either "Mr." or "Mrs.", but "-kun"?

And there's "suu" and "haku". The first verb can either mean "to breath", "to smoke", "to suck" or "to inhale". And "haku" can mean "to spit" or "to vomit". So the name means something like "cute thing which sucks stuff and then spits it somewhere else".

Let's see... "Adolescent Suck and Spit"? Uggggh, BAD mental image. Bad, bad. "Lil' Smoke and Vomit"? Ew. Er... "Mr. Inhale and Exhale"? That sounds like if he was having a baby. No, definitely you can't just go on and translate it directly. Let's settle for "Mr. In and Out"... that'll work.

Well, on with the game itself. It's a puzzle game, by Nintendo, made in the last dying breaths of the SNES (that is, '97-'98). It has the same feel as Yoshi's Island (Super Mario World 2), that is, crisp controls and nice but not overdone graphics. It IS obviously in Japanese, but you don't really need it once you know how the game works.

The objective of the game is to, in as little moves as possible, obtain all the rainbow crystals scattered around each level. The starring character is a crystal figurine with a long beak, with which it can poke, extract and inject color ink and suck and spit blocks and a few special characters.


When you start the game, and after selecting a save slot, you're sent to the School (Hakkun Goya, I think) in Happiness Island (Shiawase Shima), where you can learn all about how the game works. See, that's one of the lessons. The character is right between a Makkun filled with blue ink, and a jar of blue ink. See the Rainbow Crystal over there?

The character can suck ink from anything that has ink in it: blocks, characters or jars (jars never run out of ink). Then you can either inject it somewhere else or discard the ink, by pressing Down on the D-Pad.

You can also jump 1.5 blocks high, and walk 0.5 blocks without falling. You can hold the beak button to touch blocks at exactly 0.5 blocks above you, and if you jump holding it, you can touch stuff while falling easily. If instead of just pressing the button when spitting a block, you hold the beak button, hold Up and release the beak button, you'll spit it 0.5 blocks above. It's handy, trust me.

Using the L button, you can target a particular block you want to hit for a few seconds. Especially useful when there's a few closely overlapped. The R button is for moving the camera around the level. Start will pause the game and open up a menu with the following options:

• Quick Save: Saves the progress on the level. Which means that if you're just about to do something risky or which requires precise timing, you can save and if you fall on spikes, off the level or you just get stuck, you can start again from there.
• Quick Load: the Quick-Saved progress will be automagically loaded when you're busted (by falling on spikes or off the level), but you can do that here manually.
• Redo Level
• Return to Map
• See Hint: tricky tricky. You will be given a hint to solve the level, BUT in the map screen, there'll be a message saying "hinto wo michatta!", that is "You ended up having to see the hint!". The game says it'll affect the ending.
• See Solution: If you still don't get it after the hint, this option will appear, which'll show a demo of how solving the level optimally. As the previous option, there'll be a message saying "You ended up having the see the solution!", and it'll affect the ending even more.

---

There's a few elements to consider on each level:

• Blocks: Most basic element, you can place them anywhere (even inside walls). Doesn't move unless inked. With red ink, it moves vertically. Blue, horizontally. Yellow, diagonally. The point of origin and direction depends on where you injected ink and where you were facing then.

If you were facing right when you injected blue ink into a block, it'd move to the right, for example. Blocks don't move indefinitely - they move back and forth every 2 blocks. If you want it to keep going on, you'll have to extract the ink when it's moved 2 blocks away and then inject it again.

• Makkuns: these weird fat fellows are pretty handy. Unless blocks, they can't be placed anywhere: only on the floor, never through walls. If you spit it into the air, it'll fall down until it reaches the floor. You can't stack any Makkun, Rokkun, Burokkun or Tsubokun together: they'll blow up.

And Makkuns can be inked. Red inked Makkuns are squishy (biyobiyo makkun) and will let you jump 3 blocks rather than the usual 1.5. Blue inked ones are walky-walky (tekoteko makkun) and walk onwards until they reach an obstacle, then they go back, and so on - they're useful for crossing spiked floors (togetoge). Yellow ones fall on their behinds periodically (shirimochi makkun), triggering special switches which change the color of all jars in the level.

You can also suck Makkuns, turning temporarily in one. No effect with this: that just means you can transport one. You can jump over them. They can't be put on blocks, like Rokkun, Burokkun, or Tsubokun. They'll just go through them like if they weren't there.

• Rokkuns: (Rock-kun) As the name implies, they're big heavy rocks. You can only suck them and spit them. When you suck one, you become heavier, jumping only 1 block. You can spit them and jump on them to evade spikes. Another use is to break glass floors. Any Rokkun, or you transporting one after sucking it, which falls from a height higher or equal to 1.5 blocks will break glass floors upon contact.

See, that's Hakkun after sucking a Rokkun, and two glass floors. Text: "Glass floors can be broken by falling from a height of 1.5 blocks using Rokkun's weight".

• Burokkuns (Block-kun) and Tsubokuns (Jar-kun): they're fake blocks and fake jars. You can spot them because they have eyes. See:

"This block with the freaky eyes is Burokkun. It's a fake block."

"This block which is making such weird eyes is Tsubo-kun. It's a fake jar."

They're only good to be poked in a certain direction. They can't be sucked, they can't be stacked and they can only be on the floor.

• Spikes: They hurt. Duh.
• One-direction Floors: You can only go in one direction through them. When pointing down, you can only fall through them, and when pointing up, you can only jump up through them.

See them, right next to Hakkun? By the way, that's the Area Select part right before playing. You can either press the red button to select the level, yellow to return to the map, or R to look how it is. You can also move up and down to change the level, and left-right to change the stage. On the center of the screen, you can see how many rainbow crystals there are and what colors you can get from the jars (only red here).

---

And what's left... just one more thing: you'll unlock more levels as you go on. After completing 25 levels, you'll be granted access to the Relax Island (Nonbiri Shima), with stages 4, 5 and 6. Stage 4 is getting pretty hard. There's a third island yet whose name I still don't know. Here:

Happiness Island is the upper-left one, Relax Island the one on the lower middle.

On Relax Island, there's the Ongaku Goya (Music Cabin), a SFX and music testing screen. You can only listen to stuff you've already heard before (i.e.: previously played levels).

And this is the map screen of Happiness Island:

Touch... ugh.

Really, I don't know what can make this series 60+ episodes long. It's already been a lil' hard to watch the first eight. For the most part, it's a high school romance anime. Reminds me a lot of Kimagure Orange Road, except the main character of the show is clumsy AND lazy. Well, he can be quite good at times, except for his horrible luck (which then reminds me of Maison Ikkoku's poor Godai-kun).

There's two twins, Uesugi Kazuya (little brother, the popular one) and Uesugi Tetsuya (older brother, the lazy one). Both have a common childhood friend, errrrr.... her name's Minami. It looks like a sort of love triangle, except nobody seems to realize it. Then, a gymnast girl with the least tact I've seen since Ranma pops up and tries to make a grab for Kazuya. Something Minami's not too happy about, yet she doesn't show it.

It's just annoying how the gymnast addresses shamelessly Tetsuya ALL the time about his brother. Yes, all the while pronouncing and talking in that irritatingly sissy way. Gah.

From the plot, it doesn't look too bad. But it just so happens to be deadly boring. It's almost like the beginning of KOR, only it shows no signs of getting better. It's like... err.. who does Minami like? Is she clueless, stupid or just doesn't care? No signs there, nothing at all. The awesome Kazuya is a wuss who can't say no, and Tetsuya doesn't want to improve himself at all. It's just... TOO slow, this show. And whenever you think something's going to happen... it doesn't. Blah.

The only ones who can be redeemed are Punch (also known as Buta-Neko, Pig-Cat), Tetsuya's dog, and the Naruhodo ("Oh, I See") big guy. Those two are funny indeed. The dog appears to be sentient in more ways than one.

You know, it's almost like the Tokimeki Memorial games: either you're a hopeless romantic (and quite one at that), or you just love a good laugh. That, or the plot gets actually interesting, with much crying, slapping and running. Everyone fondly remembers Akane's Big Mallet, or Nabiki's Microphone of Doom.

And in KOR, there was the incredibly shameless Hikaru. Amazingly so, even for European standards, which are looser than Japanese ones - don't think a "serious" couple will kiss in public in Japan, because they just won't. They're, funnily enough, much more prude than us in public, yet they are said to have the most hard-core porn and hentai in the globe (harder than American porn), and statistics indicate sex toys are pretty successful there. And let's not get started about love hotels and the like (want to do it with someone without anyone knowing? do it there!). I guess that sort of thing happens all the time: the more you try to repress stuff, the harder it pops out once it finally does.

Well, all in all, that's just what I've heard from Spanish people living in Japan. You can never tell if they're lying or not, but well, I HAVE spotted a few examples, and they weren't pretty at all.

Wow, that's what I call getting side-tracked.

Mahoujin Guruguru

Well, I haven't posted anything about it before, but sis and I've been watching this series for a week and a half (or two weeks) till the end. It's a hilarious anime.

Basically, if you're a RPG lover, you'll have a good laugh. If you aren't, well, it IS funny nevertheless, but it just won't be the same. It plays on the common stereotypes of the swordsman hero and his partner, the usually female spellcaster.

The hero, Nike, IS blond as usual and his companion, Kukuri, IS a spellcaster and a girl, but that's where it ends. The show is an amazing mix of twisted stereotypes. For the first 30 episodes or so the so-called Hero won't do ONE thing except be kicked around, and occassionally give a good critical strike. Eventually, he learns to absorb the energy of his surroundings and form it into a sword. Pretty RPG-ish isn't it? Not really. You'd have to see him absorb the energy of the Kita Kita Oyaji (Old Kita Kita Man), a 70+-year-old male dancer, with hula skirt and all. And hair on his legs. Or the energy of a school. The first forms a sword which forces someone to dance until exhaustion, and the second one gives out math problems with stupid answers.

Kukuri is the last of the Migu Migu, masters of the Guruguru magic. Such magic depends on engraving magic circles on the ground. Apparently, they're long gone, but the last Migu Migu before Kukuri left circles everywhere: yes, everywhere. Cake recipes, windows, school gardens... and in the way the Kita Kita guy moves his hips around. You can imagine how hard Nike had to try and convince her to watch that long enough.

The Kita Kita Oyaji: last dancer of an almost extinct style, which is supposed for girls. In his town, there's only one girl, and she told him (in a pretty forceful way) she'd rather do anything than learn his style. Thus, he embarks on a quest to find a successor. Thinks a dance can fix anything and has a dance for anything, to everyone's chagrin. Nike and Kukuri try everything to get him off their backs, to no avail. The guy's resilient as a cockroach as well (he fell down a cliff THREE TIMES in an episode and didn't even hurt himself)

Also, there's Gail and his female companion, another spellcaster. He thinks he's the true hero; definitely the pair looks better than Nike and Kukuri, but all they do is get kicked around. Period. At least he kept Nike out of eating a poisoned meal which was made for "the Hero".

Last but not least, you can't forget the Sappari and Daikonran faeries. "Sappari" is a Japanese expression which means "nothing at all", in a million ways. For example, after you comply with nature's call, you can say "Ahh.. sappari!" (Whoo, I dumped it all out there!). If you don't understand something, you can say "Sappari wakaranai" (Can't understand a thing), and so on. Daikonran is the Big Confusion fairy. Basically, it appears when everyone is shouting, jumping and screaming at the same time. It appears FAR less often than the Sappari faeries, which are called on EVERY episode and even once to battle as a Guruguru spell. They even got their own 5 minutes of the show, explaining the life of a Sappari faerie.

Other characters include a talking poodle (who is actually the chief of the Dark Magic Clan), a dark sorceress called La-La (Run-run, actually), a bunch of annoying kids, Kukuri's mental image of Nike (with Rocket Punch attack and all), a swordsman who fights having his sword poke out from the... most unexpected places, a stripper, a priestess who is possessed once a year, an old spirit called Wanchin... the list is quite long.

The art isn't anything spectacular, but it does the job very well. Animation is nice, too. The OP and ED songs aren't stellar, but you won't feel like skipping them either. What's remarkable is that they've kept a chibi-like style along the whole show, and only drop it for comedy. Of course, this is again due to the RPG part: if anyone's played any old-school RPG (SNES, NES, Genesis), everyone remembers the squished short sprites that represented any character.

A very fun series to watch, really.

Super Robot Taisen EX pictures

Well, that's the first dialogue between Mio and Masaki. Mio appears as a result of the 2nd battle, where you defend a gate (one-way only, unless you're reeeally powerful... er, like the Silver Star =/, but even then, it's only enough to transport the core itself) from some guys who are invading the country, as the king seems to be quite not there (don't know really why: looking at a dictionary in the middle of a game is a little troublesome ^^;;).

As you pick her up asleep, she wakes up in Masaki's camp, along with some soldiers from a small country near the Gate.

Mio: "Kya~! Murderer! Kidnapper!"
Masaki: Shut up!! Stay quiet and listen to what I have to say, OK?


Mio's on a whole different wavelength.
Masaki: Well then...
Mio (interrupts): Well, certainly, even if you kidnap me, it won't be a crime if you marry me. You don't look bad, but I hate like guys like you who come on so strong...

Do you really expect that sort of dialogue in a mecha series? Well, a bit, but still...

Mazinger Z appears. By the way, that's the battlefield. Blue units are yours, red are the enemy's. As you can see, the robot under the brackets (Silver Star) is flying, and thus has no problem climbing the cliff. It can even transform, jeez.

Masaki: "Mazinger Z?! Then, that means those guys were brought here as well! Koji, Sayaka! Can you hear me??

Koji: Eh, Masaki! Where in blazes are we?! There's no horizon and the sun doesn't move... no matter how you look at it, this isn't on the Earth's surface, is it?!

Ta-dum. This is one of the screen where you can look info about a certain unit. This is the page about the robot. There's other two: your weapons and your pilot. This is Toulouse's robot, Burooweru (Blower? Blauwer?) Just for trivia, you can see their height, weight without and with armor, and then their HP, Energy (big attacks require this), type (this one's an Earth mecha), movement radius (7 squares here), armor, and maximum reaction capability. (not too sure of the last one). Mazinger Z's got a whopping 5800 HP.

And that's the weapons screen. There's the name of the weapon, its offensive power, maximum distance, effect on accuracy (some are easier to aim than others), and a stat I can't quite understand. Update: thanks to Wakan, got that one. It's "Remaining Ammo".

Also, in the second bar from the bottom, there's the kanji for "sky", "earth" and "sea". That's how effective the weapon is in the three elements (this one's not so good against enemies in the water). It might happen than one or more of them have '-', meaning it doesn't work at all. The weapon might require a minimum level of Intuition and Willpower (both noted there: no requirements at all), and use up some energy (10 units out of our 150 for this battle).

That's the main screen. We're in the 5th turn of the battle, with 9,850 credits. We can either end our turn (passing to the Enemy Phase), look up a list of our troops, see the battlefield from far above, change orders about how to react to enemy attacks, change game options, check the winning conditions (most of the time, Gotta Blast 'Em All), and Save.

Those two blue heads on the top of the cliff are Mio and Sayaka. Those two near the river are Toulouse and er.. just a Soldier acting as backup (the winning condition for the enemy was to kill him).

And that's it. Hope you like it! (that is, hope someone reads this.. xDD)

Super Robot Taisen EX

Well, it's been a long time since my last post. At least for my standards. Anyhoo, a penpal of mine, Aki-san, mentioned a favourite of him, Super Robot Taisen EX. That could be translated as Super Robotic Great War EX (lots of super/duper/ultra stuff here... =/) or Great War of the Super Robots EX (which makes a little more sense).

If you've played Final Fantasy Tactics Advance or Shining Force, you'll know the genre: strategy RPGs... sort of. I wouldn't call this a strategy RPG, that's Shining Force. FF Tactics actually gives you some choice. This game's got a story, but it's er.. kind of linear. You just read the dialogues and play the battles. Or so it seems from the 4 battles I've fought already.

As you might've brilliantly guessed from the title, yes, it's about robots. Even more, the usual Japanese robots: Mazinger Z, Aphrodite (actually, Diana A or something of the sort), and mobile suit alikes (like Silver Star), and the like. There's several game modes:

- Easy (Main Character: Masaki) - Well, no doubt it's easy. You get Masaki, a high-level pilot with the mecha equivalent of a nuclear bomb in his arsenal. Especially useful for his Psy Blast, which is a map attack: basically, a blast big enough to damage a whole area of the map.
- Normal (Main Character: Rune) - Haven't gotten this far yet, hey. xD Though, from the training lessons, it seems Rune has an attack similar to the Psy Blast.
- Training (lead by Sasuga Mio) - Masaki teaches Mio how to fight, basically.

It looks like a pretty hard-core game: there seems to be references to characters from several different mecha series, and also there's quite a bit of detail when it comes to strategic points. Different types of terrain affect your accuracy and evade ratio. Beam weapons don't work underwater. There's weapons which don't work on earth: they seem to be earth-air and air-air and that's it. And enemies you fire at can counterattack, which they do quite frequently.

There's weapons which don't let you counterattack, like energy swords a la Deathscythe (not so high-powered, though), or Anti-Counterattack Bazookas (surprisingly, used by regular troop).

It's funny, since in the 3rd battle, a weird threesome riding a single robot will just appear out of thin air, act as support and then -pop- go away. And in the 4th... Mazinger Z joins your group. Yes, Mazinger Z. And Aphrodite (didn't know her real name WASN'T Aprodite, but Dianan A or something of the sort). Complete with those :cough: weird :cough: missiles. The author was a perv, mind you.

Characters level up by earning experience, getting better stats and new skills. "Seishin" skills... now, how'd I translate that? Seishin means the human mind. For example, seishin kantoo is "human mind expert" -> psychologist. I'd rather just use Skills, than use expressions like "Mind Skills". That sounds like hypnosis. You have points to use them (just like MP), and they vary a lot between character and character.

Some allow you to stop certain enemies for a turn or so, others pump up your speed or your evade/accuracy ratios, and others repair your robot. Poor Soldier A spent the 4th battle fixing his robot, the poor guy. Good thing: you can actually use a skill and then fire, but somehow it's much harder moving and then firing. Gotta get the hang of that.

Also, yours or the enemy's mechas might or not be able to fly, and thus you might or might not be able to access difficult terrain, or climb cliffs / canyons.

Reading is a lot harder than with Tokyo Mew Mew and just a little more than with DQ5. Mucho kanji around. Glad I reviewed the Geography part in my vocab book (otherwise, I wouldn't have understood much the point of the 4th battle, which takes place in a canyon, to avoid the enemy from displaying his superior firepower - 14 machines against, what, 5?). I still need to get a grip on military ranks. I'm sure Masaki is a high-graded militar and so Toulouse, but other than that...

On the next post: Pics!

GetBackers - Ginji Dance

It's been a couple of days since the little brother and I finished watching Getbackers. The series was enjoyable, full stop. It stopped abruptly and leaving unresolved many plot threads, so we thought the manga might have probably gone on much longer. The missions were nothing too showy or sophisticated, nor were their solutions very witty. However, dear Gin-chan makes up for all of it! I don't usually find guys in anime (or their chibis, for all that) cute (in the sense of kawaii), but Ginji definitely is. A very extraordinary thing about his chibi is that not only the spectator sees the little plushie sort of figure, so do other characters in the anime, who actually ask him to take that shape every now and then for their own purposes. Something hilarious is how scared Ginji is of one of the baddies, Akabane (a dark sort of character with rather placidly sadistic habits), in spite of his being rather powerful himself. One of the following caps (afterwards edited for avatars in Photoshop, you may use them at will, etc etc) did actually happen at the sight of the sarcastic sadist (poor Gin-chan!).
Best of all is his expression of joy - his "Ginji dance", and the avatar I shall adopt elsewhere next, which is the image on top of these lines. Isn't he lovable, or what?

Harry Potter 6 - SPOILERS

Back here after a short absence. I know, I know, I should be more constant in updating. When I do, I think there's hardly anything interesting to say, and when I don't, I keep remembering things I'd like to blog! Now aren't we odd, we humans?
Anyway, I finished reading the sixth HP last Friday, after this looong wait, and a bit later than 24 hours since I got it from Amazon. The wait was all worth it, I'm sure. Yes, the books keep getting darker, and though the happy-happy, fairy sort of atmosphere of the first books has disappeared, there remains charm in every single page. The plot thickens, too. And Rowling has really taken her readers in - I really thought it'd be a student dying, I believed it might have been Neville. I really like the character, but in the light of his increasing importance and his part in the prophecy, it sort of felt possible (btw, didn't you people love Prof. MacGonagall's rebuke that she'd talk to his grandmother and tell her that her having failed Charms in her time was not a reason to dismiss it as a useless discipline?!). So did Ginny's relationship with Harry, and the feeling was right, wasn't it?

It is also remarkable how we end up pitying Malfoy. It is funny, because with all the excessive pride exhibited in the previous book, I think Harry was meant to appear slightly unlikeable even to his admirers. It is some achievement, I believe. And the idea of the Half-Blood Prince was fantastic - I really did not expect it, though it made perfect sense when revealed.

I also loved Horace Slughorn, and what about taking the shape of a shabby sofa to conceal himself from Dumbledore. As hilarious as his little drunkard scene with poor, grieving Hagrid (I love him so!) after Aragog's burial. And what a creation, Fred and George's Wizarding Wheezes. What a fantastic pair they are - and what about their "U NO POO". Heh.
And oh dear, I can't believe he is dead. After I had such a bad time when he was suffering and begging for mercy while trying to get Slytherin's locket back. The funeral was such a beautiful bit of narration, in my opinion. Nothing less for the only one You-Know-Who feared, uh? But it still leaves one really shocked and somewhat deflated. Not the book. It's just he was such a great man, such a lovable character. Well, at least there's still his portrait at the Headmaster's office.
But it is hard to imagine another book without him. I know Rowling will manage, but still...!

I shall really look forward to her work after HP is finished (oh yes, let's face it, there is only one left now!). She is a great storyteller, and she has got a great imagination and a wonderful instinct for new materials, I think.

Well, I've just finished doing a few things. Finishing the 6th HP book and ending quite depressed, I decided to try out this SNES underdog I read about in a site: Magical Pop'n. A platform game made in 1995 by Polestar (??) and distributed by Pack-in-Video (??), it obviously didnt' make much impact at all, not even coming here to Europe.

The game is surprisingly good, though. And quite fun to play, if I may add. It's the closest thing to Sonic I've seen on the SNES, actually. Fast gameplay, nice graphics (with that extra touch of kawainess on the lead character, a little girl) , and OK music. Well, the digitized voices COULD use some help - poor seiyuu was prolly just picked off the street and has as much acting talent as me in a good day (that is, nothing at all). It's sad to hear such a dull "Yatta!".

But the "Kya!" when you duck a little too long is still prime material. The girl has potential, after all.

The game's got 7 stages: first one, you get used to the game; next 5 ones, you pick up one spell every stage; and then the last one, with the final boss (and 5 mini-bosses, ugh). The fact that there's mini-bosses shows the attention to detail these guys had. Spells have two modes: normal mode, with normal strength, required stars and looks; and BIG mode, which is just plain flashy and wasteful. xD

Gameplay, as I said before, is pretty fast, and not that linear, actually.

I really recommend this game. I'll give it an 8 out of 10. Now, as usual, screenshot time!



This is the.. hmm.. 3rd stage. You can see there's no Japanese involved in the gameplay itself. xD

There's the number of tries, the energy bar (which you can expand by gaining hearts, a la Zelda), the list of spells you can use along with their cost, and the number of stars you've got to spend. Oh yes... see those little heads below the life counter? Get three of them and you get an extra life.




Ugh... this is Blogger's fault. It's screwing the order of the pictures. Anyhow, see that stone? That was what you were supposed to get back. This is part of the ending. What's she saying? Well, it's quite simple:

Princess: Yatta!







Going into a new stage. This is the 4th one, the ice one. Funnily, you actually don't get the ice spell but the _fire_ spell. Watch out for those penguins. Those have bazookas. Really.










Part of the ending as well. After beating the evil sorceror king, the princess comes back just to make hell out of her gramps' life. I hope she'll get into his old skull that pointy hats with stars and PINK clothes won't get him anything.

I wonder if he's really his gramps or he's just some old man?

"And with the spells she learnt, she pulled pranks on everyone all the time".



The bad guy, looking... quite bad. In the bad sense of the word.

Man, that was a bad joke.

... what?

Evil Sorceror King: "Guoooh... H-How can this be....?"

Kudos for the kid's victory sign.



Blogger blasting its way through my carefully ordered snapshots. This is right before you fight the guy from before.

After you beat him (which is EASY if you're fast, and I've always played fast), you'll fight the real boss, a big ugly thing which is also really easy to beat.

Bosses in this game are Megaman-ish: keep an eye out for what they do, act along and it's a piece of cake.