Itsudatte My Santa

So its the holiday season, so I decided to look into this two part OVA. It's incredibly bad, despite the fact that Ken Atsumatsu did the designs for it... and maybe the plot too... but... its like they tried to cram all of Love Hina-ish plot into two episodes.... needless to say, everyone talked like Kyon from "The Melancholy of Suzumiya Haruhi" and did stupid things at the speed of light. I found this strangely amusing, not only the part where they added random stupid antics despite the fact that they were cramming a ridiculous amount of... just... stuff... into one hour. I mean, as far as timeline goes, guy falls in love with girl and vice versa in 15 minutes, next 15 minutes is random drama with another girl and then the guy forgives santa girl... wtf...

The artwork is nice, although not excellent like KyoAni, of course. But Ken Atsumatsu is still a nice artist. The songs... I wasn't paying attention to the songs since there was like stupid stuff flying around in the series 30 million lightyears a second and I had to catch all of those first (most of the songs were background music)... so... um... yeah.

Interesting Christmas series, nevertheless. Very... holiday spirited? Despite its incredible cheesiness and lack of anything with good substance.

As another side note, apparently google bought blogger.... o_O;;; Interesting new format....

O SHI-

http://www.asosbrigade.com/

The Death of Sal2- Part 1

TheMysteriousBox (19:00:09): what?
Numberonemole (19:00:26): *a thunderous knocking is heard on Box's door*
TheMysteriousBox (19:00:31): hi
TheMysteriousBox (19:00:39): *opens door, even though he never knew he had a door*
Numberonemole (19:01:33): *Box finds himself staring at the waist of a Charitan shaman dressed in royal guard, and apparently blind, his skin dried up, and his armor sags, but there is an aura of power coming off of him, when he talks, he speaks with a thick accent* Are you Box?
TheMysteriousBox (19:01:43): yes :o
Numberonemole (19:02:04): Salvester 2 is dying, and you have been requested to go to Char to see him off
TheMysteriousBox (19:02:11): please invite me then :o
TheMysteriousBox (19:02:17): I will gladly accept


TheMysteriousBox (19:03:58): D:!
ProfJbWolf II (19:04:10): I guess I should've figured who the others are
TheMysteriousBox (19:04:35): hmm, I'm confused... and that doesn't happen often
Numberonemole (19:04:41): *the shamen opens a portal*
Numberonemole (19:04:47): Enter
TheMysteriousBox (19:04:52): *hops in*
ProfJbWolf II (19:04:57): *Goes in after.*
Numberonemole (19:05:21): *glares at PMA*
pokemasterrj (19:05:22): *follows*
Numberonemole (19:07:09): *the portal opens up into an enormous courtyard, and the three powerful men are surronded by the entire Charitan army, along with several other alien species armies, all of them wearing ceremonial armor, and wielding melee wepons
TheMysteriousBox (19:07:29): >.>
ProfJbWolf II (19:07:56): My my, quite a turnout for a funeral
pokemasterrj (19:08:17): Yeah...
Numberonemole (19:08:35): when the three are noticed, all the armies all bow to them, and horns are sounded, and Ash2 along with Dnoce walk out, Dnoce glares at PMA
TheMysteriousBox (19:08:46): must've made a bunch of treaties and whatnot since we were gone
Numberonemole (19:08:49): Ash2:Why are you three here?
TheMysteriousBox (19:08:53): hi
ProfJbWolf II (19:08:58): *Points at the shaman.* He invite dus
ProfJbWolf II (19:09:04): I assume Sal wants to talk to us
pokemasterrj (19:09:11): Or something...
TheMysteriousBox (19:09:22): quite curious, I would like to know why he's dying too
Numberonemole (19:09:56): Ash2:He over eerted himself in reforming Char after the pompus one over there destroyed it
TheMysteriousBox (19:10:41): considering how many times he nearly died to those two, though, and then regenerating as if it were nothing
TheMysteriousBox (19:10:46): death seems almost illogical :p
ProfJbWolf II (19:11:00): Death is the finality of all ain't it?
TheMysteriousBox (19:11:11): not necessarily
Numberonemole (19:11:22): Ash2:You can only expend so much energy before it eats away at your soul, as what happened to father.
TheMysteriousBox (19:11:23): I think a wipe from the entire history, is a finality
Numberonemole (19:11:45): Ash2:He restored life here too...recrreating life is nearly impossible
ProfJbWolf II (19:11:57): And here one would think Sal was only capable of destruction
TheMysteriousBox (19:12:19): when something actually causes one to disappear from history, it is gone... the ending of this can be seen as a death
Numberonemole (19:12:21): Dnoce:Destruction is ones eyes...is life in another. Earth was supposed to be our new home
TheMysteriousBox (19:12:31): but after the being "dies", he is erased from history, except in a select few
TheMysteriousBox (19:12:42): correct, I remember that distinctly
Numberonemole (19:13:17): Dnoce:Your talk on life is all well and good...
TheMysteriousBox (19:13:25): if I am not mistaken, the way you treated humans is similar to how humans dominated over other species on their planet, so
Numberonemole (19:13:25): Ash2:But do you want to continue or not?
TheMysteriousBox (19:13:31): ok
TheMysteriousBox (19:13:34): I"ll shut up :p
pokemasterrj (19:13:41): (going in character) Ash: I'm....a little glad Char's been recreated. Feels nice to know the two planets some incarnation of myself have fired energy blasts at are okay...
ProfJbWolf II (19:14:00): *Nods* C'mon lets get goin' befor ehe kicks the bucket
pokemasterrj (19:14:18): Ash: ..... *shakes his head* This seems...surreal...
TheMysteriousBox (19:14:27): for once I agree with you :-(
Numberonemole (19:15:32): Ash2:Ok, as you can see, the Charitan army is recreated...after the war ended...peace efforts continued
Numberonemole (19:15:45): and we formed a coalition, that Earth has been reluctant to join
Numberonemole (19:15:59): Even the Nameks joined us...and a colony of Saiyan mercenaries.
Numberonemole (19:16:18): They are living with us in a Ghetto of sorts...
Numberonemole (19:16:37): Now, I am not allowed into the chamber to visit him, as the heir...however...enter that door...
TheMysteriousBox (19:17:00): Ok!! *is remarkably rash and opens and enters the door immediately*
Numberonemole (19:17:28): Sal2:YOU!! WHY ARE YOU HEAR?
Numberonemole (19:17:30): HERE
pokemasterrj (19:17:31): Ash: *facepalms* That....is almost like something a hyper teenage girl would do...
ProfJbWolf II (19:17:38): *Quickly nabs Box by the collar of his shirt.* Oh crap
TheMysteriousBox (19:17:54): you didn't invit eus? :-(
Numberonemole (19:17:58): Sal2:Who invited you three! I am past that stage *cough*....
ProfJbWolf II (19:18:11): Some blind shaman guy
pokemasterrj (19:18:12): Ash: *walks in* We...were informed something was going to happen...
Numberonemole (19:18:16): Sal2:Let me die in peace! I finally accomplished something..I do not want to be dragged back in
TheMysteriousBox (19:18:33): huh... *looks rather disappointed at this statement*
ProfJbWolf II (19:18:54): *Releases Box and crosses arms.* We're here to pay final respects to an honored foe, isn't that enough?
Numberonemole (19:19:14): Sal2:You...you die this didn;t you...haha...never left me alone!
Numberonemole (19:19:22): After everything...never left me alone!
Numberonemole (19:19:38): Did he bother you three as well
Numberonemole (19:19:39): hahaah
pokemasterrj (19:19:55): Ash: We have no intention of restarting the endless cycle. If....if it's really your time, we're not going to stop you.
pokemasterrj (19:20:12): Ash: At least you get to go out on a high note.
Numberonemole (19:20:30): High note! *he grabs box* High note...did eyou hear him!!?
TheMysteriousBox (19:20:45): um, yes
TheMysteriousBox (19:20:47): yes I did
pokemasterrj (19:20:55): Ash: You restored your planet.
Numberonemole (19:21:00): *he looks prof directly in the eye* High note....a high notes is not hearing voices....
pokemasterrj (19:21:07): Ash: A much better end than being blown to atoms by me again
pokemasterrj (19:21:12): Ash: Don't you think?
Numberonemole (19:21:28): I destroyed you more than you ever destroyed me
TheMysteriousBox (19:21:40): ara ara.
TheMysteriousBox (19:21:46): I'm usually one to encourage arguments but
Numberonemole (19:21:50): I could grow
Numberonemole (19:21:52): fool!
TheMysteriousBox (19:21:54): lets just leave it
Numberonemole (19:21:54): but he...
Numberonemole (19:22:01): wouldnt let me get better
Numberonemole (19:22:03): after the war
Numberonemole (19:22:07): he made me do all this!
TheMysteriousBox (19:22:13): Sal2, just tell us more
Numberonemole (19:22:16): He never spoke to you...The Voice!??!
ProfJbWolf II (19:22:22): The Voice?
TheMysteriousBox (19:22:24): oh, him. haha
Numberonemole (19:22:40): Laugh it up Enigmatic one...
pokemasterrj (19:22:58): Ash: Haven't been hearing any voices in my head
Numberonemole (19:23:01): I know about you to now
pokemasterrj (19:23:09): Ash: Well except for....nah. Not worth mentioning.
Numberonemole (19:23:10): He nevr let me forget
ProfJbWolf II (19:23:16): Never let you forget?
Numberonemole (19:23:30): *sal2 looks at prof* The pain I caused...
Numberonemole (19:23:40): He used the pain to force me to do things...the rebuld char
Numberonemole (19:23:44): Free the Namekians!
pokemasterrj (19:23:55): Ash: Ah, a guilt trip
Numberonemole (19:23:59): He blackmailed me
ProfJbWolf II (19:24:01): *Frowns.* I don't think it's a guilt trip...
Numberonemole (19:24:06): and he never leaves me alone...
TheMysteriousBox (19:24:07): *marks slowly onto an ofuda, then shows it to him* Regret.
Numberonemole (19:24:11): Yes
Numberonemole (19:24:14): Regret...
Numberonemole (19:24:24): CAN YOU UNDERSTNAD WHAT IT IS LIKE!
Numberonemole (19:24:32): To regret you whole life?
TheMysteriousBox (19:24:58): is it better to know of it and regret it, or forget it all and never knew your past? I wonder... *looks reminicent*
pokemasterrj (19:25:20): Ash: ...I've had only a couple of regrets in my life. However events have made me feel better about them
Numberonemole (19:25:44): *Sal2 looks at Prof* You...do you understand?
Numberonemole (19:25:59): *he points to his head* He changed me up hear...but made me remember everything i did
Numberonemole (19:26:14): I had a new purpose...but my old one stayed fresh
ProfJbWolf II (19:26:22): *Spreads his hands wide.* There are things I regret in life Sal, but I don't regret my entire life. Whatever he's doing to you...
Numberonemole (19:27:16): I'll show you...I'll show you what he is doing to me...
pokemasterrj (19:27:28): Ash: Feel better for having atoned for some of the things you've done, Sal
Numberonemole (19:27:33): I do not!
Numberonemole (19:27:42): I did them in tryiing to atone!
Numberonemole (19:27:45): I did not do them
Numberonemole (19:27:49): I did not do them...
Numberonemole (19:27:54): Who are you?
TheMysteriousBox (19:28:09): We're friends, Sal2, just friends
Numberonemole (19:28:31): Who am I...why am I alone..(Sal2 curls up in his vail and begins to cry, and folds his wings around himself, although his crying sounds like a low roar)
Numberonemole (19:28:50): *the blind Shaman walks in*
Numberonemole (19:29:02): I did none of this too him...althought he believes otherwise
pokemasterrj (19:29:02): Ash: I think....it's time we left. This might not be a pleasant sight.
Numberonemole (19:29:33): The voices are very much just in his head, a very sad sight..to see one such as him fallen.
ProfJbWolf II (19:29:50): *To Shaman.* Did you bring us here to help him? Help him get rid of these voices?
Numberonemole (19:30:02): I brought you hear to finish him.
Numberonemole (19:30:08): He will not die
TheMysteriousBox (19:30:16): its... I dunno. Not unusual. I think... ah.
pokemasterrj (19:30:21): Ash: ....
Numberonemole (19:30:24): He has risen far above that...dealt in far to much black magic
ProfJbWolf II (19:30:32): You want us to kill him?
Numberonemole (19:30:41): Do you want him to live?
pokemasterrj (19:30:44): Ash: I'm not sure.....I can actually do that now...
Numberonemole (19:30:52): He truly want to die now
TheMysteriousBox (19:30:54): Let's do it!
TheMysteriousBox (19:30:57): because
Numberonemole (19:30:57): Look at him!
Numberonemole (19:31:02): Remember what he was!
Numberonemole (19:31:09): PMA, surely you remember!
TheMysteriousBox (19:31:17): somewhere inside me... I had a point too....
ProfJbWolf II (19:31:22): A point?
TheMysteriousBox (19:31:25): I don't know, I still don't know
pokemasterrj (19:31:27): Ash: ...I'm not a cold-blooded killer, though. The times I've taken him out, he was doing something horrible.
Numberonemole (19:31:29): It is a greater injustice to let him live now than to kill him.
ProfJbWolf II (19:31:45): And he's right. It's the honorable thing to do.
Numberonemole (19:32:03): He has healed much of the galaxey that he has destroyed...his sins are paid for, and whatever is assulting him now, I cannot fix.
TheMysteriousBox (19:32:36): To die is to live, if he dies, he will be remembered, still
TheMysteriousBox (19:32:47): but only in memory will he live... crap I'm talking bs now
Numberonemole (19:33:00): However...there is a problem. Attacking him on Char...is foolish. Even you, Engimatic one, can be overwhelmed here.
ProfJbWolf II (19:33:18): And I don't think Dnoce and Exo would take kindly to us offin' their pops
Numberonemole (19:33:19): Magic flows here...you must get him to leave willingly...you have to set him up.
Numberonemole (19:33:35): Ash2 is with me on this, his children know nothing.
TheMysteriousBox (19:34:06): what will happen to the children and Ash2?
Numberonemole (19:34:18): Dnoce and Exo will be good leaders
Numberonemole (19:34:26): Ash2 will be destroyed by one of them
Numberonemole (19:34:37): as he is next in line. he will attempt to attack Earth again.
ProfJbWolf II (19:34:45): And Dnoce and Exo don't?
Numberonemole (19:34:47): he will fail, a coup will happen
Numberonemole (19:34:58): and the twins (Dnoce and Exo will take over)
TheMysteriousBox (19:35:07): shall we ever see them again? That is... what I really want to know....
Numberonemole (19:35:09): But this...does not matter
Numberonemole (19:35:18): It does not mateter
pokemasterrj (19:35:20): Ash: ...So then what do we do?
ProfJbWolf II (19:35:31): *Looks at Box* Well your the tricky one. What's the plan?
TheMysteriousBox (19:35:47): huh. WEll if the shaman has one
TheMysteriousBox (19:35:54): I mean he seems to know alot about Sal2's condition
TheMysteriousBox (19:35:58): its better to listen to him first
Numberonemole (19:36:38): Get Sall2 to leave, then intiate battle
Numberonemole (19:37:20): He wantts to die....but he will fight
Numberonemole (19:37:20): Fight until he is beaten and die ina blaze of glory
Numberonemole (19:37:21): *the Shamen is gone, just a disembodied voice*
Numberonemole (19:37:21): I cannot interfear
(19:37:25) Numberonemole has left the room.
TheMysteriousBox (19:37:33): o.o
pokemasterrj (19:37:36): (Well gee, that was nice)
ProfJbWolf II (19:37:56): He's retiring Sal as a character?
TheMysteriousBox (19:38:02): OOC: let's wait a while first
TheMysteriousBox (19:38:11): because he signed off, probably just DCed
TheMysteriousBox (19:38:27): otherwise blah, I'll save this in my blog and contact him if he wants to finish it off
TheMysteriousBox (19:39:03): since we're all together anyway
TheMysteriousBox (19:39:15): yea its curious if he actually wants to retire his character
TheMysteriousBox (19:40:16): he'll come back on
pokemasterrj (19:40:19): That'll make some of my other characters feel better
pokemasterrj (19:40:39): Obviously good ol' PA is feeling conflicted about this setup
TheMysteriousBox (19:40:48): PMA on an honest opinion
TheMysteriousBox (19:40:53): how much of this are you still continuing?
TheMysteriousBox (19:41:00): do you write your "adventures" down or whatnot?
(19:41:25) Numberonemole has entered the room.
pokemasterrj (19:41:32): I haven't touched the old stories in a long time. As for the AIM stuff, I'm not writing that
Numberonemole (19:41:44): Huh
Numberonemole (19:41:46): Sorry
Numberonemole (19:41:50): wut happened?
pokemasterrj (19:41:54): Might have some minor influence on the old stuff as I learn things, but not writing anything
TheMysteriousBox (19:42:02): we were just talking about OOC stuff
ProfJbWolf II (19:42:04): Yea
Numberonemole (19:42:27): OOC?
TheMysteriousBox (19:42:30): you can read it in my blog later :p
Numberonemole (19:42:34): kk
Numberonemole (19:42:43): So, do u guys wanna kill me off or what?
TheMysteriousBox (19:42:53): we're thinking of ways to do so
Numberonemole (19:42:59): well
Numberonemole (19:43:06): do u think u can stand around in my chamber?
TheMysteriousBox (19:43:21): what would you mean by that?
ProfJbWolf II (19:43:32): And are you killing off Sal2 or just seeing if we'l do it?
TheMysteriousBox (19:43:57): he wants a final spar, ne? ;-)
Numberonemole (19:44:00): *two burly Charitan guards walk in wieling large wepons, and a saiyan walks in leading them*You have stayed in the Chancelors Chamber long enough
Numberonemole (19:44:32): You will now be escorted to your own chambers. We have been instructed not to harm you
Numberonemole (19:44:41): *he points to PMA*
ProfJbWolf II (19:44:46): How about us?
pokemasterrj (19:44:56): Ash: Well I have no intention of trying anything, so no problems there...
Numberonemole (19:45:13): You are a wanted criminal *he points to Box* but yu have been granted immunity
TheMysteriousBox (19:45:27): *creates the V sign*
ProfJbWolf II (19:45:58): *Points at PA.* He's the one who blasts him all the time and I'M the wanted criminal!/
Numberonemole (19:46:01): *the saiyan points to Prof* And you have be asked to be in an office
Numberonemole (19:46:19): Do you wish to be the mayor of the Saiyan district?
ProfJbWolf II (19:46:51): *Blink* Mayor?
ProfJbWolf II (19:47:00): I...uh...
TheMysteriousBox (19:47:06): oi
pokemasterrj (19:47:19): Ash: He has duties elsewhere
Numberonemole (19:47:20): *the Charitans hit box* Bloy!
TheMysteriousBox (19:47:21): if you stay with him, its alright, you don't have to come with me to discover my past and stuff :p
TheMysteriousBox (19:47:27): ow
Numberonemole (19:48:08): *the Sayain look at box* You offend them by look at their shiney armor...but come, you dont need to decide now Lord Wolf.
Numberonemole (19:48:23): Uhh...one of you two is going to have to share a bed too...
TheMysteriousBox (19:48:33): I'll sleep on the ground...
Numberonemole (19:48:35): *he directs them to their room*
pokemasterrj (19:48:36): Ash: No thanks...
Numberonemole (19:49:09): kk...now plan and stuff
Numberonemole (19:49:20): or order porn, or w/e. it all free :-)
Numberonemole (19:49:43): On the GCOS
TheMysteriousBox (19:49:46): ...IN ANY CASE
ProfJbWolf II (19:49:54): FREE CABLE!
TheMysteriousBox (19:50:00): no watching TV
Numberonemole (19:50:05): fucking mooches
TheMysteriousBox (19:50:08): we need to plan what we're supposed to be doing
pokemasterrj (19:50:37): Ash: Man, how the hell am I gonna go through with this? This just does not seem right.
Numberonemole (19:50:39): u needa get me off the captail homeworld of the single most powerful politcal enety of space
Numberonemole (19:50:49): i'll pop in later with Ash2
Numberonemole (19:50:56): just plan now, i am curious to see wut u think of
TheMysteriousBox (19:51:14): Memories
TheMysteriousBox (19:51:16): I think
TheMysteriousBox (19:51:22): will be a useful spell :p
TheMysteriousBox (19:51:43): even though he is haunted by those memories
TheMysteriousBox (19:51:46): somewhere in them
Numberonemole (19:51:54): Fine...uncreative losers...
TheMysteriousBox (19:51:56): there must be the original Sal2 pride
TheMysteriousBox (19:52:01): pft
TheMysteriousBox (19:52:08): you haven't heard my entir eplan yet
Numberonemole (19:52:10): *box, u doing good...they just shell shocked
Numberonemole (19:52:21): *Ash2 drops down out of the cieling*
Numberonemole (19:52:27): Ash2:Excellent...
TheMysteriousBox (19:52:31): hi
ProfJbWolf II (19:52:39): What the hell!?
Numberonemole (19:52:42): You three are finally here...*he spits at PMA*
Numberonemole (19:52:55): Now, how are you going to off the chancelor?
TheMysteriousBox (19:53:08): we need a distraction?
ProfJbWolf II (19:53:09): *Looks at the ceiling* How the hell long have you been up there?
Numberonemole (19:53:10): I thought poison...but it will not work, his body is immune to too much
TheMysteriousBox (19:53:28): we need someone to make a distraction
Numberonemole (19:53:31): Getting him out of here is the only way...
TheMysteriousBox (19:53:34): enough for me to finish my memory spell
Numberonemole (19:53:36): Willingly
ProfJbWolf II (19:53:37): A formal challenge?
Numberonemole (19:53:52): His mentaql state makes formal challenges illegal
Numberonemole (19:54:02): What memories are you talking about criminal.
pokemasterrj (19:54:15): Ash: Anything we do to him at this point will seem criminal
Numberonemole (19:54:25): Yes, we know it was you who unleashed all those animals on the Gwati space station -_-
TheMysteriousBox (19:54:27): a rememberance of his past days, despite his regret, he has some sense of pride left
TheMysteriousBox (19:54:32): I am sure of it
Numberonemole (19:54:43): I doubt he has anypride..he has become weak!
TheMysteriousBox (19:55:00): do you think so?
TheMysteriousBox (19:55:05): just let me try it
Numberonemole (19:55:08): Ash2: how will you use his pride to get him to leave?
TheMysteriousBox (19:55:10): you guys do somethign else
Numberonemole (19:55:22): Attacking him here....would be all your deaths.
TheMysteriousBox (19:55:26): without pride, one does not step up to the plate
TheMysteriousBox (19:56:01): he prides many things
TheMysteriousBox (19:56:06): I believe, his planet, his family
TheMysteriousBox (19:56:15): if we are counterportrayed
TheMysteriousBox (19:56:20): as some people evil, and for once
Numberonemole (19:56:21): Even you PMA....we are still instructed to kill you on site...even in this time of peace. It is common knowledge that you destroy Eiolia...
Numberonemole (19:56:30): ...and Char....your secret is out
TheMysteriousBox (19:56:31): he is portrayed as good
TheMysteriousBox (19:56:36): ...well?
Numberonemole (19:56:45): Yes...do whatever.
pokemasterrj (19:57:01): Ash: Well Char was something that tormented me for a while. As for Eiolia...
Numberonemole (19:57:04): Lure him out, i have planet quartined to be destroyed anyway, get him to go there
pokemasterrj (19:57:17): Ash: You can't accuse me of destroying what still exists
Numberonemole (19:57:23): Yes, I can.
ProfJbWolf II (19:57:28): A tour?
Numberonemole (19:57:33): I am next in line for power
ProfJbWolf II (19:57:36): Perhaps a 'banquet in his honor'?
Numberonemole (19:57:44): That would work....
TheMysteriousBox (19:57:48): this is not a fight between the clones, come on the more Sal2 lives on the more he suffers
TheMysteriousBox (19:57:57): hmm?>
TheMysteriousBox (19:58:00): PJBW speak more
Numberonemole (19:58:39): Ash2:*glares at PMA, but talking to the others* I of course cannot fight, because they will need a leader to take over...
Numberonemole (19:58:46): After father passes...
ProfJbWolf II (19:59:22): We just invite himi to the planet and the fight him
ProfJbWolf II (19:59:29): He at least deserves to go out in a blaze of glory
pokemasterrj (19:59:31): Ash: I'm almost considering leaving. I...don't think I want to be involved.
TheMysteriousBox (19:59:50): PMA stay you're his favorite guy!
TheMysteriousBox (19:59:57): well if you want to go at it the straightfoward way
TheMysteriousBox (20:00:00): I think that would work
Numberonemole (20:00:02): Ash2: Father would eat it all up
Numberonemole (20:00:16): if pma was at a banquet of his honor
Numberonemole (20:00:21): get the pride to work
Numberonemole (20:00:36): and he will go
Numberonemole (20:00:44): He has not left that room for 3 years
Numberonemole (20:00:58): after the captial city was rebuild...but i know he will leave for that
TheMysteriousBox (20:01:11): Well then lets make invitations shall we? *takes out a leaflet, spins it around and turns it into an invitation card*
TheMysteriousBox (20:01:20): GUARDS!! or someone!
TheMysteriousBox (20:01:26): care to deliver a message?
Numberonemole (20:01:38): Dont you need your pride spell first criminal.
Numberonemole (20:02:00): The CareBears you transported here are all dead by the way.
Numberonemole (20:02:09): Those poor creatures
TheMysteriousBox (20:02:13): *points the invitation*
TheMysteriousBox (20:02:21): just let him read it ;-)
ProfJbWolf II (20:02:55): ...*Looks at Box.* You transported Care Bears to Char?
Numberonemole (20:03:04): Ash2:13 of them
TheMysteriousBox (20:03:15): ...
TheMysteriousBox (20:03:17): >.>
ProfJbWolf II (20:03:17): The Care Bear Cousins!?
TheMysteriousBox (20:03:33): watch out they can be harsh carnivores
Numberonemole (20:03:38): Ash2: The last one who died tried to give me a hug. Our atmosphere was poison to them
Numberonemole (20:03:46): It melted their lungs.
pokemasterrj (20:03:58): Ash: *facepalms* I don't even WANT to know...
TheMysteriousBox (20:04:20): so are we ready yet?
Numberonemole (20:04:23): I must leave now, the senate is going to vote on weather I should be given Chancoler powers now, or if father is still fit to rule
TheMysteriousBox (20:04:25): should we goto the isolated planet
Numberonemole (20:04:37): Get his pride going...and then it should work
Numberonemole (20:05:02): I take it you three are able to go through the building without much trouble from the guards?
Numberonemole (20:05:22): Please...try not to kill many of them. Elite guards are hard to make...out gene pool is still very small...
pokemasterrj (20:06:09): Ash: ...I think I may sit out of this. I just don't feel right about all of this. Last thing I want is all of Char with their sights set on my family......of course, with Prof. comes the same result thanks to a technicality...
pokemasterrj (20:06:16): Ash: So I guess I'm stuck
TheMysteriousBox (20:06:29): dammit, honestly we should just get this over with then
TheMysteriousBox (20:06:46): we can, SERIOUSLY, just sit here and talk and lament all day, but I think Sal2 would want to get this over with him self
Numberonemole (20:06:51): Voice:What happened to you three...
TheMysteriousBox (20:06:57): yo!
TheMysteriousBox (20:07:07): I saw you on facebook :o
Numberonemole (20:07:09): The Voice:Box is the one with the most intiative..
Numberonemole (20:07:35): The Voice:Sal2 would be *MORE* than willing to do you in PMA...and Prof, you understand this more the anyone.
ProfJbWolf II (20:07:46): Yea yea
pokemasterrj (20:07:47): Ash: The things I've been through the last few years.....makes one aware they aren't that young and indestructible anymore
ProfJbWolf II (20:07:57): I'm just thinkin' of a way to may just snap him out of it
ProfJbWolf II (20:08:01): Do we really need to kill him?
Numberonemole (20:08:09): The Voice:He is still crying
Numberonemole (20:08:27): The Voice:he does not know where he is...or who he is right, it happens more and more...a husk.
ProfJbWolf II (20:09:01): Fine. Box whip up those inivitations. Ash2 you deliver them to him and then point us in the direction of that planet
ProfJbWolf II (20:09:04): We'll battle him there
Numberonemole (20:09:19): The Voice:...and PMA?
TheMysteriousBox (20:09:26): we'll drag him along
Numberonemole (20:09:44): The Voice: It was destined to end with you and him...you know this. And I know you still have dreams...
Numberonemole (20:10:08): The Voice: This will end the,,,,
Numberonemole (20:10:14): *them...
TheMysteriousBox (20:10:17): *lunges out his hand, and a variety of leaflets fly out and circle around Guai. Each of them is enchanted and becomes placed into one*
TheMysteriousBox (20:10:43): Send it off. NOW :p
Numberonemole (20:10:45): The Voice...and Box...turning the oceans of Oa into jello...not funny!
pokemasterrj (20:11:04): Ash: Nice to see you've been up to your usual tricks
ProfJbWolf II (20:11:08): ...Your turned the oceasn into jello...
Numberonemole (20:11:12): The Voice:I had to clean that up...I am a disembodied entiry, and I still smelled like fruit punch!
TheMysteriousBox (20:11:14): its delicious!
(20:12:31) Numberonemole has left the room.
TheMysteriousBox (20:12:35): OOC: he has an error
pokemasterrj (20:13:03): Anyone played .hack//G.U.? That's a good game?
TheMysteriousBox (20:13:05): you think we should finish off our characters too? :p
ProfJbWolf II (20:13:12): Not me
pokemasterrj (20:13:26): Ash is staying for a good long time
pokemasterrj (20:13:42): Though he is starting to get old
TheMysteriousBox (20:13:53): well, we could go off in a blast
TheMysteriousBox (20:13:55): like sal2
TheMysteriousBox (20:14:00): or fade from memory
ProfJbWolf II (20:14:12): You mean blow up with the planet and Sal2?
pokemasterrj (20:14:20): I think Ash would rather fade than go out with a bang
TheMysteriousBox (20:14:26): hmm
TheMysteriousBox (20:14:28): I guess so
TheMysteriousBox (20:14:38): likewise, Guai just fades out
TheMysteriousBox (20:14:43): in this "everlasting quest for his past"
TheMysteriousBox (20:14:51): although it makes me think up af ew things once in a while
ProfJbWolf II (20:15:44): Argh...I gotta go actually
TheMysteriousBox (20:15:57): ok we'll say you died
ProfJbWolf II (20:16:03): -_-...
(20:16:07) ProfJbWolf II has left the room.
TheMysteriousBox (20:16:10): he says continue some other time

Plagal- Part 1

There was a storyline I made a long whiles ago about a character named Plagal. I used this name twice in RPGs I played in; the story I made up about her is based on the first RPG. I kind of like the name Plagal... Anyway, I've been thinking about the story more recently and thought it'd be best to write something down about it. The story has a pretty elaborate setting so I'll start with that, then get into the actual characters themselves.

The setting is around the Medieval times complete with knights and wizardry of that sort. It revolves around the concept of Necromancy and puts a slight twist on it. Basically, its a story about Necromancers not quite being as "evil" as everyone always percieves them to be (even IRL, Necromancy is associated with the "dark side" and those who conduct it must be "evil" or using black mana in Magic: The Gathering). But Necromancy can be good just as well as it can be evil; like all magic, it all depends on how it is used. It's quite efficient, actually; here you can reanimate a body to do some menial and often dirty tasks that one wouldn't always want to do with their own hands... besides, the bodies usually would sit there and rot, wouldn't it be better to make some use of a body before it completely decomposes? Nevertheless, the concept of Necromancy is still taken as to be "evil", even in this sort of world, save a small village which practices it as tradition. This precents a conflict for the characters in the story, as they practice a taboo form of magic that many outsiders would outcast them out of fear.
Despite their ability to "reanimate the dead", it should be taken into account that the dead aren't brought back to life, but the body merely used like a tool, whether it be savagely raiding a city or doing plow work in the field on a farm. This is the case, most of the time. The concept of soul and body exist in this world; while the body can be reanimated (relatively) easily, the soul is usually the "living" part of the being eternally gone after they had died. So can the soul be captured back and, ultimately, the body be repaired enough to bring a person back to life? And can this lead to immortality? Many Necromancy researchers in the village look into this extensively. As so far, the only method that comes close to bring back a person to life is a method they call "Soul Capture".
"Soul Capture", however, is highly looked down upon in the village. This method essentually does what it says: capture the soul and forces it back into the body. The method prevents the soul from going into eternal sleep (whether that is Heaven or whatever comes after death) and makes the soul-enchanted undead basically a slave of the capturer/re-animator. So how is this different from regular reanimation, save that one now enslaves a poor soul? Basically, though the soul-captured zombie cannot disobey its master, it is able to do many things that a zombie cannot do, one of the most notable being able to think and reason without its master doing it for them. Hence, they can act on things without their master's commands, and therefore make excellent companions/warriors/whatever the necromancer wanted to do with it. Therefore, while morally this is a bad thing to do, "Soul Capture" is a powerful skill.
There are many downsides to "Soul Capture". One of which is that, since the soul almost immediately goes to the Great Beyond after death, it is IMMENSELY difficult to capture the soul in the first place. There are very few necromancers, therefore, who have achieved this. The second is that, since the Soul, along with its body, must be, in a sense, "kept alive" for it to continue serving its master, the master usually must constantly provide energy/magic, or essentially, his own soul, for both bodily and spiritual repair; otherwise, the soul would die out as soon as the body is ripped apart (and hence becoming rather pointless in conducting such a powerful spell). This is important; in normal zombies, a master can often repair the body a bit and use it again, but having it take part of their energy it usually not worth it and much more efficient to find a new body to reanimate. However, the Soul can ONLY be associated with its own body, therefore the body MUST be repaired if it suffers any damage; likewise with the soul itself (IE there are spiritually damaging skills in the era).
Before ending the discussion (or rather, lecture) on this new form of necromancy and spells, there are several loose ends to tie up. One is, if a really powerful soul is captured, one that was able to do powerful magic (or had the potential to) when it was alive, then it is still able to do powerful magic when it is in its soul-captured form. This, in the record of the story, has never really happened except for (obviously) Plagal's case, and even Plagal doesn't quite realize her own capability. In this case, they can even "divide" their own soul and control other (soulless) bodies, quite an astonishing feat from a deceased person (Normal necromancers can also control multiple bodies, but they have to be skilled in necromancy and even then have a limit to how many bodies they can control; the whole "raise an army of a million dead warriors" is, to say the least, a very tiring task). Another thing, dead bodies don't age. This should be fairly obvious. Finally, the question of bringing a person back to life has never been answered, but there have been legends and fables within the village about such a thing. This is fairly important, since one of the main goals for the main character of this story is to try and actually bring Plagal back to life, not just as a zombie, but back into an actual person. He often looks into these legends for hints as to how to help his once friend/crush (yes she was probably someone he loved) emerge back into the world he lives in now.

Well... that's one part of the story I wanted to write up. I'm feeling too lazy to write up more now, so I'll stop. (The internet does that to do, seriously) I'm thinking of putting up a little intro/prologue thing of this story rather than a straight out character profile... at least not yet, because I think the intro would make more sense then just putting in characters like I've been doing with the other stories.

Who knows, maybe I'll even make some sort of story out of it.





Or I can just procrastinate forever and never have anythign else to do with Plagal ever again!!! XD

Asakura Ryouko

...from "Meloncholy of Suzumiya Haruhi". Consequently, I was reading (and feeling quite guilty from doing so) Haruhi about up to a half an hour before my Organic Chemistry test, pretty much laughing up till the time I needed to take the test (test must be serious). And somehow I now have the 2nd highest score on the midterm in the class (well, I'm tied with one other person). IS THIS THE POWER OF HARUHIISM?!??!

Uh, I think not.

But nevertheless, I'm quite happy. So, because I have an essay due next week and I need to practice my BSing skills, I'm actually going to have a little analysis on the character of Asakura Ryouko, who I really find as a really interesting symbolic character. No, I am not obsessed with psycho emotionally-broken murderers smiling innocently and with much moe while carrying a knife ready to kill you, though I will admit this is somewhat more attractive than Nagato at the moment... >.>

HOWEVER, I'm going to be going through a lot of stuff from Volume 4, so it does spoil some things... Ah who cares, only I really make a fuss about spoilers. *ends spoiler warning*

Now, in Volume 4 Asakura comes out of nowhere to save the modified Nagato from Kyon's weird needle-gun-to-change-the-world-back, then attempts to murder Kyon without much second thought. Is this the same Asakura from Volume 1? Most likely not. This Asakura seems very different from the first Asakura in several ways. First off, the first Asakura was created by the Data-Integrated Entity dude, as backup for Nagato. At that time, she served the Data-Integrated Entity and tried to do what she thought would be best to achieve the Entity's mission.

In Volume 4, however, she could care less for what the Data-Integrated Entity wants; this Ryouko served to protect Nagato. She is in a sense the manifestation of Nagato's "Erroneous Files" which have accumulated and ultimately, when the large change occurred, taken up a form of the former Asakura Ryouko. Unfortunately, these files aren't exactly just a bunch of jarbled junk and seem to be more like a virus, or a program gone wrong in a sense. This is NOT the same Asakura as in Volume 1, even though she also is like a program gone beserk. So then, what IS Asakura and why is her form constantly used, and not say, a giant cave cricket?

One theory I recently developed was that, perhaps, if we relate a Data Integrated Entity to the body of a human being, Asakura would, literally, be the virus. Perhaps Asakura is a virus that lives on the Entity, Nagato being part of the Entity; Asakura relies on the Entity to stay alive and does harm to it. However, the Entity knows this and continually tries to purge it, but like any virus it will continue to spread itself throughout the body. Because the program is so similar, the figure of Asakura Ryouko remains the same; that's why she is constantly used as the "evil moe murderer" type of person. So, although she is not the same virus as in volume 4, she is very much a replicate of it; alas, it would not be unusual if more Asakura viruses were to appear in the future.

Oh bother, I'm starting to feel like I'd really be happy if an Asakura Virus came over to kill me with a cute smile on her face. Damn my weakness to irony! DAMMIT! I should stop now.

Southern California Conference for Undergraduate Research

Or SCCUR for short. Ironically I came online partly to write this blog entry up (and partly to print out ochem practice tests) but ended up completely forgetting and getting lost in a sea of no-new-posts message boards. :/

I figured since I do blog posts for things like Anime Expo and game gatherings, this would be rather significant to post too.

Overall experience of the conference: It was decent, I liked it. It feels a bit better when you have something to present and go to these conferences than to just visit them and have the "everyone is better than me because they actually have something to present" feeling that I got last year when visiting a science conference similar to this one... And its also not a "dammit I'm wasting my time here I have an OChem test on monday" feeling either, a feeling I get when I go off to anime club on sundays :p.
Regardless, some nickpicky criticism. So I paid 50 dollars, worked an absurd amount of hours in Lab and risked damaging my academic status to get, basically, a paragraph in a Guide to SCCUR 2006, a lunch (consisting of a ham sandwich, Sunchips (I think that's what they were called), can of Sprite, a Ba(Na)2, and a fudge cookie which I lost shortly after I finished the rest of my lunch :( ) and a few questions from people confused about my poster and brave enough to ask me what it was about. Which, in turn, made them 1. Understand it a little better or 2. confused even more. Let's hope for the most part its the former. Oh! And some pamphlets about a Undergraduate Studies Journal that looked really interesting. I want to write an article for it but I'm wondering about my lack of motivation to do so. :p
Analysis of Poster Presentations: There are two critera for a really good poster: 1. Make it look really interesting and 2. Make it confusing. Usually, making it confusing can very well lead to making it look boring, so this is a pretty difficult task to do. Nevertheless, its quite necessary, because if someone understands your poster, even if it does look pretty, there's no questions to ask because its all self-explanatory and people just walk over, nod your head, and leave. At first I didn't understand why my lab advisors made it so technical (and basically write my entire poster for me *cough*) but now I realize they made it so that people are encouraged to ask questions... provided what I do looks interesting enough.
I personally think my poster didn't look all that interesting, so that's why (I believe) I didn't get as much appeal as I could have. I found one poster that met this "Interesting but Confusing" criteria; it had something to do with Artificial Livers and it had a really nice diagram that looked really pretty but I had no clue what the hell was going on. This does, of course, encourage me to ask the poster presenter what he was doing, but he was talking with other people so I kind of just left him and moved on. :p
Yea, that's also a personal trait of mine, as a poster-viewer, I don't like large groups so I'd rather go visit posters where the person is just standing there looking lonely and unhappy that no one is viewing their poster... although, I can only ask questions if I can genuinely be interested in what their presenting. Obviously, not everything is interesting to me since there are a variety of fields (Seriously now, one poster expects you to know what CT-something is in Electrical Engineering... I'm only in Linear Circuits :( ), but a lot of it seems curious enough.
For the poster presenter himself/herself, I found many are more open to those who ask people "Do you have any questions". This is particularly applicable to me, since I can stare at a poster for 10 minutes without saying anything. Well, sometimes its just me trying to figure out how to put what I'm confused about into a question, other times its because other people are talking with the presenter... Regardless, its something I need to work on, there has been a few people that stared at my poster for a while and I probably should asked them if they had any questions. But I got my fair share of questions. Even got locked up in one of them, that was kind of embarassing...

Questions of the day:
Most Asked Question: "What's your poster/experiment about?" << This is an annoying question. Even if I'm confused about a poster, I don't want to ask this to them because their poster SERVES to explain what the experiment is doing. It is more easier IMO if they be more specific like "What does this word mean" or "What are you doing in this picture" Rather than me trying to explain (for the 8th time) what I'm doing which is basically noted in the damn title. Come on, if you're generally interested at least read the damn thing rather than just ask me "What's it about". -_-
Most Useful Question (well its a comment): I got a tip off of someone who's apparently doing the same research :O I'm sure my advisor already knows him/her, but I thought that was kind of cool. The guy not only read and figured out what I'm doing, but also knew a source which is doing something similar to my experiments and gave me a name... Most helpful guy for the entire hour I stood in front of my poster. :)
Most Entertaining Question: "LOLZ USC hAs a nEURoSciEnCe PrOgRaM???!!1" <<< My internet-talk perception of the question asked... yea... we have a Neuroscience program... that's why I have this poster... (I didn't answer that sarcastically of course :p)

Interesting Posters: Artifical Livers (mentioned above), "How Happy are Chicanos in LA" (My advisor found this one funny), "Learning Statistics through an Online Game" (It was an online dating simulator with statistics! XD) and another poster having to do with the differentation of stem cells... it had a word which I had no idea what it meant and now I completely forgot what the word is, but I remembered what it meant! (has to do with the process of the cell differentiation)

So...

A couple days ago I presented to you the best picture to represent myself.

Today I present to you the best Webcomic to represent my life.

www.phdcomics.com

Greatest picture I have found

If there is one stupid picture from the internet that can represent me, this is the one.

If I were a scene writer for a Dating Sim game...

Although I started musing about this a long while ago before I watched NHK, the fact that the main character becomes a scenario writer (somewhat) for a dating sim game catalyzed my imagination process in thinking up, what would be an "original" dating sim game I could make that would still be able to follow the genre of "dating sim?" As in, being cliche yet original at the same time. How oxymoronic...
Consequently, I did think up of one thanks to my one-year experience in the lab, although who knows? Maybe someone DID make a dating sim game about Ph. D student... >.> I wouldn't be surprised if both it existed AND it didn't do well on sales considering how niche and geeky you have to be to understand such a game... But! If it wasn't thought up before, here I present to you the "original" Research Student Dating Sim game, the game that every (male) Research Student wished happened to him (but chances of happening probably being less than them discovering the cure to cancer).
AND THE TITLE OF THE GAME IS...
I don't know. And the characters don't have names either. Yes, I'm bad with names, but I THOUGHT UP EVERYTHING ELSE!!! Like:
Plotline: The main character is a new graduate student working at a University in a city he recently moved in. The city, in actuality, is the same city he was born in and lived up until age of 6 or so, until he had to move away from it for various reasons . He is ambitiously pursuing a degree in the Pathological sciences to achieve an ultimate goal, a "promise" to cure a particular disease as requested by some childhood friend that he cannot remember very well. (Of course, he remembers the promise clearly... they never remember the girl) Immediately upon arrival, he is given a project related to his studies and is expected to complete and present his results in two weeks. The suddenness of recieving a project and its close deadline present a shock to him; furthermore, his only other collegue that he was supposed to work with insists on working alone. In fact, she practically considers the main character a rival, attempting to outdo him in as many ways as possible, the project being just one competition. After regaining his composure, the main character determines to keep his head held high and accept this new challenge as a graduate student. He will find many "discoveries" along the way that may interest and surprise him as he slowly approaches the deadline for his project...

Characters!
The character varieties are: The other graduate student (the collegue mentioned in the plotline), the Lab Director, a medical school friend of the main character, a Lab Technician, and two Undergraduate students working in the lab. All of them are girls (whoever talks to guys in dating sims? Come on!)

Graduate Student: She is of the same year as the main character. Probably same age too. Her hair is light pink and has vivid blue and determined-looking eyes. She is (I'll state this right off since people probably figured it out by now) the main character's "childhood friend" and consequently, has decided to take up a path on her own to cure this disease she had requested a friend of hers in the past to cure. The historical plotline would probably go along the lines of the main character promising to cure the girl's dying father of this "mysterious" disease (the two probably didn't know what it was at the time). Of course, the main character fails, and the girl, who doesn't know any better, blames him, then after the main character has left, made a vow to fight against the disease herself. This would probably explain her rather rash and untrustworthy attitude to most everybody she meets, especially the main character. Inside, though, she probably realizes it couldn't have been helped and wishes she can say sorry to her friend from the past. If the main character goes her path, the student slowly realizes who he is and reluctantly begins to open up to him.

Lab Director: Consider her as the typical "Onee-chan" of the harem set. She is probably the one that would most likely fit a google search of "Anime chicks with Lab Coats", considering that everyone seems to believe that only mature-looking women become doctors (an appropriate stereotype, but I don't like it). Her chest is *cough* considerably larger than the other characters; she has purple hair typically in a ponytail and small rectangular spectacles. She has the same attitude as all characters of her type: drinks, has a sort of lax attitude, sometimes acts suggestively and often thinks everything will be fine in some panicky situations. However, when she becomes serious, she WILL be serious, especially with her lab work; the main character realizes this as time goes on (the hard way or the easy way, depending on the player). Because she is significantly older and she is a PI, she probably has a decent amount of history behind her which would explain some of her actions.

Med School Student: A comrade of the main character that happened to come to the same city as he did, and works in a hospital a few blocks down from the university. She is in fact friends of both the main character and the graduate student working in the same lab as him, but she does not know the history behind the two. I had imagined her as more of the Mutsumi from Love Hina type, rather spacey and and not always knowing what's going on. She is remarkably calm in every sort of situations, but despite her ditsy attitude she is a very good repuatation as a doctor. She is kind and always willing to listen to the main character's ranting whenever he is under stress, and yes, she probably has a crush on him. Nevertheless, she will help him in no matter what love affairs the main character gets into, except possibly her own pathway which she might become a bit befuddled about... Anyway, since all the other character I imagined seemed to have relatively long hair (most of them), I thought a good balance would be necessary and she'll probably have relatively medium-cut hair sort of like Shamal from Nanoha A's. You should google her if you don't know who she is. :p And her hair color will be, uh... light brown!

Lab Technican: The cliche "maid" of the group, and she may as well be wearing a maid outfit under her lab coat for all it matters. She could also be considered a "robot", if you will, though in the game she is not (to keep the plotline somewhat realistic... "somewhat"). Her persona is probably best related to Hisui from Tsukihime: stoic yet hard working and very good at it. If someone asks her to do something for her in the lab, as a lab technician, she will do it with profound accuracy and efficiency. Needless to say, if the main character goes down her path, she'll reveal more emotions and why she acts this way? I realize this is the same trend for not just some, but nearly all the girls in dating games... She has long singly-braided white hair, and I currently can't think up a character comparison but I know that there's a female hairstyle like that in RO. :(

Undergraduates- They are supposed to help out in the lab, but in the end it turns out that the main character does all the babysitting, since the graduate student works alone and the lab director expects her researchers to work for her. (Bosses... geez) So, on top of finishing his project, the student also has to deal with some rather not-so-helpful helpers...
Undergraduate #1: Is Loli cliche #1: The Shy + clumsy girl that messes everything up and says "I'm sorry" after every sentence. It is without a doubt that she immediately develops a crush on the main character, who helps her out in spite of the fact that she is supposed to be helping him out. She is best friends with Undergraduate #2. Her hairstyle is like that of Hayate from Nanoha A's, or Shinobu from Love Hina, or Nodoka... That sort of hairstyle, one gets the point. (With a Ribbon!!!) Her hair color is dark blue.
Undergraduate #2: Is Loli cliche #2: The hyperactive and mischevious girl with ADHD that likes to blow things up more than help out in experiments. I think she's the little sister of one of the characters, but I don't know of who yet. Regardless, the plotline will inevitably, no matter which girl you choose, involve her getting sick; whoever makes her feel better is dependent on which pathway the player chooses. Of course, if she ends up dying, you'll probably figure you're going to get a bad ending...

...and THIS is the product of being an anime fan and a biology major pursuing a Ph. D.... ok so not exactly Key or TypeMoon material, but I still think its more original than those 40 million schoolgirl games... though this is almost a "school""girl" game since you're in a school and stuff... oh whatever :p

A Possible Random Story Arc stemming from...

The Anime Club group I go to?

I frequently think up random stories involving characters sometimes based off of people I know, sometimes completely original. I had at one time wondered if I could ever form a story based on the people I knew from Anime Club, and alas, today, with my overactive imagination I had thought up a semi-decent one. Unfortunately, shortly thereafter my overactive imagination was halted and crushed brutally by some theory in differential equations involving multiple variables, and I've yet to fully recover from that... But I guess I'll write something up. I think this will be the first and last time anyone will ever hear of this.
I figured I'd base this off of playing EFZ, since I always thought it would be rather interesting to have some kind of plotline revolve around it. The only "story" I ever heard that came from EFZ involves some class A/B/C and torture issue which seems rather weird... Well, mine is more of a strange Pokemon/Fate-Stay Night combination set in a fantasy world (And maybe that's based off RO...>.>). I'll just try to express it in a letter that the "author" of the story(ies?) wrote (he's not necessarily the main character):

Dear Sir.

I apologize for not having written to you recently; as you are aware, as an alchemist and a traveller I am constantly busy observing and recording down many new sites and exciting events that may happen along my travels. There has been one discovery in particular that I find extremely incredible and fascinating, and I felt it necessary to write to you about it.
Have you ever heard of familiars? Perhaps you had imagined them to be pets of some beings such as wizards. Coincidentally, I had thought so too until I recently arrived upon a small town with a rather outstanding castle. The inhabitants provided me with generous hospitality when I told them of my occupation and purpose of travels; they even provided me with access to their main library after some rather... particular events. But what was most astonishing was what happened after that; upon browsing through the ancient literature, I stumbled upon a summoning spell and after attempting to study more about this strange old incantation, figured it would be best to, um, try it out for myself. I figured that, though the odds were low and there was little chance it would accomplish anything, I might learn something from conducting the spell...
Well... something DID come out of the spell, and it came out triumphantly with a large explosion of a strange, thick liquid. But more surprising than that, was the appearance of a small, well dressed girl, looking around curiously as if she had just woken up and didn't know where she was, staring first around her surroundings and then onto me. I was completely astounded and did not know what to do.
As if to complicate things further, one of the head knights of the palace had come by to see what had happened, then, upon laying his eyes on the girl and myself, became remarkably hostile. At first I had thought he had mistaken the event for something else, but on the contrary, he knew exactly what had happened and, even more to my astonishment, materialized himself girl similar to the one I had just summoned, though she was equipped with a sword while mine had no weapon.
Now, the head knight I never thought had a particular liking for me, nor did I admire his rather pompous attitude, but the seriousness of his appearance and the murderous commands he gave to his accomplice in attacking the girl shocked me into immobility. Indeed, had it not been for another (!) girl wielding a spear, and a rather intellectual-looking figure who seemed to have just past by and saw what was going on, I wouldn't have known what to do...
It was then on I learned everything from this intellectual man. What I had summoned was a familiar, and this was a rather unique event since there are not many, apparently, that have the ability to summon such nymphs. All familiars have a class, and within the class have a specialty; the summoning of a familiar is seems somewhat akin to what the type of person is. I, apparently, had summoned a faerie-type familiar, with a specialty in animation; she seems capable of controlling movement of liquids and creating lifelike entities out of otherwise inanimate objects. (Its a rather particular skill, I must admit...) The head knight that had attacked me was of a Warrior type with a specialty in one-handed swords, whereas the intellectual's familiar was also of a Warrior type but weilded a spear.
In all of such a strange turn of events, I have now ended up travelling with them to learn more of this phenomenon. I've seen many things along the way: That the knight seems adamant on one day defeating his one idol, another great knight with the same familiar class and specialty as he has; that there exists, somewhere, an "ultimate" familiar that some have said was somewhat related to mine (?), as well as meeting others with familiars. Recently a rather large and burly young man is accompanying us with his own familiar (a fighter type, I believe? And quite powerful). I hope this does not seem too unusual to you, and I hope that someday I can stop by and show you how such unique and fascinating beings these things are.

With best regards.
*----
(haha, no name for the author yet :p)


Hmm, I guess this basically says I'm too obsessed with EFZ right now :p Although, I thought it would be neat, because saying "HEY I SUMMONED MISUZU LOLZ" would have looked rather dumb, so I thought I would split most of them into "class and specialty"... maybe someday I'll list all the characters and what exact class and specialty they are.... HAHAHA yea right :p

Raven's EFZ Gathering "Ranbato 1"

In an ironic twist of fate I happened to be placed in the easiest bracket in the EFZ tournament, and ended up somehow beating everyone in the bracket landing me in 4th place in terms of points... o_O I thought that was rather hilarious. But honestly, how the scores turned out should have been more evened out, I should be placed lower while Zaido and MTP should have been placed higher... I think it would have been good if I was tied with Evo instead of being above him since I think he is probably closer to my level in EFZ, if not higher.

But anyway, here is my excuses for somehow winning the bracket. I apologize once more for analyzing these people without their permission, and if you guys somehow stumble onto my blog >.> uh, sorry :P hope you're not offended :(

1. Rightot- He's a fairly typical beginning/intermediate player and presents a good challenge to me. Mainly because, I usually do fall for similar (and stupid) mistakes over again and I need to work on those... either learn how to avoid them, or to RG better XP But his combos are not really any good... most advanced seems to be the basic AABBCC combo everyone uses. I think because he wasn't able to execute long 3k combos is why I was able to beat him, because he certainly had the chance to do so.
Also, he doesn't do the wall slam >>> Level 3 Sayuri skill that everyone has learn to hate very well. When he learns to master that he will be a deadly foe to compete with.
2. Evospace- I am completely serious when I say the "2-0" win for me against him was a fluke. Honestly I'd probably more expect a 2-1 loss with me being the loser, but I do think there are several reasons for this. One, is that he uses Ikumi; Ikumi, I believe, is the worst character to use against Misuzu, being very terrible in the air while Misuzu can just dash over most of Ikumi's ground attacks (or lay a book trap!). The second reason I think I won was because I played him first, and while I had already played one game of EFZ in the tournament (along with having practiced EFZ during the week before) who knows how long he had touched EFZ before the tournament had begun. Afterwards he obviously did better (he won against the other people in the bracket) but that was after my game.
3. Joe- Um... if he practiced and played EFZ more often, I think he would have been able to beat me by now. But at the tournament, I think he was just free points for everyone in our bracket... in a way, that's kind of the reason why our results were skewed...
In return for my unusual victory in the C bracket, I was the official donor of points in the MBAC tournament. I was lucky that I even gave Joe a challenge by finally being able to pull off a dragonpunch motion :p But, as you can see from the results, Joe got some points in MBAC!

Some comments on other people I played:
4. Zaido- Is a cool guy, plays like a pro, and makes our matches fun and entertaining. You'll notice in my match against him that I get completely screwed over, mainly because I wasn't sure when was an attack point when he was pressuring me with Minagi (and also because of the flaming rice ticket). I did do sort of ok (except I messed up on all my combos) when I found an opening but then I died shortly thereafter.
We had fun casuals after. He mentions about this one fight where "the world freezes" when I summoned Yukito right when he was launching the blood mine super that Ikumi has... :p and we did fun random crap in practice mode that you can't do alone (like RG and testing Kaori's super thingy).

5. Psylocke- In a sense he seems like a complete opposite of a player than me; he's really good with his combos when he finds an opening, but he doesn't know a lot about the game play yet, or about his character. He tends to turtle a lot without much idea of how to get out of it, which puts him in dire situations when he was playing me (or, even worse, if he had played Raven) since I often use throws nowadays when I get tired of people turtling...I'd say he would be about the same level as I am as a player, and him getting only 1 point was really unfair in the EFZ tournament.

6. Kyle- I didn't play him in the tournament, but since I'm analyzing a bunch of people I might as well include some other people I played also. I think he's worth mentioning in that he's really good at punishing; if you make a mistake, you're screwed with his character. Well, his character IS a one-chance "you better not screw up or you'll get grabbed and creamed" type of character... In any case, I lost a lot of games to him because of my clumsiness and tendency to make mistakes, and unlike other players I played yesterday if I mess up he doesn't just do a 1k simple combo to me; he takes out 3/4ths of my health.

7. Raven- there's a reason why he's the most feared EFZ player on the west coast.

There are others of course (tekken and lina) but for the time being I'll leave them out. I never played Lina yesterday anyway.

In other notes, I think I'll need to get a PS controller to computer adaptor since MBAC is on PS2 and there's no way you can get a keyboard to play MBAC. It's probably useful since the Higarashi game Raven gave me yesterday seems rather difficult to play on keyboard too, along with a few other games (GGXX, possibly Queen of Heart) is better to use the controller instead of the keyboard. Its really tough converting to controller though. Using a thumb to execute all one's moves instead of 3 makes it unusual to play with... I can't do jump AB jump AB in MBAC (fast enough) which really makes me depressed because I would be able to do it on the keyboard. :(

OMG :O

There's Engrish even in Science Journal articles! I don't particularly find it bad, but its quite entertaining how even in such a professional field people still mess up in the language they're writing in.

Again, nothing bad, I'd like to see some scientists try and write their reviews in Chinese... /gg

Analysis of my Combo ability in EFZ

Only for Misuzu and Makoto. Maybe I'll do Mizuka and Tohno later, but so far I like playing with Misuzu and Makoto.

Misuzu:
Ability to Theorize Combos in situation-
Corner: 100%
Midscreen: 90%

Starting the Correct (Theorized, Combo I meant to do) Combo in:
Practice Mode: 85%
VS CPU: 65%
VS Player: 50%

Continuing a Combo Chain for a decent amount of time (whether I had planned it or not):
Practice Mode: 95%
VS CPU: 70%
VS Player: 30% (I keep on missing the wall bounce combos, dammit! D:)

Makoto
Ability to Theorize Combos in situation-
Corner: 90% (All of them pretty much made up myself without any help from replays... well, one combo replay but the technique I acquired is rather hard to execute and I'm not quite ready to put it properly into any of my combos, though I can theorize how it would work)
Midscreen: 5% (OMG all I can do is AB-shoot-shoot-shoot can't even dash-combo D:)

Starting the Correct (Theorized, Combo I meant to do) Combo in:
Practice Mode: 75%
VS CPU: 45%
VS Player: 20%

Continuing a Combo Chain for a decent amount of time (whether I had planned it or not):
Practice Mode: 65%
VS CPU: 40%
VS Player: 0% (T_T ;_; /sob)

Misuzu I suppose is easy to combo with; anyone who test-played with her agrees that she's probably really easy to combo with, so I guess I learned most about comboing from her. Consequently, I can combo with her the best, assuming I could get anything down with reasonable accuracy...
Makoto I really like because somehow I feel that her play style is just the play style I was meant to play, not really the same with Misuzu (although obviously, I got used to Misuzu's playing style and now I can combo :P somewhat). Makoto is rediculously hard to combo with, though, because she has short stubby arms that can whiff even if you're right next to the opponent... (or maybe Misuzu was just rediculously easy to combo with) But thanks to what I learned from Misuzu comboing with Makoto isn't nearly as hard as it would have been if I started with her first off, though if I did start with her first off, I bet I would be able to get used to her more quickly than Misuzu save the combos... Currently my strategy with her is pretty much be as annoying as hell :p Hurray for priority moves! (Which Misuzu seriously lacks)
As a side note, the damage from a 60 hit juice loop using four feathers < Level 3 GaoGaoFire. -_-;; Well, its a good combo to mock your opponent if you have nothing else to do but combo!

Kanon

This show rocks. I can tell it will rock. With the creators from Air, Kyon voice actor as the new Yuuichi, and doubling the series length, its going to be eyecandy throughout the entire season, I tell you.

Well, because it's now 26 episodes, I can tell that the series is going at a rather slow pace. Unlike the first verison of Kanon, which introduces a few characters and scenarios immediately, Kanon 2006 seems to be going at an almost painfully leisurely case, but with so much eyecandy around and a hit of humor, its certainly endurable. (notlike futakoi alternative *cough*) But in any case.

The first episode of Kanon has a REMARKABLE amount of symbolism and foreshadowing, as anyone who basically just even watched the first version of Kanon would be able to tell. They introduce all the signficant characters of Kanon and a few minor ones as well, probably teasing Kanon fans out there and making them want more. Indeed, the first Kanon was rather Mediocre, but I have high hopes for this series...

So the series will probably be released at a slow rate as well, but considering the immense load of work I have to do this semester, I'm not too bothered with it. I'll just be rather annoyed that some people will be able to watch Kanon a bit earlier than me, but I'll be happy to indulge in a weekend afternoon when school gets out, full of Kanon goodness.

A few other random notes. The voice of Sayuri, as a friend once told me, is done by the same voice actor as the one who did Misuzu. And with Sayuri's cameo, I can tell... holy crap she does sound like Misuzu o.o all she needs is a bunch of "Gaos" and she can be the perfect Misuzu clone... oh well.

In celebration of Kanon, I need to work on my Makoto combos!!

Something odd about this flyer...

When I logged into facebook, they have this column for "flyers" and advertising junk, just like every other site does. Well, except they usually specialize in people actually on facebook advertising rather than some random "invest in your home loan!" company from who knows where. But this was interesting, it was an advertisement about a research study which I found... uh... probably not too effective if you ask me.

"Dyslexia and The Brain
Are you Dislexic? Participate in a brain imaging study! We'll take pictures of your brain while you read, and we'll give you a copy. Compensation provided. "

I wonder how many Dyslexics actually surf the internet, much less have a facebook account and can read an advertisement with size 10 font. I mean, its a great idea of course, research is always a good idea, but I think this time they should be more vocal about it rather than placing an add on facebook...

A "confession"...

though confession is really a bit too strong. Its just something I noticed a long while ago.

I am not meant to be a "scientific" character though I long to portray as one. I am actually more fitted to be an author, a lawyer, or a philosopher. My strength lies more in analysis than in memorization, and I more often enjoy taking a little bit of fact and spinning a lot of ideas and concepts out of them. Consequently, this is evident in my inability to memorize LARGE amounts of data, just flat out (although I will somehow have a few facts randomly pinned into my head for all of eternity despite my lack of any use for it). I am EXTREMELY bad, as Physics, EE, and some math classes have painfully pointed out to me, in applications. While I can, say, think up a variety of chemical syntheses from just a few chemical equations, solve a variety of differential equations and interpret circuits quite well, if I have merge any of them together, I fail to see the linking point for a very very long time.
Consequently, I wonder if some of my problems in physics or whatnot may be due to overanalyzation. Especially in mechanical physics, the concept of a spring or whatnot is so incredibly simple that I may have purposely overcomplicate it myself. If there were no spring or picture associated, and the only thing given to me were equations and numbers, BAM!! Easy material, can be calculated out in a couple a seconds. But add in a picture and suddenly I'm stumped for hours, trying link formula to the picture. Even if it was a graph instead of a picture of a spring, I would understand the math; but somehow that accursed little bouncy thing screws up my mind whenever I see it... (hahaha irony there's my analysis at work :p)
My other problem is dexterity. I can rarely do the same thing twice. This applies to EVERYTHING. Science experiments, Piano performances, solving math equations, writing an essay twice (hasn't happened often), trying to do moves in EFZ. Unfortunately, in the science career this is a very essential part of an experiment, to perform and repeat the experiment and get consistent results. But I'm incredibly clumsy and my skills are rather lacking in this part; I think too fast and before I finish what I'm supposed to be doing I start something else. This leads to messups, forgetting to clean something, and thus contamination/throwing something away.
With such a realization, one would wonder why I haven't changed my career path as of yet. Its not for any monetary issues; if it were, I'd be going to pre-med or, better yet, Law school because it would fit my style. Its not because I'm a social recluse either; many authors and philosophers can do perfectly fine without society, and scientists actually have to interact with society often in order to get their experiments going. The best reasons for my actions is most likely environmental influence, which (contrast to what die-hard gene-controls-everything believers think) lead me in general to think "science is cool". My parents were scientists, and I was proud that they were. In whatever movies I may have watched as a child, I rooted for the nerdy kid; being smart just seemed "cool" to me. Now, even my parents have suggested that if I wanted to, I could go into something like 3D animation (a course I took in high school, I did fairly well in it and found it fun) instead of science, but I chose science anyway. I don't know, I liked the image of the intellectual.
This poses problems at times. I'm fairly confident that my IMAGE (note: image) is that of an intellectual, but I worry if my actual intellect can hold up to that image at times. I worry that if people ask me questions and I am unable to answer them, if my image is ruined. Does this mean I'm being a scientist and acting all smart just because I like to look smart? I at the point don't think so. And don't hope so. I still hold genuine interest in my subject. Admittedly, it wasn't as strong as my curiosity as a child, but I want to go in deeper into the world of science. Because I like Organic Chemistry. I like doing math problems. Electrical Engineering is actually really fun (a helluvalot better than mechanical physics). So I don't think its just the image thing. I'm still asking questions; although I'm quite shy at doing so, its not because I'm afraid to admit my stupidity, but more of a social disability that I've had for a while, unrelated (I think?) to my interests in science.
But, for appearances anyway, I think... I most relate to the "large forehead" character in Pani Poni Dash, the one with orange hair. Though I don't like her disrespectful attitude to her classmates, I am completely emphatic with her... as the appearance to try and be someone smart, determined and hardworking, yet only recieving mediocre scores on her test and not being able to compete with some who are just better than her. Yeah, I dislike the whole concept of other people working not as hard and still getting decent grades... that's another issue altogether, for another post. Over here I just summarized about 2-3 years of thoughts that usually come up (and will continue to come up) during times of stress and wondering about the reasons for my . And Anime is a huge distraction. Also a topic for another blog. I am done, I need to go up and develop some blots in my experiment so I can leave for anime club. (swt) IRONY AGAIN!

NOTE HOW I ANALYZE MYSELF, THIS IS AGAIN PROOF THAT I'M MORE ANALYZING THAN... ok I'll shut up now.

And the days fly by...

Haha, I noticed my last entry was my first ochem test... that was like a month ago!! I had my other ochem test yesterday, it sucked too! :p But I think I can scratch some points up by digging through my ochem book and showing them some stuff...

My EE test sucked. Whoot, that really worries me. Now I have to focus on EE, which is really a bother.

Uh, last is, lab is consuming my life. Well, oh well. I'm in lab right now, coincidentally. 9 PM... waiting for my transfer to finish so I can put my blots in antibody... Not bad for tonight, not like staying up till 1 AM last week... in the lab... But, I do worry that my lab work will affect my academics (refer to EE) and so I realize, I need to either control and seriously organize my lifestyle, make less mistakes, and ( D: D: D: ) sleep less.

My head hurts from eating too much products containing MSG. I feel like beating people up with Makoto in EFZ.

CHAOS!!!

Thomas T. Reusbucks would not approve of this post, it is very unprofessional. -_-;; I speak of more organization when I lack it even in this blog post.

I'm just writing whatever comes to mind. I know last couple of days I've been thinking about philosophical things and the concept of stress and mistakes and everything that's been going wrong with my experiment/life this past week, but I feel braindead right now and can't think it up. DAMMIT!!

Oh that's right, I remember now, the internet makes me stupid. This would have been a more thought out topic to talk about but I can't think right now. But I will discuss this some day. I'm smart without the internet. I plan things, organize things, work hard. With the internet, I sit in my chair wondering what I'm doing half the time when I'm doing nothing. Um, I'll get back to that in another post. More professionally. Hopefully while the internet hasn't dumbed me down yet.

TONY IF YOU READ THIS... lets find time to play EFZ. :( Since I'm pretty sure Tony's the only person who bothers checking my blog. :P

The Ever-so-popular test rant

REMEMBER KIDS!!! PHOSPHORUS BROMIDE LIKES TO BROMINATE ALCOHOLS!!! NOT ALKANES, NOT ALKENES, NOT ALKYNES, YES, BROMO-TAN LIKES ALCOHOL!!!!!!!!!



^&*^*&^&^%$^%$^#$%$^%^*&^*&(*)(*(&*(&(*&%^$^%#$%$^% I hate stupid mistakes. I had the other synthesis method in my head too, I really did, but I completely forgot about how that stupid PBr3 thing works.

Fate -Stay Night-

Contrary to what I've heard, I don't think the ending sucks at all. Very appropriate and though it wasn't exactly "OMG THIS ENDING RULES" I liked how it ended.

Now, the only thing with Fate is that its very complicated; I'm going to actually have to rewatch Fate -Stay Night- To understand probably what was going on. This is probably because I watched half of it for 6 hours straight on the plane back to china, and the other half 6 hours straight just right now on Labor Day. I need to rewatch to check if I'm missing so points, or if Fate -Stay Night- really is as confusing as it was the first time I watched it through. Well, not too confusing, just that all the flashbacks seem to happen so quickly, and whatnot. I probably just don't pay enough attention to detail since I have to read the subtitles while also watch what's going on.

But I don't think I'll rewatch Fate -Stay Night- right now... need to rest my eyes a bit. :p Yes, one thing is for sure, Fate -Stay Night- is very pretty. VERY pretty. @.@

Steve Irwin

Everyone knows by now. OWTF :(

Hmm... His amiable personality and passion for animals was always something I admired. I always enjoyed wildlife shows, and his shows were one of the most popular; every other wildlife documentary host wasn't quite as popular (I distinctly remember a Jack... someone) But his name is all around the world... he even made a movie of himself. Well, he certainly did have fun throughout his life.

His shows were better than some anime I watched, even!!

Addendum to Haruhi

Ok... a friend gave me the order of the series... Damn Haruhi for screwing up the order of the series... but oh well. I'm happy now because I can finally get some order in this chaotic series.

And with that, I'm now completely satisfied with the anime. I'll probably watch only up to 11 episodes since that's where the stories leave off. I am liking where this is going, however.

I have nothing more to say at the time being.

The Meloncholy of Haruhi Suzumiya (Anime and Novel)

This will be brief, as I have not finished either. For the anime, I have watched up to episode 4; the novel, up to volume 3.

The novel first, because I have been mainly focusing on the novel. The novel is in short spectacular. Much expected being the origin of the anime series; I am always more appreciative of the novel that a movie is based off of and would refuse to watch the movie, usually without reading the book first. Hence, this means I don't watch a lot of good movies like Lord of the Rings, but then again, I don't watch a lot of movies, period. Nevertheless, the Haruhi novel has the anime "essence" in it which I am happy with; it's not just another "book" to read but actually turns out really well.

Now. The anime.

The anime's random "lets do this story today!" REALLY pisses me off... because anyone who is watching Haruhi casually without reading the novels would get completely lost by the 4th episode. Scratch that, they would have no clue what's going on in the first episode, but at least the first episode was funny. But the forth episode, they suddenly skip to volume three, and not only that, the transfer character appears WITHOUT ANY INTRODUCTION AT ALL. Episode 3 ends on the fact that Yuki is an alien and doesn't expand, leaving many people (that don't read the novel) most likely baffled at the fact that they were expecting more info on the next episode, but suddenly turn to this baseball game, at which the Haruhi characters began spewing random "avatar" and "dimension" talk that anyone who hasn't read the novel would have seriously been lost by now.

Other than the randomness which absolutely sucks, everything else in the anime is awesome. They follow the script pretty well when they're not jumping around in stories, the animation and artwork are cute as usual. Mikuru is just as moe, although, like a friend told me, her screams for help are kind of strange sounding, sort of not realistic... as least she's drawn cutely...Still need to try to imitate haruhi dance.

Kyon's sister making a home run = win.

Hanbun no Tsuki ga Noboru Sora

A very good series. My opinion is proven by the fact that I actually bothered typing out the entire title of this series.
While themewise it doesn't suit the type of anime I usually watch, every other aspect it was completely superb. The artwork and animation, which is the first aspects that I notice when watching an anime, were smooth and vivid, full of color, more so than usual series that I watch... Upon watching the first series, I realized that the animation and artwork of the series seemed very beautiful.
The characters, though most of their history isn't flushed out because of the shortness of the series, were nevertheless well developed. Their most interesting aspect is the sense of reality they carry with them; their relations with each other are very much similar to relations with other people in the world. The main character, who has fallen for the girl, does not acknowledge the pains others may have been going through and thinks mostly for, if not himself, the girl. Most everyone has that sort of aspect, thinking mostly for themselves and not really for others, but then its part of human nature; in fact, selfishness overall is more benefical in survival. But that's another topic.
I in particular really admired the doctor. I can't say I wasn't biased because of the whole doctor/medical aspect of the series (hey, doctors are good guys! right? >.>) However I really did like how he turned out. Obviously when the anime first presented him, they portrayed him (and most properly, I might add) as a rather detestable type of character, trying to ruin the relationship between the two patients. Its true even I was annoyed by this, but even then I still thought, there's probably history behind him; they COULD make him a shallow jealous pedophile, but that didn't seem appropriate (plus I would have been quite angry at that if they portrayed a character like him... yes, its true there are criminals in high positions as the USC genetics professor Anderson has shown, but it wasn't appropriate for the show). His history was mostly predictable, but well suited.
The anime keenly reminds me of why I didn't want to try and go into medical profession, following a path of research instead: I felt that I may get attached to patients. Its probably one of the reasons why I like observing character traits in anime, but I trust people too easily. The trait conflicts with my knowledge that the world is not fair and proper; the confliction is the reason why I would not want to go into medicine, and not even look at the homeless man down the street... its a type of selfishness that I carry to survive and live on with the world; though I know my lifestyle can break apart any minute. But if I tried to be too nice to everyone, I'm sure that my lifestyle would break down faster...
Eeh, too philosophical. Overall I'll just conclude that digression with "I'm just selfish and will try to live my life with more modesty". Modesty is the only thing I can "make up" for the wonderful life that I've been living, not being sick or poor. Consequently, I don't want to hate or love anyone, hate because everyone has their reasons and I'm not one to judge them, love because its only possible to not hate by not loving as well... Blah more digression. Back to the anime.
The music wasn't that superb, but I thought the ending song was pretty good. Overall story arc/theme... well I think I told my opinions through my digression. I think the plot was predictable, but the point the series was to present it in a dramatic way, and they did so fluidly. So, as emotional as this was, it was still a good series.

Much better than Futakoi Alternative.

On another note, Sky Girls is also a good series, but for completely different reasons. Characters weren't that developed (its only one OVA, can't really do much) but the anime was basically eyecandy. So if they make a series out of this OVA, it will be more eyecandy...!
This contrasts greatly with the anime I just watched. :p

Edited: 50 QA questions for EFZ

Seeing how other people made new posts there, I figured I should edit it since I got a little better. A little. I think. :(

http://enigmatic-cube.blogspot.com/2005_11_01_enigmatic-cube_archive.html

Edits are in bold.

Futakoi Alternative

Overall, I thought the series was worse than the original Futakoi. And I KNOW the original Futakoi wasn't that great in the first place, but it was still at least fun to watch... Futakoi Alternative was... agonizing.

The plot of the story proceeds EVER. SO. SLOWLY. Basically, the entire series is based on an event that happens at the very end of the series, and for 8 episodes they mope around emoing over the coming of that event. It had the reminiscence of Azumanga Daioh where they'd just play a pointless scene for 5 FREAKIN MINUTES without doing anything... The series would have been much better off if they spent maybe 1 or 2 episodes on the whole "emo over our future" scenario and the rest on the supposedly crazy detective adventures they had (which, from the few scenes that had them, seemed highly more interesting than the emoing).
As for characters, although Sara and Souju (sp?) and the main detective character were flushed out pretty well (how could you NOT develop a character that emos for the entire series...) the other characters were very minor, which bothered me. In the introduction they introduce all the futakoi pairs in all their fighting glory, yet they only get one episode for each of them then never appear again. While their appearance was not meaningless (they do reveal some history about the starring twins of the show), it's quite disappointing how none of them make any new appearances after that, save for the loligothika twins which I must admit are a pretty cool pair of twins... but otherwise, the city townspeople seemed more important than the other twins that made appearances. Disappointing.
The two reasons why I continued with the series is because of its artwork and music; if it had lacked that, I wouldn't have even bothered. I actually did almost give up on the show, but I heard from someone that it got faster during the last half, which was a complete lie. It only got faster during the last two episodes, and the last two episodes were done so "recklessly" (for lack of a better word) that it didn't seem very entertaining at all. In any case I digressed; the artwork indeed was appealing. If anything, this entire series was a slow moving CG with voices, though I'm sure it would have been just as pretty without the voices... well, no, Souju's (sp?) voice is cute :p.
Second thing this show had going for it was eufonius. I can now conclude that eufonius is my second favorite J-pop celebrity (or group?), following KOTOKO. Whereas Kotoko's voice is usually a type of cheery, upbeat and energetic sorts, eufonius is quite appealing in the soft-spokenness and comfort of her music; her voice sounds very soothing and the music accompanying is usually one that reminds me of lullabys or melodies. eufonius seems pretty popular in Japan right now, though I don't think they'll be playing in America anytime soon. Then again, I never thought KOTOKO would make an appearance in America...

EUFONIUS FOR AX2007/AX2008/AX2009 :(

Yume Tsukai

Overall, a good anime. It was a bit peculiar at first, but it turns out very nicely even if the themes of the anime aren't always that clear. Mainly, in many cases when the "defeat" the dream, the problem isn't always resolved, making the viewers feel like they really didn't beat anything... but in an overall sense, in that way it seemed to portray human nature very truthfully, that not everyone becomes "good" again after they have been "saved", and some people will just be "evil" by nature (IE the boy that had dreams of dragons).

The plotline is set up much like any other old "defeat the monster with super powers" anime or show, so there really isn't much to express on it other than the ending, which reveals a lot about the characters of the show. But in terms of characters, they were flushed out pretty well. While not as thorough as Gokujo Seitokai's characters, every character has a background history that viewer learns about; this is good enough for me, since lately a lot of characters just show up with a name and that's it. It bothers me when people introduce 12 important-looking characters and never say anything about their origins and whatnot, just give them a couple insignificant scenes in the anime and make them leave. I'm not asking for people to explain the history of every person in a crowd that the main character walks by, but for those that seem to reappear and be of importance to the story, at least tell something about them...

But that's digressing. Besides character, the music is rather... strange, much like the anime. It certainly has a different sort of melody than most other songs I hear these days, whether it be American or Japanese. It doesn't sound too bad.

The animation is also not bad, save for the little girl that seems to have her eyes crossed all the time. Other than that, most of the time the animation is good. Touko looks quite charming, and her younger form is even more charming...

Strawberry Panic Episode 10

AOI NAGISA = GENUINE PROCRASTINATOR

That is all.

Insignificant Rant on Classes

The Arts and Letters class I have to take is the worst class I have to take up to date, and I'm pretty sure it will be the worst class I will be taking for my entire undergraduate years at USC.

I need to state first and foremost, I usually am against "hating" a paticular thing, object, person, or (in this case) class. Everything has its purpose for being, and I will understand that. HOWEVER, I truly find the class almost completely useless for me (it has uses to other people, of course) and I would much rather occupy some of my energy and hard work to something that can enlighten me in either science or (admittedly) anime than take this pathetic course. The course in which I speak of was a class I had chosen PURELY for scheduling reasons and had a variety of TWO DIFFERENT CLASSES: One dealing with Catholicism (I am not religious and do not wish to become involved with religious quarrels), the other dealing with the history of LA (which I am taking). The lack of variety is possibly the most frustrating thing of all. In all the General Education courses, I am not very fond of taking the required classes but at least I am able to find something in the course list that is fairly interesting, and for the most part I enjoyed my otherwise less-appreciable classes for History of the Western and History of the Eastern World.

But this course I have .no. interest whatsoever.

This is the problem. As the professor continued talking I just kept on thinking, "there is nothing I like about this course. Everything this course does is exactly what I don't want to do. This music sucks..." Essentially, this course is the most useless course I have taken since high school. And even the high school classes seem more interesting than this class. And in this class I have to work HARDER than most of my other classes. Possibly with the exception of Writing 140. I believe Writing 140 and this class are tied for the worst class I have to take, though Writing 140 lies more in its excessive workload and this class more on its content. But this class also has a ton of work to do, still.
I will consider making this class pass/fail, though I'm very hesitant as I am sure I will try to do well in the class even if I do realize its pass/fail (for fear that I get "fail" instead of "pass"...). IN that respect, if I get something like a B, I'd regret getting pass/fail... on the other hand, if I get a C, pass/fail would do very good.
As a general rule, I'll list possible positive effects of taking this class, at least ones I can observe of right now. Currently, at best this class will improve my social skills and knowledge of the area around LA, hence finding places to eat, getting around the city, and possibly even being able to talk to other people. However, from a previous job experience, I am feeling very anxious about that prospect. At worst, this class... will teach me to appreciate the tough classes like O-chem and Molecular Biology, and how, even though they may be so hard and so tough, the content is so much more interesting than learning about whatever nonsense this class teaches.
On a lighter note, I am liking my Electrical Engineering class, as it does not seem so strenuously difficult. I have to be extremely cautious, however, as many a time has I thought I got the hang of a class and just when I start to slack, WHAM!!! I'm hit in the face with something I don't get and my next midterm grade goes down the gutter.
My EE class is also extremely rich. Yes, rich. I mean, come on, they could have replaced those comfy chairs and donated something like, I dunno, new blackboards to the THH building? That room is the most "spoiled" aspect in the supposed "University of Spoiled Children".
And now, to conclude this rant appropriately, I give you the best cosplay picture at Comiket 70.
http://eg.nttpub.co.jp/event/comiket06/cm000084.html

They're coming... yes... they're COMING!!

Ok, so after the whole mari-tan issue now I'm stuck thinking about ideas on how ochem-tans would work. So I'm just gonna post a few ideas I have right now about them.

-Based on the properties of their orbitals (in terms of being an electron acceptor or an electron donor), all Alkali metals are male while all nonmetals are female. The analogy of why this is so should be obvious for anyone who understands the basics of biology and chemistry.
-Because this is so, Hydrogen will remain ambiguous as to what its gender is, due to its capability to be both an electron acceptor or an electron donor. Likewise, Nobel gases, being neither acceptors nor donors, will not be part of the element-tan family at this time since they (under normal circumstances) do not go under reactions, ie. they are boring.
-Hydrogen will be considered the "youngest" out of all the elements, being the one with the least atomic weight. As atomic weight progresses, so does physical appearance and maturity of the element-tan. Hence: As Element-tans progess further down the periodic table, the more "mature" they will appear.
-Reactivity reflects personality; hence, for alkali metals the elements furthest to the left of the table are more aggressive, and for the nonmetals the elements furthest to the right. The exception are, of course, noble gasses, which are not included.
-When first going into this project (assuming it will ever initiate), there will only be classifications of the first three rows as element-tans, since dealing with transition metals will make this idea a helluva lot more complicated. Then again, I did originally want them to be useful for organic chemistry (hence the first three rows)...
-Ionic bonds will be indicated by male-female relationships. Covalent bonds are indicated by female-female relationships. Seeing how the otaku world is built (Reference: "Welcome to NHK!!" Ep. 3), I believe no one would ever have a problem with that.

YES THIS IS GREAT Now I just need to learn how to draw :( HAHA IF YOU THINK I'M CRAZY RIGHT NOW WAIT TILL OCHEM AND MIDTERMS ARE IN FULL FLING HAHA HAHA HAHAHAHAHAHAHA :D