Aftermath

I did feel yesterday as if I'd been hurled around the inside of a car, and my knees, shoulder, hand, wrist, ribs, neck, upper back, and the outline of a lap-and-shoulder belt across my stomach and chest still hurt. And I'm pretty tired. But considering the Ought To Be Dead thing, I think I'm doing fine.

I may not have to pay for the car after all. It turns out that this is a fairly complicated situation, which will no doubt be kicked around and to different people for quite some time before it gets resolved. But in the meantime, I don't have a car and I'm stage managing a show this week, so I think I'll rent one tomorrow.

The anime convention was a blast. Buoyed by the hope of not having to buy a car, I bought about a year's worth of manga at 20% off, plus the Muay Thai film ONG BOK and the old anime THEY WERE ELEVEN on DVD. To my regret, there was no Hong Kong import or otherwise hard to find, let alone cheap, anime-- no HIKARU NO GO or FULL METAL ALCHEMIST. (Would those of you who offered to trade for those please email me? I can't find your email on your user info. Thanks.)

Tomokazu Seki (the voice of Van Fanel, Chichiri/Koji, Shuichi Shindo, Kyo Souma, etc, etc, etc) was there, but the line to get into his panel was so long, and stretched across such a hot and unshaded section of the roof of the Anaheim Convention Center, that I skipped it. Instead I went to the Tokyopop panel. It was a fateful decision.

Turns out that an editor there is my ex-boyfriend from UCLA, who I hadn't seen since we were both about nineteen. Just before the panel started, our eyes met:

"Luis?"

"Rachel?"

"Luis!"

"Rachel!

(Hug.)

So once I get a car, I'm getting a tour of Tokyopop and lunch. It also turns out that a former co-worker of mine from Henson also works there. I smell job possibilities...

I saw part of a movie called JUNKERS, COME HOME, which seemed to be an effectively sentimental story about a girl, her divorcing parents, and the magic talking dog that brings them together. I also saw some GTO (hilarious, even when dubbed), INITIAL D (Tokyo drag racing, lots of car details and CGI cars, great fun), SAIYUKI (avoid the dub like the plague), and, my favorite, WOLF'S RAIN, apparently about likable werewolves struggling to survive after the apocalypse, done in a beautiful sepia-based palette. I must watch more of this series, so I hope it's available even if I have to resort to ebay.

I shared a room with TK and six or seven of her closest friends. TK and I shared a bed. (I awoke to find her in a touchingly childlike pose, curled up with her arms around a blue hippo-thing from .HACK/SIGN.) Bottles lined the windowsill. Literally. I was on painkillers and couldn't drink. Bummer.

Sempai and Hong Kong J showed up on Sunday, and I am pleased to say that they had a great time and plan to return. On the way back we stopped at an ultra-macho izakaya in Gardena, full of bad-ass chefs hollering "IRRASSHAIMASE!!!!!" and waitresses who drank with the customers. We were almost the only non-Japanese (as in, born in Japan) people there. We had light, bright-tasting Okinawan beer, pork stewed in sweet soy sauce and served with mustard, roast quail eggs, little grilled fish stuffed with roe and eaten whole, split in-shell shrimp grilled with garlic sauce, Vienna sausages, regular sausages, chicken cartilage (ick), chicken with onions, chicken hearts, yellowtail collar, and grilled squid. All of it delicious. And I spoke Japanese to the waiter, who politely said it was very good.

So I had a great weekend, some great training for two hours this morning, and am very glad I'm not dead.

Aftermath

I did feel yesterday as if I'd been hurled around the inside of a car, and my knees, shoulder, hand, wrist, ribs, neck, upper back, and the outline of a lap-and-shoulder belt across my stomach and chest still hurt. And I'm pretty tired. But considering the Ought To Be Dead thing, I think I'm doing fine.

I may not have to pay for the car after all. It turns out that this is a fairly complicated situation, which will no doubt be kicked around and to different people for quite some time before it gets resolved. But in the meantime, I don't have a car and I'm stage managing a show this week, so I think I'll rent one tomorrow.

The anime convention was a blast. Buoyed by the hope of not having to buy a car, I bought about a year's worth of manga at 20% off, plus the Muay Thai film ONG BOK and the old anime THEY WERE ELEVEN on DVD. To my regret, there was no Hong Kong import or otherwise hard to find, let alone cheap, anime-- no HIKARU NO GO or FULL METAL ALCHEMIST. (Would those of you who offered to trade for those please email me? I can't find your email on your user info. Thanks.)

Tomokazu Seki (the voice of Van Fanel, Chichiri/Koji, Shuichi Shindo, Kyo Souma, etc, etc, etc) was there, but the line to get into his panel was so long, and stretched across such a hot and unshaded section of the roof of the Anaheim Convention Center, that I skipped it. Instead I went to the Tokyopop panel. It was a fateful decision.

Turns out that an editor there is my ex-boyfriend from UCLA, who I hadn't seen since we were both about nineteen. Just before the panel started, our eyes met:

"Luis?"

"Rachel?"

"Luis!"

"Rachel!

(Hug.)

So once I get a car, I'm getting a tour of Tokyopop and lunch. It also turns out that a former co-worker of mine from Henson also works there. I smell job possibilities...

I saw part of a movie called JUNKERS, COME HOME, which seemed to be an effectively sentimental story about a girl, her divorcing parents, and the magic talking dog that brings them together. I also saw some GTO (hilarious, even when dubbed), INITIAL D (Tokyo drag racing, lots of car details and CGI cars, great fun), SAIYUKI (avoid the dub like the plague), and, my favorite, WOLF'S RAIN, apparently about likable werewolves struggling to survive after the apocalypse, done in a beautiful sepia-based palette. I must watch more of this series, so I hope it's available even if I have to resort to ebay.

I shared a room with TK and six or seven of her closest friends. TK and I shared a bed. (I awoke to find her in a touchingly childlike pose, curled up with her arms around a blue hippo-thing from .HACK/SIGN.) Bottles lined the windowsill. Literally. I was on painkillers and couldn't drink. Bummer.

Sempai and Hong Kong J showed up on Sunday, and I am pleased to say that they had a great time and plan to return. On the way back we stopped at an ultra-macho izakaya in Gardena, full of bad-ass chefs hollering "IRRASSHAIMASE!!!!!" and waitresses who drank with the customers. We were almost the only non-Japanese (as in, born in Japan) people there. We had light, bright-tasting Okinawan beer, pork stewed in sweet soy sauce and served with mustard, roast quail eggs, little grilled fish stuffed with roe and eaten whole, split in-shell shrimp grilled with garlic sauce, Vienna sausages, regular sausages, chicken cartilage (ick), chicken with onions, chicken hearts, yellowtail collar, and grilled squid. All of it delicious. And I spoke Japanese to the waiter, who politely said it was very good.

So I had a great weekend, some great training for two hours this morning, and am very glad I'm not dead.

Manga spoils

CLOVER 3 & 4, by CLAMP. Covers amazingly intact. The rest of a beautiful, meditative series in a strange cyberpunkish world which I didn't review here because Melymbrosia already did it better.

TOKYO BABYLON 2, by CLAMP.

PLANET LADDER 1, by Yuri Harushima. Having flipped through # 6 at Ojai, I was sufficiently hooked to start yet another story about a modern schoolgirl who finds a destiny in an alternate universe.

PLEASE SAVE MY EARTH 2, by Saki Hiwatori. A girl with an affinity for plants meets two boys who share the same dreams of being scientists on a space station overlooking the Earth, and an annoying kid who wants to marry her. This promises to be a madly complex series, as it looks like the present-day characters all had relationships as their alter egos or past lives, in addition to their current (some of whom are gender-switched) identities.

PRINCE OF TENNIS 1, by Takeshi Konomi

SAIYUKI 3, by Kazuya Minekura. This is the only one I've had a chance to read so far. I'm really enjoying this series. The creator is one sick puppy who was obviously warped by reading too many doujinshi at a tender age. She includes all these pin-up drawings of her characters in modern dress, in a prison cell, what have you. They're often very sado-masochistic or bondage-y or just plain weird, like the one in # 2 of Hakkai looking scholarly in a preppy suit and holding a book labeled "Abortion." I don't think I want to know what that's about.

# 3 features Hakkai (again), wearing a crucifix necklace, all disheveled and roughed-up and tied with thorn vines and looking like he didn't necessarily have a bad time. The caption is "God, please violate me." Okay, that is SO disturbing on so many levels, not the least of which is that it's a pretty sexy picture, but I kind of feel like a perv for thinking so. Incidentally, that one actually makes sense for his character, though you don't yet know that at this point in the story.

X-DAY, by Setona Mizushiro. High school kids plan to blow up the school. I am so down with that. And I so can't believe that no guardians of public morality have made Tokyopop shrink-wrap it.

RED RIVER, by Chie Shinohara. A modern schoolgirl is swept into ancient Hattusa (the Hittites' city), where she will presumably find a destiny. I started flipping through and got hooked on the story, plus I like the Rumiko Takahashi-esque character designs.

MARS 7 & 8, by Fuyumi Soryo. Still hooked.

ALICE 19th 3, by Yu Watase. Still hooked.

IMADOKI 1, by Yu Watase. A realistic schoolgirl romance. I couldn't resist the somewhat Tamahome-esque boy who appears on page 1.

PLANETES 2 & 3, by Makoto Yukimura. Still hooked. C. J. Cherryh meets Robert A. Heinlein for ultra-realistic manga space adventures.

Manga spoils

CLOVER 3 & 4, by CLAMP. Covers amazingly intact. The rest of a beautiful, meditative series in a strange cyberpunkish world which I didn't review here because Melymbrosia already did it better.

TOKYO BABYLON 2, by CLAMP.

PLANET LADDER 1, by Yuri Harushima. Having flipped through # 6 at Ojai, I was sufficiently hooked to start yet another story about a modern schoolgirl who finds a destiny in an alternate universe.

PLEASE SAVE MY EARTH 2, by Saki Hiwatori. A girl with an affinity for plants meets two boys who share the same dreams of being scientists on a space station overlooking the Earth, and an annoying kid who wants to marry her. This promises to be a madly complex series, as it looks like the present-day characters all had relationships as their alter egos or past lives, in addition to their current (some of whom are gender-switched) identities.

PRINCE OF TENNIS 1, by Takeshi Konomi

SAIYUKI 3, by Kazuya Minekura. This is the only one I've had a chance to read so far. I'm really enjoying this series. The creator is one sick puppy who was obviously warped by reading too many doujinshi at a tender age. She includes all these pin-up drawings of her characters in modern dress, in a prison cell, what have you. They're often very sado-masochistic or bondage-y or just plain weird, like the one in # 2 of Hakkai looking scholarly in a preppy suit and holding a book labeled "Abortion." I don't think I want to know what that's about.

# 3 features Hakkai (again), wearing a crucifix necklace, all disheveled and roughed-up and tied with thorn vines and looking like he didn't necessarily have a bad time. The caption is "God, please violate me." Okay, that is SO disturbing on so many levels, not the least of which is that it's a pretty sexy picture, but I kind of feel like a perv for thinking so. Incidentally, that one actually makes sense for his character, though you don't yet know that at this point in the story.

X-DAY, by Setona Mizushiro. High school kids plan to blow up the school. I am so down with that. And I so can't believe that no guardians of public morality have made Tokyopop shrink-wrap it.

RED RIVER, by Chie Shinohara. A modern schoolgirl is swept into ancient Hattusa (the Hittites' city), where she will presumably find a destiny. I started flipping through and got hooked on the story, plus I like the Rumiko Takahashi-esque character designs.

MARS 7 & 8, by Fuyumi Soryo. Still hooked.

ALICE 19th 3, by Yu Watase. Still hooked.

IMADOKI 1, by Yu Watase. A realistic schoolgirl romance. I couldn't resist the somewhat Tamahome-esque boy who appears on page 1.

PLANETES 2 & 3, by Makoto Yukimura. Still hooked. C. J. Cherryh meets Robert A. Heinlein for ultra-realistic manga space adventures.