Almost forgot to mention…

…that I (TheBigN) will be at Otakon 2010 this weekend. At first, I had assumed that there wouldn’t be much running around this con compared to most, since the guest list for the most part doesn’t have anyone that really grabs my interest (save for those people who worked on those things some years ago – which as a side note also I guess really shows where my sad interests lie), and there wouldn’t be wall-to-wall industry panels (but then, are there ever). But based on the schedule, there will be enough panels that sound interesting that I’m a little worried that I won’t have enough time to meet and hang out with people, or join in on helping omo and co. sing the Working!! OP if he can’t find enough people to do it with. And I think that’s a good thing.

I really lucked out this year in terms of timing, since this year’s convention fell in the small bit of break time (thurs-sun this weekend yay) between my third and fourth years of medical school, and I’m grateful to have the opportunity to enjoy everything to the fullest. I’m not sure if I’ll have many opportunities to visit conventions fully again, so I’m hoping to try and make the most of what I have now. Or at least have fun winging it this year like I did last year. As for the future? We’ll see.

Speaking of Moyasimon….

by dm00

…how aspergillus oryzae and friends really talk (for the longest time during her talk I was convinced that her skirt had an Aspergillus Oryzae pattern):

He asked that it be spelled “Moyasimon” so…

…he could use Google to find commentary on the English-language version of the manga, instead of the anime.

by dm00

Stare at it for a long time, then look at a white wall

Volume two of Moyasimon arrives with many, many margin notes from Ishikawa-sensei, including a plaintive comment that he can’t find any reactions to the English language manga on the net. Perhaps now we know why he asked DelRey to spell the title “Moyasimon” instead of the “Moyashimon” romanization that we’re more accustomed to.

In among the sometimes-trivial, sometimes-educational, and often amusing marginalia is a story about college life and fermentation.

Zaregoto 2: The Kubishime Romanticist

 

The narrator is someone capable of mostly ignoring her

 

by dm00

The second volume of NisiOisiN’s Zaregoto series arrived last week, and I read it over the weekend. It follows a couple of months after the incidents of the first book — the book opens with the narrator drowning his tastebuds in kimchi to burn them out, resetting them so he can enjoy mundane food once again, now that he’s no longer trapped on an isolated island with the world’s greatest cook. As he is doing this, he is confronted by Mikoko Aoii, who invites him to a friend’s birthday party. The narrator finds himself drifting along with events (that include murders, an encounter with a serial-killer, and the return of humanity’s strongest consultant, Aikawa Jun.

I’m not sure — these books remind me of Bret Easton Ellis substituting otaku references for designer-brand name-dropping. For this volume it seems to be Japanese mystery writers or characters more than anime and manga (save for Aoii referring to the strength of the narrator’s AT-field). There’s a curious void at the heart of the characters — particularly the central narrator — and Isin spends more time telling than showing as the narrator talks about his own emptiness. At one point the narrator seems to have a refreshingly human reaction. However, it’s very normality should tip the reader off that something is up.

The blue-haired moeblob hacker is nearly reduced to a footnote.

I’d forgotten from the first book that these are mystery novels with an unreliable narrator. If we are to solve the mystery we have to realize that the narrator may be hiding vital information from us. Indeed, the narrator comes close to being so misleading as to hide necessary clues. He comes close, but doesn’t quite cross that line — when Jun Aikawa does figure things out, she uses evidence that we are also privy to.

And yet, something about the books makes them more compelling for me than, say Haruki Murakami. After finishing this novel, I think the leap to the supernatural that happens in Bakemonogatari is a good strategy for NisiOisiN — it might, ironically, make the characters more human by giving them a reason to be less human.

I’m more-or-less hooked. Del Rey, why not bring the next volume out a little sooner than late 2011?

What is Rider’s Favorite Food?

Gorgonzola.

…I’m sorry. Just had a little bit of SDShamshel in me that I needed to get out.

The One Thing I Got From Angel Beats! Is A Little Sad

By TheBigN

It’s kind of silly, and already has been covered before… probably.