Found band-aids in suitcase. Book-capacity: 90 volumes.

3 hours. How I wish I could sleep.

posted at 4:34 AM

 
Test book-capacity of suitcase, gather passport and credit cards, pack clothes. Pay rent!

Forgot to buy band-aids.

11 hours.

posted at 8:20 PM

 
Print shopping list, withdraw (a little more) cash, test book-capacity of suitcase, gather passport and credit cards, pack clothes. Finish homework!

35 hours.

posted at 8:40 PM

 
Buy watch, buy map, print shopping list, withdraw more cash, test book-capacity of suitcase, gather passport and credit cards, pack clothes. Finish homework.

64 hours.

posted at 3:16 PM

 
Buy watch, buy map, locate at least one Book-Off in Tokyo, complete and print shopping list, withdraw cash, test book-capacity of suitcase, ask A and M to confirm subway route to Mandarake, gather passport and credit cards, call Bayporter for ride, pack clothes. Do homework. (Where can I find cutter tables?)

Why does "all the time in the world" suddenly evaporate into 72 hours?

posted at 11:26 PM

 
I can't re-read volumes 13 and 14 of HikaGo because of Sai's fate in volume 15. I love the whole idea of Touya Kouyo x Sai, and the "culmination" of their relationship is attached to the most unfortunate event in the manga. Argh!
posted at 11:26 PM

 
If hell is other people, fandom is surely the eighth circle of the Inferno: panderers, flatterers, hypocrites, thieves, and sowers of discord.

Here endeth my brief foray into bitch blogging, inspired by the existence of and requests for scanlations.

posted at 2:08 AM

 
I desperately need something to distract me from the situation at work, but I don't have volume 19 of Hikaru and my October manga order is stalled at Jamall thanks to the Tosuisha titles. I'll probably be in Tokyo when it arrives, where I could have picked up the books for less. Grrrr. Okay, my favorite Stargate episode will help me calm down (thank you, SciFi channel), and then maybe I can work on my Tokyo shopping list. Or my last XML assignment. Or just sleep and forget.
posted at 7:11 PM

 
Kanade Tokiwa's Dynasty IV is a complete wash as a picture-read. After three separate attempts, I can't tell the difference between Silva and Astaroth, or begin to comprehend why they're doing what they are to Lowe and why he's putting up with it, being in line to be the Holy Roman Emperor and all. Heck, half the time I can't tell what is being done to Lowe. The artist's style combines all the worst aspects of Minami Ozaki and Shima Asahi and Bohra Naono and Sakia Higa. Hulking, misproportioned figures against a background of squiggles.

Maybe the story is fabulous. If so, it would be better presented as a novel, using the dozen or so eye-catching panels as cuts. I'll try to remember this book next time I whine that I wish some BL novel were manga, instead. Comics != comprehensible.

posted at 10:13 PM

 
Hikaru no Go vol.15. *sob*
posted at 8:14 PM

 
52
This episode contains competitive intensity bordering on sexual obsession. As always, there's Hikaru and Akira. Hikaru is thrilled that he has "at last" (it's been, what, a year?) become a pro so that he can play Akira at or near Akira's level. He's trying to express this anticipation and excitement to the other boy when Akira cuts him dead, walking right by him in the lobby at the Igo ceremonies. To my mind, this is the counterpoint to the rejection way back in the pre-double-digit episodes, when Akira stands outside the window of the Go club at Hikaru's school -- sakura blossoms floating by -- while Hikaru refuses to play against him. Of course, Akira is nowhere near as indifferent or egotistical as that gesture makes him appear to Hikaru. He's tense with anticipation, silently declaring war. Oh, and the two of them in their suits at the ceremony...yes, time is passing and soon the boys will be old enough to be taken out of the box.

Then there's Touya-papa's dignified, polite, and impassive face-off with Ogata-sensei. Ogata is sophisticated, but he's not as controlled as the great Touya, so the viewer can sense his urgency and his passion. Victory is tantalizingly close, and his opponent's quiet confidence is a red flag.

Finally, Sai wistfully questions when he will be able to play against someone of "that person's" strength again. Soon, Sai-chan. Touya wants you as badly as his son does.

posted at 7:43 PM

 
list mania
I usually look up ISBNs for my monthly orders on Book1, but using Amazon.com Japan has its advantages: the links to the recommendation lists posted by Japanese readers that are sutomatically generated along with the results of your search. For BL, the emphasis is inevitably on novels (go figure), but this time something extraordinary captured my eye: a list in English amid all the Japanese comments:

A Yaoi Mania's Reading Recommendation

posted at 2:22 PM

 
xml homework? what xml homework?
Apart from 5 hours spent with Matoh's Ra-i at the hospital while having my fractured foot treated, I used the long weekend to wallow in back issues of Gold and Reijin. I was surprised and a little disappointed to discover that I enjoyed many more of the stories in Reijin this time around (most of which are yomikiri, incidentally). The disappointment comes from having let my subscription lapse a couple of months ago, since I was interested in only one story at most when the new issues first arrived. Always Bohra Naono (but she doesn't show up in every issue), occasionally Shiuko Kano. But nothing like my experience with Gold, where I can anticipate being interested in two or three chapters per issue. Reijin's little extras are more appealing than Gold's, but "That's Tanbism" is lost on a picture-reader and the gay video review manga essays can prick my realism nerve.
posted at 11:55 PM

 
The October update to Yuki Shimizu's Biblos page says that Love Mode volume 11--due to be published in January, 2003--will be the end of the series. Nooo! That's too bad. With the B & B dating club, Shimizu had established a universe that could have supported dozens of stories. I suppose she felt that the main relationships in the series had "peaked," but I have to disagree. Sure, there wasn't much more for Reiji to be magnificent about and Kiichi's mischievous matchmaking has always been one(or two)-note, but the boys still have to become adults. I like the idea of Shimizu doing Blue Boy side stories, focusing on the club's staff and members, but offering glimpses of the main characters' development. I particularly like the idea of Naoya and Izumi being longtime friends, like their respective lovers. I want Love Mode Gaiden, darnit.

I wonder where Shimizu ends the series. The last chapter I saw in Magazine Be Boy was a flashback to Aoe's and Takamiya's youth, and their relationship with Shiki.

The one benefit to ending a series that still has energy in it--besides not having it become stale--is closure. I don't have to worry it will always remain open-ended. Every time Kodaka puts Kizuna on hiatus, I worry that she might be unable to return to it. Bronze is the prime example of this unendingness, even though I'm mostly indifferent to seeing it completed. At this point, any conclusion to Kouji and Izumi's story (other than death) would feel anticlimactic, which is an uncomfortable position for an HEA romantic.

posted at 2:09 AM

 
They slash hobbits, don't they?
Okay, I was all set to begin writing "The Axe and the Bow," my epic LOTR slash trilogy featuring the under-utilized erotic pairing of Legolas and Gimli, when I did a Google search and discovered that people *are* slashing them. And the title has already been taken by a web site. Fine. I'll just slash the third shadow wraith from the left and that silent elf from the forest of ... what was that the forest of? I'm sure if they ever met, they would be madly attracted.

There is nothing sadder than realizing you're in love with your great, hulking traveling companion only when he lies dying in your arms, confessing his love to you: "my brother. My captain. My king."

Fortunately, Frodo doesn't make the same mistake: "Sam, I'm glad you're with me."

posted at 7:00 PM

 
sexing Schama
Gladstone and Disraeli should have been secret lovers. Their conflict of personality and politics--Gladstone's morality and liberalism, Disraeli's imagination and imperialism--reads better as fuel for the love that dares not speak its name. My preference is for Disraeli x Gladstone, with the Grand Old Man of liberal politics in the role of a beleaguered oyaji and Disraeli (eternally youthful to me, though in reality older than Gladstone) vainly trying to assert control through penetration. Maybe it's because their mother figure (younger still than both men) preferred Dizzy, leaving Gladstone to mope over the sting of her rejection. However, with Disraeli's romanticism and cunning, I can also picture him as the seductive, manipulative uke running circles around his reluctant seme. Well, to be honest, I don't picture Disraeli. I picture Shimizu's Kiichi-sensei as Disraeli. Seme!Disraeli would be something by Fuhri Misasagi, I think. Or Nitta (sans reversibility). Gladstone, top or bottom, would be a Bohra Naono oyaji, all good intentions.
posted at 2:28 AM

 
Naruto
4 episodes into the anime: I don't think I would have pondered the yaoi-ness of Naruto without already knowing there was a HUGE yaoi fandom in Japan for it. This 12-year-old ninja apprentice has all the right emotional catalysts, but he's...repulsive. Except when he's adorable. Or in profile.

Reading what slash-kun writes on the mailing list, it sounds as if Japan is developing two yaoi paths: adult pairings for the mature yaoi readers and kids for...well, everybody else. (*fretful* It suggests the slippery slope of slash politics to me. I prefer to let my emotional response to the characters determine pairings. Or else pair two really sexy guys, which frankly doesn't seem to apply to anyone in Naruto yet.) So the pairing of Iruka-sensei and Kakashi-sensei is popular with the dj-ka? Right now, I'm drawn to something intergenerational, with Iruka-sensei as Naruto's first love. (Hey, after only 4 episodes, Kakashi doesn't have an emotional life for me.) In his relationship with Iruka, Naruto melds Naoya's emotional triggers with Kai's attitude. Iruka-sensei is, so far, a good man. A kind man. A selfless man. An insightful man. And a capable ninja. What's not to love? Alternately, I can see the producers have laid the path for Naruto x Sasuke (or vice-versa) with the "first kiss" scene, reminiscent of Hana yori Dango, of all things.

What does impress me is that this series was a huge yaoi-magnet in Japan and a mild yaoi-magnet in the west even before it was animated.

gentle grump
Where has all the good yaoi talk gone? (For the purposes of this discussion, we'll define "good" as "stuff I'm interested in.") Blogs? Series-specific mailing lists? AMLA never really talked about characters or stories in-depth, but does no-one even think in broader trends--other than smut, smut, muscles and smut--anymore?

posted at 11:58 AM

 
HikaGo again
Akira believes he will only be complete if he faces and defeats Hikaru. Of course, what he doesn't realize is that the force he's contending against is really Sai. Hikaru, swept up by the Touya passion, decides that he won't play Akira again until he is able to compete on his own. Meanwhile, Sai desires Touya-papa...well, to play against him, at least. It's classic Japanese love geometry, all the more erotic for supposedly not being about romance at all.

I think I see the appeal of shounen manga/anime for the yaoista. The emotions are all there, incorrectly channeled. Just kiss already, guys!

posted at 11:30 PM

 
exercise in picture-reading
The Fumi Yoshinaga story in Gold 12/02, "Watashi no Eien no Koibito," goes from funny to sexy to tragic (gruesome) to romantic to poignant in 50 pages. It would make a great OVA, but that may just be me wanting more of this story. Since any kind of a follow-up would just steal its impact, I need to see the exact same thing in a different medium.

The story also illustrates the hazards of picture-reading. I was three-quarters through before I realized that the characters other than Lawford weren't part of a computer simulation. I swiftly readjusted my understanding of the "androids" (I am very confused by Yoshinaga's use of "clone" as well, since these are two separate beings to me, one AI and the other entirely human), but the story left me wondering just who the uke was in relationship to Lawford. Was he an iteration of Lawford's (presumably dead) brother, or is the "aniki" just part of Arthur's programming? I need to know more about the puppetmaster. Nevertheless, the end left me with emotions bleeding everywhere: admiration for Miss Hamilton's selflessness (machine or not); pity for Arthur's realization that he, too, was an android (and sorrow that this meant the end of him), and my familiar romantic sympathy for Lawford, the creator, who destroys what he loves only to build it again. I hope.

Unfortunately, I was thwarted by the uke's name. A-sa-/Aasaa/Arsar/ARTHUR! I can blame the evil s-for-th ("chi" for "ti" in katakana'd "romantic" does it to me as well), but I get "birthday" (baasudei) and "sank you." I would rather blame the name "Arthur," which I find singularly unattractive. Sexier pronounced the Japanese way, yes?

vocabulary lesson
Hikaru no Go taught me "makeru." I first heard the term "make da" from Muroi in Odoru 11, but seeing it again and again in the context of resigning a match in HikaGo has cemented it as part of my manga vocabulary. Odoru, on the other hand, gave me "fuzakeru na" in one of its slashier moments. I won't be forgetting that soon, thanks to Muroi's pouty delivery.

posted at 8:44 PM

 
Riding home on the bus today (I really must buy a watch if I'm going to continue to take public transit), I saw two young woman with large Kinokuniya shopping bags reading manga: Sotsugyou M and Satosumi Takaguchi's Utsukushii Otoko. I have to check out where that bus line goes to figure out if that's the best way to get to SF Kino. No more BART to Civic Center followed by a trek up Van Ness? That may be a necessity if my foot doesn't improve.

Be Boy Gold 12/2002 arrived today, and--yea me!--I was right about Tachibana-kun having a crush on his family's Masa. Kodaka's twist on the story was to have the boy believe that Nakatani was in love with Itsuki's sister, Ruriko. Ah, jealousy. Itsuki can't quite believe that Nakatani loves him: "but, Nakatani, you're not gay!" "That's true," Nakatani muses, "I'm not attracted to other men. But [something about Itsuki's pheremones?]" My favorite yaoi stuff, the character who isn't gay but just loves this one particular guy. It did seem a little odd/cutesy/improbable to see Masa giving "bon love" support to his counterpart, if only because his relationship with Kai is still a closely-guarded secret from the Sagano crew.

posted at 7:32 PM

 
I injured my foot and took Rinta Hashiba's Mind Distance to the Emergency Room with me. (Self-conscious? Not until I was seated in the crowded minor injuries clinic and reached the rape scene. Thank God for Japanese bookstores' generosity with paper book covers.) None of the hospital personnel I encountered acted like Matsuyama or Yana...shoot. I forgot his full name. I blame the cute side-story manga at the end, where his character is "Yanakitsune." Sexy, sexy fox man. Actually, cute chibi fox becomes sexy, sexy fox. It made a charming appendix to this story, but I would love to see an original foxy tale from Hashiba. I am continually astonished at the freedom and desire manga-ka have to "doujinshi" their own characters and stories. HikaGo does the same, putting the middle-schoolers into a 16th-century Japanese setting in one of the volumes.

Speaking of chibi, J-with-two-Ns came for a visit last weekend. One of the benefits of hearing her use fannish Japanese is the reminder that the "i" is a long ee sound.

posted at 6:26 PM