While I’m sitting home, working from home, and eventing from home under this COVID-19 scheme of things, the world keeps on ticking. Just because life may have paused somewhat for me, the world has not. Which is just to say, I feel like this blog could use a change.
I thought about doing a newsletter type format thing for this blog for a while now, and maybe that makes more sense. Of course, to make a proper email newsletter, it’s a different type of syndication. I will probably still post the letters on this site for posterity sake. It is going to have a similar voice.
Nonetheless a newsletter format of journaling seems a bit more appropriate for the things I’m thinking about. It takes a lot of time to germinate ideas worth the while for public posting, and then survive the iterative review I do. It’s not like my unpublished draft count is going down… Only a portion of what I write is gets published in the end, no matter how stream-of-conscious the rambling gets. I don’t have a formal clipboard process but that might change as a result?
In short, below is an example from this week. I’m not committed to a set schedule, but I’ll aim for a weekly schedule. I’ll post them in the emails at least, and probably on the blog too, as I go. You can subscribe to it by entering your email below. At some point those emails will go out, when I figure out how this works anyways. Meanwhile I’ll post them on the site for now.
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Omonomono Newsletter, 2021-02-15
The first newsletter just means I have many ongoing ideas that has not fleshed out.
Intro
I’ve been casually blogging my hobbies here, or specifically about anime fandom from a North American/Asian-American point of view, in respect to anime otaku-focused content. Over the years I’ve drifted into a specialization: cartoon idol otaku. I’ve always been interested in anime music (of all types) and fascination with various female character types with more of a slant towards classic media analysis. It is a natural turn. I also go to a bunch of conventions every year, at least pre-COVID, and those things only give me more excuses to fall deeper in this trench, so to speak.
As some may know, I wrote for Japanator for a while, with somewhat of a focus for about a few years and really tapered off after, only really doing con coverage and interviews. I don’t write much about anime per se anymore, mainly because in this 1000% post-modern Year of 2021 of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ it is not particularly meaningful to review an anime like a middle schooler’s book report assignment. It might still be useful for meta reasons, like why some folks do newsletters.
Just like how I’m listening to Junichi Sato (of fhana) talk about various media/anime inclinations with his friends on Clubhouse as I write this (I guess I will stick to “given-family” format for the Japanese names in this newsletter), there is not a real purpose but to convey information and ideas to you, whoever that is reading this. My changing them from thoughts into words, I have already achieved what I am after–which is to just give birth to ideas, to craft words to mean things. Merely expression is reward.
In that spirit, the medium is also part of the message–thus a newsletter. It provides the framework; limitations and guidelines to make this both more fun and easy for me, and maybe easier to understand for you.
Here are a list of things I’d like to do:
- Start email syndication. MailChimp has a free tier, so maybe that works?
- Name the newsletter maybe?
- Get some graphics assets
- Nail down the structure more
- Get a few signups ww
This past week
Normally I would do some recap that I omitted from last time, or follow up from last week/weeks. I don’t know. Just some notes.
Something about Astolfo’s penis – cosplayer made meme pics of his genitals and it trended big time in EN/FGO circles, causing various reactions as people found out about a new meme involving Astolfo and Monster Energy (and other bottled drinks).
There were a lot of Valentine Day things, but nothing really surprising? Lunar New Year being past Friday meant the Chinese and Korean zako folks put out their cow bikini illustrations instead of during the 1/1 holiday period.
Japan vaccine plan for Pfizer is a go as approval is met. This means a lot of events will be a lot more open about going ahead, especially the ones in the middle of the year or later. That said who knows how fast rollout will be?
What is this? Original Bushiroad thing that is not that obnoxious at a glance?
More Kimetsu no Yaiba later this year.
That Wataten*5 live was still really good.
Priconne Global CB…was just like JP but still ridiculous lol.
Yoasobi solo live came and went.
Koroazu, or Azusa Tadokoro, announced a FREE online concert, which you can watch on Youtube in April.
China’s online army started to pick on Ai Kayano because in her daily Youtube video, episode 152, (which is taken down), she visits the oh-so-famous Yasukuni Shrine. Yeah, you don’t want anything like that on a video stored on a platform that the Chinese people have banned from the country. It’s dumb but unfortuante.
On the mind
Probably just some thoughts here, and upcoming events (online or otherwise)
Starlit Season new character is still…a big brain thing.
Popmas is a bit of a shitshow, sorry. I enjoy the game and the overall concept. But it is a toxic gacha. No suptix, no guaranteed SR, extreme imbalance (hello Teru). They nerfed the SR “yellow cycle” thing but so what? As someone who paid a bit to roll in this game I’m actually passively aggressive angry about it. But the content is so good otherwise the really painful skill-based gacha thing. And that the game runs like turd on Android.
Chojigen Ongakusai was this past weekend and it seemed fun, but mendou…so I didn’t watch.
Just like all the valentine day streams. I will TS the Seaside one (day1) at some point I think, but that’s pretty much it. Not because they are not interesting or whatever–no time.
A lot of anime cons broke news the past week–It’s about time they took seriously their new look. Acen’s main point of note is that when they polled their staff, majority of them wouldn’t want to volunteer at a 2021 Acen. That will axe any con that has that kind of makeup. I think you won’t find things too differently for the big coastal cons this summer. The ongoing question is vaccination rate & can these cons afford to keep rolling another year.
JP folks are on Clubhouse. Worth it if you are into production side of things because a number of casual backend folks do go on and chat.
I keep wanting to compare Mushoku Tensei with Game of Thrones. I think this is due to my media bias of not having read either but as casual bystanders seeing these major media projects brush past me. The gratuitous violence and sex (and sexual violence) in GoT is a big turnoff for me for some reason, which might relate to how a number of folks find Mushoku Tensei’s heavy sexual themes. In the latter case it feels that those actually serve some purpose beyond having to color the characters in this way, and even that kind of makes it less gratuitous than GoT.
Which is just to say I have mixed feelings about that kind of fanservice in Gekidol, even if that isn’t gratuitous either, at least in a meta point of view.
Events
Brought to you by Boglecord. Watch him on Twitch Tuesday nights I guess?
Eitaso graduation event for Denpagumi.inc types. Corona has put an end to so many idol, sadly.
Let Aki-chan heal you: Aki Toyosaki @ DiveConnect Zepp|Online. Stagecrowd is what oversea folks should use. Both this and Eitaso’s event are on Tuesday but can be timeshifted.
fhana @ Nissin Foods Power Station – Thanks to the ‘Rona (no thanks?), Nissin is sponsoring a bunch of paid streams on their site taking place at the Power Station venue.
The big event next weekend for me is Priconne Fes. Both days are on Youtube for free, and there’s even a concert at the end of day2.
Lastly there is eufonius’s online stream, which is a first for them. They are still on my bucket list!
Personal note
Going to put random stuff here–IRL things maybe?
In the US, COVID vaccine rollout vary state by state, but generally speaking it is also just a terrible time state by state. However people are getting it. As for the USA being the laughingstock of COVID resistance worldwide, the vaccine priority for this first-world country is real. I guess it’s hard to argue that Americans have any other choice here when so many have died unnecessarily. Still, it’s tragic, in an ever-evolving kind of way.
The vaccination rate is worth noting. In early Feb we’ve hit 10% in the USA, but it will probably take the bulk of Feb to hit 20%. Would we get 60% by end of June? Maybe, by that logic. There will needs to be also more breakthrough on the under-16 group since no vaccines are authorized for that yet in the US. But 60% vaccination rate by June, a pretty safe goal, probably is still quite dicey for a significant number of membership for, say, AX. Any earlier con probably should forget about it. Even if they start vaccinating kids, it won’t be 60% of kids by end of June. A mid-autumn date seems way different than a mid-summer date for any con planner. Well, only if things stay on track, that is.
Wintry camping is both pricy and a little challenging. I am glad that the latest episode of Yurucamp highlighted the danger of cold temperature. In my research, wintry camping means making peace with the fact that you will be cold. I think it isn’t a bad kind of cold since you will be out and about and active. And being an adult male my body probably takes the cold as well as anyone. All because, of course, I’m tired of this stay-home life and would like to go outdoors for a while. With Million 7th “Reburn” getting more steam, it sounds like a fun outdoor camping time to watch the live? Can BBQ or something. Things won’t be subzero by May and my pleb tier gear would suffice.
Long read
I think I’ll try to close out every one of these with a proper read that you will spend more than 60 seconds on. That said, I always am open to feedback. It can be comments here or if it’s in the email form, a response.
Chaki, or Saki Ogasawara, is a voice actress slowing getting some kinda-big roles, but to me she plays Akane from Million Live. She had surgery on her tongue to deal with cancer back in 2019 and she has written about it in a long-form article here (JP). It is a rare kind of rehab given the work she has to do and the type of injury.
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