Happy Chinese New Year!

Mood:

It's the year of the Horse. Interesting that it falls on the first day of the new month of Adar in the Jewish calendar this year.They're both lunar calendars. Maybe I should watch a couple of episodes of Fruits Basket in honor of it? (Might do it tomorrow, though.) It's an anime that is based on the story behind the Chinese zodiac animals. Also, one of the few anime I actually have the official DVDs for. It's a very good series.The manga was even better. Interesting that I like the English dub voices more than the original Japanese ones. That's rare for me.Rin, who is the horse of the zodiac, actually only shows up in the manga. She's pretty cool and strong. Yesterday was National Croissant Day. I love croissants! 

This week has been very weird.It started off really well, but halfway through I felt horrible. I was getting my sit-ups in, going to bed at decent times, and doing walks until then. My stomach started doing somersaults around halfway through the week. I started to go to bed later than I should, and I slept in to get my full amount of sleep. Since I slept in, I didn't get as much stuff done as I could have.Didn't feel like doing my sit-ups because of my stomach. (Felt like I'd throw up during it.) Because of this stuff, I started to feel down too...Just made it all peachy. Well, this weekend and coming week I can try and do better. Hopefully my stomach will calm down a little more, too. 

Went to Red Lobster last night. I got tea, and ordered from their 4-course meal deal again. (It's an awesome deal, and it makes several meals for me!) Decided on the house salad with bleu cheese dressing, chicken tortilla soup, wood-grilled tilapia with broccoli and mashed potatoes, and substituted a dessert that was seasonal and wasn't on there which was red velvet cake in a jar. I usually got their Caesar salad, but the house salad was good too. It was a nice and simple mix of vegetables. Light on the dressing as well, which I like. The tortilla soup didn't have cheese in it like it usually does. So, I asked for some, and they gave me a big sauce bowl full of it. I love cheese, so thinking I shouldn't waste it, I dumped it all in. It was probably more cheese than soup...I usually get the Cajun chicken linguine as my entree. I wanted to try something a little different. There aren't that many options on the meal deal list for me. (It is a seafood place that specializes in lobster and other shellfish...) This was good, though. The fish was very lightly seasoned with salt and pepper. The broccoli was fresh and was still a bit crisp, not overdone. The mash potatoes had a mixture of cheese and pepper in them. They were so good!I didn't realize I could substitute a dessert. The meal deal only lists 3 desserts. Not many, and sometimes those get old.Although, I've only had 2. I have to be in the mood for cheesecake, and I'm not entirely positive that I'd like caramel cheesecake. It sounds odd. Kind of close to sounding like flan, and I hate flan.But, now that I know, there are a lot more options for me. Anyways, the red velvet cake in a jar was awesome!A while back I had their seasonal strawberry shortcake in a jar, and that was amazing too! This had layers of icing, cake, and chocolate chips on top. It's kind of fun to eat it out of a jar. 

Oh, and when I asked for a bread bag for the Cheddar Bay biscuits (which I only ate one of, I was saving the rest for later), our waitress gave me a pre-filled bag of extra ones. I had to ask again for a bag for the ones I already had in the basket. It was a little too generous.I try not to eat too many in one sitting, so a full bag takes me a while to get through. And, to have another bag...Although, I don't think it ended up being the amount I got last time. Our waitress back then kept giving us basket after basket of them. I had put them off to the side so I would remember to get them later. I don't remember how many it ended up being that time. 

I started Switch Girl on Wednesday. I'll talk more about it soon. And, I started Atami no Sousakan or Atami Investigators today. Another Satoshi Miki drama. I love his shows!He's an amazing writer/director. I'll go into more detail soon with this one, too. 

Finished Henshin Interviewer no Yuuutsu or The Melancholy of the Transformer Interviewer. It was really good. Satoshi is as great with his mysteries as his humor. It was kind of a twisted ride. The very end was a bit weird, and I'm not entirely sure that I really got it. Everything was very well done, though. Everything was timed well, the story was interesting although creepy at times, just like Jikou Keisatsu they knew when to be serious and when to be hilarious. Since it dealt with some heavy/dark stuff, it seemed they didn't want to make light of it. Which was good. 

I finished editing the 5th short story to my nightmare anthology. I think this one was quicker than the others. Next time I can start the 6th one. Yay!This one's actual nightmare was even more gruesome than the 5th one. So, hopefully I'll be able to get through it. It'll be interesting to see how this one turns out.

Yesterday, I also played my clarinet. Did a lot of klezmer tunes. It sounded pretty good.

日本語

Yesterday, I studied more compounds for 発, and started studying the kanji 反. 発足 or ほっそく (hossoku): starting, inauguration, launch, founding, establishment, start-up. 発心 or ほっしん (hosshin): spiritual (or religious) awakening, resolution. 発疹 or はっしん (hasshin): rash, eruption. 自発 or じはつ (jihatsu): spontaneous. 蒸発 or じょうはつ (jouhatsu): evaporation; unexplained disappearance. 反す or かえ.す (kae.su): to turn over, turn upside down, overturn; (after the -ます stem of a verb) to repeat..., do...back. 反らす or そ.らす (so.rasu): to bend, warp, curve. 反る or そ.る (so.ru): to warp, be warped, curve, be curved, be arched, bend, be bent; to bend backward (body or body part, e.g. fingers). As はん (han): (pref) anti-. As たん (tan): a measure of fabric for kimonos, haori, and other clothes. 反物 or たんもの (tanmono): fabric, cloth, textiles, drapery, dry-goods, piece goods; measure of kimono material. 反映 or はんえい (hanei): reflection (light, image, situation, attitude, etc.), reflecting; influence, application (e.g. of an update). 

National Chocolate Cake Day!

Mood:

I love chocolate with pretty much anything!There's such a variety of chocolate cakes out there. Makes it interesting that they made it vague like that. Probably my all-time fave cake in general would be Black Forest. I love it so much!Had it a few times as a birthday cake. What's better than putting one of my fave fruits, cherries, together with whipped cream, and chocolate? It's like the perfect dessert to me. 

Finished watching Tokyo Bandwagon. It was a really good series. Overall, it had a very positive feel/message. I wish it had continued though...They kind of rushed things in the last 10 minutes. Ganato, Ao's father, decided to try and live longer. Don't know if he started treatment or not, but he left for a while again. (Beforehand, he had agreed to getting treatment when Ao tried to convince him. There were many people that tried to convince him, and he may have just caved with Ao.) Ao and Suzumi had a baby. It went from her finding out (about a couple of months of being pregnant already), to having the baby be a few months old in a really short amount of time. Ao's brother Kon and his wife Ami also had a baby at the same time. So, it was a 'double pregnancy'. They looked really miserable in the snippets they showed of them being pregnant. Ao and Kon kept thinking something was wrong with them every few minutes. They found the book that Ao's grandmother was desperately searching for. She was searching for it even while she was dying. It was very important to the family. It was her father's diary. Apparently it had been stolen. Aiko, Ao's sister, went on an exhibition with her paintings in London. Mudoch suggested it, and Fujishima tagged along. Murdoch had wanted to go alone with her. They are still fighting over her. But, they're civil about it. She didn't know they felt that way until the last couple of episodes. I think she felt as a single mother, no one would want to be with her. (She might have actually said that during the first couple of episodes.) So, things ended up really nice for everyone.

I also finished Kasuka na Kanojo or She's Faint. I liked it a lot. Not one of my absolute faves, but it was good. The ending was kind of mixed for me. They made this huge deal about Akane leaving and going to heaven. Then during the last few minutes she said she was too distracted by life/earthly things, she couldn't leave. She first went to a castle, and realized she hadn't seen as much as she wanted to of the world. Good to have her back, but not so great having us go through all that while thinking she's leaving. Kamiyama had actually died for a brief amount of time. While he was a ghost he appeared in his apartment with Akane. Since he was a ghost as well, he was able to touch her and interact with her more. He had previously confessed that he loved her. He said he wanted to stay a ghost so he could be with her. She wanted him to live a good long and happy life. After some talking to, he came back to life. He managed to change the way students and teachers look at each other at his school. When he started, there was a great deal of distrust on both sides. In fact, he had felt that if he didn't help solve a student's personal life/crisis or care about their well being, he could avoid conflict with them and just teach. It came off as cold. He cared about one student during his second year of teaching, tried to help her but made things worse, and she attempted to commit suicide. He didn't want to feel that pain again. But, ever since he met Akane, all that changed. He thought more about his actions when he wanted to help a student. He basically grew along with his students. 

Dad and I met with a Modern Orthodox Jewish family. The only experience I had with Orthodox Jews was with my aunt's family. They're (at least she is, might be slightly more lax now) Ultra-Orthodox. It's like super super strict. About as strict as you can get. Modern is apparently quite different. They don't try to monitor what you say, even to their children. They're more open to things, and really not as extreme. It was very interesting to me. I almost feel like I 'connect' with it. At least, from what I've read and how they interacted. There's apparently a new term floating around online called Reformadox. It sounds very similar to this. I feel like I need a stronger connection of some sort to my Judaism, but not sure if I'd go Orthodox. I like being Reform, since you can decide how strict you want to be about things. A lot of people say you can pick and choose. The weird thing is it doesn't sound like many want to 'observe' as much or know as much as I do. So, I don't know. I'm betwixt in between right now, I guess.

Anyways, we chatted, enjoyed a really nice Shabbat lunch, went for a walk around their neighborhood (met some of their neighbors, they were very nice), went to a lecture on gematria (a Jewish system that assigns numbers to the Hebrew alphabet. The numbers in a word or phrase add up to a certain number that may hold some symbolism or show a connection to other words or phrases. I read that the word chai (life), its 2 letters added together is 18. So, some people feel that 18 is a lucky number because of that. Others can be about the number of days in the year in a word. It's fascinating stuff. Not sure if I believe much of the superstitious side. 13 by the way, is also a lucky number for us.) and how some words in English seem to have connections to Hebrew ones, did Havdallah (ending mini-service for Shabbat) at their place, and left pretty late. Didn't know we'd be there for so long.Their kids were pretty rambunctious, but nice. They had 3. Earlier they had a friend join them for lunch, so that was nice for them, too. 

We also had a chance to peek into 2 Orthodox synagogues. (I think it was my first time in one.) They were basically across the street from each other. One was an Ashkenazic one. Ashkenazic Jews come from German and eastern European ancestry. (I'm an Ashkenazic Jew.) The other was Sephardic. Sephardic Jews come from Spanish/Mediterranean ancestry. (Some are from northern Africa, and a lot of South American Jews identify as Sephardic.) Despite Sephardic Jews covering a larger area, the Ashkenazic Jews outnumber them in population. There are also several other cultural divisions between Jews, but these are the main ones. The Ashkenazic Jews came up with Yiddish (a mixture of German and Hebrew), and the Sephardic ones came up with Ladino (a mixture of Spanish and Hebrew). They all have different dietary laws when it comes to holidays like Passover. They also have different customs/traditions. Even when speaking Hebrew, they have slight differences. Like a 't' sound becomes an 's' sound, or vice a versa. It's all very interesting. Anyways, it was interesting to see that they were divided that way. The family we were with for the day likes to go to both. Both of the synagogues are huge! 

In Jikou Keisatsu it was about an identical twin being murdered. The twins were adopted together, and acted in a drama once they were old enough. Eventually, they found out they had 3 other identical sisters. So, they were actually quintuplets. One of the original 2 had wanted to have the others live with them. The other one didn't agree to it, and blew the money that they were saving up for them on gambling. The one that wanted to live with all of them killed the other as soon as she found out. She used her sisters to her advantage by acting like she had many alibis. The police were too confused with the case. They even questioned if the one that was killed was actually dead, since the body disappeared. The surviving main sister got into acting in horror movies/shows, even though she was terrified of stuff like that. Directors hired her for these roles since they figured she was 'cursed' because of her sister. The other sisters would have fun acting like their deceased sister's ghost and posing for photos and such. They loved to make people guess who was who. The weird thing is only one of them wears glasses, so that one's easier to guess, unless she takes them off...It was funny, but probably not as funny as last week's.

In Log Horizon, they're still strategizing about what to do with the goblin king and its minions wreaking havoc. The princess of the People of the Land got enough nerve to step in and give her piece. It was the most useful. The reps for the adventurers and the People of the Land's lords were at odds with each other. It's interesting that an NPC/the princess has stepped in and actually wants to personally persuade adventurers to volunteer to join an army to fight the enemy. The preview shows her going to Akihabara, one of the main adventurer towns. It's the town Shiroe revitalized after the 'Apocalypse'. She seemed very surprised by it all.

Started watching Ranma 1/2 on Friday. I remember hearing about it for a very long time, but I never actually watched it before. I had seen amv's (anime music videos) of it, but that was it. It's created by the same person who did Inuyasha. I used to be really into watching that show, then it got very old. Ranma is drawn in a similar way. Or, I should say Inuyasha is, because this is older. I think in most of the creator's works the characters all have similar designs. She's one of the most successful female mangakas. Popular not only in Japan, but worldwide. All of her works have been translated in many languages. Ranma's manga started in 1987 and ended in 1996. The anime started in 1989, but after 18 episodes, they canceled it due to low ratings. One month later, the series was relaunched and went until 1992. The relaunch ended up being 143 more episodes. It's a monster of a series.There's also a few movies to the series. One of them was a 2011 live-action one. That would be interesting. I'll just see how this one goes. Ranma and his father Genma are martial artists who traveled to the 'cursed training ground' of Jusenkyo in China. While there, despite the warning of a Chinese guard, they fall into the cursed springs. Genma falls into one that a panda had drowned in. Ranma fell into one where a Chinese girl drowned. So, every time Ranma is doused in cold water, he turns into a girl. Every time Genma is doused in cold water, he turns into a panda. If Ranma's in contact with hot water he changes back to being a guy, and Genma turns back to being human. Genma engages Ranma to Tendo Akane. She says she absolutely hates boys. Ranma wants to find a way to undo his curse. 

Wrote more of the 5th short story for my nightmare anthology. I might be done with this one. I have to edit it again and fix one thing that I know of. So, other than the editing, I'm done with this one. Next, is the 6th! Yay!

Played my clarinet. Did a lot of Irish tunes. Sounded better than last time. 

日本語

Studied more compounds for 発. 発展 or はってん (hatten): development, growth, advancement, unfurling; expansion, extension, enlargement. 発熱 or はつねつ (hatsunetsu): generation of heat, (attack of) fever. 発破 or はっぱ (happa): explosive blast (in construction, mining, etc.), blasting. 発表 or はっぴょう (happyou): announcement, publication. 発憤 or はっぷん (happun): inspired, stimulated, roused. 発明 or はつめい (hatsumei): invention. 発令 or はつれい (hatsurei): official announcement, proclamation. 発露 or はつろ (hatsuro): appearance, expression, manifestation. 発作 or ほっさ (hossa): (med) fit, spasm, attack, seizure. Translated more of a You Maga article. Next time, I'll put the paragraph all together, and make it so it makes sense in English. Read a few articles in Japanese on Asahi's site.  

Droplets

Mood:

By MEG. Another great one from her.It's about how everyone else runs inside when it's about to rain/snow, but the person who's singing runs outside when it starts. It has a calming effect on them. Almost seems like their dancing in the rain, only slowly. I like that kind of stuff. Rain calms me down too. The vid's a bit trippy, but most of hers are. 

Even though I went to bed at a decent time, and got up at a decent time; I still felt horrible today.I have this weird gut thing going on. I don't really know why. It kind of has made me not feel like doing much today. (Although, time seems to be going really slowly lately.) I still have a nasty bruise around my lower left leg from a horrible fall. So, I should probably take it easy, and treat myself better, I guess. 

I've at least been doing my sit-ups for yesterday and today. Up to 75 of them twice a day this week.I'm still figuring out ways of eating less, yet finishing things quickly enough so they don't go bad. It's kind of a balancing act. I've just realized since I turned all my meals into the same amount of calories, I can try and continue with leftovers during my 'snacks'. I need to think differently about meals now. (It's taking me a while to iron everything out.) This way I get through things at a decent rate, and yet don't go over the calories I've set for the day.

Oh, and this weekend I found out that I really did drop a size.It's kind of my guide to see how I'm doing. If just going by number, I went down 8. (From my heaviest size.) But, with the way they size things, 4 sizes. That's a lot.I didn't think I'd get down to this, at least not as quickly. I thought I imagined that my pants were becoming really baggy again. My shirts are a bit loser on me lately too. I think I'm slightly lighter than I was towards the end of high school. (At the end of high school, I was a size bigger than I am now.) I don't really feel like it yet. But, it kind of feels surreal. The only problem I'm having is my gut is going down much slower.So, I look kind of funny. I know the sit-ups are helping a lot, and it really just takes time. (And, at least it's getting better already.) Another weird thing is I have a lot of lose skin. It's starting to bounce back, but it may take a little while for it to completely do so.

Went through a good chunk of tupperware we have in the kitchen on Monday. I was amazed by how much we had in such a small area. My mom was very into keeping every piece of tupperware she got. (Plus cleaned out containers that were originally for things like whipped cream, almond roca, etc.) She also kept them for decades. I don't think we ever used some of them while I've been alive. It was just taking up a bunch of space.Plus, some of the ones we were still using didn't look very healthy anymore. I was a little weary of using them at times. But, we got some new ones to replace those. They've been great. Might want a couple more of the larger-sized ones, since I got rid of the older large-sized ones. But, those cupboards look very bare now. I know there's at least one more area in the kitchen that has a ton of tupperware, but it's a bit harder to reach for me. Some are on the top of the refrigerator, and some are in the cupboards above that. I'm not that tall.Not very many people are. So, that might take me a bit longer to go through. 

Tried to watch a new drama today. Looked into Gal Cir and Minami-kun no Koibito. Both pretty old (especially the 2nd one), but I've been curious about them for a while. Didn't like either of them. Maybe watched like 10 minutes of both. They seemed like they'd be good, but turned out not so much.I might try Switch Girl next time. If that doesn't work, I'll try to finish dramas I couldn't finish before. The site I'm using now has most of those dramas completed with all the episodes. I might have forgotten about what some of those shows were like, so it'd be interesting to get back into them like that. A lot of the ones I couldn't complete didn't have the last episode up. Some I only could watch halfway through. I really liked most of them, though. I don't think I'm interested in the new season's stuff. Sadly.

Tokyo Ravens was interesting. Harutora's realizing that Hokuto may have actually been Natsume. I'm surprised it's taken him so long to even suspect it. They both were about to talk about it, but the academy was about to be attacked. So, they didn't get to it. Kon knows it's really bugging Harutora, but he won't open up to her even if she's his familiar. I hope they resolve it soon, and then get back to the action. None of this back and forth...

Caught up with recent updates of Anagle Mole. They rescued Chiwa, but now every majin is after them. The person who's supposedly next in line to becoming king told everyone that if they kill them, they'll get the equivalent of a billion dollars. He even set free a majin that had been locked up, who everyone calls a monster. Anyone he sees is viewed as an enemy, and he's extremely powerful. I wonder if the king will actually make more of an appearance soon. (He actually looks younger than the guy who claimed that he's next in line...) They've cut to him a few times, but it's usually in his room, he's very temperamental, and kills people if they get something wrong. Like the bathwater isn't warm enough, the grapes aren't peeled, etc. He's ruthless. I'm more interested in him, oddly. He probably will show up after the 'monster' is defeated. Next time, I might start a new manga, or go back to one of the ones I put aside. Some of those I thought people stopped updating. But, another group picked it up, and there are already a lot more chapters up. (If not the rest of the series at least more, or it might be still ongoing, etc.) It was like that with Toraneko Folklore. I guess I'll see. Lots of options. 

Wrote more of the 5th short story for my nightmare anthology. It's definitely creepy, but somehow intriguing. I'm usually into watching/reading stuff in the horror genre, but when it's based on a recurring nightmare it feels a bit different.

Played my clarinet. Did a jazz tune and lots of Irish tunes. Haven't done the Irish ones in a while. Wasn't too bad. 

日本語

Studied some more compounds for 発. 発音 or はつおん (hatsuon): pronunciation. 発覚 or はっかく (hakkaku): detection, coming to light. 発揮 or はっき (hakki): exhibition, demonstration, show, display, manifestation. 発狂 or はっきょう (hakkyou): madness, craziness, insanity. 発見 or はっけん (hakken): discovery, detection, finding. 発言 or はつげん (hatsugen): utterance, speech, proposal. 発光 or はっこう (hakkou): luminescence, radiation. 発行 or はっこう (hakkou): issue (publications), publishing. 発効 or はっこう (hakkou): coming into effect. 発酵 or はっこう (hakkou): fermentation. 発達 or はったつ (hattatsu): development, growth. 

National Cheese Lover's Day!

Mood:

I love cheese!To have a day devoted to it is awesome! This was actually yesterday, but I like it so much why not celebrate it for an extra day? There are certain types I can't stand. Things like cottage cheese, brie, and some of the really smelly cheeses. Some I can only have if it's mixed in something. But, I love the majority of them. I've gotten hooked on a new cheese I tried recently called boursin. It's really good. I tried the garlic and herb one. Apparently, it's one of the most popular cheeses in France. I can see why.Yesterday was also Martin Luther King Jr. Day. He was a great and inspiring civil rights leader.

Got up early today. Earlier than I was expecting.Even though I went to bed late, I couldn't sleep. Might have had maybe 4 or 5 hours of sleep. I was wide awake at one point, and couldn't fall back asleep. So weird. 

On Sunday, I suddenly felt a weird itch around my ankle. I didn't think much of it, and scratched. Then, I felt unusually cool and like some sort of fluid was coming from that area. For a moment I thought that maybe I popped a pimple or something. Then, I looked down at it. Blood was streaming down it.I kind of freak out whenever I see my own blood. I eventually get a weird dizzy, sweaty, nauseous, faint thing going on. I've fainted before from getting my blood drawn.Apparently, I had scratched a weird leaf pattern, or maybe it was a bite. Can't really tell. I quickly found the largest band-aid I could find, and used it. It wasn't enough, and had to use another slightly smaller one to cover the rest of it. I still don't know what that was about. It's not everyday people bleed like that. My nails were cut pretty short, and I don't think anything bit me...Rosie (one of our cats) likes to bite me, but I don't think she did it around that time. Plus, it usually doesn't draw blood. They're more like love bites.

Finished watching Kyoukai no Kanata or Beyond the Boundary. It had a very trippy ending. It was good though. Even though I liked how it turned out, the last minute didn't seem very logical. More like a way to make the fans happy. She was supposed to 'disappear' or die, but suddenly appeared at the very end. They didn't explain that. Some people are coming up with their own interpretation, and I guess it leaves it open for people. Just a little unsettling, yet a feel good ending. Very mixed. It seems that they could make another season, but I'm not sure. It'd be nice, and they might explain more. What if she's not really herself or he was dreaming? That's even more unsettling.

Started the 2nd season of Tsubasa Chronicle. Sakura finally decided to do something for the group in order to get another one of her feathers back. She entered a race where the winner gets the feather. According to this parallel universe, it grants immense power. They said enough to power an entire city. All of the participants are people they met through their travels to different universes. They still think that they look the same, but aren't the same people they knew. Apparently, that theory is going to change soon. According to the people that keep watching them. Still don't know who they are. They have plans to stop the group from finding all the feathers, though. 

Jikou Keisatsu was hilarious!Funnier than usual. I liked the restaurant they visited. It's called something like 'Fast Restaurant'. Everything is ready super quickly. For some, even before a customer has walked in. The owner knows exactly when someone will have an accident (like they spill something, burn their mouth, etc.) and gives them things ahead of time. She also closes early, but reopens the restaurant for the next day, an hour later. That was probably the best part of the episode. The hypnotist stuff was funny too. Shizuka wanted to find a way to fall asleep and she read about a hypnotist. She had a session with her, and found out that it was her old best friend from high school. The assistant to the hypnotist had a much stronger hypnosis and told Shizuka that she's an accomplished singer. So, in her head she was making it big, but to everyone else she looked like a fool. Turned out her friend was the murderer. But she did it as a minor, and like all the usual cases, it had reached the statute of limitations long ago. Kiriyama was a better hypnotist than her. She thought she could hypnotize him, but she was already under his. While they were hypnotizing each other, there were some really trippy backgrounds. They were sitting around a dinner table, and one background was a beach, another a surreal-horror theme, I think another one they were in the sky, etc. Made it even more funny.

Log Horizon has gotten even more interesting. The goblin king is planning to destroy everything/everyone in his way. Usually when it was just a game, there was an event where everyone had to kill him within a week. If they didn't, the goblins would multiply exponentially, he'd start moving from his castle and attack people, and the 'fish' goblins will multiply as well at the coasts. So, everyone would end up being surrounded. If they killed him during that week, the adventurers would be rewarded with very rare items. They were too worried about making their own lives better, they didn't know that the week was up for killing the goblin king. His minions aren't usually hard to kill, but the problem is the sheer number of them. Shiroe shared his info that he gathered on what happens to adventurers when they die. Crusty said it makes sense, because he's died enough times to realize that he's lost some memories of the outside world already. Since he forgot those memories, he's not sure how many and what they were specifically. He does know that he had a cat in the outside world, but can't remember its name or what it looks like. Sad. The 'kids' group from the camp (we don't know how old they really are, they're just low-leveled adventurers. The camp was to help them level up.) is off to battle the goblins that are heading to a defenseless town. They still haven't really explained Rudy yet. He might be apart of a group of People of the Land that are warriors (they rival the strongest adventurers). 

Toshi Desetsu no Onna was kind of sad. It was about a teacher who was in charge of the female dance group at the school, some were already apart of national idol groups. She had fallen in love with one of the stars of the group. They would meet during breaks in the girl's bathroom. Eventually the girl, Miki, tried to break it off, but the teacher first thought if she can't have her she would kill herself with a pair of scissors. Miki tried to stop her and the scissors went into her, killing her instantly. Another member of the group, who everyone thought hated Miki because they were 'bitter' rivals, was targeted by the teacher. The teacher thought she had influenced Miki's decision to break up. She wasn't successful with killing her though, and she survived. Miki's rival really loved her, and never hated her. The reason why the UIU were investigating it was because of an urban legend of a ghost that inhabits the 3rd stall of the 3rd floor's girl's bathroom. They say if you knock 3 times on the door, say "Hanako-chan, let's play", she'll come out and kill you or something. They didn't really know what happens when she answers it. Apparently, they basically proved that it was true. But, the ghost wasn't evil, and honestly wanted them to get to the bottom of the case. She even appeared as a regular student to them telling them about the teacher's secret meetings, rumors, and what they would do. Even Tsukiko was terrified of it by the end. But, why be scared of such a helpful ghost? She seemed nice, too. 

In Rurouni Kenshin, they explained more of Megumi's past and what her connection to an opium ring is. She, like her father, was once a regular doctor. The head of the ring had told her father to make opium for them. After a while, he stopped and refused to make anymore. He killed him, and made Megumi do it. She was told to make a new type of opium that's even more addictive and deadly. She refused to make it and ran away. Then, she found Kenshin and the rest of his group. The character's a bit over dramatic. Everything with her seems over the top. I feel sorry for her, but it makes it hard to take her seriously. She wants to go back to being a doctor. The opium ring finds her, captures her, and takes her to a guarded mansion. Kenshin and the others are going to bust in and save her. 

For Pandora Hearts, I still have a ways to go until I catch up to where the anime left off, but I'm getting there. I've always liked Break, but he seems even creepier in manga-form. He called Oz a creepy brat. Coming from him, it's a little odd. But, Oz is a bit weird anyways. At times he can seem creepy and not really himself. He's the key to knowing more about the Abyss, and possibly opening and closing it. So, everyone wants him. His clock 'seal' (looks like a tattoo) started to move. If it makes a full rotation, he'll be sent to the lowest level of the Abyss. Nobody knows if people can survive there, much less make it out. You're basically doomed. I don't think it made a full rotation in the anime. Maybe I'll find out what happens if it does. 

Wrote a bit of the 5th short story of my nightmare anthology. There's definitely more to this one than there was in the nightmare it's based on. I'm starting to like it, though.