there it is, plain as daylight.

It’s a dim, cloudy kind of morning over here in western Massachusetts, and I can’t seem to shake the grogginess I woke up with today. It’s a perfect day for cozy blankets, grilled cheese sandwiches, tomato soup, and manga.

Here are a few brief thoughts on new chapters of xxxHolic, NANA, Bakuman, and Bleach.

SPOILERS after the jump! Continue Reading »

I don’t ever seem to have time enough for anything lately, so just a few brief items today.

I’m having a lot of frustration while trying to write these days, and I expect it’s a bit of anxiety over the self-imposed deadline I have coming up which I don’t think I’m going to make. For the most part, I’ve made peace with the fact that I’m not always going to make the deadlines I set for myself, and that it is still good to set them, because I’ll still get further along than if I did not, but I think in this case I may have paralyzed myself a little bit with the urgency of it, and how much important I’ve placed on it. I guess we’ll see.

In any case, time to move on to my topics of the day, Bleach, Bakuman, and Princess Tutu!

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Well, a friend warned about the sexism in chapter 2 of Bakuman, but I didn’t realize how strong it was until I saw it for myself today. I’ll keep reading the series, and I’ll buy the books when they come out, because I’m a Takeshi Obata fangirl and there’s nothing to be done about it. But, wow.

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I had a busy weekend, spending some with an old family friend and her teenaged daughter (a toddler the last I’d seen her!) who arrived in town Friday, and then attending last night’s installment of “Hooked on Who” at the Brattle theater in Cambridge (quite a hike from here, but so much fun). We watched Douglas Adams’ Pirate Planet arc along with a theater full of like-minded fans, well worth the drive. Before the event began, there was a rousing introduction that included a rundown of some of the theater’s upcoming events (including a screening of “The Girl Who Leapt Through Time” which is such a lovely film). The whole thing made us wish that our local independent theaters (in Northampton and Amherst) would host these kinds of things.

In manga news, the first chapter of the new manga, Bakuman, by Death Note’s Tsugumi Ohba and Takeshi Obata is out, and it’s definitely got me interested. Continue Reading »