TToF: The Return

(Oooh, sounds creepy for a post made on Friday the 13th, huh?)

Hey, everyone! Sorry I missed posting the last couple of Fridays...I've been a little busy, so I had to put it on hold. But I promise to try to keep up on it again. ;D Soooo, without further adieu!

Whoo!

So April 2nd was my birthday! And for my birthday, I decided to go thrifting in the morning, to see if my birthday got me any extra luck. My boyfriend and I went to 2 different places, and I actually ended up finding some pretty awesome stuff!

From L-R:
--2 old t-shirts to make into more t-shirt bags: top one is The Beatles, the bottom is a "Marvel Girls Rule!" ladies tee with Storm, Phoenix, and The Invisible Woman
--a G3 Cheerilee MLP
--a vintage '84 Care Bear Cousin plus of Gentle Heart Lamb! I was stupidly excited about this because since I started looking for Care Bears while thrifting, 99% of the ones I find are either the 90s or early 00s. So finding this was pretty cool!
--an old copy of "Grimm's Complete Fairy Tales". I honestly have no idea how old this book is because there's surprisingly no date inside (unless I completely overlooked it), but it looked old and the cover was neat, so I snapped it up
--an old 90s promo CD of "Songs from Disney's Fantasia & Other Disney Classics"
--a cute plastic cereal bowl with a strawberry printed on the bottom
--and the most surprising find: the limited edition version of the Complete .Hack//Sign DVD box set...including the pin set! Although one of the pins is apparently missing, but everything else was there! Zack & I were shocked...there was no price, so when we brought it up to the counter, we asked and the woman shrugged & said, "it's DVDs, right? All DVDs are $2.99."
I only ever saw like 3 episodes of this series, but for 3 bucks? Hell yeah, I'll try it out. XD We figured it would be worth more than that, since it's out of print, so I was amused to see that most people want to sell it for between $50-180. Crazy, right?

Not pictured: a couple more books I picked up (nothing as nice as the fairy tale book, lol) and a glass oil/wax warmer (I've been meaning to buy a new one, since I got rid of my old one when I moved--I would've taken a pic of it with the other things, but I already started to use it.)

All for less than $10! I was pretty excited about that. I guess birthdays do give you a little extra good luck, huh? ;D

Til next time!
♥Usamimi

Geeks & High Fashion

Can we talk about how awesome "Princess Jellyfish" is for a moment?

I don't watch NEARLY as much anime as I used to when I was growing up (there's an understatement, lol)--but when a friend introduced me to "Kuragehime" (aka "Princess Jellyfish"), I gave it a shot. And boy, am I glad I did!

Meet Tsukimi. She loves to draw...and specifically, she likes to draw jellyfish. Make that LOVES to. Why? Because she is a jellyfish otaku (fanatic). If you think that's weird, she lives in a house with roommates that have similar crazy obsessions: one is in love with anything that has to do with "Records of Three Kingdoms" (and turns EVERYthing into a reference to Ancient China and/or war strategy), one is fanatical about any and all trains, one wears nothing but traditional Japanese kimono & has a small army of dolls in her room, and another is an anti-social shut-in who does nothing but draw manga night and day.

And what do they all have in common? 1. They're all scared of "trendy", beautiful people (since they are all far from being social and fashionable), 2. They're all NEETS (not in education, employment, or training--aka, jobless) and 3. They're all afraid of men. In fact, they've gone so far as to call themselves "The Amars", which basically translates into "The Nuns".

All of the Amars are geeky loners, basically, and don't really like having to talk to anyone who might not understand their respective loves & hobbies. In their little group, they feel safe and secure, knowing that they all have each other and don't have to be bothered with things that might upset them; like social gatherings, talking to people, or being forced to doing things they don't like.

But Tsukimi's life (as well as the other Amars) starts changing drastically once she meets Kuranosuke Koibuchi.

Not only is Kuranosuke a fashionable social butterfly with a wardrobe some would kill for...Kuranosuke's also a DUDE.

But when Kuranosuke helps Tsukimi save a jellyfish from an ignorant pet shop worker, little does she know that soon it will lead to haute couture make-overs and designing incredibly detailed, jellyfish-inspired dressed to the very same fashionable women that Tsukimi & the rest of the Amars have spent most of their lives trying to avoid!

While the show is a romantic sit-com sort of series, it also deals with some issues that are surprisingly heavy--dealing with things like social anxiety, for example. The Amars have had their fair share of being called names or being made fun of for their strange hobbies & fanatical behavior, and the only way they can think of dealing with it is to hold onto each other for support while shutting out the rest of the world. While this starts out as a "funny annoyance" for Kuranosuke, as the series progresses, he learns that there's no quick fix to this problem, and the only thing he can really do is to try to help Tsukimi and her friends deal with their problems as best as he can....without actually revealing to the rest of the Amars that he's actually a man, because they'd probably freak the hell out.

Funimation streamed the entire series subtitled on Hulu as well as it's own Youtube Channel. It was so popular that they recently released the entire series in a DVD/Blu-ray combo pack domestically (which I will hopefully be picking up myself whenever I get the extra cash XD)...but if you want to try it out before you buy it, I definitely recommend giving one of the streaming channels a go! Only the first 2 eps seem to be available as dubbed, but the whole thing is free to watch subtitled!

The series does sort of have an open-ending, though--probably because the manga is still ongoing. There have been rumors of a second season once more of the manga is completed, though! (I'm hoping someone will pick up the manga eventually...it's so cute!) Until then, though, this series is a sweet, fun one and I'd definitely recommend it to anyone. ;D

Until next time!
♥Usamimi

A Miracle Romance!

I actually meant to post this yesterday, but I got too busy and didn't get to. But I couldn't resist posting a little something to celebrate Sailor Moon's 20TH anniversary! (Wow, something else to make me feel old, lol.)

Sailor Moon originally aired in Japan on March 7th, 1992. It didn't air on American television until about 4 years later, but it had already made it's way into some fansub distros (back in the day when fansubs were on VHS tapes). I first saw some Sailor Moon in '93 or '94 at a comic convention...I didn't know what it was, but I was drawn to the art style, and when I saw it in English on TV, I knew that it wasn't totally the same but...I was hooked. XD

I had been a fan of anime as a kid (though I didn't really know what it was at first), but Sailor Moon was one of the first series I actually got basically fanatical about. And it was the first time I was sort of into an actual "fandom" (before there was really a term for that sort of thing)--I drew lots of fanart, bought as much of the American merch as I could find (to help support the show, of course!), started actively trading VHS tapes of fansubs, and even chatting with other people online about the series & it's characters online once my family finally signed up with internet service. (Ah, dial-up and Geocities pages...seems like so long ago!)

And because of Sailor Moon, not only did I meet some amazing people through it (some friends I still know to this day!), but I honestly think that it helped me through some rough times. I know that sounds corny, but when I was young, I was painfully shy and it was very hard for me to talk to others and make friends. Sailor Moon not only helped me connect to other people, but for awhile? The Senshi where like friends I never had. And over time, I came out of my shell and DID find those friends...and I'd like to think that fandom was a small part in that.

So, yeah...some might find Sailor Moon to be outdated or corny, but who cares! I still love Sailor Moon, and if I ever have kids, you better believe they're gonna watch it eventually.

月の光は愛のメッセージ!
♥Usamimi