I know, I know… back in my anniversary/State of the Blog post I said that Worth Reading was temporarily suspended. But the blogging community insists on publishing Really Cool Stuff, and I just can’t resist sharing. So, I’m starting to collect links again but rather than publishing on a fixed schedule (which was a PITA anyhow) I’ll publish whenever I have “enough”. Enough time to edit and write, enough material to make it worth your while to read.
All that being said, let’s take a look at what’s Worth Reading:
- Recently I came across Jakitauji (Yes Kitauji?) by Jakiba, and a pair of interesting entries:
- Set as Completed: Princess Principal – a fun little review of one my favorites series from 2017.
- Why Anime? – a very personal discourse on why she watches and blogs about anime.
- John Samuel of Pirates of the Burley Griffin took a major vacation trip last year, and visited a number of interesting place… including tank museums. He’s taken his photographs of tanks and produced a series: Meet the Cast: The Tanks of Girls und Panzer. Check them out: Ōarai, St. Gloriana & Saunders, Pravda, and Kuromorimine.
- Stop Calling Everything a Madoka Rip-off! – a strong compare-and-contrast of Madoka Magica and YuYuYu by Zeria of Floating into Bliss. I happen to agree with her, while the two have surface similarities because they’re in the same genre… The similarities end there.
- At littleanimeblog, Dominic posted a fascinating look at drug use in Japanese society and its portrayal in anime: The High Life: drug use in anime.
Living as I do in an area with a large number (and a long history, not all of it happy) of pan-Asian immigrants and first and second generation residents… I take it for granted that Asian ingredients are easily available. Within two miles (give or take) of my apartment there’s five pan-Asian grocers, one of which is a full size grocery store with Asian, Hispanic, and Western (American) departments. (I’m a geek, I actually opened Google Earth, drew a circle, and counted.) There’s easily another half dozen or so in the central and northern portion of the county. (I’m not so familiar with the south end.)
- So I found this account on NPR of how a Toyota factory in Lexington, KY spurred local demand for Japanese grocery products pretty interesting… Especially since the demand isn’t just from immigrants and temporary residents.
=========
Yes, yes, I should be working on today’s post today… But this happened yesterday, and for whatever reason my mind still refuses to focus this morning. So I thought I’d use my morning blogging time somewhat productively and edit and publish this post.
So, it’s official, today’s normally scheduled weekly post will be delayed until tomorrow.
Now off to housework and errands, will get back to writing and editing this afternoon. One of the errands is to the grocery store mentioned above as they carry some better-than-average instant ramen, and we’re getting low. Time to stock up again.
Thanks for reading! Drop a line in the comments and let me know what you think!
Apprentice Mages Lounge. 
Thanks for enjoying the “Meet the Cast” posts!
LikeLiked by 1 person
Certainly! Thanks for stopping by, hope to see you back soon!
LikeLike
Yes, Kitauji! (it’s in fact a pun, combining my name Jaki and Kitauji)
Glad to hear that you enjoyed reading my posts, thanks for your lovely words ^^
LikeLiked by 1 person
You’re welcome, thanks for stopping by! Hope to see you around more in the future!
LikeLike
Some very interesting posts to read.
Yeah, after Madoka pretty much every “dark” magical girl show was a rip-off. The first time I remember getting fed-up with that and saying somewhat more firmly than I meant to that it’s not a rip-off was in 2013 with a now pretty much forgotten show, Genei wo Kakeru Taiyou (as a side-note, the show reminded me much more of Mai Hime, and not that much either). If anything about Madoka was unique, it’s that you got a story line where the titular character is the last to become an (on-screen) magical girl. Magical girl shows, dark or not, often follow a fools-rush-in formula.
Why anime? Interesting read. For me, that’s not really a question, since I’ve been watching anime since I was four years old. I’ve been watching “Japanese Cartoons” (“Japanische Zeichentrickfilme” in German) for nearly two decades befor the term “anime” even became a thing. It’s just that I never quit. I do sort of get the “anime gets me” feeling, too, but once you reach a certain saturation point it’s just a thing you like very much. If I had to say what anime is particular good at, it’s the nothing-much-happens slice-of-life shows. Occasionally, you get film makers who can do that, too (say, Jim Jarmush), but anime can rely on genre conventions: it works for me, even if it’s not particularly good.
I also liked the Toyota/Food article a lot. Very interesting read.
LikeLiked by 1 person
I’m trying to use “clone” or some such rather than “rip-off”… That implies a certain intent. There are shows that ride the genre wave, but that doesn’t make them a rip-off.
I found the Toyota/food article interesting because Kentucky isn’t exactly known for being cosmopolitan, even in this day of mallification.
LikeLike
Good picks. I’d already commented on the Garupan posts previously, but I left a comment for Zeria as well, and the drug use article was an interesting topic I’d never thought about before.
I lived in Lexington for two years (went to UK for grad school), and I never knew about that association with Japan. That’s very cool. I didn’t even know there was a Toyota plant in the area, actually (though ironically Toyota used to have a plant just a few miles down the road from where I grew up in California – Tesla owns it now). The largest corporate employers in Lexington and the ones I always heard the most about were Xerox and Lexmark, with the latter being headquartered there.
LikeLiked by 1 person
I lived in Lexington for a few months as a kid, but I don’t remember much because I was all of nine.
LikeLike