oh well, I guess that's just the way that it is
hi, hello
One of my great loves is weather. I love wind, rain, snow, and, greatest of these: thunderstorms. We haven’t had any snow to speak of so far this winter, but the last few days have been delightfully windy, strong enough to knock a couple branches out of the oaks in my yard, and loud enough to have my dog growling suspiciously at the sky. Nothing puts me in a good mood like weather.
Another mood-maker for me is Shin Miyauchi’s instagram, which is full of photos of his lovely, plant-filled home, in which he lives with his family, cats, and beautiful dog, Azuki.
I’m mostly in it for the plants and Azuki, honestly.
They always make me smile.
Notable Breakfast
Dog Thing
Mixed Media
Fullmetal Alchemist has been a part of my life for a long, long time. It was a manga first, by Hiromu Arakawa, and while the manga was ongoing, they started an anime. Eventually the anime got ahead of the manga, which is a pretty common thing (animation doesn’t take as long as creating a manga), and the series went off the rails a bit, and in the end was fairly different from its source material. But both were so popular that after the manga ended, they made an entirely new anime series, Fullmetal Alchemist Brotherhood, which was a closer adaptation. I decided last week that I wanted to rewatch it, and next thing I knew I was spending every non-working waking hour barreling through all 64 episodes of the series. I watched them all in 6 days.
FMA is the story of two brothers who attempt to use alchemy to bring their dead mother back to life. In the world in which it’s set, alchemy operates on the principle of equivalent exchange–you can’t create something out of nothing. Ed and Al succeed in bringing something back to life, but in the process Ed loses a leg and an arm, and Al loses his entire body. Ed’s limbs are replaced by machinery, Al’s soul is bonded to a suit of armor, and like that they set off to attempt to find a way to retrieve what they’ve lost.
It gets much bigger than that, of course.
What I love about FMA is that it brilliantly balances humor and sweetness with war and grief and loss. The majority of the secondary characters are veterans of a war which was plainly about the extermination of a group of people, which is horrible, and the show knows that it’s horrible, and doesn’t shy away from that or let them off the hook for it.
Also, it is chock-full of a wide variety of AMAZING LADIES.
Who each have their own priorities and motivations but who are, without exception, the most hardcore characters onscreen.
It’s also some of the smoothest, most beautiful animation I’ve seen in an anime series. Highly recommended! Just…maybe not in under a week. FMA Brotherhood is available (in both English and Japanese) on Hulu and Crunchyroll.
Continuing in my rewatch of good things, I’ve started Cowboy Bebop. It is still, I can assure you, very good.
I read Girl Waits with Gun by Amy Stewart all the way to the end before I realized it was about a woman who had actually lived, and was one of the first female sheriff’s deputy in the US. I enjoyed it! I read Star Wars: A New Dawn by John Jackson Miller which yes is a Star Wars Rebels tie-in novel. I had some problems with the writing, but once it got rolling I enjoyed it a lot!
I revisited First Aid Kit’s album Stay Gold, which I still love a whole, whole lot. I also sort of forgot (somehow??) how great Yoko Kanno’s music for Cowboy Bebop was, so I’ve been listening to a lot of that, too.
I fished a blu-ray of Speed out of a bargain bucket in a Wal-Mart in North Carolina, and cannot regret it: Speed holds up. Also, watching it prepared us for John Wick Chapter 2, which was a ton of fun but needed more women. My cinema’s anime throwback movie this month was Ghost in the Shell, which I’d never seen. I wouldn’t call it a great movie, but it was really interesting and at times visually stunning. And I finally saw The Wind Rises, Miyazaki’s final film (maybe). I loved it.
Anxiety Pyjamas
Fics I Shouted About
hood & glove by Fahye & Hawberries Yuri!!! On Ice, Yuri/Otabek, Fairy Tale AU. Otabek is a knight, Yuri is a fairy. Yuri wants to steal Otabek’s strength in order to challenge his king, but Otabek won’t be outsmarted. I LOVE THIS. I’ve reached a level of love of Fahye’s writing that I think I would probably follow her into battle if she asked. I have probably read this 20 times. Hawberries’ art is now my phone and tablet backgrounds. It good.
Trouble Coming (In the Dead of Knight) by Mytay Voltron, Keith/Lance, Western AU. Space Westerns are pretty much my jam, so no surprise that this fic (and its sequels) about Keith and Lance stranded on a planet that operates like the old west is right up my alley.
begin to be half what you think of me by kevystel Yuri!!! On Ice, Yuuri/Victor, future fic. Kevystel’s fics about Victor and Yuuri in Russia are some of my favourites, and this one might be the best of the bunch. I love how she deals with Yuuri’s anxiety and the way both Yuuri and Victor relate to it. This also features one of the best drunk sequences I’ve ever read in a fic.
A Series of Optical Illusions by Fahye Miss Fisher’s Murder Mysteries, Phryne/Jack, future fic. This fic follows Phryne to London, where Jack finds her in the middle of a party designed to catch a murderer. It completely captures their banter, as well as their complicated feelings about one another.
Repeat After Me by queenieofaces Yuri!!! On Ice, Victor/Yuuri. This fic takes us through the events of the series from Victor’s point of view, and frames them with how Victor relates to language as he learns to speak Japanese. There’s a sequel that I loved, as well.
Lastly
in closing:
bye!
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