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-I made the best genoise I have ever made for the christmas cake, which was a strawberry shortcake after all. I made two fairly thin cakes that I cut into three layers---yes, my cake had three layers. But then I didn't have enough whipped cream to decorate the top as much as I would have liked, so I suppose I'm going to be doing this again. This time it has to be fruit that's in season. The strawberries were all bruised somewhere, some were rotten and some were weird and dry inside. I cut off the weird parts but the ones in the last piece of cake still weren't quite right after 2 days in the fridge. I wonder if roasted chestnuts would work? And candied chestnuts, of course.
-Tales of Graces has made me want karuta, though it's going to have to be the Tales version they're making soon because I'm not exactly experienced with old poetry. While researching karuta I learned about hanafuda and have been happily enjoying a koi koi flash game ever since. When you get 50 points, you get a little ending screen, and then you can play the "other side" where you can see your opponent's cards and the card that comes up next. The CPU is MEAN AND RAPEY, as in if you're not paying attention a little bit you can LOSE BY LIKE 20 POINTS. Why doesn't the computer lose when I get 20 points, huuuuuh? *keeps playing*
-I got a bunch of books from JP amazon and they are suuuuuuuuuuper. Christmas is fuuuuuuuuun. Mmmmmm, possessions.
-After the last entry I survived to the end of the event and had a merry christmas for it. I have a headgear that drops candy canes and rare buche de noel cakes, a ring that drops cookie bags, cards that drop gift boxes and blue boxes, and pretty soon the set that drops purple boxes. The cookie ring especially was a lucky break because I kind of blew a lot of money trying to get it. I don't like to think about how annoying I would have been on Christmas if I hadn't had it.
-Tales of Graces was part of my Christmas. I'm in Strata right now. It's a fine game. It has a lot of yarikomi stuff, and not all of it is the kind I care to pursue (typical Mutsumi game?). I want to say that Asbel was a stupid kid, and I disapprove of the way Hubert treats his mother when he grows up, but Cheria...is really actually a liar, is jealous of everyone who hangs out with Asbel, and blames her lack of communication on Asbel. And you know what? The party totally accepts her when she plays mommy with Sophie (you can die from not bathing for 2-3 days, also you better eat a goddamn yakitori-don even though you're not hungry and seasickness is a possibility), when she's too busy chasing tail to be polite (no need to help, Malik) or too busy being Miss Femininity to let the rest of the party do extremely important things (didn't they end up coming out of its nose? Doesn't the pepper mean that they were in its nose the whole time? Is snot okay?). I can't see any reason for her personality, except that some developer or writer wanted to show us all how beautiful lovesick teenage girls are. That's what I see when I look at Cheria, some dude insisting that young women are at their most precious and worthy of the title "Angel" when they are emotional, illogical, inconsistent, dependent, jealous, bossy, lying, and a little mean. ಠ_ಠ Why do people make jabs like this? FFS.
-If one reads Hachima frequently, one may find themselves growing tired of the fighting over which console is the winner, or how Japan has silly Galapagos technology (biased hint: get rid of region locks), or claims that fangirls are just as likely to fantasize about putting their penises in any human who looks under 14 as some especially devoted XBOX360 believers. One may start to think that if one has to read some stuff in Japanese, one might as well read a novel or a comic book. Unless it's about the next Tales game.
-Tales of Graces has made me want karuta, though it's going to have to be the Tales version they're making soon because I'm not exactly experienced with old poetry. While researching karuta I learned about hanafuda and have been happily enjoying a koi koi flash game ever since. When you get 50 points, you get a little ending screen, and then you can play the "other side" where you can see your opponent's cards and the card that comes up next. The CPU is MEAN AND RAPEY, as in if you're not paying attention a little bit you can LOSE BY LIKE 20 POINTS. Why doesn't the computer lose when I get 20 points, huuuuuh? *keeps playing*
-I got a bunch of books from JP amazon and they are suuuuuuuuuuper. Christmas is fuuuuuuuuun. Mmmmmm, possessions.
-After the last entry I survived to the end of the event and had a merry christmas for it. I have a headgear that drops candy canes and rare buche de noel cakes, a ring that drops cookie bags, cards that drop gift boxes and blue boxes, and pretty soon the set that drops purple boxes. The cookie ring especially was a lucky break because I kind of blew a lot of money trying to get it. I don't like to think about how annoying I would have been on Christmas if I hadn't had it.
-Tales of Graces was part of my Christmas. I'm in Strata right now. It's a fine game. It has a lot of yarikomi stuff, and not all of it is the kind I care to pursue (typical Mutsumi game?). I want to say that Asbel was a stupid kid, and I disapprove of the way Hubert treats his mother when he grows up, but Cheria...is really actually a liar, is jealous of everyone who hangs out with Asbel, and blames her lack of communication on Asbel. And you know what? The party totally accepts her when she plays mommy with Sophie (you can die from not bathing for 2-3 days, also you better eat a goddamn yakitori-don even though you're not hungry and seasickness is a possibility), when she's too busy chasing tail to be polite (no need to help, Malik) or too busy being Miss Femininity to let the rest of the party do extremely important things (didn't they end up coming out of its nose? Doesn't the pepper mean that they were in its nose the whole time? Is snot okay?). I can't see any reason for her personality, except that some developer or writer wanted to show us all how beautiful lovesick teenage girls are. That's what I see when I look at Cheria, some dude insisting that young women are at their most precious and worthy of the title "Angel" when they are emotional, illogical, inconsistent, dependent, jealous, bossy, lying, and a little mean. ಠ_ಠ Why do people make jabs like this? FFS.
-If one reads Hachima frequently, one may find themselves growing tired of the fighting over which console is the winner, or how Japan has silly Galapagos technology (biased hint: get rid of region locks), or claims that fangirls are just as likely to fantasize about putting their penises in any human who looks under 14 as some especially devoted XBOX360 believers. One may start to think that if one has to read some stuff in Japanese, one might as well read a novel or a comic book. Unless it's about the next Tales game.
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From:
no subject
Which books did you get? Anything I would know?
Speaking of koi koi, you should watch Summer Wars! It's adorable and has the most badass grandma ever. Plus a really flashy game of koi koi.
Yeah, well, it is my New Year's resolution to stop reading Hachima.
From:
no subject
It depends on what I make. I used a Japanese page called 午後のひととき, supplemented with a great deal of ahem, research through the visual medium, and the occasional english language google search. Japanese shortcake is genoise with creme chantilly, so there are actually a lot of western recipes. I browse Cookpad but their stuff can be hit and miss. I also have a collection of cookbooks that just grew because of my presents ^^;;;
Other than the cookbooks they're either things you don't really know or probably aren't interested in. All the shoujo manga comes from Ribon, so it's Tanemura Arina, Mochida Aki, and Haruta Nana. Haruta Nana is the one I want to recommend here---her ability to create bewitching male characters is truly remarkable. Behold the teacher man who smells like chocolate and lets a student do his nails on the last day of summer vacation. *_*
I, is Summer Wars anime? TV? Err? tell us moar.
From:
no subject
Oh, I have a volume of Haruta's Saboten no Himitsu! It's really cute~ Currently I am still playing catchup on Akagami no Shirayukihime though.
Summer Wars is a movie. I actually watched it with my mom - it's one of those rare all-ages anime that isn't Ghibli. It's really really adorable and focused on the importance of family, so it has a HUGE extended cast with a wide variety of characters, not just the usual mixture of 6 different moe girls.
From:
no subject
LOL, 6 different moe girls. >w> I would even accept that if they all had, like, boyfriends or possible boyfriends, and male friends. Then they would be like real humans---but no. Because men who love anime girls can't have real humans. I'll check it out.
From:
no subject
You have the choice between childhood friend girl, glasses girl, class president girl, girl who is actually a boy in a skirt, twelve-year-old-girl, and maybe even kendo team girl! Why would you ever want anything else?!
This is why I never bother watching anything anymore.
Summer Wars is great. Best match of koi koi ever.