So, I was going through my Linux RSS feeds when I stumble on this post of a translation of a "Ubuntu romantic school comedy"...

I don't know whether to laugh or cry. Maybe both. Printing it out now to read it...

She is wishing you a happy Mardi Gras!

Since it's the day before Ash Wednesday, the start of Lent, the custom down here in South Louisiana seems to be gorge yourself silly on food and alcohol before the 40 days of fasting and abstinence. Me, I just avoid stuffing and inebriating myself for Mardi Gras and eat normally afterwards. And there are the parades. Don't know if I'll go see the parades this year1, I'm not one for crowds and don't think that catching plastic trinkets is as good a time as it used to be2.

Still doesn't mean I can't wish everybody a happy Mardi Gras...

Mardi Gras Celebration drawing by Jeff Jue3.

1. 1. Haven't for a few years
2. 2. Never mind dealing with parking; many streets are closed and pedestrians (and often drunk pedestrians) are all over the place. And I don't dare go to New Orleans for Mardi Gras...
3. 3. He is my housemate. Managed to annoyencourage him to make this drawing, as there aren't many Mardi Gras-based anime drawings around.

Well, my first taste of Ralph Bakshi wasn't too good, though it had its interesting moments. But in truth, this wasn't Bakshi's original script for this movie; supposedly, his producer took his original script that had a subtext of a warning about casual sex and got it rewritten into the mess of a plot in the movie today.

Some of the plusses about Cool World include the smooth animation quality and an interesting soundtrack. I'm not a big fan of rotoscoping in animation, but it's not like I really consider it cheating1 and Bakshi seems to make good use of it here. The one-off gags that go on constantly in the background in cool world also provide entertainment.

1. 1. the modern equivalent would be to use motion capturing to animate 3D models

It feels good to give a gift to someone who I never met face-to-face, but only know each other through words.

In any case, Merry Christmas to all. Hope all of you have happy holidays, and at least a better next year than how mine will be starting.

... but anyways:

Hope everyone had a good Thanksgiving. Well, those of you in the U.S. Hope the rest of you had a good Thursday...

Some members on an anime forum I frequent had a topic up showing off their collection and how they watch it, so I figure I should post it here just for the hell of it:

Behold! The Hall of Anime!

Actually, the nearest shelf contains my housemate's anime DVDs. The further shelf houses my girfriend's and my DVDs. Two-thirds of it is mine; I have maybe about 10 boxes of non-anime. Here's a picture with only my anime DVDs in it:

My Anime Collection: Look how it stretches into the darkness!

No, my new hobby hasn't taken up all of my time that I haven't watched anime. I'm still watching, just not having enough time dedicated to blogging it as much as I used to.

Hopefully, I can get an update out this weekend.

Fledge posts about his blogroll and triggered a few thoughts on my end1.

1. 1. Somewhat treading on the tenth blogging cliché (via)

I've been unable to connect to AnimeNfo.com since this morning. The DNS entry resolves to a server at IP 204.15.225.46 that is up and running, but http seems to be down. Anybody know what's going on?

UPDATE: Looks like it's back up again.  

Something about this poll on the AnimeNfo.com forum struck me. Well, it isn't any surprise that 85% of the 65 members that answered the polls identified themselves as between the ages of 15 to 24. And the poll results also helps to support the hypothesis a friend had that most anime fans "grow out of" anime by the age of 25 for various reasons.