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August 2022

The Brain

So I heard an interesting question the other day – I found it on the thumbnail of YouTube video.  It’s apparently part of skit by Bill Burr – which I haven’t watched, and at the moment, don’t plan to.  But it asked an interesting question, one which has been reverberating through my mind ever since I read it. The question goes something like this:  “Do you control your brain, or does your brain control you?” Now this is a fascinating question, and not because of the question as stated.  It’s because… Read More »The Brain

Thoughts on Worship

As with most of my posts, wherever you think this is going to go, it probably won’t, so take that for what you will. I have been on a binge of watching Babymetal and Sakura Gakuin lately.  No idea why, it’s just what popped up on YouTube and I get bored.  So I was churning through, and found this one thing called “Moabanger”.  It’s a version of “Headbanger” where Moa takes the microphone from Su on her birthday, and she stands there holding it while literally the whole concert venue… Read More »Thoughts on Worship

Thoughts on Idols

I mentioned a couple of posts back about a video by Sakura Gakuin, where they were singing a song called “Graduation Toss” and where they pretty much were finding it impossible to hold it together.  You could see it on their faces throughout the song.  One girl was just about one word away from completely losing it, and as the song progresses, you can see them falling apart in real time.  At the end of the song, they’re trying to do their smiley wavey thing at the end of the… Read More »Thoughts on Idols

Losing

I admit it.  I play a waifu game. These are a form of “gacha” games – of which “Raid: Shadow Legends” is perhaps one of the more artificially famous varieties.  Except the characters are all very beautiful women, most of whom have very large breasts.  I mean, very large breasts.  One character has what I not so affectionately call “watermelons”.  Now, the eye candy is not the reason I play it, and I would really like it if, in fact, they made some of the proportions and costumes a little more… Read More »Losing

Magic

As a child, the world was magic. When you’re a child, you don’t know how anything works, and generally, even if someone explained it to you, you wouldn’t really understand. I remember a few things as a child.  I remember in first grade they played a video of two alien puppets in what was supposed to be a spaceship, teaching letters and numbers, and while I had doubts even at that age, I wasn’t entirely sure if it was real or not.  I remember thinking there were little people playing… Read More »Magic

Yui Mizuno: Unfinished Business

For those of you who are unfamiliar, Babymetal started with three singers:  Nakamoto Suzuka, Kikuchi Moa, and Mizuno Yui.  At one point, Yui had to leave the group for unspecified health reasons (which are none of anyone’s business, if we’re being blunt about it) and hasn’t been heard from since.  Many fans miss her a lot, and there are lots of videos and blogs and stuff saying how much they miss her and wish she would return. This isn’t one of those. I worry about her. In my life I… Read More »Yui Mizuno: Unfinished Business

Graduation Toss

So lately I discovered a song by the (now defunct, iirc) group called Sakura Gakuin called “Graduation Toss”.  In particular, a live, extremely emotional version where nearly all the girls are on the verge of crying throughout the song, and people seem to take a rather unhealthy interest in exactly who’s near tears and when.  But while that’s moderately interesting, that’s not what’s attracting me to the song. There is something about its structure that reminds me very powerfully of a late 70s or early 80s song. Young people don’t… Read More »Graduation Toss

Thin-Skinned Japanese People: One Mystery Solved

So, last night, I had a question answered that’s been bugging me for years. On YouTube, one of the major things I tend to watch is Japanese or Japanese-oriented content.  One channel I currently follow is a guy who reacts to random Japanese videos as a “try not to laugh challenge”.  I remarked that the Japanese culture was kind of repressed and blows off steam in unusual ways.  I also said their culture had dark aspects, careful to also say it had beautiful aspects too.  Basically, what I’ve been repeatedly… Read More »Thin-Skinned Japanese People: One Mystery Solved

The Trouble with the Internet

Writing in this blog is difficult.  I think it’s because there’s a mix of two drives – a need to share, and a rather strong distaste for the medium in which I’m sharing. I’ve been on the net, in one form or another, since I was maybe seventeen or eighteen.  That’s…  around twenty-five years now, give or take.  My first experience on the Internet (not including earlier BBSes) was on a VMS machine at the college I was attending, and it’s defined my life and social life ever since, in… Read More »The Trouble with the Internet