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Why Japanese Was, and Wasn’t, a Waste of Time.

So a couple of things before I start this post. Thing #1:  This is a post where I take advantage of the fact that no one reads this.  If this post were to somehow, by some miracle, go viral, I will probably remove it. Thing #2: This post is a statement on how things are, not how they should be.  The distinction is very important here, and I’d appreciate it if you, the reader, would keep it in mind. I am a very intelligent person.  In fact, I’d go so far as to say… Read More »Why Japanese Was, and Wasn’t, a Waste of Time.

Liminal

This blog is nearly six years old now. And tonight I came very close to shutting it down.  I’ve talked about doing that before, and I talked myself out of it, and the primary reason is, I’d just end up spinning another one up anyway.  I can’t stop writing.  I’ve never been able to stop writing. I started learning Japanese in 2018.  The first post here is March, 2018.  It is almost March, 2024.  I started learning Japanese at around the time (give or take) that I started this blog,… Read More »Liminal

Japan

Before I work today, I have a post I need to make.  I’m making this post because I need to make it.  The only real choice I have, really, is whether I post it privately, or publicly, and for now I chose publicly. Japan hurts, and I don’t know why. When I first started learning Japanese, I did so because I felt a strong attraction to the language, country, and people.  I don’t have this feeling about any other country.  There are countries I absolutely loathe (Russia, North Korea), countries I… Read More »Japan

Good Riddance to Bad Localizers

Or, I finally found a reason to learn Japanese. One thing I’ve noticed as I study Japanese is that the translators often aren’t very good.  They tend to make choices that seem designed to water down the message the mangaka is trying to send half the time. For example, one of the first animes I watched was “Sound! Euphonium” which was a great anime, one of the best.  At one point there was an interaction between Kumiko and Asuka.  Kumiko says something translated correctly as “Welcome back” or some such. … Read More »Good Riddance to Bad Localizers

All sorts of updates and stuffs

I have a bunch of stuff to talk about, and some updates, too!  Let’s start with the updates. The first update is, I opened a new blog.  You can find it at animelife.blog.  This is actually a little bit similar to Texihabara (which I will be repurposing or closing soon, and I should have done that months ago), but this is stuff I actually want to talk about, instead of just trying to make content for the sake of making content, which is what Texihabara was.  I will be reviewing… Read More »All sorts of updates and stuffs

Why I Joined – and Left – Twitter (X)

Over the past year, I was experimenting with X.  I joined about the time when Elon bought it.  Almost to the day, actually.  I hated Twitter before and actively avoided it, but I really did appreciate what Elon was trying to do with it, at least according to his stated goals.  And, it really was a ride. Immediately, I started getting regaled with right-wing grifters and I found it to be really toxic, honestly.  I had to do a lot of muting and learned to stifle my first impulse, which was… Read More »Why I Joined – and Left – Twitter (X)

Anime Changed My Life

Hi. I haven’t posted here for about a year now – almost exactly a year, actually.  Has it been that long?  It doesn’t seem that long, and it almost seems longer.  I came very close to just deleting this entirely, and I’m probably going to go through shortly and hide many posts that I’m not proud of.  Some I’ll keep though.  I did move a lot of content over to hiddenjapanese.com (and I need to add more), and I have a few projects I’m working on. So, what happened to… Read More »Anime Changed My Life

Desire

There is a tree near my apartment that, until recently, has been host to hundreds of birds in the evenings.  There are two species, the great-tailed grackle and another smaller species that I haven’t identified.  Some white-winged doves also hang out there, chilling with the grackles. The birds seem to be gone now.  They have begun their migration south. I was on a walk last night and noticed that the birds were gone, and thought about what migration must feel like to them.  Although I’m not a bird, I think… Read More »Desire

A Rare Mea Culpa

Anyone who knows me, knows that I don’t apologize.  For almost anything.  Even if I’m wrong, I take it as a learning experience and consider that I was making the best judgement, decision, or what-not that I could have made at the time.  Apologizing only seems to feed the monster these days, so I just don’t do it.  Even if I’m wrong, I don’t do it. But I’m going to come a bit closer than usual, today. I have a weakness, or a flaw.  Okay, I have plenty, but this… Read More »A Rare Mea Culpa

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