wednesday_10_00 | final final count

Sure you won't be visiting Animate in the morning? (When are they opening that branch in the airport. I want to know.)

Hey, at least you didn't break 200. Are any of your suitcases going to be overweight? (ETA: oh crap, I see you had to ship some stuff. How did that go?)

Safe travels tomorrow, and I hope everyone is soon home wallowing in their piles of manga and doujinshi. I look forward to detailed reports! (I'll be doing my own trip report... someday...)

Or lose... or win... or something. Anyway, I finally came in last! *rejoices*

(Next time, it would be nice if I could rely on my own self-control instead of external circumstances.)

Special message for

mangaroo: I'm reading ~~Swiss Cheese~~ Doukyuusei/Sotsugyousei and it is freaking ADORABLE. I am hoping that if I re-read it often enough, it will erase the memory of the scanlation of Doublemints from my mind. THANK YOU for preventing me from buying that, it would have contaminated half the books on my shelf by its mere presence (radioactive angst fallout). How can the same author write something so sweet and something so vile?

Edited 2011-08-17 16:30 (UTC)

I'm still vexed about Doublemints because I like the unrelated extra story in the volume. (I completely understand if you find the scenario in the extra story as repellant as Doublemints proper, but I see a lot of similarities to Swiss Cheese in the emotional content and the story's structure.) However, I hate the rest of the book so much I can't bear to own it because I might accidentally look at the title story and go blind.

And YAYYAYYAY for reading Swiss Cheese. How far along are you? Do you have a favorite chapter? Do you want to hug Kusakabe from joy and Hara-sen from compassion? (Did you know Sajou was voted favorite uke in KBLY 2011?) Have I mentioned I love this manga?

(Did you know Sajou was voted favorite uke in KBLY 2011?)

One one hand, I am not surprised given how popular this series is on that list, but on the other, it's not like there aren't other ukes like him. It feels extreme. (Not that I didn't like him, or anything, though?) hrm.

Sorry for taking so long to reply to this, but today was the first time I had enough focus to attempt translation without kissy pictures to guide me. Each "best of" winner gets a little blurb from a different source (I assume fandom blogs and the like), and Sajou's is "Megane!! Majime!!! Bukiyou!!!! Soshite bijin ~~ [heart] パーフェクツ、パーフェクツ desu."

Glasses!! Serious!!! Awkward!!!! Also, a beautiful person. [He/it is] perfect, perfect.

I included the kana for the last bit because that is actually perfektsu and not perfeckto. So I'm not sure it's supposed to be English at all, and if it is English, if it should be translated as "perfection" instead of "perfect." But you catch the drift: the point of the vote -- if there is any point beyond the overwhelming popularity of the manga in this ranking guide -- isn't uniqueness, but awesomeness. Sajou is simply the pinnacle of these non-original uke qualities. Kusakabe, who makes a far more unique seme (to the point where it's a little difficult to apply that label at all), only ranked at number 3 in the poll for best seme, where Shoui from Ze was #1 (because Shoui is the best seme EVER and volume 9 had better come out in English eventually).

re: パーフェクツ - that's a callback to what Kusakabe says to Sajou in the first chapter, when he's teaching him the song, right? I remember we were talking about it in the hotel room. My suggestion was that it was Italian, but no idea, really.

Thanks for the translation, as it is always interesting to hear what fangirls are saying, and it sort of answered my question. (Maybe my style of pondering isn't clear -- it wasn't at all that I think uniqueness is what characters are judged on, or even that unique characters should win, it was that in a sea of ukes like him, why was *he* the favorite? What about *his* particular qualities swayed him above the other serious, awkward boys who wear glasses? I guess the answer is just nothing really other than he just did sway them. :P)

Setting aside whether Sajou is better than other serious-type-ukes or not, keep in mind that this is only for manga published in one year, so it's not THAT big of a sea, maybe?

Could be! I would obviously have no idea, which is why I was curious.

You are impugning Sajou's awesomeness. I challenge you to a duel, madame. *faceslap* *gauntlet throwing* *fan thwap*

Based on Manga-oh's new releases list, subtracting anthologies, we get between 65-70 single-author BL tankoubon per month. I'm just going to call it 66 to account for series titles featuring only one couple that might have more than one volume released in a year (though most of my series seem to be spaced 12+ months apart). Sajou beat at least 791 other ukes with his seriously awkward spectacled beauty.

Oh, dang. I have to go to work now. WANT VACATION ALWAYS.

Sajou beat at least 791 other ukes with his seriously awkward spectacled beauty.

But the point was how many other of that specific type of uke there are, right? So you would have to go through the 791(ish) volumes of manga released in that year (10/09-10/10 or whatever) and figure out how many serious, glasses-wearing ukes there were. And...I honestly have no idea how to go about doing that.

(I also feel I should point out that given the number of short story collections out there, even if we're just going by total number of ukes, there are probably a lot more than 791 ukes in one year.)

I don't think his specific type is the point at all. Sajou is the best uke, not just the best serious, awkward, glasses-wearing, beautiful person uke. (In fact, he is only #3 on the best megane poll, right? I meant to check if the other two were semes, but I don't have my KBLY at work.) The poll just validates his breathtaking embodiment of non-unique uke qualities.

I know KBLY's only been around 4 years (how awesome that you picked it up in its first year), but do you recall seeing any winners from short stories in any of the polls? In other words, if only serialized stories produce viable contenders, Sajou probably faced significantly less than 791 rivals. But he's still パーフェクツ, darnit!

You didn't post best uke and seme for the past three years, did you? GAH! Now I'm all curious and wish I had bought that used copy of the 2010 KBLY.

Sorry, I didn't meant to be confusing. That's the point of the poll, yes. But cnj's comment was "in a sea of ukes like him, why was *he* the favorite? What about *his* particular qualities swayed him above the other serious, awkward boys who wear glasses?" So the number of all ukes doesn't really answer that question.

do you recall seeing any winners from short stories in any of the polls?

I am pretty sure there have been, because I remember it specifically saying "xxx story from xxx manga" for short story winners.

But he's still パーフェクツ, darnit!

I am definitely not arguing on this point!

You didn't post best uke and seme for the past three years, did you?

I didn't, but I could.

Oy, re-reading the thread, it's very clear that you're responding to cnj's comment. I agree that the sea of megane-wearing, serious, awkward, beautiful ukes in a given year is probably not that vast (I'm randomly guessing 53), but now you have to post the #1 ukes from the preceding three years, because I am assuming the same type doesn't win every year. (Even though it is my moe and therefore should.)

To wrap up: most BL characters can be assigned a type, but it's possible to be a type and still be especially appealing (more than the sum of his parts). Not that I want to pretend to speak authoritatively on KBLY matters, since I still don't know WHO they're polling.

Also, I'm delighted to know that short stories have produced winners. There's not enough appreciation for short story BL.

now you have to post the #1 ukes from the preceding three years

This takes less thinking than other things I should be doing, so: OK!

re: who they're polling - I just checked, and: they ask 40 bookstore employees, reviewers, and editor about their top 10 manga, which are assigned points (#1 = 10 points, #2 = 9 points, etc), and also ask Tonari no 801-chan subscribers their top (one) manga for the year, for which each vote gets one point.

(Oh my gosh, Gokujou no Koibito made the list in 2008?? Was that a slow year?)

I guess I lied about the short story thing. I must be remembering winners from other categories or something (megane or S or whatever other categories they have). Some of the characters are from stories that don't take up whole volumes, but most of them are from series.

Every chapter is more favorite than the last. I just read the one in Swiss Cheese 2 where Kusakabe meets Sajou's mother. There might have been squeeing. (I laughed so hard when she did the "talk trash about your family to be polite" thing, and Kusakabe's all "Oh, but I like those things about him!" And Sajou is just /facepalm, literally.)

The art weirds me out, but I could see how it might grow on me as I re-read; it suits the story, somehow. (But some of the images of Kusakabe freaking out remind me bizarrely of Hyperbole and a Half. Sample image chosen almost purely at random)

Hara-sen! (Seku-hara! Ero-seku!) So inappropriate on the surface, such a gentleman underneath. I really hope his boyfriend in the side story treats him well, he deserves it.

PS What are you doing awake at this hour?

Edited 2011-08-17 20:26 (UTC)

The ladies may have laughed out loud at your Kusakabe = Hyperbole and a Half.

What are you doing awake at this hour?

Post-packing adrenaline combined with anxiety about how I'm going to eat today with no money. Can I make it 'til the first meal service on my flight?

Also, if you're not going to make your own Swiss Cheese top-level post, cnj and I are talking about it over here.

Sample image chosen almost purely at random

Yes! That's him exactly. Laughs have ensued.

I admit the side story pretty much squicked me out as much as the main one, in different ways (the one with the senator, yes?), but to each his own. I'd be curious to hear what, specifically, about that story reminded you of Swiss Cheese (granted, it was... sweeter than the main story? Sort of?), but if it's a purely individual thing, then never mind. God knows my kinks are not the world's kinks. Mostly.

Well, the character designs and personality dynamic of the seme and uke (carefree but secretly sincere x serious and...out of control?) reminded me a lot of Kusakabe and Sajou, as did the song. And the uke's love for the senator touches me in a similar way to Hara-sen's. I think Nakamura does a rather splendid job with these tragic emotions. Plus, the use of the song reminded me a lot of the song/poetry chapters in Doukyuusei.

I concede that the scenario is creepy (I could find it erotic if it weren't for the senator's advanced age, but then I wouldn't find the uke's love for the senator to be sweet). What I like best is the suggestion that the Ichigo is going to find a fulfilling love with the escort via the escort's repetition of the senator's song and response to Ichigo's name. (Also, my assumption is that the escort fell in love early on and has been wooing Ichigo via their creepy sexual encounters.)

I guess what I'm trying to say is that the only "kink" I see in my response to this story is my fondness for stories where a serious character is chased by a more cheerful character. I'm responding to that, rather than sex-as-performance-art/soporific.

Thank you! That makes a lot of sense, though unfortunately I find I'm so creeped out by the story as a whole that I can't seem to respond to the sweeter elements you mention.

Also, I think I don't share your weakness (?) for unrequited pining. Even when the person gets to be happy with someone else later, I just find it painful rather than touchingly tragic.

I will go back to reading Sotsugyousei. (Why did no one tell me there was a chapter where they go out for okonomiyaki and talk about Tokyo Disneyland? Did I miss that part of the pimping? I laughed so hard. I think Tani-kun might be a zombie (wtf character design), but he totally cracks me up.)

Also, I think I don't share your weakness (?) for unrequited pining. Even when the person gets to be happy with someone else later, I just find it painful rather than touchingly tragic.

Oh, no. I don't have a weakness or a fondness for unrequited pining in general, despite my appreciation for it in these two works by Nakamura. Hara-sen's is only tolerable because it is intolerable to think of Sajou with anyone but Kusakabe. And Ichigo's is tolerable because any romance with the childlike yet perverted senator would be icky to me. Basically, I can only bear pining when an actual romance between the characters is unthinkable to me. Also, I'm not sure I would describe either of those pinings as 100% unrequited love. I think the object of the pining in both cases feels something in return, but love in these two stories has to be nurtured to blossom, and the piners were deliberately not developing the relationships.

Um, you are not "anyone else," you are part of the "we" in "we're done shopping."

I see you had to ship some stuff. How did that go?

Well...I don't think it saved me any money, but I honestly ran out of SPACE in my suitcases, because I had so many toys and goods and presents and things like that. I sent one (lightweight) package to my brother (SAL) and one (heavy) package of shoujo/shounen/novels to myself (surface) and they cost about 8000 yen together. And they only take cash at the post office, so I had to make a pit stop at their ATM (where, fortunately, my 5/3 card worked, because my credit union card did not). They messed up on the fees at the airport (told me it was $50 for an overweight bag instead of $75--btw, $200 is the fee if your bag weighs over 70lbs). If I'd known it would only be 4000 yen for an overweight bag I might have tried to get everything into two overweight suitcases, but what's done is done.

I was actually thinking that if one planned ahead to ship, one could buy up a bunch of shoujo/shounen stuff early in the trip and ship it right away, minimizing the wait to get it home. But I don't know that I'd ever have the discipline to do that.

Do you remember how much the heavy (surface) package cost by itself? How many items did you fit in it? One of my problems with the idea of shipping is figuring out ahead of time how much I can ship, for how much money, and how long it'll take (I know surface can take months, sob). The other part, of course, is not wanting to be separated from the pretty piles of manga.

Coming home with only about 160 books in my luggage was so very pleasant, I'd like to be able to repeat the experience. Often.

(Also, good to know about the post office only taking cash -- I might not have anticipated that.)

Glad the overweight fees at the airport weren't too bad! I must be misremembering the $200, because I don't think I've ever gone over 70 lbs for a single bag. Or maybe the fees came back down after being higher in previous years.

Hmm, apparently I didn't save the receipt because I thought the weight/cost was on the address slip thingy (it's not). I think they were both around 4,000, give or take, and I sent about 30 books.

I don't think I've ever gone over 70 lbs for a single bag.

I don't know, after making the decision to have one bag overweight, I struggled to keep it under 70lbs. :/

OMG, 80 doujinshi... .. .. I was about to ask what on earth could make you buy so much since those kind of numbers can only come from fandom doujinshi (which I thought you didn't do much of?), but... then I remembered your new obsessions. Is it Tiger & Bunny? Durarara? Is the anime wave of 2011 going to be the gift that keeps on giving (to your bookshelves)? mangaroo's 36 isn't much to sneeze at, either. XD

Hooray for your shopping successes(?) though - even if it's a pain to pack, you obviously got lots of stuff you are excited about? :)

(PS: it's funny to me too, even though I'm not in on the joke, because I'm pretty sure I can imagine it. At least I can if it's anything like my "just one last run in the dealers room" bits.) ;)

Safe travels back!

I suspect Tiger & Bunny as well, but for the record, I have managed to buy over 100 dj in the past while buying almost no fandom doujinshi (at most, there might have been a dozen Phoenix Wright or Fujimi dj, and those mostly only by one or two authors). There is an AMAZING amount of original author dj, especially if you get into collecting all of the past work of an author whose stuff is still widely available, like Yamato Nase or Naono Bohra. The only reason I bought so little this time is that I had finally completed almost the entire back catalog of the authors I like the most.

Speaking of dj, I forgot to tell you that I have Mori no Koe (cheap, 3500 yen!) and a Takanaga Hinako dj for you (the Takanaga one is a thin follow-up to the Aru Hi series). I think the others have other things for you, as well.

(And yes, the joke is pretty much as you imagine it. I think it started on the first or second day and got worse from there.)

There is an AMAZING amount of original author dj, especially if you get into collecting all of the past work of an author whose stuff is still widely available

Right, right, but I've never had the impression that W_10_00 is someone needing to back-collect. ;) Of course, you're also right in that I think I forgot how many authors might be in others' repertoires; my circle of authors who would apply here is definitely preeeetty small. I'd only get those kinds of numbers out of fandom.

I still think it's Tiger & Bunny, though. :P

And hooray for Mori no Koe! Thanks! I'm looking forward to my goodies, too. :) It'll be like a ~~first~~ second birthday this summer!

I've never had the impression that W_10_00 is someone needing to back-collect

Day-and-time easily develops insta-obsessions out of thin air. This trip's would be Nekota Yonezou: she started with one doujinshi from the Otona/Mousou Elektel series picked up at Comiket (aka "get me pinstripes"). Then she discovered that a character she had assumed was mean in one of Nekota's manga really wasn't and started collecting a doujinshi series about those characters. During the hunt for those books, she discovered a completely original Nekota doujinshi series entitled Sensei wa Dummy, which also had a drama cd. So I would estimate she's now the proud owner of 10 Nekota dj + one drama cd...and this was after Comiket.

I'll wait for her to do the breakdown on the rest. Given T&B's popularity this year, there's also a bit of spillover in purchasing books by favorite artists and collecting T&B doujinshi (Yoneda Kou contributed to a Tiger & Bunny doujinshi anthology!!). I wish I had the funds to return this winter for Comiket 81. I want to catch the full impact of the T&B phenomenon before it wanes but after it has been around long enough to get its own section of tables at Tokyo Big Sight.

Day-and-time easily develops insta-obsessions out of thin air.

LOL! Ah, but: Don't we all? ♥ Thankfully (?) I do not suffer the ability to visit and read and fall in love with random doujinshi series! (And I'll take my cold comfort with with a Mt Dew to wash it down, thanks.)

Nekota Yonezou: Oh, dear. I've never started collecting her doujinshi because they appeared to be many and popular (and hence possibly expensive) and her lines at Comiket are always horrendous, but I have a feeling she'll be on my agenda sometime in the future. I do look forward hearing which of her doujinshi might be worth collecting.

Re: price - I bought a used compilation of Nekota's Yasashiku Shinaide doujinshi for ¥4200, but the individual volumes of that as well as Sensei wa Dummy were selling for ¥630, so expense was less of an issue than finding them. The stores were overflowing with doujinshi from her Catholic boys' school series, which we weren't buying, and had just enough of the stuff we were buying that W_10_00 and I didn't have to resort to Rock Paper Scissors Lizard Spock to resolve any disputes.

A question: is your compilation of Yasashiku Shinaide doujinshi called "Shinaide Mix"? I am prowling Yahoo-Auctions, as you know.

Yes, that's it. It's supposed to be Yasashiku 1-3, Shinaide Plus, ¥0-Priceless, and a kakioroshi. But I can't help but feel odd about it. At least ONE of those doujinshi would have to have been extremely short (shorter even than the kakioroshi in this volume), because the compilation isn't long enough for 5 volumes otherwise.

Can't say about Priceless, but Shinaide Plus is extremely short. Nekota even makes a joke about it on the first page ("Note: this is only 8 pages of manga").

For the record: I bought 18 Tiger & Bunny doujinshi (5 of which I only bought because they were written by certain BL authors), and one G-Defend doujinshi. The rest were all original author. (Not really interested in the big pairings for Durarara.)

At least I can if it's anything like my "just one last run in the dealers room" bits.

The way I remember it, it started with a conversation between me and Sara on the first day, which went something like this:

Me (getting ready to leave the store) : I think I'm done, I'm going to go check out.
Sara (incredulous) : What, you're done? With your whole list??
Me: No, I'm just done here. My basket is full.

And then

mangaroo said something like "Yes, she's done shopping! No more shopping the rest of the trip!" It then became extremely funny to joke about how we wouldn't be spending much time in this store or that, because we were done shopping. (However, it became difficult at the end of the trip, when we would try to seriously say we were done shopping, and it just sounded like the same joke we'd made 800 times before.)

5 of which I only bought because they were written by certain BL authors

Hey, wait a minute. Asou Kai, Kodaka (2), Inariya Fusanosuke (2?), Yoneda Kou, and ... who? I thought you didn't get a copy of the Miyamoto (?) doujinshi for yourself. Or did you mean 6 doujinshi (i.e., counting different books by the same artists separately).

Sorry, that count is off, I guess. I was only counting the full-size ones (I was thinking I didn't get any T&B in the smaller size), so I forgot about Inariya. And Kodaka is 3; two full ones and the paper thingy.

Glad you all had a good time. :) I've enjoyed hearing about your adventures from Sara. Can't believe K-Books was closed for your first week there; what were they thinking!!!!!!!!!

It was OK; we've broken up with K-Books and are now in love with Mandarake. XD

Well, I'm very glad you were able to find a different store to supply your manga needs! I was having consumer-empathy-pains for you all when Sara told me about K-Books! :)

Nothing worse than having money and no place to spend it.

Oh, we would have found places. ;) We're VERY good at buying manga. XD

final final count

It was funny to me!

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