Sunday 6 April 2003

Pic of the day: Useful words to know in Japanese: "Suki dayo" = I (being male) like (as in love) you. And what is not to love about these girls? You'll find out if you watch the anime or read the manga "Azumanga Daioh"! The weirdest people you can get without mutations. Then again, they are girls. Well, one of them is a dog, and two are teachers, not that it helps much.

Disjointed notes

I have been feeling weak all day, as if exhausted or feverish, even though I was neither. Not even chocolate helped!

On the bright side, it doesn't take much energy to play Dark Age of Camelot ... I took my level 25 paladin into Darkness Falls to try to hunt Plated Fiends, at a time where very few players were online. Somehow the yellow plated were taken anyway. I noticed that the rats were left alone ... Back when they were my level, it seemed they were almost always camped ...

I guess that's like the two keys in my pocket. One is for my house door, one for my office door. They are the same size and the same material, there is no way to feel which is which with your fingers. Even so, I somehow manage to come up with the house key when I'm at the office, and the office key at home. (And it doesn't help to put the first back in the pocket without looking ... In that case they switch places. I have tried.) Don't ask me how, but it is so much second nature that earlier in the week I was surprised to actually pick the home key first at home. "This must be my lucky day" I thought to myself. But now I have forgotten what day it was...

***

Even less energy than playing games is needed to watch anime. I have stacks of Japanese animated TV-series, their equivalent of cartoons, which I have downloaded from the Net. According to a recent Norwegian court decision, this is perfectly legal as long as it for private use. As long as I can remember, Norwegians have enjoyed the right to tape any broadcasting for private use, and this court ruling shows that the same applies to the Internet. Broadcasting copyrighted work however is restricted.

My new favorite, as you may have noticed lately, is Azumanga Daioh. As the name implies, it is based on a manga (Japanese comic). Unlike the usual anime, it doesn't feature romance or magic or science fiction. It features a bunch of high school girls and their teachers. There are boys, but they have no names and no personalities. They are basically comic relief background, much like in real life.

But don't mistake this series for realistic. The girls and their teachers are all weird, about as weird as they come and still get to roam free. The only male with a name is the teacher who informs the class that he became teacher because he likes girls. He likes to hang around the pool to see the girls in wet swimsuits. That's about as far as male-female relations get in this series. Azumanga Daioh is extremely decent for a Japanese series, although the adult viewer is likely to have an opinion on the girl who always blushes furiously when the tall dark girl looks at her...

Ah, high school. It was such a good time. Then again, I am not American. I have heard from many Americans that high school was purgatory. May God bless America, for they could sure need it.