tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-28497999102895410042009-06-26T08:40:58.338-07:00Writing and Otakuism... the Ninja Way!Ninjeffhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02489574463256645325noreply@blogger.comBlogger132125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2849799910289541004.post-72030119053359424782009-06-26T00:17:00.000-07:002009-06-26T00:17:57.049-07:00

If I've learned only one thing In the 10 months since I started dancing, it's this: play to your strengths. I've learned the basic steps (and then some) for over a dozen different social dances, and each style has its own quirks that make it good or bad for a particular person. Dances like Rhumba and Bolero, for instance, don't really fit me because they're too slow for my taste; and while I

Ninjeffhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02489574463256645325noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2849799910289541004.post-91253331345771886392009-06-24T18:00:00.000-07:002009-06-24T18:00:03.196-07:00

My friend Katherine and I both have our birthdays in August, separated by a mere week; my birthday is August 14th while hers is August 21. So together we hatched a plan: combine our birthday into one giant celebration that will cause the world to stand up and take notice of our respective awesomeness. For 10 days, we'll do nothing but dance, party, eat copious amounts of cake and ice cream, dance

Ninjeffhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02489574463256645325noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2849799910289541004.post-22267537493122837022009-06-10T17:30:00.000-07:002009-06-10T18:11:45.078-07:00

Sometimes my conversational talents wow even myself! I spent my lunch break hanging out with one of my coworkers and the topics of conversation really ran the gamut. We talked about some pretty off-the-wall stuff. Though I'm starting to wonder whether I'm not secretly insane and no one has ever bothered to tell me. Oh well. Here are the highlights for your reading pleasure: Real vs. Planned

Ninjeffhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02489574463256645325noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2849799910289541004.post-21350940418105401252009-06-05T01:50:00.000-07:002009-06-05T01:50:00.707-07:00

Tomorrow (or I guess technically today, at this hour) is gonna rock! I've started working half-days on Friday, which means I get to spend the afternoon having fun with friends. At least, that's what the past two weeks have been like. Last week, my friend Katherine and I went shopping at IKEA to look for bedroom furniture for my new apartment. This was followed by our usual ritual of Swing dancing

Ninjeffhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02489574463256645325noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2849799910289541004.post-85063349031124327452009-06-03T14:46:00.000-07:002009-06-03T14:46:28.062-07:00

I'm starting to think that I'm not very good at dating. I don't know what it is, but for some reason I have a really hard time feeling comfortable when I go out with someone I'm interested in dating. Maybe it's the pressure of the "date" label because I'm perfectly fine interacting with these same people prior to asking them out. Without fail though, I'll end up saying something I should or

Ninjeffhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02489574463256645325noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2849799910289541004.post-90587608574001686212009-06-02T11:13:00.000-07:002009-06-02T16:18:20.964-07:00

I realized something a couple weeks ago:Year 21 has been the greatest year on record for me!Although I've never had what anyone could call a "hard life," there have always been certain things that kept me from feeling truly good about myself. For starters, I never really put myself or any talents I might have on display, meaning that I never really got a whole lot of recognition from my family or

Ninjeffhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02489574463256645325noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2849799910289541004.post-77845538973559245152009-04-02T20:04:00.000-07:002009-04-02T20:05:44.952-07:00

I'm growing increasingly concerned about the direction my beloved country of America is taking. I'm sad to see my fellow Americans suffering under this oppressive economy, but I know we are not alone in this struggle. Worldwide, nations and families are struggling. I hate seeing businesses - both large and small - buckle and fold under the weight, but then, that is imply the cycle of capitalism.

Ninjeffhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02489574463256645325noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2849799910289541004.post-72832797243508102862009-03-29T18:16:00.000-07:002009-03-29T18:16:03.428-07:00

My love affair with the iTunes Store continues. As I mentioned last summer, iTunes contains a very nice selection of major Japanese music from artists like Utada Hikaru and Hamasaki Ayumi. But sometime in the last several months the store has expanded its selection of this music to include the likes of Morning Musume, Kumi Koda, BoA, Ami Suzuki, and KOTOKO, among others. Last night, I went

Ninjeffhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02489574463256645325noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2849799910289541004.post-76003266474436821942009-01-07T20:36:00.000-08:002009-01-07T20:51:24.535-08:00

I'm posting to let you guys know that I have launched a "spin-off" blog focusing primarily on gaming called "Save the Colossi." Although I'll continue to post about gaming-related topics here from time to time, Save the Colossi is meant to be a repository of essays on videogames and occasionally anime. The celebrate the launch of this new blog, I've made a post about No More Heroes, in which I

Ninjeffhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02489574463256645325noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2849799910289541004.post-53937908898380497062009-01-04T19:53:00.000-08:002009-01-04T20:11:31.087-08:00

New Resolutions Devised for this brand new year. I'll keep them this time! That's what I said last January, and some of my resolutions were more successful than others. On the upside, I'm well on my way to reaching my target weight (I've already lost ~15 lbs in the last 5 months) and I finally developed a system of tracking my finances, even if I'm sinking copious amounts of money on anime

Ninjeffhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02489574463256645325noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2849799910289541004.post-44702428879841775452008-12-29T13:56:00.000-08:002008-12-29T18:25:28.874-08:00

I'm sure some of my followers and friends on Twitter and Facebook are all wondering what's been going on since last night. For those of you out of the loop: I made a couple of discoveries last night, one of which left me so shocked that I still haven't quite recovered. I'd like to preface this story by saying two things: (1) I don't often write about my own personal life, which may make this

Ninjeffhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02489574463256645325noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2849799910289541004.post-58612290021595363642008-11-08T14:11:00.000-08:002008-11-08T14:32:57.984-08:00

After many months of anticipation, I received a very special package from Play-Asia.com. More often than not, this means one thing: new figure acquisitions! The box was a little beat up on arrival, but thankfully the precious contents were undamaged.-Just what I've always wanted! A couple of Petit Haruhi Nendoroids. These two are from the most recent series, released just last month.-One of the

Ninjeffhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02489574463256645325noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2849799910289541004.post-26315422399280754862008-11-05T09:45:00.000-08:002008-11-05T09:50:37.401-08:00

Last night, America elected Barack Obama to be the next President. That is all!

Ninjeffhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02489574463256645325noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2849799910289541004.post-61157494516952654352008-10-29T09:57:00.000-07:002008-10-29T14:38:08.395-07:00

As a Californian, I'm bombarded with arguments for and against the upcoming vote on Proposition 8, which if passed will deny the rights of same-sex couples to marry, which has been legal since the appeals court overturned another proposition, Proposition 22. Regarding my stance on the issue: I'm torn. On the one hand, I believe same-sex couples should have all the basic rights that straight

Ninjeffhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02489574463256645325noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2849799910289541004.post-28856118617142454712008-09-21T23:25:00.000-07:002008-09-21T23:42:52.083-07:00

Blogger and Attack of the Show host Kevin Pereira introduced me to a little site called Wordle, which makes typographical word clouds out of any text you provide. The Boss Lady at work suggested I try the service out by feeding the website the entire text from this blog for the month of August. This is the result. The size of each word represents how much it used in the given text. Not

Ninjeffhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02489574463256645325noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2849799910289541004.post-79065656760393507282008-09-08T20:16:00.000-07:002008-09-09T07:50:43.319-07:00

My whole life growing up, I loved receiving mail. When your life isn't filled with car payments and utility bills, what is there to dislike about mail. Mail always meant either a new videogame magazine or maybe a hallmark card celebrating some occasion (which often came with money or giftcards in tow). But even better are the packages. They hold such possibilities! So what did the nice mailman

Ninjeffhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02489574463256645325noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2849799910289541004.post-79028039666730511532008-08-31T15:10:00.000-07:002008-08-31T15:51:41.194-07:00

Sacramento, CA has a bi-annual anime convention appropriately titled Sac Anime. The Con isn't very old, and I've known about it for a few years, but never actually got around to going. But this year, the event happened to coincide with me moving back into the campus dorms. Not only that, but the hall Sac Anime is held in is within walking distance. Having missed out on the first two days of the

Ninjeffhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02489574463256645325noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2849799910289541004.post-63338192347822544872008-08-25T22:02:00.000-07:002008-08-26T09:58:47.519-07:00

- Today, I'd like to talk a little about my musical tastes. I've always considered my tastes in music rather eclectic. Like everyone, I have certain genres that I like less than others (see: country) and others that I really enjoy, but don't have a broad knowledge of, such as shoegaze and electronic music. I was lucky enough to have a parent who exposed me to older music from a young age and

Ninjeffhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02489574463256645325noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2849799910289541004.post-92126987125959608552008-08-12T19:55:00.000-07:002008-08-23T10:14:07.841-07:00

Google Blogoscoped does a better job of explaining this video than I could (at least without quoting them verbatim). What I want to know is why the girl playing guitar is wearing Serafuku... EDIT: The owner of the above video has since disabled embedding, but you can still watch the video here.

Ninjeffhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02489574463256645325noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2849799910289541004.post-48269342116901090972008-08-12T19:19:00.000-07:002008-08-12T19:37:08.576-07:00

Some of you may know about my (sometimes unexplicable) infatuation with the Anime, Lucky Star, but I don't think I ever mentioned that an OVA, or original video animation, for the series was in the works. We still don't know what the OVA is going to be about, but speculation points to a "parallel work," similar to the Gurren Lagann music videos. Looking at the recently released concept images

Ninjeffhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02489574463256645325noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2849799910289541004.post-27426116633659146422008-08-10T11:44:00.000-07:002008-08-10T11:49:45.932-07:00

I came across this video earlier today. It's from the Anime series to Sayounara Zetsubou Sensei, and it seems to reenvision some of the characters as Magical Girls. It's all very reminiscent of Sailor Moon and the PowerPuff Girls Anime. I'm convinced now more than ever that I need to watch this series again, if only to figure out WTH is going on.

Ninjeffhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02489574463256645325noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2849799910289541004.post-47852602919860432362008-08-07T21:48:00.000-07:002008-08-07T22:35:55.449-07:00

Today I get to talk about two of my favorite subjects which rarely overlap: Anime and Social Media. Say what you will about Web 2.0 and Social Media, but these buzzwords and the ideas they represent are changing how we digest information and how many companies do business. Anime is just one of many industries being affected by this paradigm shift. Last year, writer Justin Sevakis of the Anime

Ninjeffhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02489574463256645325noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2849799910289541004.post-47536617317359905042008-08-07T21:26:00.000-07:002008-08-07T21:40:15.229-07:00

Today was the official date of Tanabata, otherwise known as the Japanese Star Festival. Much like last year, I observed the occasion by tying a wish on some local bamboo shoots. Of course, it wasn't written in Japanese like the picture to the right, but it wish was simple and inkeeping with the mythology behind the festival. From Wikipedia: Orihime, the daughter of the Tentei wove beautiful

Ninjeffhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02489574463256645325noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2849799910289541004.post-46673941828794829602008-08-06T21:44:00.000-07:002008-08-06T21:58:58.611-07:00

Speaking of Gurren Lagann: my dream has come true! I've been hoping that GoodSmile Co. would create one of their famous Nendoroid figures of Gurren Lagann's heroine, Yoko Litona. Well, sure enough, they have. Blogger Danny Choo made a lengthy and photo-filled post this morning about the upcoming Figma and Nendoroid releases, and among the many never-before-seen Nendos was Yoko (pictures below).

Ninjeffhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02489574463256645325noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2849799910289541004.post-38364451146651053192008-08-05T20:59:00.000-07:002008-08-05T21:08:05.144-07:00

I've been working the last couple nights on a new, more professional header for this blog. After a few designs, I finally settled on this one. The background (i.e. the orange and black bars) are designed to extend with the size of each user's computer screen. I'm having difficulty implementing this in blogger though. As you can see, I want a simple navigation for the top of the page, but I can't

Ninjeffhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02489574463256645325noreply@blogger.com1