music and romance can be complicated

I don't usually like Manga based off of dating sims because it builds up all of this romantic tension and then doesn't follow through. This one wasn't so bad though, and because of the art and the story telling.

I do get really annoyed at the lead though, there is no way a person can be so clueless as to not notice that Six guys are seriously interested in her. I know it's necessary to drive the story but it makes her look seriously stupid. The books also seem to have a bit of a Madonna complex in regards to her, which is a bit creepy, especially when the guys who are romantically interested in her start thinking of her in motherly ways. I know it's mild, but ick.

The series is really good at building romantic tension though, so if you are a fan of that (as I am) then check this series out. It's also about music, which is beautiful and great so that's another reason to give it a try.

I also found the inclusion of a whole new set of characters very distracting. I kept thinking that there was so little space left, so why waste it on people we aren't invested in? Bah.

This is a good book for young tweens, since the romance is high, but the actual contact between bodies is (incredibly) low. There isn't even kissing, except maybe once on the forehead.

They were there, but then I left.

So i was reading along, thinking this would be your average slice of life shojo manga. I generally like that genre, and even though the guy love interest was a little needy and annoying and there was some slut shaming of his dead girlfriend i was managing to enjoy it enough to continue.

Then the big gap happened. If you've read it you know that there's a five year period where boyfriend just drops off the map, doesn't tell anyone where he is, if he's alive, anything. Just gone. Now if it were me, that would be the point where I say "forget that loser, I'm better then this" and move on, but noooo. Apparently boyfriend is so special and damaged that she cannot forget him and chastely waits until he will some day come back. And I use the word chaste on purpose here, because despite the fact that they dated for over a year they do not have sex. They almost do, twice, but never actually get there. And then since she's waiting for him she still doesn't have sex, even after she starts dating his best friend and pretty much living with him. With the fact that the first (now dead) girlfriend is painted as a whore (the word is actually used by boyfriend in regards to her) it makes for some creepy parallels.

Oh and the reason boyfriend ran away? It seems to be a mix of needing to be needed/help the emotionally weak and also a fear of being actually loved. How's that for baggage? Yeah, I think teens would like this series, but it was too melodramatic and had way to many broken relationships/people for me. Real adult relationships are so far away from what's shown in this book that they look like completely different species.

I guess I did find it entertaining enough to finish it though...

Visioning as a map

We met as a trio last week with J, the library's ambassador to the LLDP program (she helps us find our way, and makes us more comfortable there, so that's how I think of her. It's not her actual title, in fact she's like our sempei in that she's already completed the LLDP training and now is there to liaison and help us through it too. ). During the meeting we talked a lot about what we had covered during the last two sessions, coaching and visioning. I've already written about coaching so today I want to go over having a vision statement.

My mother often listened to those motivational tapes growing up, she was especially fond of Zig Zigler.I don't know why but I got it into my head that doing so was a little silly (I was six and pretty much unformed play-doe) and I've kept some of that feeling ever since. Of course your brain is a powerful tool, and you can use it in many ways to better your life, or even to help keep you physically healthy. This kind of thinking is being studied by scientists and far from silly as I once believed, but still the idea of it has kind of eluded me. It took an explanation from B (my book making friend) to really help me understand why we vision. She said to put your goal on the path you want to take and then move back from there to where you are. Not only can you see where you want to be (motivation) but every step you take on the path is now clearer. One decision may look nicer, but it could take you further away from your goal. In that sense a vision statement is like having a map to where you want to be. If it wasn't for B, and E (my trio) and Ambassador J I would not have this understanding now. I still haven't really learned to fully use this new skill, but I hope to. I have some pretty clear goals that I'd like to get out of this program.

Anyway the next two sessions are next week. We're working on collaboration, so I need to go do the pre-reading and find an article. I'll write more again after the sessions.

Coaching

I have been thinking some more on coaching, and while it has bee difficult to practice I've been trying to implement it more in my daily life. Not so much at work, because I don't care what they say about leading from where you stand there are some lines that you just don't cross (especially as a young person). So I've tried doing it with the students I've worked with at the desk and with my friends. It's HARD to not give advice when people tell you their problems, like really hard.

So I get that the main idea behind coaching is to help people come to the realization about what they want to do in a situation, which outcome suits them best. Giving advice may feel better to the giver but it can wildly miss the mark too, and occasionally leave the receiver very upset. For personal examples I'll offer up my poor dad, who just couldn't understand why I wouldn't major in a science in University. I could never explain why it wouldn't do, even though it should have been easier for my dyslexic self to manage. But then I am pretty stubborn, and will often take the hard path out of spite just to prove I can.

Coaching is kind of a difficult skill to learn, although it seems like it wouldn't be. It involves active listening, and asking pertinent open ended questions. That's pretty much it... I guess I'll follow up again after the next session?

LLDP intro

Well I'm back in a new library learning situation, so I thought I might get back into blogging a little. It won't be as interesting as the manga stuff, but I'm sure you'll all love to hear about it anyway.

So our Library Leadership Development programme has been running at our library for many years, and ours is the fifth set of people to go through it. Apparently almost 50% of our staff will have done it by the end of our group, which is pretty major given the size of our system.

The first two sessions ran over the last couple days, so I'll have some time to work on the homework until the next sessions next month. I'm most interested in meeting with my trio, who are badass ladies. One of which reads my blog, so I'll be careful to say nothing but high praise for her :P Joking of course, since she's my partner in crime and a book making goddess extraordinaire. My other partner is not well known to me, but she's a full librarian and seems super nice and sweet too. I'm excited to get to know her as well, and maybe by the end of this I'll have nifty new praise words for her too.

Well that's the intro, I should probably talk about what we learned (so much) or the food (so good) but i don't have much to say about vision statements or coaching skills. So next time kiddies, next time.

A forced intrest in Pinterest

So against my better judgement I joined Pinterest today (http://pinterest.com/)and I'm still not sure what I think of it.

I generally don't go in for design or other things like that, but I wish this had existed two years ago when I was planning my wedding. So many visual ideas for so very many things...it's almost overwhelming.

So far my interests seem to lie mostly in the garden and in yarn bombing my community, but pretty much everyone who knows me would have told you that. I'll have to give it a little more time before I decide to keep up with the play, or throw it away.

Why I like my place of work

One of the best things about working on a large campus is that something is always going on. Sometimes it's the big things like plays, concerts and art shows. Some times it's the little things. Today in the tunnel there where several booths set up for the students and other general passerby. Not only did I get to learn about asthma, healthy eating and job opportunities I also got free popcorn and a doughnut egg (more commonly known as a Timbit). It's the constant whirl of activity and change that keeps this place interesting, even at it's worst.

Literature map

So this is cool, apparently you put a writer's name in and it makes a map of other authors a reader is likely to enjoy. Great for reader's advisory, so long as you don't need to go into detail about why an author is liked. It's a great first step for doing research on your own.

Here's a link, go put your own authors in and try it! http://www.literature-map.com/

Songza

So I found a cool new music thing! Finally! It's called Songza, obviously, and it's free!

So if you log in online or on your phone, you get to a "concierge" Who asks you what mood you are in limited by the time of day (Wednesday has "cooking dinner," "reading," and "winding down," etc... as moods) and then offers some musical genres to pick from. It's a little like Stereomood, but I think it's a bit better because you can pick the types of music you like as well as your feelings.

I find I like this feature the most because it's allowing me to find genres that I usually wouldn't listen to. For instance I find I like folk metal, even though I didn't know that existed before this program. After all you have to respect a genre that uses harpsichords and bagpipes with skill. Of course I also listen to styles I already love, I'm guilty listening to a show tunes playlist right now my sister's opinion be damned. :P

One limiting factor is that when I first started listening on my phone the only genre it would give me was indie music. Apparently this was because it was using the three or four songs already on my phone to decide what I liked. It isn't smart enough to know that those aren't a good enough sample, ha ha. Oh and it also gives you the oportuninty to buy songs you especially like. I haven't tried that out yet, but I suspect that this is why they can offer free music so if something awesome comes up I probably will.

I am bad and I should feel bad

Turns out I don't use most of the cool tools that ifttt connects for you. Now I have to go learn all of the things. That gets both a :( and a :) from me. I swear I will get somewhat tech savvy one of these days!

IFTTT is a gift for lazy people

So ifttt stands for "if This then That" and it connects different media actions for you. You can set it up (for instance) to post to Facebook every time you create a blog post. You can get it to do so many different things automatically and without thought on your part, kind of like your lungs breathing in air or your heart beating. It can be a great time saver, or a new way to waste it. I'll let you know how it turns out for me.

A new thing I'm trying

So I'm going to try out the brainchild of Library 23 things. It's called Year for Productivity and it looks really great. Lets see how far I get! http://www.academicpkm.org/

Bunny Drop

This is a series I would hesitate to add to a collection read by youngsters. Not because of violence or sex, but because of the implications of some of the relationships involved. Let me explain a little first... (Huge, huge Spoiler alert a head!)


Usagi drop follows Daikichi, a grown man on the rise in his field and Rin, the orphaned daughter of his grandfather. Rin is seen as a bit of a scandal because the grandfather was quite old, and the mother is a complete unknown to the family. After the grandfather's death no one wants to raise Rin and so Daikichi, who is single and awkward, blurts out that he will take Rin in. Most of the stories from there follow them as they grow into a family and raise Rin. This is all done in the sweetest style and you just feel so heart warmed watching it. The sacrifices he makes for this little girl simply because it's the right thing to do make you wish that every family could be like theirs. After a very short time he comes to love her and she grows to trust him and their days are spent gently living.

This is the point that the anime cuts off. Since I came to the story through the anime I then went to search out the manga and was surprised to see the second part. About ten years later Rin is in high school and still living with Daikichi who is still single. Okay, that's fine because we can follow Rin as she matures and eventually falls in love and has her own family. Still very sweet, except she has her sights on Daikichi... ummm, she's his aunt isn't she?

Turns out that she's not, and is no biological relation to the man who raised her. That hurdle being passed they then decide to continue on as husband and wife. I find this a little skeezy personally, since the man did raise her, and such. It's a little bit to close to incest to me. I really liked the early half, and even the attempt at making this relationship happen might have gotten to me if I didn't think things through. It's a well told story, but if you run a library I'd read the whole thing before buying it for your shelves.

It's not easy to make new friends when you see spirits

Natsume and the book of friends is another slice of life show, but with a twist. Natsume is a young boy just on the edge of manhood who has come to live with distant relatives in a new town. He is wary of trusting people since he see's what most people cannot, and has often been called a liar and excluded because of it. He has one link to his heritage: an old book from his grandmother filled with the names of local spirits. His grandmother is the only other person he knows of who could see what he sees, and while he's never met her he feels a deep kinship with her.

The book, called the book of friends, is mostly made up of contracts his grandmother bullied spirits to make. The names give the holder power over the deamon or spirit that goes with it. While Natsume and his grandmother have much in common, their outlook about the spirits is completely opposite. Grandmother Reiko overpowers the spirits and then never asks for help while Natsume goes out of the way to return the names and give aid to human and spirit alike.

Now I've been calling them spirits but they aren't quite, being an entire pantheon of local mythology. I could use the term demon or monster or such, but I think the closest we come to them are the old versions of the fey. Some are evil and some good, some powerful and some inconsequential, but all are alien to humanity. Natsume and those like him are the only bridge between the two cultures, and that's important because to Natsume both the spirits and the people in the town are new friends. Learning to trust, and to balance his two lives, is what makes this show so good. That and his "pet cat" who's attitude goes something like this: "good night Westley, sweet dreams. I'll most likely kill you in the morning." Something most cat owners are undoubtedly familiar with.

Kimi to Boku, you and me

Another slice of life drama I've been watching is called You and Me, based on the manga Kimi to Boku (Which I'm also reading. I did not get my name from this Japanese word, I'm not nearly that clever. I also wish this had been around when I first started watching anime, back then in order to watch anime with a mixed group you almost always watched something with crazy martial arts, giant mecca, or a harem fantasy. The first two don't really interest me, but are okay. The last one is kinda ick (I should do a rant as to why I'm anti-harem shows someday....).

Anyway this show is about boys, and it's for boys. It was first serialized in a shonen magazine, which is usually all the above kinds of anime, but also can carry sports and violence and cars now that more stuff comes across to North America. Don't get me wrong, those are all great things and if you have a young male or my sister on your hands those things will keep them happy and occupied. I just think that there should also be more that those little boxes of things for guys to watch, and while this one doesn't strongly scream masculine pursuits, it was made for the boys so...

The plot centers around four high school boys; twins Yuki and Yuta who are both laid back types but with subtle differences, Shun who is the girly sweet heart of the group, and Kaname who is the glasses wearing head of class type. Part way through the first season they are joined by Chizuru, who is half German and a bit of a class clown. While all of the boys are kind of stereotypes or tropes I think it's the way the show plays with that that really makes it good. Each one goes through their days pretty averagely, but it's the friendship between them that makes their days special.


Edit: I should note that most of the emotional elements are shown in cut away scenes where the characters are represented by cats. I don't know why they do this, but it's kind of awesome.

Lions and Tigers and a whole lot of Bears, oh my!

So I've been playing about on Crunchyroll lately (go Google it, it's awesome) and I've been finding so many great anime shows to watch. The conventional anime companies, and who thought we could ever say that, seem to translate predominately boy flavored shows. Maybe because the hyper girly stuff that was the only other option didn't sell at all and the last bastion of such has now closed their doors forever. But the stuff I'm finding (legally! Woohoo) online is neither of those things. Instead I find myself watching calming slice of life dramas, shows that are more character than plat driven. They have the atmosphere of a Saturday summer afternoon when you have just nothing to do.

One big favorite lately is called Polar Bear Cafe, and it's literally about a cafe run by a polar bear. I expected it to be a children's show but it's not. It has quite a few gags (the polar bear loves bad puns, which are usually illustrated for the viewer) but it also has some very smart moments. On in particular is when a new human moves into town and he's shocked to see animals working, and so many at once! Up until that point the show just accepts that animals can talk and work like humans do, so you take that as an ordinary occurrence. It's an odd bit of world building, but it works to leave the viewer just a little bit unsteady and confused.

The show has a lot of heart, and is filled with a soft sweetness that is in no ways cloying. I also don't think I've ever laughed so hard at an anime before. Go check it out at Crunchyroll, since free is the best price.

I'll go back to Manga, but here's a book to tide you over

The Lady by Anne McCaffrey

My rating: 4 of 5 stars


This is an odd book, it doesn't really match McCaffrey's other works and it's really a shame she didn't write more like it. I never had a horse girl phase, but some of my friends did and I always thought it was kind of stupid. We lived in a city, most of us would never see a horse let alone ride one. This is the first and only horse book I've ever read and it makes me see why girls go horse crazy.

The book is set in Ireland in the 70's, and it has a surprising number of focuses. Sure it's about horses, but it's also about a family, and about a young girl becoming a grown woman, and about politics and about love. One interesting factor is the coverage it gives to the rights of women, which is a pretty deep topic to cover in a novel. McCaffrey does it pretty well, she gives us enough detail to see that the issue is important but she doesn't overwhelm or get preachy. That's important in a novel, since most people will go to a non-fic book (or Wikipedia, lol) for hard facts.

I've read this book about five times and while there are a few details I don't like (extra marital affairs, anyone?) something about this book really draws me. I think it may be how the characters really feel like real people. They have flaws, and some of those flaws are pretty big, but I still think it would be neat to go visit them and learn about horses and riding. That's a pretty big thing to learn for a horse book hating girl.



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Flicking back and forth over Flickr

I found my flicker account again! So I might actually use it again, depending on how easy it is to get pictures off of my camera and phone. The new phone links photo's right to Facebook at the press of a button but it's more difficult for Flickr. Then again Flickr isn't a privacy seller like Facebook so it's definitely has an edge.

Cantarella

Cantarella is a rare manga that follows real historic people, in this case the Borgia family. The main character is Cesare Borgia, and the narrative follows him as he grows up and takes on his destiny. I enjoyed how it tried to follow a more neutral path than many other stories about this family. For people who have enjoyed the Assassins Creed games you might find this confusing, but then Cantarella takes a lot less artistic license than the games.

The art is gorgeous.
One thing that might be a bit off putting is the amount of violence in this series, although I don't think it's excessive considering the time period. There is also a bit of mystical stuff to hinder the true historian. Cesare's father sells his son's soul to become Pope, etc. Given that this is set in medieval/ Renaissance period I think that it still fits the the story.

I haven't read much of this series yet, but I plan to finish it soon. I really started to feel for the main characters and how they were trapped and shaped by the ambitions of the people around them. Of course it's easy to enjoy if you are new to the story, or if you already know it and can see the foreshadowing. At the very least it makes reading about history fun and rich, and oh so pretty to look at.

Hikaru no Go

Now back when I was a kid and manga was new to these shores manga for boys mostly consisted of harem manga, with full fan service, and giant robots with people in them beating each other up. Things have changed since then and there are a lot more options and genres available.

One genre I see a lot of now is sports manga like Prince of Tennis, Whistle, Rebound and many others. These generally consist of one Joe average who loves the game but isn't really very good at it and often is the worst player on the team. They usually end up succeeding through some special inner skill and a whole boat lad of determination and love of the game. I'm sure you recognize the plot from any number of western sports movies.

Hikaru no Go is a little different than most of this genre; firstly because Go is more like chess then football, and secondly because Go is usually played by old men and not boys. To get around this the main character, a punk kid named Hikari Shindo, is haunted by the ghost of a great Go player named Fujiwara-no-Sai. In order to get his life back Hikari starts to learn to play Go, mostly to keep Sai off his back. He unwittingly starts to love the game and eventually finds himself playing against the strongest player in his age group as Sai. This starts a rivalry between the boys and Hikari vows to reach the other young man so that they can play as equals.

For someone who could easily have Sai switch in whenever he starts to lose Hikari is surprisingly honest. He never cheats except by ignorance of the game and often has to keep Sai from playing when he shouldn't. Unlike other boy types there is almost no violence 9other than a few school yard scraps) and no sex or other things you might like your young men to avoid. It's manga like this that proves you can tell a good story, and keep boys engaged, with out resorting to an "R" rating.