Saturday, April 9, 2016

A basic update

Well shit. I did not want to release non-content but this time I have to. Revision classes have started so I have to start sacrificing more of my free time to my books. That said, I will attempt to continue my look at Pillars of Eternity and make a part 3 as soon as possible.

I will also state what anime I will be looking at for this season namely Sakamoto desu ga?, Kabaneri of the Iron Fortress and Kuma Miko. The first for something similar to One Punch Man in terms of comedy, the second for the steampunk aesthetics (while praying it does not end up being lame like Attack on Titan) and the third for unexpected curve-balls in comedy. 

As for last season's anime, I will say that my faith in Konosuba was well rewarded as it wound up being quite entertaining from start to finish. The writing is nothing spectacular but a solid piece that kept me entertained whenever I found time to watch it. My negative views on Aqua are still justified but now I am rather fond of Darkness and Megumin as characters since there are depths to the characters. Kazuma is still an arse but I would not be surprised if that did not change as the jerk with the heart of gold routine may be necessary around a bunch of scrubs in Konosuba.

Erased rushed through its ending but compared to the manga's overly drawn out confrontation across a rope bridge (I shit you not), this ending may be a lot better. I am aware that some people are rather angry that Kayo not ending up with Satoru which is rather immature since Satoru does not even mind it. He's simply grateful for the fact that she got a life and a chance to recover from her past abuse in this timeline when in the original timeline, she was murdered and the abuse she suffered from was never uncovered. As for her, she does mention waiting for Satoru for a long while but had to recognise the possibility of him never waking up; a rather realistic portrayal of being in love with a coma patient and the risks of said love. At least, Satoru still ends up with someone from the original timeline that he found again.

Now, back to work. 



Friday, April 1, 2016

A beard

This is an odd topic to write about. Mainly because my own facial hair resembles a prepubescent goatee rather than any facial hair worth writing home about. Fictional materials however have used the beard for a variety of reasons, whether it is to make a character seem mature, wise epic or to hide the artist's inability to draw a good chin. So let's GROW A BEARD together since it makes life easier.
http://vignette2.wikia.nocookie.net/lotr/images/e/e7/Gandalf_the_Grey.jpg/revision/latest?cb=20121110131754

So let's talk about beards.

Beards are quite useful in cold weather where the extra layer of hair can protect the face from the cold air. To contrast this, beards can be irritating especially when eating food with some from of liquid topping that can cover the facial hair (even worse if the beard is part of a goatee). THEN AGAIN, a long beard can be used for storing small items. Thus, the reader should GROW A BEARD!


http://vignette3.wikia.nocookie.net/witcher/images/b/b9/Tw3_geralt_journal.png/revision/latest?cb=20160321140042
Some beards can be used to show off experience. In the above's case; Geralt having traveled the land, hunting monsters for a living, barely has anytime to shave properly resulting in a decent amount of facial hair. A world weary traveller or an experienced wanderer could be marked either with a large amount of scars and/or a decent beard. A subversion is where a charlatan makes use of their appearance to look experienced in order to exploit others for money or whatever strikes their fancy. So grow a beard to look experienced BUT be sure to let people know, you grew it for the experience.


http://vignette1.wikia.nocookie.net/harrypotter/images/e/ee/Rubeushagrid.PNG/revision/latest?cb=20090730174208
On the other hand, a beard could indicate unpleasantness, especially if the person with such beard constantly has a dirty beard with food stuck in between. It can be used to remind people that this person is not a role-model while the other person with the trimmed beard is. It could also be used to show how rugged they are or show that beneath that dirty untrimmed mess lies a person with a heart of gold making the poor first impression nothing more than a superficial critique, critiques like the first sentence of this paragraph. So in a nutshell, I am a bad person for not having a beard to understand these people. So to avoid being bad, GROW A BEARD!

http://vignette3.wikia.nocookie.net/merlin1/images/3/33/Old-Merlin_series4promo.jpg/revision/latest?cb=20120211004021
Extremely long beards have a story of their own. They either indicate wisdom beyond their years like with wizards or that they did not have access to a shaving blade for years and have reached the point where they require scissors instead. The long bearded wise individual in popular culture probably started with Merlin (I am working with what I remember, not what I look up) so it could actually be a case of both working in tandem; the wise and powerful trickster wizard probably needed some kind of super-razor to shave his magical beard. So to become wise, GROW A BEARD! It will make you into a mix of Odin and Loki with twice the hotness!

There are more ways to use a beard but if I list them all, I'll just be spoiling the surprise. So, go forth and discover every use for a beard. I have found several so far, most of them irritating but those with longer beards may discover more. So to find out more, GROW A BEARD!

From this extremely short post, the reader now knows why one should GROW A BEARD even if they are of another gender, race, religion etc. They are functional and can be used to let people know of your personality. Even if the reader cannot grow one, the reader can attempt to. So beards, go forth and multiply! Subjugate humanity if you must!

Happy April Fools reader.