Niko

Ahhhh, had a pretty good weekend. :) 

Other Random Stuff:
 

On the upside, I did read a really good book this week:  The Winter Prince by Elizabeth Wein.  More and more, I find that I enjoy this sort of shorter, perfectly told story more than the longer, epic works that fantasy is famous for.  This was actually a reread from many years ago, and I'm thrilled to find out that she's actually written sequels since then.  Can't wait for the Amazon shipment to arrive.  :)  The book itself is an Arthurian-inspired story that focuses on Mordred (Medraut, in the book) and his relationship with Arthur's younger, legitimate son, Lleu.  Just like with Idylls of the Queen a while back, I love the more intimate story here.  There are elements of the greater Arthurian mythos as a backdrop, but the focus is extremely narrow, giving you a detailed look at one or two characters, rather than trying to retell the whole legend.  I think I'm developing a real Mordred-kink.  His portrayal in these two books is so wonderfully conflicted noble and committed to rightness, but unable to escape the taint of his birth.  It pulls at all my woobly little h/c strings, as well as making for a great story as this strong character is torn between his loyalties to Arthur and Morgawse.

Finished R.O.D. the TV, and am not terribly impressed, honestly.  I'd heard such raves of this show, and I wonder if it's one of those things that appeals to guys more than girls for some reason.  I found the series a bit of a slog throughout, but things really took a nosedive once two particular spoilerly characters arrived.  You could tell that it was supposed to up the stakes and add new tension, but to me it just diffused the situation so that the plot got all meandery and trudging.  I can't say I'm a fan.

One Piece dub:  I have to say, I'm a bit disappointed.  I have a tremendous love for Funimation's dubs, and this wasn't outright *bad*... but it's also not their best work, imo.  In particular, Luffy was just way too generic.  So much of the success of One Piece relies on Luffy's charisma.  Sure, he's a doofus... but his boundless/clueless optimism and excitement is so infectious that you can't help but be drawn into his special brand of idiocy.  It's important for his voice actor to sell that charisma, or the show becomes no better than any other shonen jump fare.  I'm not wailing and gnashing my teeth over a one episode sample, or anything, and I'll be first in line for the uncut sets.  But I do hope things improve for the sake of the franchise here in the U.S.

The Dark is Rising movie has apparently opened... or will be soon.  Heard an interview on NPR with Susan Cooper earlier this week, and any excitement I had for the movie is pretty much dead.  This is one of my beloved childhood series, and it sounds like they did a real hatchet job on it.  *sigh*

Well, I've shifted my Japan plans to do a European thing instead.  It's going to involve more work for me because I'm doing this one without a tour, but my excitement levels are back up.

I'm also getting into my   "Gee, my birthday is only a month away.  I deserve a present. Or two. Or three." mode.  I don't want to go as crazy as I did on my artbook-spree last year, but I'm definitely eyeing THIS and THIS, with perhaps a smidgen of THIS because there's something frighteningly adorable about chibi-fied Light.

There are also Light and L dolls coming out in the same quality as the Mushishi one, but two more at that price is too rich for my blood, even if they would be perfect alongside that Ryuk figure.  <sigh>

LOL...as I'm typing about Death Note figures, Sam & Dean are on the TV talking about guys in prison dying of heart attacks.  It's not a ghost, guys! It's Kira! :)

Man, I knew that the Borders Rewards program was too useful to last long, but still...  *sigh*

The old program:  For every $50 spent in the store, you basically get a "10% off entire purchase" coupon good until the end of the next month.  Plus some small percentage of every purchase goes into a "Holiday" account to get additional $X.XX off of purchases made around Christmas.  So if you're like me and spend a lot of money on books & manga, you can stop in once a month, spend $60 (some of which comes off from the 10% coupon), earn next month's coupon, and also earn a little cash towards a bigger discount at the end of the year.  Decent deal, and one that made me change my buying habits from sporadic binge-shopping at whatever bookstore happened to be handy, to a steady budget that was all directed right at Borders.  Even during months when I only had $30-worth of books that I really *needed*, I would usually throw a few more on the pile just to get up to that $50 target.

The new program:  A single $5-off coupon for every $150 spent in the store.  Period.   For my $50/month habit, that's a fair drop from the $15 off I would've gotten with the 10% discounts.  Not to mention the loss of the holiday cash bonus.

They just completely killed any brand loyalty they had built with me...

I assume this trend is occurring everywhere, but in the last four months my area has seen an explosion of "Dinner Solutions" joints.  The gimmick for these places is that you pick 12 dinners from a menu (which changes monthly), go to their location, and move through 12 stations in which they have set up everything you need to make the dinner.  You combine the ingredients there, then take the meals home, stick 'em in your freezer, and have a freezer full of ready-to-cook meals all set for the next two weeks.

As someone who *never* cooks, this idea has had a lot of appeal, and I finally went to one shortly before Christmas.  At first, I was a little leary of the results.  There was more work required than I expected to get the food from the freezer to the table, and the recipes weren't quite as customizable as I'd been lead to believe.  (They advertise that you can tweak the recipes if there are certain seasonings or ingredients that you don't like, but half the meals had pre-made elements like sauces that you had no control over, and for a few they had the whole meal pre-made and just handed to you when you got there.

My gripes not withstanding, I've made two meals now, and I am *such* a believer.  They've been *delicious*.  Like restaurant meals... interesting and flavorful and *SO* much better than the crappy food I make myself. :)

And the best part is that the servings are perfect.  I paid $109.00 for the "Half-Portion" option.  It got me 12 meals that serve 2-3 people.  Since I'm single, this is just right for me.  I cook one meal, have half of it the first night and save the rest for later in the week.  No mammoth portions left over or ingredients left to rot because I only used one scoop of something.  $109.00 for 24 dinners =  $4.55 per dinner...  not bad at all. :)    When you consider time saved and the fun of having different menus available to you every month, this is my favorite consumer fad ever.  :)