Category: Anime

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New Projects and Blogs

Wow… It’s been awhile since my last post, but I’ve been working on a new project which isn’t quite ready to be revealed yet. It will be in due time. I’ve also started 3 separate blogs:

  • HD Trailers – A blog about HD (High Definition) Trailers and how to download them
  • Modern Evolution – Evolution is happening everywhere around us today.
  • Sue Happy – Just how “Sue Happy” is America?

The latter 2 are just collections of articles which I find particularly interesting, while also giving my opinion on them. The 1st one (HD Trailers) might be retired once my “project” gets completed.

Random Crap:

Perfect Petzzz (from Cari) – These sleeping puppies and kittens plush / stuffed animals are so cute!!!

Yahoo! Be a Better Planet (from SD) – Yahoo! is on a mission to find and reward America’s most eco-friendly city. Can your hometown claim that title? Join in now to help your city win a fleet of hybrid taxis, and get free compact fluorescent light bulbs (CFLs) for your efforts. I’ve also been a big fan for fluorescent light. Not only because it saves me a bunch on my electricity bill, but also the fact that it’s white light compared to the yellowish light most regular light bulbs emit. Also, you never burn yourself trying to touch one, because it just never gets that hot.

Prosthetics (from Digg) – Robert Barron is a master of disguises. He uses his artistry to create realistic body parts for those who are missing them.

The man who owns the Internet – Kevin Ham is the most powerful dotcom mogul you’ve never heard of, reports Business 2.0 Magazine. Here’s how the master of Web domains built a $300 million empire.

Online Savings from Washington Mutual (from SD) – Wamu apparently has joined the rank of the online high interest savings account game. Although 5% isn’t shocking to many, the good thing about Wamu is the fact they have branches everywhere. You can easily link up your checking account and online savings account. When you use your Wamu ATM card at any ATM, they won’t charge you any fee. I’m not certain if they’ll refund the fees that the ATM itself charges, but Wamu has always been customer friendly in my opinion.

Robot Arm Pours Beer Into Glass (from MS newsgroup) – You’ve probably seen the Kuka Robotic Arm in other videos before (one even had it swinging samurai swords around), but this one is program to perfect beer pouring from a bottle into a glass.

Hjo3 posted this awhile back about how the opening song of BPS (Battle Programmer Shirase) is actually using the melody of Rick Astley – Never Gonna Give You Up. I never knew this, then again I’m not that familiar with songs from the 80’s and 70’s, but this was interesting trivia knowledge. I do have to say, Rick Astley’s voice doesn’t quite match his face.

Ant Buster (from Digg) – Another Tower Defense type of game, where this time, there’s actually more freedom for the attackers, and the attackers (ants) are actually stealing pieces of pizza from you.

Xbox LIVE Brings You Even More Matrix Content (from Ars) – I got my copy a few days ago. Circuit City had it on sale for $20 (price mistake) and they actually decided to ship 1 copy per customer, which was pretty cool. Then again, I don’t have a HD DVD player yet, but Matrix being my favorite movie of all time, I have a hard time deciding if I should sell this or not. Plus the fact, I can download the Animatrix in HD via Xbox Live makes it even tougher. When you purchase The Complete Matrix Trilogy, you will also receive a token in the box to download the entire Animatrix series from Xbox LIVE® Marketplace. Unfortunately, I posted this a bit too late, but you were also able to download HD trailers and clips of the Matrix via Xbox Live: From May 15 through May 25, download free content like HD trailers from all three Matrix movies and some of your favorite scenes in HD like “Bullet Time in the Subway” and “Morpheus fighting Agent Smith.” You can also purchase and download themes for all three films plus Animatrix.

Captive shark had ‘virgin birth’ (from Digg) – Female hammerhead sharks can reproduce without having sex, scientists confirm. Story was somewhat interesting, but the funniest was when commented: Jesus Shark?

Top 4 Ways You’re Wasting Gas When You Think You’re Saving It (from Digg) –

  1. Driving across town to save a nickel on a gallon of gas.
  2. Driving on the highway with their windows down to avoid using the air conditioner.
  3. Driving with their truck’s tailgate down.
  4. Accelerating extremely slowly.

#1 is a toughie. I agree that it’s rather stupid to drive across tow to save a nickel per gallon, but what about driving 3 blocks or planning a trip across town so you can stop by the cheap gas station? CDMCC and I had an argument about this awhile back. It wasn’t really about saving on gas, but the time you spent driving 3 extra blocks to save a dime per gallon. If you have a 15 gallon tank, that equates to a saving of $1.50. To drive those 3 extra blocks, you’ve wasted more than 5 minutes already. Is 5 minutes of time really worth the $1.50 savings? I dunno, but coming from a family that squeezes the most out of a penny, I’m always willing to drive the 3 extra blocks, and with tools like Seattle Gas Prices (or the corresponding gas price searching tool for your area), it makes it easy to find the gas stations that is cheap and not too far out of your way.

#2 is also something I’ve known for awhile, since Mechy often talked about aerodynamics of car. Opening windows just breaks that efficiency.

15 (Painfully) Unforgettable Cartoon Theme Songs (from Digg) – It’s tragic, really. For every math formula forgotten, every anniversary that passes unremembered, and every pet ferret dead from starvation, there’s a cartoon theme song from our youth, tenaciously hogging our limited mental hard drive space. In what is perhaps some sort of small attempt to exorcise these demonically persistent tunes from the depths of our consciousness, we’ve ranked 15 of them through the highly technical and thoroughly researched process of writing down whichever ones we could remember/find on YouTube first. Enjoy. Haha! Ungsunghero and I enjoyed this post as it sure brought back a bunch of memories. We even pointed out a few that they forgot to include: Chip ‘n Dale Rescue Rangers and Darkwing Duck. What happened to cartoons? They use to be awesome and now, they’re just the same stupid crap over and over again.

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Highlander – The Search For Vengeance

The animation was really good, however the storyline seemed a bit rushed. It was great that they mixed real history into it, but there wasn’t really much time to develop the characters and explain the back story. I’m guessing they were assuming that everyone’s watched the original Highlander and knew what quickening is, but the animated movie was basically fight after fight, which may be a good thing for some. The fight scenes were indeed really cool.

Official Site
IMDb: User Rating: 7.4/10
Anime News Network
Amazon.com DVD
MY RATING: 7/10

You can watch the trailer on the official site.

highlander - the search for vengeance poster dvd cover

Spoilers: (Show)

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Emoticons – East vs West

Emoticons carry cultural baggage –

Emoticons act as proxies for facial expressions, and there are a lot of studies showing that many facial expressions can be interpreted correctly by all human cultures. Despite that universality, however, there are subtle differences in interpretations across cultures. The authors propose a model in which a culture’s interpretation of facial expressions is dependent upon a combination of the culture’s emotional openness and the challenge of controlling certain facial muscles. As they put it, “Given that the eyes are more difficult to control than the mouth when people express emotions, we predicted that individuals in cultures where emotional subduction is the norm (such as Japan) would focus more strongly on the eyes than the mouth when interpreting others’ emotions. By contrast, we predicted that people in cultures where overt emotional expression is the norm (such as the US) would tend to interpret emotions based on the position of the mouth, because it is the most expressive part of the face.“

You can download the research paper here (PDF). To bring this point across, they provide this example:

For example, in the United States the emoticons :) and :-) denote a happy face, whereas the emoticons :( or :-( denote a sad face. However, Japanese tend to use the symbol (^_^) to indicate a happy face, and (; _ ;) to indicate a sad (or crying) face (Pollack, 1996).

Random Crap:

Puget Custom Computer’s mineral-oil-cooled PC (from Maxxius) – We’ve definitely seen our share of wacky CPU cooling (and silencing) schemes, but most liquid-cooling setups aren’t as, uh, immersive as Puget Custom Computer’s mineral-oil-cooled PC. Essentially a motherboard in an aquarium topped off with fluid, the Washington company claims the oil effectively cools system components for up to 12 hours at peak load. While traditional homebrew oil-cooling setups use vegetable oil, the Puget crew chose mineral oil because it’s perfectly clear and, more importantly, doesn’t go rancid after a while. Disadvantage? Large quantities of mineral oil are difficult to find — Puget had to explain what they were doing to a local vet, who normally uses the stuff as a horse laxative. That means those of you looking to build one of these better get friendly with Fido’s doc, cause Puget isn’t planning on selling these. Peep a vid of the crazy setup — including the aquarium’s bubble bar in action — after the jump. I’ve seen my share of mineral oil cooled PCs, but this is the first one I’ve seen in a aquarium. Usually the ones I’ve seen are in Styrofoam boxes.

If this thread is true: Citi Dividend Platinum Select MasterCard – 5% rebate again YMMV, those who have the Citi Dividend Platinum Select card might have their cashback program bumped back up to 5%. A few months ago, they dropped the cashback program from 5% to 2% and I’ve completely stopped using them and swapped over to my Chase Cash Rewards card, which had exactly the same 5% cashback program. However, that card is no longer available to apply for and basically I’m grandfathered in.

I found this image off someone’s FaceBook picture and thought it was really cute and decided to share it.
bleach kon plush
Kon Plush (from Bleach)

10 Totally Stupid Online Business Ideas That Made Someone Rich (from Digg) – I wish I cam up with a stupid idea that made me rich too!

Wis. festival sells deep-fried testicles – Around here, it may be tough to pass up anything deep-fried. Wisconsinites have deep-fried cheese curds, candy bars and Twinkies. They now have deep-fried livestock testicles, too. … “Once you get over the mental (aspect) of what you’re eating, it’s just like eating any other food, and it tastes good,” Buster Hoffman said. … “After a few beers, you can’t really tell the difference,” Joubert said. Yum?

The “official” X-clamp Replacement Success Thread, Please read the first post carefully! (from Digg) – With the recent discovery of replacing the x-clamps on the motherboard being a good fix for 3RLOD, RBJtech suggested that we keep track of results. 3RLOD = 3 red lights of death, a pun on the BSOD (blue screen of death). Many Xbox 360s have encountered this unfortunate disaster. Microsoft hasn’t released any official numbers of how many Xbox 360s have received this fate, but I recall hearing less than 1%. You’ve probably heard of the Towel Trick. Many have guessed by using the towel trick, it heats the system to the point the re-solders the gpu back correctly. However apparently if you replace the x-clamps on the Xbox 360, many have reported success in fixing their Xbox 360s. The score so far is 150 vs 7 (95.5% success rate). So if your Xbox 360 is out of warranty, there’s no harm in trying to replace your x-clamps. Detail instructions are provided over at Tutorial : X-clamp Replacement – RBJtech’s Method and Tutorial : X-clamp Replacement – Lawdawg0931’s Method.

I was reading up on some new deals with Vizio and found out that they have a 0 dead pixel policy. I was shocked! Even Samsung doesn’t offer that here in America. Most companies have a 4-7 dead pixel policy where they’ll fix or replace your LCD if you find more than the given number of dead pixels. Vizio will replace your LCD if you find just 1. From A Lot of LCD for a Little Bit of Loot – And speaking of pixels, Vizio also offers a “no dead pixel” guarantee, which is rare in the LCD TV industry, particularly at entry-level price points. I examined the L42 closely and was not able to find a single dead pixel, so kudos to Vizio in that respect.

UserFriendly – Consumer Choice Enhancement – If HBO thinks it can get away by calling DRM Digital Consumer Enablement (which by the way, enablement isn’t a real word), by that logic piracy should be called Consumer Choice Enhancement.

Infrared – More Than Your Eyes Can See (from Digg) – I was watching this video about how night vision works and I had a hard time digesting the fact they were calling everything from radio waves to microwaves to even gamma rays light. I understand they are all part of the electromagnetic spectrum, but I’ve always associated light to only the visible range of that spectrum. According to Wikipedia: Light is electromagnetic radiation with a wavelength that is visible to the eye (visible light) or, in a technical or scientific context, the word is sometimes used to mean electromagnetic radiation of all wavelengths. I guess with the latter definition, they were using it correctly.

MK vs. SF 3 (from RayAlome) – MK vs SF 3. See part 2 if you haven’t. Most likely the final one of the series. This is the 3rd and apparently final chapter of the MK vs. SF series (Mortal Kombat vs. Street Fighter). The animation is done really well as well as the fight choreography. All is done with sprites, which is amazingly pretty.

Fox sues website for “The O.J.Simpsons” (from Digg) – Fox doesn’t seem to have a sense of humor about a “Simpsons” parody that’s been going around the net called “The O.J. Simpsons,” reports TV Guide. The parody is quite obviously about O.J. Simpson, but done in the style of “The Simpsons,” with the same music and similar animation.

How not to ship a plasma TV – The guy who shipped this may or may not have been a professional delivery person. It’s tough to tell based on the work he did on this plasma TV. Seriously though, he might as well have shipped this thing using bowling balls. Or, I dunno, hammers. Ouch!

Cyclist OK after truck runs over head – A delivery truck ran over a cyclist’s head, leaving him only with a concussion and a mangled helmet. Ryan Lipscomb, 26, was shaken up, especially after he saw the condition of his helmet. Check out the damage of the helmet and you’d be surprise he’s still alive: Bike helmet crushed, but head fine (from Digg)

Teen hurt whacking bullets with hammer – – A teenager who put bullets in a vise and whacked them with a hammer to empty the brass shell casings was wounded in the abdomen by approximately the 100th bullet he hit, according to Warren County deputies. Sigh…

Texas man charged in Skittles heist – A man caught removing tires from a truck has been charged with stealing the tractor-trailer containing $250,000 worth of Skittles, police said. How many tons of Skittles is that!?!?!

Light Criticism (from Consumerist) – This is the first collaboration between the Anti-Advertising Agency and Graffiti Research Lab. Modified from Ji Lee’s Abstractor TV. We used black foam core ($10/sheet) cut with a laser cutter – however, this project can be done with an x-acto blade, black construction paper, and duct tape for next to nothing. It can be repeated using any backlit display – bus shelters, display ads, television store windows… dream big, act now. NYC’s TRUE GRAFFITI PROBLEM Watch the video here.

Coca-Cola settles lawsuits over benzene (from Consumerist) – Fanta Pineapple, Vault Zero had ingredients that could form substance. The Coca-Cola Co. has agreed to offer replacements to people who purchased two soft drinks to settle lawsuits over ingredients that can form cancer-causing benzene, the plaintiffs said Monday. The only interesting part of this article was the fact that I’m a big fan of Fanta Pineapple.

Weird Al – I’ll Sue Ya (from Consumerist) – Hilarious song from Weird Al from his new “Straight Outta Lynwood” album, done in the style of Rage Against the Machine. The vid features animation by Thomas Edward Lee. Enjoy! This is so sad, yet so true. Americans have become sue-happy.

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Fan Resonating Voice

I’m not sure what the correct word here is (in regards to resonate), but what do you call the effect when you talk into an electric fan and it makes that robotic choppy voice? Who hasn’t done that when they were small. It was so cool back then! I guess it’s still somewhat cool today.

Anyway, I was watching Lucky Star and I saw this clip (large and small versions respectively):
lucky star - fan resonating voicelucky star - fan resonating voice

Konata goes over to visit the twins Kagami and Tsukasa and seeing how there’s a fan and that they’re maybe 10 years old, Konata goes “ahhhhhhhhhhhhh” into the fan making that resonating sound. Kagami basically calls her immature. Awhile later, Tsukasa wakes up and does the same thing. Kagami as her older sister says, “Not you too!” Konata says it’s the normal thing to do. Then their father chimes in and says Kagami was doing it earlier in the morning.

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Random Crap

15 ways stores trick you into spending (from Consumerist) – Ever notice how you can go to a store to pick up just one thing and then, by the time you get to the check stand, you have five or six things in your cart and a bigger bill than you had anticipated? The list is in my opinion pretty much common sense. That’s why retail stores are so much about will power and people who purchase online don’t often have this problem. Unless of course if you browse deal sites all day long. Like this weekend, I purchased a new KitchenAid knife set ($54 shipped), some software (make $13 after rebate shipped), leather case for my Canon PowerShot SD1000 ($21 shipped), a photo color printer (make $4 after rebate shipped). See why my wallet cries every night?

Woman ‘tricked into sex’ by penis cream treatment (from Digg) – A Syrian-born airline pilot allegedly tricked a schoolteacher from Haverfordwest into having sex with him by pretending he had to administer ointment on the end of his penis, a jury heard yesterday (Tuesday).

Gene explains why people are night owls – A genetic mutation called the “after-hours gene” may explain why some people are night owls, it is revealed in Science journal today. I so must have this gene! I’m typing this at 4:52am.

German thief betrays himself to get free beer – A German phone thief led police right to his front door when they called the stolen mobile to say he had won some free beer and he willingly gave his address.

Legendary ‘Hogzilla’ to hit big screen – Hogzilla, a near-mythical monster hog that roamed south Georgia, is about to get a little bigger.

hogzilla
That’s one giant hog!

Porn dominates Saudi mobile use (from Digg) – Up to 70% of files exchanged between Saudi teenagers’ mobile phones contain pornography, according to a study in the ultra-conservative Muslim kingdom.

Only another 5,500 calories to go … (from Digg) –

A Swedish university has replicated Morgan Spurlock’s Super Size Me junk food binge under lab conditions. The early results are surprising, says Marten Blomkvist.

…

Well, at one Swedish university, a group of students are getting the chance. At the University of Linköping, the Spurlock experience is being replicated under clinical conditions. In February, seven healthy medical students in their early 20s spent weeks stuffing themselves with hamburgers, pizzas, milk shakes and 200g bacon breakfasts – all on the university’s tab. A second group of subjects are just now hitting the junk food. Physical exercise is to be avoided. Bikes are out. To discourage walking even the shortest distance, free bus passes have been issued.

…

The students managed to gain between 5-15% extra weight over the month. They felt “tired and bloated”, especially during the first week, but there seemed to be no signs of the mood swings towards the end that the rather despondent Spurlock reported.

Final results from the questionnaires will be released at the end of the study. But judging from the provisional results, no one suffered anything like as much as Spurlock. One of the most shocking scenes in the film is when his three doctors urge him to abandon his experiment after getting the results of blood tests which show that his liver is so badly damaged it looks as though it is the result of heavy drinking – “You’re pickling your liver!”. While Nyström and his team also noted “significant” changes in the liver, relating to the liver enzyme levels in the blood, and the content of fat in the liver, the changes were “never even close to dangerous”.

Japanese patch measures pet stress – Wondering if your dog or cat is stressed? Just stick a special patch on the bottom of its paw and you’ll be able to tell, according to a Japanese company. Reminds me of those flat heat sensor things that measure your stress by the color it changes to when you put a finger on it.

Pipe cleaners are the new sexy (from Digg) – With that in mind, it’s no surprise that nobody put me in charge of the “Really Cool 3-D Video Game Pipe Cleaner Sculpture” department. Someone over at HumorMe has, thankfully, filled that spot. Those pipe cleaner models are actually pretty cute.

Indian groom too drunk to wed, so brother steps in – Villagers at a wedding in eastern India decided the groom had arrived too drunk to get married, and so the bride married the groom’s more sober brother instead, police said on Monday. … “The groom apologised for his behaviour, but has been crying that word will spread and he will never get a bride again,” Singh said by phone.

Feeling Cingular (from Consumerist) – Check out the Feeling Cingular music video. Watch as the tragic story of Feeling, the spurned Cingular customer, trying to find his missing, depressed speaker, Most Blown 2 after his other speaker Most Blown 1 was killed by Cingular/ATT’s GSM RF interference. Ever experience your speakers going tk tk tk tk when your cellphone is next to your speakers and is about to ring? Well, this guy made a pretty cool video of how his cellphone blew out his speakers.

Incredible monitor setups (from Derek) – So many LCDs! *drools*

The voice of Pikachu (from RayAlome) – this is awesome! The Japanese voice of Pikachu!!! She even sounds like Pikachu in real life!

9 things I learned about the world according to anonymous stock photo models. (from Digg) – The list is hilarious. The ones I enjoyed included:

  • Attempts to portray sincere parent/child relationships always seem creepy.
  • Kids love manual labor.
  • That one-handed, one-knee laptop bullshit is the preferred way to get real work done.
  • Random-ass white dudes should be placed all over your corporate website for no fucking reason. – Ungsunghero said instead of “ass”, it should be replaced by “douchey prick“

Inmates take swipe at toilet paper cuts – One side effect of the policy could be that toilet paper will become a new form of currency among inmates.

Duck penises show “arms race” between sexes – An exception is ducks — especially mallards. Although mallards pair off to mate, females are often raped by stray males. Yet studies show that these rapes do not pay off for the males. “Even in a species where 40 percent of the copulations are forced copulations, the ducklings still are mostly sired by the mates,” Brennan said. … What they found surprised them — corkscrew-shaped oviducts, with plenty of potential dead-ends. “Interestingly, the male phallus is also a spiral, but it twists in the opposite, counterclockwise, direction,” said Yale ornithologist Richard Prum in a statement. See what real duck genitals look like in this article: Duck genitals locked in arms race (from Digg).

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Lucky Star

I started watching a new anime called Lucky Star, and it’s really cute! If I had to qualify it, it’d a Belldandy type of anime. I actually would say it’s cuteness overloaded, yet still so funny.

lucky star cosplay
(from Artemyst via shuushuu)

Description from Artemyst:

They’re cosplaying 4 other shows.

  • Top left is Akari from To Heart (Lucky Star’s Tsukasa)
  • Bottom left is Rin from Fate/Stay Night (Lucky Star’s Kagami)
  • Top right is Mikuru from The Melancholy of Haruhi Suzumiya (Lucky Star’s Miyuki)
  • Bottom right is Shana from Shakugan no Shana (Lucky Star’s Konata)

I’ve also attached a video clip of it so you know how overkill this cuteness thing is:
lucky star - how to eat food

Several things they chat about are quite relevant to me, like I actually push the ice cream down into the cone so at the end I don’t have to be just eating the cone. It’s just hilarious, yet so cute!

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Ergo Proxy

I just started watching Ergo Proxy last week. Pino is so cute!!! KAWAII!!! 可愛い！！！ So before you watch the videos, you have to understand Pino is a companion robot, meant to represent a child. This society grew children in artificial wombs and you have to apply to have a child, and when granted, they’ll grow one for you and give it to you when it’s born. In the mean time, while you wait for your application to be approved, you can get a companion robot, which can simulate a child all the way to an adult. The reason for this is because they’re trying to sustain a Utopian society, and given human history, when Utopia is being reached, population will explode as there are no longer any natural enemies of humans besides themselves, causing a great downfall later.

Also, Pino went through a very serious impact. Her mother and baby brother were both killed in front of her. She was then chased by soldiers who were ordered to have her destroyed. I’m not sure what psychological impact that’ll have on a robot, but it’s interesting. And she’s so cute!!!

Here’s a few videos I made for now:

ergo proxy - episode 2 - pino awaits for papa's returnergo proxy - episode 3- pino leaves romdeauergo proxy - episode 4 - pino is happy after vicent law awakesergo proxy - episode 6 - pino learns lonliness and sets sailergo proxy - episode 7 - pino buries comradesergo proxy - episode 9 - pino escapes from tower

Here’s a few videos I found on YouTube:

The anime talks about a futuristic society in where humans have to live inside domes and has these robots (split between entourages and autoraves) that become human companions and workers. The story is very philosophical as it introduces authors and poets and philosophers and different types of Utopian philosophies. I haven’t watched enough of the series to know what the true storyline is, but apparently there are these proxies (as they called it) which are somewhat like messengers of God. However, even after years of researching, they are unable to determine what they really are.

A boy named Vincent Law appears (immigrant from Mosque) hoping to become a citizen of Romdeau (this Utopian city), but has been casted away as a fugitive. Real Mayar, the granddaughter of the Regent (somewhat like a King), is a bit too curious for her own good and with her sharp perceptions, she unveils the truth bit by bit, showing how ugly this Utopian society has hidden from view.

I’ve been getting my subtitles from Shinsen-Subs and at the end of each episode, they have panels of information describing the names and where they’re from. Some are places in legends and tales. Others are real philosophers and they go in depth of what they stood for and what their philosophy is.

In episode 9, they have this:

“See no evil, hear no evil, speak no evil” is a common phrase, usually used to describe someone who doesn’t want to be involved in a situation, or who is turning a willful blind eye to an evil act that they are involved in. The saying is typically associated with the Three Wise Monkeys (one cover his eyes, one covering his ears, and the other covering his mouth). It is therefore believed that the saying may have its origin in a 17th century temple in Japan. Many scholars believe the monkeys were carved as a visual representation of the religious principle, “If we do not hear, see, or speak evil, we ourselves shall be spared all evil.” The monkeys originated from a Japanese play on words. “See no evil, hear no evil, speak no evil,” translated into Japanese is “mizaru, kikazaru, iwazaru.” (見ざる、聞かざる、言わざる) The Japanese word for monkey is “saru” (猿), and sounds very similar to the verb-ending “zaru”.

Here’s a number Japanese word for you 兎 (usagi) which means rabbit. Pino really likes rabbits I’m presuming as she has a rabbit suit she hops around in and even counts in rabbits (like we count using sheep).

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Pumpkin Scissors

I just finished this series which was recommended to me by both Maxxius and Artemyst. This series was really good and funny. Had a slight resemblance to Full Metal Alchemist, but maybe because both are comedies and relating to the military.

Spoilers: (Show)

I can’t wait for Season 2.

Any way, episode 18 contained a bunch of hilarious scenes with Stekkins, the little Sergeant Major girl. There are 2 versions of each video (large: 640×480 and small: 320×240), displayed respectively in that order.

Welp, I learnt a new Japanese phrase today: 一人上手 (hitori jouzu) which translates to literally “alone skillful”. However, according to the captions, it’s slang for masturbation. Stekkins goes and calls Machs the one-man machine! In fact, he’s the best one-man machine in the Empire. However, everyone hears it as he’s the number one masturbator in the empire. Check out this clip (work safe):

pumpkin scissors - hitorijouzupumpkin scissors - hitorijouzu

Then I found Stekkin’s finishing move to be awesome! And to name it Pumpkin Scissors and chop the guys head. Haha!

pumpkin scissors - finishing movepumpkin scissors - finishing move

Finally, she has the Lunatic Dance, where she goes Pa-Pa-Pa-Pumpkin, La-La-La-Pumpkin. There’s 2 versions of this song and one during the episode where she gets caught doing the dance and in fact, they used this song as the ending in this particular episode:

pumpkin scissors - lunatic dancepumpkin scissors - lunatic dance
pumpkin scissors - lunatic dancepumpkin scissors - lunatic dance

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Naruto Shippuuden

With the new arc of Naruto anime starting, I’ve begun watching it again. The last 100 episodes or so of the original arc were just fillers which I decided to skip as it’s not really based on anything worth watching, just random storylines they decided to add while they decide how begin the next arc. The new arc is called 疾風伝 (Shippuuden or Hurricane Chronicles) and it’s started out with a bang! The story takes place about 3 years later and the characters have grown up and have become more mature. Of course they have new skills and they’ll be introducing the new bad guys from 暁 (akatsuki which means dawn).

Anyway, I really like the opening song and sequence and decided to share it:

Large version:
naruto shippuuden opening

Small Version:
nartuo shippuuden opening

The song is called: Hero’s Come Back!! by nobodyknows+

While I was looking for the band’s name, I found this video: Naruto iPod. It’s using the same scheme with silhouettes, but the characters in there are Naruto, Sasuke, and Sakura. However, Naruto’s hair seems a big funky when it’s not spiky. The others are pretty good 3d cg models.

Lyrics (from 自分流でイコウ！！ ヽ(^Д^*)/おひさ～♪　新曲nobodyknows+♪ and Naruto · Stage6):

遠くで聞こえる声を一人
一人また一人で血上がる闘士
繰り返すだけの普段通り
いつが行く準備いい　ARE YOU READY?
体中風のは　心臓に
激しく血ならせよ　STOMPING
耐える月を浮かす　CALL ME
変わりすぎるが抜きか　STORY

COME ON!!
EVERYBODY STAND UP
上げろｋ今日一番の時間だ
目にもとまらんの SPEED をはんだ
誰ものびなっとりこかんば　YEAH!!
COME ON!!
EVERYBODY HANDS UP
また明日のHEROESはCOME BACK
通常数える日々をCOUNTDOWN
いくぜ！！３・２・１　MAKE SOME NOISE

<ﾉﾘﾀﾞﾌｧﾝｷｰｼﾋﾞﾚｻｽ>
HEY YO もう場所乗りつくわ覚悟でしょ
何回転んだって立つけれど
なで間なぜ神　人への聖書
入り組んだ感情気付き上げたでしょ

<ｸﾘｽﾀﾙ・ﾎﾞｰｲ>
持ち上がるかんせいが勇気となる
立ち上げれば　今以上　苦しみ伴う
それでも最後はきっとある
すべて浚うと勝利のかんせい！！！

EVERYBODY STAND UP
上げろｋ今日一番の時間だ
目にもとまらんの SPEED をはんだ
誰ものびなっとりこかんば　YEAH!!
COME ON!!
EVERYBODY HANDS UP
また明日のHEROESはCOME BACK
通常数える日々をCOUNTDOWN
いくぜ！！３・２・１　MAKE SOME NOISE

Romanji:

tooku de kikoeru koe wo hitori
hitori mata hitori tachi agaru toushi
kurikaesu dake no fudan doori
kutsugaesu junbi iza ARE YOU READY?

karadajuu furuwasu shinzou ni
hageshiku uchinarase yo STOMPING
taezu tsukiugokasu CALL ME
kawarazu yuruganu kikan STORY

COME ON EVERYBODY STAND UP!
agero kyou ichiban no jikan da
menimo tomaranu SPEED HUNTER
daremo ga minna toriko COME BACK YEAH

COME ON EVERYBODY HANDS UP
mata ashita no HERO’S COME BACK
zujou kazoe yubiori COUNT DOWN
ikuze 3 2 1 MAKE SOME NOISE

HEY YO WOAH tasho no risuku wa kakugo desho
nankai korondatte tatsu keredo
nareai tagai na kamihitoe no sesshou
irikunda kanjo kizuki ageta kasshou

wakiagaru kansei ga yuuki to naru
tachiagareba ima ijo kurushimi tomanau
soredemo saigo wa kitto warau
subete sarau shori no kansei

COME ON EVERYBODY STAND UP!
agero kyou ichiban no jikan da
menimo tomaranu SPEED HUNTER
daremo ga minna toriko COME BACK YEAH

COME ON EVERYBODY HANDS UP
mata ashita no HERO’S COME BACK
zujou kazoe yubiori COUNT DOWN
ikuze 3 2 1 MAKE SOME NOISE

Posted on

Free TaxCut and Other Deals

Some deals I wanted to share:

Download your FREE TaxCut Premium Software (from SD) – The tax cut off date is coming soon and hopefully you’ve started working on filing your taxes. Anyway, H&R Block has decided to give away a free download of TaxCut Premium in hopes that you’ll purchase their state software. For states with no state income tax (i.e. Washington), this basically means a free tax software for our return!

USPS & MasterCard Make Saving a Priority (from SD) – From March 1, 2007, to April 30, 2007, use your MasterCard® card to buy a 25-pack of USPS® Prepaid Priority Mail® Flat Rate Envelopes and you’ll receive a 5-pack of envelopes FREE—compliments of MasterCard®! A really good deal if you ship via USPS Priority Mail often. Plus the impending postal rates raising in April, this is one sweet deal!

Call of Duty 2 (Xbox 360) (from SD) for $13.99. Limit 3 per order. Free shipping if order is $24 or more, or you can always opt for in-store pick up and not pay any shipping and handling fee.

Random Crap:

Speeding teen wanted to catch school bus – – A teenager clocked driving at 93 mph told a deputy he had to get home in time to catch the school bus, police said. Porter Superior Court Judge Julia Jent sentenced the teen to ride the bus to school after an earlier speeding conviction, Porter County Sheriff’s deputies said.

Hebron museum to preserve four-legged chicken – A museum that displays animals with shocking physical abnormalities in a cave near the West Bank city of Hebron will be adding its newest exhibit this week: a four-legged chicken.
4 legged chicken

Serial lingerie thief arrested – Police found more than 4,000 pieces of lingerie in the home of a Japanese construction worker who used climbing skills developed on his job to steal women’s underwear.

Delutube (from Ars Technica) – Delutube offers users a way to view deleted YouTube videos

Passover Produces a Real Coke Classic (from Consumerist) – Kosher-for-Passover Coke is made with sugar — not corn syrup — just like in the old days. And that’s why many true Coca-Cola fans stock up during the Jewish holiday. NPR’s Linda Wertheimer talks about the difference in taste with Ralph Roberts, co-author of Classic Cooking with Coca-Cola. I actually want to find this coke. I’ve missed coke made with pure sugar cane sugar that I’ve had outside of the USA.

German brothel offers pensioners 50 percent off – A brothel in Germany hopes to capitalise on the growing number of pensioners by offering them a 50 percent discount for sex in the afternoon. Guess it’s time to retire and go to Germany ;p

Ubuntu is sexy alright (from Digg) – Could the new Ubuntu Splash get any more phallic?

Sphere (from Digg) – another one of those escape from this room games where you randomly click on things hoping to uncover some hidden stuff. Unfortunately the tab trick doesn’t work. Solutions are posted somewhere if you know how to search.

Russian Man Grows Penis on Arm (from Digg) – Russian doctors have conducted an 11-hour operation to replace a patient’s deformed penis with one grown on his forearm, the Moskovskiy Komsomolets daily reports. … The doctors had the penis removed and attached to the man’s arm. Using his body tissue it grew to six-and-a-half inches and was sewn back on to his groin. Silicone tubes were inserted into the organ to ensure an erection was possible. Doctors also created a scrotum from the patient’s own skin and placed silicone testicles in it.

Prosecutor: Unicorn defense was a mixup – On Tuesday, a Billings prosecutor had told a district judge that Phillip C. Holliday Jr., 42, claimed a unicorn was driving when his truck crashed into a light pole earlier this month.

Girlfriend dumped live on radio (from Digg) – From Galaxy Radio show – dj calls cheating girlfriend, tricks her into thinking her boyfriend is going to ask her to marry him then reveals she is actually being dumped.

Ivy – Sonata of Temptation (from Stanman) – Korean Pop singer ‘IVY”s 2nd album title song. it samples Beethoven(For Elise), and Music Video parodys FF7-advance children(JAPAN GAME) A Korean music video with real live actors acting out the fight sequence in the church from Final Fantasy VII – Advent Children between Tifa and that strong arm guy.

Maburaho @ MS Paint – It`s my third MS Paint drawing. I`ve spent about 2 hours and a half in it. It`s pretty cool! Enjoy! Another really cool drawing using MS Paint. A quick search on YouTube for ‘mspaint‘ reveals a bunch of other interesting videos of people using MS Paint to draw.