Anime Update
Sorry for taking so long to do another update! Life has been quite hectic lately with typical life obligations, but what can I say? I love boring things like fixing up things around my home, and then settling into a nice TV coma at night. Ever since I finished playing Hakuoki, my boyfriend and I have been obsessively watching GinTama for our anime series these past few months. So Gintama is where all my spare time has been going lately, blame Gintoki for capturing my heart and funny bone! We’ve also recently discovered and become addicted to the TV Series called Grimm, the series definitely has a feel of being from someone who was involved with creating Buffy the Vampire Slayer (my favorite TV Show in junior high). I may have to do a review of the Gintama anime soon, it’s a series I now consider to be one of the best shonen anime series around. Gintoki is the first hero I’ve seen that comes close to rivaling Luffy (One Piece) as my favorite. I may have to re-do my favorite Shonen characters list. After we (sadly) catch up in GinTama we’ll be moving on to Beezlebub next, not sure what’ll be after that. Otherwise the only other series on the anime front that I am continuing to keep up with are Fairy Tail, One Piece, and Sket Dance.

Figure Update
When I have solo free time I’ve been spending it taking pictures of figures I want to sell and listing them on eBay! Sales are going well, I’m happy to be cutting back on my collection. I admit I sent a few figures to the chopping block that many fans would facepalm over, but a lot of the figures I owned didn’t reflect my current tastes in anime/manga. In the old days I think I got too caught up in the enthusiasm for certain figures and let my collection be taken over by a series I REALLY liked, but weren’t one of my all time favorites *cough Haruhi*. OR I was SO in love with a show and certain characters, that my love blinded me to the flaws in the figure itself *cough Aria*. And putting a figure away into storage where it can’t be seen and appreciated just seems too sad, not to mention it takes up a lot of storage space. So I put them up on eBay and used the money to go towards other things. Don’t get me wrong though, I’m not giving up on figure collecting!! I’m just in a lot more control on what I pre-order now…so in other words I can resist figures from almost anything except (GSC/Max Factory/Megahouse) One Piece, Puella Magica Madoka, Persona, GinTama, and Durarara!! Not to mention a few gorgeous Alter figures here and there. I know I know, this haul looks RIDICULOUSLY large for someone cutting back on figures. But I haven’t opened up a single figure since I started re-selling some of my collection, so you’re looking at A LOT of little hauls. Since I’m almost done with sales. the plan is to open up and display everyone soon. Although I must admit…my collection is getting quite manly, seems like most of my “must haves” are badass male characters.

Ah One Piece…I should just write a portion of my check to Eiichiro Oda (One Piece mangaka). Although I’m actually going to be passing on the rest of the figure crew from Sailing Again. I love the entire cast of One Piece. But Nami, Luffy, and Zoro are above and beyond my favorite characters. And I already have two full sets of figures of the Straw Hat crew (original and Strong World). Although I have to raise an eyebrow at the sudden boob growth Nami and Robin had in the Sailing Again story arc…I don’t know about the rest of the girls out there but I’m pretty sure they were both past the age where they could have “growth” there without gaining weight elsewhere as well. I was PARTICULARLY excited to get Perona, I became pretty fond of her during her interactions with Zoro, and I’ve always thought this was a well done figure but never seemed to be able to pre-order her at a reasonable price. I ended up finding her in stock at a store I trusted at a good price (and yes I’m aware she already has bootlegs to watch out for, this Luffy too). I’m really looking forward to the figure of Shirahoshi I pre-ordered, but otherwise none of the other new One Piece figures have caught my eye.

Video Game Update
Valkyria Chronicles was the very first video game I purchased for the PS3!!! In fact, I technically purchased it before I even owned a PS3!!! Gamestop was having a great sale on this title and I picked it up, ironically if I had waited and purchased this game when I actually started it…I would have paid the same price or less. That’s part of the reason I’ve decided to chill out on pre-ordering and buying games soon after the release date. I’m going to try and not worry about them going Out of Production and just buy them as I play them (with certain exceptions).  So I started Valkyria Chronicles to start going after my backlog pile, I had hesitated to start this game because I was a bit worried about my coordination in shooting games. Turns out you don’t really need that much coordination in shooting (or reflexes in general), just the ability to think strategically when given some time. I REALLY enjoy this game, this will be my casual video game focus for a while. Although I found that I had to replace my PS3 Controller to play this game, the one I originally got with my PS3 had an issue with the joystick that caused excessive movement. And when you only have a set distance each turn will allow a character to move, I didn’t want to deal with that frustration anymore. Afterward I’m thinking I’ll move on to Catherine…but we’ll see, the video games I choose to play are pretty spontaneous choices.

Manga/Manhwa Update
I recently re-read Oresama Teacher, I have a lot more appreciation for the series now. Perhaps the humor appealed to me more now that I undertand the characters better? Or I forgot the main underlying plot points and re-reading them helped me with my understanding of what’s currently going on. Re-reading the series has certainly raised my appreciation/affection for Takuomi, I had forgotten the small sweet moments that made the heroine even want to be around that creep. Banchou is still the best though! I read the first 11 volumes of the 13th Boy, the last volume will be available this summer. This series has beautiful art and wacky-ish  situations for a romance series, overall I give it my stamp of approval. Bunny Drop has finally changed in a way that made me realize why people kept telling me that at a certain point it can’t be compared to Yotsuba anymore. I couldn’t sit still so I read the rest of the series online…definitely very different…at first I wasn’t sure what to think, and in the end I decided that the choices the mangaka made in the series made it a lot more memorable for me. I’ve Started The Betrayal Knows My Name and Firefighter Daigo, both series have the potential to be something great. I’m already pretty sure Firefighter Daigo will have some inspirational moments that make it a manga that I won’t soon forget. And a Twitter pal has already assured me that The Betrayal Knows My Name is going to get really great, although I must admit Shonen ai is generally not afavorite genre of mine…but I don’t mind it so far. As long as a love story is done well  without being cheap, I’ll love it. I’ve also mostly caught up in Maoh: Juvenile Remix! UUUGGHHH what an emotionally painful series!!! Everything feels so hopeless and dark…but I still like it a lot and will follow it through to the end (only a few more volumes left for me). This is a series where I won’t be able to pass verdict on until I’m completely done.

Book Update
Read the first two Hunger Game books, and I’m working my way through the Repairman Jack series (currently on All the Rage). I highly recommend both series so far. The Hunger Games are the last books I’ve purchased as a hard copy. I bought a kindle to make reading at the gym easier, and I love it! It’s all digital copies from here on out! I’ve started donating and selling off my hard copies of books, gotta save on space where I can when I have thousands of manga I’m not willing to let go of lol.