2020.04.21 Dispatches From the Wasteland – Entry 27

For no discernible reason I listened to “The Boys Are Back in Town” by Thin Lizzy 5 times this morning? So that’s about par for the quarantine sanity course right there.

Greetings from my hovel on the shores of the Bow.

Speaking of weird stages of quarantine… I just spent a bunch of time looking at guides for making Monkey D. Luffy costumes for my kids? So, that’s new.

I spent about 2 hours listening to Fleetwood Mac this morning to try to figure out why the hell I don’t like this band. I like TUSK. That’s a great song. I think THE CHAIN is aight. GO YOUR OWN WAY, sure. But, that’s about it? I have never been able to get into this band despite all the people around me with good taste loving them. The guitar and drumming are both excellent, but these songs just do nothing for me. I will probably continue to attempt to try and like them every year or so until one day they click.

While it’s not Fleetwood Mac’s fault, but the fact that Stevie Nicks’ hit “ONE WINGED DOVE” is NOT CALLED ONE WINGED DOVE. I’ve been apoplectic about that since I learned it a few months ago. Fuck off out of here, EDGE OF SEVENTEEN. You can’t sing JUST LIKE A ONE-WINGED DOVE over and over again in a song and then not fucking call it that. GOD DAMN IT, STEVIE.

I will never bend on this.

When I was in high school I maintained that Pearl Jam was the worst band in history. When Eddie Vedder’s solo soundtrack to INTO THE WILD came out I liked that and my opinion softened? Over the years I’d listen to songs here and there and think “well, that’s not THAT bad, I guess”. Until yesterday when hearing JEREMY again I finally just said: “hmm… I think this band might just be awesome? shit. MY IDENTITY!!!!”

*Ron Howard Voice* Joey was getting life lessons all over the place.

Currently Playing: Fleetwood Mac – “Rumors” and not getting it still.
Currently Reading: THE DRIFTING CLASSROOM, PERFECT EDITION: VOL.1, Kazuo Umezz

2020.04.20 Dispatches From the Wasteland – Entry 26

Happy 420. SMOKEWEEDEVERYDEED

Greetings from my hovel on the shores of the Bow

Dana White has apparently secured a private island to host UFC fights.

It’s not that I didn’t always suspect our society would get to “Enter The Dragon/Mortal Kombat Island” or even that I thought it would take longer. I just always imagined a better class of super-villain to be behind it. We as a crumbling civilization deserve a better deranged criminal to organize fight island than Dana White.

Call me crazy, but this seems like an irresponsible thing to do. How are you supposed to maintain social distance while in a cage-fight?

I also worry we’re maybe 2 months away from some kind of Battle Royale or Running Man situation.

What we really need is BATTLE BOTS. We need that movie REAL STEEL starring noted song & dance-man Hugh Jackman. (Which I think is based on a Richard Matheson story? Did I make that up?) I want Big Robots and I want them to fight each other.

In case it wasn’t clear it’s monday morning and my brain is short-circuiting. Buckle up, it’s gonna be a week.

Currently Playing: //delay(5000); – “Dispatch from COVID-19 Occupied Tokyo, pt 3”

Currently Reading: CRYING FREEMAN: VOL. 2, Kazuo Koike & Ryoichi Ikegami

2020.04.17 Dispatches From the Wasteland – Entry 25

I’m at the “watching hour long videos of nerds touring their manga collection” phase of isolation.

Greetings from my hovel on the shores of the Bow.

I moved a bunch of manga down into my office (I got another table so my workspace quadrupled and now I have so much more space to do activities!) so that I would see them every day until I felt shamed into reading them all. I’m being stared at currently by the first 6 20TH CENTURY BOYS omnibus editions by Naoki Urasawa, the first 5 URUSEI YATSURA omnibus’ by Rumiko Takahashi (I’ve read the first one and I loved it), a big collection of the complete DORORO by Osamu Tezuka (given to me by my friend Sho for my birthday! What a guy.), Junji Ito’s adaptation of Osamu Dazai’s NO LONGER HUMAN and a bunch of other stuff. (Gotta save some for the next time I can’t think of what to blog about on a friday).

Here’s hoping this strategy of piling stuff I want to read beside me all day will prompt me to read some of it.

Speaking of reading! I suck at it again… My reading rate has plummeted of late and I only finished one thing this week so I’m not going to bother with a full Read Icculus entry. I’ll just mention it here:

I read Haruki Murakami’s memoir about running (and really, about writing) WHAT I TALK ABOUT WHEN I TALK ABOUT RUNNING. I loved it. Maybe I should start running? Why not me?!

Currently Playing: Makeup and Vanity Set – “Roy”

Currently Reading: That same stupid light novel about meeting girls in dungeons, it’s TRASH, but it is a fun diversion from the apocalypse.

2020.04.16 Dispatches From the Wasteland – Entry 24

Tiny anarchists ate in my bed again. Popcorn this time.

Greetings from my hovel on the shores of the Bow

I have a lot of comics and every time I walk past the shelves I think “I really need to reorganize these shelves”. To do this I need way more shelves and to take a bunch of stuff to the dump and I should really create some kind of database to track all my stuff and, and, and…

I usually get sweaty and anxious and just go stress-eat some pizza or something at this point.

I love collecting stuff, much to the chagrin of the bride, I have multiple stupid collections. I collect old video games, books, comics, blu-rays and probably other stuff I’m forgetting. I’ve stopped collecting physical music and toys (meaning I’m not actively acquiring new items, doesn’t mean I still don’t have a metric ton of those things taking up space in my basement).

At some point I started to realize I was running out of space (and the bride was running out of patience) and I decided to try to focus a bit. I rarely buy single issue comics anymore (those physical collections are currently split between my mother and mother-in-law’s homes, it’s aroudn 20,000 comics I think) and I mostly only buy physical manga collections these days. Books I’ve all but switched to reading digitally and only buy physical books of specific authors or of big art/coffee-table type things that just don’t make sense to read digitally. Blu-Rays I’ve tried to slow down… I mostly stick to one or two boutique labels and resist the urge to be a completionist for anything.

I don’t know why I’m like this. I mean, I have SOME idea -I don’t take those prescription meds every morning for hay fever- but I’m really pretty fortunate to be married to such a patient, understanding woman… Anyway, I am gonna go count my collection of used bandages.

Currently Playing: Tuluum Shimmering – “Bird Song”

Currently Reading: THE DOGS OF RIGA, Henning Mankell

2020.04.15 Dispatches From the Wasteland – Entry 23

Bet you thought I was going to forget again! No such luck.

Greetings from my hovel on the shores of the Bow.

Ed Brubaker, Marco Martin & Muntsa Vicente released a new digital first comic on Panel Syndicate today! I have only read the first couple pages but it appears that Marcos Martin is doing his best work ever? Which is already a pretty high bar? I really love this format. I wish more creators would release their comics digitally like this. (No disrespect to the many fine local comic shops out there who are definitely hurting at this time, but the fact that they’re wonderful places doesn’t change the fact that the mainstream comics distribution and sales model is badly in need of repair). Brubaker and Martin get instant buys from me anyway, but this appears to be great even for them!

A new season of anime is upon us. Cheer or groan here depending on your persuasion. I am excited and managed to watch the first episode of 3 series last night:

Kaguya-Sama Love is War: Season 2
I was a big fan of season 1 and this first episode was great. It’s a very funny show, though I could see it being patience-trying for some. Chika is eternal best girl.

Appare-Ranman!
This was the new show I was most intrigued by as it looked like a 19th-century, steampunk, anime WACKY RACES. The first episode was very light on the WACKY RACING, but it did give us a taste before flashing back to setting up how our characters arrived in said WACKY RACE. It seems good. The animation is very strong and I love the character designs.

Gleipnir
I don’t know what to make of this show? It could go either way, but after episode 1 I was pretty into it. It’s got weird sports-mascot monster guys and a deranged seeming female (pro?an?)tagonist? I’m definitely going to keep watching, but it’s not going to be for everyone.

Currently Playing: Phish – “Sigma Oasis”
Currently Reading: IS IT WRONG TO PICK UP GIRLS IN A DUNGEON? LIGHT NOVEL VOL. 1, Fujino Omori

2020.04.10 Dispatches From the Wasteland – Entry 20

You know how most kids animated movies just cut to dance parties in lieu of endings? Well, Trolls World Tour is just 90 minutes of that. Good tunes though.

Greetings from my hovel on the shores of the Bow

Bit of a day off today. Felt good not to be sitting in this chair all day AND all night, I even toyed with the idea of not sitting in this chair at all today, but then I remembered that I could play the Final Fantasy VII remake, so here I sit, awaiting a download to finish.

Watching Dave Matthews play a quarantine solo acoustic show in his house and I’m reminded how much I like Dave Matthews Band. He’s got a really cool voice and if there’s one thing in this world I love it’s excessive, self-indulgent jamming. So for fans of long, live, excessive jamming there’s never been a better time as dozens of jambands are streaming old concerts basically every night. It’s prettay prettay prettay good.

Currently Playing: Dave Matthews Band – “American Baby”
Currently Reading: WHAT I TALK ABOUT WHEN I TALK ABOUT RUNNING, Haruki Murakami

2020.04.09 Dispatches From the Wasteland – Entry 19

This basement was not designed with my hermit command center in mind, and so I have too many things to plug in and not enough outlets. There’s never been a better time to learn how to wire up more outlets I suppose…

Greetings from my hovel on the banks of the Bow.

I think I’m finally getting cured of whatever strange mental deficiency caused me to never bail on an anime series no matter how bored I was. I dropped 3 shows this week that I only had 3-4 episodes left in and it felt good… but also terrible and there’s a non-zero chance I’ll end up finishing them just because my brain is broken.

Granted, my standard for anime is MUCH lower than the standard I hold other forms of entertainment up to for some reason. I think it’s because I watch anime the way some people watch reality TV. I’ll watch whole multi season series of anime I barely have any interest in whereas I STILL have not finished The Wire, a show I KNOW to be brilliant. I like to have bad anime series on as a sort of background hum while I’m doing other things. At some point I realized I watch more YouTube and bad anime than I do anything else? It should maybe bother me, but I also know that I get more pleasure out of bad anime than most prestige tv. When I want entertainment to engage and challenge me I will watch a film or read a book, watching tv for me is way more passive.

I promise to finish The Wire someday though.

Currently Playing: Phish – “Sigma Oasis” (it’s gonna be this for a while)
Currently Reading: WHAT I TALK ABOUT WHEN I TALK ABOUT RUNNING, Haruki Murakami

2020.04.08 Dispatches From the Wasteland – Entry 18

It’s so cold in here today. From hell’s cold basement I type at thee..

Greetings from my frozen hovel on the shores of the Bow.

I must be slipping in my old age or else my social media feeds are tuned TOO much because I only just learned that my favorite band of all time PHISH surprise-released a new studio album last week. It’s called Sigma Oasis and it’s excellent. I get tears in my eyes when I hear new Phish music. I am a strange boy.

Speaking of being a strange boy, I binge-watched the entirety of BEASTARS on Netflix yesterday and… I’m a furry now? I thought it was a very good show, the character designs and animation are both excellent and will likely be like nothing you’ve ever seen before. I was expecting the show to be more of a noir murder-mystery, but it’s not really. Perhaps I was connecting it in my head with BLACKSAD, but it’s really more of a high-school drama. It’s about how confusing, scary and horny everyone is in high-school… plus in this instance there’s the whole “half the students are carnivorous and the other half are like, sheeps and rabbits and whatnot” thing. It’s a good time.

I started another series today: “Ascendance of a Bookworm”. It’s a very “cozy” anime series about a girl who finds herself in a fantasy world (this is the premise of all anime now) where books are only available to the very very rich. She makes it her mission to create books for the world and the series follows her as she is cute and does cute things while bringing new technology to the primitive fantasy world she now lives in and pursues her goal of creating a bookstore. It’s extremely nice.

Currently Playing: Phish – “Sigma Oasis”
Currently Reading: WHAT I TALK ABOUT WHEN I TALK ABOUT RUNNING, Haruki Murakami

2020.04.07 Dispatches From the Wasteland – Entry 17

Finished the last energy drink I had in the fridge. Gonna be a rough go for a while.

Greetings from my hovel on the shores of the Bow.

Watched night 2 of Wrestlemania 36. What a weird show.

It’s a real feast or famine situation this year at Wrestlemania. 16 total matches (18, but I didn’t watch the preshows). I gave ratings to 14 of them (2 are not really wrestling matches, they are performance art pieces so they can’t *really* be rated as wrestling matches). Of those 14 only 3 matches met or surpassed the 3 star mark for me. Of those 3 only 1 match surpassed the 4 star mark. That’s not a great ratio for Wrestlemania, especially one with this much talent. I’m going to give my star ratings for each of the matches here, so if you don’t care about pro-wrestling I would advise you to stop reading and come back tomorrow where I’ll probably talk about something else. I will think no less of you.

NIGHT 1
Women’s Tag-Team Championship
Kabuki Warriors (Kairi Sane & Asuka) (c) VS Alexa Bliss & Nikki Cross
**1/2

King Corbin VS Elias
*

RAW Women’s Championship
Becky Lynch (c) VS Shayna Baszler
**1/2

WWE Intercontinental Championship
Sami Zayn (w/ Shinsuke Nakamura & Cesaro) (c) VS Daniel Bryan (w/ Drew Gulak)
**

Triangle Ladder Match for SmackDown Tag-Team Championship
John Morrison (c) VS Jimmy Use VS Kofi Kingston
***

Kevin Owens VS Seth Rollins
***3/4

WWE Universal Championship
Goldberg (c) VS Braun Strowman
*3/4

The Boneyard
The Undertaker VS AJ Styles
(no rating, but if it had one it’d be ***** because it was the best thing WWE has done in years)

NIGHT2
NXT Women’s Championship
Rhea Ripley (c) VS Charlotte Flair
****1/2

Aleister Black VS Bobby Lashley (w/ Lana)
**

Otis Dozovic VS Dolph Ziggler (w/ Sonya Deville)
**1/4

Last Man Standing Match
Edge VS Randy Orton
ZERO stars (this was one of the worst matches I’ve ever seen)

RAW Tag-Team Championship
The Street Profits (Montez Ford & Angelo Dawkins) (c) VS Austin Theory & Angel Garza (w/ Zelina Vega)
**1/2

Fatal 5 Way Elimination Match for SmackDown Women’s Championship
Bayley (c) VS Sasha Banks VS Lacey Evans VS Tamina VS Naomi
***1/4

Firefly Fun House
Bray Wyatt VS John Cena
(again, not a match, but if you ever wanted to see John Cena in the Black Lodge from Twin Peaks? This was for you. I LOVED this.)

WWE Championship
Brock Lesnar (c) VS Drew McIntyre
*1/2

Ok. That’s it. I promise. No more wrestling talk… until I next want to talk about wrestling. See you tomorrow.

Currently Playing: Just a podcast. About wrestling. Don’t worry about it.
Currently Reading: WHAT I TALK ABOUT WHEN I TALK ABOUT RUNNING, Haruki Murakami

2020.04.06 Dispatches From the Wasteland – Entry 16

I don’t want to be typing this. I just want to go play Animal Crossing. It’s that kind of a day.

Greetings from my hovel on the shores of the Bow.

I watched Night 1 of Wrestlemania (not live, but they didn’t perform it live either). I’ve been a huge wrestling fan my whole life but in the past few years I’ve watched precious little WWE programming. I started watching less of it when New Japan Pro Wrestling stuff became easier to get ahold of and now that AEW is a going concern I am completely checked out of the current WWE product. I still know who everyone is and keep up with big news and whatnot, but I’m mostly ignorant of the product these days.

I’ve watched 35 Wrestlemanias and this one sounded like it was going to be WEIRD, so I had to watch.

For the most part? It’s just like I remember. Mostly really talented roster with just wretched booking and match layouts. Not having a crowd is weird, but I got used to it, sadly it REALLY impacted some of the matches (the ladder match in particular was hurt BAD by having noone to react. Ladder match selling and dramatic tension spots just looks stupid in silence). Of the “matches” on the show the only one actually worth seeing was Kevin Owens VS Seth Rollins, but even that one suffered from stupid booking and layout.

Then came the “Boneyard Match”. The Undertaker VS AJ Styles.

It’s been many years since the Undertaker had anything resembling a good match, and they knew that this year would be no exception so they did something different… and it ruled. Regardless of your interest in wrestling, I’d recommend checking out this match. It’s the natural next evolution in the “cinematic wrestling storytelling” of things like Matt & Jeff Hardy’s “Final Deletion” or the crazy shit DDT has been doing in Japan for years. Pretty Special.

Currently Playing: Nothing. Watching Wrestlemania 36 Night 2 to talk about tomorrow.
Currently Reading: NORWEIGAN WOOD, Haruki Murakami