Thursday, March 20, 2008

Happy Easter!

Just found this picture on Cute Overload and had to share it here:


"Peep show." Heehee...

Wednesday, March 19, 2008

kiwiberries

I was in my neighborhood overpriced health food store the other day (I needed Japanese buckwheat noodles and Chinatown is too far away for a grocery run). And they had these weird fruit that I'd never seen before called kiwiberries. Here's a picture:


(from nzkiwiberry.com)


And here's a photo from phronesisaical.blogspot.com that shows their size:



They look like mini hairless kiwis. I assumed they were a hybrid of kiwis and grapes, but it turns out they're a real fruit, just some cousin of the furry kiwi I'm used to. They're also apparently really good for you. Check it:

(from kiwiberry.com)


I thought they were a bit steep at $4.99 (you only get 8 or 9 in a package), but you can just pop them in your mouth like grapes and the thought of eating kiwi without having to peel it really appeals to me, so I bought them anyways. But blech! What a disappointment! They're much more squishy than a regular kiwi--they feel like an overripe peach in your mouth. And all the delicious tart that kiwis have is completely nonexistent. These things are way saccharine. I'm going to stick with my 4 for $2 hairy kiwis.

Tuesday, March 11, 2008

go me!

I have two new posts up at AnimeIntro today because I'm just that good. (kidding!) I'm hoping the latter one will generate a good deal of debate, as it concerns fansubbing vs. file-sharing vs. piracy, so everybody please clicky clicky.

In other news, I may be getting a press pass to next month's New York Comic Con thanks to AnimeIntro--sweet! I'll obviously be writing a formal blog about it there, but some more personal reactions may surface in here. So far the only events I've ever managed to get into with a press pass have been free admission to museums.

Thursday, March 6, 2008

blogging fun

New post at animeintro.

Also found this fantastic artist yesterday. David Horvitz does all kinds of conceptual things that require some serious audience participation. For one thing, he's taking one photo of the sky every day for this entire year. He'll mail them to you for free. I signed up yesterday. Here is yesterday's sky (it's in NYC):



My favorite thing he does is offer for people to pay him a certain amount of money, which he'll then use to go to a specific place and mail you an item. Most of the options are big (expensive) trips to foreign countries (which I totally wish I'd thought of first!), but some are as small as giving him $5 for him to mail you one of his secrets.

I have two favorite cheap ones. One is giving him $10 to write a letter of apology to someone he knows. He'll send one copy of the letter to its recipient and one to you. He has an example of a letter on his website. This letter is really simple, but so touching for some reason. So far, 12 people have bought apologies. I think this is absolutely genius. It's incredibly voyeuristic, but also sort of vicariously relieving. Even if you're too scared to make your own random apology, you can be part of someone else's. I think I might purchase an apology letter in the coming days.

My other favorite is for people to pay him a dollar to think about them for one full minute. Twenty-one people have bought a minute of time, by far the largest number of people to participate in any of these projects. I think this is very telling. People are actually so full of themselves that they're willing to pay someone--a complete stranger no less--just to think about them. But on the other hand, a couple people paid David to think about someone else. Someone named Jim Darrough paid him to think about his step-mom who had passed away four days prior. Quote:

I thought about Jim Darrough's step-mother, Arleen, who passed away on February 24th, 2008 at 3:32 am Pacific Time. Jim was holding her hand at this time. I thought about Arleen from 1:18am to 1:19am on February 28, 2008 in New York.

Ok, that's actually really moving. As is this one:

I thought about Luca Kunz's mom who is in a hospital in Switzerland from 3:12am to 3:13am on February 29th, 2008 in New York. I went a little over a minute to make it stronger.

People love their families so much that it helps them to know that a stranger knows who the family member is, and is actively thinking about them.

I think that the entire body of work just speaks to the interconnectedness of everyone on Earth. And it's as easy as dropping an envelope into a mailbox. Maybe that's too obvious of an explanation, but I think it's rare that you see such a blatant physical manifestation of this. I look forward to reading more about David's exploits.

Tuesday, March 4, 2008

bob loblah's law blog

I was recently hired as a featured blogger for animeintro.net, and my first post is now up. I'll be posting every Monday and Thursday. It's a new website, so it doesn't get much traffic yet and I pretty much have to create my own readership, so if any of my loyal readers here either care about, or have friends who care about, anime, manga, designer toys, Japanese fashion, and other offshoots of Japanese pop culture, please pass on the link :]

The blog cover page.
My current post: The Oscars Hate Anime

I'll probably be providing a link here every time a new post is up for the next few months, but don't worry, it'll only be a short little sentence each time.

Oh yeah, and the post went up yesterday and I already have three comments! Yay yay! So exciting!