Poncho chapter 2 translation

I dunno if you guys still remember the translation I did for this manga months ago. So I actually finished this at like, the start of Summer. But my blog was closed down by then and so I never posted it here. I forgot that I never shared it with you guys. I mean, it'd make sense for me to post it here, right? I figured I might as well post it now. Better late than never, eh? I should probably repost these on /a/ as well or something. I dunno how to get these up on manga hosting sites like Mangafox because I'm too lazy to research what you should do if you want your translations posted places.

This time around, I did take into consideration the feedback I've received from my last chapter (thanks for that, guys) and if there's something still not to your liking, let me know. I still dunno how I really wanna handle sound effects, but I guess it's something I'll eventually get more used to if I ever plan to do full scale translation projects. I usually never have to really deal with that sort of thing, because when I'm usually translating, it's a single 4koma or something that's simple and doesn't require heavy editing or complicated sound effects.

As I said before, I'm not really good with Japanese yet. Some lines could be translated better, some may be a bit mistranslated, but I'm confident that it's mostly correct, so don't worry too much. It's a really short manga anyway, and each chapter is like 5 or 6 pages, which is really short. Especially since it's 4koma. 

Anyway, the download for the chapter can be found here.

 

~ Kirari ミ★

Poncho translation!

 Hey guys! I was a bit bored today so I decided I'd give a crack at quickly translating a few pages. I plan to finish chapter 1 and then post it on /a/ or something in hopes that translation groups (or individuals that have close ties to said groups) can gain an interest in picking up where I left off.

Keep in mind I'm not exactly fluent in Japanese or anything. I understand maybe 75% of what I read in this manga, and some of what I read I'd have the gist of what it means in Japanese without being able to really word it right into English. It's entirely possible there will be mistranslations, but they (hopefully) aren't big ones anyway. I'd translate the whole thing, but I'd rather have confidence that I can understand it at least 95% before picking up the whole translation on my own.

I don't even know how I'll handle stuff like honorifics. I decided to leave them out for now, I think those work better for certain translations. I do know for sure that I won't over-localize (for example, what GG does with their translations where "Call me Yuki-sama" turns into "Call me darling" or turning "tsundere" into "bipolar"). I'm not a very big fan of that. I do like wording sentences in a more natural manner, and that does occasionally require you to toy around with the literal translation a little and sometimes tweak it, but I hate removing the original connotation of a line, or inserting memes just because they kinda match what the character said ("Come at me, bro!")

Anyway, Poncho is a really cute slice of life 4koma following the every day adventures of Hiroshi and Pon. Hiroshi's just trying to spend time with his girlfriend, whom he's really lovey dovey with; but every time he goes to visit her house, she's busy working! Instead of spending time with his girlfriend, he ends up babysitting her little sister!

I was multitasking with this all day, so I've only got 3 and a half pages done (I'm lazy). When I finish the chapter I'll make a post of it and provide a download link, so just think of this as a preview for now. I'll be organizing the images to be opened left to right, but  read them in normal manga format.

This one is a joke translation I made because someone asked me when the blood and fighting comes in.

I'll probably finish tomorrow, or at least sometime this week. Then I'll let it roam the net a bit and wait for someone to get interested in it. If anyone has any criticism to give, please feel free to post them.

~ Kirari ミ★

I don't think about the future

I don't think about the future. It usually gets in the way of taking it easy. The future is a bit too complicated to think about at times really, and I'm bad at predicting. I'm also extremely indecisive. But for some reason I found myself thinking a bit about it last night before drifting to sleep. Maybe it's because of the debt I've been accumulating and the fee I have to pay by next month before it escalates into a legal issue (in which case the fees would have increased dramatically).

If I had remained a NEET I could have avoided this really. I feel as if I've fallen into a scam I saw miles away but disregarded anyway. But that's just how it works when you take everything in your own pace. I'm not sure what I'll even do. The plan was never for me to work, even though it'd be obvious from the fees I'd have to find a job at some time. Being at a 2 year college, at least the debt isn't so large, still I've no idea what happens after I finish those 2 years. I could continue language in another school, but I'm pretty sure the only other school around that has Japanese would be an expensive private school that's hard to get into. And then for what? It's not like a degree in Japanese would really open any jobs that would be able to pay for the large debt I have. 

But if I just finish my 2 years and decide to start work after, what exactly will that lead to either? I guess it'd make nabbing an entry level job easier as resume fodder or something. But what the hell job would I work? For some reason I see myself working at a bookstore or something, through some entry level job like organizing shelves or working the register. And staying at this position to the point where 10 years from now I'd still be that quiet bookstore worker that occasionally knocks stuff over because of how clumsy I am. I'd still be paying off my debt by then due to my low pay and interest sprouting up. Of course, I'd still live with my mother, but this isn't something I've ever looked down on or thought was a bad idea. I find it more appropriate to live with your family, as it eases the burden of cash and you could always help support each other. But I guess some people find it as a sign that you can't walk on your own two legs so look down on it. Not something I care about really, I just felt like pointing out that I always thought it to be an odd idea to live on your own if there's no actual reason for doing so such as better job opportunities outside of one's hometown.

But as I was saying, it's hard to imagine myself doing anything more than small jobs. After all, I really don't think I've many skills. No, I really don't have anything special about me at all. People believe I'm good at computers, but I'm not really, I've just used them since a younger age than a lot of other people. In some cases some could say that experience alone counts as skill I have that others don't, but it's nothing that any employer would particularly find interesting. I know how to not be stupid with a computer, interesting skill I guess. I have a yellow belt in
Google-fu, which allows me to fix problems by stealing answers from other people. My family comes to me when they have computer issues and I usually just Google it and pick the first result to fix their computer. One could argue it's no different than learning information from a textbook, but I've no actual knowledge in how any of that stuff works most of the time. I guess what I'm trying to say is that anyone can do it, people just don't, so I'm not sure if anyone can call it an actual skill. I've gotten money for doing easy computer jobs from my father's technologically illiterate friends, but (no real offense to them) they're not exactly the brightest of the bunch anyway.

In the end I feel as if I can't really do anything. Maybe that's why I can only imagine myself at an entry level job that could be acquired without any college experience, and remaining at that position. A completely optimistic view of the future would be nabbing one of those nice translation jobs where I could work at home for a game company like Atlus or Capcom or something. Or maybe novel translations. Even manga translations. I can't even imagine this stuff paying much, but I'm sure it'd probably pay more than anything else in my head, and I'd have the benefit of not having to go outside. But I doubt this job has many openings, or that they'd be given to someone with no prior translation experience and only 2 years of classes to show for language proficiency. I guess if they actually tested my Japanese they'd know it was beyond the level I have a degree in, but that's not exactly something I expect them to do when shifting through resumes for a candidate.

But I suppose it doesn't matter too much. More money from a better job simply means I can get my loans paid faster. Besides, if I had too much money I'd probably stuff my room with too many figures and have a problem.

At least I've still got a strong goal and determination for learning Japanese. In my job working as a bookstore employee, or as a janitor, or as a cashier, or anything else, I can at least think of myself as being proficient in Japanese by that point. I don't think 2 more years on top of my current experience (which I've lost track of how long by now) would be an unreasonable time frame for me to be well versed in the language. I don't see myself dropping this determination. In fact, it's the only thing I've ever actually taken initiative and interest to sit down and study in my life. The only thing I really have a passion to learn. If I don't find success in Japanese, I really can't see myself succeeding in anything else. It'd be a huge fall, and a huge failure. But I'm not worried about this, because I've no doubts that I'll continue. I've come too far and I'm still far too determined to back out. That's why I can see myself being able to read novels and VNs fluently, even as a cashier. I can see myself taking my breaks in the bookstore to sit in a private corner and pull out a Japanese novel, reading through the pages at the rate I could read  through with my native language (maybe faster, kanji makes reading feel fast even at my current level). Because I really think that no matter what happens to me by that point in the future, my hard work now would shine by then.

But that's enough for today's shitpost. I downloaded Solanin yesterday and I'm going to give it a watch right now. Thanks for reading. Or skimming, I understand since my post is such a wall and I don't even know when to properly highlight certain points with bold or italics.. Or even just coming to this page to look at my image, that's fine too.

~ Kirari ミ★

Slight inactivity

Yay, this week I have tons of stuff to do! So I'll be slightly inactive for a few days. I might be able to pop in and read a few blogs every now and then, but I'll certainly be too busy to post anything. I've got a test on Monday that I didn't know about until the professor announced it yesterday, and 2 projects due next week, one of which I need to watch a movie for; but I'll most likely just pick a clip from youtube and look up the summary to use for my paper. But I think I also need to keep in contact with my group members (ugh, group assignment) to find out what clip they picked from the movie. And can I really right a 3 page paper using a summary? I hope I don't actually have to waste an 1.5+ hours watching a movie this week.

I also need to try to get in contact with some Korean kid in my college as part of an assignment too. It's the first year they're trying this program, where transfer students can talk to native speakers on campus. Only it's required I do it for my class, which the professor just came up with out of the blue mid semester. Unfortunately, I gave the wrong email by accident, and apparently my partner did too. We have each other's phone numbers as well but I think we're both too awkward to call each other. Kinda makes me feel bad that someone got stuck with such an uninterested partner that's not taking the initiative to contact them. I just have to meet up at least 3 times, chat for an hour, and write a small log of what happened. It's supposed to be simple work but 1 hour of my day is a lot of my freaking time, especially if I need to spend it talking to someone. But it can't be helped. I need to get on it because the semester is almost over.

On a side note, I wanted to play Marvel vs Capcom 3 today for just an hour since it's been a while, and ended up spending my whole day on it. Oh boy! Well I guess I'll finish my kanji for the day and go to sleep so I can wake up early tomorrow and try doing something productive. And maybe text my partner or something as well.

~ Kirari ミ★

My kingdom for strawberry fruit snacks!

I'm about to reveal a story that still haunts me to this very day. You see, I love fruit snacks, I really do. I remember being younger and getting a pack of them at the corner store before heading to school. I love those little colored shapes of pure delight. However, I am plagued with a curse. For my packages always...always are filled with those little demons. More than half of each package is filled with those foul, disgusting, and utterly revolting things. Oranges. Pineapples. These are my least favorite of the fruit snacks, and yet they torment me so! Why, why must I receive so many of them in one pack and so few of my favorite flavor?! Why am I forced to the torment of eating these orange creatures before getting my satisfying prize? Why do I not simply throw them out? I feel as if I've given up if I throw them out, as if some divine force out there is waiting for that day, so that they may personally come before me and laugh in the face of the mortal who thought they could endure this fruity torture.

NAY, there is INDEED a divine force out there there that is preventing me from reaching my delicious goal! Some grand force that simply frowned upon my very taste buds! For there is simply no statistical way for it to be properly explained! I've come to the conclusion that I am being targeted. I am being personally watched over and toyed with, by this fruit snack god. Why, why!? Why am I denied the pleasure of a pack filled with strawberries!?

"JUST ONCE" I cried with all my heart, my hands clasped tightly together as I prayed to the stars "I'D LIKE TO EXPERIENCE THEY JOY OF A FRUIT SNACK PACK WITH MOSTLY STRAWBERRIES! IS THAT TOO MUCH TO ASK FOR!?"

As if responding, the frightening boom of thunder cried throughout the skies. There was no lightning, there weren't even any clouds within sight; but somewhere out there, something had listened to my cries. My vision blurred, my body collapsed, and my eyes nailed shut. I woke up in what seemed like a full month later, though checking the date I could see it had only been a night. I didn't even brush my teeth. I didn't head anywhere near the bathroom. I ran straight into the kitchen. My legs trusted against the ground at a pace I've never felt them move at before, yet I was not controlling them. It was as if they were being moved by pure instinct.

I reach the pantry, and with one swift movement, throw the door open. There, in the center, a beam of light from a crack in the curtains shines a single ray right on what I seek. The box of fruity decadence, waiting for me to claim it. I pull the box out and open the flaps. My hands shake as I reach in and pull out a small plastic package. Every pore on my body tingles as my fingers fumble to the ends of the package and rip a small tear.

What's this? Pink? I close my eyes and gulp down what seemed like an anvil before opening them again. My eyes deceive me not, for there is indeed a pink fruit poking out from the very small tear I have created on this package. My breathing becomes heavy. My knees start rubbing against each other as if they've a will of their own. I further advance the rip to reveal yet another heavenly shade of pink. My heart races at a rate that makes me feel as if it's about to burst. My pants become violent. My glasses fog. My head becomes light. My body feels as if it's too weak to support itself. Yet my body straightens out until I'm standing on my very tiptoes. But no, it's too early, it can't happen now. I have to hold on. I need to wait longer. I lose control of my salivary glands and a trickle of drool seeps out from my agape mouth. But I mustn't focus on such little things. I must hold back. I must claim my prize!

I can no longer hold it in. It has to be now. A primal urge boils from deep within me. I rip the package completely in half within the blink of an eye, with the force of seven gorillas. The fruit snacks catapult into the very skies, soaking in the oxygen surrounding them. But I do not look. My eyes are closed. I extend my hands out and feel as they fall neatly into even piles within each palm. I close my hands and savor their feel for a bit. That texture, that soft stretchy feel, the slight coldness of each one. Yes, I feel them. I want them. I want them in me now. I shoot my eyes open and glare beams into my hands as I slowly open them.

My legs finally give in. The sound of a sickening smash and crunch echoes throughout the room as my kneecaps slam against the ground, undoubtedly either horribly dislocated or broken from the impact. However, I do not feel any pain whatsoever. I bring my hands up to my face. I press them with all my force against my skin. With a searing sound, I feel the snacks melt into my very core. The smell of fruit snacks wafts throughout a 40 mile radius, alerting all. Alerting them all of...my sorrow. I pull my hands away from my face. The hot, sticky goop thins out into small threads of liquid as I pull my hands further. The hot and sticky threads that drip down burn like molten lava. Rivers of tears fall from my eyes. However, nobody can see these tears, for they are hidden behind a coat of orange. I sit there, head bowed in defeat. Why? Why have I been denied once more? I was certain I'd get my wish this time. I was certain I'd achieve fruity goodness that would surpass the feel of any pleasure ever experienced in my life. I do not clean my face of this sticky goop. I wear it as a mask of shame, as an eternal reminder of the day I foolishly thought I could go against the fruit snack god.

There were indeed two strawberries within the pack, for they now stand as pink marks indicating where my eyes used to be. I've been toyed with. Never in my life have I faced such utter humiliation. And so I carry on, forever lost, denied the right to properly enjoy the luxury of the divine fruit snack pack.

This is my sorrow.
This is my pain.
This is my curse.
This is my story.

(Based on a true story of what happened to me this morning)

It sounds a bit odd considering all the typos I make (I notice them, yes), but I do sometimes writefag when I'm bored, usually in random /jp/ threads when I feel like it. some of them circulate occasional as pasta, but I won't point out which ones I've created. This story has nothing /jp/ related thought, it's just me writing down my tragic story. Since I can't think of anything to post about, I may think about just writing some stories here every now and then. But I think they'd be tl;dr and nobody would read them anyway, so maybe I won't. I have some assignment due tonight at 11 that I'm just procrastinating on, so it's all cool. It's an easy assignment anyway, but those are the worst because I end up thinking they're so easy that I don't have to jump onto it right away. Before I know it I have like 20 minutes to complete it, and even though it's easy to do, it becomes a race against time.

I'm going to get another fruit pack. It'll just be filled with oranges and pineapples anyway...

~ Kirari ミ★

IDon'tKNowWhatToCallThisPost

So I still haven't gotten my computer up, but then again I've been too lazy to really sit down and spend time with it. I tried taking all the jumpers out and replugging them into place and it didn't work (though the motherboard still receives power, just won't start up). I'm suspecting it's my power switch, but I've no idea how anything bad could have possibly happened to it when all I was doing was swapping the SATA cable from my Hard Drive to my CD Drive, and I also plugged it into the power source since I didn't have it plugged before. I'll probably spend more time with it tomorrow, I kinda wanna get back into my game so I can non-shitpost with a review of it.

As for other happenings, I've been amazed at how much kanji grinding has sped up my reading and overall increased confidence while reading. Even kanji I knew before, but took a second to remember because of manually fitting radicals, have come to my head easier from my grinding. I was reading through Mysterious Girlfriend X, which uses almost no furigana, and didn't have as much of a problem as I was having before bumping into unknown kanji and feeling discouraged. Even if I don't know the reading of the kanji, just being comfortable seeing it and having a name associated with it is enough to smooth things out.

I've been reading back through Negima 29, Mysterious Girlfriend X, Symphonic Rain (which is on my main computer so is stuck midway through right now), and a few other titles, but they're all stuff I've enjoyed previously in English. So I've been reading Non Non Biyori and soon will be getting a few other titles I've yet to pick up. 

Hey, Symphonic Rain...maybe I'll do a review of that. But I don't have many English screenshots of it, and the English patch completely overwrites the Japanese exe. That is, if I plan on just putting it onto my laptop. It is one of my favorite VNs, being sweet and having 2 unlockable routes that add even more warm fuzzies to the story. I'll think about it for now.

Today might be the first day I don't complete 25 kanji. I came home rather late and tired out (bus wait times plus professor letting us out later than usual). I've only gotten like 5 kanji done right now and it's 9:30. Of course, that's not late, and I have no class tomorrow so can stay up will whenever just fine, but my eyes are pretty heavy right now. Might just do 10 more kanji and run Anki. I won't go hard on myself and try to force more kanji than I can take right now, there's no point if it's not properly retained. I'm going to go take a shower, maybe that'll wake me a little.

~ Kirari ミ★

Computer sicky

I blame the drivers I put in to use my Wiimote on my computer, it's the only change I made recently that I can really think of. I turned my computer on yesterday and it booted fine until the login screen, where it just hanged with a black screen and nothing else. Monitors still received signal, but no cursor or anything. I didn't panic because I know better than that. So I started it up in safe mode, and it did indeed start up perfectly fine. I didn't think it's the culprit, as I'm always too cautious to get them, but just to make sure, I ran some virus scanners. All clean, as expected, so I cleaned out my registry and checked small details here and there to try to isolate the problem. So I eventually thought I'd just try fixing the MBR with recovery console. Well, it didn't do anything, but I figured it was worth a shot. This time I figured I'd run CHKDSK. I didn't want it to come to that, since it's quite lengthy, but I just left it alone and continued with my day using my laptop instead.

When it finally finished, I checked and: hey, it booted fine. So I used it for the rest of the day, everything was fine. I shut it off for the night, turned it on this morning and face the same problem.I ran through the steps above one more time, but this time CHKDSK wasn't fixing the problem either. So it comes down to the point where I'll need to put in my XP disk and just run repair. This is something I really didn't want it to come to because I'd have to go through the trouble of hooking up my CD drive again (I don't have extra SATA cables so just unhooked my CD drive when I got my new hard drive on Christmas). Before it comes to that I tried the steps again one more time, wasting more of my day, and it comes to the same results. Well, I figured I should stop being lazy and start some physical labor. So I open my case, switch out my new hard drive and replace the cables for my CD drive. I boot up my computer and: no power. Fans don't run at all but motherboard has its light on. I mess with the switch in the back and take a quick glance at my jumpers. I don't know what happened, I'm guessing one of the jumpers came out while opening my case again and I didn't notice. In any case, the power button doesn't start my computer up right now. I've used up enough of my day trying to fix it, so I'll leave it alone for now and get back to it some other time.

Worst case scenario would be I don't know what the hell is wrong and will probably have to take my case over to my uncle's house to see if he can spot anything wrong with how everything's hooked up. And it'd probably be an obvious problem I'm overlooking as well, like one of the jumpers not being on securely enough. At least I know it's my own fault, even if I don't know what I did actually. I just worry having to take the trip to my uncle's place just to bother him, and my machine isn't exactly portable enough to just carry along. What really sucks though is that I now have a bundle of hard drives worth of data that I can't access at the moment, and I don't even know how long it'll be before I'm able to access them again.

I was going to make a non-shitpost today but I just wanna take it easy the rest of the day and continue with my kanji.

~ Kirari ミ★

REAL final midterm is tomorrow. Also, video of the week.

If you want to avoid the cool story, the video is at the bottom.

So  I said in my earlier post that spring break doesn't actually start for me until Monday because I still have a midterm for an online course due tomorrow. I do at least know some of what's on it, but I can't say I'm too confident on all the material considering how she does her quizzes. A lot of her questions are worded vaguely, and since it's not multiple choice you just have to pretty much deal with her wording. I also don't really feel like trying too much in the class. 

She has her tests planned on such awkward time frames, and I'm so forgetful that I forgot the date of our first test so got a 0 for it. Considering tests make up about 60% of our grade, that one test alone is almost the death blow of the class grade, which pretty much makes me lose motivation for even trying hard in it. I don't like the idea of busting my ass studying and still getting a poor/failing grade, wasting valuable time I could be using to focus on what I really want to learn instead. So I was supposed to study a bit today, but ended up spending almost the entire day on Japanese instead while procrastinating. I don't really mind, taking it easy is my thing. No need to stress over small stuff, it'll get me nowhere. So just taking it easy. I'll probably fail that course, but it can't be helped. 

I got some laminated kanji poster to hang on my wall and help me keep track of my progress. Works pretty well, looks nice, and I can easily write on it and highlight troubled ones that aren't clicking with me so I can review them first thing when I wake up and look at my wall. 

But enough about me. Here's the video of the week.

Video contains Madoka spoilers

Here we have a nice little parody opening of Hidamari Sketch (Chidamari Sketch, where chidamari means blood puddle) using Madoka's cast.

~ Kirari ミ★

Start of spring break, and free from the chains of midterms. And Patchy.

I now have more free time with midterms finished. Spring break has started for me, so I'm taking it easy right now. Well, actually, it doesn't officially start until next Monday, and I have a midterm on my online course that's locked until Saturday (and then I have 1 day to complete it), but I'm not going to stress over it. My days have been super busy because I've been trying to fit everything together. I usually don't study, because I end up actually doing worse on tests when I do study (because I end up second guessing myself a lot during the test only to find my gut instinct was correct), but considering I knew absolutely nothing on the material for 2 of my midterms, I decided I'd look into it a bit. Of course, I procrastinate so much that it was a pain to handle. I also put daily Japanese studies above everything else. My days last week consisted of Japanese studies, try to study some school stuff, anime/Jdrama break, Japanese studies, food, Japanese studies, break, try school stuff, Japanese studies, and sleep.

Now I have more time to focus on Japanese studies, I guess. My Japanese professor was trying to think of ways she can help out Japan. Her family is fine, living in Tokyo and all, but she planned on going out there during Spring break and giving a hand. But there are pretty much no opportunities for individuals to go over and help out. I suggested she donate the money she'd use for travel expenses and such instead, and she agreed that was the best idea. While I was packing my stuff at the end of class she gave me a bear hug for emailing her the week before make sure she's okay. I'm glad she didn't decide to do that during class after giving her the donation suggestion.

And then after, I went to the cafeteria. I don't usually eat at my school since the prices are usually high, and I don't really eat much, but I figured it'd be best to have something in my stomach before taking he midterm that I had the next class, which started in about an hour and a half. Last time I ate, there was some jazz band performing there, it made for some nice background music while I munched. Didn't even turn my MP3 player on because it was okay to listen to. But this time, apparently the anime club was doing karaoke. They had a projector set up to play videos. Tomare!, Brooklyn Rage, On A Blimp, Mottoke! Sailor Fuku, some Dragonball Z parody of Make A Man Out of You (along with also doing the real version, kinda out of place). I did put my MP3 player on for this one, actually, but from the videos alone I could tell what they were singing. I came in during the Dragonball Z parody and didn't know what the hell was going on. Didn't bother me much, and not too noteworthy (aside from the random black kids in the center table getting up and dancing during Brooklyn Rage), but I guess I picked an odd day to eat at the cafeteria.

Oh, and my Patchy plush came in quite some time ago but I never made a post about it. Her hat, sadly, her hat doesn't fit on Beatrice's big head. 

Hat actually topples Mew off balance.

This one is actually from Mari, but it's so cute.

~ Kirari ミ★

NEET Eats 2!

 So, I decided I'd do another one of these. Okay, not really, I was just cooking today and thinking "What should I make a post about?" and then realized that there was material (shitty material) to make a post on right under my nose as I was cooking the chicken in my pan.

Making one blog post sometimes opens the door for me to make more, and since I've been so focused on my studies (Japanese and studies for the upcoming midterm...and 2 other tests) that I've just been popping in to check up on some blogs and then getting off.

So, I the dish I'm showing off today is something I often make, provided I can wait long enough for some chicken to defrost. Spicy instant noodles with chicken!

Of course, it's nothing too spectacular, but that doesn't matter! What matters is if it's cheap, quick to make, and adds some spice to an otherwise boring meal! Like last time, I won't give measurements, just put the amount you think you'll enjoy, and experiment a little. After all, most of this stuff I just make from experimentation, without looking up recipes. In preparation for this, all you'll need is:

1. Some chicken breasts
2. Some instant noodles (I use Maruchan chicken noodles for this dish)
3. Canola oil or vegetable oil
4. Hot sauce
5. Whatever extras you think may be good, usually some veggies. In mine I have carrots, peas, and corn.

So, simple enough, right? Only real hassle is the chicken, having to wait for it to defrost. But if you're patient enough to wait 30 minutes while it rests in a bowl of water to defrost, then it'll pay off with a meal that cooks in about 10 minutes or so.

What you'll want to do is cut the chicken into pieces while the water boils your instant noodles. You'll want to keep the seasoning packet until after, if you want to keep that flavor, as most of it will go away when you drain the broth from the noodles later. If you have extra ingredients, it's nice to prepare them at this stage as well. By the time you finish everything, the noodles should be close to completion. At this time you can heat up a skillet or wok, and place enough oil on it to leave a very light layer on the surface. It doesn't matter if there are a few dry spots here and there, so long as it's mostly covered in oil. I normally use canola oil, but vegetable oil is probably more common in most households, and works fine as well.

Throw in the chicken pieces and extra ingredients to start cooking over a medium-high flame. Make sure to stir it around a little so that the chicken whitens on all sides. Keep an eye on your noodles so they don't get soggy. You'll want to take them out when they're done and drain the water from it before the noodles absorb too much of the water. Unless you're into soft noodles, that's fine then, but if you want them to be crispy or crunchy then you'll want to get them before they reach that soft point. If your chicken is white on all sides, then it's fine to just toss the drained noodles into the pan along with them. You'll want to constantly stir from this point on, or flip if you're experienced enough to do so (it's fun with a wok). From here you add some hot sauce and seasonings on top. Usually the seasoning packet that comes with the noodles is enough, but if you find the flavor too concentrated you can experiment a bit with other seasonings you'll like. For some ideas, I sometimes use soy sauce with a tad bit of sugar, and sometimes I use some Adobo all purpose seasoning (this thing works on everything, seriously). 

Your seasonings should naturally mix in as you're cooking, since you're stirring the noodles constantly anyway. I usually like my noodles crispy and cook the chicken until it's a bit more brown, but today I made them a bit soft for a change of pace. And with that, you're done. It's relatively cheap, using maybe one slice of chicken breast per noodle packet (or one and a half if you really like your meat), and instant noodles are a STAPLE in a penny pincher's diet!

Enjoy! 

(Or not, people tell me my dishes are strange, but this one is one of the more normal of the bunch)

~ Kirari ミ★

Workload woes

So I thought I was caught up on everything until I realized I have a midterm in about a week and I know absolutely nothing on the topics being brought up in it due to the fact that I never cracked the textbook open. I was lazy, yeah. I tried reading it though, but I always hate reading textbooks. I read a pargraph, but it's so dull that my mind wanders off on its own. So even though I'm reading the words on the page, my mind isn't absorbing them because I'm too focused on other things. 

Because of this, it takes me like an hour just to read one page, because I constantly have to go back and re-read what I wasn't paying attention to. I'm usually like this with textbooks, especially History textbooks. I'm just much more of a visual learner, I guess. I don't like learning from texts, I'd rather learn in video form or something. So I was thinking I'd just look up a documentary for the subjects I'm supposed to be studying. Nothing on youtube but a bunch of kids that uploaded their history project online (and it seems like the whole class did it, and all of their results show up as the first thing, isn't that just nice?)

So I guess I could search the web for some videos. Maybe the History Channel website has some of the stuff I'm looking for. I just don't want to take the chance that I spend time looking for these videos, and in the end find nothing that goes deep enough into the topics for me to really build an essay around for the exam. At least the review sheet tells us what essays will be on the test. The problem is he gave 8 essays and said of those 8 he'll only use 4 maximum on the test, and of the ones he picks we choose 2. Not a bad bargain really, but knowing my luck he'll pick the questions I focused least on studying.

On the bright side, I ended up procrastinating on my History studies by focusing more on my Japanese studies. That's fine, I guess. Not good for my History class (or really my Japanese class either since my studies are usually learning stuff not covered in my course at the moment) but at least I didn't spend most of my time procrastinating on the internet.

Now if you'll excuse me, I have to go procrastinate more by doing some kanji grinding.

~ Kirari ミ★

Work work work

So I calmed down on Marvel vs Capcom, but didn't realize how much work piled up. Been inactive (again) after coming back because I realized this. It's mostly out of the way though, so I should really be back tomorrow. Now to think of something to post about. Been reading a manga I heard about quite some time ago but never picked up, it's Koko Ni Iru Yo (I Am Here). The main character looks like Saya from Saya no Uta, but with brown hair, which is kinda the only thing I knew about the series before picking it up.Well, that and the fact that it was shoujo romance. But seriously, she looks like Saya. It doesn't help that the manga pages are obviously in black and white. She doesn't have the same eyes as Saya in the manga though, for the most part.

It's about a girl that's so unnoticed that she's literally invisible to others sometimes. But she's used to it and blogs every day, and have 2 frequent visitors that comment on her posts and such. I'd go more into detail, but I might want to save that for an actual review post than sticking it into a crappy filler post like this.

Anyway, I'm actually a bit disappointed in myself because I picked English chapters of it to read even though I'm trying my best to stay away from that. I guess I just have so much work right now that I want to use my free time to breeze through chapters and understand a majority of what's said. I still haven't picked up Poncho (introduced by Tigoris) either, which I really do plan on doing sometime this week. I took a glance at the first few pages that were in color, but didn't get past page 6 or so since it was about 4 in the morning and I realized I didn't do my daily SRS reps at the time.

So, normal blog post tomorrow unless I'm forgetting something. I already missed 1 test and 1 quiz from my online course, that that's more from the fact that I have a crappy memory and the professor put them at incontinent times. Last semester my professor gave us a week to complete assignments, but this time my online course has a professor that just assigns stuff whenever and usually gives a 1-3 day window to complete it. Don't really mind much though, if I fail the course then I just fail it, bot like I won't already be in debt that I won't be able to pay of by the time I get out of classes. Why did I decide to enroll in College again? I probably would have done better just looking for a language center and take Japanese there. It'd give me more time to focus on what I really want to learn anyway, and get the other crap I'm not interested in out of the way (and save money). Kinda too late to back out now. Or maybe not? I dunno, don't like thinking about the future too much. Oh well, whatever happens will happen.

~ Kirari ミ★

Review tomorrow

Took it too easy today and now I'm sleepy. I'll do my Flandre Nendoroid review tomorrow, and catch up on missed blog posts today. For anyone wondering, I did get the charges of my case dropped. I'm surprised that I actually did, but I always have a pessimistic view on everything, especially something like this. I was prepared to pay the fine, I guess, but it all worked out so I can keep my money. It was quicker than I thought too. I figured I'd be stuck in the court for hours waiting for people ahead of me to finish, and then have my date rescheduled when I pleaded not guilty so they could bring in the officer that ticketed me to provide his side of the story or something. But it seems the proof I provided was valid enough to clear my name. 

Today I've just been really lazy. I didn't even play MvC3 all day. For some reason I wasn't at top performance today, so just ended my game early. The rest of the time I spent lounging around and studying Japanese every few hours. Right now my dog is sleeping on my lap and not allowing me to move.

I did see Madoka episode 8 today, and enjoyed it a lot. I then proceeded to spend the rest of my day pretty much lurking Madoka threads on /a/ to see what they're talking about.

And I want to pay for my Patchouli plush that I managed to get off Amiami, but my paypal won't sent the text to my cellphone for me to sign on. I don't know why really. I have until the 3rd to pay, so I'm not too worried, and if worse comes to worse then I'll just fill out the security questions to bypass the text key, but I hope I don't have to go through the extra work.

Oh well, lazying it up. Time to go look around to see what you guys are up to.

~ Kirari ミ★

Short rant on procrastination

Me being a lazy ass cat. Cats are professionals at taking it easy.

So I realized I had this essay due this weekend that I completely forgot about. I was a relatively easy essay though, but because it was so easy I pushed it back so far. The thing is, when I procrastinate I try splitting my free time in increments. So, I'd wake up and browse around online for an hour, let's say it's 1 PM by now.

 

"I'll start my essay at...2" is what I say to myself, because I haven't satisfied myself yet. But I don't do anything important in this time frame, or anything interesting, like watching anime (if I get too into it, I'll want to watch more and it will distract me), or reading VNs (easy way to lose track of time). So what am I left with? Just browsing online, lurking 4chan and constantly refreshing stuff for a full hour. An hour I could have spent doing something else, at least playing games or something. But by the time it's 2, I don't feel ready to do the essay yet. "2:30 then, really."

So I go and maybe take a shower or something to increase blood flow a little. But wait, I haven't eaten yet! No worries, at 3 I'll get started! Oh no, I suddenly feel sleepy now that it's 3, maybe I should nap a bit. I mean, there's no use in doing an essay while sleepy, right? I'll make sure it's just a 15 minute nap. Damn, 15 minutes passed already? I'm still sleepy. I'll just set the alarm for another 15 minutes.

Crap like this goes on the whole day. I know I'm making excuses to procrastinate, and it does more harm than good anyway because I waste the day for an essay that I could have done at the start of the day and be over with, leaving me the rest of the day to do whatever I want without worrying about meeting a deadline that I set for myself. I usually get stuff on time, but last minute. 

I was supposed to do the 999 review this weekend, but I kept saying "after my essay because I don't want to get caught up in writing it up" which is kinda how I keep myself from watching anime or playing games or something while in my procrastination stage. Maybe if I actually satisfied myself by playing a game or watching anime, or whatever, I'd actually stop procrastinating because I'd feel more relieved. But I never do this.

So tomorrow is class for me, but I don't have anything after, so I should have my 999 review up then. I actually wrote it up a bit before doing this entry, but realized I had to go in game for a few screenshots I wanted and didn't feel like doing that right now. I have to head off it a bit to wake up early for tomorrow's classes anyway, so I'll do a quick daily Japanese study session and maybe watch an episode of Aria to calm me down before I sleep.

~ Kirari ミ★

Video of the week Jan. 19

Semi-filler, but I forgot I haven't done one of these in a while. I had a blog planned for today, but it'd require me to get some screenshots of something, and I didn't feel like loading up my emulator. Also, today was a surprisingly productive day for me, because I spent almost the whole day reviewing and studying Japanese instead of lazing around and lazily looking over Japanese for 30 minutes or so. Didn't want to break the flow, so kinda stuck with it. Right now I think I'll call it a night for my Japanese studies, felt kinda nice looking over old stuff I had problems with understanding, and being able to get it with little effort.

I emailed Amiami about the account change and haven't gotten word from them yet about what my new email means for my previous orders, but hopefully I get some word on them soon (before Takoluka comes in stock). I also don't even know if they shipped my Dead Master figure yet, but I did pay for it and there's no noticed on my Paypal or anything, so I assume it was shipped out by now. I asked them to confirm there was no issues with the shipping just to make sure. Rather not have to wait another month because of a complication that could have been avoided if I simply informed them of my situation.

So the video of this week is something cute I just picked up on while lurking around the new for a bit. Might not be so cute to anyone that hasn't seen Milky Holmes, but if you have then you might want to get your nutbladder bandages ready.

~ Kirari ミ★

BACKLOGGIN, EVERYDAY~

Still alive, just working through C79 and Christmas backlog a little. I'll do a non-filler post n a few hours, just felt like popping in and making a really small update in case I don't finish my post within a few hours and it's delayed until tomorrow. 

I've been mostly playing the Umineko fighter, making a few combos and such. The online play in it is pretty bad, but hopefully there'll be a fix for it. Someone on /jp/ already said they were working on one, and apparently it worked well enough that they could do 6 matches lag free before disconnecting, which is much better than my streak of 1 full match every 6 disconnects! Unfortunately, he said he's not releasing it. No idea why, but if a fix exists and was found this quickly, I'm sure someone else will give it a try. Someone said Hamachi seems to drop connections less than direct connections, which is ironic but I guess I'll give that a try later and see if that's true.

Also, I recently ordered this Dead Master figure. It should be sent out some time next week, but who knows when it'll actually make it to me. I missed out on it last time because of my indecisiveness, but decided to take this opportunity of the reprint to actually get it, now that I have Christmas funds to help me in getting it.

Just a slight update on a few random things. I'll make an actual blogpost later tonight if I don't get caught up in marathoning a series or finishing up a game or something.

~ Kirari ミ★

Video of the week #...whatever

I lost track. The numbers don't matter much, do they? 

I'm thinking of doing another music post for tomorrow, but I kinda feel I've been falling back on those too much. I thought of doing a review on Umineko, but dunno if I could actually do something like that, especially without accidentally spoiling. Kind of running dry on ideas. C79 can't come any sooner, that'll give me some fresh stuff to blog about. I spent today taking a big bite out of my backlog. Almost done with Ika Musume, watched a few Soredemo Machi wa Mawatteiru episodes, played some of my current MMO...

In other words, a very laid back day for me. Feels good, man. So, I actually didn't find any interesting videos this week, probably because I haven't been browsing my usual places much this week for various reasons, so this video isn't so interesting. Just a Touhou GTA hack with Flandre going around shooting pogeymanz.

~ Kirari ミ★

Remilia came!

So, this actually came yesterday, but I forgot to make a blog post because I was taking it easy with my backlog all day. I came home and saw two packages on my bed. 

"What could this be? I ordered something?"

It's times like this I actually like having the memory capacity of a goldfish. I ordered Remilia, remember!? Of course. I also got a ton of (bootleg) mini Touhou figs from Dealextreme that just happened to come the same day. I don't usually buy bootleg figures, but there were really cheap, and I figured I wouldn't mind too much. 

The ones with bad paint jobs (see Chen) were just stuffed in my drawer somewhere. So, that leaves Kaguya, big Reimu, Marisa, Patchouli, and Komachi as the decent ones in the bunch. The others had really noticable errors, but I was expecting that. I think the worst one was small Cirno, having her head made out of a different material than her body, making her skin two tones, and some of the paint used for her face applied sloppily to her hair, along with an overall lazy paint job. But it's all fine, I wanted the Kaguya figure from this the most, and I'm glad she was the highest quality one of the bunch.

Oh, right, and of course there's Remilia. She's not fake, since she was a serious purchase.

I may do an actual review tomorrow. Or not, it depends how easy I'm going to take it with my backlog. Though, considering this figure was already done by two people that have better cameras and reviewing skill than me, I might pass up on it. Cpt.Awesome did one, and so did orange drink, so if you want a review of her you'll probably get more informative reviews from those guys. My reviews are mostly just me playing around with my figures before posing them. I got Remilia in preparation for the Flandre Nendoroid that's coming out soon. Have to have them both, y'know. 

 

As for my life, I've got finals next week (and had one yesterday and today, actually), so now's the perfect time for me to be taking it easy so I don't get bummed over tests. At least I've got new figures to brighten me up a bit.

~ Kirari ミ★

Narcissu

Okay, super slowpoke here. I've read the first Narcissu long ago, but it never had too great of an impact on me. I did get a bit sad reading it, but it wasn't anything too emotional for me. I read Narcissu 2 and stopped after a few chapters and have been picking at it slowly whenever I feel in the mood to read some Hospice Tales. I finished the 2nd part today, and I have to say that the last few chapters are soul shattering. I was reading it on the bus and couldn't help crying a bit. Nobody was around, but it's a bit embarrassing to cry in public over a scene. Seriously, those last few chapters...

I'd actually recommend reading Narcissu 2 before reading 1. It's a prequel anyway, so it's not like you'll lose anything. It makes the ending of Narcissu 1 a bit more emotional as well. If you've already read 1 and didn't like it enough to try 2, I'd say you might want to give the 2nd one a chance. It starts off with a pace that's actually a bit slower than 1, so you may think it'll pretty much be the same, and I believe it's actually a little longer than 1. But that's good, because I felt in part 1 you didn't really get to know the characters well enough. You mostly got a vague impression of their personalities, but in part 2 they really go into depth on the characters.

This isn't really a review, just felt like sharing with you guys some thoughts on what I just finished in my backlog. Time to finish something else now. I had an essay due today that I missed the deadline for because of my procrastination and underestimating how much I'd have to do for it. I'll just submit it tomorrow, it's not like I care too much about the grade I get so long as I pass, and 10 points off this essay for being late won't cause enough damage to actually harm my grade.

~ Kirari ミ★

MMO addiction

Why? Maplestory is the only MMO I've ever played. Why is that? Because I'm afraid to try something else and get addicted. Maplestory has given me a fear of MMOs. I will never pick up another one because of it. This game has gotten me to come back to it so many times. Why can't I just quit it? I'm always in a cycle of leaving the game for a few months and then joining back the next time there's a big update, and I always get sucked in to the point where I waste a majority of my day on it.

It's not like the game is particularly amazing or anything. In fact, I wouldn't say it's too great at all, and there's better things I could be doing with my time. And yet, I always find myself coming back to it and I always find myself playing again every few months. For years I've been like this, on and off this game. What is it exactly that's keeping me hooked on it? I know I'm not the only one that came back recently though. A lot of quit players are coming back due to the largest update Maple has ever received being released this week. Still, I can't help but feel I'm some sort of druggie. No matter how hard I try to quit, I always "accidentally" check up on some Maplestory news, and if I see something interesting it may be enough to pull me back in. How am I supposed to finish my backlog when I'm busy grindan my characters all day? How am I supposed to make room for my Japanese studies when I'm too busy killing cute possessed teddy bears? I mean, I could download the Japanese version and play with Japanese players, at least then I'd be able to study Japanese while I play. But I already have too many characters established in the Global version (AKA North American) version of the game. I don't want to start from scratch.

The customer service is crap, the gameplay ins't exactly innovative or spectacular, it takes up way too much time, there's so many negative points about it. I just keep coming back. Once I log in, I already know that there's no turning back, because I'm going to want to check out the new features added into the game and get stuck again.

;_;

~ Kirari ミ★