One of my biggest beefs with Starbucks is that they have taught everyone that the proper way to roast coffee is to stop just before it catches fire. Everything is over-roasted these days. I've been trying different brands of coffee trying to find one that isn't roasted too much, and I just found one. The Safeway house brand "breakfast blend" actually tastes like coffee, not like charcoal.
Why in hell does everyone seem to want me to create an account and log in? UPS just changed their web site so that you can't see when your package is expected to be delivered unless you log in first. Why in hell do I need to log in for that? I didn't used to.
There are a lot of reasons why I resent HorribleSubs, but maybe the biggest is the way they say, "This is brought to you by the HorribleSubs fansubbing team". Horseshit! Maybe there's a team, but the subbing is being done by Crunchyroll and Funimation. I wish they'd be more honest about what they're doing -- or perhaps "less dishonest" would be more to the point. I guess there has to be a team, because there's no damned way a single person could do all the stuff they do. But they don't sub anything.
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By the way, this post is not a request for suggestions and advice.
Posted by: Steven Den Beste at December 18, 2015 02:32 PM (+rSRq)
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I'm sadly familiar with the coffee problem. We found that Whole Foods sell passable coffee, in particular Colombian. Our latest workaround is to order from one of gourmet places. I can't seem to find an empty box with the name though...
Posted by: Pete Zaitcev at December 18, 2015 06:16 PM (XOPVE)
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For those of us who are drug addicts, overroasting is a double problem. Not only does it ruin the flavor, it also destroys a larger percentage of the caffeine. A light roast leaves more caffeine intact.
Posted by: Steven Den Beste at December 18, 2015 11:18 PM (+rSRq)
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Personally, I'm a tea drinker. Coffee smells heavenly, but the taste is shockingly different. At least tea doesn't pull a bait and switch on you.
Now, if somebody could come up with a beverage that tastes like coffee smells, I'd switch to it in an instant.
I suspect what's going on here, is that the people making the decisions are so deep into the product, and have been for so long, that they get jaded, and make their decisions on that basis. Like this fad for acidic wines. I swear, my sister gave me a bottle of wine a couple years ago that was more acidic than the vinegar I normally use!
Posted by: Brett Bellmore at December 19, 2015 05:15 AM (l55xw)
Are the first three movies (i.e. chap 1, chap 2, chap 3) now officially non-canon?
One of the new characters in the new movie (chap 7) is a former storm trooper who decided to change sides. He's black.
I thought all the storm troopers were clones of Jango Fett. Has that changed?
Or... we never actually saw the faces of Jango Fett or Boba Fett, not to mention any storm trooper. Are they all black? (Yikes! The SJW's will spike if so! Black slaves fighting and dying for the white emperor!)
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The problem with the clonetroopers is that they aged at an accelerated rate. That meant that they "wore out" quickly, with only a few remaining by the time of Episode IV.
They were replaced by both volunteers and draftees.
Posted by: Wonderduck at December 17, 2015 09:59 PM (zAcee)
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Well, that's the canon explanation. But the stormtroopers were not originally clones. The clone thing didn't come along until, IIRC, a George Lucas interview between Star Wars and Empire. And it was never in a script until Attack of the Clones. The stormtroopers in Star Wars were normal, Imperial Academy recruits.
Oh, and the clones in the Clone Wars were originally the conceptual predecessor of the Mandalorians. The "Clones" were a race of cloned soldiers that were the sworn enemies of the Jedi-Bendu.
Posted by: Ben at December 17, 2015 11:30 PM (DRaH+)
The term "Clone wars" appears in ep IV; Luke says "You fought in the Clone Wars?" to Ben Kenobi.
So Lucas had to come up with something to be the "clone wars" for the prequel. And what he came up with was pretty pitiful.
What I was hoping for was that the "clones" were ringers, duplicates of important people who replaced them to infiltrate the top levels of the government. The reason, then, that the Jedi were important was that they were the only ones who could tell who were clones and who were not. Or so I imagined it.
I think that would have made for a lot more interesting story than the one he ended up with IMHO.
Posted by: Steven Den Beste at December 18, 2015 12:13 AM (+rSRq)
4I think that would have made for a lot more interesting story than the one he ended up with IMHO.
I think that sentence applies to the entire "first" trilogy.
Posted by: Wonderduck at December 18, 2015 06:07 AM (zAcee)
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I keep meaning to put together a t-shirt design for the slogan "Kurosawa Shot First!". What Lucas did with the prequels was prove that he's a terrible writer and director who still doesn't understand his accidental masterpiece.
-j
Posted by: J Greely at December 18, 2015 07:37 AM (ZlYZd)
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The sad thing is that it's essentially true that the prequels are, except for Vader being a Skywalker, the story he intended to tell. He just didn't have anyone around to tell him he was doing a crap job anymore.
As to the original point, Abrams has sort-of kind-of hinted that he's mostly ignoring the prequels. However, they are still "officially" canon.
Posted by: Ben at December 18, 2015 10:17 AM (dGKUu)
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The canon, as mentioned is that Imperial Storm Trooper != Republic Clone Trooper. And, without going into spoilers, First Order Storm Trooper != Imperial Storm Trooper. But the background of the character and how he became a storm trooper is explicitly brought up in the movie and it makes as much sense as anything else in the universe.
I saw the movie last night. The first two thirds was amazing,and if the whole movie had been like that, it would undoubtedly place as the best movie in the franchise by far. Unfortunately the last third was ripe with refrigerator moments. It still blows eps 1-3 out of the water, but I'm not sure it will dethrone episode V as "the best".
Posted by: David at December 18, 2015 11:01 AM (BL/iE)
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From Wikipedia, The official Star Wars canon consists of the seven released Star Wars theatrical feature films, the Star Warsanimated film and television series The Clone Wars and Star Wars Rebels, and every other material released after April 25, 2014, unless otherwise stated. The Clone Wars animated movie got bad reviews, but the animated series is considered very good, some even saying it makes up for the prequels. Rebels recently introduced three clone troopers from the series as recurring characters, along with Ahsoka Tano. One of them, Captain Rex, said the official Empire line was that the Clone Troopers had outlived their usefulness and were replaced by the Storm Troopers. (At least the clones could hit things when shooting.) When Rex had to disguise himself as a Storm trooper, he complained about how inferior the armor was.
Posted by: muon at December 18, 2015 02:29 PM (IUHrD)
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So, nothing Zahn wrote, nor Anderson is canon? No Thrawn? No Pellaeon?
By this movie, I would think Han is too old to have twins plus one, so they're out?
No Mara Jade?
Man.
Posted by: topmaker at December 18, 2015 06:22 PM (6stZH)
So, nothing Zahn wrote, nor Anderson is canon? No Thrawn? No Pellaeon?
By this movie, I would think Han is too old to have twins plus one, so they're out?
No Mara Jade?
Pretty much. Disney dropped the Expanded Universe into the round container not long after they bought the franchise from George Lucas. So my Mara Jade action figure (For the longest time, among the most valued action figure released for Star Wars.) is no longer part of the franchise proper.
Posted by: cxt217 at December 18, 2015 06:49 PM (HFKy5)
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Lucasfilm had this multi-tiered canon definition for a long time. It was basically A) What's in the movies B) What Lucas says or writes, until it's confirmed or contradicted by a movie, and C) licensed properties, until contradicted by B or A.
And as usual, Zahn has pretty strong evidence that Lucas did in fact originally intend the Thrawn trilogy to be chapters 7 - 9, just as Splinter of the Mind's Eye was originally Star Wars 2. When the Zahn books showed how much demand there was for Star Wars stories, the expanded universe was born. Although it's always had an asterisk next to the name.
Posted by: Ben at December 18, 2015 09:10 PM (DRaH+)
Sorry for not posting about anime much in the last month, but this season has been bleak-and-a-half. The two shows I originally thought I'd follow both turned out to be complete garbage, and I dropped them. I started watching Shinmai Maou no Testament: Burst and have posted about it a couple of times, but it looks like it might be over with episode 10.
Time was when a one-cour series would routinely be 13 episodes, but we've settled into a pattern in the last couple of years where it will be 12. But are we moving towards 10 episodes? Metanorn seems to think this is the end (NSFW) and I have to admit it felt like a series-ender.
After ep 9 I thought we were in for a huge battle that was going to last a long time, but they finished it all up neatly in the first half of this episode, and then everyone went home. Basara, Mio, and Leohart finished off the big-bad without too much difficulty, which made all the nasty giants he summoned disappear. The "Council", the five bad-bad guys, were all about to push magical buttons to summon a doomsday weapon, and then that babe up there one-shotted them. We didn't see what, exactly, she did to them; all we saw was flying heads. And she didn't even get any blood on her.
So who is she? Apparently she's Leohart's older sister, and for a while I thought they were setting her up to be an even worse big-bad for the rest of the series. But that doesn't seem to be what happened; as long as Leohart is winning, she seems to be happy, and it looks like he's going to be the new Maou since Mio doesn't want the job.
Mondaijitachi was also 10 episodes, and if this becomes the new standard it's going to be a real problem for the broadcast channels. For them a cour is 13 weeks, and how do they fill out the slot?
In a couple of days the next Hakone travellog will be out and I'll visit that again, but aside from that there just isn't anything to write about in anime. So I guess I'll keep going with the cheesecake.
UPDATE: I should say that Shinmai Maou no Testament: Burst is also garbage. Ep 10 ended with another orgy, which I could seriously do without. But it should make a generous contribution to the top rotation, come the day. If there is another episode we'll see it on Saturday...
I went through a preliminary version of the new chart a few weeks ago, but now we're near and the chart is pretty much complete.
SO...
Kono Subarashii Sekai ni Shukufuku wo! -- an otaku from our world ends up in a fantasy realm, fighting a demon lord, accompanied by several gorgeous girls. We've seen this before, lots of times. It's otaku wish fulfilment and it's virtually certain to be crap.
Ajin -- a kid is (or rather, isn't) killed in a traffic accident, and is thus revealed as being an "Ajin", an immortal demi-human. A price is put on his head. He looks more sullen than the lead in Evangelion, and I fear this is going to be a major league angst fest. Oh, and nearly all the cast are guys.
Fairy Tail Zero -- is a prequel. The manga just revealed the Mavis back story, and this series is supposed to fill that in a bit more. The problem is that we already know the ending and... it ain't pretty. For one thing,
of the five main characters, four are dead by the current point in the manga, and the fifth one is a loon. Yuri is Makarov's father and he died a long time ago, though we don't know how. Pureshito turned evil and attacked Fairy Tail, and was eventually killed by Zeref. Mavis ended up cursed and undead. Zera was the mother of Makarov and was killed by Mavis's curse. Warrod was on the Council and then retired; right now he lives alone and is completely nuts.
Musaigen no Phantom World -- A high school boy and his harem use extraordinary powers to fight against a mystical foe, and where have we heard THAT before.
Sushi Police -- well, at least it's original. WIth the popularity of Japanese cooking around the world, three men are tasked to make sure the world's sushi is up to standards. I think that's what it was about.
Ao no Kanata no Four Rhythm -- Double-talk techno-magical boots get invented that permit people to fly. It becomes the basis for a sport. According to the series website the four main characters are all girls. #5 is a guy. Unfortunately, the girls do not wear flouncy skirts when they fly, which means this isn't going to be the mother of all panty-shot series. (Anyway, Najica Blitz Tactics retired that trophy a long time ago.)
Gate: Jieitai Kanochi nite, Kaku Tatakaeri - Enryuu-hen -- Is the only show I'm really looking forward to. It's the continuation of the first Gate series, and the main plotline is going to be fighting the Fire Dragon. I expect it to tell the story in the manga up to chapter 46.
Mahou Shoujo Nante Mou Ii Desu Kara -- The description of it makes it sound like a comedy version of Madoka. A pervy alien recruits a human girl to become a magical girl, but when she transforms she's wearing a bikini. Not counting the aliens, all the main characters are lolis. As the sage said, "I have a bad feeling about this."
Oshiete! Galko-chan -- looks like a "cute girls doing cute things" series, except that the title character has exceptional jugs. (She makes Super Sonico look inadequate.) The summary says that it's all about girl-talk -- but if so, it's also going to be exceptionally dull.
Nijiiro Days -- is cute boys doing cute things. Include me out.
Saijaku Muhai no Bahamut -- is The Only Guy At The Girls' School Who Forms A Team For Combat. In this case the harem is five girls, three of whom are DFC's. This is not exactly an original concept, to put it mildly.
This isn't a complete list, of course; see the chart. But the others seemed even less enticing. As usual I lament finding something worth watching. But it isn't a total loss; the second season of GATE is certain to be good.
And there are several other shows which... give me "awful" vibes but I could be wrong. Active Raid, Red-haired Snow White, Divine Gate, Luck and Logic, Dagashi Kashi, Dimension W -- is there any hope that any of them are even slightly worthwhile? probably not.
There are a few of these I'll probably watch one episode of which (such as Magical Bikini Girl), just to witness the beginning of the trainwreck. But as usual, trainwrecks are going to badly outnumber worthwhile shows.
UPDATE: That came from this artist. He's really good, but a bit of a lolicon. About half his pictures are of Wendy Marvell, who is somewhere between 10 and 12 years old depending on where in the canon you look.
That link is NSFW because it's two images and the second one is nude.
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What do you mean, an African or European swallow?
Posted by: Jaked at December 14, 2015 02:22 PM (TwejG)
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I remember reading that someone realized that very few road crews care about computer security, so nearly all of the towable road signs use the default password straight from the factory. That led to shenanigans that made the news.
This one's a permanent install, though, so I'm sure it's a Photoshop like you said.
Posted by: Boviate at December 14, 2015 09:33 PM (XRvFv)
Posted by: Jeremy Bowers at December 12, 2015 03:04 PM (qPsU5)
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According to the artist, this is somebody named "Shimamura Uzuki" from Cinderella Girls. So Santa is moonlighting as an idol.
Posted by: Steven Den Beste at December 12, 2015 06:43 PM (+rSRq)
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Not similar enough to Shimamu/Uzupaka. If you look at the canonical imagery, the eye cut on her eye is a bit wrong and the colors are off. That said, Uzuki isn't an easy type: not distinct enough.
Posted by: Pete Zaitcev at December 12, 2015 11:28 PM (XOPVE)
Posted by: Mikeski at December 13, 2015 06:03 PM (hAtXl)
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Artist can't be "wrong". Could be careless, inept, not interested in anything but balloon boobs, exploitative. Or may have a bad day. Pixiv is full of poor illustrations, including Uzuki's.
Posted by: Pete Zaitcev at December 13, 2015 06:32 PM (XOPVE)
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I see the point has been missed. Well, that's okay too.
Posted by: Wonderduck at December 13, 2015 08:03 PM (zAcee)
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Wonderduck, I'm with Pete. I have no idea what you're talking about.
Posted by: Steven Den Beste at December 13, 2015 09:25 PM (+rSRq)
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Not safe for work, and not safe for computer. Site tried to download a virus. Or one of those fake virus alert scams, anyway. Had to shut down my browser using task manager to leave it.
Other than that, nice pic.
Posted by: Brett Bellmore at December 10, 2015 12:47 PM (l55xw)
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Ouch, thanks for the warning. I run with an ad-blocker, so I didn't see that (or, like a lot of malware these days, it detected my Mac/browser and didn't bother to try installing Windows viruses).
Steven, please delete that comment, and I'll link to one of the pictures directly here (still NSFW).
-j
Posted by: J Greely at December 10, 2015 01:37 PM (dGpmn)
Posted by: The Brickmuppet at December 12, 2015 10:19 AM (AaBUm)
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The heavy rain stopped a few days ago and the creek is back to normal. Actually, it's been a bit lower than usual; the flooding washed part of the dam away.
Posted by: Steven Den Beste at December 12, 2015 11:53 AM (+rSRq)
