Whether you call it dorky (and yes, I do think the idea is still dorky to an extent), I went to a Naruto movie party. The party consisted of three people: Me, Zoe, and Sam. We all branded something Naruto. I put on my brother’s wristband, Zoe had her headband on, and Sam wore her oh-so-awesome Sasuke T-shirt.

A small surprise came to me when I walked through the threshold of Zoe’s house. I was welcomed by a bee sting, the first one I’ve ever had. There was a little paranoia (would I be allergic?) but after a couple minutes and I showed no sign of throat closing up or of me passing out, we all went back to watching Zoe prepare stove-top rice and ramen.

We watched the movie without any incidents. There were instances where we wanted to kill the commercials because, let’s face it, Toonami is horrible at showing anything. They show about 5-10 minutes of something and cut right back to commercial. Though I suppose we all could’ve watched it separately at our own houses, I think it was nice that we all got together. Funny parts are funnier when watched with someone else and let’s face it, we’re dramatic when we watch our anime. We gasp, giggle, and roll our eyes at all cliches. How many times was Naruto going to come up after a ridiculous fall? And we all nearly died at the part where Sasuke was muttering about how it was all up to Naruto when he was collapsing. The way “NARUTO!” was screamed as his last word was just priceless. We ended up rewinding (oh digital cable, how I miss you so!) just to watch that part again.

I think we may end up doing this again for the second movie, whenever they decide to dub it. We joked it’ll be four years later, and like the characters in the movie, our clothes will be a little different but we’ll look the same and be sitting in the same positions.

Moving on to something else, hours after the initial bee sting, it still burns a bit.

Anime. My friends and family alike all know the word - some wait hesitantly for my long winded rambles, others happily engage in my long winded rambles. Whatever their stand on the word with me, they all know that they can associate anime with moi.

I’ve been watching and following anime faithfully since as long as I can remember. I watched it as it made a large spike in the U.S. shortly after CardCaptors and Adult Swim made their debut. I was bubbling over with excitement when I learned that this wonderful genre of cartoons was in fact, growing up with me. It was at one time, considered childish to continue to watch cartoons for my class - though I still did no matter what was being said about it. I even watched the manga section grow from that dusty shelf in the back to this gigantic section in the front.

Wherever anime has gone and branched out, I’ve been there, helping it along every step of the way. And now, I’m here to help anime again. I’ve recently learned that Fuse has its own anime block every Friday at midnight, provided by Geneon. At the moment, they’re only showing two anime. I highly recommend watching Ergo Proxy, which I was quite happy to learn that I wouldn’t have to run out and buy. The other anime Fuse is showing is Tenjho Tenge. Also, I just learned that every Monday at 11 p.m., Sci-Fi channel has its own anime block provided by Manga Entertainment and Starz Media. Apparently, they’ve been showing doing this for a month now, but I’ll have to check out what Sci-Fi has to offer. I do know that they will be showing Noein, Tokko, and a form of Ghost in the Shell: Stand Alone Complex. I’ll watch what they have to offer and get back to everyone later.

Still, with this much anime being given out on your basic cable package, who needs to upgrade to get Anime on Demand or the FUNImation Channel? Though, I do admit, it’d be nice to have those too…

I should feel terrible, corrupting my brother and making him quite addicted to Tsubasa Reservoir Chronicles. However, I don’t feel bad. In fact, I feel like I did my sisterly duties. After all, I’ve been influencing what he watches since he was tiny. If he didn’t watch anime, then he probably wouldn’t have as much as an interest in art as he does now. If I didn’t push anime on a friend, she wouldn’t have wanted to be a voice actress. Who knows what she would have wanted to be.

I do (however) feel quite sorry for my disappearance on the web.  I knew that my payment on my hosting/domain was due, but my old host did promise to tell me about it. Thus I was just as much as surprised to find out about the disappearance as any of you. I emailed the host about it, but I mysteriously never received a reply back. So…I went about, took a month off, and reappeared with a brand new host.

Speaking of hosting, I’m offering hosting as well as custom designs. You can find out more about it at Creative Suites.

On a different note, Beautiful Addiction is back up. It doesn’t have everything up right now, but most, if not all, of the information is up. There’s a new layout featuring Sakura and Syaoran from Tsubasa Reservoir Chronicles.

I won’t be blogging on a regular basis yet. I’m still going through and fixing everything up. So, expect a new layout soon.