telophase | Hah!

See, THIS is what I can now do with my new office!

Leftover Chinese food, rice cooked in my little microwave steamer, and anime! I've got an hour for lunch, which is enough to grab two eps.

The anime is Rental Magica season 1, lent to me by

youshou. For the anime con PR committee I'm on, we're considering having a group blog (debut to be some point in the future), and I suggested that I could do a column on Japanese creatures/spiritual/religious themes, as they show up in a lot of anime, and I've done a lot of reading on it. I'm also catching Occult Academy on Crunchyroll, but the Rental Magica box set has a booklet devoted to information about all the various elements it pulls on, which is highly useful. :)

Anyway, while Occult Academy has better animation and (so far) characters and storyline, Rental Magica is entertaining enough. I am also watching it in broadcast order instead of chronological order (I was confronted with a choice on the first disk, so picked that; it's been sort of interesting picking clues up out of order), so I may be missing some of the development here, but so far none of the characters really stands out as exceptionally well-done. The main character, Itsuki Iba, is your standard sort of bland character that a lot of manga and anime put in to allow as wide an audience as possible to identify with him.

Itsuki also has that standard anime trope, a missing eye! (

rachelmanija alert!) He wears a large eyepatch that covers it and part of his face and I am not actually revealing any spoilers here to say that it's possessed - when he takes it off, he reveals a scarred face and a red eye with a slit pupil that often CRIES BLOOD. And which, during the first broadcast episode, EATS A CROW.

Let me repeat that. HIS EYE EATS A CROW.

Itsuki is the president of the Astral Group, a small company ~~staffed by CHILDREN~~ of young employees that are rental mages - they can be hired to clean up spell contamination, to intercede with the gods, exorcise areas, etc. Itsuki's dad was the original president, but disappeared mysteriously so Itsuki inherited the position. He doesn't know much about the business and isn't very good at it.

The other employees include:

Honami Takase Ambler, a girl who specializes in Celtic magic. She wears a big witches' hat and cape.

Manami Kuroha, who I won't mention more about as her backstory and nature is in an early episode.

Mikan Katsuragi - a second-grader who is a Shinto miko

Ren Nekoyashiki - a Shinto priest with a focus on onmyoudo. He's obsessed with cats and has four of them which act as familiars. Named after the four gods that show up in every anime as well: Byakko, Suzaku, Seiryuu, and Genbu. He's the one I'm most intrigued by, as he's drawn to hit all the Evil and Untrustwothy tropes, which include white hair and thin, slanty, kitsune eyes. So far, there's no indication that he's anything other than what he seems to be. We shall see.

The primary antagonist so far is Adelicia Lenn Mathers, who is a descendant of King Solomon and a practitioner of his magic. She's the head of a rival group, Goetia. And is also in Itsuki's school grade, along with Honami.

I shall stop there, and I won't bother to write up anything on Occult Academy and just point you at

inkstone's Occult Academy posts, because she explains exactly why you should see it. And why Maya is such a fantastic character. (although she is so fantastic a strong female character that she has to wear a miniskirt, stockings, and heels all the time to reassure people that she's not actually going to take over the world. We can't be having with a woman getting *too* uppity.)

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I know, right? I mean, I like the outfit but she's been wearing some version of it since she was little!Maya!

Yup. I cannot help but think of some essay I read long ago that discussed how, in some anime, strong female fighting characters had to be handicapped in some way to show that they were still feminine. The example given in the essay was Sango from Inu-Yasha. She's a damn good demon hunter with a practical black jumpsuit and an enormous boomerang, but when she's not actively fighting she's put into this tightly-tied kimono with a narrow bottom, as if she has to be restrained to prove she's not some sort of man-eater.

I think the miniskirt, heels, and upskirt shots do the same for Maya (not very well!), as does that one point in the climax of the Mothman episode where she gets shoved aside to protect Whatsherface while the Goth guy and the janitor leap in and whack moths. (I don't remember anyone's name except Maya and Bunmei! Oh, and Ami.)

At least Bunmei is a total dweeb and not heroic!

The goth guy is JK (I think) and the janitor is Smile (yeah, I don't know).

he's drawn to hit all the Evil and Untrustwothy tropes, which include white hair and thin, slanty, kitsune eyes

Tiny Squinty White-haired Fox Doll says "Harrumph!"

:D

If it's any consolation, they're usually my favorite characters.

She's not bad, she's just ~~drawn~~ sculpted that way! XD

You know, I read this And which, during the first broadcast episode, EATS A CROW. as having a typo, such as "which" for "he," but I see from your clarification, that no! His eye does indeed eact a crow! Wow.

Yes! Yes, it does! That sort of makes up for the boringness of the character. Netflix has the first season - you'll have to make a decision the first time you put it in to watch either the broadcast order or the chronological order. You *could* watch all six episodes on the first disc, but that would be even more out of order. XD (Check the disc descriptions on the Netflix page to see how messed-up the order is!)

I notice you have a microwave rice steamer much like the one I bought from J-List. I do NOT understand how to use this and it has been sitting around in my cupboards for a year now. Please explain how to use such a steamer *makes puppy eyes*, sensei.

Also I like your table lamp.

I haven't got it perfect yet, but yesterday was the first time I'd used in in, like, three years. :) When I got it, I took photos and posted, asking for translation help, and got it, here (http://telophase.livejournal.com/1097945.html).

Essentially, it doesn't take any less time to cook rice with it than it does to cook rice normally, it's just that you can make very small servings.

There should be markings on the sides (and if it's like mine, there's markings for rice and markings for jook/congee/porridge). Fill to the lower one with rice, then to the higher corresponding marking with water. Let sit 20-30 minutes. Then nuke according to the directions in the comments there, adjusting for the power of your microwave (which is the hard part, and I haven't worked it out yet). Then let sit and steam for 20 minutes.

Ah, interesting! I shall have to try it, although I can buy one-serving pre-packaged rice cups that only take one minute to nuke over here (because they already added some water beforehand). But they only come in certain rice combinations and I might like to try parboiled rice, which isn't one of them but my mum always uses this when she makes rice.

Especially the time needed for soaking and steaming is interesting (and also not what J-List says about their rice cookers, but yours looks like mine).

Yeah - when I tried it without the soaking and steaming, it was pretty hard. Yesterday I nuked it for 8 minutes instead of 10, because the microwave was a bit higher power than the 500watt one assumed in the instructions, and that wasn't quite long enough. Next time I'll do it the full 10. I also had very old rice, which may have needed longer soaking or a little bit more water.

ETA: I also meant to say that I think I can get some rice packets like the ones you talk about here, but they're long-grain rice and I prefer short-grain rice.

Edited 2010-09-14 17:11 (UTC)

Yes, when you use the pre-done stuff you are at the mercy of what the sellers think will likely be bought *nod nod*

Old rice does indeed tend to dry out and cook up firm rather than sticky (http://news.curiouscook.com/2007/02/rice-scented-and-un-old-and-new.html), so if the cooking-time adjustment doesn't help, tweaking the soak-time/water level may be needed.

And I've only ever seen the microwave-insta-serv-rice in shortgrain (http://www.amazon.com/Shirakiku-Instant-Cooked-Rice-Pk/dp/B000643THQ/ref=pd_sim_gro_1) around here, but that's from shopping at Korean and Japanese markets -- I'd imagine non-Asian supermarkets might be more likely to stock similar products in long-grain.

I've only got one serving's worth of the old rice left, so I'll give it an extra-long soak and nuke it for the full ten minutes next time. :D

Hah!

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