WEBTOONS FOR EVERYONE!

 Remember WAYYYY back when, when this blog was called "Welcome to Nerdvana, Population: Me"? Probably not, but initially, I created this blog to share my nerdy interests. But then you get married and have an adorable baby and crippling loneliness and yada yada, your blog morphs into "Look at my cute baby, plus some occasionally funny quips!". Anyway, this post is a throwback to those Good Old Nerdy Days--With Lists!

 I do love a good list.

 I did a post three years back, coming out about suddenly being obsessed with anime (it has another list, which you can read here). I didn't anticipate at the time how this interest would . . . kind of spiral out of control. Like my #10 on the list mentioned before, most anime endings are pretty sudden, and if you want to know the rest, you need to read the manga it's more-than-likely based on. So then I got reaaaallly into manga. I'll probably make a list one day about that. But then I STARTED RUNNING OUT OF MANGA, GUYS. And then I found. . . (*harp music playing*) . . . webtoons.

  So, for the uninitiated (like me, six months ago), webtoons are online comics that are updated regularly, usually weekly. Many are actually manhwa (manhwa = Korean comics, like manga = Japanese comics), but it's very easy to find sites that translate them into english. My favorite of these sites is LINE Webtoons, as it's the most user-friendly and doesn't charge a fee for the latest comics (great app, too). So, if you're looking for something to read, I'm going to compile one GIANT, NERDY LIST, sorted by genre, just for you! IT'S JUST LIKE THE GOOD OLD DAYS, GUYS. Or the old days, anyway. And this is by no means a comprehensive list of all great webtoons. It's just the ones I've read and enjoyed. If you have any suggestions, lay 'em on me. Pictures are included (mostly from the webtoons' banners) just to give you an idea of the art style.

*Ahem*

SHORT AND FUNNY-- You missing the days when Sunday funnies were funny? HERE YOU GO, short and sweet, and very random! Just how I like 'em.

--dustinteractive. Updated every 2-3 days, and very funny. There's no real "theme" to this one, just rando-ness. Has cursing with strategically places *s, as a heads up.

Source: Webtoon

--My Giant Nerd Boyfriend. Exactly what it sounds like. Tiny girl, giant boyfriend. Cute. Updates three times a week. I love when he wears the Pikachu shirt. Like in this magical one.

--Library Ghost. VERY random, and very much my sense of humor. About a ghost. In a library. And very little of either of those things seem to matter much. Others may not appreciate it as much as I do. BECAUSE THEY CRAY-CRAY. Author said he's taking a break, but it's been two years, so . . . But there's 75 of 'em to blow through and enjoy.

--Sarah's Scribbles. By Sarah Anderson, you've probably seen her stuff around if you on da interwebs. She only recently started putting them out in this format, however.

IF YOU WANT A SCARE/THRILL--
--The Cliff. Survival story. Pretty frickin' amazing read, and only 9 chapters (issues? Comics? Whatever) long. Highly recommend, don't want to spoil it by giving a description beyond "two men trapped on a cliff". Read it. Now.

--DEEP. Dead loved ones are returning from the sea. How do people react? Why are they coming? Are they who they seem? Good read, though slow at times. I tend to enjoy the "how do people react" more than the mystery part of these kinds of things. Completed series, so you can binge.

--Duty After School. For the war/sci fi lover. What if giant purple blobs invaded earth? And they killed people? Like, a good deal of the military was wiped out pretty quick? South Korea's solution--give high schoolers extra credit to enlist! VERY confusing initially, as it's shown as a documentary of one class' experiences, so there are a lot of characters with very foreign names that are hard to keep track of. But you know how I said I like the "how people react" part of these premises more than the mystery? That's ALL this series. You never know much of anything about the blobs. It's all about the characters, the adjustment, the growing up. Right up my alley. Completed series.

--Distant Sky. Survival story. Supposedly on hiatus, but again, it's been a while. I hope it gets revisited because it ends in THE MOST RIDICULOUS WAY POSSIBLE. But even so, it's a good read. The stakes are always high, and always try to top themselves. Which gets hard to do without being kind of, well, redonkulous after a while. Anyway, PREMISE: Man wakes up in complete darkness. He's apparently on a crashed train, and he's surrounded by the bodies of his fellow travelers. It's a heck of a journey, and it makes the most of the format. WARNING: Very spooky, and lots of gore.

--DEAD DAYS. I'm not a zombie lover, but I liked this. Starts with boy trapped in his room--his mother, like a good portion of the population, has turned into something like a zombie, and keeps banging on his door . . . Completed series. Some gore.

HONORABLE SPOOKY MENTIONS:
These are a few more I'm enjoying, but I'm not very far in because the website makes you pay for most of the episodes and cycles through which ones are free. But so far I'm liking The Watching (like Rear Window, but add a creepy man in a poncho), 0.0MHZ (group of paranormal-interested teens enter a haunted shack. It does not go well),  Leon Soul's Exo Club (group of teens summon a revenge-demon thing. What could possibly go wrong?), and Melvina's Therapy (all free, but this series just started so there's not much there yet. Anyway, creepy therapist gets to the root of your issues, and messes you up good in the process).

IF YOU'RE MISSING ROMANTIC COMEDIES-- (this list could go on forever)

--Super Secret. I was very reluctant to start this, because I (like many, I believe) am pretty sick of werewolves. And vampires. And all those other teen fantasy things that have been overused of late. But this is pretty adorable and fresh. How can you not love the overly-protective, mothering Ryan? Ongoing.

--Cheese in the Trap. This series, man. It's hard to categorize, actually, and putting it here is kind of . . . wrong. And let me say, I read ahead, and the ending INFURIATED me. But it made some people very happy. I dunno. I won't say any more, but if you read it, we need to talk. I have feelings. So many feelings. The best way I can sum this one up is, what if you made a modern Pride and Prejudice set in Korea? Oh, and what if Mr. Darcy might be a sociopath? And what if everyone around you was kind of messed up? I HAVE SO MANY FEELINGS ON THIS, GUYS. You should read it. It starts slow, but then YOU ARE ADDICTED AND CONFLICTED AND UGHHHHH. READ IT NOW SO I CAN TALK ABOUT IT.

--Something About Us. Pretty simple premise--friends since middle school (now in college), will they be more? Very cute, and told well. Ongoing.

--Kind of Confidential. I was reluctant on this one as well. Not only is the name and art style pretty similar to Super Secret, but it has SUPER HEROES instead of werewolves. I was resolved not to like it. But. . . it drew me in, guys. Who should fall on the balcony of reformed super villain Rena but the city's golden boy hero? To be honest, I'm rooting more for Daze (the one with white hair in the back) than hero boy at this point, though. Currently on a hiatus.

--My Secret Brother. So . . . okay. Apparently there's a thing in Asian countries where people fall in love with their cousins, and it's slightly okay and slightly not? It's a thing in manga and manhwa, anyway. They seem into the sort-of taboo aspect of it. If you can get past that, this one's a really fun read. The premise is a bit convoluted, but here's the gyst: lead girl pretends her cousin (who has been living in her house since they were kids and is practically a sibling) is her boyfriend to make her crush jealous. Things get complicated. Ongoing.

--The Stories of Those Around Me. Follows three adult women friends and their relationships. Completed.

IF YOU WANT TO READ SOMETHING THAT WILL HIT YOU RIGHT IN THE FEELS/SOUL--

--Annarasumanara. Basically translates to "Abracadabra", a pain in the butt to spell, but an amazing read. It was my first webtoon, and it's still my favorite. By the same author as "Duty After School", but very different story. Hard to describe, but basically, a high school girl in desperate need of magic meets a magician living in an abandoned amusement park. It hits all the feels, guys. ALL OF THEM. This isn't just a webtoon, it's art. Completed.

--About Death. Every episode is accompanied by music, and heightens the impact of what is already incredible writing. I teared up multiple times, and there wasn't one that didn't feel like a punch right in the soul. I put off reading it for a while because the art style isn't my thing, but I promise that you should read this. Completed.

--Family Man. Ughhhh, so much feels. Hard to describe premise, but basically it's about a man willing to do anything for his family, except face the truth. That's a horrible description. But you should read it. Completed.

  There are more I could cover, but this seems like a good start. I recommend downloading the apps to read on the go, webtoons are short enough to read in a few minutes, but they're very addictive! Tell me what you think.

Halloweenies 2014

   Skipping birthdays and all that junk, heeeeere's Halloween!

  So, I chose a "Firefly" (Joss Whedon's amazing space-cowboy-outlaw masterpiece) theme for this Halloween back in . . . June? I figured Lincoln's costume would take a bit of work, and mine and McKay's would be easy-peasy. I was going as Kaylee, McKay as Wash, and Lincoln as Mal. Here are some reference pictures if you don't know:

Wash upper left, Kaylee upper right, Mal on the bottom. Anyway, I figured for mine and McKay's the main thing we'd need is coveralls. McKay already had a Hawaiian shirt from a different Halloween costume that didn't pan out, and I figured there'd be a billion shirts like Kaylee's at the thrift store, it's got a very nineties vibe. 

  I . . . was wrong. My shirt was easily the hardest thing to find, I went to the thrift stores every few weeks since June and could find nothing. Also, coveralls are INSANELY expensive (at least to college students), and I looked for weeks to find some under $80. I finally found a website where they were listed at $40, and I leaped at it. Unfortunately, they didn't have any olive-khaki color in my size, so I bought the white with long sleeves. McKay's were spot on. 

  Here's a picture of my coveralls (and Lincoln, who couldn't understand the concept of a picture without him in it), after I'd already de-hemmed the sleeves into oblivion.

   Next was the dye. We don't have a washer and dryer, and I didn't want to potentially ruin a friend's next load with leftover dye, so I decided to use our sink. It was a long, long hour of turning the coveralls in the sink. And then I looked at the package for the thousandth time and realized I only had to do it for half that long. GAH.

  Here was the awful result! I was pretty disappointed at how uneven the dye job was (but, really, what had I expected with that huge thing bunched up in the tiny bathroom sink?), but then I remembered--Kaylee's coveralls aren't exactly squeaky clean. In fact, they're filthy. So I shrugged it off. And dyed them one more time in an attempt to make them slightly less mint green.

  McKay tried his coveralls on . . . to discover that the sizing was off. Way, way off. McKay's usually a 34-34, so I got a 36 to be on the safe side. When McKay pulled them on, he had a good five inches of ankle showing. I couldn't remember what site I'd bought them off of, plus I hadn't even bothered to have him try them on for MONTHS because I was so sure they were going to be large on him, so we were pretty much stuck. But since the Hawaiian shirt covered up the middle, McKay added a panel of cloth in the torso, and they fit pretty well after that. I got zero pictures of this process.

  Lincoln's costume turned out to be the easiest. Mostly thrift store finds, just needed some extra buttons on the pants for the suspenders, plus I added the brown line down the sides. The coat was from a cheap Hobbit costume we bought, so we've already got next year's Halloween pretty much covered for him.

  I had also bought some cheap temporary hair spray dye for McKay and I so we could be the brunettes/red heads we were supposed to be. I even thought I could share mine with Lincoln. But did you know that cosmetics people don't believe anyone would want to spray their hair a normal brown color? I looked at half a dozen stores, and none sold brown hair spray dye stuff. Finally found one that was labelled "burnt brown". Good enough.

  We decided to use the ward Halloween party as a test run for the hair dye. And thank goodness we did. It was a DISASTER. Dye everywhere, the fumes nearly made McKay throw up, my spray was way too dark, and because I have so much hair, it ran out before we'd finished. Leaving me with skunk hair. And McKay wasn't thrilled with his neon orange hair, either.

    Thank goodness we did it on me before Lincoln. He would've freaked the freak out.

   Lincoln kicking butt at the games. He did very well, mostly because people tend to let cute two year olds cheat. A LOT. After a few tries he gave up on throwing and gently placed the spiders inside the buckets.

   The sister missionaries were doing face painting. They nearly fainted when Lincoln said he wanted a train. I had to look up a picture of a train on my phone for reference. Lincoln liked the result at least.

  Wash, failing at bobbing for apples. He kept saying he was going to have to dunk his whole head to get the apple, but if he had that water would've been straight-up poison. Lincoln grabbed the apple for him in the end.

  And now on to real Halloween! We learned from our mistakes and decided not to try dying our hair again.

   We told Lincoln to blow off his gun, which naturally turned into raspberries.

     I'm sure there's some fanfic out there with Kaylee and Mal getting makey-outy.

   Mal probably doesn't have a runny nose in it, though.

   Lincoln was very, very ready to stop taking pictures and go trick-or-treating at this point.

Aaaand we lost him. He was off to ring doorbells.

It seemed like there were fewer houses with their porch light on this year, but Lincoln got SO EXCITED for each new house, it was really fun to watch. Every time we told him to say 'thank you', though, he would turn back to the street while signing it. After every house we'd say, "Be sure to say 'thank you' out loud, Lincoln," and make him practice. And then in the excitement of doorbells and candy he would turn his back while signing it. Again and again and again. Except for the few times he said, "Thank you out loud." The payoff was when we knocked on the door of a deaf man, who looked so excited to have someone say 'thank you' to him.

Zero recognition on our costumes, but that's okay. Nerdiness for nerdiness' sake is our game. Happy Halloween, everyone! Hope you had a fantastic, sugar-fueled night!

What I've Learned About Anime

  I'm pretty open about being a nerd for the most part, but if there's one thing I keep hidden away in my closet of nerd shame, it's anime. I associate anime with the kids who wore black trench coats with way, way too many buckles in high school, even though it was the desert and over a hundred degrees. So I don't often talk about anime. I watched a few series with my brother when I was in high school, and that was about it. I never really sought it out again.

  The other thing you should know about me is that I don't like things. I'm obsessed with them. That is to say, a few weeks ago I decided to try another anime series on Netflix. And I finished it within two days. So I watched another. And another. And another. I think in the last few weeks I've watched about ten anime series. To be fair, most anime series only last one season, and many of those are only 13 episodes, so it's not like I've watched ten series of, like, Frasier length. But still. It's pretty bad.

  So, if you were ever curious, here's my list of things I've learned from exhaustive anime watching:

1. Anime is really, really weird and also really, really addictive. One of my favorite things about them is the character development. Seriously, how many shows in the US have character development, let alone the cartoons? It's pretty rare. Most shows here are about status quo--meaning by the end of the episode, nothing has changed since the beginning of it. People might go in and out of relationships, but the characters themselves are stagnant. In anime, these characters evolve, and you care about them. You root for them. And I'm always a sucker for good characters.

2. Watching romance in anime is INCREDIBLY FRUSTRATING. I mean, unless you're watching, like, porn anime. I don't do that. But in most anime I cannot tell for the LIFE of me if any of these characters like each other! Here's how the formula generally goes:

GIRL A: (says something that can be construed as flirtatious to BOY)

GIRL B: Whooooaaa, GIRL A, I didn't know you felt that way!

GIRL A: (blushes) NOOO, I didn't mean it like that!

  DID YOU MEAN IT LIKE THAT, GIRL A?! Because I'm sorry, I want to see some smooching. All these hit-and-misses are driving me crazy. And that's all most of them are. GAHHH.

3. The school-girl fascination is alive and well. Do all high school girls in Japan seriously wear those outfits? With the pleated mini skirt? And speaking of romance, WHAT IS UP WITH THE SUPER-OLD-YOUNG-LOOKING GUY AND HIGH SCHOOL GIRL TROPE?! It's like every romance is Twilight. Noragami (which translates to "Stray God") was a series I watched and greatly enjoyed. The ending even almost-sort-of-implied that the two leads liked each other! It was a definite maybe, anyway. I thought, "Aww, that's so sweet." and then I remembered, "WAIT, isn't she, like, fourteen? And he's a god that's at least a thousand years old?  . . . Well, that ruined it a bit." And that isn't uncommon, either. There are absolutely zero college aged girls in the world of anime. They're strictly seventeen and younger. Probably because most of these shows are aimed at high schoolers . . . Don't look at me that way! I can watch anime if I want to! (this is a slight exaggeration. I did watch one show that did not have a teenage girl lead)

4. All leading men look alike. Super-humanly skinny, pale skin, shaggy black hair, and usually wearing black. That's the formula. Seriously, here are the lead men from the anime shows I watched with two exceptions:

  And don't try to be all, "Well, most Japanese people have dark hair!" on me. The rest of the characters in these shows have every kind of color hair, including pink and green. Black hair is for leading men. If there are other black haired men on the show, the distinguish by giving them glasses. For serious.

5. Enemies becoming friends. This is another thing that isn't very common in American entertainment. Enemies are there to be vanquished, right? But in many of these shows (not all, but a pretty high average) the lead will learn that the Big Baddie they've been at war with since episode one is actually just lonely. So they make them their friend. Which is pretty dang awesome, actually. 

6. If you can't stand the voices, switch languages. Seriously. I had a boyfriend I used to watch "Naruto" with, but I spent most of the time making fun of it, primarily because Naruto's voice is THE WORST THING EVER in English. I've come across this many times. It's usually a female voice actor trying to do a young boy, and it sounds TERRIBLE. Not always. I mean, c'mon, Bart Simpson (not anime obviously, but there are some very, very talented women who voice boys). Anyway, if you find that you can't stand someone's voice, switch. And it goes both ways. There were many shows that I thought the voice acting was better in English (ugh, squeaky teenage girl voices). Ignore the purists that say it's always better in the original Japanese. They can suck it.

7. Yes, boob jokes are bread-and-butter. Not always, but very, very, very often. Strangely, the younger the intended audience is, the bigger the bust. Again, unless you're talking porn. I'm guessing there's big boobs there, too.

8. If you think you don't like anime, you're probably wrong. I feel this way about reading, too; if you think you don't like reading, it's because you haven't found the right book yet. There are a wide variety of anime shows. Even though I've watched a good number of them these last few weeks, I don't at all feel like I've been watching the same thing over and over (even if the leading men DO all look alike). Do you like sci-fi suspense, a la GATTACA or Minority Report? Give Psycho-Pass a try, it's got a very similar vibe. You an RPG junky like me? Sword Art Online, despite the stupid name, is a fantastic show, involving 10,000 people trapped in a virtual reality RPG. Win the game or die. Ghost stories your thing? Ghost Hunt will give you goosebumps. I have to recommend the Japanese, though, the leading man's voice in English drove me nuts in English. Do you like demon-fighting shows, like Buffy the Vampire Slayer? No end to anime shows there, but I recommend Soul Eater. Comedies more your thing? The Devil is a Part-Timer (again, stupid title) made me laugh out loud ("Don't you 'sheesh' me! Sheesh you, King Satan!"). If you have any nerdy tendencies at all, I promise you can find something you like.

9. Pretend there's a number nine here so this list can reach ten. It'll bug me otherwise.

10. Don't expect the endings to be tied up with a bow. Seriously. Like I said, most series are one season only, so you'll go, "Alright next epis--holy crap, that's the end?!". Did the characters end up together? Will so-and-so ever make peace with that one awful thing in their past? Were the overlords overthrown? WHO FRIGGIN' KNOWS. Well, manga readers, maybe. Many of them continue their story via manga, but if you're like me and broke with no manga selection at their library, then tough patooties. 

  I wrote this list mostly for myself, and I apologize if I made little sense. I'm sick, so you know, free pass on weird post. But are any of you closet anime watchers? Any recommendations for me? Because I'm running out of ones that look interesting to me on Netflix.

THE DOCTOR WHO 50TH SPECIAL, AGHHHHH!!!!

   Ahem. For those of you who know Doctor Who, you know that the special was back in November. I'm catching up still, leave me be! Anyhoo, I was crazy excited for the 50th. CRAZY EXCITED. I looked up news on it daily. Maybe hourly. I bought tickets to see it in theaters the first day they went on sale. I talked about theories involving Rose's reappearance with my mom on the phone for weeks. She humored me.

  So, November 23rd shows up, and I'm beyond excited. We get a babysitter, we drive close to an hour to get to a theater that was showing it, and McKay even dresses up in his Halloween costume from the year before, the 11th Doctor (which I did not get a picture of, sadly). We're running slightly late, which has me practically tearing out my hair because DOCTOR WHO. AND LATENESS. I REALLY HATE LATENESS. So I have McKay drop me off while he looks for a parking spot, I run up to the ticket booth, print out the tickets, and--

  The savvy among you will notice that the date on this ticket is for the 25th. I had somehow never paid attention to the fact that the special was showing on the 23rd for TV, and the 25th in theaters. What was that about, anyway? 

  I was crushed and hugely embarrassed, but McKay was very nice about it. I think he got a bit tired of me saying, "I am an idiot. I am such a ginormous idiot" after the 80th time, though. We ended up seeing Ender's Game instead, with McKay still in his 11th Doctor glory (we did get a couple of turned heads, thanks for asking).  I thought they did a fabulous job with Ender's Game, by the by. McKay was ambivalent. To be fair, though, he had re-read the book recently, which seems to be a huge factor on whether you enjoyed it or not. 

  ANYWAY, two days later, back we went on the hour-long drive to get to the theater to finally see THE DOCTOR WHO 50th ANNIVERSARY EPISODE! We didn't even watch it online during the two day wait (which was probably the hardest thing I've ever done, including labor) because we wanted our first experience seeing it to be on the big screen. 

  It was awesome, seeing a bunch of other people that love Doctor Who as much as us. Well, me. McKay likes it a normal amount. Like I've said, I like it a crazy amount. And the beginning video with Strax talking about movie etiquette (and eating screaming popcorn with great relish) alone made the price of admission worth it. But the 3D was pretty freaking rad, too. 

  I managed to snap this photo on the way out (I know none of these people, but I admire them all greatly). I love Doctor Who nerds. We're the best. AND HOW INSANELY ACCURATE ARE THOSE DOLLS?! Best ever.

  Thank you, McKay, for going along with my obsessions! And thank you, Doctor Who, for being awesome.