Added a review of KamiChu!, which I finished yesterday. Nice little slice-of-life show.

Awesome! A big thunderstorm is sweeping through tonight. We haven’t had a good storm in months. This one comes complete with huge flashes of lightning and foundation-shaking thunder. The rain’s steady as a pair of Mormons canvasing a neighborhood.

I rolled down my window on the way back from a church group and just inhaled deeply of weather.

Finished Texhnolyze. What a mind trip. It’s a perfect ending for this particular show, but it’s tragic. Sad, in the sense of watching an insect get trapped in tar. You know it’s not getting out of there.

It’s odd. I never want to create a show like this. I don’t like depressing stories, and I certainly don’t like Texhnolyze. It is well-made, and thought-provoking. I appreciate it. I value it. It’s a strong work of art.

There aren’t that many of those in the world.

Been watching Texhnolyze. It’s pure science fiction. It’s dystopian storytelling. It’s…true. Real.

I disagree with some of its philosophy, strongly, on a lot of levels. But that’s surely part of the point, to watch and think and form opinions (reactionary or otherwise).

Nice to have something I can sink my teeth into.

Life is practice.

(Not that it is practice for something later. It’s a matter of practicing things, over and over. You may never get it “right.” Getting it “right” is a question for the historians, not us living and practicing.)

Just back from the first night of AWANA. Great fun. I feel centered now, like I have a much better feel for how I should act with these kids. I should focus on them, give them plenty of grace.

We all need grace.

Relationships are the wellspring of happiness.

Another long day at the office. But…

…because I’m so busy, I’m focused. I don’t let time slide by. I refuse to waste a minute of my one, precious life.

I wonder if I could get used to this.

It’s amazing to watch people create something out of nothing.

Case in point: the first five episodes of Space Battleship Yamato, which I watched recently. Made in 1974, when anime was still a bunch of crude cartoons for kids, this is a show with weight and melancholy. It’s slow and deliberate. We spend whole episodes in almost real time. We see huge futuristic cities, empty due to the prolonged war with Gamilon.

This was in 1974. A tremendous accomplishment. All because they decided to do it.

Noticed someone on a personal productivity forum, who asks a lot of questions. This is normally good. However, this person appears to ask questions instead of doing things.

There’s a difference between inquisitiveness and Analysis Paralysis. In the former, curiosity is combined with action. See: children. They open their mouths as they reach out their hands.

A good philosophy.