Oh good yes, ha. On the flip side what with this scene and the last one of the previous story, I feel like I’m getting good practice reading the kanji for various body parts…
I also almost feel that the vocab sheet itself, which I was filling out as I went, now needs a NSFW warning 
Anyone else feeling... a bit underwhelmed by this story?
So… this scene was interesting. I agree with other people’s take on things being very rule-based, which seems a bit excessive. But hey, if it works for you then shrugs. There is also some clear messaging about how arbitrary rules around love in general can be - hence when the Triples make fun of the people who are in couples.
But overall, as a story, I’m not really feeling this one is doing it for me at the moment. A lot of world building, not a lot of plot and a bit too much telling instead of showing. And like, don’t get me wrong, world building is good! I also don’t need a hero’s journey style narrative arc. But I do feel like the story needs some underlying questions that need resolving. Will Keiko leave her job at the convenience store? Who is going to kill who as an umibito? But I don’t really have an underlying question here that is driving me to keep reading.
I think part of the issue for me is that alternate forms of relationships - like same-sex marriage or even polyamorous ones are not that shocking to me? Like same-sex marriage has been legal for 15+ years here, and no serious politician would dare try to challenge it (not to say that there are not the occasional back-benchers… but they tend to get shut down pretty quickly). Polyamorous relationship are obviously not as normalized, but I know of some people who are involved in ones, so not really shocking for me.
So maybe this story would work better if you were reading it as someone who was more conservative/had only really been exposed to traditional couple arrangements - and so part of the tension would come from the question of whether or not triples are “amoral” or not.
Maybe I’ll feel differently next week once the story is over! But yeah, if it wasn’t for the fact that there is only a week left, I’m not sure I’d feel particularly compelled to finish this story. Curious to hear what other people think! Maybe I’m missing something really obvious. Or maybe it’s just because the previous one was soooo good, that it is having difficulty living up to expectations.
Or maybe part of the problem is that I’m not a native speaker, so I can’t just read it in one go - it could be that this story works better if you can get through it quickly!