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Day before yesterday, when I decided to get SPY x FAMILY, Amazon didn’t have a Global listing for vol 1, but it did have one for a vol 1-3 set. When I checked this morning, that was sold out, but there was now a listing for vol 1 as temporarily out of stock. Granted, there was no guarantee an order placed today would even arrive when my parents are on vacation, as the earliest projected date is a week before they leave and the latest is a couple days before they get back, so I’m probably gonna wait until they leave and get the expedited shipping (which surprisingly is only like $4 more? At least on the test order I put together—and subsequently saved for later—today to check dates). So it’s possible it might be back in stock then. But I hate waiting and poked around on eBay and found a 9-vol set, brand new, for $70 with free shipping, and I had a gift card so it only came out to $50! And while that might be practically a steal, it also means I’ll be taking at least a couple books off the list I’m planning on getting off Amazon, because $200 is a little more than I was planning on spending, especially after just getting those games, even if this is my “get a bunch at once to tide you over then finish your shelves and then do smaller, more regular orders.” But which ones, though??? Decisions are the worst…
I read the 描き下ろし ch 12 of クールドジ男子, finishing vol 2, and then started vol 3 with ch 13! In this volume, it’s the 3rd and 6th chapters that are 描き下ろし, rather than the 5th and 6th. I wonder how sensei planned those, which would go on pixiv and which only in the collected volumes. And when she knew the series would be published.
Into uncharted territory!
It’s the day of Shun’s handball tournament, and I’m a bit disappointed that when he greets Hayate, he calls him “Hayate-san” rather than “sensei,” ngl. Hayate and Mima are waiting for him together, but Souma accidentally took the wrong train, so he doesn’t arrive until after the game starts.
We learn from Shun-and-team’s uniforms that their school’s name is Yuzuki… whaddaya wanna bet it’s written 柚木 (or maybe 柚子木). Souma’s vocational school must be named after a fruit too, then.
Anyway, he’s super nervous and making lots of mistakes (more than usual, that is), but when he sees Souma in the stands with the lens still on his camera, he thinks he’s lame as usual but that the lamest one here is him himself, and he manages to pull himself together! (Souma still thinks he’s cool even before he does, though.) The team still loses, but at least Souma probably got some good pictures, since he noticed after the first photo that the lens cap was still on and took it off (and Shun gave him a pleased lil smirk when he noticed ♡). lol and he gets called cute by one of his senpai so he tells him to please retire and not show his face at club activities again. Cute’s not an insult!
Should you two really be speaking…? lmao
Turns out Igarashi-sensei refers to himself as ボク!
Ch 13 follows Mima! We open with him enjoying a book on a rainy day… and accidentally reading the same line twice.
He thinks that the power to enchant people with words (or something like that: 文字の羅列で人を夢中にさせる力) is cool, and we get a short flashback to his school days (4th grade) as he remembers someone close to him he knew a long time ago who was like that: a boy named Motoharu who wanted to be an author and wanted Takayuki to be his first reader. A boy who has become the published author Igarashi Motoharu, a favorite author of Mima’s whose works he’s has apparently read all of, who is at Mima’s workplace today as a client, as they’ll be designing the promotional materials for his upcoming film adaptation! (Or at least the website.)
Mima doesn’t realize that Igarashi Motoharu-sensei is his childhood friend Motoharu though; he just feels an affinity for sensei’s works because his name is familiar. Even when they meet, his only reaction is that Igarashi-sensei is younger than he expected. Igarashi realizes who he is when Mima gives him his card and he sees that his given name is Takayuki, though. When Igarashi hints that he knows who Mima is, Mima just thinks that writers are amazing and that Igarashi-sensei must be some sort of diviner asdfghjkl. He doesn’t even consider that Igarashi-sensei and Motoharu are the same person until Souta points it out to him that they surely know each other after the meeting. He’s so dumb, I love him. And it seems Igarashi feels the same way.
We learn that their elementary school was named 葉山小学校, which certainly fits with Hayate’s uni and Shun’s high school being named after plants. So the theme’s not fruits anymore, then.
I skimmed ahead a bit, and we’ll be getting a longer flashback to their school days in Igarashi’s chapter later in the book! I’m excited for that.
I just realized I have no idea what color Mima’s eyes are supposed to be. Sometimes they’re brown, sometimes they’re slate-gray, sometimes half is brown and half is slate-gray (and which half, top or bottom, isn’t consistent). Sensei’s consistent about how she colors everyone else’s, though. Unless they’re supposed to be like hazel or partially heterochromatic or something?? I doubt black, since there are multiple characters with black hair and eyes, and sensei doesn’t color them like that.
I played quite a bit more of ゼルダ無双 today! Did some side challenges and continued the main storyline, recruiting Daruk, as well as completing several tasks where you give items to people to unlock combos, stores, recipes, etc. It’s really hard getting myself to try and read stuff that I wouldn’t even really read in English. Like those unlock tasks. When I played in English, I might glance at the text at most, but all I cared about was if I had the required items or if I could easily get them if not and what I’d unlock. So I find myself not paying attention when I play in Japanese as well. I read the stuff on the loading screen, though! I always did in English too, even if it was one I’d seen a hundred times already… The upside to doing it in Japanese though is that the time it takes me to read it is about the time it takes for the stage to load.
Yeah no, it’s definitely because I’m biased that I like how Revali will refer to himself as この僕. It has a rather similar feel to 俺様, and TeniPuri’s Atobe Keigo will refer to himself as 俺様, and I really did not like that at first because I really did not like him at first. Now I’m just like, you’re an idiot (affectionate). So yeah, if I didn’t like Revali that would just be one more thing I didn’t like about him, but luckily for him I’ve loved him from the beginning. When Daruk refers to himself as このダルケル様, though (and even as 俺様, to some extent), it feels more like just stating a fact than arrogance. Maybe because of his attitude? Unlike Revali, he’s not haughty. Also, the way he talks is just super fun. Playing him today, I’m not sure why he was my lowest-leveled character before I reset.
Some vocab of note:
あざっす (and variations) is an abbreviation of ありがとうございます. I’d heard it quite a bit in sports anime, but only on its own, so I didn’t know what it actually meant. This is my first time seeing it in a -てあざっす construction.
読み漁る (よみあさる) [ラ五, transitive] to read a large number (of); to read widely; to read everything that one can lay one’s hands on (usu. of a specific type or genre)
満タン (まんたん) [noun] full health. Literally it means “full tank.”
中腹 (ちゅうふく) [noun] halfway up/down a mountain; mountainside
猛者 (もさ) [noun] tough guy; wild one; fearless fighter
麓 (ふもと) [noun] foot (of a mountain or hill); bottom; base
操る (あやつる) [ラ五, transitive] to operate (e.g. a machine); to handle; to manage; to control; to maneuver; to steer. 操 is Aoki’s (2.43) given name, and the kanji quite aptly also has senses of manipulating a person and masterminding and of fidelity and loyalty, and I have seen it in compounds before as well, but this is my first time seeing it as a verb!
Really not very much energy left for reading.
Surprising, I know. Same author as クマとたぬき, with a very similar art style (so - it’s cute haha). The crow is from the city, but he got lost and ended up in the forest somehow, and he’s hanging out with a moon bear now. 
I didn’t know that! I thought that European languages generally(*) have singular and plural, and Swedish feels to me that it is closely connected to German and English, which are two languages that both have singular and plural tenses.
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