1) paper palace
starring the computer IBM Thinkpad T20 with omoulo
"what is every living person afraid of?" "..us?" "death! the big sleep. deep down, fearing the reaper is the reason why everyones so messed up in the head. they know the end is nigh, but theres nothing they can do about it so it drives them nuts and they live their lives with one eye on the clock...we dont have to do that."
"the person who pulled the curtain on me - all they were trying to do was survive a little bit longer. thats the driving force at the core of every human being. forget morality and ethics and all the other bullshit they say theyre striving for. the living just care about surviving as long as humanly possible. its a pitiful, pitiful, desperate existence. we're better than that. we're free."
"we can conquer death..."
i read this book last month and it is still on my mind just about every single day. though i imagine itd feel very alien and confusing to someone whp isnt/hasnt been chronically swamped by social media in some way, to those who have, this book is so familiar and frames everything in a lense that makes you realise how absurd everything is - and as the book goes onto its second part, how things in real life render it all in comparison.
mia ikumi was a japanese manga artist, most well known for having illustrated the tokyo mew mew manga. she wrote the manga's sequel tokyo mew mew a la mode, and super doll lica chan. here you can read about ikumi's work besides tokyo mew mew.
she was one of my very first artistic inspirations - her style and designs are incredibly cute, dainty, and charming. across all of her work, she always has lovely and sweet themes - such as fruit, cats, desserts, and fantasy elements. i love to pick up her manga simply to gaze upon the beautiful artwork. id like to share some of my favourite artwork from her. when i have time, id like to update this section with more.
the tokyo mew mew card series is some of my favourites- each card has a chibi style character and an animal.
ikumi left curious insights into her day-to-day in authors notes in her manga, and apparently liked to wear fun costumes and cat ears. here she is dressed up as ichigo, and as a hampster!
ikumi also had a website which sadly is lost, but hikayagami on tumblr has two posts of artwork she posted/made for the site. the text can still be viewed here. i loved reading her 'notes' section which having a similar feeling to her authors notes.
my favourite character of hers is retasu midorikawa. we share the same birthday (april 29th)!
march 27th would've been mia ikumi's 43rd birthday. yesterday, the 14th of march it was announced that she had died. her last published work was a short sequel tokyo mew mew 2020 re-turn. she was working on artwork to include in tokyo mew mew new edition, to be released alongside the new animation in the summer.
thank you for everything, mia ikumi
drawn from her own experience as a convenience store woman, murata's story follows keiko furukura who has comfortably been a convenience store worker for eighteen years, but is facing increasing pressure from those around her to conform to what is expected from a woman in her late thirties in japanese society. many reviews call this book "quirky", "weird", and "hilarious" as you can see on this copy i read from the library - but as a fellow woman who works in this style of job and whos brain finds comfort in the little world of rules found inside said job - i actually found it hauntingly kindred and cathartic.
i had the pleasure of finding this film on youtube after seeing some screenshots! its a charming and hilarious film adapted from the book of the same title about the powerful and unexpected friendship of two teenage girls - momoko who loves lolita fashion above everything, and ichigo the loyal deliquent.
last weekend, i had the pleasure of visiting brighton. id only been once but i never got to explore on my own terms, so i was very excited to have this solo trip. i particularly enjoyed the exhibition shown at the brighton museum down from london: spencer gore & friends. heres a few of the paintings.
17776 / homestuck
