Yumeiro Patissiere

When this series came out, it was much of a gamble whether or not it’s going to waste my time sitting at my desk. Jumping to conclusions, it wasn’t a waste of time. The story goes with a girl named Ichigo Amano who since she was a child be a pâtissière (female pastry chef). Starting off (so far with 3 episodes) telling her depressing story of how her grades aren’t all that great and she’s not good with sports or many activities. On top of that she goes on telling about how her sister is good with the piano while they are on the way to a recital. Afterwards is when the story really kicks in with a few flashbacks of when Ichigo was with her grandmother (is is a pâtissière). Then after that story, it’s Ichigo ending up finding a pastry festival where all sorts of things happen at once. Everything from getting food to the stereotypical forgetting money then another story time about the grandmother who some random guy knows about. From then on, the main part of the story comes into play with Ichigo being able to transfer to St. Marie school of cullinary arts, after a blackmail incident from the mother to the father about some golf clubs. This is all in the first episode so it’s more of a stage for the entire series.

After the enrollment into the new school, there’s the whole new school experience that’s almost like when Nagisa entering Astrarea Hill from Strawberry Panic, minus the yuri scenes, but things takes a downhill turn for Ichigo right afterwards. Things turn out that Ichigo never really had much experience in the culinary field, so she’s scolded left and right by some douche students, and nearly leaves the school. But like most any shows (not just anime), life lessons are thrown in; in this case, not giving up. After the long wet wait at the bus stop, she returns to the school and starts her own crash course in the kitchen. While in the kitchen attempting to make crepes, a fairy shows up wanting to help Ichigo. From this on out, it’s starting to be a pattern of screw ups, fix ups in the kitchen, and finding the inner Ichigo.

Truthfully, this has been an interesting series…so far. In the outros, there are showings of other fairies in the show that will most likely pop in later on.

After each of the series, there’s a little special on some real life Japanese pastry chefs. Man I’m hungry.

Windows 7 Whopper…ugh…

So over at Engadget they were talking about how there’s the Windows 7 Whopper. It’s a burger to commemorate the release date for Windows 7. A whopper with seven patties.

Knowing the US vs. Japan, burgers are cheap here. Also knowing Burger King, I can supposedly have it my way. So I work at a computer store while in college and knowing me, I saw the ad and went, “Where’s my Windows 7 Whopper here on the east coast?” During a lunch break I went to a Burger King to ask for a 7 patty Whopper.

This burger is a burger I nearly gave up on finishing. Using a few techniques from Monster Burger (Hardees), Triple Stackers from Wendys, and such, I went for THE burger. I rarely show myself on the internet but this could have been a Darwin award.

Technically this isn’t the Windows 7 burger in the states, but a Tripple Whopper with four extra patties. Total cost, $11.95 after tax with a medium drink (North Carolina).

Man I feel sick…and I have 3 more hours of work left.

If you’re wondering about the Windows 7 package, it’s an OEM copy since Intrex is a small system builder partner with Microsoft.

Ichibancon

In the last few years people have complained about there wasn’t a convention west of the Triangle area of North Carolina (Raleigh, Chapel Hill, Durham). Januaury 8 – 10 will be Ichibancon located in Concord, North Carolina (North of Charlotte). It’s located near Concord Mills mall and up the street from Ikea where you can pick up your Detolf glass display case after buying figures from the convention.

Website: Ichibancon
Date: January 8 – 10, 2010
Registration: $25 (by December 13) $35 at the door
Address: 10175 Weddington Road, Concord, NC 28027 (Google Maps hasn’t updated yet)

Room Rate: $199 / night ($232.05 / night with tax)
Reservation Requirements: First night deposit is required. If you cancel the room any time before 3 days before the arrival date, there will be a $25 penalty. Canceling or not arriving will forfeiture your deposit.

Aside from the bad things about the reserving a room, each registered attendee under the room will receive a pass for the INDOOR water park at the hotel (up to 4 people in the room). A 5th and 6th guest is permitted for an additional $40 per person.

There has been little information provided by their website. This is a bit skeptical for anyone attend, especially with three months to go.

Seitokai no Ichizon

The fall season has finally kicked in and finally good things are coming out instead of Haruhi Second Season or 07-Ghost (not bad or anything, but it had potential to fail with boring people). One of the series that fianlly got to episode 2 on is Seitokai no Ichizon. At a private school, a student council is voted in by popularity and high grades, etc. In the group is the only male of the five in the group, Ken Sugisaki, who of course acts like the stereotypical crazy anime male in the series. The few activities so far have been, studying, approving clubs, and approving more clubs. So far only Chizuru Akaba, Ken Sugisaki, and Mafuyu Shiina have made huge scenes in the series. Maybe later on in the series the other three characters will play a role, since they are main characters too.

Seitokai no Ichizon doesn’t bore the crap out of a person (like a lot of them last season of animes), but rather throws in the usual comedy to make it enjoyable. Not the Last Exile enjoyable, but more like the first season of Haruhi, but taken a step further. I mean how can a male in a harem not be funny, there will be times where he gets abused to pieces by videotaping females in costumes. For the nerd side, how the heck can a person play a H-game on a 5.25″ floppy?

Can’t really say for sure how the series is by the means of “hands down good / bad,” however, so far after watching the first episodes, it maybe a series that’s worth continue to watch.

Detolf Glass Display Case…For Your Collection

Thanks to the community over at dannychoo, there seems to be an unofficial glass display case for the collectors. One good thing about this display case is that it’s 1. Cheap and 2. Cheap and it looks good. 2.5 hours away is the “local” Ikea (in Concord, NC) where they sell the Detolf Glass Display Case; so, after the long drive, looking at an Ikea store, ate some swedish meatballs, purchased the case, and put it together, it’s a…glass display case. Luckily dealing with the local TigerDirect (CompUSA, or whatever it is) made it seem dealing with Ikea not bad, if not better, since Ikea had self check-out lanes.

So since this came from Ikea, reading the instructions is a must. It showed two people building the case and yes it did take two people to build it. The glass was initially held together with some rubber cornering along with the top plate. There was one point where two people had to flip the entire case to place to put the base plate on. Everything was then secured by the metal support inside the case.

The included items were the usual glass, wood plates (top and bottom), tools, nuts and bolts, and plastic covers to cover up the hole at the top of the case. At Ikea, the demo had a Hopen light attached inside of it, so that was also added to the list of items purchased at Ikea. Overall it’s not a bad case for the price.

With the Hopen light, it was a cheap solution for lighting and the wiring does show on the back of it for power. It does use a standard G4 halogen bulb so it can get really hot. One of the future projects is to replace the Hopen light with some bookcase LED accent lighting.

One advice about this case, if you’re going to get one of these, build it on a hard floor, because it will chew up some carpet.

Overall with the $59.99 price tag to hold some figures that as been overflowing my bookcase, it was well worth the trip and money. Blends well with the desk setup too.

URL TO DETOLF DISPLAY CASE

Starting Things Back Up

Over the few days, some of the galleries will be shut down as some of the old galleries will be moved over to the new system. It’s finally fall break so there are things to be added to the site among other things (and studying for classes, err that’s not related to the site).

Good Ol’ Phone

So a few weeks ago I had my phone stolen (The old HTC Hermes 100 aka AT&T 8525). Thanks to insurance it was replaced (after a co-pay of $120) with a HTC Fuze and everything was good to go. Of course the GPS and few other features was good, but thanks to the people on XDA-Developers I found a nifty feature that was exploited. With an iPod AV cable (I had laying around) and a the adapter that came with the phone, the phone was able to output to any television with composite components (didn’t have to buy a $20 cable). It wasn’t exactly the best of quality but it works. Guess there is a way to bring my anime along and share it.

Witht he iPod AV cable, it has to be a cable that works with an iPod due to the wiring.