Naruto

You guys, go read Naruto.  Like, for real.  GO READ NARUTO.  It is incredibly good.  Don't believe me? Go read it.  Here's a link to the very first chapter: http://www.mangastream.to/naruto-chapter-1-page-1.html (read RIGHT TO LEFT)

The plot focuses on this ninja named Naruto--who is a boss.  Don't believe me? Go read it.  It is a typical shounen manga in that it's about a young-ish boy who has to beat all the odds against him.  This one really focuses on the proving oneself part, though.  As well as friends.  Like, you need good friends.  Go read it, and tell your friends about its awesomeness.

As a LGBTQ youth, it helped me through a lot.  At one point, I remember saying that it was the one thing that gave me hope to continue on.  It's actually one of the reasons I still continue on.  If the mangaka behind Naruto--Masashi Kishimoto--died, I would also die.  We are intertwined.



At the beginning, it is a bit slow because the main character IS moderately innocent and ignorant.  But the first chapter itself is powerful. Like, it gives me chills to reread it.  It is legitimately THE BEST manga out there.  Nothing compares.

I honestly can't wait for every Wednesday update and it kills me if Kishimoto-san takes a week off.  I have been reading/watching (I started out watching the anime) Naruto since 6th grade (2005/2006), and it is one of the best things in my life.

Saying that, I am not a very extensive manga reader.  The only manga I have read completely (partly because many manga comics are ongoing things.  Like, this one called Detective Conan--interesting mystery comic--has over 900 chapters and is still going) is called M.A.R. and it was also rather good but still not as good as Naruto.

Anyway, if you are an active Naruto reader, I would love to be a co-fan with you.  If you have not tried Naruto before, try it.  If you have tried Naruto before but dropped it for a while, I implore you to take it back up.  It's super legit.  Get to the current chapter and then we can talk about whether or not it is good.  (btw, japanese names put the surname first; so where Westerners call Naruto "Naruto Uzumaki," the Japanese call Naruto "Uzumaki Naruto")



GOSH NARUTO AND SASUKE AND KAKASHI AND ITACHI AND TSUNADE AND NARUTO AND SASUKE AND ITACHI AND ROCK LEE.  OMFG GO READ IT!!

You Can't Handle the Penguin!

So I've talked before about how I love manga/anime (manga is superior).  Well, I have recruited one of my friends.  She is a BAMF and she is reading Naruto.  She's on like chapter 60 or so, and she said it was amazing so far.  And it is.  So, uh, go read Naruto.

Anyway, as a person of gender, it seems that gender is SOMEWHAT important in determining one's course of life.  I often wonder what it would be like to have been born a girl--would certainly be a bit easier in some faculties, but then much more difficult in others.  For instance, I WOULD NOT have to worry about feeling like a girl, but I WOULD have to worry about how much I eat.  Ahh, the conundrums of life.

So what got me started on this thought, you ask?  Well listen close, and I'll tell you.  I am the middle of three boys that my parents created.  Apparently, none of the three of us were quite what the rents ordered: they always wanted a little girl.  A while back my older brother remarked on the somewhat odd names that we were born into: he said that I got the shaft.  A boy with a girl's name?  Who would do such a thing to their child whom they love?  Well, my parents did it (practically unwittingly, since "Madison" was not a popular girl's name 18 years ago).

Anyway, I do not feel like a girl in a boy's body.  I feel like a boy in a boy's body (or should I say man now?).  I simply wonder what it would be like to be a girl.  Introversion would be easier.  When people see a quiet male, they generally think he is weird, but when they see a quiet female, they just think of her as shy or a book-worm, not some outcast whom nobody likes.  Oh gender roles, FOR SHAME!

So I don't quite know where I was going with this.  I guess just wandering through some thoughts.  It's an interesting idea to delve in dreams, but as the Great ALBUS said, "It does not do to dwell on dreams, Harry, and forget to live."  I'm off into the world (of Naruto).  What about you?

Pizza, Christmas, College, and Naruto

Haven't posted in forever.  Should I fill you with mindless droll topics?  Yes, yeas i should.  Ok, so, yesterday (MLK, Jr. Day), 4 friends and myself had a pizza eating contest.  I am proud to say that I won with 26 slices (well, 2 of us tied for first, but it still counts).  Total, the five of us ate over 100 slices of pieces.  So, you're thinking I am super fat--as are my friends.  Well, I'm only 160 or 170 pounds, so not that fat... and I probably weigh the most of the five of us.  So how did we eat over 20 pieces of pizza each?  The world may never know.

Christmas was good, as was New Years.  I now am in possession of a vehicle of my own, finally.  And my family hopes to upgrade to smart phones soon (I've had the same flip-camera phone for at least 5 years now).  So, materially, things are looking pretty good for me.  I finished all of my college applications and plan to move on to financial aid applications soon.  I pulled out the big guns in applying to Stanford.  One of the essays was: "What matters to you and why?"  So I wrote about how fairness and equality are top on my priorities-list and the way that being gay has influenced that.

I've been pretty stagnant in the coming-out phase, though I did go to a movie with another boy whom I know to be gay.  I didn't tell him anything about me, but I'm working on stepping out some.

Recently, I have fallen back in love with Naruto because it has gotten really interesting considering the ninja-world-war going on and the impending epic showdown of naruto v. sasuke.  If you want to start reading Naruto, I highly recommend it.  Here is a link to mangareader's naruto archives: http://www.mangareader.net/93-1-1/naruto/chapter-1.html
But I warn you, you are 569 manga chapters behind.  If you read constantly, you might finish in 2 to 3 days.  So get cracking.  It really is a good manga--quite emotional for me.

Anyway, that's about all of the important stuff I can think of.  Have a good day.  Remind me to post about the friend from a while back that had started copying some of my mannerisms.  He's in the back of my mind, and I need to vent, somewhat.

This one

I love this one more than the Teamwork one.  No Different.  This is why I like Sasunaru and asuka-sama.

So... we are reading The Crucible in English.  It's a decent book; it's about the Salem witch trials.  And it is an allegory of McCarthyism.  I liked the intro to the book.  It pointed out how it is no longer pertinent as an allegory.  But its remarks on human nature are what make it pertinent to society, now.  VERY Basically, when someone is accused, that accused person denies it.  When the accuser does not accept this, the accused admits to a little bit of it and then exposes others so that the blame is shifted from themselves.  It is society against the individual on a societal level.  It also spoke on the change in the colonial times from submission to the big ruler to the gaining of personal power.  This is illustrated in the accusers who can now attack whoever they want with a simple accusation (libel/slander).


What was it I wanted to say?  Oh yes, I don't hate you.  I just want to save you.  jk

Really though, I wanted to discuss Brave New World by Aldous Huxley.  So yeah, i saw sth the other day that compared Brave New World to 1984.  Where 1984 is about subjugation through power, BNW is about subjugation through pleasure.  I haven't read 1984, but I have read part of BNW because my older brother is lazy and had me read it to him...  We were in the car and he coerced me into reading it--blackmailing me about how he drives me to school everyday (a school to which he went as well and which i had to go to... but anyway, i read parts of it a year or two ago).  So, the sex and drugs and whatnot in BNW are meant to tame society--keep it down.  This can be seen to have come true at least in America where fast food, television, and even the internet (e.g., facebook and other tedious sites/programs) are tying down the people.  These things supposedly keep the population from their potential.  It's true for some--while not true for others.  I just thought that was kind of interesting.

I'm listening to "Satellite" by Rise Against.  Have a good day, folks.  Enjoy the porn, the literature, and the music.

Teamwork

Picture unrelated >.> somewhat.

Teamwork.  By Asuka Kureru.  If you're not into it, try the threesome (written) porn version of it.  It's pretty decent.  Hope I didn't totally destroy your fan-girl senses.  Yaoi is pretty.

Anime/Manga

I have liked anime ever since I was a little boy.  So far, my favorite is Naruto (watched from sixth to eighth grade and then read manga).  Since I started high school, however, I've really only been reading the manga.  I like Bleach, DBZ, Naruto, Yuyu Hakusho, Ruroni Kenshin, Inuyasha, MAR, Detective Conan, and a few others.  I don't know if Avatar: the Last Airbender counts, but it is definitely my favorite anime (Naruto is my favorite manga/anime).  I might make posts about these from time to time.  So I just felt that I should get the fact out there.

DBZ may be an exception to the rule, but manga seems to be much more intelligent than any of the American cartoons that I see around nowadays.  It's even a bit more intelligent than some of the old cartoons that used to air on television.  Don't even get me started on how far the cartoon industry in America has fallen.