Same book, new edition:

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Update: a link to Ian Livingstone’s twitter feed, with more revised covers, and a sample of the interior art.

Somebody asked me the difference between ai, koi, and suki/daisuki, words commonly rendered as “love” in English, especially in anime and manga contexts. Here’s the short version I came up with:

You can suki pizza, you can ai your mom, but unless you're willing to stick your tongue in their mouth, don't say koi.

The more detailed explanation is that suki is simply typical Japanese cultural reserve and indirection. Suki: “X is liked (by me)”, daisuki: “X is liked a lot (by me)”. The difference between ai and koi is an instance of a general rule: if you have two words that appear to mean the same thing, where one of them is a Chinese-derived on-reading and the other is a native Japanese kun-reading, then the Chinese term is more objective, formal, and/or polite; the Japanese term is more subjective, personal, and/or casual, often describing feelings rather than reality. The historical basis for this is that the Chinese terms were imported and used by the upper classes and the government.

It’s easy to find a lot of examples where the two share the same kanji, but even when they’re different, like ai and koi, the rule holds up pretty well. Ai is your loving relationship to a living being, koi is your passionate feeling about someone.

Reading the JustHungry food blog, I discovered that there’s a serious shortage of butter in Japan. The author and commenters speculate on reasons why, but fail to mention the one I thought was obvious: import tariffs. After all, New Zealand is practically made of butter, and it’s a major trading partner.

Sure enough, dairy is a protected industry, and there’s a 35% tariff on imported butter.

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Quit your day job.

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Never do this again. (Not Safe For Shoggoths)

I know we haven’t spoken recently, but that’s mostly because Idolpimp has been pasturing out the grownups and spending his time on spin-off groups (again). Still, I just wanted to let you know that I’ve got my eye on you. If only because I have to look away from how you’re dressing Reina…