I Like These Things

I have become the type of person that used to mystify me. I … am a fitness fanatic.

That was certainly not the case a year and a half ago. Back then, like a lot of Americans, I was mostly sedentary (unless you count walking to meetings). Which is ironic, because, as a senior editor for NPR’s science, food and health team, it is literally my job to know better. But, with two small kids, a full-time job and recurring insomnia, I didn’t have the time or energy to work out. And I’m not going tell you how much I used to weigh, but it wasn’t healthy.

So what changed? For starters, I reframed what I thought of as exercise.

“The research does now show that basically all movement counts, and anything is better than nothing,” says Michelle Segar, a psychologist and director of the University of Michigan Sport, Health and Activity Research and Policy Center. She studies how we sustain healthy behaviors, and she says one big stumbling block for people is that they fail to take advantage of the exercise opportunities they can build into their daily lives, like taking the stairs or walking to work.

The following is from a binder of family recipes assembled by my great-aunt Alice sometime in the 1970s (I think). I hope you’ll understand why I felt obligated to share it.

Oscar’s $100 Cake

Sift:

1 cup sugar

2 cups cake flour

4 tablespoons cocoa

2 teaspoons soda

Pinch salt

Add:

1 cup mayonnaise

1 cup water

1 teaspoon vanilla

Bake in 9 x 13 pan in 375° oven.

A lot of websites are offering virtual fortunes this time of year.

For this one (hobonichi) my kanji for 2019 is 命 ‘life’

Bilingual English-Japanese Manga

Bilingual Manga: Just a few titles with very few chapters but it’s a good place to try your hand at reading. I recommend Yotsubato: it’s fun, cute, good for beginners and there’s like a whole volume worth of chapters.

Manga Club: Global site with legal translated manga. Uses ticket system, so chapters could be either free for all, free for users or paid. Has slowly but steadily growing number of bilingual titles. Check out Chika’s Forest.

Free manga sites

ツイ４: various 4komas such as ハリネズミのハリー and ふしぎねこのきゅーちゃん. Very good site actually! Short bite-sized comics of various difficulty.

Ganma.jp: Lots of original works. Great variety of genres and art styles. Even though interface is quite chaotic, definitely worth a look. Tsubu Ganma has some 4komas.

Manga Z: out of print manga published with permission from authors. Lots of ‘retro’ manga. Reading online is free, pdf downloads are paid.

Pixiv: a well-known site where people publish their artworks, manga, novels and so on. Because of sheer amount of stuff here, you may want to look for something specific.

Some random individual works posted elsewhere

Ace Attorney 4koma and other fun stuff.

Fire Emblem Heroes 4koma

One Punch Man (original webcomic drawn by ONE himself)

Silver Kamuy: Golden Kamuy official parody with characters reimagined as old people plus some random original chapters

Popperakyuu: manga by Matsunaga Toyokazu (Castle of the Dragon, Bakune Young)

Online book stores. It’s a good idea to make an account on one of these for digital reading. Each one has an app that allows you to read downloaded books offline. Range of books they have is pretty much the same. Lots of manga freebies and some good limited time offers.

BookWalker: While global page only has translated manga and ranobe, Japanese page has all kind of books. Big downside is that some Japanese books are for domestic sale only (╯°□°）╯︵ ┻━┻.

EbookJP: Japanese-only digital bookstore. Nice world-wide available app (ebiReader) with built-in store browser. Your best bet, hands down.

There are plenty of other Japanese-only bookstores like Booklive or Honto, but since their apps are region-locked I don’t recommend them unless you actually live in Japan.

Now, this should be more than enough for comfortable reading. But if you feel like browsing through some random websites looking for a perfect read, the list below is for you.

Innumerable amount of various manga sites. Mostly these sites are affiliated with various publishers or magazines, therefore may provide only partial access, like some introductory chapters and whatnot.

Pixiv Comics: this is where especially popular works from Pixiv end up when they get a proper release. Check out おじさまと猫.

NicoNico: Much like pixiv, a place where people can publish their creations.

XOY webtoons: This is a Japanese version of Korean Webtoon site from Naver.

Days Neo: site for young manga artist aiming to make their debut.

Mangahack: another place for young artists to share their work.

Kurage Bunch: original works. That’s where 極主夫道 is published!

Web-Ace.jp various works, here’s ‘I’m a spider, so what?’.

ComicWalker: lots of various original works, mostly free to read.

Comic Newtype. first chapters and latest chapters.

Morning-Afternoon-Evening: web comics and trial chapters.

Tonari no Young JUMP: trial chapters and one-shots. One Punch Man is published here.

Shounen Jump Plus: Trial chapters, one-shots and such.

Jump SQ: some trial chapters.

URA Sunday: first and last chapters. Here’s Reigen.

Pocket.Shonen magazine: trial chapters.

Web Sunday: trial chapters of works currently being serialized in Shounen Sunday.

Ganga Online: mostly trial chapters.

Sukima: same as aforementioned Manga club with the same ticket system, but Japanese.

Comic-Essay. manga based on personal experience: about pets, travel, hobbies and such.

Comic-Polaris. first and latest chapters.

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

there’s a right way to do unexpected villans

and a wrong way

*whispers*

Hello! This is the first time I try something like this but I made a Ikémen Sengoku Bias Character Sorter if anyone wants to play it :)