Cool Products Wednesday, February 29, 2012

Here are today's "really cool products" that I've picked out for you, out of the 30+ new items we've added to the J-List and JBOX.com sites today. Note that some products may be "not safe for work" but that all links will allow you to redirect yourself either to the J-List or JBOX.com websites. To see all the J-List products, check out J-List or the JBOX.com updated products link.

	Megami Magazine April 2012 A new issue of Megami is here, and you know what that means! Cover your walls with 18 beautiful new pinup posters of this anime season's most moe girls. Then catch up on all the latest anime and game news with full-color info and art spreads. It's the best time of the month for anime fans! View products »
	Gothic Lolita Bible Spring 2012 vol. 43 Dive into gothic lolita culture with a new issue of this fantastic magazine that features beautiful girls in the most elegant dresses you've ever seen.
	Hobby Japan April 2012 The latest issue of Hobby Japan will have you drooling with page after page of awesome mecha models and beautiful bishoujo figures.
	Comic Rex April 2012 Grab a new issue of Comic REX, the magazine that offers moe comedy like Kannagi, ecchi fanservice like Senran Kagura, and tons more great manga.
	Evangelion NERV Black iPhone 4/4S Case Wow, this just looks amazing. Show off your EVA fandom on your iPhone4 with this amazing protective case. I bet even Gendo has one.
	Today's New and Restocked Japanese Fashions Also, browse our choice selection of cute and trendy Japanese fashion items, like our Chiffon Knit Tops and Brassiere & Shorts set, now restocked.
	Sailor Uniform, Shimapan for 'Trap' Fans We've got them all in 5L sizes, perfect for those who want to cosplay as their favorite girls from anime, manga and games.
	Geta Style Tabi, aka 'Ninja Socks' Tabi are the famous split-toe footwear worn by ninjas, or with traditional Japanese kimonos. Enjoy these awesome restocked socks!
	Men's Charcoal Nose Cleaning Pack ~ 10 Sheets Cleansing strips that flush out your nose's pores with the charcoal powered chemistry. Men, look your best for that cute someone in your life.
	Restocked Pixiv & Anime Artbooks For the art connoisseurs out there, we have a new issue of Quarterly Pixiv, full of the best art from Japan's number one art sharing site.
	Gorgeous Nendoroid, Revoltech Figures In Stock We've got some amazing Nendoroid figure preorders just in from series like Strike Witches and Ano Hana. Check them out.
	Ore wa Shoujo Mangaka Romance cute girls as an aspiring shoujo manga artist in this new PSP visual novel. A great romantic comedy full of joso crossdressing humor.
	Restocked PSP Anime Games Also see new PSP anime games, including Photo Kano (Photo Girlfriend), Utawarerumono, Fate/EXTRA PSP, ToHeart and "Railgun" limited edition.
	Kutsushita Nyanko Products Restocked Kawaii mascot kitties from San-X (Rilakkuma brand) are so adorable, you'll want one for everyone. Exceptionally high quality.
	Restocked Ghibli Products We've got some super cute Ghibli and Totoro products back in stock that is sure to make any child (or adult) very happy.
	Restocked Japanese Study Books Get started on that New Year's resolution to master Japanese with our newly-restocked Genki series of textbooks, plus other great study aids.
	Annual Events in Japan vol 1 & 2 Keep up with Japanese holidays and events with this two volume guidebook designed for learners of Japanese. A great way to study language and culture.
	Amazing Japanese Snacks Japan's "interesting caramel boom" continues, with a bold new flavor of caramels in stock -- Takoyaki! Or if you prefer a different taste sensation, try Cheese Fondu potato snacks, Peach Hi-Chew gum, or one of our many other unique and delicious Japanese snacks. J-List supports world peace through shared snack-related popular culture! View products »
	Epic Microwave Products from Japan Wacky microwave products restocked, including our Microwave Potato Chip Maker, Microwave Waffle Maker and even Takoyaki. Yum!
	Today's Restocked Japanese Snacks Enjoy Devil Fruits One Piece gummy, plus Kracie's Dinosaur and Insect Making Gummy Set, Meltykiss Fran Green Tea, plus awesome Glico Pretz in many flavors.
	Hello Kitty Strawberry Bento Box We've got a bunch of cuteness today from Japan, like this Hello Kitty bento box. Fits perfectly in your purse.
	Totoro Bento Boxes Restocked Love Totoro all over again, in a whole new way with these very cute bento boxes and accessories, now newly restocked.
	GLIT & BRILLIA Bento Boxes, Bags & Chopsticks Plus, we've got some more bento and dining items from GLIT & BRILLIA that will help make any outing a fun one with everything you need.
	The Best Bento Accessories Restocked Also: sandwich shapers and food cutters from Torune, including the ABC Bento Cutter for creating messages out of food. Delicious!
	Restocked Onigiri Shapers Restocked Say goodbye to improperly shaped onigiri rice balls with the shapers we're restocking, plus the vegetable shaper and bamboo "cooking chopsticks."
	Lucky Cat Mini Plate Set (Chopsticks Rests) A great little item that is sure to make your parties wildly enjoyed by all who attend, Maneki Neko mini plates.
	Restocked 'Fude' Pens & Mechanical Pencils We've restocked our popular traditional fude pens for Japanese calligraphy and art, plus other fun pens & mechanical pencils from Japan.
	Amazing Japanese Notebooks & More, Too You'll get a lot more studying done when you have the right materials to help you out, giving you an edge above the rest.
	Restocked Kokeshi Dolls & More We love kokeshi wooden dolls form Japan, and have restocked all four "season" dolls -- winter, spring, summer, fall!
	Great Traditional Products Restocked These beautiful green tea containers will look absolutely delightful in your home. We also have some cute sakura lacquered wood business card boxes.
	Yozora Figures, Premium Dolls *Preorder* Are you in love with Yozora from I Have Few Friends? Then take a look at these beautiful Yozora dolls and figures, now available for preorder.
	Hyper Nurse Milky Way Series *Preorder* Coming soon, a real treat for fans of hot girls with guns. These futuristic and sexy battle nurses are here to kick ass and take your temperature.
	IDOLM@STER 2 Nendoroid Petite Box *Preorder* Your very own idol unit awaits in this box of adorable chibi Nendoroids. It'll take a master producer to find just the right position for all of them.
	Other Fun Preorder Figures Durarara!! fans should check out this cool and sexy figure of headless biker Celty Sturluson. Maybe you'll get to find out what's under that helmet.
	Dengeki Hime April 2012 We carry popular anime and eroge magazines that are on the ecchi side too, and we got the new Dengeki Hime in stock. Nosebleed warnings apply.
	Gorgeous Ecchi Photobooks Restocked Fall in love with girls from all over the world (but mostly Japan), each with her own photobooks that leave no inch of her sexy body unexplored.
	Tsundere Peach Hip DX Onahole Toy Experience the pleasure of plumbing uncharted depths with this top-quality stress relief toy. Comes with both vaginal and anal openings for a variety of fun, plus lubricant to maximize your pleasure. This toy is extra special because it's so heavy, a full 1500g/3.3 lbs, for a more realistic feel when you want to lay down your burdens at the end of the day. The best friend a man can have! View products »
	Amazing Personal Lotion from Japan Spice up your private time with our selection of personal lotions, including varieties specially formulated to increase your moe moe kyun.
	Ero Cosplay Products Restocked Take your cosplay to the next level with these great underwear sets from Tamatoys. Now with new pink and white sets in stock.
	Other Awesome Eroge from Japan Also: Demonbane is a fabulous game you should get now, perhaps while you preorder the other two Nitroplus titles we've got posted?

The Wonderful World of Japanese Anime Magazines

J-List carries all the best monthly anime, manga and moe magazines from Japan, which are especially cool because they're generally filled with free stuff for fans, in the form of original posters, pencil boards, figures and so on. We've posted the new issue of Megami Magazine as well as many of the top magazines for this month, so have fun browsing the new items. While we nearly always extra stock of these magazines, we recommend you consider a revolving monthly subscription, which reserves the new issue for you automatically. Magazine subscriptions are done month-to-month so you can cancel or change magazines at any time.

Sleeping with Kanji Style

The Chinese writing system, kanji, is an inseparable part of the Japanese language, the same way Latin or Greek is a part of Western languages, and this relationship with the written word pops up in the language in interesting ways. In Sazae-san, the long-running anime that captures in calming, peaceful tones the happiness of a traditional Japanese family, Sazae and her husband Masuo sleep on futons with their son, Tara-chan, sandwiched in between. This is called sleeping in kawa no ji style, literally "sleeping like the character for river" since it imitates the three flowing lines that make up the kanji for river. Back when my daughter was young enough to want to sleep with us, she would invariably lie in the center of the bed in a pose called dai no ji, or the shape of the character for "big", with her arms and legs spread as wide as possible, leaving very little room for her mom and dad.

An example of sleeping dai no ji style.

Japanese Humor and Puns

One aspect of learning a foreign language is getting a handle on its jokes, gags and other forms of humor. Why a given language group finds some things hilarious but not others is an extremely complex question, and is no doubt linked closely each the kokumin-sei (national character) of the group. Comedy in Japan takes many forms, including the straight man/tsukkomi vs funny man/boke comedy team genre known as manzai; comedians who cast around for a bizarre act that will resonate with the public, such as Razor "Hard Gay" Ramon's outrageous hip motion; or bizarre physical humor, like the Sasuke/Ninja Warrior obstacle course series. For some reason, various types of puns are common in Japanese, either in spoken form as bad dajare jokes uttered by middle-aged men, or in the form of visual gags as seen below. Do you get the jokes?

(On the left is "Hatsune Niku," niku meaning "meat" which is the nickname of Sena from I Have Few Friends. The girl on the right is holding a "muffler" she made for a boy, but instead of being a hand-knitted scarf, it's a car muffler.)

Puns are a big part of humor in Japanese.

J-List T-Shirt Update

J-List has been making wacky anime and kanji T-shirts for years, and we have some great original and licensed T-shirts for you. If you click through to a T-shirt page -- for example, our epic new Vintage Domo-kun shirt design we posted on Friday -- you'll see the sizes each shirt is available in more clearly at the bottom. You can now click on your size and bring up all other San Diego-based T-shirt and hoodies in your size, which makes it easier to browse. Click here to see the top J-List anime and kanji T-shirts, as ranked by our customers.

Light Anime: Makoto Shinkai Edition

The other evening I was sitting in front of the TV, wanting to watch some lighthearted and relaxing anime, so I chose Voices of a Distant Star by Makoto Shinkai. (Warning: this is sarcasm.) Mr. Shinkai's films are good examples of the ability of animation to affect us emotionally by creating believable characters in uniquely tragic situations, usually involving really beautiful images of skies. "Voices" is the story of Mikako, a middle-school student who's chosen to travel into space and fight an alien race called the Tarsians. She enjoys typing mails to her classmate Noboru, pecking away on the keypad as she tells him about each stage in her journey away from Earth. As the story progresses, the mails take longer to reach him, with each message eventually taking eight years to arrive due to her distance from the Earth. Waiting that long for your phone to beep with an incoming message becomes an exquisitely painful concept, and I was really drawn into the story.

I'm a fan of the grand stories told by Makoto Shinkai.

Cool Products Monday, February 27, 2012

Here are today's "really cool products" that I've picked out for you, out of the 30+ new items we've added to the J-List and JBOX.com sites today. Note that some products may be "not safe for work" but that all links will allow you to redirect yourself either to the J-List or JBOX.com websites. To see all the J-List products, check out J-List or the JBOX.com updated products link.

	Hollow Material. ~ Fate/Complete Material V Grab the 5th volume of the awesome Complete Material artbook series, loaded with over 300 pages of top-quality material from Fate/stay night and Fate/hollow ataraxia. You won't find a thicker or more content-packed artbook than this, with plenty of gorgeous visuals to browse as well as the highest quality printing in the world. View products »
	Hardware Girls Magazine vol. 1 Nothing is hotter than a girl who knows her gadgets. Check out this brand-new magazine full of cute geek girls surrounded by cool toys.
	Sweet Chocolatetier Sweet! And we mean it literally this time. With this easy to use set, you can make your own chocolate treats with just a few basic ingredients and a microwave.
	Gorgeous Evangelion Figures In Stock And if you're an Evangelion fan, we've gotten the gorgeous new Asuka and Kaoru figures in stock too, as seen in the Evangelion 2.22 film.
	Evangelion GALAXY SII Case ~ Nerv Black *Preorder* Eva fans will also want to check out this very cool black phone case with the NERV emblem, designed to fit your GALAXY SII phone.
	Kitty Gothic One-piece Dresses Get ready for the upcoming season of Cons, and arrive in style as a very cute neko maid, just like those found in Akihabara.
	Pink Skull, Panda Fashion Items Restocked Check out our newly restocked selection of fashion outerwear, accessories and other stylish items that can only be found in Japan.
	90cm Loose Socks . Socks Glue Great for cosplay, but also great fun just to wear -- these are the socks Japanese school girls wear to get that unique baggy sock look.
	Awesome Cosplay Products Restocked We have kits if random anime cosplay products for you, including the "battle damage" eye patch and that awesome horse head, great for flash mobs.
	Crystal Lucky Cat Display, New Stacking Box Some great new traditional items to add that authentic Japanese flavor to your life. Try the lucky Crystal Cat Display, the Jubako bento, and more.
	Beautiful Kimonos and Yukatas from Japan Live the life of a samurai or geisha with these cool, authentic kimonos from Japan, for both men and women.
	Felt Camera Case, Other Items Restocked Longing for the classic camera look in the age of digital? Check out this stylish case for your camera, patterned after the photographic devices of yore.
	Chu Totoro Window Mascot Stick them to your car, home, or friend's forehead. These cute and fluffy Totoro plushies love to go wherever you go.
	New and Restocked Queen's Blade Books Also see the beautiful Queen's Blade Annelotte in her new fanservice storybook form, complete with limited edition Revoltech action figure!
	Great Anime Figures In Stock We've got dozens of great Hatsune Miku products for you, including the new meganekko figure and more.
	Steins;Gate, Super Sonico and More! We love to carry fun games for PC from Japan, and we've got Steins;Gate, the Super Sonico photography game, the Touhou series, and more for you.
	Restocked Anime Artbooks, Too Artbooks are the best, and we've restocked the new Steins;Gate dating-sim game fanbook plus the Otona no Anime Yearbook and Hetalia guide to Italy.
	Touhou, Other Anime T-Shirts from J-List Our Touhou "Bad Apple" T-shirt is a hit, so we decided to offer it in 2XL so more customers could enjoy it. If you love Reimu, Marisa and Cirno, get it now!
	New 'Let's Make Original Sticker' Pens Make your own accessories with this easy to use sticker seal pen, allowing you to make anything extra glamourous.
	Restocked Stationery, Traditional Brush Pens See the popular Coffret du Couturier Letter Set restocked, plus an those traditional fude brush pens that let you write Japanese calligraphy.
	Neru Neru Nerune ~ Peach Flavor (Nerunerunerune) Set of 3 Then see Peach Neru Neru Nerune, the bizarre Japanese powdered candy you mix and eat. It's fun and very random, plus other great snacks.
	Deluxe Kyoto Tea Assortment Set A premium set of teas that are picked in the fields of Kyoto, Japan. Made with experience and precision that produces a luxurious tasting tea.
	Mugicha & Green Tea, Other Fun Drinks We restocked our popular mugicha barley tea and green tea, great for a healthy refreshing drink anywhere. Also, Aojiru, a very healthy vegetable drink.
	Today's Restocked Snacks See Puccho Ball Ramune and Grape, delicious traditional mochi candy (!), Kracie Gummy Fishing, the Felix Gum Box and my favorite Pocky of the year.
	Great Traditional Bento Boxes Restocked Also, some of our most elegant traditional bento boxes are restocked, including the Blue Rabbit x Moon bento (both colors) plus the Sakura Saku Bento.
	Kawaii Bento Sauce Bottles A large restocking of soy sauce bottles for bento fans, shaped like fish, flying pigs, anything. Sometimes it's the little things that make you love Japan.
	Traditional 'Kiseru' Pipes from Japan Feel like a samurai as you smoke from a traditional pipe, plus others great gifts for those who love sake, sumo and Edo-era Japan.
	Mini Magic Sakura Tree Spring is still a couple months off, but you can get an early start with the magic sakura tree that blooms right on your desk. Spring has come early!
	Black Rock Figure Dead Master Figure Reissue Great news for Black Rock Shooter fans. The awesomely cute and cool figure of Death Master from the BRS anime is getting reissued! Preorder now.
	Kobato's Plush Toy ~ Haganai *Preorder* Haganai not only has cute girls, but cute plushes too! Check out these large and squeezable plush of Kobato's stuffed bunny. Perfect for cosplay.
	SEGA Heroine Collection *Preorder* Nine rare collectable straps, each showcasing one of Sega's many iconic heroines from its most famous of games. So cool.
	Anime Mug Cups & Green Tea Cups Get a cup for your office that shows your love of anime or video gaming, with characters from series like Another, Dragon Quest, Evangelion and more.
	Dengeki Moeoh April 2012 The newest issue of Dengeki Moeoh has all the awesome art of an artbook plus many extras and free stuff. We love this amazing snapshot of all that's awesome about 2D anime and game culture in Japan. Definitely one of the best magazines on the site, if you really love sexy anime and moe culture. View products »
	Deliverance of Strays Magicarat Radiant Visual Fanbook Dive into an artbook that features the adorable girls from two of Japan's most moetastic erotic visual novels.
	New Ikki Tousen Cast Off Figure, More Check out this smoking figure of Ikkitousen's Chou'un Shiryuu. Such an amazing "cast off" figure, with others in stock today too.
	New Amagami Parody Onahole Toys See more anime-inspired parody toys, including this Yawa Kano (an Amagami parody), and spend some special time with Ai, Tsukasa or Rihoko.
	Our Favorite Parody Anime Toys Plus several other parodies of awesome girls from famous series like like A Certain Magical Index, K-On!, Oreimo, Hatsune Miku, Ano Hana and more.
	OTOKONOKO? ~ Futanari Stress Toy This body-shaped stress relief toy is one of a kind, being the first futanari onahole toy we've ever seen. Why not?
	Awesome Import Eroge Restocked Today's restocked titles include For My Precious Sweetheart, The Best Thing I Can Do, Custom AI-Droid Ai, A Little Queen of Kingdom, Shion's Blood Family, more.
	Great Eroge in English by Download Since you can buy our great English translated eroge via convenient Internet download, everyone can enjoy great titles. Why not browse today?