So there's some digimon T-Shirts for sale out there

I think this is the best looking one of the lot personally.

CDJapan has already sold out their pre-order stock, but you can still pick them up elsewhere. Amiami is still taking pre-orders. They're due out next month. They cost about $40USD plus shipping (3000yen approx at 75yen to the dollar exchange presently) so they're a bit pricey if you want one. Might be interesting to pick one up and wear to a con just to see how many people even recognize who's on the shirt considering the heads are cut off. Only Taichi and Yamato are available from the human side.

CDJapan sent back a response regarding the missing Inazuma Eleven memorial book insert that wasn't in my copy of May animage, and they said they made an inquiry and the publisher is sending them another insert booklet.

CDJapan customer service has always been top notch, and they've always returned a reply within 2 service days. They rank up there in my list of great places to shop at, so I really recommend them if you'd like an english site to use to purchase Japanese merchandise from.

In other news, CDJapan now has the Inazuma Eleven movie listed in all formats (Blu-Ray and DVD) for both the special edition and normal editions.

Go merchandise is coming out too, though I'm still iffy on the series. It's nice, but it hasn't really pulled me in yet. I'm not really sold on this super dimensional avatars business either.

Still trying to decide if I should get a box of these Inazuma key chain thingies splash linked. Animate has them listed here. The only problem is it costs 7560 yen per box, making them pretty damn expensive, and since no english supplier site has them listed, I would have to get them through a deputy service meaning even more fees. On the other hand, it's still probably cheaper than trying to get just the ones I would want anyway... I'm hoping some pictures of the actual product show up soon so I can decide if they look nice enough.

So the Canada Post worker's (Urban) union has issues strike notice. All mail and parcels will stop delivery on Friday. Sort of sucks if it drags on too long, AmiAmi just released the Inazuma MofuMofus, so that package is going to get caught up in all this.

So I bought the May Animage, but the 36 page Inazuma insert booklet was missing. I've fired off an email to CDJapan to see if there's any way they can help me, but I don't think they have any spare copies lying around. I may end up trying my luck and re-ordering at another online store that still has stock if CDJapan comes back and says that there's nothing they can do about it.

FexEx shipping is superior to air mail from CDJapan though. Shipping is cheaper, it comes way faster, and the brokerage fee is only marginally higher than if I use Canada Post. Plus, I don't have to worry about this impending postal strike when I use them. I think my AmiAmi package will get stuck up in it... On the other hand, the first time I use fedex and suddenly part of a magazine goes missing... I'd rather think it just fell out by accident at CDJapan's warehouse than the customs agent swiped it since it's far more likely what happened, but it does darken my outlook.

Spring anime season wasn't that bad, tried a few things, dropped a few things.

CDJapan wasn't able to get any Inazuma Eleven movie postcard books in stock and went and cancelled my order. Now I have to turn to the substantially more expensive method of getting them through Yahoo Auction.

So, my box of stuff from SMJ arrived, and in it I got my Inazuma Drama CD. I paid a little more than retail price for it (before SMJ's fees), but as a bonus, not only did I get the Tsunami Inazuma TCG card that's only supposed to come with the Inazuma-Shop CDs, but I also got a mini-poster for the Inazuma Movie (12/23/2010), a mini-poster advertising the Inazuma Live Action stage play (9/4/2010 - 9/12/2010), and lastly


The mini Inazuma Movie poster signed, by (I think) Tsunami, which is slightly ironic since Tsunami isn't on the poster at all, wondering if he'll even make it into the movie, I'm already pretty sure that Tachimukai won't make it in. It would make no sense since Endou hasn't learnt about his Libero powers at that point and Tachimukai stinks as a midfielder (no special techniques at all), and it makes no sense to have him warm the bench (since it's unlikely that Endou would be knocked out of the match).

I also picked up a pair of Inazuma Doujins I would love to put up later (no scanner). One's this one where everyone (except Megane for some reason) turn into catboys (of various sizes). The other is that mini-Fubuki series (book 6) where while Fubuki is recuperating from his injury during the Korea match, the mini-Fubuki become normal sized Fubuki (Shiro personality and Atsuya personality) and join up with Inazuma Japan. Time frame is sort of when they leave for the FFI island to when Fubuki rejoins Inazuma Japan. One of the panels is Kudou saying Kurimatsu and Fudou are going to be replaced by the Fubukis, and then at the end a panel where Fudou looks all relieved when the Fubukis disapear, but Kurimatsu being told he's still leaving.

More Inazuma stuff on the way, but it's not here yet XD.

So, Animethon 17: Less than stellar.

It seems like every year I go the vendor room downgrades itself. This year it felt considerably less diverse than years previous, in fact it seemed almost empty compared to normal in terms of shoppers. The range of merchandise fell too. Seemed like this year most places only had DVDs and Manga, the volume of series goods was way down.

Managed to take in half the AMV contest this year (woke up way late and couldn't make the start), also got to see Summer Wars and RyRo's Emperor Jungle Leo Special on projector. Was pretty good, though they could have opted to get a better converter for the subtitles when it got ported to DVD.

They also skimped out and used paper wrist bands again this year instead of the laminate passes they've been using for the past three years, thereby effectively bumping the entry price on a 3 day pass by $5 if you preregistered (lanyard was not provided this year, sold at a cost of $5) while the door price jumped $10 ($5 plus the lanyard price). I think at the very least, people who are pre-registering 3 day passes ought to have gotten the lami cards like the X-Pass people, one day passes I can see using the wristband.

Anyway, since I spent like no cash this year at con, I bought Starcraft 2, going through the campaign a second time now (did it once as a guest account).

So LJ messed up my display layout for the second time in a month, except this time it was unrecoverable. Upgraded to the S2 layout system, made it look sort of the same as before.

Inazuma: Lineart books came in. Had to pick them up at the post office since no one was able to receive shipment yesterday.

Got my Inazuma CDs, kinda want the SP DVD that has the textless ED5...

Oh, and here's my top 11 lists for season 1 and 2, see how my tastes change per season :p

Top 11 Season 1 Characters
Endou
Max
Handa
Aki
Ichinose
Gouenji
Kidou
Domon
Kazemaru
Nishigaki
Kabeyama

Top 11 Season 2 Characters
Tachimukai
Tsunami
Endou
Fubuki
Ichinose
Aki
Hiroto
Gouenji
Kidou
Kogure
Domon

Top 11 current favorite characters in order.

Tachimukai
Tsunami
Endou
Fubuki
Fidio
Toramaru
Tobitaka
Ichinose
Kogure
Kidou
Gouenji

._. Well, all the sites have updated, so I took a look, and it looks like we now have a 100% chance of "Megazord sequence has been initiated" because there's this big ass Omegamon lookalike that obviously made up of parts of all the other digimon the main character seems to have.

Really not sure if I'm seriously going to be interested in this one. Probably not the way it's going, though I'll likely collect it anyway just because.