The Wavering of Haruhi Suzumiya- novel 6- Where Did The Cat Go?

*MAJOR SPOILERS AHEAD*

Where Did The Cat Go?- the fourth short story of "The Wavering of Haruhi Suzumiya" (novel 6).

Set on new years eve 2003, the day after Snowy Mountain Syndrome, this is the story of the winter version of the murder mystery, with the same people that were on the remote island last summer.

The SOS Brigade have to wait until the afternoon before starting the Murder game. They all decide to stay indoors because Haruhi insists that Yuki needs time to recover, and it would be better if they all had fun together.

Yuki Nagato inspecting her abstract Fukuwarai portrait

As part of the murder game, everyone has to stay in the living room from 2pm-3pm, then have a 5min break before spending another hour in the room. They use this time to have fun with a homemade SOS Brigade board game, where Kyon ends up landing on tasks that requires him to do push ups and other exercises. They also play a game of Fukuwarai, a game much like Pin the Tail on the Donkey, but they have to use a picture and cut outs of a face, and in this case, the faces are similar to the participants. Tsuruya ends up in hysterics during this game.

The murder investigation then properly starts. Itsuki assigns himself as the games master, Keiichi Tamaru pretends to be dead in an out building, while Yutaka Tamaru and everyone apart from Arakawa and Mori serve as suspects. A snow storm outside serves as an ideal prop because it would cover up the murderers tracks leading back to the lodge. Shamisen the cat is also used as a prop because he is locked inside the out building along with the murder victim, despite the fact he was inside the living room with the others for much of the previous 2 hours.

Haruhi and Tsuruya end up as joint winners because they conclude that Itsuki must be the killer because he was the only one to have left the room during the time that Shamisen was away, and must have been using a fake Shamisen to fool everyone.

Joint winners Tsuruya and Haruhi

Haruhi goes to the bag that Itsuki has been using for the board games and out pops a new cat, one that looks identical to Shamisen but is female. He explains he spend months finding a lookalike calico and training it, and even went as far to dye the cat in places to make it as close looking to Kyons cat. Her name is Shamisen 2.

Haruhi liked the game so much that she declares that she wants next years summer game to be set in a castle overseas, and Tsuruya declares that she could arrange it. Itsuki sighs.

They have a party that night and see the new year in with the phrase "Omedetou Gozaiimasu!"

They plan on playing a Japanese style game of badminton tomorrow, and visiting a shrine when they get back home.

Welcome to 2004.

---

7-10. Not a bad short story, not as great as I was expecting, but fun none the less.

Up next: The Prologue to the Intrigues (part 1).

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RANTS: Orange Dolphin pay as you go ate my credit

Topping up £10 gives you 100MB for a month. After the month is passed it eats your credit up in seconds. Ever since I got the phone i have only ever used up 33.11MB.

I installed a statistics app to make sure i would never go beyond that 100MB when not in range of my home router.

This message is made clear and simple so people reading this dont fall into the same trap.

Solution: Permanently turn off mobile internet after that month has passed. Top up when needed then feel free to turn mobile internet on for a month.

The Rampage of Haruhi Suzumiya- novel 5- Snowy Mountain Syndrome

*MAJOR SPOILERS AHEAD*

Snowy Mountain Syndrome- the third (and last) short story of "The Rampage of Haruhi Suzumiya" (novel 5).

Much like how Remote Island Syndrome started, things start out at the bleakest point in the chapter, that being that the SOS Brigade are lost wading through thick snow in the middle of a snow storm. Then the flashback starts.

This flashback takes us back before Love at First Sight. It starts during the SOS Brigade Christmas hot pot party, starting right where The Disappearance left off on December 24th.

When Kyon walks into the club room, he finds Tsuruya among the usual brigade members. Haruhi has invited her as a guest because she has invited the SOS Brigade to her family's villa to go skiing to see the new year in. Kyon thinks that Mikuru must have mentioned something about Haruhi's winter vacation plans to Tsuruya sometime in the last 5 months. Koizumi then chimes in by saying that Tsuruya is providing the setting, but he is planning the event, which will be another detective game involving the same people that were on the remote island.

The hot pot goes well. Afterwards they continue their party around Yuki's apartment, where Kyon and Haruhi play a game of Twister. Unfortunately not much else is mentioned about this party.

Fast forward to the 30th December. Kyon's packing to leave very early in the morning, and his sister finds out. She clings to his bags and demands to go too. Unlike last time, Kyon allows her to tag along. The cat Shamisen is also needed so he tags along in a carry cage. Everyone meets at the station and boards a train which takes them deep into the mountains. They are met at the mountain station by Butler Arakawa and Mori the maid, where they then board a truck driven by Mori to a short journey to Tsuruya's family lodge. There is a ski slope a short walk away and Haruhi is raring to get out there. Tsuruya explains that the complex used to be privately owned by her family, until they sold it 10 years ago. Hence why its not very busy or popular by the tourists.

Yuki takes to the slopes with no fuss. Mikuru gets into it after a bit of practice. Tsuruya teaches Kyon's sister how to ski, but they end up building snowmen. Haruhi gathers the official SOS brigade members to ski together, but out from nowhere an unexpected snow storm turns up. They stick very close together because the snow comes down so hard they cannot see that far ahead. Yuki leads the way but after a while she informs Kyon that they should be back by now. After half an hour of walking and getting lost, Haruhi spots artificial light in the distance. They walk towards it, which turns out to be a huge western style mansion with its lights on in every room. They knock on the door but nobody answers. They decide to go inside otherwise it would mean freezing to death. Haruhi and Kyon inspect the house for residents whilst the others stay in the lobby. Every room is devoid of people.

Haruhi has a heart to heart with Kyon alone on one of the upper floors. Its the first time shes had a chance since Someday In The Rain. She suspects Kyon of becoming intimate with Yuki. Kyon makes a story up on the spot about how shes feeling emotionally wrecked due to family issues which could see her being transferred from school in a few months for the start of their second year. He strains the point that she lives alone but her family want her back. Its a lie but Haruhi buys it.

They go back to Mikuru, Koizumi and Yuki in the lobby. Kyon is taken to one side out of earshot of Haruhi. Apparently they have been gone 3 hours, whilst it seemed like only 10mins or so for Kyon. The group decide that its best to stick together. They end up making sandwiches, deciding on the rooms to sleep in, and eventually Haruhi and the two other girls take a lavish bath together. Its during this time that Kyon talks to Koizumi about events that happened and things that still need to be sorted out from the Disappearance arc. Koizumi says that he feels like Yuki's power may be slipping because she's becoming more like a typical high school girl, and the same goes for Haruhi too. hummmm........

We learn that Yuki's connection to the Integrated Data Sentient Entity has been severed, and that the mansion is a trap designed to keep them locked in there together forever, which means its not Haruhis fault this time.

That night, each member has a dream of seeing a fake duplicate of another SOS brigade member in his/her room. Its implied that said duplicate is coming onto each person. Kyon has a dream about Mikuru coming onto him, Haruhi has a dream about Kyon, Mikuru has a dream of Haruhi (lol), Koizumi has one with Kyon for some reason ( :X ) and Yuki has one about Kyon.
In each case the real person chases the duplicate out of the room. They then wake up and begin to continue chasing them out into the hallway. They all simultaneously open their doors to find each other standing there at the exact same time. They then explain each of their dreams to each other.
I would like to point out here that Haruhi is coping quite well under the circumstances. This is her first proper adventure with the SOS Brigade, discounting the time She and Kyon had that adventure in the school grounds with the Celetrials blowing everything up.

Yuki collapses right there and then in her doorway, saying that things have taken a toll on her. Haruhi takes charge and concludes that she has a fever. She orders everyone about to collect things to aid her.

After Kyon collects an ice pack from the fridge, he finds Koizumi wondering what on earth a maths equation is doing placed on the front door. They deliberate what its all about for a while until Haruhi turns up. She nags at them to get a move on, but then she too helps them figure out how to solve it.

In a nutshell according to Haruhi, Yuki was muttering a word that sounded like "Kyon", but Koizumi realises must have been the word "Yon", or four in Japanese. This is the answer they need to solve the maths problem. Koizumi explains that the dreams they had was all done by Yuki on purpose to determine the answer of four. Anyway, they sort out the riddle and the door opens.

A second later they all find themselves back on the ski slope on a beautiful day. Haruhi broods over Nagato, despite the fact that Nagato is now back to normal. Koizumi, Kyon and Yuki refuse to speak of their adventure whilst Haruhi talks about it to them as if it was as real as anything. Mikuru slips up and agrees with Haruhi about the experience. This leaves koizumi to start explaining some ridiculous story about group hypnotism. Haruhi buys it, eventually, though sort of doesn't because she carries yuki back to the lodge on her back, and forces her to rest in bed.

Personally I think this adventure has shown Haruhi to cope well with strange goings on happening around her. I would bet that she's ready to know exactly what she is now.

Tsuruya explains to Kyon that her intuition tells her that she knows the SOS Brigade is mysterious, and that its members are not normal humans, apart from Kyon that is. Kyon feels like she should become a full time brigade member.

---

9-10. As I mentioned this chapter is interesting because Haruhi is active during when all the weird stuff is going on. She copes really well, including during the moment when things go from the mansion back to reality.

Tsuruya explaining to Kyon that she 'knows' about the club activities is interesting. I'm now expecting her to join in next time something weird happens. Haruhi would cope too, but I doubt she will join in until the end of the series, though she kinda proves here that she wont freak out about it when she learns the truth.

Kyon keeps mentioning Sliders. He's expecting one to turn up, which makes me think that this may happen soon.

Up next: we are continuing with the snowy retreat story in Where Did The Cat Go?

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Thoughts: Oh My Goddess!

Yeah I dunno what happened. I decided in the summer just to read them all in one hit. So i did. I tried to blog my way through them, and kept a review in edit which was on the permanent back burner. It needed to be completed, so i did it just now. My love for the series diminished completely. Fujishima just keeps retconning things to the point that it ends up being nothing like the original vision. Im not saying its a bad series, its just been overdone. Things would have worked better if it just ended, and not come out with boring lack luster events. This series was all about K1 and bell's relationship, which may be getting sorted out now after the hell arc, but things still dont feel right. The movie did it better.

REVIEW: Oh My Goddess!- Manga volumes 29-

*SPOILERS AHEAD*

Volume 29:

The Polka-Dotted Cat and the Broom Race arc (continued):

Belldandy and chibi Hild are still racing. Bell damages her broom and starts to slow down. Watching on TV at home, Velsper comes up with an idea to help out. As Hild and Belldandy passes overhead, K1 thwacks the poor hairy cat with a baceball bat into the sky, which is timed perfectly so she can join Belldandy. the cat uses itself to stabilize the part of the brush that is damaged, so the broom can get back to full power.

Eventually Hild looses because Gluhende Herz is apparently a short range racer.
As the loser, Hild has to tell them what to do to sort out Velspers problem. She needs to name her recently acquired angel. Thats it.

Urd and Skuld spend the next chapter pestering Velsper about what name she has chosen for her angel. After chacing the cat around town, belldandy reminds urd that the naming process requires 2 goddess witnesses and must be done by the time the sun sets after the name is chosen. The cerimony begins and the name velsper chooses is 'Wasp of the Blue Lance'.

Urd: First Class Goddess Candidate arc:

Peorth informs Urd that she has been chosen to become a first class goddess. apparently its one of the resons Peorth is on earth in the first place.

Urd was originally turned down when they were kids. After passing a test from belldandy a spell is cast upon urd which sees her first class powers unlocked, which is immense. Urd is tested a few time.

Volume 30:

One of the tests is to make K1 truly happy by the time its sun set.

The scene then changes to the past and to the time that Urd was originally rejected. I personally thought she was rejected because of racism, but it turns out that it was because of another reason. Either way young urd told young belldandy
that it was because she 'lied'.

Belldandy and K1 are walking around town. Urd causes it to rain in the hopes of the couple foring to find shealter in a love hotel.
Sex isnt on the mind however for belldandy and she asks K1 if its alright for her to use her powers to make the rain stop. K1 then buys an umbrella and they walk out into the rain. Its the act of being forced to shair an umbrella that makes K1 truly happy, which then makes Urd pass this test. In the end though urd chooses to stay a second class goddess, not because of being able to lie, but because she doesnt want the power to protect the universe, but the power to protect her family. i also suspect that having too much power may be a bad thing for if the devil in her turns it to the gods disadvantage.

The "I love You" arc:

Peorth and later on Chihiro try to teach K1 to say the three magic words to Belldandy. Peorth tells K1 that he has a "limiter on his heart" which is holding him back. So she tries to help by forcing him to ignore it. K1 practices saying it to Peorth and Belldandy walks in the room.

Volume 31:

Its painfully obvious that they were just practicing, and nothing comes from it.

Peorth is teasing him. he ends up next to bell and is about to confess his true feelings to her when Urd forces him to swallow a pill. K1 goes to say how much he loves her, but the word forces her to collapse in emotion. this is urds pill at work.

skuld interfeers and he says the l word to her too, which makes hr collapse too. in the end, the other goddesses get caught in the trap too.

The Gate arc:

Peorths time on earth is over, but she cant get back. The gate functionality is wrong. it turns out that he gate is a living being, in the shape of a girl. It/she explains that she is on strike because she wants experiance living a life like everyone else do. all she ever gets is a copy of peoples memories when they pass through her, but he says she wants to create her own memories.

they let her have fun, and she even kisses peorth which is funny. but she next wants to kiss the others. she kisses urd and skuld, and wants to kiss bell and k1.

things are sorted out when K1 says love to her. yup, his spell is still in effect. in the end she turns back into a proper looking gate, but will only allow Peorth passage under a certain speed because shes just rebooted, or something.

Volume 32:

Miss Gate is transfered to another plane so she woulnt be board.

Beach Vacation arc part 1- The Lorelei:


Chihiro decides its time for a beach vacation, leaving Otaki and Tamiya to run the shop.

K1 and Bell are on the beach. K1 cannot swim and starts to drown, and notices a mermaid like creature in the water at the time. Bell saves him and the issue of his lack of ability to swim is brought up with the others.

Back at the inn K1 collapses due to a song he hears.

Something causes him to run about frantically to find Bll to tell her how much he loves her.

That night a song forces him to sleep walk to the beach to meet a mermaid like creature called a Lorelei. But the goddesses follow.

The female Lorelei tries to kidnap K1. Belldandy starts brewing up another one of her jellousy storms, this appears to be more powerful then in past situations. Other Lorelei turn up and explain something about a love festival.

A song is sung, K1 is treated and everything is normal again. Male lorelei turn up and the females make for a quick exit. Why would they retreat if they are celebrating a love festival? Maybe im thinking too much into this.

Volume 33:

Beach Vacation arc part 2- Motor contest:

Chihiro asks K1 what sort of motor he would like to build. She asks her local friends for help, and soon enough they are building two different vehicles, to be swapped for their test drive. Urd and Skuld interfeer. K1's is built for fun, whilst Chihiro's is built for speed. Bell learns that the other two goddess have sabotarged the bikes, so goes off on Chihiro's bought bike to rescue them, which she customises along the way using her power. She really hadnt have bothered because things are fine. Chihiro rides her custom bike home, and fails to notice it changing back along the way. FFS.

Volume 34:

Back home, Otaki and Tamiya have made a mess of whirlwind. Stuff happens regarding a bike.

Sentaro makes Skuld control her powers a little better.

Volume 35:

Sentaro was worried about moving, but it turns out to be nearby.

The next story is about a old style camera that holds memories.

Megumi gets dumped.


Volume 36:

Everyone looses there memories due to something to do with skuld and urd. Things are sorted out when K1 recites his wish to Bell.

Volume 37:

Chrono arc:

Goddess Chrono arrives in town. Apparently the songs of the world are being deleted. They have adventures around town to find and repear the program, or something.

Volume 38:

Oh yeah, she also has a thing against cats.

The Hell arc:

The longest arc ever. this should mark the end of the tired series.

Hild gets overthrown, and its up to the gang to go into hell and sort it all out, defeating demons one at a time.

Volumes 39,40,41,42,43:

Still in the hell arc. nuff said.


---


Go here http://lanssidequest.blogspot.co.uk/2012/10/thoughts-oh-my-goddess.html

AMV Minis S2 Episode 11

OH MY GOD ITS OUT! The latest AMV Hell Mini is here! :D


 

Totally worth the wait!

Thoughts: Cross Channel

I would have liked to have done a review for the game Cross Channel, but to be honest in a nutshell its a mind fuck.

I didnt watch Lost, but i would compare it to that because you enjoy the ride, but hate the outcome. true the main character had a bad ending, but this isnt what im talking about here. The game has contradictions, and then some. In fact I wouldnt be wrong in saying it has so many I dont know where to start, and that I think even itself didnt care in the end. No wonder this isnt an anime. I mean it could be, but the writers would need to sort out all these problems before even starting such a project. Its a mind fuck. that is all. Other then that its great. Totally worth it.

The Wavering of Haruhi Suzumiya- novel 6- Love at First Sight

*MAJOR SPOILERS AHEAD*

This is it!! This is moment I've been waiting/reading for! THE REST OF THE HARUHI SERIES! XD

I'm seriously excited. I love this series and quite frankly could not wait for a possible continuation of the anime, so this is why I'm reading the novels.

---

Love at First Sight- the third short story of "The Wavering of Haruhi Suzumiya" (novel 6)

Set near enough on the 26th December 2003, Kyon is clipping Shamisen's claws on his bed, when his sister walks into the room holding the house phone, saying "Kyon-kun, denwa". *shudders* XD

The guy on the other end of the phone is Kyons old middle school friend named Nakagawa. This guy spills his love over the phone, making Kyon think this guy is confessing to him. It actually turns out that he is love with a girl that he saw with Kyon, over 6 months ago. She was apparently in a North High uniform, which tells Kyon that he is in love with Yuki Nagato.
This guy Nakagawa was so overcome by her beauty that it took him 6 months to realise that Kyon was standing next to her in his memories. Wow. Nakagawa goes as far as to ask Kyon to send Yuki a message, and this consists of having a 10 year plan in which he will get into a good enough job before he wants to meet her and marry her. He's asking Kyon for her to wait for him for ten years. :/

Exasperated, Kyon writes all this down word for word.

Classes at North High ended for the winter holidays on the 24th. But despite this, Haruhi's SOS Brigade is still in full swing.

The next day is planned as the spring cleaning day for the club room (Its traditional in Japan to have the annual spring cleaning in time for the new year). Kyon arrives one hour early, in the hope of finding Nagato alone in the club room. Sure enough she's there, and he tentatively dictates Nakagawa's speech to her. Yuki doesn't need a lot of time to decline Nakagawa's request, saying that her self-control mechanism will be unable to remain stable after ten years. Kyon considers his situation and realizes that he is jealous of Nakagawa because he can't stand anyone getting in between him or Yuki; the image of Yuki pulling his sleeve in The Disappearance has left an effect on him. Kyon then goes on to think that he would get jealous if Mikuru had a boyfriend, but would be happy if Haruhi had one because this would take the strain off things.

Kyon scrunches the note into a ball and throws it out the window. The wind catches it, making it land under the Bridge walkway that connects the two buildings. Haruhi just so happens to be walking here at the time on her way up. She sees Kyon throw it and goes to pick it up, and starts reading. With a smirk on her face, she runs up into the club room in 10 seconds flat and pins Kyon against the window, demanding to know whats the big idea.

Koizumi and Asahina walk in and mistake the scene for a lovers quarrel, and promptly walk out again. It takes ten minutes to calm Haruhi down and explain the situation.

After Haruhi reads the note out loud in exaggerated mannerisms, Nagato, who has been quite up until now asks to read the note herself. She studies it then asks if she could meet this guy. This is unexpected.

Club room cleaning gets underway. Kyon and Haruhi take Mikuru's costumes to a dry cleaners, and the guys there look at them with upturned eye brows lol. Kinky indeed.

The rest of the club time is spent sorting the club room out.

Later at home, Kyon gets another phone call from Nakagawa, asking Kyon if he would bring Nagato to his American football game that he's participating in the next day. Kyon does, but naturally also invites the rest of the bridage.
At the ball game (An hour by bus somewhere in the city), Yuki sees this guy playing and under her coat hood, she recites an "incantation" quickly under her breath without anyone else noticing. This causes Nakagawa to suffer an accident during the game and be wheeled out in a stretcher. They decide to follow him to the hospital, but Koizumi wants this time to plan the mountain retreat with Haruhi and Mikuru at their usual cafe.

At the hospital, Nakagawa speaks to Yuki but claims that he can no longer see anything special in her. Later, Yuki reveals that he did not see love in her; instead, he saw the Integrated Data Sentient Entity and interacted with it, while the existence of the Entity overwhelmed him. Yuki's incantation had removed his ability to interact with the Entity.

Kyon thinks about his relationship with Yuki, and asks her if it was a pity that the first person who confessed to her turned out to be a fake. Yuki replies that it was, "...a little bit".

---

8-10. This really felt in tune with how the characters are feeling prior to this. Haruhi even confessed just how special Kyon is to her in this chapter after their rant. And Yuki is opening up even more than before, which is to be expected after the disappearance. During the window cleaning, even Koizumi spoke to Kyon about how fed up he's feeling with having to mask his personality in front of eveyone.

Up next: Snowy Mountain Syndrome.

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The Readable Timeline of Haruhi Suzumiya

Here's the timeline of events for the Haruhi novel series in its proper reading order. Each one are links to the relevant review page. Use this to get the full picture.

01) The Melancholy of Haruhi Suzumiya (April-May 2003)
02) The Boredom of Haruhi Suzumiya (Early June)
03) Bamboo Leaf Rhapsody (July 7th)
04) Mysterique Sign (July)
05) Remote Island Syndrome (Late July)
06) Endless Eight (August 17-31)
07) The Sigh of Haruhi Suzumiya (Mid-November)
08) The Adventures of Mikuru Asahina Episode 00 (Mid-November)
09) Live Alive (Late November)
10) The Day Of Sagittarius (Late November)
11) Someday In The Rain (Early or Mid December)
12) The Disappearance of Haruhi Suzumiya (December 16th to 24th)

Not adapted into the anime-
13) Love at First Sight (26th December)
14) Snowy Mountain Syndrome (30th December)
15) Where Did The Cat Go? (31st December)
16) The Intrigues of Haruhi Suzumiya- Prologue (part 1) (January 2nd 2004)
17) Random Numbers (3rd January)
18) The Melancholy of Mikuru Asahina (mid-late January)
19) The Intrigues of Haruhi Suzumiya- Prologue (part 2) (Tuesday 3rd February)
20) The Intrigues of Haruhi Suzumiya (early February)
21) Editor in Chief, Full Speed Ahead! (late February)
22) Wandering Shadow (early March)
23) The Dissociation of Haruhi Suzumiya (April)
24) Rainy Day (September 2002)
25) The Surprise of Haruhi Suzumiya (April)
26) Seven Wonders Overtime (Late May)
27) Tsuruya's Challenge (June)

The Publication Mess of Haruhi Suzumiya: Someday in the Rain

Someday in the Rain- episode 28 of the anime, written by Nagaru Tanigawa, with the script being published in "The Sneaker"

Set a few days before The Disappearance, Haruhi walks into the peaceful clubroom and orders Kyon to pick up a heater from the electronics store that was featured in The Sigh. She explains that she blagged it from the owner, for free. Kyon thinks it over. This involves waltzing down the hill, catching a train to two stops down the line to the commercial district, picking up the package and making a return journey, climbing up the dreaded hill again, only to walk down it once more to go home later on. Feeling deflated, he dons his coat, with Mikuru dressing him up with her scarf for the journey. Then he sets off.

With Kyon out the way for a while, Haruhi explains to the others that they will spend the remaining time sorting out the DVD extras for their movie, saying that she's going against Kyon's constant nagging to leave the movie alone.

Haruhi forces Mikuru into different costumes and takes pictures of her. Koizumi promptly leaves the room each time she's forced to get changed.

Having arrived, Kyon discovers the store had agreed to give them the heater in return for an advertising spot in their next film, which Haruhi promised. Kyon pulls a face and makes his way back, bumping into Taniguchi and Kunikida along the way.

He arrives back to find Yuki the only one in the room. He asks her where they are and she looks towards the adjacent building. Kyon pulls up a chair and falls asleep on the table.

Meanwhile Haruhi is filming Mikuru in the sports hall.

Kyon awakes to realize that he's alone with Haruhi. She seems different and shy, stuttering an explanation that she was waiting for him to wake up. He then realizes that he must have been asleep in the room whilst Mikuru was getting changed. Haruhi explains that they tried to wake him up but couldn't. She then demands for him to hand over her cardigan, which he finds to be covering his back, being used as a blanket. A second one underneath this implies that it was left by Yuki. He questions Haruhi as to why she waited for him, and she comes up with some excuse that she has to be the one to lock up the club room. He folds up the second cardi and places it on the back of a chair before leaving the room with her.

They walk home together in the rain, sharing an umbrella. For the first time, Kyon discovers a friendly more playful side to her personality.

---

This episode is canon to the novels as long as you ignore one shot that showed a pined up photograph of the girls with Kyons sister, taken from the Remote Island Syndrome story.
Its canon because it was written by Nagaru Tanigawa, the original author. This is also the only anime episode that is not adapted from any of the books. The script was published in The Sneaker, so yeah, its canon.

This marks the first time that Haruhi opens up to Kyon. She's expressing herself to him in a way that she will never show to anyone else. XD
Her feelings towards Kyon really show in this, and are equally expressed in the next story in the timeline, The Disappearance.

The mood of winter time is really well done here. Tanigawa wrote this episode so that the audience would feel the mood that winter brings. Its slow progressing, using a LOT of time focusing on Yuki reading her book alone in the club room, whilst you can hear the drama club a few doors down, people walking along the hallway, the sports club playing outside and the wind and other sounds coming from outside.

This episode really sets the mood up for The Disappearance.

10-10.

What I'm reading next is "Love at First Sight", a short story set after The Disappearance. From here on out its brand new unadapted stories. I'm reading them in the timeline order and not in the publication order. I hope you're all as interested in the rest of the Haruhi series as i am!

Up next: The Disappearance.

Click here for easy navigation around my Haruhi articles

The Publication Mess of Haruhi Suzumiya: The Adventures of Mikuru Asahina Episode 00

The Adventures of Mikuru Asahina Episode 00- the second short story of "The Wavering of Haruhi Suzumiya" (novel 6)

Thank god for Wikipedia.

The events of the SOS Brigade movie that was shown in the AV room during the culture festival is narrated out in this chapter by Kyon. He makes snide remarks about the movie's cinematography and poor writing throughout.

"Mikuru" is a girl sent from the future to protect a boy, "Itsuki", who is actually an esper with hidden latent powers but is trying to ignore that and live a normal high school life. An evil alien magician named "Yuki" also watches over "Itsuki" in the hopes of gaining his powers, fighting randomly scattered battle scenes with "Mikuru" in the process. "Yuki" approaches "Itsuki" and threatens to attack him, when "Mikuru" intervenes and saves him, then decides to run off for no apparent reason. "Yuki" manipulates "Mikuru"'s friends to attack her, causing "Mikuru" to nearly drown, but "Itsuki" saves her. Then, both "Yuki" and "Mikuru" transfer into "Itsuki"'s school, enacting a love triangle. "Yuki" then stages a final battle with "Mikuru", but "Itsuki"'s esper powers are unleashed and blast "Yuki" back into space.

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This was a fun chapter because its payoff for what Haruhis film was. All we saw in The Sigh was the random filming, but here we see what Haruhi's story was trying to be. I laughed at how the teachers intervened on the school roof, with the onlookers behind them.

We also got a bit more background towards the end of the chapter, that being that the film was so popular on the day that it drew more audiences than the film clubs work. In fact every time the film club tried to show their film the audience got annoyed. lol i guess they wanted some fanservice shots of Mikuru. In the end requests were made to Haruhi for the film to be burnt and sold on DVD, which led to Haruhis desire to create a directors cut version, and a sequel.

6-10

Up next: Live Alive.

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The Publication Mess of Haruhi Suzumiya: Live Alive

Live Alive- the first short story of "The Wavering of Haruhi Suzumiya" (novel 6)

Its the day of the school festival. The SOS brigade movie is being screened to the masses somewhere on site with Haruhi handing out flyers dressed in her bunny outfit. Kyon is staying well away from it. He's groggy after not having had a decent nights sleep, thinking about whether to visit Nagatos fortune telling booth, or Koizumi's stage play. But right now he, Taniguchi, and Kunikida are ascending the stairs to Mikuru's Yakisoba cafe. He has her special discount ticket clutched firmly in his hand. After all, he's been looking forward to this moment most of all.

They arrive outside her class and are instantly welcomed by Tsuruya in a gorgeous waitress outfit. They chat to her and pay up, despite the fact they are all in awe of her beauty.

They have to wait half an hour in the queue before being allowed into the class room cafe. Mikuru turns up cleaning tables and taking peoples tickets. She is also in the same style waitress outfit as Tsuruya. The signs around the room say 'no photos', and this is hardly surprising considering how gorgeous the boys think she looks.

Unfortunately, the portions that arrive are too small and after 5 minutes they have to leave.

The boys go their separate ways. Taniguchi at least goes off to hit on some of the private school girls. Kyon wanders around and eventually decides to visit the band hall. I have to say that he doesn't visit Koizumi or Nagato. But he does have another day for that because apparently the festival is spanned over two days. He plans on visiting tomorrow with his mother and sister (does he even have a father??).

He picks a seat in the music hall and watches the lucrative bands. The audience is small, but the hall is slowly filling up.

A band finish their set and leave the hall as the next group start setting up. Kyon is stunned to find that two of the four people in this all girl band are Nagato and Haruhi, dressed in a witches outfit and a bunny costume respectively.

He's even more stunned at how awesome they are with their set kicking off with explosive style.

Haruhi sings flawlessly, reading off sheet music in front of her the whole time (and unlike the anime, she's not playing guitar). Nagato plays the guitar like a pro whilst the other two appear to be upperclassman on the bass and drums.

The crowd begins to pick up and start getting into the songs. Koizumi turns up and sits next to Kyon. After four songs, Haruhi informs the crowd that the three-member band (not four like it was in the anime) had been unable to have their lead singer/main guitarist present, and so Haruhi and Yuki are acting as stand-ins. She also says to the crowd that they can pick up a copy of the real songs if they bring along a tape or mini disk.

Koizumi explains that what makes this set so great was the mystery surrounding the band. The mystery may have been solved now, but Haruhi starts to get into the music on their last number, smiling for the first time.

Later on, Haruhi tells him that the leader of the band fell into a fever, but turned up on the day despite this, only to fall over and hurt herself badly. Whilst arguing to the teachers who were trying to organize taking her to hospital, Haruhi intervened and volunteered herself and Nagato to act as stand ins. She only had one hour to practice singing the songs on the demo tape with the sheet music before they went live. Nagato picked up how to learn the guitar instantly. lol

At break time a few days later (which could even be the same day that starts The Day Of Sagittarius story), Haruhi is called to the hallway by Kunikida, saying the three band members want to thank her. She's anxious about receiving praise and grabs Kyon by the collar to back her up. She receives their thanks in what Kyon notices makes Haruhi look like she's acting.

At lunch time Kyon goes for a walk and finds Haruhi lying on the grass in the space between the two school buildings.
Looking at Haruhi lying on the grass feeling odd, Kyon comes to realise that she feels that way because for the first time she actually did something that was appreciated. Though he doesn't tell her. This actually pisses her off and she throws grass at him, only for the wind to catch it and throw it back in her face.

In the end she comes up with another brilliant plan involving filming the Mikuru sequel and turning the SOS Brigade into a pop band in time for next year. She grabs his hand and marches forward to the music room.

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This was a nice story to accompany The Sigh. My favourite bits were obviously the band, but i also liked how Haruhi needed Kyon around to make her feel secure when talking to the band. One of the girls nearly referred to him as the boyfriend, but she held back. lol

I must say I felt this worked better with Haruhi acting like a real stand in, and guitar-less.

8-10

Up next: The Day Of Sagittarius.

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The Publication Mess of Haruhi Suzumiya: The Day Of Sagittarius

The Day Of Sagittarius- the second short story of "The Rampage of Haruhi Suzumiya" (novel 5).

This takes place after the school cultural festival in November. Things have settled down since their exploits filming a movie. Everyone apart from Haruhi are in the club room. She is on cleaning duty. Kyons peace is interrupted by a knock on the door. The members of the computer club are all standing there in the hallway. Their president challenges Kyon and the SOS Brigade to a competition. He is about to explain the details when he is drop kicked to the floor by Haruhi. She takes charge and instantly accepts the challenge, claiming that they must vanquish all enemies.

The proposition is for the SOS Brigade to fight the computer club over a networked PC game that they have created, called "The Day Of Sagittarius III". If the computer club wins, they get to reclaim their computer that Haruhi virtually stole from them. They are so confident in winning that they say if the SOS Brigade wins, they will get to keep 4 new laptop computers for each member.

The computer club then sets to changing the literary club room up with 4 laptops, connecting them up (including Haruhi's desktop PC) to a LAN network that goes to a server in the computer club room.

The contest is to take place in one weeks time. So for the rest of the week the SOS Brigade brush up on their skills at the game.

The game is a space battle simulation much like Asteroids. A triangle in the middle of your screen represents your fleet. There is also a 'fog of war' around space so that you cannot see enemy ships very easily.

During the week of practice, Nagato becomes familiar to the computer and the game and the programming code that runs it. She ends up ditching the GUI interface that mainly uses a mouse in favor of the keyboard and live programming language. Kyon persuades Itsuki and Yuki to play the game honestly without using any supernatural powers, and Haruhi is too engrossed in her gameplay to listen or even care about however supernatural some of her brigade members might be behaving a few meters away. Is she a ditz or something? As for Mikuru, well she has no idea how to play it and gets lost all the time.

When the day of the contest arrives, Haruhi wants to charge her fleet ahead. Kyon explains to her that as the leader, she is vulnerable. They could destroy her and win the game without having to destroy the other fleets.

Many minutes into the game, struggling against the computer clubs assault, Kyon talks to Yuki and she says that the computer club has cheated: their fog of war is permanently off, so they have a mighty advantage. Unlike the anime episode, the computer club also have another advantage; warp teleportation. They have all been teleporting to different locations inside the SOS Brigades fog of war area so they wouldnt notice.

Nagato, using the live programming code that is scrolling on her screen, is busy typing on her keyboard at superhuman speed. She has split her fleet into 20 different parts, all within legal limits according to the set rules. However, whilst simultaneously controlling 20 different ships, she has also hacked into the game code and created a cheat that will only activate under Kyons authorization. She asks him if its OK to go ahead and he agrees. Then she hits the enter button.

BAM, the SOS brigades fog of war has been turned off. Haruhi gets over excited as per usual and wants to charge ahead. The members of the computer club know whats going on and start to get worried. The SOS Brigade start to gang up on one of the enemy fleets. He decides to use his teleporting warp much to the disgust and bafflement of Haruhi. But this only causes a major trap set by Nagato. All the players warp to a set up that puts the SOS brigade fleets in a circle surrounding the computer club presidents flagship fleet, with the henchman located to the outer edges of the map. Haruhi gives the order of FIRE! and they set their guns on him and destroy him. Game over.

Instead of feeling glum having lost, the president of the computer club is awestruck by Yuki's hacking abilities, and asks her to come in occasionally to help them out. Although Haruhi objects at first, Kyon realizes that Yuki showed enormous enthusiasm to the game. This he realizes is the most emotional Yuki has ever been. Yuki looks at Kyon for some sort of permission to be allowed to enjoy participating with the computer club, and he tames Haruhi and tells Yuki to do whatever she feels like doing. Hence from here on out, Nagato occasionally visits the computer club instead.

---

I loved the anime episode, and this worked much the same. For a lot of the time in both iterations we were viewing the battle from the perspective of the collective imagination of the SOS Brigade, set in space. All the characters were properly getting into their military characters and saying stuff appropriate for real military battles.

Stareeeeeeeee~~

Another thing I feel like saying is that recently in the novel series Kyons speach is written without speach, or quotes. It now works much like the anime in that you dont always know when hes thinking and when hes talking out loud. In one such situation Kyon wonders if you can bottle up Haruhis confidence and take it like medicine. Shes sitting right next to him and replys that she will. Basically she stares at him and wills him over some of it. Lol this is a cute moment. Oh, in case you dont know, im a big fan of Haruhi and Kyon getting together.

I also loved another scene when Kyon was forced speechless when Koizumi explained that Kyon and Haruhi completely trust in each other. He goes on to explain that Kyon completely trusts in Haruhi not to cause any closed space if they loose the game, and that Haruhi completely trusts in Kyon to help them win the game.

9-10

What I'm reading next is confusing yet again. I'm skipping the next short story of the The Rampage which is set after the anime, and going BACK in time to read Live Alive, set just before The Day Of Sagittarius.

Sorry guys for the confusing messed up sequence of events. But it is the first short story of the next novel, The Wavering. >.<

Up next: the anime episode Someday In The Rain.

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MUSIC: Gundam Style

Gundam Style is the UK's official top selling single of the week!



There is hope to the UK charts after all *sniff* ;__;

Vblog: Gaming: Nanaca Crash

Here's a rare video of me playing a game. The game in question is an old favourite, Nanaca Crash, spin off of the eroge visual novel Cross Channel.