It's been a while. I just re-read it again so I could give a thorough critique.

I think that this story could've been so much better. I think there was a lot of wasted potential to discuss various queer issues. I felt that a lot of the queer plot points seemed to primarily served to be fodder to spur speeches full of platitudes, especially by the straight characters. It felt like a "very special" episode in parts. Basically is was too simple and generic of a story (a girl falls for a endlessly selfless and understanding boy who is helpful to her when she's going through a difficult point in her life) for the (queer) themes it seemed like it wanted to explore.

It's not horrible, but it didn't live up to its promise.

(I also love her saying she's in the second half of her 20s, despite it being made clear she's 30)

Ages 20-29 are the first half of your 20s, 30-39 are the second half. XD

Reading a yuri story, but I actually wouldn't mind if Tsuruta ends up with Miwa. Getting sick of Saeko shits. At least Tsuruta seems like a nice guy. He always got Miwa's back and get her off a tight spot. The dude genuinely cares for Miwa.

Except that Miwa is squarely a lesbian? And Tsuruta literally knows this, which makes his continued crush on her all the more sad and pathetic.

"Pathetic", he can't help it if he likes someone. If this was a girl having a crush on a girl she knew was straight you all would be in tears cheering her on.

He's not pathetic for finding Miwa attractive. He's pathetic for not moving on, just hovering, hoping she'll change something that's understood to be immutable. Moving on from a crush, is something pretty much everyone has to do. Their crush marries someone else, they have a deal breaker, they just aren't interested in them, etc. It's not healthy to fixate on things that aren't possible.

Raising kids is hard, especially as they get older. By the time you have young adult children, you've live your life independently for a few decades and have found what works for that, and you want to give that to your children. But everyone has to do that for themselves, you can't give them a short-cut by just coercing them into making choices that would've made sense for you when you were their age. You just have to teach them to value themselves, and assuming they're sensitive and smart, they can figure out how to protect and care for themselves then.

I ship Neeko X proper mental health care more than I ship most couples on this site. Poor girl, she's suffering so much.

It's funny how they both sort of have the same core problem: trying to hide their insecurities and never resolve them (and I see myself in both of them, fuck). Saeko is just better at hiding them usually, even from herself. As long as they just treat each other's flaws as "cute," it won't be possible for them to make a deep, honest connection. It sorta feels like the author is deconstructing the common yuri (or really, romance manga in general) relationship dynamics of 'shy, needy bottom x bold, possessive top,' pointing out how unhealthy that can be, regardless of how nice it feels in the moment. Usshi was onto something when she guessed that people want relationships because they like to feel needed. Regardless of where the relationship ends up, I think the characters are going to grow a lot from it. Happy for Miwa taking her first steps this chapter.

And we're at over three months already. Was that mentioned before? Guess it's time to prepare for the downward spiral.

As someone married over 10 years: neither yourself nor your partner will ever be perfect. Your partner will always have faults and insecurities that are dumb, and annoying, that they should just fix/get over (and you will have the same). The key to a happy relationship is to not focus on their minor faults (now abusive behavior is different), treat those like a trick knee, something you just have to work around and you can get along fine. Obsess about how your partner always leaves a mess in the kitchen/leaves socks on the floor, and you won't have a happy relationship.

I thought the author's name was familiar, it's the person behind Octave (definitely worth a read if you haven't).

Has anyone watched the live action version of this? It seems hard to find subbed, but I'm also a little skeptical that this could even work half as well without the body horror expressions.

I've seen some of it. The actresses try very hard and they are actually good. But man, no amount of talent could replicate those expressions. Plus the constant monologue looks kinda weird in live action. Just my opinion tho, the autor seems to like it so.?

They really do their best at trying to be human cartoons. I've seen one episode, it wasn't as bad as I was expecting, given that the material is 90% about comically exaggerated reactions. The actress who plays Mikage kind of reminded me of the actress who plays Villanelle.

Hana-chan sure is thirsty.

She seems at least as sheltered as Yamada. Kase isn't wrong to direct her towards guys she at least has some knowledge of.

That's cute. But, is she more an author vs a mangaka, or is mangaka more general than comic artists?

Adorable, fairly unique.

Well, I think IRL it'd be bizarre for things to progress so quickly - or at least in a long term relationship that lasts, but I don't think entering into a relationship is the main story of the manga, but the whole career conflict feelings of the MC (dating someone succeeding in something you quit for mysterious reasons is probably going to be a source of angst, but hopefully growth too). I'm interested in seeing where this goes.

I'm not sure why, but I really enjoy this manga. I don't care if they ever kiss or move in together, I just like them awkwardly hanging out, trying to "normal human" properly.

They say a marathon, but I don't think they really mean a marathon. Those damn things are F-in long. My dad runs them. once he had me drop him off at the start, and pick im up at the finish. It took me a half hour of highway driving to get between the two.

https://chaniebon.com/blog/2016/2/19/marathon-taikai
http://michellestimeinjapan.blogspot.com/2014/12/running-japanese-high-school-marathon.html

It's a 5-8k run - so doable in under an hr for the 5k, maybe a little more than an hr for the 8k. I think the idea of going from only having PE class and being otherwise sedentary to running a full marathon (~42k) would be crazy and result in injuries or it would take literally all day.

Wow, the art really has an 80/90s vibe to it. I like it.

The problem when you build your relationship as a "brand" - you feel pressured to make it look perfect all the time, because people want to believe perfect is reachable. I don't know if perfect exists or not, but most of us are flawed people who will be in relationships with other flawed people. There's going to be friction between competing desires and visions for the future some of the time, compromises will have to be made. The key is to always be respectful of your partner, and accept some of their flaws as funny little quirks.

That's the tension, Shino's motives are unknown and look questionable. RomComs need tension. I hope Eriko and Shino learn how to communicate well with each other. And Eriko should do her own homework already.

This one is so cute and pure. :-)

Geez, theres a thing called being friends with benefits you know. All that headache for nothing

Shhh! it's more fun to watch them angst.

I'm not complaining about it at all, but there seems to be an uptick in OL and Adult Life yuri lately.

A reboot of https://dynasty-scans.com/series/todo_no_tsumari_no_uchouten

I thought it was a repost, but couldn't remember for sure. Thanks!

This is great. I think many of us grew up, got crushes, and then had to learn how to ask out women, since we were conditioned to expect men to do the asking, lol.

My GF and I have separated beds, because she's really sensitive and would suffer otherwise. I got used to it and we are used to snuggle between each other's arms in the evening or putting the bed together if we want to do other stuff. People just underestimate the importance of a good sleep.

My wife and I are that way a bit, we have our own blankets we use, so we get space that way (before that, we'd wake up with one of us uncovered and the other rolled up - we both sleep well these days).

This is really sweet and gentle.

I'll be honest, I stopped reading after a couple chapters. But I just decided to revisit it, since it's gone on longer and I thought that maybe it had matured with time and space for a more nuanced exploration of the themes introduced. I've got trans and gender non-conforming friends IRL, I fostered a trans* kid for a couple years. I think that very few comics do trans* well (some feature perfect trans* characters who always pass, others treat it as not seriously or something that needs to be fixed).

I don't really see this as a trans* comic, as it seems to focus on the cis friend more than the trans* character, by an order of magnitude. I think it's aimed at a younger audience, as it has a couple characters (the one teacher, and the wavy-haired guy) who are always right (and to a lesser extend the blonde lesbian). These characters seem to never have personal agendas that interfere with them giving insightful advice to the characters (mostly to the cis-girl, who honestly is a piece of work at the start and a good example of how not to be an ally).

That being said, I don't find the plot particularly moving, it can be summed up as "childhood friends in high school have a lot of feelings and bad boundaries" which is in part understandable as high schoolers aren't adults. Adding in gender identity issues doesn't add that much to the plot (it'd be interesting if it explored what steps Akira would have to take, and the medical treatment options for transgender youth in Japan, it does cover some issues, but mostly in terms of the parents' reaction).