George and Lennie; Lina and Gourry

So, many of you have probably read "Of Mice and Men" by John Steinbeck. If you haven't though, I highly recommend to, but for a quick summary:

Lennie and George are traveling from Weeds to a small ranch to earn some money. Lennie (on the left) is a big, strong guy who really can't think for himself. He pretty much does what George (on the right) says. While there, they make some acquaintances, if you want to call them that, and some trouble, especially with small, but tough Curley. Lennie and George have this dream to have their own ranch and live off of the "fatta the land". Lennie wants to have rabbits too and tend to them. Soon, Candy, an old rancher with one hand, joins in on this idea or dream and everything seems to be set until Lennie makes a big "mistake". I don't want to spoil the ending so I won't mention that, since it's not too important to this entry.

When I first began to read this in my english class, I started thinking about how George and Lennie interact with one another and why it seemed so familiar and then it hit me! George and Lennie remind me of Lina and Gourry from "The Slayers". For those who don't know what "The Slayers" are here's a quick summary: It's a popular anime, novel, manga and movie series about the infamous Lina Inverse and her adventures. In the first season she meets up with an older mercenary named Gourry Gabriev and begins her new adventure with him. At first they didn't get along with Lina being a "little girl" in Gourry's eyes, but soon they form a bond that'll never be broken. Defeating Lord Shabraningdu with ally, Zelgadis, was their first feat, but as the series continues they make more friends/allies in Princess Amelia of Seyrunn, Dragon Princess Filia, a mazoku by the name of Xellos, Princess Martina of Xoana and many others.

I started to seriously think about this and came up with some reasons on how the relationship between Lennie and George is simialr to that of Lina (the red head) and Gourry (the blonde man). First off, Gourry is like Lennie while Lina is like George because Gourry is a large and strong man, like Lennie, and can be stupid and clueless about simple things while Lina is a small person, like Geroge, and is the leader or more intelligent of the two. Also, the way that Lina can tell Gourry what to do and he'll (usually) do it is a lot like how anyone, especially George, can tell Lennie what to do and he'll do it. Both Gourry and Lennie remember important things, even though they don't remember what happened five minutes ago. Lennie remembered to go to the brush after he made that "mistake" and Gourry remembered Lina's name for one and for two, that something happened in the "chaos" that he can't remember clearly (neither can Lina) in "The Slayers NEXT". Another point is that Lina cares about Gourry a lot, even though he's a "jellyfish", especially when Hellmaster Fibrizzo took Gourry captive in "NEXT". George cares about Lennie a lot too because he was upset and bothered after he had to do "the right thing" at the end of the novel. Even though, in both partnerships, they seem to not get along, without the other, Lennie wouldn't know what to do, George would feel guilty most likely. Lina would be worse and more reckless than she already is and Gourry would still be working odd jobs and not know how to "care" in a way (according to the novels, Gourry was about to throw away the Sword of Light until a mysterious man, Lina's Father though Gourry didn't know this, told him to use it for a good purpose and Gourry decides to use his sword to protect Lina.) Oh, another good point is that Gourry and Lennie say/do some weird things, or may not say anything coherent to whatever is going on, but they do say/do some things that show how much they need/want Lina and George. Like, Gourry told Lina, again in NEXT, that he was planning on protecting her for the rest of his life while Lennie gets upset when George starts complaining about him and telling him that his life would be better without Lennie. Lina blushes when Gourry tells her this and George tells Lennie to go get some fireword and come back, showing that both need/want Gourry and Lennie too. Even though the relationship between Lina and Gourry is much stronger and romantic than that of George and Lennie's, both relationships are stronger than most and are a big part to their corresponding story.

Well, that concludes my rant. There are probably more things that you could compare between the two couples, but I can't really think of anymore at the moment. Thanks for reading.

Copyright: "Of Mice and Men" (1937) belongs to John Steinbeck and it's publisher(s). "The Slayers" (1989-2008) belongs to Hajime Kanzaka, Softx, FUNimation and other companies.

The Caramelldansen

We've all, or most of us, have heard of the Caramelldansen. It's especially popular with anime and J-pop fans. I am one of those people. These past few days have consisted of me going onto youtube and searching for said videos. Just searching "Caramelldansen" gets you about a 15 thousand hits and from there you can search for your favorite anime or game. I searched my favorite anime, The Slayers, and I got about five caramelldansen videos! I'm happy about that because Slayers is a pretty old anime that not a lot of people have heard of. Watching these videos made me laugh and made me get up and do the Caramelldansen myself. I've been doing this dance for days now. I even taught my mother how to do said dance. Seriously, you cannot be mad, sad or depressed once you've seen a Caramelldansen video. It's just so much fun! So I suggest that all of you go out there, go onto youtube and search for the Caramelldansen and learn the dance!

The picture is of Shinji and Asuka from Neon Genesis Evangelion. Jeesh, doesn't seeing them doing it make you happy?

War in Iraq; Barney for President

This is a sticky topic for it has many opinions and many answers, but I thought that I'd get my own opinion out there on how I feel.

War. What's the point of it? How can we retain peace by killing others? Why start one at all? How does a war start in the first place? These are questions that I've been asking since I was young, and even more now that I'm older and one of the hot topic amongst teens is this War in Iraq. I'm constantly hearing kids at my school argue about their opinions on this, and even teachers arguing with students about it. I try to stay out of these conversations, but now it's inevitable. Here's what I think...

To me, war is pointless. From learning about it in History class to hearing it on the news every night, no one or nothing has showed me the point of sending innocent people, even if they volunteer, to fight and kill other innocent people. I know that that's a general statement, but it's pretty much what we're doing. We're sending these men and women to fight in a foreign country and kill them just to try to make peace. What kind of peace is it if a country is losing thousands of soldiers and civilians every year? To me, peace can't be made this way. It should be made by compromise and talk, not violence. By sending our troops over to Iraq and those other countries in the Middle East, we're just pretty much doing the same thing that they did to us on 9/11. It's not justice! It's not solving anything. I'm so tired of hearing about these young people die in battle. Some of these people are two or three years older than myself! They had so much coming for them in the future and yet, they're killed trying to save our country. I'm also tired of hearing Obama and McCain say that they're gonna pull our troops out asap. I'm sorry, but that's not going to happen; we're too deep in this battle. When this war, this killing, going to end? I'll probably be old and dieing by the time that this war ends. That's nearly half of my life hearing about these young and older people dieing because of this. Why can't we just live peacefully with each other? Why can't we settle this in a civil matter? Because we don't know how to. It's because we're not sure how to speak to people civilly and non-violently.

So this brings me to a conversation that I had with one of my best friends. It was random and it was funny. We were talking about this topic, war, and about the current presidential election. I, personally, don't think that either of the current candidates are able to lead our nation. In joking, I said why not have Barney, the great purple dinosaur, be president. She laughed at me, but then I began to seriously think this. Not necessarily have Barney be our president, but someone who is like him be president. I mean, he teaches us how to share and care and how to be nice to others along with other basic things that we learn in our youngin' years. Someone like Barney could, possibly, make our nation a bit more peaceful and, possibly, help end some of the violence.

I know what I'm saying may be just or unjust to some people out there, but this is how I feel and this is my opinion. It may sound childish because I am, technically, a child. I'm sorry for anyone who is offended or bothered by this post and my opinion. Thank you for reading this. =D