I've done it! WM6.5 Build 21901 running on my Palm Treo750

After several days of toiling away with OSKitchen, I have finally
cooked a bootable ROM for the elderly Palm Treo 750. Of course, being
bootable does not compute to fully operational, so given a few tweaks
here and there I'm sure everything will be fine. I hope.

Meet Shadow the HermitHog

Look at that crab boogie!

Meet Shadow the Hedgehog, the name I gave a hermit crab which, although the pictures don't show it (due to a strange type of chameleon type shell), it has a primarily black spikey shell. That prompted me to name it Shadow, after the character in the Sonic Adventure 2 game and it's spinoffs thereafter.

Press your clothes on the Irony Board

I had a pretty much nothing but laughs for the WikiLeaks fiasco going on now, considering I had just talked about operational security in my famous "Hermit Crab watches Hyakka Ryoran" post. The whole wikileaks thing started because an US Army Private decided to take some stuff. I can see why the US Army's Operation Security policy concerning the internet does hinge largely on a single soldier's common sense; put simply, don't do what you didn't need to. Every action humans take in this world will have a reaction, small or big.

But my past few weeks had nothing to do with the Wikileaks, I assure you. No, there are no documents or "cables" about me in there, and I am definitely am not the Private. No, this post mainly talks about just why do I have so many things to do these days. Of course, I'm not venting like my little moody post last week, no, this is about me wondering just how far can I keep multi-tasking.

Even I have bad days (slightly NSFW)

I had a bad day. I had a long day. I had a crappy day, worst day of my life, whatever it is, they all have the same thing in common: unhappy times.

Ow my hand!

So, lately I haven't been blog posting. There are a number of reasons, mainly (but not limited to) my health, so I figured I'd do an update.

Some of you already know about my recent run in with stomach flu/food poisoning, and thankfully I've recuperated from that. but during the time of my rehab, a problem surfaced which I ignored during the first week of this "vacation". It's regarding my right hand, which many would remember is my drawing hand, and it is somewhat damaged. Now, I don't know the extent of the damage, since I can still use it and flex each finger, but I cannot lift anything more than a pound or so with it anymore.

Q: Oh man! How did it happen?
A: Actually, it's very embarrassing how it happened, kind of like that NBA (or was it MLB) player who cut his arm on a fruit knife.... that was on his bed. As I got up that morning, my back was in such a horrible state (the local beds are.... terrible to say the least), and unable to pull myself up, I used my hands to support myself, and in the groggy, half-awake state I was in, I put all 120 pounds (about 54 KG) of my body weight on the right hand, and I heard that horrible cracking sound.

Q: Why is it a problem now? didn't it really hurt right then and there?
A: My "two-headed" sword, as Gilbert Arenas would say. You'd know by now I'm no stranger to pain, and since I was able to use my fingers, I thought nothing of it. That's what I didn't foresee, was my stomach problems happening, and with that deterioration in health, I received little to none of the nutrients I eat on a regluar basis [due to the inability to eat properly]. That lack of nutrients led to my body allocating self-repairs to my stomach instead of my wrist, where eventually my wrist, without nutrients for self-repair, ended up failing, which is why I think I only started feeling the effects after the stomach problem.

Q: What now? No more Sawamura Seiji Right Hand?
A: Well, what probably happened was I dislocated my wrist, if that even happens. Since I can still use my fingers, and since I don't have symptoms of Carpal Tunnel, what I cannot do anymore is bend my hand forward (like how a cat does with it's paw) or that kung fu stuff (you know, Palm Strike... or something). But that's not the important stuff, see. What sucks is that now I have to limit the following activities:

-My Logitech Trackball is right hand based (as the ambidextrous Trackball mysteriously failed), so I can hardly use that without feeling pain, since the right hand model is thumb based (my specialty when FPS gaming as I am a terror with that mouse). Which, for the first time in almost a decade, I personally used a conventional mouse (the one with a tail, and that you grasp and move around a square pad. Wait, you knew that...). Funny isn't it? How I've just used a trackball all those years (Thanks Microsoft for creating your Trackball, lord knows what I'd do without it.), and my first foray into a conventional mouse since is due to health reasons.

-Some of you would do well to remember that my right hand is for precision, and my left hand is for power. Now I'm somewhat ambidextrous as my right hand can be very powerful (due to precise handling, as my brain is probably connected to it lol), and my left hand can be very crafty with individual finger usage. For a few years now I've been training both hands to be in tune and fully ambidextrous (as my dominant eye is surprisingly on my left), but with this recent injury I probably have to return to the previous state of Right Skills, Left Power.

-My right hand isn't new to injury, sadly. I broke the ring finger of my right hand playing American football back when I was in Germany in my younger years. This has brought about an unusual ability, such as showing someone the birdie, but instead of the middle finger I can use the ring finger lol. That injury, though, was the start of my eventual decision to be Right Skills Left Power.

-Now, very important here, is drawing. Precision is my right hand, and drawing goes with it. But now I must limit my drawing time to shorter intervals, as I have been knowing for drawing for hours for a month or so. Now, I'm uncertain how my art style is affected by this new predicament, as I haven't attempted to seriously draw since. I believe though, that my ability to draw manga and girls will not be deterred, and that I will continue to do what I love: drawing.

-Also important is the modern times, ja. You probably know I type very fast, quite unorthodoxly at that due to my unique ability to maintain a set speed across any form of keyboard possible. I won't be thanking Mavis Beacon, though, because I never finished her lessons and the typing games became more of a game than, well, learning how to type lol. Now, I know I'm not 100 WPM (because I believe people use that rating for full sized computer keyboards anyway), but I would put myself between 50-60 WPM. Keep in mind this is across mutiple keyboard form factors and sizes. I remember one time when my friend showed me his Samsung Q1 UMPC, and that he said the typing needs to get used to, and he had an external keyboard for that, which I did see, but when I asked him to try his device, he was shocked when I, for the first time using a UMPC, was typing very fast with no errors. Mind you the early Samsung Q1 model had no physical keyboard, and the software keyboard I used was cut in half, which meant you were only supposed to use your thumbs, and you only have two thumbs total. And that's where we are now, you would remember my current phone, a Palm Treo, which is a portrait QWERTY, and my thumbs do extra duty now that my right hand hurts faster than before. I still type damn fast, though, but at the price of pain and the sudden realization that I have an impulse to type fast before anything else.

There are other tiny little things like unable to princess-carry a girl unless I can somehow use my left hand behind her back and my right hand softening her butt, or now I have to use my left hand to roll dice, or now I'm unable to use my right hand to shake the hot sauce bottle lol. That may sound funny, but with me, when it comes to barbecue, it's all about my left hand to eat and the right hand to pour the ketchup. I'm somewhat of a clean freak in that in no way do I find it logical to use ones dirty hand for such things. So, this is also part of the reason why I'm not active online much anymore. That, and... I'll confess I have some new pets now, in the form of several hermit crabs (ranging from tiny, tip-of-your-finger sized, to the size of a pint carton). I find it fun taking care of these guys, in the hopes of seeing the smaller ones grow to ginormous sizes XD

Wish me luck.

Someone dial nein won won!

Or was I supposed to say 112..... whatever, the real problem now is that I;m having those stomach problems again. While on a supposed vacation. Think about it again. I thought I was better for the greater part of a year, and while vacationing at the beach, I get food poisoning. And here I was supposed to do a blog post about how "fun" it's been here, but instead my first real post after a long time and it's about bad [local] food.

I'm serious, it's not healthy here. The locals aren't exactly clean, the water quality (faucet water) smells funky, and... it's not exactly a resort resort, but a local resort.... not sure I said it properly, but perhaps if I tell everyone where it is. Two hints: How many of my readers remember the last location I mentioned on this blog, and part 2, here's some fun coordinates (I hope I did this right, there isn't exactly a degree key on this keyboard):

13 degrees 40'14."N, 121 degrees23'22.29"E

So, later on with my posts about how this "vacation" has been going besides sickly, so to ease my frustrations, how about a piccy of the local kitty (taken with an HTC HD2):

Renovation test

Not exactly renovating this blog.

wOWser

Ouchie.

Meine goddannar, I knew my shoulder was bad yesterday, but when I woke up this morning there was a sharp pain in the right side of my upper body (right rib cage going all the way to my wrist). Man, that freakin hurt I know it was a stupid decision when I tried to go the the frontline in Iraq (thank god that never went through) but man, it felt like I got shot in my right lung. Now I'm scared.

Another long day...

 Or another bad day. Strange day more like. Whatever day it is today, it's supposed to be a Saturday, but man I feel so ruined that it deserves it's own blog post.

My day kinda starts like this: there's two funny things I heard about in my life; one is "[If] life is so short, why waste it on sleep?", and the other thing is that research a couple years ago indicating that people who get more sleep have better brain operational capacity than those who don't [get enough sleep].

Now, I'm doing a great job of not getting enough sleep [when I need it], and I'm keeping that up with a 'am good job of over-working my brain day in and night out. I am effectively using two "theories" and clashing them all into one big contradiction. But it seems, even that contradiction must come to an end, and I'm feeling it. A part of this whole mess is the insignificant wireless carrier that I use for internet, it is highly unreliable during the day, with it's only best use coming in at the ungodly hours of humankind (Read: when you are supposed to be sleeping). This means all the information I need is best accessed when I am supposed to be sleeping, and when I'm awake I cannot access them [in a reliable manner].

If you thought that was weird, I got word earlier this week that I am supposed to do some sort of autobiography or something like that about my life (in case you were going to ask, it's not an obituary >_>). Now, given the odd nature of my way of life, how am I supposed to do this? As far as I can remember the happy days came far and few in-between, I'm just going to be writing some strange, somewhat sad stuff of my past. Definitely not something I want to delve into...

But, life is life. If I want to live it, there's certain things I have to do. And now it seems like sleep is one of them.

Ichiban Ushiro no Dai Maou Research, series 01

So... lousy week, actually. Lots of ruination and developments
affecting my performance in real life, my anime life has taken a
backseat yet again. Memories of 3 years ago are resurfacing...

Back to it though, the start of my Ichiban Ushiro no Dai Maou research
posts, meine gott meine gott, how much I could have done if I had the
time. Ahem, my real-life escapades aside, let's tackle something first
from episode 10. Part 01 of my II no DM research.

We learn from this episode that it was the headmaster and Bouchirou
that had a hand in the previous Maou's demise. This means it actually
clears up something interesting:

1. The legend of Brave defeating the Maou, was just that, a legend.
2. Because Peterhausen did not recognize Brave, this confirms that
legend/D-13 was created after the previous Maou's demise.

From this I believe D-13 was created after Sai went missing as a baby,
without him under surveillance D-13 was probably the plan B to take
care of the Maou when he arises later on. What is interesting though,
with D-13 having been created after the previous Maou bought the farm,
the Yatagarasu calling out Hiroshi as a hero would then seem more and
more like the setup I have been theorizing about a few weeks ago. Or
perhaps the yatagarasu is the headmasters' way of knowing ahead of
time where the chess pieces of Bouchirou's next game will be. Of
course, this will probably be a detail we will never see...

The next part I'd like to talk about, is when it is known the source
for controlling the monsters is within the school. Huh huh, one might
simply think it's Fujiko, but what if... it's actually Keena? Far as I
can tell there remains nothing else in the school basements other than
Peterhausen, so that would leave Keena, or... those weird
lights-in-a-circle. Let's see if I can make this Keena theory
something:

--Keena's special.
--Let's pretend Fujiko didn't really have control of the monsters, but
rather they just happened to be heading there to "assist her".
--There's still that egg debalce from ep 08.
--As well as her having some sort of attraction to some of the animals
related to monsters (demon dog, cucumber).

There is of course some things to consider about this theory, like her
not up to war and killing, and being sort of a saint, it's kind of
hard to see her having something to do with monsters.

My take on episode 11, has it as Keena being the deciding factor
between headmaster, Sai and Bouchirou. This isn't about Sai killing
gods, but about Keena not liking the idea of Sai being a killer. Keena
is going to save Sai, and the only possibilities of saving him are:

1. If he is about to kill someone.
2. If he's about to get himself killed.
3. If someone's going to kill him.

I'll say, #1 seems highly likely given the alluded hints of Keena not
wanting Sai to kill someone.

Part 2 of research will continue in a moment.

(Anime research by The mangatron is a feature of his blog where he
puts his mind to the history of anime, and how that history affects
the present, and ultimately future projects in the days ahead.)

Backup of a wall of text

Just that usual backup of text I do from time to time.

About Soga Keena.

[b]Episode 01:[/b]
--She is chilling in the forest when Sai bumps into her and she greets him with a school-play like atmosphere. Keena proceeds to bring in the line where she will protect Sai. Now Junko arrives at the scene where we get our first taste at what Keena would do if Sai was in trouble: she'd apparently risk her life for him.
[u]speculation[/u]:
How important it all sounds, how her being there is to watch and protect the school and the world(connect to ep 08). So after all that "airheadedness" of the lines of poetry or what not, why did she bring about a dead-serious tone when she said he's important to her? Here's the best part: [b]the dove's mysterious glistening sound is heard as she says this.[/b]
--After the blast eliminates Junko, Keena proceeds with her lines of poetry of confessions. Why is this important?
[u]speculation[/u]: connect it with eps 03 and 07.

[b]Episode 02:[/b]
--The episode starts with a scene several years ago to a younger Sai handing a dove ornament accessory to a girl, we later see it's something similar to what Keena wears.
[u]speculation[/u]: We have no idea who this girl is. :uhoh:
--Near the start of the episode she casually floating around as Korone explains the meaning of her presence. At the mere mention of the headmaster, Keena is shocked in a scared kind of way and proceeds to escape in the best way she usually does: run away invisible.
[u]speculation[/u]:
Scared of the headmaster? Why should she be? If it's because of low class attendance then what's to stop him, Lily, and Fujiko from kicking her out? What's to stop Torii-sensei from turning Keena into an undead? Torii apparently lets it slide, the head master seems dead, Lily isn't doing anything to students who seem to be breaking the school laws, and Fujiko, merely as the head of the female dorm, has better things to worry about. My take: they're keeping her around for more than just good grades. Government guarantees a job for all students? We've yet to see what Keena's title is.
--Later in the episode Keena is seen walking around the forest naked. Apparently around the place where Sai was to meet Fujiko.
[u]speculation[/u]:
This one is heavy, as there are several implications to this. First, she might have lured out the demon dog towards Sai so he can take care of it. Or, she might have brought it down to take care of Sai and drive him out of the forest. Maybe she has a high attraction to monsters (possibly connect with ep 07, connect with ep 08) Or, she simply wanted to have a cause to be friends with him. Whatever the case, she was apparently here before Sai is set to meet with Fujiko. Connect with episode 03. One thing we do know: her mana appears to be undetectable, either as invisible or as a whole.

[b]Episode 03:[/b]
--Apparently our first look at Keena this episode has her visiting Sai before he sets out on the plan set by Fujiko to meet with Junko. She proceeds to leave just before the planned meeting time.
[u]speculation[/u]:
We later see the purpose of her visit: she removes the hearty pills from Sai's double barreled pistol. Say what? How in the world did she know? Apparently she was watching Sai's meeting with Fujiko in the previous episode, which adds further fuel to the fire of what she was doing in the forest in the first place (a forest with monster sightings, I might add). She is then hiding the fact that she knows someone is out to control the Maou (connect with episode 04).
--She dispels the crowd that attacks Sai later towards the end of the episode.
[u]speculation[/u]:
Saving Sai when he is in trouble? Check. Doing so without killing or even harming anyone? Check. Making those students happy? Check. The world around Sai proceeds to be a happy place. Make of it what you will.

[b]Episode 04:[/b]
--We learn Keena is good with studying, bad with magic. Having no friends, she's apparently putting up with these facts despite wanting to protect the world.
[u]speculation[/u]:
This episode is probably where the speculation starts on whether or not she might be a bad guy. Being good with studies and not at magic? Sounds like someone entered the wrong school. So the way I see it, it might be similar to Sai: worked hard, good grades, enroll at magic school, Yatagarasu gives out a title and school life begins. Except, we don't know who processed Keena's enrollment and we have no idea what the Yatagarasu labeled Keena as.
--She lurks and stalks Sai as he heads out to the meditation shack.
[u]speculation[/u]:
Worried about his health or wanting to save him in case he loses his mind, or *gasp* she was out for the map from the get-go? Whatever it is, she yet again is there when something significant enters Sai's life. So why do I think she was out for the map? Well, first of all, she properly identified it as a map of the school, which we later find out the Student Council identifies it as locations of the school [i]100 years ago[/i]. At a first glance, there's no way anyone would have known it was a map of the school when its a location that predates the school by 100 years, well before the school was even built on there. She seems to have full knowledge of the school's origins in order to come up with that conclusion. Secondly, we can probably tie her knowledge of the map to her dove, possibly connect this with the OP, and episode 05.
--She commits a felony of breaking and entering of Fujiko's secret black magic room to steal the map, a map she proceeds to plaster all over the school.
[u]speculation[/u]:
First of all, how did she know Fujiko has the map? That is, she might have raided Sai's room before concluding the person she bumps into leaving the meditation chamber has it. Next, how did she even know how to access Fujiko's secret room? We know Fujiko simply snaps her fingers to open the doorway, but could it also respond to her black magical ways? Whatever it is, Keena entered the room, and she took the map, and she glue it all over the school. Graffiti? Public defacement of property? They sure put up with her.
--When Eiko introduces herself to Fujiko and the viewers, we see she knows a fact Keena knows as well: someone's out to control the Maou.
[u]speculation[/u]:
We can judge from Keena's episode 03 antics that she was out to stop Sai from falling under the control of another. Protecting him or carrying out a mission? Whatever it is, we later see Eiko knows this as well, so the big question remains: how did Eiko know? She first showed up at Fujiko's yuri lovemaking, if anyone else see's that at first arrival they'd think Fujiko is just some silly perverted girl. But what do we hear? Eiko sees Fujiko has failed at her plan to dominate the Maou. There's only two ways Eiko knows of this: either Keena told her *gasp* or Eiko's been lurking behind the scenes, which wouldn't make sense because you'd need first hand visual confirmation in order to come to that conclusion, a conclusion Eiko arrives at as her first order of business.

[b]Episode 05:[/b]
--Keena's absence is questionable as we see she's sleeping through this whole map ordeal. Why in the world would she do that?
[u]speculation[/u]:
This is probably the first time she pulls her shifty eyes to dodge a topic: she appears to not know the other girl who is with Sai, and later identifies her. There's two ways to tuesday: either she knows who Eiko is and what she's after, or she's trying to avoid a confrontation between the Teruya and Hattori families. Once Junko runs off Keena has the bright idea of dragging Fujiko into the mess, Fujiko, who seems content with watching things on tv. Again with the breaking and entering, but more importantly we find out bringing Fujiko to Sai did more than just give her ringside seats.
--The dove, the dove the dove. Dove soap is good for your skin.
[u]speculation[/u]:
Well well well, here we are at the cause of this whole series so far: the dove hair ornament accessory. We see it activates Peterhausen's DivX playback capabilities that reveals all there is behind the Etou brother mystery. The fun part that everyone seems to have missed: not the dove, or the intro that spoiled the dove's video playback ability, but rather, Keena apparently knows full well what Fujiko's been going through: the pains of dealing with the mystery behind her brother. Either Keena knew ahead of time what happened to the Etou brother, or eps 1-5 was all a setup to clear up the mystery behind Etou brother's death. She knows something...

[b]Episode 06:[/b]
--Probably the scene of choice this episode is not her discovery of the sea cucumber, but rather her alcoholic rice :heh: Ok, seriously, it's that alcoholic scene that is important, not the alcohol itself.
[u]speculation[/u]:
First of all, she is able to find Sai, despite the mana jamming in the area (Korone is unaffected remember?). Lucky guess or more than just coincidence? Make of it what you will, but she proceeds to warn Sai about Simon8 and nothing else. Nothing else she needed to share, anyways, because we later learn that had he knew of Korone's seduction plans, it wouldn't have worked on him, thereby he easily avoids a plot that he needed to avoid on his own (he did well on that too). Keeping that from him or too drunk to drive? Find your fate mystery.

[b]Episode 07:[/b]
--Keena as a monster magnet or she just plain didn't know?
[u]speculation[/u]:
It should be noted that a monster appears(X or the cucumber, you decide:heh: ) as Keena is present again, maybe just my small implication of her being around when monsters strike(connect with episode 08). But you might have missed the important part of my implication: she is apparently more affected by Mister X's Noizetanker than Hiroshi is, either she's got high enough mana to be affected from such a distance or she is just plain scared. Remember, Hiroshi is not so powerful so he probably wasn't affected by the Noize at that distance, compared to Keena (who felt it as a pain, while Hiroshi simply heard it as someone's voice) Yet another mystery? You decide.
--Here I'll connect episode 01's last lines of Keena's play-acting(she lines out what happens when Sai kills another) with this scene in episode 07.
[u]speculation[/u]:
Recall when Sai is about to fight Mister X, Keena in all her dead-serious tone of voice tells Sai he must not kill him. Protecting him or knowing full well what happens should Sai go berserk? She is definitely not an airhead so far in case you're keeping count.

[b]Episode 08:[/b]
--Blond guy, who apparently is a bad guy if we pin Etou's murder on him, has a pendant of what looks to be a girl with a dove pin in her hair.
[u]speculation[/u]:
Everyone might be pinning speculation on the dove, but we know it's not important now because Sai simply bought that at some bazaar or flea market or something. Whether or not the dove's mysteries of being Keena's source of mystery, I believe the implication is there already: Soga Keena. What's so special about her? Well, think of it this way: I believe she may be the angel of this world, or the goddess, so to say. There's a Maou, and there's a God, what's not to say there's a goddess inbetween these two? It would be even more apparent if we consider the blond guy as the God of this society, if we add up his knowledge of the mana's conditioning, as well as knowing the future as well as, we can see, being up on a high place. Remember Soga Keena's earlier implications of her imprtant person, if Sai considers her a fated partner, and this whole thing about watching over Sai since ep 01? She's the special one here, not the dove or her connections to whoever
it is she works for or what not. So just how holy can she be? No knowledge of her past? Check. In a church at such a young age? Check. A cross on her uniform? Check. Undetectable mana abilities? Check. Capable of flying? Check. Special sound [of her voice]? Check. Grand plan to save the world? Check. The way I see it, she's much more special to this whole war between the Maou and whoever is at the other end of the spectrum, in which the blond guy seems to be the other end if his upcoming final confrontation with Sai is any indication. What the dove plays into this remains to be seen, but it can be the catalyst of her power(s).
--Keena approaches Sai as her first objective being the thing about birthdays. When asked about if she is the girl of Sai's past, she's clearly not listening to it.
[u]speculation[/u]:
Only a future episode can clear up the mystery surrounding her birthday, and why Sai didn't need to know at that time.
--Keena steals yet another item from Fujiko, this time, it's something much more deadlier than a map, a monster egg.
[u]speculation[/u]:
My earlier implication of Keena being a monster magnet shows up again here. The mystery starts with how in the world did Keena even know Fujiko had the egg, when Fujiko clearly hid it from Peter and apparently she told no one but Etou oniichan. The mystery continues: this marks the second time Keena has taken something from Fujiko's black magic room, which we can now safely say all this in Etou brothers view. Why did he not say anything? He seems to have seen two things taken from Fujiko, which both were taken while Keena was invisible. Call Etou brother stupified at floating objects, but it happened twice, and he saw it happen.
--Keena a monster magnet part 2
[u]speculation[/u]:
When the double headed Gallus Domesticus hatches, who his first target? Why, Keena of course. Why attack her? Well, if my earlier implication is correct, Keena, possibly being a holy angelic being, is clearly a target of the baddies. We see it clearly went after again and again, only being sidetracked by the erotically tasty Fujiko, and *drumroll* it leaves when Sai attacks it. But wait! Look at it at another angle! What Sai may have unknowingly done was juice the chicken, of course making it bigger, but more importantly it may look like a command of the Maou to go somewhere else and wreck havoc. All those earlier scenes of Sai activating the egg, the monsters being restless due to Sai, it'll make sense with this.

The making of the mangatron's 4koma manga

So, I thought I'd share with everyone just how I go about drawing my 4koma manga on my device, a business HP iPAQ hx2415 w/ 64MB RAM and 64MB storage, screen resolution of 240x320, resistive touch screen and dual memory card slots (Compact Flash and SD card), stock ROM was Windows Mobile 2003se.

The software used is Pocket Artist 3.3 for Windows Mobile 2003 or later. This is, essentially, photoshop in the palm of your hand. You have layers, brush tools, pencil tools, each with variable brush sizes. Standard tools include an erase tool, lasso, marquee tools, hand tool and temporary hand tool, as well as the move tool and more. It also includes filters, as well as a grid and ruler tools, transparency and so on, with a very useful guide tool. It is, the very definition of Photoshop in the palm of your hand.

Of course, the amount of layers you can work with and the size of your canvas determine how well the document can operate, with more device RAM you can work with larger images, supposing you have the megahertz to keep up with such large +1000 pixel images. There is of course, the resolution, as you can see in the above and below pictures, my art is hampered by my device resolution, which is a measly 240x320. That is to say, it is about 1/3 of today's largest windows mobile phone, the HTC HD2.

As you can see, even when I work in full screen, I still run out of room when drawing Keena, which I must say I had a real blast drawing her because of that hair of hers. But that blast meant it was difficult working on her hair, as you can see below Fujiko doesn't suffer from that due to her having long, flowing hair.

Of course, you're probably wondering how I finish up the rest of their body, which I simply zoom out and sketch draw, return to normal zoom and touch up.

You're now wondering why I don't upgrade to a better device with higher res screen and more RAM. Well as you may have known, they no longer make standalone PDA's, as well call them, devices without a phone radio. Nowadays smartphones are the next best thing, apparently, and it hurts, because a powerhouse like the HD2 is unusable to me because it uses a capacitive screen, thereby ruining everything I needed a resistive screen for drawing on (resistive screen are more accurate, providing you use a stylus). So until I find Toshiba's TG01 (which is to say, a resistive HD2 with 1GHz CPU, 256MB RAM and a 4.1 inch screen.

So why not use a tablet PC? Well, they are much heavier, their battery life isn't so high, and with a larger screen there is no palm rest. Also, with photoshop using as high a CPU cycle as it does, it'll drain battery life faster and make the unit hotter. Perhaps today's technology can handle it better, but currently I cannot afford to replace my laptop right now until I finish my work as I'm a traveler, so carrying two laptops doesn't sit too well with me or the TSA lol.

So there you have it, a peek into how the mangatron turns technology into a manga. If I ever do upgrade my device, I just may be able to go public and release my manga project entirely done on Windows Mobile. I would probably then be known as the Pocket PC manga-ka >_>

May 08 part 1

As a part of my sub-routines, I will be posting some things that may
not make sense to you, so think of it as me making up for the lost
years.

Here it is

May 08, my special day. What's so special about it? That remains my
personal secret.

Teruya Eiko in Iron Man 2

So I'm sitting at my computer table, going through the recent
animesuki forum posts for Ichiban Ushiro no Dai Maou on my phone, and
I'm thinking about Teruya Eiko again (do I ever stop thinking about
her? ;), and I was wondering where in the world did I see it before,
in live action to boot.

And so I went through all the trailers I have for movies this year,
and fired up the Iron Man 2 Trailer #2 and there it is, Scarlett
Johansson does something similar to a Teruya Eiko Leg Wrap. From the
scene it doesn't look like she completely wrapped him, but... the
guy's reaction say's "It @#@$*#!kin hurts!".

The trailer can be seen at http://davestrailerpage.co.uk , listed
under "I", "Trailer 2". Personally I find that the best place for
trailers in a no-nonsense website.

I once was cold, but now I am hot...

So, after two days of testing, I am fully healed. Thanks to an
imported medicinal from Indonesia, I, being the mad scientist that I
am, decided to test it out on myself, ready to bear any consequences
experienced thereafter.

I always believe that real scientists believe in their theories enough
to test their findings on themselves. Of course I planned ahead of
time of what I had in my possession and where its most effectiveness
will be felt. And thanks to my dare, that Nezu Haruhiko Nuclear Snot
is no more. This 2 day sickness, 3 day test proves to be my shortest
cold yet.

And now, I am so tired...

I have a cold...

So, after enjoying almost a year of rehabilitating a 3 year sickness,
I had to come down with a cold now of all times.

How it happen was kinda lame. After spending last week theoretically
speculating and going berserk in my Teruya Eiko love campaign, I was
so slagged, I accidentally fell asleep... when the A/C was still on.
There I was, in my everyday clothes, not a blanket or a shirt to cover
me.

No wonder why in anime friends/family always cover a sleeping person.
Not that I didn't know that already, but I was truly slagged to the
point half my body was on the bed, the other half on the floor >_>

Lol what the hell google

Sorry for the picture in the last post, Gmail decided it'd be hella
funny to re-upload the attachment. But if I do take the route of a
plumber, that is the ending to me lol...

Sent from my Treo750 (this and the previous post)

Life changing career decisions.

You know, just recently I fixed a kitchen sink and a shower. Does that
make me a plumber?

In related news, I'm still doing electrical repairs, but so far no
luck on a laptop power adapter. Looks like there's more to learn.

So there's more where that came from, pard'ner

So I recently got a Gundam Model Kit that I've had my eyes on for quite some time, but as you know traveling extensively really takes a toll on how much one can carry. Luckily for me half the stuff I left the USA/Germany with is now dead/worn out, so that freed up some room. I guess I'll take pictures of that some time.

And also I'll be blogging about my endeavors of my everyday life, from strange things like how many Lithium batteries I cut up to normal things like... what ever is normal anyways. so yeah, expect more from me.

Nintendo DS Lite joystick mod

Maybe I'll go and claim that world's first DS Lite joystick mod, but... I think I just did. Anyways, What we have here is a mod I worked on for the same amount of time I did for my 4 speaker DS mod, and just like that as well this one is perfected. Best of all: the joystick is removable, for hot swappable lid closing portability! More on this mod here.

Q: Ok, million dollar question here. How do you do this mod?
A: If I answer, I get a million? Or are you charging me a million to answer that? I know the economy is tough these days, but gee... Well, I'll try to do this step by step.
What we'll need:
-A DS Lite. I don't have a DSi so I wouldn't suggest that right now.
-A joystick addon from the Pelican GBA SP Starter pack. I'm not sure of anything similar to this...
-A tri-screwdriver. Or is it called Tri-wing screwdriver? You know, the special kind that can unscrew Nintendo stuff. Believe it or not, I modified a flat tip to fit in 2 of the 3 slots of the Nintendo Screw, that when effort is used to turn the screw, it will turn as well as long as the flat tip of your screw driver fits well enough in the 2 of 3 slots of the screw.
-A small screwdriver. Philips or flat or cross shaped is fine, as long as it's a small kind.
-A guide to actually know how to open the DS lite. Searching online "DS lite disassembly guide" brought some nice results, try it out and see which one serves you best.
-Another DS to transfer any WiFi or other setting you may not want to lose. Removing the battery for an extended period of time will *synthesizes Sidious voice* wipe out your data. All of them.
-A soda can, or strong plastic. Or, if you have something comparable that is tough yet easy to cut/carve/slice and dice.
-One really strong, tough super glue. Or something to attach metal onto plastic, like a soldering kit maybe.
-Something similar to the width of the screw that is holding the Pelican Joystick together to it's base. I carved ABS plastic from a Gundam Model Kit parts tree and shoved it up the joystick's hole, eventually that failed so I took a small metal rod from an old bluetooth headset I had in a tech graveyard. Sounds cruel, but it's to ensure that the joystick will not fall out during gameplay and to also be able to remove the joystick when we want to close our DS (put it on standby).
-An exacto knife. Or a clone of one, as long as it's sharp and as long as it has cut you before a few times earlier in your life >_>

Some notes when fondling the innards of your DS Lite:
-Be careful of the L and R buttons. If you just aimlessly pull them out, the metal rod holding them might slip free and the spring might fly off into space.
-I start to split open the DS by starting at the D-pad side of the DS, seperate the bottom from the top starting there and it's all a matter of gazing at the circuit board underneath.


1. As you read earlier, I used the joystick addon for the GBA SP that came in the Pelican GBA SP starter kit. It looks a little something like this below: (note: It's not a GBA game case. At least when you buy it, it holds the 5 or 6 different joystick addons which unfortunately I can't show here as of now due to unforeseen circumstances [read: stowed away somewhere I don't remember where]. I ripped out the styrofoam inside and found out my GBA games can fit in there, 4 in all. Talk about Pelican pulling a fast one on us...)

Nice end to the Battle Network series, that Gregar/Falzer one...

2. When you remove the joystick+A+B button addon from the clear plastic case, turn it over (upside down) and you'll see a screw underneath the joystick. Unscrew that and you'll have two pieces, the stick and the D-pad'ish thing as seen in the first picture of this blog post. A spring will be there as well, but it's big, springless and worthless in my opinion. Remember that we will now be treating this joystick as two parts now, 1) the stick part, and 2) the cross shaped D-pad.

The joystick and the d-pad

3. The part where you'll need to have patient hands and also the part where you'll read my disclaimer: Warning. Opening your DS will void your warranty. Maybe. I didn't see that classic "removing this seal will void your warranty" sticker anywhere... But yeah, I'm not responsible for anything that may happen to you or your DS lite, ie sudden loss of battery life after applying joystick mod, an accidentally cut wire, sleepless nights from extended play, etc. Do this mod at your own discretion and at your own budget and at your own free will and in a sane and reasonable manner. Pelican is also not responsible for the mutilation you will be doing to it's joystick addon. Please mod responsibly. Thank you. Proceed.

3.5 (Please consult online documentation on disassembly of the DS lite. Be sure to heed the warnings.)

4. Once you've got your DS opened, remove the only screw that is visible and hold the circuit board together with the case. with your DS slightly opened (that is, open it like your going to play), push the touchscreen inwards (towards its internals) and the circuit board ought to go along with it. Remove the rubbery substance covering the D-pad and remove the D-pad itself and grope it to your hearts content, because it may be the last time you will get to do so.

5. If you've got that soda can, or something similar with a tough easy to cut metal/plastic, cut out a round circular CD-rom disc like thing out of the soda can/metal substance. Using the DS lite D-pad you just removed, use the quarter-like shapes underneath the DS lite D-pad to compare the size to your mini disc'ish thing. Don't worry if you don't understand, it'll all come to you when you see the underside of that D-pad. Once you've carved it into the likeness of the circle beneath the D-pad (from a top view of the D-pad it looks like there's a circle underneath), grab that Pelican cross shaped D-pad and grab some glue. An example of how the mini disc should look on the cross shaped pad below:

Tubular dude...

6. Reason for us cutting that mini disc thing out of the soda can, is because the Pelican Joystick does not have this underneath the cross shaped part. So what we'll do is glue this tough, circular object onto the base of the cross shaped d-pad, and make sure your glue is a good one, because this joystick is gonna abuse it. Be sure to use the DS lite D-pad as a reference on where to apply the mini disc onto the cross shaped pad of the joystick. Or weld this thing if glue isnt your style. Not sure how welding metal onto plastic will work...

7. Once all the glue is done in let the part dry. This next part will be a bit tricky, but if you have an easier way of doing this, it would either be to not do it or glue the stick onto your d-pad permanently. Not fun for closing your DS.

8. You'll recall we unscrewed a screw from the Pelican Joystick. This screw actually helps in holding the whole joystick together so you won't experience a dead stick some time in the close future. But wait! Do we have to put this screw back in once we shove this joystick into the DS? No! That's why we'll make a makeshift "plug" that we will be inserting into the stick part to compensate for the lack of a screw. The reason for us sticking this "plug" into the stick part and not the cross shaped D-pad is so that when we want to close our DS, we simply pull the stick part and with it the plug, leaving the cross shaped D-pad in the DS lite fitting nice enough to be closed on. So, using your exacto knife or clone of it, find a little plastic pole or similar and carve it so that on side will fit tightly into the stick part, and the other side will go into the hole of the cross shaped D-pad. Rememeber not to make that side too long, as it just won't fit. Also remember that the part that goes into the cross shaped d-pad must have a rounded tip, similar to the DS lite d-pad. Or, if model kit hobbies aren't your thing, just find a metal rod that can fit in the joystick part and have a rubber tubing as shown to hold that in place (and eventually compensate for the lack of a rounded tip)

That's the metal piece in place.

9. Once that plug is in the stick part, try connecting the stick part to the cross shaped D-pad. If the "plug" is sticking out through the hole in the cross shaped D-pad, you are good to go! As long as your super gluey thing applied to the cross shaped D-pad part was the fast drying type. Make sure that it is sticking out from beneath the cross shaped d-pad, and easier way to tell is compare your new joystick with the old DS lite d-pad.

10. Make sure that you only insert the cross shaped D-pad by itself onto the DS lite, not with the stick part as well, since it's easier to re-assemble the DS when the lid is closed.

11. So, re-assemble your DS. Remember to be careful and to consult the online documentation for disassembly (I'm sure they include re-assembly too...)

12. Once the screws are back on, battery in place and battery cover not lost as easily as the old first production model GBA battery cover, stick your stick part onto the cross shaped D-pad and oogle at your new joystick-on-a-DS mod! Except when we turn on the DS we need to re-configure it...

13. Once your DS has been reconfigured, shove a game into the Slot-1 and enjoy some joysticky action! (Shove the game in when the system is off, obviously >_>)

14. This tutorial was done in less that 15 steps!

15. Oh no! we've reached the 15th step. I forgot to add "Show this off to friends and co-workers and brag about how cool it is and how easy it is to play with".

16. Ok, no more steps. We're really done!

Enjoy and hope you didn't mind my very walls of texty explanation on making your own joystick mod for the DS Lite. This mod definitely stands among my other successful usable mods, which was a HP iPAQ hx2415 Gaming D-pad adjustment (it's a business PDA mind you, the default D-Pad sucked for gaming), and a Palm Tungsten E2 Battery transplanted to an even older HP iPAQ rz1715, which granted the iPAQ more juice (long since retired though).

If this post looks odd with a lot less pictures than you thought there'd be, that's because I didn't put much effort into this post due to tiredness. I thought I'd get this out of the way so +1 for nothing else to do when your dead tired.

More on the DS Lite Joystick mod

I may have started the new year blog posts in an odd way with my DS 4 speaker mod, but being healthy yet again makes me invigorated to make proper posts like this one.

What we have here is something that's been on my mind for awhile now, as we all know how thin the Nintendo DS lite is when it is opened, I'll say the base is about as thick as two Compact Flash cards stacked on top of each other. That makes holding the DS Lite a bit tiring playing for longer than 20 minutes.

So the solution to my DS gripless problem was this odd joystick that came in a Pelican GBA SP starter pack I got a few clicks back er few years back. What was odd that when attached to the GBA SP, it's a rather tight fit and a few skipped hearbeats removing it from it's crabby grasp on the GBA SP. And you can't close the GBA SP with this thing on, so the idea of it being hard to remove wasn't a really good one there.

With my GBA SP nothing but a museum piece now, I do all my gaming on the DS and GBA games go on there without a second thought. That's when I said good riddance to the Pelican joystick and shoved that onto my DS, which we have the outcome below:

That looks like a N64 joystick would fit there...

As you can see from the pictures it fits perfectly where the original DS lite D-pad used to be. It's slightly smaller than the original DS lite D-pad, but it's the joystick on top of that that matters most.

Let's do this in an interview style:

Q: So what is the purpose of having this joystick on there?
A: Well, think about a D-Pad. You press on it, right? D-pad's aren't like the analog stick on the PSP where you slide that thing around, d-pad's are digital where you press up, down, left and right. Of course some old d-pads weren't capable of the 8 way style of today, but the mod I did brings a little taste of a joystick in the form of how it works. D-pads are pressable, right? With my mod, you just tilt the stick, or in some cases push it. NO pressing. No sweaty thumb slipping off costing you that extra point online on Nintendo WiFi.

Q: Has your gaming improved?
A: Yes it has. I get effortless kills on Metroid Prime Hunters using Kanden's Volt gun from a distance from one end of Combat Hall to the other end shooting at Elite class CPU bots (multi-card play option) while juking left and right avoiding their shots. Try rapidly tapping the L Button like that while moving left and right rapidly with the d-pad, it was hella tiring, with two fingers burning out faster than with one only.

Q: So now the index finger on your left hand hurts more?
A: Yes. Being able to transfer the D-pad strength to the index finger using the joystick, that means more presses for the L button. And more pain in the joints.

Q: So why is it on your White DS Lite and not your Japanese Ice blue DS Lite?
A: Because my import is more precious than the North American one. You know how much it cost me to import that? I wasn't about to bust open a Japanese import, first production run just like that, not to mention it has a 4 year old, scratchless screen protector(from my DS Fat) that endured early abuse like Wario Ware Touched and the Feel the Rub Rabbit series of games. No, instead I opted to test this joystick on my White DS lite, because not only was it an impulse buy, it was yet another first production run that had the faulty touchscreen calibration. Early adopters might know what I'm talking about, if you have Goldeneye Rogue Agent, that game would have the top screen shaking erratically randomly. I know it's not my cartridge because if it is I'll sue EA, because, well, I hate EA for being a big company and releasing crappy games like Rogue Agent. Note I did check reviews online before buying, it's just that DS releases were slow that time of the year and waiting for Advance Wars Dual Strike wasn't fun, so off I went to the store, the wonderful store of all... By the way, I sort have fixed the touchscreen problem by adding a weird, anti glossy, slightly thick low grade screen protector. The Goldeneye shutterbug happens less, but still happens. Talk about messed up...

Q: Does the joystick come off during gameplay?
A: No, thanks to some modding I did to compensate for the lack of a screw that originally held the joystick together. A rubberized tubing for the joystick part made it more difficult to pull off.

Q: What if you want to standby in a flash?
A: Well, if you've gotta do a piss-break (honestly, who hasn't done that at least once in their online FPS gaming life?), simply put a magnet on top of the ABYX buttons. No seriously, it'll work, it has to be in the center but if you have a large magnet it'll work even when on top of the ABYX buttons. Or you can use a busted headphone speaker, similar to an example in the latter photo below (in this case, I used a speaker from an Palm E2). Face the speaker face down (face the side where sound comes out face down) and if it is the slightly magnetic type it will put the DS on standby. While it is open. Or just pull the joystick and close your DS. Your call.

Note the off screens and the standby light on.

Q: How do you close the DS? Is the joystick removable?
A: Amazingly enough, it is. As you can see in the following pictures, a special plug was made from Gundam Model Kit parts trees and shoved into where the Pelican screw used to be. In this way, if you want to close your DS and pocket it, simply pull the joystick upward and it'll pop right out. When closed, the DS lite has a slight opening as you can see in the latter images. It can still be closed shut, it just stays like that if you don't fit it into something like a jeans pocket or tight slip case.

Note the right side of the DS and compare to the left.

That is a direct frontal view, note how much the joystick part sticks out.

Q: Any pros/cons?
A: While I think you know very well what the Pros would be, the only Con I can think of is that it is a bit loud, but that could be 2 factors, 1) My White DS lite is known for that (my Ice Blue DS lite is quiet due to extended use), or 2) It could be because the joystick cross shaped D-pad is a bit smaller than the original DS lite D-pad. It's the rubber pads that are making the noise, so it could be just my DS lite. Note: ADRESSED THE NOISY JOYSTICK problem. It's as quiet as the old d-pad now. Another bad thing: I broke the power switch, which, unsurprisingly enough, is not uncommon for those with DS Lite's. But as always I fixed it, it's even better than the default none broken one.

Sure doesn't look like it used to...

Hey look, it's on!

Q: Are there other joystick parts besides that round thing with 4 arrows?
A: The Pelican GBA Starter Pack includes about 5 or 6, from what I remember it is: The one in my pictures, a ridiculously larger version of that, 1 that is similar to the analog stick on the PSP, and possibly a larger one of that, and an odd, taller version of the one in my pictures. Of course, anything that fits and is comfortable, like the one in the picture below, works. (It's this funky rubberized microphone cover I ripped out of an old telephone.)

Q: Will this work for the DS Phat (1st gen DS)?
A: No, partially because the DS Phat has the d-pad at such a thin size when viewed from the side, if you were to add anything the DS definitely will not close. That and I can't think of anything similar that is the size of the rather large DS Phat D-pad. That d-pad on there is huge, a lot fatter than you'd think...

Q: Why are you using Top Gun DS as an example, of all games?
A: Because that game has a special part in my video game buying history. Not only is the touch screen useless in the game (seriously, it's not a map), it is the only game that I bought after reading negative reviews. I checked weekly DS releases on Gamespot, saw Top Gun in the release list for that week, saw the review rating and read the review, laughing at how bad the reviewer said it to be (with a Good being the Top Gun theme playing in the menu screen). So I went out to the store, bought Top Gun DS, stuck it into my DS and what do you know, after doing the tutorial and all that, jumping into Free Play for the first time I was laughing at the "He's got a lock on me!" and that laughter instantly died down when I realized how bad the hit detection was, how the gun was pretty much as strong as rapid fire missiles, how easy it was to get shot down, and so on and so forth. Money well spent? Think about it! I own a rare piece of history! A game I knowingly knew was bad but went and bought it anyways just to have the sorry butt cartridge in my hands! XD

 Note the power switch left on the on position. No more accidental power-off's now! As if one could accidentally slide it off...

Q: How many DS's do you have?
A: 3, one grey/black DS Phat first production run, one imported Japanese Ice Blue DS lite first production run, and one North American White DS lite first production run. I must have fell in love with buying them when they were first produced, huh...

Q: So you like anime girls?
A: This is not the place to discuss that.

So, there we have it. Another successful post, another successful mod.