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Date: March 10th, 2020.

Time of Writing: 10:01 PM.

Weather: Warm, a little bit of a hint of a drizzle at some points but it never truly materialized.

Mood: Dry lips but otherwise good.

Day Overview: Thank goodness I spent time writing with Tsz last night. She saw a good deal of issues in my paper that my peer review folk didn't, and I wouldn't have been able to fix them if I didn't know they existed. It looks like the next assignment for that class is going to be a presentation, which would be exciting if not for the fact that it was paired with an annotated bibliography. Yikes! My stomach hurt in the morning but that was probably because of the Quesadilla I had for my late dinner last night. It cleared up by my media class, which was not the exam - it was actually a study session. That's good, because God knows if I was going to study for the exam otherwise.

The exam for my Film Studies class went really well. I thank two things for that - it was an open book exam, and I know how to use an index. The film we watched afterwards was pretty alright. I got a burrito from the campus center for my dinner, and then went to anime club. I was too late for trivia, but it went to a crazy number of tiebreakers for probably the third time this semester.

On My Mind: It's looking really likely that UMass might close for the rest of the spring semester. Mount Holyoke, Amherst College, and Smith College have closed. Hampshire College is going to close for some reason or other regardless of the Coronavirus. As soon as UMass says it's going to close, I need to start packing. Well, first I'm going to start throwing things away. Then I'll start packing. At first, I suspect it'll be pretty nice. There'll be a longer spring break before classes go online, and I'll use that to catch up with friends and stuff. But pretty soon, I'm going to have to look for work. My Dad's going to lose income because of this, and my Mom might catch it and have to stay home for a while. My household will need all the income it can get, and that means I need to find a job. It'll also suck not being able to do my radio show. No way will I be able to make it down to Amherst once a week to go on air. Not with my timeslot.

• Collateral directed by Michael Mann: I've seen people praising Tom Cruise's performance in this. I'm sorry, but he's just not a convincing villain, and the hair looks terrible on him. Jamie Foxx is pretty great in this, though. The plot is pretty riveting up until the last act of the movie, when it just gets kind of stupid. I'd say as soon as the nightclub scene happens is when it starts to get stupid. The most interesting subplot turns out to be a red herring to set Vincent up as a more starkly evil character than he was made out to be. His philosophizing turns out to be just him being edgy, not any real point made. The cinematography can be good sometimes, and the shots of the city at night are really neat. The soundtrack is mostly great, except for the bit with the coyote, holy shit that sucked. Overall it's a mixed bag but I liked it a good deal more than I disliked it. 7/10.
• Showa Genroku Rakugo Shinjuu animated by Studio Deen: This rating is for the first season of the show, since it has a separate entry on MyAnimeList. I liked the show a whole lot so far! It had very memorable characters, and the extended flashback was incredibly engaging. Storywise, it's basically flawless. The animation is somewhat stiff, however, and doesn't really bring the stories that are so central to the practice of Rakugo to life in the evocative way that animation is good for. I can't think of a very good reason for this to not be a live action show, actually. I also sort of wish there was more present day scenes, even if the first episode was a bit of a drag. Just to check in, to make the sudden leap forward at the end of the season less jarring. Also, isn't Kikuhiko a bit young to have such white hair, considering that Masuda is older than him and seems a lot more able? Idk. 8/10 so far.
• In The Flat Field by Bauhaus: Promising start, somewhat waffly finish. I wish more of this album leaned into the gritty, unforgiving sound of the first couple of tracks and spent less time in the waifish goth dance of the remainder of the album. I specifically listened to the original nine song tracklist, but I forgot to clear my queue, and as such some of the bonus tracks started to play. I didn't really notice. These songs blend into each other a good deal. Bauhaus got better with age. I still like it, though. It's solid post-punk. 7/10.

• Houseki no Kuni animated by studio Orange: Episode 7.
• Hinamatsuri animated by studio feel.: Episode 7.

Works Produced: Slim pickings. Going to go hang out with Tsz in the band building again, though, and my goal is to write some more while I'm there.

Other Thoughts: Thank you for reading my blog. There's a good chance that this week's radio show will be my last of the semester. It would mean a lot to me if you could tune in. The theme is Travel, which is fitting given the likely diaspora from the area. You can listen on WMUA Amherst. That's 91.1 FM and WMUA.org online. Once again, thank you. I hope you tune in.