Decent-sized haul this past week (as in last Mon-Fri, I've been meaning to write this since Friday). I ended up with two proxy service packages in the same week, which is a first for me. I've ceased proxy bidding as of this week, it is waaaaay too expensive. I don't necessarily like posting how much I spent on stuff on here because I think it's rude. Dot dot dot, but for example, I got a new Monster Hunter shirt (difficult franchise, awesome merchandising) and special Puchi Nendoroids that came with a Japanese DS game called Cross of Venus, it's a collaborative (RPG) effort between all/most of Dengeki's mangaka. No matter who you go with it's generally fairly expensive to import something "middle of the road" -- like $15-$75 -- and this case was no exception. For this $30 shirt and $60 set of 'droids it was $164 after all was said and done. That's $74 for fees and shipping in case you weren't counting. That said, I don't dislike or think that these services are a ripoff. They're performing a service that would otherwise be nearly impossible unless you have friends or family in Japan that you're willing to bother, so I think they're entitled to their fair share. I just happen to think that the fees outweight the importance of what I'm getting at this point and I need to just cool it till I make it back to Japan or make more money or hopefully both. I also think that I'm going to let my existing pre-orders run out and just be a grown up (that has impulse control) and wait until I make a respectable amount of money and have my feet on the ground before I buy anything else that isn't a life essential.
Now on to the haul. I keep slowly amassing modeling materials, and heard that Tamiya Putty was the best, so I grabbed a tube of that for 266yen when I was getting everything else from Hobby Search here. The other things that came from HS were a Nendoroid of Kyouka Midarezaki from Kyouran Kazoku Nikki (or Diary of a Crazed Family), Kanzaki Kaori from To Aru Majutsu no Index by Kotobukiya, 1/100 HG Aile Strike Gundam to begin my Gunpla modeling and two Keropla models Garuru and Musha Keroro. Then from Goody Japan came my long-awaited Mama Chapp doll (yeah I totally bought a doll, shut up ^^;). And then from Shopping Mall Japan came the aforementioned Cross of Venus omake Puchi Nendoroids and a really awesome Monster Hunter shirt. In retrospect I sorta wish I would've passed on the 'droid of Kyouka-san and gotten Kotobukiya's Index figure. I may do that this week, depending on how the wind blows (i.e. - how my auctions go). I also have 3 occasions this month where I need to buy gifts, including one that's belated that I haven't forgotten about but still need to get something for. Luckily either people don't like Kotobukiya's sculpts or To Aru Index isn't a popular series (which is honestly not the case) because both Index (released in October of last year) and Kanzaki (released in Jan or Feb of this year) were still in stock as of this writing.
As far as this blog is concerned and how cessation of purchases will affect it, only time will tell. Most of my posts are either centered around "I got this today," or dealing with Company X that screwed me on shipping, or was a delight to deal with or whatever. But I have confidence that it'll continue in some form, fansubs and RAWs are still free, right? ^^;
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