This is a good time of year to do that 'what makes you happy' meme. Many disked sets of Uncle Ming is a good start, but today it was followed by kickinpants' Christmas package. It contains a Hasui calendar, and I nearly wept when I looked at the plates.

They have the colours right. So few people get the colours right. Especially my favourite of the lot, Twilight at Ushibori. The online versions of the same have the colours wrong- too harsh, too dramatic. It's a somber mellow scene and I can't find a proper rendition of it.

And that, I fancy, is because it turns out all the online ones for sale are later printings done from the original blocks. I bought a couple of those twenty years ago on my first trip to Japan and could see the difference between them and the one or two originals I have. Loss of detail, loss of colouring. The winter moon that hangs downstairs is nothing like the real thing. So I was amused to read here that even these 'newer' reprints done in the 80s have mellowed with age and increased in value. (Have they ever. I think they cost me about $50 each twenty years ago, and are going for five times that now.) Which is cool, but they still have a long way to go.

And that's why one has calendars. Thanks so much, kickinpants!

(Package also included the latest Wild Adapter and the last two WA chapters and a new Phantom Moon Tower ep. It seems like ages since I last sat on my sofa reading Japanese-- it was in fact what I spent the winter of '06-'07 doing-- but I intend to do it tomorrow night. Not tonight because I must be up too early tomorrow morning for work, after today's exciting adventures ("My alarm didn't go off and I have to be there to open in ten minutes!!!", from the woman who lives over an hour away) but when I have leisure to savour my fortune.

And when my scanner gets over its sulks I'll show you all the 'Totoro stained glass window' card that came with it all.