MARCH 2006

March 2, 2006
Hello, this is Long Skirt.

As of March 1st, we have a new staff member in the Blood+ team.

It's so nice to see a guy without glasses!

I'm sure he'll bring down the percentage of staff members with glasses here.
Thank you to our president! Thank you HR Department! And thank you, Mr. HR Manager!

This event puts a definitive end to the sad and laughable scene of me sitting with a contingent of spectacled colleagues going to lunch twice or three times a week to this curry shop behind our company building.
What a relief.

March 13, 2006
Hi, this is Snow White.
Nowadays, I sleep in the back of the production's dispatch car.
This isn't bad at all. If you allow me a luxury, I wouldn't mind a pillow...

Time flies and it's already March. It is the month of pollen allergies. I see people guarding themselves heavily with masks here and there in the studio.

Poor Long Skirt, whenever she hears the lyric of Sakura (Cherry), the top ten song from last spring, the words, "cherry blossoms" just sound as "pollen" to her... She gets so depressed. Spring is not her season.
Would I be like her some day? Anyway, it's spring. Spring has arrived. "In spring one sleeps a sleep that knows no dawn."

I should be getting back to my old futon left spread out at home. But for now, I am dreaming at my desk at work in the middle of night. Well, you know, it's spring and "one sleeps a sleep that knows no dawn." Excuse me.

March 23, 2006
Hello, this is Long Skirt.
Snow White came to me and said she needed a photo of "a man's bare-naked back" to use as a reference. To be precise, she wanted to see how muscles were positioned. I thought it would be hard to find a good photo for that purpose.
Then I happened to remember our president's words: "Exploit anyone, even your boss!"

That's right. I almost forgot. There was a perfect model right here: a lean well-built guy in our studio. I picked up a digital camera and approached the subject in question.

Long Skirt: OO, take off your clothes.
OO: What's the matter with you?
Long Skirt: You said you'd do what you could (NOTE: literally "shedding a layer of skin" in Japanese) for the project.

I saw in OO's face a perplexed expression that said, "that's not exactly what I meant" intermittently changing into a tormented expression that said "should I or shouldn't I take off my shirt for the project."

I felt sorry for the guy and changed my approach a little.

Long Skirt: Snow White, don't you have anything you could use?
Snow White: What about Teppei Koike's photo book?
Long Skirt: Does it have any photos of his back?
Snow White: Yes, he's all half naked in the first half of the book.
Long Skirt: Why didn't you tell me in the beginning?

I must say I'm relieved we didn't have to attempt the brutal stunt of getting OO to take his clothes off in the corner of our office.

March 30, 2006
Hello, this is Long Skirt.

Our animator's challenge today was to find out the spinning speed of a centrifugal cell separation machine for blood donation. You've asked the wrong person. I have a tendency to be anemic and have strictly followed my doctor's advice that blood donation was not a good idea.

So, recognizing this, Matty ignored me and asked the experienced OO about the spinning speed of said machine. Sorry to say that it was hard to put the delicate issue of spinning speed into words.

OO: I think I saw a blood donation bus in front of the train station.
(Translation: Matty, go and check for yourself.)
Long Skirt: Do you need a digital camera?
(Translation: Matty, please go and take a photo.)
Matty: No, no thank you.
(Translation: You guys can't be serious! I would die if I had my blood extracted after working all-night for three consecutive days!)

After some contemplation, we came to the conclusion that Matty, who drinks three bottles of energy drinks and five cans of coffee a day, was not an appropriate subject for donating blood.

So it was our freshman Mr. KG who was chosen to sacrifice himself to get the photo of the machine. And we patiently waited hours for him to get back from a meeting.

By the way, according to Mr. KG, the speed was like, "whirrrrl, whirrrrl!"
Can anyone tell me what that means?