5/31/2005: Just got back from the extra-long weekend of the annual company trip; we caravanned six hours west to Nagoya for the World Expo, and came back a different route, looping up through the Japan Alps and stopping for dinner in Karuizawa. Wow! Got back with just under an hour left in May 31--the last day for "Saiyuubito" submissions--so frantically filled out the form. My clock said 12:01 when I submitted it--hoping hard that the clock was fast...! Brought this month's Zero-Sum back with me; am too whupped to do scans and the write-up tonight (only put up the new trivia fact), but will get busy on that tomorrow. Glad to be back!
5/25/2005: Updated Journey To The Rest Area.
5/23/2005: Frantic lunchtime update of the 5/19 news item on the online "Saiyuubito" submission form; I'd left out the fifth field! The fifth-field explanation has been added to the news item now. Very sorry about that, and thanks to "Joe Blank" for letting me know about the problem!
5/22/2005: New trivia fact today (Bob Saget?! *shudder*), and note the addition of Saiyuki Gaiden tankoubon Vol. 1 and Vol. 2 to the list of upcoming releases...no specific dates yet, but Minekura-sensei says they're coming! Meanwhile, the prizes have doubled in the two contests underway now at Journey To The Rest Area. If you haven't entered yet, better hurry; the deadline is midnight tonight U.S. Eastern time!
5/21/2005: Added a doujinshi each to the circle sections for AIMAIYA, DOHC, EGOISTIC GUESS, FLOW SNOW and HANDSOME DAN.
5/19/2005: Another big new news item on the front page--submissions are now being taken online for "Saiyuubito"! The news item includes an explanation of the form and what goes in each field. Don't miss out!
5/18/2005: TWO differents contests, each awarding a Spring 2005 issue of WARD to its winner, are underway now at Journey To The Rest Area!
5/16/2005: Exciting new news item, plus a new entry at Journey To The Rest Area!
5/15/2005: New trivia fact today, and added further information to the page on Studio Backgammon and the relevant results from the Animage Grand Prix to the page of TV Ratings and Fan Popularity Statistics . Meanwhile, the write-up on Minekura-sensei's book signing is up at Journey To The Rest Area. WARD comes out tomorrow!
5/13/2005: Just in time to celebrate Dokugakuji's birthday...here at long last is Dokugaku site JACKALOPE SYNDROME! (And now that that's finally up, can do the writeup on Minekura-sensei's book signing and the Animage Grand Prix results in good conscience. :^ ) )
5/12/2005: Yowza, have I gotten a bunch of questions on the "Saiyuubito" fan participation news item! Updated the news item today with some clarifications and things folks have asked about that I hadn't thought to include before (such as, art submissions need to be something you draw or paint right onto the postcard, not a printed image; and all submissions become the property of Ichijinsha). A few people reported that their computers weren't able to read the kanji font used for Ichijinsha's address, so on the linked page with the text of Ichijinsha's address, I've added a .jpg graphic of the address.
The updates cover about half the questions people have asked. I certainly don't mind questions, and am glad to help--but there's only so much I can do. I won't be able to fill out and/or send in postcards for people, and don't plan to post Ichijinsha's address in romaji (this is to give your submission its best chance to arrive--the "JAPAN" will guide it out of your country, and the kanji address will get it to Ichijinsha as fast as possible), and have just plain stopped answering e-mails asking anything already answered in the news item (am sorry to be hard-nosed about this, but there's only so much time each night after work; it needs to go for things other than repeating information already in the news item).
Please remember that "Saiyuubito" is a Japanese book, being produced for the Japanese market. For the best chance to get into "Saiyuubito," try to follow the guidelines in the news item; the fact that you're trying will impress Ichijinsha's staff and be big-time points in your favor!
5/10/2005: Added a page on Saiyuki doujinshi by Minekura-sensei's own circle Studio Backgammon! Also added the newly-decided name of the Saiyuki 10th-anniversary book--"Saiyuubito"iŗVlj-- to yesterday's news item.
5/09/2005: New news item is up! Coming up next--probably in Journey To The Rest Room--will be "A Minute With Minekura-Sensei"!
5/08/2005: Back from more Golden Week craziness, culminating with A Minute With Minekura-Sensei--report and a new news item to come tomorrow! Today I added the May Honorable Mention award winner in the Zakuro Art Contest and this week's trivia fact. Also took the password protection off the site...am so sorry about that! Had put it on around April 30, but forgot to take it off when the site got back underway May 1. Thought I'd taken it off a couple days ago, but it was still on as of today. Fixed now! (Think I made the change but somehow didn't submit it to finalize it...With the system upgrade am using Safari now instead of IE, and am discovering that Safari's kinda weird about caching forms.) Will keep the Mind-Control Method up an extra week. More to come!
5/01/2005: Omataseshimashita! Been a busy past couple of weeks, getting both the computer and myself overhauled. Things couldn't continue as they were, so finally got MacOS X installed--but lost my beloved old scanner (no drivers exist for it in OS X, arrggh!) and all the makings for two sections that were in the works, and about half my Japanese fonts (the Font Of DOOOOOOM is gone! *sob*) and filters, and all the e-mail in my Dion account, and Photoshop 4.0J. Now have a new scanner (that does a shitty job on line drawings, double arrggh!!), and Photoshop CS in Japanese (and a pretty steep learning curve after Photoshop 4.0J...). The changeover has made for 'way faster work online--now it only takes a few seconds to open a page instead of three minutes, yayyy!--but much slower sledding in putting images together; hope to figure things out soon. I need to get a kneeling chair sometime pretty soon here, too; sitting is still an issue, although things are better than before. Turns out I have a "longer than usual" tailbone (biteikotsu in Japanese, by the way ;^) ), and have lost muscle back there the past couple years, and sleeping on the floor under the kotatsu all winter put too much pressure on it so it gets ouchy easily now if I sit too long. But I have adhesive medicine patches to plaster onto my butt-bone when things get bad, and if I can find a kneeling chair, that'll be a huge help. Anyway! Have added a new news item, and this month's Mind-Control Method--grateful thanks as always to Lux for the use of the screencap!--and also a Hakkai fukusei cel and identifying characteristics of Pierrot's very first Saiyuki fukusei cel edition to DOUGA PARTY: FUKUSEI CELS. There are several additions to DOUGA PARTY PART 4 and PART 5--but my new scanner unfortunately does such a crappy job on douga, these might be the last ones I put up. (I want my old scanner, dammit--but freakin' MacOS X won't let me use it!)
LATER 4/14/2005: In my ranting at the computer to hurry and open the damn editing page and hurry and save the damn editing page (it takes about three minutes to do each with my wonderful dial-up connection), and debating whether to mention my bizarro physical affliction, spaced on mentioning--the January through April Honorable Mention award winners in the Zakuro Art Contest are up now! Had goofed and forgot to change the link leading to the winners, but that's been fixed now--enjoy! And congratulations to GBeanJuice, whose entry was chosen to be the front-page banner leading to the contest results--she wins a Spring 2005 issue of WARD! (If you don't know what's so great about that upcoming issue of WARD, be sure to check out the new news item that went up yesterday...!) See you on the 28th, just in time for ZERO-SUM!
4/14/2005: This is short notice, but have been thinking about it a while--going to take a two-week break from JTTR to catch up on e-mail, concentrate on finally getting up a different Saiyuki-related site I've been roughing out for three years, and try to get to a doctor (I, uh, seem to be growing a second tailbone. Had hoped the freaky bony thing would go away, but it hasn't, so, better get it checked out...wish me luck. *sigh*).
4/13/2005: New news item, new trivia fact. Some Honorable Mention winners in the Zakuro Art Contest gallery will be posted tomorrow--very sorry about the delay!
4/08/2005: Added five new douga images to DOUGA PARTY: Gojyo and Hakkai to RELOAD episode 1, Chin Iisou (no foolin'!) to GUNLOCK episode 13, and Zakuro and Sanzo to GUNLOCK episode 23.
4/06/2005: Oh, lordy, where to begin? On April 1 I got seriously sidetracked by a crisis at work, and was so tired and headachy after that, the planned April-Fools version of the front page didn't make it up--but on April 2 I went ahead and put up its "Big-Beef Sanzo" illo anyway so at least that wouldn't go to waist...er, waste. Had a terrible headache that just got worse as the weekend went on; it's mortifying how long the doofy thing took to do, but finally got up the Zakuro method on Sunday night. By Monday I was nauseated with the pain, so after work the past couple days I just went home, pulled off the new glasses I'd gotten while in Tokyo 3/30, and slept. Well, today I realized what the problem was: despite gritting it out for a week, I just wasn't getting used to these new glasses' frames, and the damn things have dug a groove on both sides of my skull! My boss recommended I go back to my (four-year-)old glasses, and y'know what? The headache is almost gone now! Did the overdue news item tonight, now that I can concentrate (just have to park my nose six inches from the screen now, after having used the new glasses for a week!).
3/30/2005: This morning's journey was a success, and so--astonishing but true--I get to be one of the 300 people attending Minekura-sensei's book-signing of "Saiyuki RELOAD" Vol. 5 at the Ikebukuro Animate this May!! The tale of the trip is at Journey To The Rest Area. Put up the new trivia fact; too whupped to get through the news item on the May ZERO-SUM tonight, but watch for it tomorrow!
3/29/2005: Sneak peek at the new chapter in ZERO-SUM at Journey To The Rest Area; news item on the issue and chapter to come tomorrow, though, as I gotta hurry and get ready for a next-to-no-notice trip to Tokyo on the first train in tomorrow's wee hours, in the hopes of bringing back a super-scoop...! Earlier today, in DOUGA PARTY, added seven new douga images to the Saiyuki RELOAD and Saiyuki RELOAD GUNLOCK sections (Hakuryuu, Hazel squirmin' in bed, Kami-sama, ankle-grabbin' Zakuro, Kougaiji wakes up, Dokugakuji lets loose, and the anime version of my favorite of all "Saiyuki" manga panels, the viewed-up-through-the-table shot of our four mixing the mahjongg tiles!). Still need to add the new trivia fact tonight.
3/22/2005: Updated Journey To The Rest Area.
3/21/2005: Added this week's Trivia Fact and a doujinshi each to the circle sections for HALF MOON, MENODETA TOKEI, SAKURA ANNIN, TEAM CHIRARISM/SHOKOCAPRICCIO and XION.
3/14/2005: Well, shocking bad words...somehow hadn't uploaded the Kouryuu scan, and had managed to turn the "Ichijinsha" kanji in last week's news item to garbage somewhere along the way. Sorry about that! The elusive Kouryuu is there now (in douga for GUNLOCK episode 19), and the "Ichijinsha" kanji are fixed. Also updated Journey To The Rest Area.
3/13/2005: Let's just pretend this is the first Sunday of the month...the March Mind-Control Method of the Month is now up! Congratulations to UltraM2000 and Zakuro's Monthly Gang Of Five! Over in DOUGA PARTY, added a dozen new douga images to the Saiyuki RELOAD and Saiyuki RELOAD GUNLOCK sections (Gojyo and Hakkai get nekkid, Kouryuu wants your loose change, li'l Hazel is feeling mighty low, Gato gets stoned, Dokugaku is toast...and then there's Zakuro...!), plus nine additions in the Fukusei Cels section!.
3/11/2005: Added a doujinshi each to the circle sections for AIMAIYA, AXEL, EGOISTIC GUESS, HERZ KAISER and SUPER BABY's/TENKAICHI BENNY's, and updated Journey To The Rest Area.
3/10/2005: The Grand Prize and Genjy Award winners in the Zakuro Art Contest of DOOOOOOM! are up now! Some will be resized to be a bit bigger tomorrow, after I'm able to see how the pages look on the computer at work. Congratuations to the winners...and there are a dozen more to come! Mind-Control Method of the Month will go up soon!
3/07/2005: New news item and trivia fact, and updated the release list and release archive. Really got walloped by the weekend, brain and body both; hope to be more functional tomorrow...
3/04/2005: The bad news is that the winners of the Zakuro Art Contest and March Mind-Control Method of the Month will be announced on March 10, delayed from March 6 (very sorry--it was either that or lose what's left of my mind!). But the good news is that the release date for Saiyuki RELOAD manga tankoubon Vol. 5 has been set: April 25! Updated the news item with that tidbit, and also updated the release archive. Will be offline all weekend for the Akira Kushida karaoke event--see you Monday!
3/03/2005: Added the "Ichijinsha" kanji and scan of the April ZERO-SUM's Saiyuki RELOAD page to yesterday's news item.
3/02/2005: Back at last--and boy, am I beat! Did a quick news item on ZERO-SUM, the upcoming Saiyuki RELOAD tankoubon Vol. 5, and Issaisha's merger with Studio DNA to become Ichijinsha (big thanks to Big A for alerting me to the Ichijinsha news--I'd sleepwalked right through that announcement in the issue!). Was thrilled to come back to find so many great entries for the Zakuro Art Contest of DOOOOOOM--thanks so much to everyone for entering! Am off to get some sleep now; might be quiet here for a little while as I get caught up at work and Avalon Jones and I judge the art contest, but there'll definitely be action here on Sunday, if not before...! Thanks again, folks--you guys are the best!!
2/17/2005: Added a doujinshi each to the circle sections for AIGAN DOUBUTSU, DOKUSAI DENPA/FUTAGOHA and EGOISTIC GUESS. Will be offline until March 1, so don't forget, the deadline for the Zakuro Art Contest of DOOOOOOM! is FEBRUARY 28! See you March 1!
2/13/2005: Added this week's trivia fact, and put something scary on Journey To The Rest Area.
2/08/2005: Quick update today to Journey To The Rest Area.
2/07/2005: Added a doujinshi each to 10 circle sections tonight: AIMAIYA, ANGEL NIGHT, FLOW SNOW, GEKKA NI HITORI, HERZ KAISER, NOUZENKAZURA, SAKURA ANNIN, SUPER BABY'S/TENKAICHI BENNY'S, TEAM CHIRARIZM/SHOKOCAPRICCIO and TREFOIL SYS. Also added an UKOKU/KOUMYOU page to the COUPLINGS page and updated three other sections there (all noted on the Couplings page). Oh, and Minekura-sensei's site NITRO is back up today, freshly updated.
2/06/2005: Don't have a key at work, so wasn't able to use the computer to update until someone with a key came in--today! Very sorry about that! The details of the Zakuro Art Contest of DOOOOOOM! are up now, along with this month's Mind-Control Method of the Month and the listing of Zakuro's Monthly Gang Of Five. Also plugged the holes in Friday's news item. Minekura-sensei's site NITRO was down today; it's about time for its monthly update on projects, so with luck is just down to do the update.
2/04/2005: It's official--there will be a Zakuro Art Contest this month, with the Grand Prize winner to get "Salty-Dog III," and at least a dozen other prizes awarded! Details will be posted tomorrow! In the meantime, there's a new news item (details on price and sale dates will be plugged in shortly) and a new entry at online journal Journey To The Rest Area!
2/02/2005: Tinkered with the news item and added a line about Hakkai's latest title awarded by ZERO-SUM readers this issue. Y'know, there are 11 more Mind-Control Methods Of The Month coming this year (each starts the first Sunday of the month, so watch out for February's...)--but I'm all out of Zakuro art now! But "Salty-Dog III" is coming out later this month, and I have an extra of it on order that would make a nifty prize...so am thinking hard about having a Zakuro art contest...! Whaddya think?
2/01/2005: New news is up. I weep for Mac OS 9...
1/31/2005: This is ugly. I've been avoiding updating the computer at home from Mac OS 9 to Mac OS X (can't risk losing the PhotoShop, fonts and scanner!), so am limited in the browers I can use. Haven't been able to log into more and more places, and as of Saturday, it looks like the time has finally come that I can't log into Yahoo to make changes to this site. Was away on Sunday and didn't have a chance to try then, and was hoping the Saturday problem was a one-day thing--but today it still crashed my browser. Can get in fine here at work! Can still FTP images from home with no problem--knock wood--but have always edited text online; gonna have to e-mail text here to work, and then log in and paste new stuff in after hours. Mannnnn...*sigh* Whacked out the trivia fact here tonight, but the news item text is on the home computer; watch for it tomorrow.
1/28/2005: Earlier today, put a preview of the new news item that's now in the works up on Journey To The Rest Area. So far tonight, have updated the release lists. Holy cats, has it really been more than two months since the last doujinshi update?! Gonna have to do something about that too...! Second half of ONE WEEKEND still to come too, but that'll be sometime this weekend; trying to get the news item up tonight.
1/27/2005: Added 21 images to the DOUGA PARTY section. The March ZERO-SUM comes out tomorrow!
1/26/2005: The first half of photo-feature ONE WEEKEND is up now, and the results of the Zakuro SPAZ contest have been posted at Journey To The Rest Area!
1/25/2005: Update at Journey To The Rest Area--such as it is.
1/23/2005: New trivia fact, updated the release list, and added 22 more douga (listings only; some images will follow soon) to the DOUGA PARTY section. Went to a douga random sale yesterday (and scored an UraSai douga!) and Gojyo/Sanzo-only doujinshi event today; shot a lot of photos both days to document the weekend, and hope to put 'em up in a photo-feature this week.
1/18/2005: Quick update at Journey To The Rest Area.
1/16/2005: New trivia fact today, and added 52 douga images to the DOUGA PARTY section! Feel like the walking dead right now--damn cough kept waking me up. The rest of me is sure ready to sleep, if the cough will just cooperate...
1/12/2005: In the process of e-mailing Zakuro contest winners now...and a Zakuro contest of a different sort, with the February 2003 ZERO-SUM as the prize, has just started at Journey To The Rest Area; anyone can enter!
1/10/2005: Zakuro's first Mind-Control Method Of The Month went up today--congratulations to Zymz, who wins a shitajiki of favorites Sanzo and Goku that was a special giveaway with Saiyuki Drama CD Vol. 12! Coming soon is a list of Zakuro's Gang Of Five for this month, listing the top five finishers and their entries. Also corrected a couple typos in "A Very Special Saiyuki Christmas", and did a quick update of online diary Journey To The Rest Area. Finally feeling better after several days down with the Cold From Hell, and hope to get a lot more done tomorrow.
Later 1/07/2005: "A Very Special Saiyuki Christmas" is finished at long last, woo-hoo! Congratulations to the winners, and thanks so much to everyone who entered (I'll be e-mailing entrants soon)! Wow...hadn't expected the apocryphal Louie to make it in...then again, hadn't expected most of what happened to happen...! (The Cookie Monster part scares even me...and I'm fearless. ;^) ) Thanks to everyone for sticking through it! I'm going to go be unconscious for a while, but will be back soon!
1/07/2005: Man oh man...have been pretty wiped out by The Cold From Hell. Last night after work I sat down under the kotatsu to eat, and woke up there this morning, late for work! Am so sorry about that!! The ending of "A Very Special Saiyuki Christmas" is going up now--writing it online at work during lunch! ;^)
1/05/2005: Akemashite omedetou! The new and improved "A Very Special Saiyuki Christmas" is up at last (if you saw the first half before, almost every page is different now)! The Honorable Mention winners are announced in it, but since I can't access Gmail at home, only at work, and I can't find where I wrote down peoples' Grand Prize choices, I need to check their emails while at work so I can also announce who got what. Watch for that the evening of Jan. 6!
Added more than 100 douga cuts--mostly Saiyuki RELOAD and Saiyuki RELOAD GUNLOCK!--to the Douga Party section. Haven't scanned images yet, but hope to do so later this month. Lots of new books from last week's Winter Comiket to add, too!
Also did an update to online diary Journey To The Rest Area on December 31.
Close Personal Friends of Zakuro entrants, I wasn't able to put up the January winner the first weekend of January. Really would like to keep to a schedule where the winners run the first week of the month the rest of the year, so will aim for this weekend for the January winner.
Need to finish getting caught up at work--we were closed 10 days for the winter holidays, and I'm still working through the 700 non-spam e-mails that were waiting!--and then will be able to do more here. Thanks for your patience, and best wishes for the New Year!
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This page was created January 5, 2005. Last updated July 17, 2006.
This page's text and source code are copyright Kagenami Q. DO NOT USE WITHOUT PERMISSION. Saiyuki, Saiyuki Gaiden and Saiyuki RELOAD are copyright Kazuya Minekura/Ichijinsha; Gensomaden Saiyuki is copyright Kazuya Minekura/Issaisha, Saiyuki Project and TV Tokyo 2000; the Saiyuki RELOAD anime is copyright Kazuya Minekura/Issaisha, TV Tokyo, Dentsu and Pierrot 2003; Saiyuki RELOAD GUNLOCK is copyright Kazuya Minekura/Issaisha, TV Tokyo, Dentsu and Pierrot 2004. All images are copyright their respective artists and creators. No copyright infringement is intended or implied.