I’m going to try and get a post out today, but it suddenly dawned on me that on August 14th my beloved baby Okazu turns 9 years old. I think that deserves a little cake or something, don’t you?

Best party suggestion wins a copy of the Strawberry Panic: The Complete Novel Collection for you or for your library, if you already have a copy.

Pictures/stories/videos/other of Yuriko and Midori eating Okazu birthday cake will likely get you better prizes.

Another Twitter triumph! Not only can I communicate with Yuri manga artists quickly, not only do I have awesome conversations with other anime and manga bloggers, industry folk and notables…not only do I have amazing amounts of high-utility fun on the world’s most annoying chat room, erm, social networking platform…I got me a new header, too!

One day, Lissa Patillo said on twitter that she felt creative, but had no projects. Half-jokingly I said, “You can always make me a new Okazu header!” And so she did.

So, let me say that 1) she’s a delight to work with (in case you have some paying work for her, hint hint); 2) her reviews are a blast to read, and; 3) she’s loads of fun to talk to.

Follow, friend, connect whatever, Social Media works. I got a new header to prove it. :-) I’ll be playing with it a bit in the days to come to see what I can add to the mix. Okazu has always been my playground for experimentation, so why not?

Thanks again Lissa! It’s going to make me happy every time I look at it.

Sorry for lack of posts this week. Work is kicking my butt in several directions and I’m in the process of shifting everything over to a new computer (nicknamed “Balsa.”)

I’m out the next few evenings, as well, so please excuse me while Okazu goes into some forced downtime.

In the meantime, please entertain yourselves by following two roundtables in which I have the pleasure of participating this week:

The Manhwa Movable Feast, July Edition. This month, hosted by Melinda Beasi of Manga Bookshelf, we are covering The Color of… Trilogy. I took a stab at the third book in the series, The Color of Heaven. *So* not my kind of book.

And on Hooded Utilitarian, I am pleased to be part of a roundtable on marketing “arty” manga. My “Solution” article has been reworked slightly to address some of the many excellent comments that appeared in the comments here and make a few points relevant to the issue there. The rest of the roundtable folks are going to have a lot to say, so follow the roundtable all week long!

I’ll be back with reviews asap.

I have two volumes of Yuri Manga sitting here that I’d like to give to a good home. Tadaima! and Hinagiku Junshin Jogakuen.

To win these volumes tell me who you would invite to a Yuri Tea Party and why. You have to include three real humans (live or dead) that have something to do with Yuri and then you have to invite three fictitious characters.

Here’s an example:

I would invite Yoshiya Nobuko, because she is the Grandmother of Yuri, Rica Takashima, because she’s one of the funniest people I know, and Ryoko Ikeda because she’s seems like she’s a hoot. For the fictitious characters I’d invite Cutey Honey because she seems like she’d be a hoot and a half, Tenoh Haruka from Sailor Moon  because she’s intense and cool and my “gateway” character and Iono-sama from Iono-sama Fanatics because she seems like she’d have some fun stories to tell.

They all represent different decades and different genres of Yuri, so that’s an added bonus.

Assume yourself and myself will be there, so don’t add me or yourself to the list. :-)

So, get out those invitation cards and let’s have the guest list! The winner will be determined by whim, as always, and will get two volumes of manga and some random crap I’ll throw into the envelope. ;-)