It's cold, it's dark, work is every day. And yet there is time for anime.
Manga
Beyond continuing GTO at a glacial pace, as well as keeping up with Shibuya Near Family and Wasteful Days of High School Girls + Gekkan-Shoujo Nozaki Kun whenever updates release, I have picked up Inari, Konkon, Koi Iroha. It's short, it's fun. I'm pretty early into the story to comment more.
Anime
I have finished Monogatari: Second Season, and the Kaiki arc is just fantastic. It's another high in a series that I have both underestimated and feel that it does live to its questionable reputation. Onto the next series, which is... uh... Hanamonogatari?
One Outs is a gambling sports anime that has been recommended to me for a while, and it is decent so far. The MC is pretty un-Kaiji like, and more your average extremely confident gambling genius.
I've watched Vivy: Fluorite Eye's Song and I enjoyed it quite a bit. It's somewhat style over substance, but it is refreshing in a sea of formulatic slop. I remember the ending having a bit of controversy surrounding it. I thought it was tragic. The post-credit scene did cheapen that though.
Cardcaptor Sakura keeps being fun and cozy.
I have also resumed Sailor Moon, from Season S. It's still good old Sailor Moon.
Millennium Actress was a pretty good movie, aided by the soundtrack of the excellent Susumu Hirasawa. I felt like I missed half of the appeal of the movie by not being that familiar with what was most likely 1930s to early 1970s Japanese cinema.
I have returned to complain about Champignon Witch
up to ep 7 spoilers
Luna is a witch who is much older than she looks, although we don't know how old -- she's basically like an elf or something similar.
At first we think Luna is very isolated. She can't touch anyone because of her poisonous skin. Therefore physical gestures of romance is out of the question, right? Except that we learn later she actually has a lot of people around her who care for her. She's able to make friends but still fails at the romantic aspect.
The red flag was the "romance" at the beginning she had with a boy from the town, which resulted quite badly. I think here, the author is stretching the character into too many directions, trying to make her a vehicle for a doomed romance from the perspective of a young isolated socially awkward girl. Except she's not actually "young," and she's not actually isolated. Now this "romance" seems inappropriate.
Then, the narrator says that Luna is the love of his life, and reveals himself to be a 15 year old boy that Luna rescues, who immediately transforms into a much younger boy.
At this point its too much for me. Luna has set herself up to be his mentor and teach him magic, and basically raise him, and also to have some form romantic feelings for him. I thought they would wait until he grew up again, but they're exchanging blushing glances and at one point he says something about another character being "her lover" and seems jealous or upset. As you can imagine, this is bothering me a lot and I can't really put this detail aside and indulge in this "romantic fantasy"
smh. smh.