Rise up High!:

I've added two new songs to my Music Hall of Fame, deleting two Valkyrie Profile songs to make room.  One of them is from the recent Love Live! Nijigasaki movie, the opening song by Shizuku, 'Rise up High!'.  The song is as addictive as the dance.  In fact, the song and dance she performed is so good I decided to promote Shizuku to my Fictional Character Hall of Fame as well.  I always liked Shizuku, she was my second favorite girl among the Nijigasaki club, but this moment really put her over the top.

I love how her simple character design, long straight black hair with a dainty ribbon, managed to be so amazingly beautiful.  She radiates charisma with her bold theatrical gestures learned from her secondary drama club.  It's like, 'hey, look at me!' is always being released from her body in spiritual emissions.

Shizuku has always been a voice of reason in the club of oddballs, avoiding confrontation while producing results and getting along with everyone.  She's everything a girl should be.

The other song I added was Arifureta Battle Song, the theme song of Chapter 3 of Heaven Burns Red.  Like every song produced by Jun Maeda it's amazing.  My replay of Heaven made me more aware of that fact than before.  Rise up High! reached 4-star status, whilst Ciga Choco, Arch Light and Arifureta Battle Song had to content themselves with 3-star status.

I also think Heaven deserves two more fictional character entries:  Charlotta and Yingxia.  They're both beautiful in their distinctive Russian and Chinese garb and hairstyle.  Charlotta is the best yandere ever.  Obsessive, scary, cute and hilarious.  Yingxia is also funny in a sort of 'dame-ningen' way.  She's commonly misled, easily taken advantage of, and just generally incapable of getting people to listen to her, despite actually being intelligent, caring and strong.  That contrast is another continuous font of humor.

Fictional Characters can be good for reasons other than pure virtue.  If they make a lasting positive impression/impact, then they're still hall of fame worthy.  As always the marker of greatness is 'moving and memorable,' and they both pass that standard.  For the same reason villains can make my fictional character hall of fame.

I don't want a ceasefire in Ukraine, I want a Russian victory in Ukraine, so I'm happy to hear the Trump-Putin phone call didn't result in a ceasefire.  The war should continue until its natural conclusion, just like World War II, where Russia took Berlin.  I won't be happy with anything short of that.

As for the new war Trump launched against Yemen (which will undoubtedly spiral into a war with Iran) I kinda see the logic behind it.  We can't allow third world countries to impede first world trading lanes.  Our economies are important.  At the same time, it would be a lot easier to accede to Yemen's demand, which is completely moral and justified.  All they want is for Israel to stop genociding the Gaza Strip (which Israel is back to doing again with a new bombing wave killing over 400 people, like usual barely any actual combatants.)  Yemen isn't doing terrorism for fun but for the self-defense of the most unfortunate people on Earth.  Surely we could meet them halfway?  It would be a lot cheaper.  But as usual America is Israel's poodle, so back to the Middle East for another war we go.