So for blogpost number 600 (yikes! where did the time go?), I'm going to confess a little bit.

Don't worry, it's not anything bad. As warning, it's hugely nerdy so if you're not into that sort of thing, escape now while you can.

Okay. Ready? Good.

Pokemon Manga. (linked for your convenience to the very first page of the very first book. it even reads left to right, as opposed to most mangas that go R to L. awesome!)

Honestly, I've read through the third generation four times and I've been enthralled EVERY time. It's just... woo! (that's all the way up through ep 337, btw. yeah, I'm lame. what else is new.) the ones that I love the most are through ep 90, but they're really easy to get through cos they're only 20 pages each, and they have big pictures so it's an easy read.

Anyway, the question of canon is likely to come up. (canon being material accepted as "official" in that fictional universe. i.e., there are tonnnnns of head-canons about the children of Harry and his friends, but none of it is official because JK never claims any of it. that's the beauty of her creation, but that's another story for another day.) Is the anime canon? Is the manga canon? What about the games, where do those fit in?

Well, honestly, they all pull from each other. The manga strongly follows the games in terms of plot, and the anime doesn't follow anything close (Red is SO much more pwn than Ash; Red actually is the league champion for two years before he goes missing) but the rules of the pokemon/evolution/etc. is structured off the others. What came first I actually don't know. I think the cards and then the anime, then the games and then manga. As far as canon is concerned for me, the anime never happened. I could live off the manga alone. Red is totally a fictional crush of mine. I'll just admit it.

In any case, I just got through ep. 90 (again) and I remembered it inspired this picture I pieced together almost two years ago:

I hope it's big enough so you can read it.

"So time flows, and the stories never truly end..."

This simple phrase has captured my heart, and I do my best to remember it always. It's so powerful. Time keeps moving. A fact of nature and the universe, yet so easy to forget that no matter what happens you can't help but keep moving. And the stories... the chapters of our lives and the things that touch us deeply never leave us. Just like how Pokemon and the lessons they've taught me, however cheesy they may seem in hindsight, will always be close to my heart.

Anyway. I wanted something epic for a milestone post and this is what I came up with.

I hope you have something dear to your heart that you can turn to, to make you feel like a child again. For me, it's Pokemon. And I adore it.

What do you have?