by Ryan Mathews

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February 1999

It's been a interesting month for your faithful columnist. First there was the "situation" resulting from last month's letter column. For obvious reasons, I'm not going to repeat a word of it here; nevertheless, I thank everyone who sent letters of support. Then I miscounted the number of Mondays in the month and missed the usual deadline. (How do you miscount Mondays? It helps to do it in your head instead of looking at a calendar.)

Part of the reason I missed the deadline was that I had planned to visit my friend in Burlington, Ontario. Now, for some reason, it had never occurred to me to call my friend to see what the weather was like before I left. I tried to get the information off the news and the Weather Channel, but on US weather maps, Canada is blank. Canada's a foreign country, you see, and since we're not bombing them (yet), the news programs aren't interested. I didn't see a single story on the US news, even though Toronto and Burlington were being hit with the worst blizzard in over a hundred years.

Thankfully, I made it safely to Burlington. My car, however, had to be left behind, as I'd bounced it off the median wall on the Queen Elizabeth Way after sliding across snow-covered ice masquerading as the highway. I spent most of the rest of my "vacation" snowed in at my friend's house, and spending time with his five wonderful children, one of whom threw many liquidy open-mouthed coughs in my direction. I made it home Sunday evening (driving my car, which turned out still to be operational), and spent two days sick as a dog.

As a final "up yours" from the world, my CD player died on me.

But hey! I'm not here to bitch about my life! I'm here to review websites! Which I've still managed to do, but just barely.

Before I get on with the review, I'd like to clear something up about my role on the Anime Web Turnpike. Officially, I don't have one. I've seen myself referred to as an "employee" of the 'Pike, a "representative", or a "staff member". The truth is that I'm just a friend who writes a column, a contributor. I have no say in the content of the site, other than what I put in my own column. As a friend of Jei Harvey, I do have his ear, so I've given him advice now and then. But the 'Pike is his baby and his alone. I've added a disclaimer to this month's column to delineate where Last Exit begins and the Turnpike ends. So, if you have suggestions for the site, don't write me, and if I say something that pisses you off, don't write Jei, okay?

Let's get on with the topic, a sequel to last February's topic!