Congratulations, reader! After so many months of miraculous recovery and therapy, caused by that horrifying incident of having your house explode via plane–sized projectiles, you are finally one hundred percent recovered! Naturally, none of this would have been possible without the medical expertise of that unlicensed doctor your friends found while surfing /b/.

Of course, all of this wouldn’t have happened if you had gotten that plane-crashing-into-house insurance in the first place.

To top it off, that strange but brilliant doctor only charged you twenty-five bucks for the entire procedure and recovery! Looks like you didn’t have to do all that fundraising after all. To celebrate your good fortune, you have decided to fulfill one of your biggest dreams, and make way to the land of the Rising Sun –Japan!

Also home to a good portion of Rule 34 contributors.

You spend your vacation having the time of your life, until one day you collapse for unknown reasons while running around in Akihabara. When you finally wake up in the hospital, a nurse and a translator are there waiting to tell you that you have developed a completely new heart condition. However, the best the hospital can do is to help pay for the flight home, due to that fact that the hospital cannot care for someone in your condition. Just before the nurse can continue another doctor rushes into the room and says:

Don’t listen to these fools; they’re towing the hospital line. Nobody wants to deal with your case because not only is it expensive, but you are a foreigner –who cares about you? But, I’d be willing to help… if you’re willing to take the risk.

And then he gives you that smile that says: “Like you have any say in the matter.”

Several days ago, I celebrated my 22^nd birthday, readers. And like most birthdays, it paled in comparison to previous ones while reminding me of how much older I’ve become.

Remember this place? Remember how awesome it was? Remember how after this, every other birthday sucked?

I’m only 22 though, and even though my diet is slowly but surely making its way to a prune based end – I still have time to make something out of myself. Climb mountains, travel the world, make new discoveries, moon the social elite – because we’re all aiming for that particular trophy : “Achievement unlocked – Bucket List completed.” I’ve still got time… until I turn 28. Then I’m screwed.

Okay, I’ve already nailed number 84 - ”Dedicate my life to comics.” I’ll most likely have number 324 - “Have a respectable career” when I turn twenty-six… Probably will have to write off number 1,986 - “Turn into a jet and fly into the sun like a boss” Achievement. Awww.

Iwamaki Rikitarou has hit that point, ladies and gentlemen. At age 28 he has achieved his true goal in life – absolute freedom! Freedom to live his life any way he wants it, any way he needs it! And yet, all that freedom is failing him right now. His girlfriend is fed up with his laziness and wants to leave him, his band mates don’t respect him and to top it off his dream of becoming a rock star is all but done. (Apparently all great rock stars die between twenty six and twenty eight. Go figure.) Cursing the world and the fate he has been dealt, Rikitarou does what any slacker does – gets wasted. And like most binge drinking runs, he gets into a fight where he is hopeless out classed. With his life flashing in front of his eyes, Rikitarou does the only thing any man with self worth can do…

After spending years upon years of helping your family slave and save what little funds you can get, you’ve finally done it. Through your combined efforts, you and your family have managed to collect enough funds to send you, the eldest child, to Cicero City! From the tales you’ve heard from foreigners, Cicero City is a place where money flows like water and opportunities are abound in every way. Hopefully you’ll be able to bring your family here once you’ve struck it big. You step out of the carriage and walk into the inn where you’ll be staying, deep in Friedrichstown, only to come across this scene:

Happy Holidays, readers! Hope that the lot of you have finished your finals, completed your shopping, and won that battle against the hated Christmas decorations. SO, to end the year on a high note (and not because all my Christmas ideas stunk), enjoy the last issue of Manga Hermit for the 2011 year – Otoyomegatari!

It is the 19^th century. The location is a rural town, near the coast of the Caspian Sea in Central Asia. Within the town, there is a sense of urgency and excitement. It seems that one of the sons of the Eihon family is getting married, hence the excitement. The Bride-to-be is supposed to be special – coming on horseback from over the far mountains to live with her new family. I wonder what the new couple looks like - !!!

Happy Turkey Day, readers! I’m sure that yesterday the lot of you had your fill of food from the numerous dinners, family gatherings, parties, et cetera….that you attended. Sweet stuffing, savory gravy, mashed potatoes that just melted in your mouth and of course the thanksgiving centerpiece – turkey. I hope the lot of you that fell into a thanksgiving day stupor from all that food finally digested it because I’m giving you another heaping helping of food, whether you like it or not! In paper form!

Some of you are just getting nauseous just by looking at this photo. Ha.

Written by Tetsuji Sekiya, Bambino! is a Seinen cooking manga, with some dashes of drama and a couple “slices” of life thrown in. First appearing in the older men’s Big Comic Spirits (published by Shogakukan) in 2005, Bambino! is still been running strong, with fourteen volumes in print. The manga follows the simple story of Ban Shogo as he starts off his career as a chef. He doesn’t have extreme cooking skills, nor any blessed abilities from birth. Ban Shogo is your average college student who started out in the food service industries like most part timers. Luckily, Ban got to work in a restaurant where he could actually develop his skills, instead of flipping burgers. The head chef sees his skill and sends him to Trattoria Baccanale, the longest-running Italian restaurant in Roppongi, Tokyo, as a favor to his friend, the head chef at the aforementioned restaurant. He arrives in the dead of summer with a chip on his shoulder. And yet, the waiters and chefs give him a knowing stare – as if they know the punch line to an inside joke. Will Ban survive his time at Baccanale?

It’s 7pm down in Ginza, Tokyo. A young man walks among the numerous bars and stores, his eyes filled with wonder and self-consciousness. Seeing wealthy businessmen and their high-end dates strolling about reminds him of the dinky ensemble he is wearing and the only money he has in his back pocket – 4000 yen. Ashamed, he finds the nearest stairwell and ducks into the first door he sees.

It’s 10pm down in Ginza, Tokyo. A hostess has just quit her job after having one too many “touchy-feely” customers attempt to get her drunk. The loss of another job reminds her of the gigantic debt that she has to pay to the yakuza. But, for one night, she wants to find a place to lash out… or to at least find some peace. She finds the darkest stairwell within eyesight and brazenly walks through the thick wooden door.

It’s 1am down in Ginza, Tokyo. An intern gets dragged along with his overbearing boss on one of his bar hopping trips. Along the way, the boss criticizes the intern for his lack of skills, ability and social graces. It doesn’t help that the boss is wildly drunk. After falling down some steps, the boss waves off his intern’s forced concern for his well-being and pulls him through the wooden door at the bottom of the stairwell.

What do these three seemingly random people have in common? Read on to find out.

Music is a powerful thing, ne? Whether you’re head banging to the latest heavy metal sound, mosh-pitting with the newest grunge rock, belting out the blues at karaoke amateur hour or singing in the shower to the newest Justin Bieber song, one cannot deny that music is an inherent part of our lives. Hell, during the writing of this article I had my YouTube favorite’s list on repeat. Music is like water – we all need it, but some just throw themselves into it. Musicians, singers, conductors, DJ’s – all those people are the ones who “throw themselves into the water” as I’ve so eloquently phrased it. Which brings us to this issue's subject: Nodame Cantabile!

Yen press has announced a whole slew of new releases for their Yen Plus online magazine, and new titles that they’ve acquired for the upcoming year. The first main draw is the new adaptations of two widely popular English young adult novel series into graphic novel form: The Infernal Devices, written by Cassandra Clare and Dark Hunters: Infinity written by Sherrilyn Kenyon.

The Infernal Devices is a prequel of Ms. Clare’s Moral Instruments - a riveting tale about the adventures of American teen Tessa Gray in the supernatural hallows of Victorian London. Dark Hunters: Infinity is also a prequel to the Dark Hunters series. It follows Nick Gautier and his travels into the occult and horrifying within the streets of New Orleans, encountering the Dark Hunter Kyrian of Trace. Both comics will be making their big splash in Yen Plus this fall!

The second draw is the announcement of the addition of the popular Soul Eater Not! series to Yen Plus for 2012. Yen Press also took the opportunity to announce that following the release of the current English issues, Yen Press (in collaboration with the author and publisher) will make Soul Eater Not! a simultaneous release series. As soon as those issues hit the shelves in Japan, all you yen plus subscribers will get you fix of Soul Eater slice-of-life goodness!

For the lot of you who thought that this was going to be some gratuitous lolicon story review, get your minds out of the gutter. Here at leetNEET, we have standards, moral standards, which are held up to the strictest levels. Our Maso Mondays articles are just a bizarre anomaly. To that end, the manga being presented today reflect those standards. Today’s manga will show such values such as individual growth, family ties, the bonds of friendship, etc… Today, is about the tale of one man’s responsibility to his… loli!?

Goddammit, not another Chris Hansen meeting.

Otaku no Musume-san, translated as “The Otaku’s Daughter”, is a slice-of-life story written by the largely unknown “Sutahiro”. It is a story that depicts the radical change an otaku undergoes when reality decides to drop in, unannounced. Kouta Morisaki is your traditional 26 year old otaku, living his introverted days at the apartment complex Higansou. A collector of scantily-clad anime figurines, an illustrious history as a long-standing veteran of Comiket, works as a manga artist to support himself and his addiction - Kouta is an otaku through and through. All of that changes when nine year old Kanau Yukimura arrives on his doorstep, claiming to be his daughter from his high school ex-girlfriend Nozomi Yukimura, who’s on the run from debt collectors.

I’m not a lucky person, readers. Being a hermit doesn’t mean I get blessed with good fortune or things of such nature. Personally, I think lady luck has it in for me. Every once in a while, she does send a bit of fortune my way. For example, several weeks ago at a friend’s barbeque, I learned how to play Mahjong. Given a generous handicap for the first few rounds, (if you count the numbers 1-9 translated from Chinese to English on a picnic napkin a “handicap”) I managed to secure a six-game winning streak to the shock of everyone there. Probably because I wasn’t Asian, but still winning. Go figure. While musing about my recent bout of luck, I thought back to another game of mahjong. A simple mahjong game where the plays were high, the bets were higher, and the stakes were astronomical. A simple mahjong game that gave birth to a legend.

Tokyo. 1959. A grimy, nondescript mahjong parlor. A man tries to bet his debts away to the reigning yakuza in the area. However he finds his chances of victory washing away, like the grime off the windows of the parlor on that stormy night. Just as the noose of defeat tightens around the man’s neck, the game is interrupted by a youth –soaked to the bone. Seeing a chance to break the momentum, the man covers for the boy and allows him to stay. The short reprieve does little to help the man’s poor standing and poor hand. He has a chance to turn it around, but does he risk it, or play it safe?