One Desperate Fool's Struggle to Obtain 'Iketeru Futari' Episodes
By now, all two of you regular readers to this site (and I know one of you's only here to keep an eye out for Pachinko Sexy Reaction pictures) have probably figured out a long time ago that I like anime. I personally own a grand total of thirty-two anime VHS tapes and DVDs as of the first time I saved this file to my hard drive. That's not the issue there, so I'll get to the point.

Out on the internet, there's a little trend for anime that isn't really planned for release here in the U.S. (I will not count Excel Saga, which has since been released and bought by myself). It's called 'fansubbing'. I'm pretty sure that if you've made it to this page, you're enough of an anime freak to ALREADY know what that is, but on the off-chance anybody reading this page doesn't, it's basically where a group of people take an anime from Japan that hasn't been released out here, add subtitles themselves, and release it to us in either tapes or .avi-style files on computers. I have never seen the results of one of these efforts before so I am totally unsure of how it usually turns out.

One of those .avi-style files, or rather, sixteen of them, form the focus of my latest project. I am REASONABLY sure you can guess the anime in question. If none of you have ever heard of 'Iketeru Futari' before, lemme bring you up to speed with my amazingly limited knowledge of the series.

Take your average 16-year-old pubescent male and do the following things. Crank up his horniness to the absolute extreme, take out this thing we call 'dignity', and erase any intelligence and common sense he may possibly have had before puberty. Now give him the name 'Keisuke Saji' and realize that I based the ENTIRE CONCEPT OF 'THE ANIME HUNTER'S' ANIME LECHERS EPISODE AROUND THE GUY'S BEHAVIOR (or what I've heard) and you have a basic idea of the main character of this series.
Okay, got that? Now add a Rei Ayanami look-a-like that looks like she's twelve, maximum... Except instead of being an emotionless robot-like human by ANY means, in fact, she's instead a hotheaded girl with mood swings more violent than your average Seagal flick and gets her kicks both seducing and hating boys. Especially the Keisuke Saji I described, who she gets a whole lot of other kicks in. Now give her the name 'Akira Koizumi'. There you have your other main character. And perhaps I should mention that Saji wants her BAD.
Now you add some supporting characters. We'll start with Saji's childhood friend, Yuki 'Anyone in real life who tried to play basketball with breasts like those would be in intensive care in ten minutes tops' Umemiya. Then add Koizumi's friends, Ryoko Arigase and Maki Akamasu, and don't forget- their 'preferences' are less obvious (read that reeeeeally carefully, use French pronunciation if you still don't get it) than usual. And, heck with it, throw in Yuki's growing feelings for our resident idiot, Saji.
Now, for the coup de grace, add as much ecchi content as you can until your mind explodes. I'm talkin' breast-feeling, panty-shots, implied yuri, not-so-implied yuri, pointless nudity, name your gratuitilicious ecchi pleasure, from what I hear, there's a good chance you'll find it.
There you have it. S'all I know.

From what I also hear, it's supposed to be as funny as all-get-out, and lemme tell ya, ecchi comedy holds a very special place in my heart. Even if it isn't, I've SEEN screenshots. I even somehow managed to talk my friend of mine into getting me a LOT of 'em. You might see some of these screenshots used as icons, or rejected banner ideas on this very site. I've seen reviews. And I have the opening song 'Fall in YOU' (I don't know, I don't WANT to know, and I don't want to find out) on my computer as one of my favorite .mp3 files. Basically, I've seen everything 'cept the anime itself. And since I know that each episode isn't supposed to be much longer than MAYBE five, six minutes apiece, that times sixteen episodes makes for not much money to be earned from it stateside (and the .avi files are the only way I can get those oh-so-wonderful screenshots you and I love so much...), guess what, it's downloadin' time. 'Course, as is tradition given my reputation as the world's unluckiest person, I have several things working against me.

1) I use dial-up. At TWENTY @$%#ING MEGABYTES per episode, that divided by 2.3 KB a sec works out to nearly six hours. And disconnection = Instant failure.
2) My internet connection, provided by a company which shall remain nameless in order to prevent having them test their latest disconnection device on me specifically, is dodgy as @#%$ and disconnects me on a pretty much random basis. (Since this has since been fixed due to me switching ISPs, EarthLink is the offender. Expect to see them as Variable Constant villians sometime.)
3) I can't afford DSL yet, even though it's a pretty high priority on my list.
4) Did I mention I had a bad enough time downloading 20 megabytes of Pachinko Sexy Reaction, including my personal recurring nightmare of having the download screw up and stop eternally at 15 megabytes (a.k.a. TWO HOURS IN)?

But all's not lost! From this point until I get what I want, this section will be periodically updated with my useless attempts to finally get the good stuff. So join me, take my hand, and let us (okay, me) embark on an exciting adventure to obtain that anime!

But first, y'better let go of my hand, 'cause it's really hard to operate my mouse and keyboard this way.


July 25, 2002
Day 1		 -Started log of activities.
-Got looking for Iketeru Futari episodes. Disconnected about 1623 times.
-Got pissed. Instead gawked at picture of Yuki Umemiya in her underwear.
-Overall: Zero progress.
July 29, 2002
Day 5		 -Decided '@$%# this'; started looking for a DSL provider. Learned that all DSL providers I could conceivably use were either:
A) Not available in my area.
B) Had their instructions for installation, use and requirements typed up by people who either had Q-tips wedged in their brains or were aliens using their native languages, which only resemble English in the 26 letters they all seem to use.
C) Led me to believe that there was no way possible that they could not be available in my area, then learning otherwise. As an aside, I hate you, DirecTV.
-Now looking for download sources that don't entirely conk out upon disconnection.
-Overall: Zero progress, although today I learned Hyatt from 'Excel Saga' has a rather busty twin in 'Puni Puni Poemi' during a 10-minute sanity preservation break right before disconnection #1245 (today, at least).
August 7, 2002
Day 14		 -Getting nowhere on non-conkin' download sources. Going into desperation mode.
-Gave up for the day and bought something called 'Steel Angel Kurumi'.
-Now broke.
-Overall: Zero progress, and I just remembered that I have completely forgotten to watch my new anime.
August 10, 2002
Day 17		 -Began searching for any potential download source.
-Failing miserably.
-Bearing intense hatred for those people who claim to have it up for download and turn out to be lying. But I'm not bitter. You worthless bastards.
-Overall: Zero progress, but Steel Angel Kurumi turned out to be pretty good.
August 15, 2002
Day 22		 -Switched ISPs.
-Signs of no disconnections.
-Spent most of day jumping around like a maniac indicating happiness.
-Overall: Zero progress, but things are looking up. This is before my luck is factored in.
August 18, 2002
Day 25		 -Received e-mail from a person who I now consider a friend, Aaron Rieger.
-Friendship status strongly based on him straight-up telling me where to find all 16 episodes.
-Downloaded episode one successfully!
-Found I need DivX codec in order to see the picture instead of just hearing the sound (remember, this is subtitled)
-Also found that I do not have this codec.
-Overall: There is actually progress. Now if only I could get the ****in' picture to show. At least I was able to beat several video games during the time it took to finish the download.
-SERIES COMPLETION RATE: 6.25%
August 19, 2002
Day 26		 -Got episode 2.
-Forgot to download codec.
-Downloaded codec.
-Installed codec.
-Saw snippets of video, extremely choppy...
-...Until I installed the player, too. Works fine now.
-Overall: Well whaddya know, I actually fixed my own problem...
-SERIES COMPLETION RATE: 12.5%
August 21, 2002
Day 28		 -Attempted to download episode 3.
-The EXACT SAME ****ING THING that happened with P.S.R. happened again.
-Screamed in agony.
-Attempted the same feat.
-Well, I DID get episode 3...
-Overall: Emotional shattering and another episode complete.
-SERIES COMPLETION RATE: 18.75%
August 28, 2002
Day 35		 -No comment on progress with episode 4.
-Overall: Zero progress.
August 30, 2002
Day 37		 -Episode 4 had better kick serious ass.
-Overall: Zero progress.
August 31, 2002
Day 38		 -Got episode 4. Too busy shouting in glee to type more.
-Overall: Progress.
-SERIES COMPLETION RATE: 25%
September 3, 2002
Day 41		 -Got episode 5.
-My oh my, does Koizumi get around.
-Overall: I learned many fun facts.
-SERIES COMPLETION RATE: 31.25%
September 6, 2002
Day 44		 -Remembered episode 6 was supposed to have a Yuki-in-her-underwear shot.
-Downloaded with extreme fervor.
-Almost won half the battle.
-Too giddy to watch or type right now.
-Overall: Whee!
-SERIES COMPLETION RATE: 37.5%
October 15, 2002
Day 83		 -NOTE TO ALL: I realize that I have not been keeping up to date on my progress. This is because, quite frankly, nothing very new or interesting has happened during the download process besides the 'cannot download' error that goes away eventually changing from 'FTP session has been terminated' to 'server returned too much information'. As a result, I have been somewhat slow at putting up new info.
-But who cares. I GOT ALL 16 EPISODES!
-Overall: FINISHED!
-SERIES COMPLETION RATE: 100%!



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