I'm not into brushie-plushies, personally; I prefer the "hair" on plushies to be stuffed fabric, like the rest of it. Because I like hugging plushies, and if I get sweaty, hair strands just stick everywhere (and the plushie itself looks inconsistent). Figurines are usually fixed-position anyway, so solid plastic hair makes perfect sense. Plus, it's very, very hard to do "anime hair" with actual hair strands. Very hard. It might leave the factory with perfect synthetic hair, but it'd never stay that way.
In any case, I finally bought K-On season 1 on DVD, and Akira on Blu-Ray. I've not actually seen Akira yet, but it's been recommended to me a lot, so I'll give it a spin. I bought them from a nerd store in London called Forbidden Planet, and honestly, even though they were cheap, I wouldn't buy from there again. Why? Because the DVDs and Blu-Rays are all sold out of their cases; to prevent theft, the discs themselves are stored in paper envelopes behind the checkout counter, and are put back in their cases when you take the case to the counter and pay.
The problem with this is that EVERY SINGLE DVD in that K-On box set was covered in micro-scratches. The first disc - which I have not yet tested - even has a nasty-looking scuff mark, which I find utterly unforgivable on a brand new DVD. Personally, I'd have been willing to pay for the premium of shipping and waiting a few days to be able to break the cellophane wrapping myself, and ensure no scratches on my discs. It's not so much a problem on Blu-Rays, as they're incredibly scratch-resistant, but it's still an incredibly uncomfortable experience to watch MY brand-new discs being handled and scraped out of a paper envelope. Not acceptable.
They'd prevent theft a lot more effectively if they didn't put the bloody checkout right next to the exit of the store.
Later on that day, I went to TokyoToys, which was full of glorious waifus, all of which were too expensive for me to buy at the time, so... eh. They were mostly Miku statues, and I wasn't interested enough to splash out. This was despite the excellent J-pop soundtrack playing over the in-store speakers, which didn't go unappreciated.
What was interesting, though, was that next door was another specialist anime store. It's not even on the mall's website, meaning that it's probably fairly new; in fact, the central part of the Trocadero seemed totally closed-off, probably due to it having changed management (again). By comparison, this other store's goods were largely cheap. Some obviously-not-unofficial-Chinese-import waifu wall scrolls, a cute-yet-poorly-printed Madoka poster (which I felt guilty ALL DAY for not having bought), and a load of other memorabilia caught my eye, but as my wallet was already reeling from its experiences at Forbidden Planet, (and because Chinese knock-offs are best bought from eBay, where they're even cheaper) I decided to buy nothing.
This wasn't helped by the utterly obnoxious K-pop dirge playing over the in-store speakers, which wasn't at all appreciated.
I finished up with a stop off at Cyber Candy, but all I found were some Food Regulation Violation American imported sweets, and a couple of overpriced Japanese chocolates - and really, for what I was looking for, my local oriental market has a far wider range at a far lower price. Banana Chocolate Pocky is the bomb, but I'd have had to have paid double for it to get it at Cyber Candy, and again, I simply didn't care enough.
Had a great day despite that, though. ;P
