Anime : Polar Bear's Cafe (Shirokuma Cafe)

Look at his adorable little face!

I've been working through some personal stuff lately, and while it's nothing too serious - I have been feeling a little blue. Some adorable panda faces and cheesy puns sounded like just the cure. Enter Shirokuma Cafe.

I had seen a few random gifs from the show, and had no intention of watching it. It seemed fairly strange - and my list of shows to watch is already way too long. But noooo, Isaac had to have the first episode playing on his laptop, and though I tried my hardest not to pay attention... the voices and sound effects snagged my interest. By then it was too late - I was hooked. (Thanks a lot Isaac. No seriously, Thanks! ^^)

 What I had failed to realize was that in addition to all the silliness, this show is absolutely overflowing with cute.

I'm only seven episodes in, so far - but I love it! The voice acting is solid, the puns get me every time, Panda-kun's faces are insanely adorbs... but the main reason I love it so much is this guy:

Shirokuma.

He's the main source of puns in the show, also extremely adorable, and is the owner (these animals have jobs, yo) of a quiet little cafe. His sense of calm and overall chillness totally won me over. 

This show is the ultimate bad-day fixer. It's a comedy for sure, but it also has some very heart warming moments - and a subtle, underlying message of 'stay true to yourself'. If you can handle the slice-of-life style and anthropomorphic animals, you're in for a heavy dose of smiles & hahas.

I can't stop laughing at this. Panda-kun, you so crazy. ^^

Check it out!

(Images in this post came from Random Curiosity, Lemmas and Submodalites, Good Morning Lovely, and Polar Bear Cafe on Tumblr. I added the 'This Guy' text.)

Panda Poet

When I'm winding down at night, or just need a break from life - I love getting lost in puzzle games. Panda Poet is awesome because it's a combination word/strategy game, with relaxing music and lots of adorable pandas!

(Source: Lost Garden)

You can invite friends to play against you, or hop on a local match (which is usually what I do). There's also a small chat box on the left side if you feel like chatting up your opponent. I do recommend going through the tutorial as well. Even though it's a pretty simple game, half of the game is stealing your opponents pandas - which could be a bit confusing for new players.

The only tricky thing is : you need to have a gmail / google account to play. That's it! You have to deal with a few minor ads, but for such a cute game it's a price I'm more than willing to pay for a free game.

The other thing I love is that the games can continue for a long time. If you only have five minutes to play, no big deal - your game will be saved and you can even receive emails when it's your turn to play, if you wish. I like to have about ten games going at all times, so there's always a game for me to come back to. And if you have a great game with someone, you can challenge them to a rematch after the current game is done! Awesome.

I play as CardiganNoir (cardigannoir@gmail.com). If anyone's interested, I'd love to battle you with words! ^-^