Happy New Year!

One of the best things about the end of the year is the constant stream of top ten and top 100 lists. In that spirit, here is a link to the 10 Best Animated Movies for (Traumatizing) Kids. Now, I read the whole list, because I am a dork from the 80s, but all I ask of you is that you read #1.

http://www.cracked.com/article_15070_10-best-animated-movies-traumatizing-kids.html

Crazy disturbing, right? But the little blurb doesn't even tell you how disturbing it is. My friend Jessie lived in Japan for a few years, and is currently working in the anime industry. I told her about this, thinking she would say, "Oh yes, what an odd little bit of cultural flotsam." Instead she said, "Oh yeah, the tanuki. Those are real animals. Raccoon dogs. They really do have giant testicles, and supposedly they fight with them." (And if you didn't follow the link before, you totally are now, aren't you?) So apparently, they are a wild animal that has a whole mythology behind them in Japanese culture largely because of their giant testicles. And if all of that isn't testicle-tastic enough for you, check this it out from the Wikipedia article about tanuki:

A common schoolyard song in Japan (the tune of which can be heard in the
arcade game Ponpoko and a variation of which
is sung in the Studio Ghibli film Pom Poko) makes explicit
reference to the tanuki's anatomy:
Tan Tan Tanuki no kintama wa,
Kaze mo
nai no ni,
Bura bura
(Roughly translated, this means
"Tan-tan-tanuki's/Raccoon-raccoon-raccoon dog's testicles, there isn't even any wind but still go swing-swing-swing".[1] It then proceeds to continue for several verses, with many regional variations. It is sung to the melody of an American Baptist hymn called Shall We Gather At The River?.[2])

They sing about tanuki testicles to the tune of Shall We Gather at the River!!!! My childhood was empty!

On that note, happy new year! This is a crap holiday, if you ask me, but enjoy it anyway. Especially if you like football, a character flaw for which I will forgive you, just this once.