Nemurenu Yoru no Chiisana Ohanashi

Here's a charming all-ages OVA from 1992, Nemurenu Yoru no Chiisana Ohanashi (Little Stories for Sleepless Nights). It's based on a column by Hara Yuuko that ran in Monthly Kadokawa magazine. Hara is better known as the keyboard player/vocalist with the Southern All Stars.

Over its three volumes, Nemurenu Yoru tells twelve stories about a cat (named Cat) and his friends, also named generically: Rabbit, Bandit Cat, Bird, Squirrel, Star, Mr. Moon, etc. 

They have small adventures or just enjoy the pleasures of the days and nights.

1. Cat and Star
2. Bandit Cat's Clumsiness
3. Night of the Full Moon
4. The Flying Blanket
5. Riding the Whale
6. Gomotan
7. Ice Cream Souvenirs
8. Singing to Mr. Moon
9. Lovely Christmas Eve
10. Cat Man
11. Why Cat Has a Cat's Tongue
12. A Snow Spirit on a Snowy Day
    

It's pointless trying to provide a plot summary, because there is none, or even to summarize the individual stories. 

It's soothing and enjoyable, like a children's bedtime story (which it is), with simple animation and character designs. 

Voice-over narration by the original author, also very soothing, provides the framework for all the stories.

Translation notes:

• When Cat addresses the moon, Cat always calls him hisakata-sama, which is very respectful, so Mr. Moon.
  
• The bird that sleeps in Cat's guitar is a brown-eared bulbul (hiyodori in Japanese), even though the bird is colored green.
  

The seiyuu are not well known. Most have no other credits than the sequel Tomodachi de Iyou ne (Let's Be Friends), which itself only shows up in a few anime databases. I suspect that several of them are children; for example, Kikuchi Yuumi was eight years old when the show was made.

• Suzuki Hiroshi (Cat).
• Hara Yuuko (narrator) is a keyboard player, vocalist, and author.
  
• Inoue Aya (Rabbit).
• Aikawa Rikako (Bandit Cat) appeared in many children's series, including Doraemon, Kaiketsu Zorori, Pokemon, and Hamtaro.
• Kikuchi Yuumi (Star, Squirrel).
• Ezaki Reina (Bird) appeared in Pom Poko.
• Meguru Yuuichi (Moon) played Banana in Okama Hakusho and appeared in Izumo, both Orphan releases. She appeared in several h-anime as well.

The director, Oguma Kimiharu, also directed the Hiatari Ryouko movie, an Orphan release.

The origins of this project are lost in the haze of the past. Erik of PPP-Raws encoded the first two volumes from laserdiscs in his collection, but the third volume proved elusive. About four years ago, all three volumes showed up on Japanese second-hand media sites. They were purchased, ripped on the Domesday Duplicator, and encoded. Last year, ninjacat (ninjacloud) pretimed the first episode, but again, the project languished. Then Perevodildo picked up the project, translated all three episodes, and timed the second and third. I edited and typeset. ImAWasteOfHair, Nemesis, and Uchuu QCed. The encoding was done by an anonymous friend based on Domesday Duplicator laserdisc rips. The audio is FLAC, taken from the laserdiscs' digital audio tracks.

Nemurenu Yoru no Chiisana Ohanashi is not going to set the world on fire. As the title implies, it's bedtime stories for children - and for adults needing relief from the stress and angst of daily life. Either its charm works on you, or it doesn't (and you're probably spending too much time doomscrolling or on social media). It works for me. You can get the OVAs from the usual torrent site or from IRC bot Orphan|Arutha in channels #nibl or #news on irc.rizon.net.