where u been?

So i guess it's time for an update? I'm gonna do a show tomorrow, so look forward? to that. Sorry there was no show last week, but the Xbox 360 and NCAA '09 has completely taken over my life... completely. I went out to Narita ariport (成田空港) last thursday and picked them up from dude? (thanks dude?!) and haven't stopped playing since i got home (aside from the stupid interruptions of work and sleep). All of my breaks at work have involed day dreaming about it, or getting crap to make it work right, long story, listen to the show tomorrow. I got the elusive "steak curry rice" pic from Soul Food, so that review should be up tomorrow as well. Also I'll do a post about the baseball game I went to and the fireworks! Stay tuned!

Wanna hear a joke?

Yeah? me neither. But check out what the Seattle times says about the Oklahoma City Thunder. What a joke of a name. Ha ha ha!

new stuff!

Lots of new stuff coming my way over the past few months that I never got around to posting about so I thought that I would put it all together here in one massive post. Well, at least picture heavy.

First thing on the received list, the TV stand!
Then came the sofa!
Next, the SG, Sweet Grandma Cherry!
I got a handy-dandy recording do hickey thing!
Here`s the loop station baby!
And most recently... The satellite dish!

That`s about it, there`s a moratorium on buying stuff (at least big stuff) for a while. Saving money for the trip home... oh yeah, dude? might be bringing me an Xbox 360 next week... ok, after that a moratorium.

Summer `08 vol. 3 (vol. 28!) a walkabout!

So I took a walk around my hot ass neighborhood today and talked about it and other stuff. Hear me buy beer, buy 2 mos cheeseburgers, no onions, and hear some long awkward silences! wahooo! here`s the route I took (or roughly) around today. Red is start, green is finish.

a mullet is a mullet is a mullet...

is it just me or does a mullet in any language scream "white trash!"? I`m just saying...

it`s baaaaaack!

The NDL (National Devestatoration League) is back and in full effect! It`s well before the beginning of the season, but it`s time to get going, pre-ranking your players and what not... I hope it`ll be a good season, last season was quite fun! Send me a mail, or comment, if you wanna join!

New site! and musical terror!

I launched a new website that will probably be interesting to no one except myself, but it`s out there... Scrumped! (http://scrumped.blogspot.com) is the place to check out all the sweet ass restaurants in the Yukigaya-Otsuka area, and beyond!


While investigating a restaurant in Kamata this evening I heard the sweet sounds of street musicians carried on the wind. At first I was frozen with shock, and disbelief at what I was hearing. Then I played it off as my mind playing tricks on me (気のせい). Then I realized that I wasn`t going crazy, that the sounds I was hearing were the same exact sounds I hear at least 2 days a week at work in the far off area of Ikebukuro (remember I only work there 3 days a week)! These 2 bastards were invading my backyard! I couldn`t believe it! It`s not that these 2 early to mid 30`s love song sculptors are so terrible (they`re not so great either) but it`s that I hear them at least twice a week, and they seriously have no more than 4 songs in their repertoire that they play over and over for roughly 4 hours per performance! Of course they occasionally take "5" and then are right back singing the same damn songs! I have them memorized as I can hear them clearly through the closed window of my classroom... over and over... I`m absolutely flabbergasted at the shear unexpected randomness that would plop them down in Kamata, about an hour train ride from what I thought was their normal scene of Ikebukuro. I wonder where else I might run into them... and I cringe! I hope they make it big so I can avoid them easier.

Summer `08 vol. 2 (vol. 27!) ...!

Sup? crap! hear about it here!

jumping on

thought I`d jump on the boat and put up a picture of a covered garbage can at Ikebukuro station. Not sure why it took so long, Apoc was talking about it 2 weeks before it finally showed up on my route to work, and he`s in Osaka. Gotta think Tokyo would be a hotter spot for terrorism, maybe not Ikebukuro in particular...poor homeless people, how they gonna make that paper?

L.W.O.D. `08`s "conbini challenge" preview!

I`m currently working on a post about the weekend BBQ but in the meantime...

Here`s the map for one of the challenges that has been added to the L.W.O.D. `08. Taking place on Saturday August 23rd will be the "conbini challenge" involving 8 convenience stores in the span of 1-1.5 hours or so. This challenge is similar to the Yamanote challenge in that the idea is to drink a beer (or chu-hi) between each convenience store along the route. So if you are out on the 23rd of August in the neighborhood along the route, say "hi!"

ba ba ba ba ba baa- ba ba ba ba ba baa- happy 4th!

I got so fat this weekend it`s stupid. Starting with the trial run BBQ on Thursday, continuing with the trip to An An on Friday, and on to the big ol` juicy BBQ on Saturday I probably gained 10Kgs over 3 days. Unfortunately I have no actual measurements to prove/disprove this statement, nor do I have more than a completely vague idea of what a Kg is...

I do know that I`ve got the meat sweats...
or it could be the ridiculous humidity.

The BBQ on Saturday went down (after being moved from my rooftop because of capacity issues) at a park about a 25 min walk from my place. Throughout the day about 20-25 people came around and I made it through about 9 tall boys and 5 hotdogs. It was a good time, cooking, talking and setting off fireworks. Mr. Eggthief forgot his football, so we didn`t get a chance to play with that and now that I think about it, I might have left my hacky sack at the park... crap!
The park is in a good location, near the Tama river with a lot of shade and a few places to set up a BBQ. There are lots of flowers and trees and greens. It was pretty.

Here`s the naked/blue afro wig guy,

"Change!" Cry o` the Monkeys!

Some controversy surrounding a commercial put out by E-mobile has been blowing around the internet and the newspapers involving Barack Obama, a monkey, and the slogan of "change!" You can read more about it, and also see the commercial on other sites like Apoc`s site or on the Mercury, because the only place I get my news about Japan is from "The Voice of Tasmania!"
The basic idea is that people found it offensive, and it`s easy to see why it could be seen that way considering certain racial connotations between monkeys and certain groups of people. I was under the impression that when the TV commercial was pulled, that the whole campaign would be going down too, that is not so! I was riding the train to work yesterday when I saw this:judge for yourself...

a birth in the neighborhood...

So, going waaay back ("a death in the neighborhood..." post), I mentioned that gyu-kaku (牛角) went under and we were waiting to see what would fill the void. I predicted a "super gyu-kaku" which doesn't actually exist, except in the form of An An (安安)! I actually predicted that! Ask anyone who was there on the last day of the gyu-kaku experience, i.e. mornin, and i actually said that it would be coming in! ka-pow! So being the An An lover that I am (see the early days of this blog when I lived in Omori (大森) still or after a Baystars home game), I was there for opening night, and have been there twice since with plans (as I write this on my cell phone at work) to visit tonight, for my 3rd straight 4th of July! It's a tradition you could say ;) What sets An An apart in the yakiniku (焼き肉) kingdom is it's ridiculous (shout out to meltin faces and mornin!) low prices! 290 yen for a beer or a plate of meat, or a number of other delicious menu items. My favorite thing to do is get the "mountain of sliced cabbage (山盛りスライスキャベツ)" with ceasar dressing, and top it off with some juicy meat to make some delicious bite sized grilled beef salad! do it!

Bar ba quey! Bar ba quey!

As I mentioned on the show yesterday, I was thinking about rockin` up to the roof to take the BBQ for a test run, and thus I did! I headed up around 2:30 or so, and came back down around midnight. It was fun, It was also a pain in the ass! It took me about 3 hours to eat my first hot dog, and it was still a bit underdone... the biggest problem was the wind! It was terribly windy and continually f`d up my attempts to light the coals. Anywho, I got it going fairly well and cooked up some more dogs and played some guitar and was up there for about 4 hours before meltin faces showed up, followed shortly by mornin and much later another friend came by. The little BBQ faired well in it`s first cruise around the block and should be ready for the real BBQ on Saturday or Sunday

Summer `08 vol. 1 (vol. 26!) beer!

feast on my hairy tomatoes! 1st episode of the summer `08 season is in the books! Just news!
by the way, I accidentaly called out Dale Ellis, I`m sorry for that Dale, you`re a good guy! I meant Nate McMillan, eat it Cap`n Mac!

裏切り, Seattle Supersonics 1967-2008

Let`s learn a new Japanese term today, it`s 裏切り(うらぎり). Literally translated it means "back stabber". Loosely translated it means "traitor". That`s what these people are. On the left, Howard Schultz (of Starbucks fame), and the right, Clayton Bennett. The 2 people most responsible for the demise of the Seattle Supersonics. It`s been settled. The Sonics are heading to Oklahoma City. What a crap-hole of a location. Let`s see, Seattle or Oklahoma City? Not a hard choice. But just for fun, let`s look at the tape:

City Name:
Oklahoma City
Seattle+
(Any city with the name "city" in it is stupid)

Time Zone:
OKC-Central
Sea-West Coast+

Metro Pop:
OKC-1,262,027
Sea-3,919,624+

City Motto:
OKC-"the big friendly"
Sea-"the emerald city"+

Cityhood-ish:
OKC-April 22, 1889 (founded)
Sea-Dec 2, 1869 (incorporated)+

I could go on and on, but i think that it would near impossible to come up with a category that OKC could ever compete with the great city of Seattle. But, again, just for fun, let`s look at the history of sports in the 2 cities:

Oklahoma City: nothing. Well, sorry, they did host the N.O. Hornets for 2 years after hurricane Katrina...
Seattle: 3 world Championships! (Yeah, not a ton, but hey, compared with OKC...) The Stanley Cup was won by the Seattle Metropolitans in 1917, and had 2 more chances, one of them, in 1919, was canceled (at 2-2-1) because of a spanish flu pandemic. In 1979 the Seattle Supersonics won the NBA championship over the Washington Bullets. And a 3rd was won by the Seattle Storm, sometime, no one cares really.+

Seattle: Grunge+
OKC: dirt

That`s it, can`t believe it... What a crap thing to happen. I`ll talk a bit more about it on the show.
pictures: The Seattle Times
info*: Wikipedia