Friday, January 30, 2009

some roarin good news!

Just wanted to let everyone know that the Saitama Seibu Lions are going to change their uniforms if you haven't heard! Sweeeeeet! Let's take a look at what they have been rockin recently:
The uniform on the right in this picture is basically what they had been wearing for many years prior to the most recent incarnation:
And last year they brought out some really nice throwbacks, the Nishitesu Lions uniforms from when they were back in Kyushu:
And finally, the newly introduced, nod to the throwbacks, uniform that the team will be going with starting next year!

Thursday, January 29, 2009

floppin in a winter wonderland...

This morning mornin and I headed over to Akasaka and Akasaka Sacas for my, and her, first visit to the Sakas (pronounced "Circus" (kinda, maybe closer to "suck-ass")). Being as there has been poop for snow this year here in Tokyo, I thought we should bring the snow to us. In the form of ice. Lots of it. And in the shape of a rink. We could call it an "ice rink" if you like. "White Sacas," which is a little too close to "White Suckas" for my taste is an ice rink set-up in the plaza out front of the TBS building in Akasaka. Before we see the rink, check out the cool stairs, looks an awful lot like Space Invaders but I think it's a train...
The price for the skating was reasonable, 1000円 plus 500円 for skate rental but mornin's a student and I printed out a coupon that I got from the Akasaka Sacas website so we both ended up getting in a little cheaper, buya! It was the first time I've seen mornin rock jeans (or pants of any sort) in freakin ages, and it was the first time I've set skate to ice since I was about 16 years old, and only my second time ever. Once I was back on the ice I was back in the flow fairly well.

Of course I had a couple of balancing issues at the beginning, but I held my own fairly well and could make trips around the rink without incident, for the most part However, there were about 3 times where I did end up on the ice and none of them were very bad, but apparently one of those times I landed particularly wrong on my knee. It hurt a bit at the time, but nothing more than a little bump, and while we were at the skating rink it really didn't bother me too much. more later...
Mornin hadn't been skating for a longer time than myself and she had some trouble getting started, but later, she was able to make her way around the rink much quicker!By the end of the day, she was doing tricks! Way to go!
After skating we headed across the way and had lunch and then went to check out the TBS building. See if we could get into a show taping? That didn't happen, especially after we realized that TBS doesn't really have any interesting shows, but we made the weather!
After doing the weather, we went to do a little purikura-ing and this is where I ran into trouble. My knee had been feeling fine until I knelled down to type in my e-mail address so that the pictures we had just taken would be sent to my cell phone... searing pain shot through my knee as I tried to stand back up. I tried to walk it off but it just wouldn't subside. We sat down for awhile and eventually I could walk, however with a pronounced limp now. It was time to go home. Very good day, lots of fun, but my knee is still killing me with every step. It's times like these that I wish my building had an elevator.

Sunday, January 25, 2009

anything + drinking = better!

A long standing belief that I have held is that drinking can make anything more interesting. A belief that I have put into practice in a variety of ways:
ghetto golph
any video game I've ever played
pirate house golf
pirate house baseball
bowlin zi deutch
caps
riding the train
riding a bicycle
watching baseball
quiz shows
going to school
working
driving
intermural basketball
walking
sitting

So I decided to try this theory out the past couple of days on some things that I considered generally boring:
figure skating
sumo
I must say that I haven't actually tried out the figure skating deal because I came up with it kinda in the middle of the actual event, but I have come up with the rules. As we all know, without rules, we'd be up in a tree flinging poo at one another... and the All-Americas' figure skating championship is coming up soon, I can't wait!
The rules for figure skating are simple, but yet, completely established.
1 drink for every successfully completed trick where the skater leaves her (men's figure skating is not an option!) feet. i.e. a jump.
A shot of something (other than beer) such as Shochu, Tequila, Vodka, Awamori, Nihonshu, or something of the same ilk, or a 3-5 second chug of beer for every fall.
(A fall is defined as any time a skater touches the ice with any part of their body excluding their skates) This must be established before the "game" begins, and agreed upon by all (or the most important, i.e. the home's owner/apartment's renter) participants.

That's pretty much it for the on-ice action. Other rules can be established for "waiting for the judge's score" scenes. For example, a blown kiss is a drink, a blink is a drink, etc.
I must say that high-vision (high definition) has taken the sport of figure skating to new highs and lows. If you're at home watching on an olde-school TV, you won't understand how many pimples 16-18 year old girls have... especially on their backs...

*yesterday melvis and I did some figure skating drinking and it was intense! I was finished! I also did drinking Sumo for most of the day leading up to the figure skating, which probably wasn't the best planning...*

Sumo!
So sumo is a sport I don't hate, but it's not really something that I get pumped about, especially because the Japanese coverage of it is as dry as a dead dingo's donger usually.
The rules for drinking sumo are a bit more complicated and can be added to as well. So feel free to drink more than the rules call for!
Any time:
salt is thrown: 1 drink
After the ref is ready: (this is when he is facing forward)
a wrestler's hand touches the dohyo and the fight is not started: 1 drink
a "flying" start occurs: 2 drinks
the fight ends:
with both wrestlers on the dohyo: 1 drink
1 wrestler on the dohyo: 2 drinks
0 wrestlers on the dohyo: 3 drinks

That's about it. Happy drinking and enjoy!

Monday, January 19, 2009

2009 vol. 3 + playlist!


epically short show today. pretty uninteresting too. I talked about my new shoes some more, a tiny bit about the NFL playoffs and... well, listen and find out. As I say, I think that more and more "shows" will be of this length. And they might be a bit more sporadic in occurrence. I'm not gonna be on a "weekly" schedule necessarily, just more of a "need to" schedule. If there's actually something interesting that happens, or not. Who knows, they may end up being weekly. Here's my mega-break playlist as well:

1. Stronger / Kanye West
2. U Not Like Me / 50 cent
3. Anarchy Camp / NoFX
4. Best Of My Love / The Eagles
5. Asian Kung-fu Generation / Konayuki
6. Carry / Isis
7. TV Maniacs / Ellegarden
8. 海猫 / 奥田民生
9. One Man Army / Our Lady Peace
10. Cakes and Ale and Everlasting Laugh / Ellegarden
11. Come Back Baby / Stevie Wonder
12. Ride On!! Blue Vehicle / ポルノグラフィティ
13. Forgotten / Linkin Park
14. 30才 / 奥田民生
15. Troubles / Alicia Keys
16. Save The Day / The Living End
17. Head Bobs / Black Eyed Peas (Pre-Fergie!)
18. Caravans to Ur / Melechesh
19. Real Thing / Alice in Chains
20. Disconnected / Face to Face

There you have it, listen along!

Saturday, January 17, 2009

in anticipation...

in anticipation of the Holiday on Monday (U.S.), I request of you to read this response to an atrocious article (Op-Ed) published in the Japan Times.

Friday, January 16, 2009

2009 vol. 2

Today's show is short and ramblin'. Enjoyish...

so this morning i headed out early to stop by the gotanda big ass shoes store. said store is just a short walk (towards meguro) from gotanda station, next to the yamanote tracks. they sell a range of styles and brands from 27-36cm. i found the same style of shoe that i looked at a couple of times at ABC mart (and was told wasn't made in my size), however in a couple different colors. i went with the kinda reddish brown, figuring black was too easy, and although not the color i really wanted, good enough i guess. also a bit more than i would have like to have paid, in fact, the most I've ever paid for shoes! first it hurt that i had to get them at the big ass shoes store which tacked on an extra 2000 yen, plus the stupid Japanese price gauging on American stuff. しょうがない as they say. hopefully I'll have a decent break today so i can take a walk and break these puppies in!

took a walk, recorded it, and here's some pictures...

Thursday, January 15, 2009

oh, what to talk about...

I had a good/bad day today. It started out fine as I woke up in the early afternoon after a series of crazy ass dreams that I won't bother covering here, but they were crazy none the less. After that mornin and I headed over to wait! I didn't get my PTI today, that sucked! We headed over to Kawasaki to do some shopping, namely for me to do some shopping, and namely shoes.
I guess I talked about this on Wednesday, I recorded a show, but it was terrible, stupid, and boring so I didn't even bother posting it, but I want some new shoes for work. My shoes now are rad, and comfortable while I'm at work, but if I go out walking on my mega-epic breaks (had a 3 hour one on Wed.) they wear on my feet a little bit after some time so I wanted to get some new ones that aren't really worky, but still respectable enough to wear to work, and comfortable enough to walk around in. I found a really nice pair of Timberlands like this but a different color, a much better color. Problem is, I seem to have giant feet! In the U.S. I wear a 10.5 (depending on brand i guess), which seems to be just about the most common shoe size back home (sometimes sold out), but here in Japan that translates to a 28.5 which is only worn by giants as almost no shoe stores actually carry this size and in fact the shoe that I wanted doesn't even come in my size. They stop at 28... and that's just not working for me. 29 I could do, 28.5 is not an option. I looked all around Kawasaki and later Kamata and Ontakesan with little, well, no success. I gave up today and decided to hoof it home (alone because mornin had to go meet her lab folks). The walk from Kamata was wrought with chill but I quickly warmed up because I was walking at a pretty good clip, a 5.61km (~3.5mi), (thanks google maps!) walk took me about 55 mins with a couple stops to check some shoe stores along the way. I took a picture at each station (except Kamata because I hadn't planned on walking home when I left) to capture the essence of the Ikegami line, from Kamata (no picture) to Yukigaya.
HasunumaIkegamiChidorichoKugaharaOntakesanYukigaya
It's a pretty lonely walk...
I also picked up a new Wii game while in Kawasaki. Let's Tap is the name of that game, and it's another of the many, many, many mini-game-fest that is the Wii line-up. It's a little different however in that you actually don't hold the controller as you play, you set it on a cardboard box (2 come with it) and tap the box. You can also use a tissue box if you are so inclined or if you have more people over. One of the games, can't recall what it's called but it has something to do with running is a ton of fun, there are 16 courses each between 40-60secs long. I think they could have done a lot more with this part of the game, but there is no argument that they could have done a freakin ton more with the rest of the game! All the other "mini games" are pretty forgettable. 4500 yen! Man! I wish that Nintendo would just price these fuckin mini-games shit at like 2500 or something. It would be worth it. There just isn't enough content in most of them to warrant 4500 yen. Rat bastards! AHHHHHH!!! It's fun, just not 4500 yen worth of it.
Speaking of rat bastards, check out this little rat bastard that showed up in the bedroom:So, that brings the total number of insects I've seen in Japan that I've never seen in America (excluding zoos) to 3.

So tomorrow morning, before work, I think I'm gonna go to the Gotanda BIG shoes shop (made famous by A.O.S. in his "Gotanda Christmas" mega-hit) to see if I can find anything decent that will fit my monster, freakishly huge feet.

Tuesday, January 13, 2009

2008 NAPpYs!!!

so after all the postponing, not limited to tonsillitis, the flu, and acute lazy, i figure that it was about time to get to the NAPpYs! the massive break i have at work today helped a lot too...

the what happened to that award goes to...
ninety9bottles! this award seems to have lost its impact since dude? has actually posted twice since this award was supposed to have been awarded, my bad!

the best podcast hosted by a guy in america and a guy in japan goes to...
the moon masters! originally it was the best podcast hosted by two guys from kentucky, but i thought there would be too much competition.

the single greatest podcasting moment of 2008 goes to...
purple-san vs. the picture-taking lady, the apocalypse dowell show, episode... actually, i don't remember the episode number, but this was an amazing moment in podcasting history, check it out if you can find it! (I checked, and it's episode 63 です)

the most kerchiefs worn this year award goes to...
meltin faces! check it out:

the guy who looks most like earl from my name is earl award goes to...
dude?! see what i mean:

the bet you thought we were dead award goes to...
home by 8 drunk by 10! yeah, after over a year absence this masterpiece is back!

worst game of 2008 award goes to...
tie! deca sporta/family stadium for the wii. these games were terrible, and i bought them both! a close 3rd place was disaster:day of ... that game was terrible too, but at least they tried something big.

the best game of 2008(besides NCAA 09) goes to...
god of war: chains of olympus for PSP. i don't even remember if this was released in 2008, but it was rad!


best movie i saw in 2008 award goes to...
子ぎつねヘレン! i almost cried...

worst movie i saw in 2008 award goes to...
superhero movie. not funny, just stupid.

worst thing coming of the year goes to...
guys wearing boots outside there pants! this is something i've noticed recently and it's totally disturbing. this is something that the ladies have been doing for some time now, but the dudes are at it now. what's worse is when you see dudes rocking uggs (in general) outside their pants. i hope this thing dies off quickly! Sorry, no picture yet.

worst thing going of the year goes to...
BECK! In October, my favorite, and really the only manga I like, finished its run... very sad, you will be missed!

so there you have the 1st ever NAPpY award winners, congrats to you all! I'm so glad I did that.

Sunday, January 11, 2009

episode 4!

The first new episode of Home by 8 Drunk by 10 in over a year! hear us play NCAA 09 and talk about some predictions for 2009! I even left the pee breaks in!

Friday, January 09, 2009

chinese democ*crap, i just threw up in my mouth.

so tonight, on my train ride home, out of podcasts, i thought i would give the new G&R album a listen. god knows I'd probably never get around to it otherwise. so i decided to listen to it straight through, for the duration of the trip home (usually about 35mins from Shinjuku, but tonight, roughly forever!). after the 1st song i thought "not the worst, but for sure should have been released 14 years ago." after the 2nd song, i knew i had heard the best of what there was to come. god it was terrible! give me 22 million dollars and 8 years (numbers not exact) and i could create a grandiose piece of ludicrousness that would destroy that steaming pile of awful.

***update***
I just googled "Chinese Democracy" and came up with this review from Rolling Stone. Are you joking!?! Rolling Stone is a piece of trash too.

Tuesday, January 06, 2009

2009 vol. 1

1st episode of the newest (for now) year. Walked around the pond sack and talked about my disappointing new year's break. Some other stuff maybe too.

I was hungry this night of nights and going to my cupboard I found some dismal pickings... I ended up creating this pasta. Ingredients:
spaghetti noodles
1 can of tomato juice
some milk
salt
mayonnaise
1/4 of a left over bag of frozen squash
a little olive oil
almond powder
some cheese

yeah, sounds like we're setting up for something fierce, but surprisingly it wasn't bad at all. Don't believe me? Screw you! and ask mornin, she said it was good! Shocked!

"the white stuff"

attention news people! Don't say "the white stuff" ever again. Call it snow. Thank you, that is all.

Monday, January 05, 2009

commute playlist

today is my first day back at work, crap. My work was over-hauled while I was away and it's really strange being back here, not so happy with the changes... my tiny room got tinier. I also got a lot closer to my students...
so Monday is usually a slow day for podcasts and so it gives me the chance to shuffle some songs and bring to you my commute playlist for today! Hey!

1. Sworn and Broken / Screaming Trees
2. Holly's Dream Vacation / Super Deluxe
3. Genies, Sorcerers and Mesopotamian Nights / Melechesh
4. Special News Bulletin (interlude) / The Fuggees
5. The Deepest Blues are Black / Foo Fighters
6. The Pusher / Blind Melon
7. Diamonds on the Souls of her shoes / Paul Simon
8. Garden Of Light / Isis
9. The Life / Alicia Keys
10. Words from the Chief Rocker / De La Soul
11. Lee / Tenacious D
12. Andy Wolff / Minus the Bear
13. Hot Blooded / Foreigner (didn't even know I had this)
14. Love Speakeasy / Talib Kweli
15. Father and Daughter / Paul Simon
16. Track 04 / Ozrosaurus
17. Stranded in a Limousine / Paul Simon
18. track 17 / Ozrosaurus

Paul Simon was on fire!

Sunday, January 04, 2009

Winter Vacation '08 day 8

today, the last day of my "vacation," I awoke from dreams of teaching English, my former roommate, an apartment for rent in Kent, my old car, only orange and with a HUGE, forward facing muffler...
I spent the rest of the day watching discovery channel new year's specials about the Internet and Stephen Hawking with mornin. Also went to an Izakaya and now I'm drinking left over champagne. That's it for my vacation. Tomorrow it's back to work. Crap! I can't even re-cap my vacation because it would just be too sad... but starting tomorrow I'm beginning my training for football, and my study for the JLPT. We'll see how that goes...
88.7

Saturday, January 03, 2009

Winter Vacation '08 day 7

I woke up with a slight fever, watched the rest of the 箱根駅伝 where 拓大 finished in 17th again and I finally began to feel good! My fever was gone! So I spent the rest of the day just hanging out and played a few games against dude? in the evening. We tried about 3 or 4 times to play an NCAA game but every one of them got disconnected... that's stupid! I think I was winning every one of them too... also went out for some Thai food in Hatanodai with mornin, it was pretty tasty, but not really enough, and the service was terrible! And finally I saw 99 bottles updated! Amazing!
89.2

Friday, January 02, 2009

2009... the year of 実

I have said that my goal this year is study for my JLPT test coming in December. That's my goal, but as a theme for this year I want to decide something to represent what this year will embody. The Japanese have chosen (change) to be the Kanji to represent the year 2008, and in turn I have selected my own for the year 2008: . 未 (み) has the connotation of being unfininshed and is a pretty much the summation of my unfulfilled dreams of 2008. Although a lot of good things happened, travels, relationships, financially and also things I wanted to buy. There were a few things that I didn't (and didn't expect to get to) do/buy/experience this past year, but the most disappointing was in the mental/creative development department. I didn't study worth a damn. Artistically I felt completly constricted in all aspects. I learned a ton of new vocabulary through teaching, and living life such as: 竹馬、扁桃腺炎、腫れる、日焼け止め、加湿器、気管、among many others, worthless and worthwhile, but I don't really feel like my overall ability to be a successful, contributing member of this society has been increased a great deal. I really feel I need to work on that this year. So for 2009 I have choosen a Kanji that I hope with spring from it a new creativity in academics and arts. It's another "み" kanji, and withought further ado, I present to you, my 2009 Kanji:

Winter Vacation '08 day 6

So today started off like the rest of them. Fuckin sick again. I got up (late because someone didn't wake me up) and watched the 箱根駅伝 for the 1st time and watched my boys (拓殖大学) finish 17th, damn, not a lock for next year but not too bad. Then I went to sleep for the rest of the day. just woke up a few mins ago after dreams of my old car, contact lens cases, slick rick, mobsters, whores, traffic and me screamin "I'm fucking Tony Montana!" That's my day... but I checked my temp again and it seems to have broken fairly well, down about .6 degrees from this morning!

p.s. if you haven't noticed, the NAPpYs have been pushed back because I've been sick and sleeping a lot more than I would have normally.

Thursday, January 01, 2009

winter vacation '08 day 5, 初詣

Today, the 1st day of the year 2000 and 9 and my fever continues to rage. GODDAMMIT! I'm running out of vacation! But I got up today and went to the phone booth to make a call home to my pops for his b-day (Dec. 31st US time). He's the big 5-8 today! Congrats! But I ran into a problem. See how in the picture there's no phone booth? Well, there used to be... So I had to find another one, and find another one I did. Called home, talked to the family, then called my dad and came home. After a bit, I took some ominous pictures of the sunset and then mornin and I headed over to Ikegami honmonji for our first prayers of the year (初詣). It was a good pray and I was completely over-dressed for the occasion, but gotta stay warm...
Just took my temp and I think it's finally breaking! Maybe my last 3 days will be saved!

Oh, I also learned today that on the 1st day of the new year, if you do everything you want to be good at, at least a little, you will do it good throughout the year. I'm parrearrangeaphrasing here, but you get the point.

Japanese do!

So, I've finally got my Japanese blog up and-a-runnin! If you are interested in studying Japanese or just want to see me try and write Japanese, check it out, it`s called がんばるや~(ganbaruya)

2008, year in the rearview...

2008 was the year of the Rat and the year of the post. I posted 135 times last year. Compare that to 2007=40 and 2006=54. Now granted 2006 I didn't start posting until July, but still, tons of posting this year! Well, let's take a look back through my photos and try and encapsulate what 2008 meant to me:

Jan '08
I made a list of stuff I wanted to buy and do this year and I checked almost all of them off my list, but I also made a bucket list for this year, and didn't do any of those... Watched some terrible football, started working again, became a Frontale fan, went greenish, bought milk, wrote the new Australian national anthem, and it snowed!

Feb '08
I got my unreal results from the JLPTest (I passed) and saw some more snow baby! Also celebrated Kenkokukinenbi right! I joined the ranks of other child molesters, saw a Minus the Bear concert, welcomed a homie to the neighborhood, talked about what I hate and celebrated my 2 years in Japan!

Mar '08
I went to my first Frontale game, finally got a haircut and was held up by a robber in my own apartment! Went to a wedding, bought an iPod and a couple guitars.




Apr '08
Went to a bunch of sporting events, dominated Wii like no one before, planted tomatoes, got a new cell phone and missed my train station twice! I also caused a girl to crash her moped (not the one pictured) and said good bye to A.O.S. and deuce...

May '08
Went on an Epic Goldenweek vacation with mornin, got a new PC and camera, and went to Sanja-matsuri. Also learned that if you're gonna miss last train, GO TO THE ATM EARLY! Lost a good friend in the neighborhood... Oh! and round face and melting faces' b-days!

June '08
June seems to have been boring, went to some horse racing, cooked, tried some crappy blue pepsi... anything else??? Oh, got a new guitar, made some umeshu, sang karaoke, checked out the new train line here in Tokyo, got a new couch and TV stand!


July '08
The sonics moved. Had a couple b-b-qers, Tokyo was freaking out because of the summit in Hokkaido, started a new site and had my life taken over by NCAA '09... I have yet to get it back, but slowly, slowly... also had an anniversary!



Aug '08
Went to see some fireworks, stayed home and saw some fireworks, experienced the magic of cats, nearly drowned, played NCAA '09 too much! saw the launch of ninety9bottles (and the death?) and the L.W.O.D. '08! Not to mention the ridiculous amount of rain...



Sept '08
I did very little posting in september but I went to my first Frontale away game, Sendai, and I bought my ticket home!


Oct '08
Went to Oktoberfest, Tokyo Game Show, Celebrated my B-day and Nichiren's death all in one weekend! Also celebrated mornin's b-day! Moved apartments, and saw a mantis baby! Bowled some of the worst games of my life!



Nov '08
I went home for the first time in years, got the flu, got a new president!




Dec '08
Got tonsillitis (?). Got sick again. Most of my vacation was screwed. but, I also did a ton of posting, went to see Asian Kung-fu Generation, Yasukuni Shrine, started a new random playlist post, and a new awards show! Cleaned like a demon and got a new TV! Also did the 'Japanese Thing' and waited in line for some donuts!

That`s about it for last year, ended on a bad note, let`s get the new year in full thrust baby!