08.30.07/00:49  katsutadai no matsuri                  

The other people were actually sitting on blankets in the tall grass on top of the snakes and cicadas...but not me.  I watched the fireworks from the relative splendor of our wooden table, erected on the lot behind the fire station near the banks of the Shinagawa river, a table laden with snacks and delicious drinks, all courtesy of a friend whose name I don't quite remember...well, her husband, anyway.  Nice people.

Another component of Yachiyo's biggest festival was the setup on the street in front of my school in Katsutadai.  The street was closed off, stalls were erected, and a giant stage loomed at the far end, near the police station.  Women danced to mariachi music, bon odoris bon odori'd, and Jordan ate corndogs and fried chicken on a stick.  It was glorious.

It's not something I wanted to mention, but if we're going for honesty, I might as well...I can't shit as much as I'd like to.  My main goal for the past month has been to take a satisfactory dump, but to no avail.  I've tried drinking more, but that just makes me constipated and drunk.  Smoking helps a little, but it might be time to start eating fruit.  Another option would be to wait a few weeks and have the resulting diamonds surgically removed from my colon.

I can't stop reading. I've gone through all the books in Charlie-sensei's stash, and now it's time to find some real mental nourishment.  A pathetic collection of fiction about foreigners in Japan has left me pretty irritated.  I read Tokyo Station, and it felt a lot like Last Samurai, which is to say, pretty stupid.  No matter how much these writers want to, nobody can BECOME Japanese.  You can pay for every  sex-change operation under the sun, but, as Chuck points out, you'll still have man-hands.

I don't even know where I was going with that metaphor.  Also, yesterday was the first total lunar eclipse in Japan in six or seven years!  And I didn't get to see it!  Because it was too damn cloudy!  Sucks to the weather.  That cowardly full moon finally full moon'd me at midnight out of spite, after hiding its shadowy performace behind the rain.

Next time, next time.

08.19.07/02:55  back from being on hiatus...           

Hello, my peachycomics faithful.  You knew I'd be back eventually, but just when that would be was a question on both of your minds, I'm sure.  Anyway, the festivities are over now, for the time being, and I've enough time to put up a post.  The past month (exactly one month, to be exactly exact) has been rife with activity enough for several of me.

So, last week, my family made a visit all the way to the land of the eternally rising-and-burning-my-eyes-sun.  We hit Kyoto and Chiba and rode the shinkansen and did formal tea ceremony and went blueberry-picking and hit all my choicest izakayas and all of that.  It was a super good time for everyone.

Needless to say, I'm exhausted.  To coordinate such a trip requires a lot of Japanese and skill and tact and manners and obeisance I just don't possess.  The planning was hell, the execution was murder, and the denouement was also trying.  But I'm happy I got to see them.  Very happy!

And, you may wonder what else has been happening.  The next comic is basically done, but I don't think I will post it.  I think I will save it for the grand opening of the dep edge site, whenever that is.  I'd like it to have features and look slick and good, and that will take time.  But the progress I've made so far looks promising, so we shall see how it goes.

What else...Harry Potter?  Minako-sensei was kind enough to lend it to me, so I've finally finished the series.  No huge surprises, but it was good enough, and almost as good as I expected.  I wonder what she will do next...a series about Harry's father?  Who knows.  But good times, either way.