EGBOK!
Just a few random musings on this Thursday night in Tokyo.
- Something happened to my wrist. Not sure what, but the damn thing has been hurting me for the past month or so. Seems to be a tendon or nerve issue from what I can tell. Desperate, I went to see an acupuncturist, hoping those little needles could work some magic. Turns out they didn’t – nor did the cigars that the guy burned into my wrist, claiming they were special Chinese herbs – but Lizzi insists that it takes more than one visit. In any event, the name of the place that I visited was EGBOK. When I asked the acupuncurist what it stood for, he said, “everything’s gonna be ok”. Thinking he must’ve taken me for a nervous nellie, I responded with an assuring, “yeah, I know, I’m just curious to know what EGBOK stands for.” With a smirk, he again told me that everything’s gonna be ok. Slowly, the wheels creaked to life and it finally hit me. “Oh, right…Everything’s Gonna Be OK. I get it.” Clever, cheesy needle guy, you.
- I’ve been watching the new season of 24 and was struck by the following thought during one of my recent viewings: what happens to all those minutes that are counting down when Fox cuts to commercial? I mean, it’s not like Jack Bauer takes time off from torturing bad guys and yelling really, really loud things like “Who are you working for?!” while Fox tries to pay the bills. Either they should change the show’s title to 16 in order to properly account for the number of hours we are actually treated to throughout the season or they need to release a special DVD that shows us what Jack was up to while we were on our bathroom breaks. Knowing Jack, he probably spends the time eating glass.
- Speaking of commercials and Fox, the content-to-ads ratio for American Idol might be the most lopsided outside of what we get with the airing of professional football games. It’s basically one audition followed by five minutes worth of commercials. That really sucks. Greedy bastards.
- Whoever picks the music for Morning Joe on MSNBC is fantastic. That person’s choices for background music as the show fades out for commercial breaks are right up my alley. The last three were Coldplay’s Talk, the Stones’ Jumping Jack Flash and Radiohead’s Let Down (one of my favorite songs of all time). Well done.
The Dooze
One of my favorite sportswriters, ESPN’s Bill Simmons, did a Marley & Me impersonation with his latest column. And a mighty fine one at that. A must read for dog lovers of all stripes, be you sports fans or not.
The Perks Of Being A State Health Commissioner
In a word – fantastic.
…the New York State inspector general’s office says that [Dr. Antonia Novello] turned her staff at the Health Department into her personal chauffeurs, porters and shopping assistants during her seven-year tenure, and has referred a criminal case, including potential felony charges, to the Albany County district attorney.
A report from the office of Inspector General Joseph Fisch to be released Tuesday depicts Dr. Novello as preoccupied with shopping and routinely abusive of her authority over employees, ordering them to buy her groceries, pick up her dry cleaning and even water her houseplants.
On one occasion, Dr. Novello purchased a heavy statue of Buddha during a shopping excursion in Troy, N.Y., then required a Health Department security guard to move it into her apartment, and then a few days later move it to another spot in her home because she didn’t like how it looked, according to the report, a copy of which was obtained by The New York Times. The guard told investigators that he often had to ask his teenage son to help him move her furniture around.
Dr. Novello also ordered a Medicaid fraud investigator in her department to drive her on trips to Macy’s and Saks Fifth Avenue in Manhattan. On numerous occasions she had state workers drive her or her mother from the Albany area to Neward Liberty International Airport, roughly 300 miles round trip, to fly to Puerto Rico for personal business. When traveling between state offices in New York City and Albany, she liked to stop at the Woodbury Common Premium Outlets in Central Valley, N.Y., and she is also accused of using state workers to take her on excursions to three malls in the Albany area.
Fear Imbalance
On his show this past Friday, the ever insightful and witty Jon Stewart totally nailed the misleading way that Fox News represents itself. Now, I’m all for hearing dissenting views and opinions, and I’ll concede that the media tends to lean left, so having a one-sided take on the news from the right is perfectly fine by me; however, Fox News masquerading as a bastion for even-handedness is downright hilarious. The fact that their tag line is “Fair and Balanced” is one of the more disingenuous mantras around. They can’t possibly be serious when they say that! Just watch one “Fox and Friends” or “Hannity” and you’ll see what I mean. Completely and utterly blatant in their myopia. I always wonder if people in the Fox News studio giggle every time they hear their motto being said because there is no way in hell any reasonable person could take the statement seriously. Of course, there is a meaningful chance that these people are totally oblivious, demonstrating an amazing ability to believe their own bullshit while also providing a watchful public with a real life example of Orwellian doublethink. This must be the case, as I’ve seen multiple shows over the past week or so that lament the media’s one-sided take on the Obama inauguration, which causes me to throw up in my mouth each time it occurs.
Why can’t we just call a spade a spade? MSNBC = liberal. Fox News = conservative. Let’s just make peace with the obvious and move on. Why all the faking?
The Rush Limbaugh affair evokes a level of disgust that is several orders removed. I love that Keith Olbermann refers to him as “comedian Rush Limbaugh” because the guy has indeed turned into a caricature of an angry, mean-spirited ideologue. And the fact that he commonly uses the metaphor of “grabbing one’s ankles” is weird on several levels, not least of which involves the very real possibility that this man hasn’t even been able to see his ankles for most of his adult life, much less bend over to grab them.
What the?
First, Glenn Beck got a new show on Fox. And now this. The utter stupidity of the human race never ceases to amaze:
LAGOS, Nigeria (AP) ― One of Nigeria’s biggest daily newspapers reported that police implicated a goat in an attempted automobile theft. In a front-page article on Friday, the Vanguard newspaper said that two men tried to steal a Mazda car two days earlier in Kwara State, with one suspect transforming himself into a goat as vigilantes cornered him. The paper quoted police spokesman Tunde Mohammed as saying that while one suspect escaped, the other transformed into a goat as he was about to be apprehended. The newspaper reported that police paraded the goat before journalists, and published a picture of the animal. Police in the state couldn’t immediately be reached for comment. Belief in black magic is widespread in Nigeria, particularly in far-flung rural areas.
Pointing Fingers
The UK newspaper The Guardian put together a list of the twenty-five people responsible for the current economic crisis, which – in case you’ve been comatose for the past 18 months – is turning out to be the most severe downturn the world has seen since at least World War II.
The list is pretty good. At the top is Alan Greenspan, a designation I find quite fitting, and it also includes some folks that tend to get overlooked, including my favorite:
The American public
There’s no escaping the fact: politicians might have teed up the financial system and failed to police it properly and Wall Street’s greedy bankers might have got carried away with the riches they could generate, but if millions of Americans had just realised they were borrowing more than they could repay then we would not be in this mess. The British public got just as carried away. We are the credit junkies of Europe and many of our problems could easily have been avoided if we had been more sensible and just said no.
Those whom I believe should’ve at least received an honorable mention include Charles Schumer (slimy, dimwitted and conflicted politician), Barney Frank (see Schumer…and add bombastic and abrasive), Franklin Raines (someone from Fannie or Freddie should get a mention), Christopher Cox (just for running a clueless organization), Robert Rubin (where shall I begin?) and anyone associated with the ratings agencies (oddly, the list includes the former CEO of S&P as someone who saw the storm approaching, which doesn’t seem to fit with the spirit of the section). Oh, and Rod Blagojevic, for no other reason than he should, by rule, be included on any list of ignominy from this point onward. His actual involvement in, or relevance to, the topic at hand should be viewed as immaterial. Just put his name in there and move on.
Speaking of special mentions, we should not exclude John Thain, the now former CEO of Merrill Lynch. Of course, he was brought in to fix the mess that Stanley O’Neal left him with, so you can’t assign him much of the direct blame for Merrill’s current woes. However, his performance in the Bank of America/Merrill Lynch merger (where he was reportedly less than forthcoming regarding his firm’s exposure to toxic assets and where he expedited bonus payouts to clear before he was found out) and his penchant for high-end redecorating (where he spent $1.2 million to upgrade his office space) clearly stand out. Now, I have no problem with executives treating themselves to certain accoutrements, particularly when at the helm of successful enterprises whose profits could justify such extravagance. But $87,000 for an area rug? When your company would likely be in dire straits but for a fire sale transaction with a bank that itself could’ve gone under but for the generosity of Uncle Sam? And when said merger will result in the termination of thousands of employees? Seriously? To paraphrase Robert Scheer, whom I heard this weekend on KCRW’s Left, Right and Center, it would appear that Thain subscribes to the Marie Antoinette school of public presentation.
Hardy Har Har
I got a nice chuckle out of this little blurb from The Onion’s business section today:
Stocks rose today, pointing to early signs of success for the company’s new “the president does it, so can you” ad campaign.
Slice Of Awesome
They kinda flubbed the execution but you gotta give it up for new beginnings!
More On That Rick Warren Character
JJ reminded me today of a couple pieces Christopher Hitchens wrote for Slate.com on the abomination that is Rick Warren. As always, Hitch is much more persuasive than I could ever be, given his magically incisive way with words and all. You can find his articles here and here. At taste:
…the man he has chosen to deliver his inaugural invocation is a relentless clerical businessman who raises money on the proposition that certain Americans—non-Christians, the wrong kind of Christians, homosexuals, nonbelievers—are of less worth and littler virtue than his own lovely flock of redeemed and salvaged and paid-up donors.
You’ll also be happy to know that the wonderful folks over at Dickipedia have an entry for Warren. Of course, no site dedicated to dicks would be complete without him. The entry begins:
Richard D. “Rick” Warren (born January 28, 1954) is the founder and senior pastor of the Saddleback Church, a bigot, an anti-semite, a holder of bizarre sexual theories, a non-believer in science, a moral degenerate, a thug, an embarrassment to his religion, a liar, a huckster, a glutton, a goatee wearer, and a dick.
Tim Tebow – The Second Coming?
Here is a fun take on the man-love being showered upon Tim Tebow, the quarterback who recently led the Florida Gators to their second BCS championship in three years. Good stuff – an Onion-like take on the nation’s newest sporting obsession. Though the media’s fixation with him is approaching Favre-like heights, I must say that the man is one helluva an athlete. It’s not often you get to watch a quarterback actually lower his shoulder into defenders when he scrambles from the pocket. Dude’s built like a linebacker and isn’t afraid to bring it!
For those of you too lazy to click on the link, I’ve taken the liberty of posting the article from Sporting Press below. h/t Skimel for the tip.
Tebow Skips Senior Season, Ascends Directly Into Heaven
MIAMI (SP) — Shortly after leading the Florida Gators to a national championship with a 24-14 win over Oklahoma, junior quarterback Tim Tebow announced he would skip his senior season and ascend directly into heaven.
Tebow entered the press room to wild applause. A reporter for a 24-hour cable sports network burst into tears when the 2007 Heisman winner walked into the room. Another threw a pair of boxer shorts on the podium. Tebow smiled at the gesture and several sports reporters fainted.
“Sorry I’m late,” Tebow began. “There was a six-year-old boy with cancer in row 54 and I had to make my way through the crowd to heal him.”
“I want to start by saying that playing quarterback for the University of Florida, winning two national championships, has been a great honor. There has been some speculation about my future and I want to clear that up right now,” he continued.“Don’t go, Tim!” a reporter shouted from the back of the room.“After much consideration, I have decided to skip my senior season at the University of Florida and ascend directly into Heaven,” Tebow announced. Upon making the announcement, Tebow was bathed in a blinding white light and vanished.In response to the news, ESPN announced they will have a month-long tribute to Tebow. ESPN2 will now be known as ESPN-TEBOW and will feature Tebow highlights (including home videos of Tebow’s childhood), re-airings of past interviews, Tebow-centric analysis by ESPN air personalities, a Tebow quiz show and a reality show to find the “most Tebow-like” person in America.“He wasn’t just the greatest player in college football history,” said a college football writer at the press conference, tears streaming down his face. “He might have been the greatest person to ever walk on earth.”
Why So Surprised?
I don’t understand all the hoopla surrounding Obama’s decision to have Rick Warren deliver the invocation at tomorrow’s inauguration ceremony. What’s the big deal? It’s not like the guy is divisive or anything. So long as you’re not gay…or believe in a woman’s right to choose…or subscribe to any religion besides Christianity - you should be all set!
Did you know that Warren told a woman at an Aspen Ideas event that, since she was Jewish, she was destined for eternal damnation? How hilarious is that?! I love it! Such inflexible, baseless and grossly-ignorant statements remind me of this gem from Stephen Colbert’s infamous White House Correspondents’ Dinner speech from a couple years back:
And though I am a committed Christian, I believe that everyone has the right to their own religion, be you Hindu, Jewish or Muslim. I believe there are infinite paths to accepting Jesus Christ as your personal savior.
Did you know that Christianity is the world’s largest religion? Most estimates peg the number of Christian adherents worldwide at around 2 billion. Now guess the population of the world today. The answer – roughly 6.7 billion, according to the World Population Clock. This means that, according to Warren’s dimwitted idee fixe, 4.7 billion people, or 70% of the globe, are destined to spend eternity burning in the fires of hell. And therein lies one of my biggest gripes about religion – it is fundamentally one of the most divisive things on this planet.
In any event, we shouldn’t be surprised that Obama invited Warren along for the big party. After all, Obama is Christian, so he’s got that going for him in terms of similarities. And second, it’s not like Obama is a strong proponent of gay rights; after all, the man has made clear his view that homosexual couples should not be granted the right to marry. So enough with the shock, people! Obama and Warren simply aren’t as different as you might wish they were.
New Rule
No more holiday cards that are either: 1) blast mailings (i.e. sent to everyone on your mailing list) that go either unsigned or are signed but nothing more (i.e. all I get is your scribbled autograph and no personalized note) or only include some painfully boring recounting of the year’s events for the sender and his/her family (if we are really friends, then I already know what I need to know on that front); or 2) cards signed by a group of people who were clearly forced to sign the card not knowing where each of the 100 cards they signed is headed (largely applies to cards set in a professional context).
I was absolutely a perpetrator of the second offense, I’m afraid to admit. I was presented with a 75-deep stack of generic holiday cards by a colleague and told to sign my name to each of them, with my John Hancock situated alongside those of my Japanese colleagues. The cards would be mailed to various people throughout my firm’s Chicago office, each of whom undoubtedly took a brief note of the card’s delivery before quickly disposing of said card in the nearest paper recycling bin. Average time (and thought) assigned to each opening? 4.2 seconds. Such a routine is common for those of us who receive dozens of holiday cards that are more a happenstance of our being located in someone’s address book than of that person actually caring about wishing us a happy holiday. There is nothing tackier than opening a card from a long lost friend and seeing some politically-correct artistic representation of the holidays highlighted with the equally lame and unfeeling words of “Seasons Greetings”. Such a holiday greeting is the customer service equivalent of “your call is very important to us”.
If the sender really cared, they’d send you a personal note, whether via snail mail, email or phone. You know, one that indicated they had the slightest interest in you and your well-being. Maybe I’m selfish in my insistence upon a personal touch, but I’d much rather receive nothing than some lame card that everyone else on your list got where the most thinking about me you did when you sent it was finding – then writing – my address. My advice – save the paper and the postage. And don’t send those stupid blast e-cards either. They’re even worse since it’s so much easier for one to send a blast email to everyone in their address book. At least with the physical card the sender has to go through the somewhat manual process of finding the mailing address and writing it on the envelope, whereas sending it by email requires an expenditure of energy equivalent of the number of times Wade Phillips said anything into his headphones this season (my guess is he didn’t even realize they were never actually plugged in, making an enterprising Cowboys staff member $100 richer from the preseason wager he placed on such an occurrence with the team’s equipment manager).
Random Japan
More fun happenings from the land of the 5 PM jingle (those who have visited understand the jingle reference).
- The Japanese health ministry has found that kids who often skip breakfast in their early teens begin having sex at the age of 17.5 years – almost two years earlier than those who eat breakfast every day.
- Japan’s long-ruling Liberal Democratic Party, which has never met a tax hike it didn’t love, is said to be considering a “pet tax” whose proceeds would be used to fund animal shelters and raise awareness of the importance of using ID tags.
- Roughly 5,000 Japanese teachers took a leave of absense during the 2007 academic year because of “depression or other mental disorders”; that number has been increasing for fifteen straight years.
- And finally, in a news item really close to the home front, a knife-wielding man shouting “I lost my job!” was apprehended in Roppongi Hills (the complex where we live) by cops after they fired a warning shot.
Good Luck Being President
The author Dave Eggers, he of A Heartbreaking Work Of Staggering Genius and McSweeney’s fame, started a non-profit a few years back called 826 Valencia (named after its address in San Francisco). The goal of Valencia is to support the writing efforts of kids aged 6-18, offering “a variety of free programs and services throughout the school year and summer months including drop-in tutoring, field trips, specialized workshops, in-school assistance, and extensive student publishing.”
In the inaugural spirit that is sweeping America, the good folks at Valencia compiled some students’ notes to the incoming President and created a book that will be released the day Obama takes office. It’s called Thanks and Have Fun Running the Country and appears to be comprised of really funny and adorable notes from Obama’s pint-sized well-wishers. A NY Times piece this weekend gave the book a little shout-out.
My favorite from the piece:
Dear Obama,
If I were president I would have fun, because I could run fast.
— Kenja Zelaya, age 6, Los Angeles
I also liked this one, which captures the innocence of its young author in a way that belies the maturity of its delivery. And I love the ending.
Dear President Obama,
I am small, quiet, smart. I love to swim and play basketball. My mom and dad are from the Dominican Republic. I am going to the Dominican Republic next year. I think you should try to change the world by building shelters for the people who live in the streets. It’s the beginning of January, and it’s cold. Good luck being the president.
— Pamela Mejia, age 11, Boston
Good stuff.
Eight Years In Eight Minutes
Keith Olbermann can be annoying in the same way as Sean Hannity and Bill O’Reilly tend to be – taking a myopic view on pretty much everything and shaping his show in a way that egregiously caters to his own ideology. Not much middle ground when it comes to these guys (I would include Rachel Maddow in the Olbermann mix, by the way). That being said, the below clip is worthwhile. Not surprisingly, it takes a piercing view of Bush’s eight years in office and is so comprehensive it’s damn near overwhelming. And though I hate the incessant partisanship, I must say, the clip does bring up some awfully interesting points, even if I don’t agree with all of Mr. Olbermann’s assertions (largely on the economic front, of course).
Huh?
Isn’t this an oxymoron?
The Pope is declaring a ‘holy war’ against people who claim falsely that the Virgin Mary is appearing to them. He will attempt to snuff out an explosion of bogus heavenly apparitions with new guidelines to help bishops root out frauds. Benedict XVI plans to publish criteria to help them distinguish between true and false claims of visions of Jesus and the Virgin Mary, messages, stigmata – the appearances of the five wounds of Christ – and weeping or bleeding statues. In some cases exorcists will be used to determine if a credible apparition is ‘divine’ origin or ‘demonic’.
Seriously? That’s like an “Elvis Lives” group creating a special investigative unit to determine which Elvis sightings are real versus fake. Amazing that this gets such serious official attention. Yet we make fun of people who claim to see UFOs, despite the fact that the odds of those sightings being legit (though still small) are considerably higher when compared to possible sightings of the Virgin Mary. Just incredible.
Gonna Miss Ya, Dubya!
Knowing what a sucker I am for all things humorous, particularly of the political variety, a friend of mine from Down Under sent along this article from the Sydney Morning Herald. Though the aim of the article was to lament the state of political leadership in the U.K, the setup focused largely on the gaffes of “Dubya” as comparison. A taste:
In his gift for surreal improvisation, he resembles an unintentional Paul Merton, a linguistic Dadaist armed with nuclear weapons and a worrying sense that God is on his side. No longer will the White House be inhabited by a man who blissfully jumbles Slovakia and Slovenia, who fears for the fate of the “Kosovians”, or who believes the secret of Balkan stability is “to keep good relations with the Grecians”, with their lustrous black locks.
We say goodbye to the global strategist whose sunny optimism still persuades him Japan and America have “had a peaceful alliance for 150 years” – something of a revelation to the people of Pearl Harbour and Hiroshima – and we say goodbye to the conservative thinker and moralist who understands “families is where our nation finds hope, where wings take dream”, and yet finds compassion for the unmarried mother of two. “I know how hard it is for you to put food on your family,” he told her. We can all attest to that truth, especially when they won’t keep still.
Ah…I will miss the unintentional comedy Dubya provided. He certainly managed to smooth the sting of seeing our nation in decline. Speaking of the man himself, I’ve watched with great interest the myriad exit interviews he’s been conducting and I can’t help but marvel at the cognitive dissonance he is capable of displaying. On virtually every metric, he has, without a doubt, left the world worse off than when he found it as President eight years ago. While not all of the world’s ills can be attributed to him without qualification, particularly the economic ones, the one complete brain fart that he cannot possibly run from is the mess he created in Iraq. Yet the man somehow manages to claim that he is proud of what his administration has accomplished, all the while clinging to the crutch of “history will be the final judge.” The next time I f*&k up in a royal fashion, I’m just going to say that history will be the judge, no matter how obvious the mess may be. If Bush can say that after the extraordinary clusterf*&k he created, then I can do the same since my screwups will pale massively when compared to his.
Garrison Keillor
The International Herald Tribune (the international publication of the NY Times, my daily staple) occasionally runs a piece by Garrison Keillor, he of Prairie Home Companion fame. After several readings, I now happily count myself among his fans. He’s a very witty, interesting writer. I highly recommend anyone looking for a chuckle from a good wordsmith to check out his page over at Salon.com. Well worth it.
Dear Coley
Why?
The temperature at 5 a.m. was 13 below zero at Minneapolis-St. Paul International Airport. Elsewhere, it was 23 below in Brainerd, 20 below in Duluth, 26 below in Moorhead, 17 below in Mankato and Albert Lea and 12 below in Rochester, the National Weather Service says.
The weather service this morning is warning of dangerous wind chills for much of central and south central Minnesota. The combination of arctic temperatures combined with northwest winds will cause windchill readings from 25 to 40 below this morning.
What the?
I stumbled across two WTF? moments today.
First, there was this:
A student who is auctioning her virginity to pay for a Masters degree in Family and Marriage therapy has seen bidding hit $3.7 million.
Then this:
Knicks center Eddy Curry was slapped with a shocking sex-harassment suit Monday by his former driver, who claims the 6-foot-11 hoopster tried to solicit gay sex from him.
The stunning court papers claim Curry, a married father of three, repeatedly approached chauffeur David Kuchinsky “in the nude,” allegedly telling him, “Look at me, Dave, look” and “Come and touch it, Dave.”
Curry also made Kuchinsky perform “humiliating tasks outside the scope of his employment, such as cleaning up and removing dirty towels [Curry had ejaculated into] so that his wife would not see them,” the Manhattan federal court suit says.
Kuchinsky, who is straight and Jewish, also alleges racial discrimination, saying that Curry hurled slurs at him including “f—ing Jew,” “cracker,” “white slave,” “white devil” and “grandmaster of the KKK.”
In the immortal words of Gob Bluth – “come on!”.
Random Japan
One of the most amusing things about Japan is the naming convention for all things “Engrish”. A lot of the names are either funny plays on the pronunciation or simply so random that they invite furrowed brows of confusion. As an example, see the below cereal box that solicits a chuckle each time I see it.
Justice Is Served
Though a recent reading of Consider The Lobster by David Foster Wallace made me consider the ridiculousness of Hollywood award shows, I must say that I’m quite happy about the solid showing from Slumdog Millionaire during last night’s Golden Globes. Best score, best screenplay, best director and – most importanly – best picture. Three cheers for Mr. Boyle and crew. Despite the inconvenient fact that I have yet to view any of the other films up for the title of “best”, I’m going to go out on the ill-informed limb and make the statement that justice was indeed served last night. As I mentioned in a previous post, Millionaire was a brilliant piece of filmmaking and deserving of every piece of acknowledgement thrown its way during the awards season.
Meanwhile, back to feeling disgusted about Hollywood award shows (from the aforementioned Mr. Wallace himself):
The [awards shows'] notorious commercialism and hypocrisy disgust many of the millions and millions and millions of viewers who tune in during prime time to watch the presentations…We pretty much all tune in, despite the grotesquerie of watching an industry congratulate itself on its pretense that it’s still an art form, of hearing people in $5,000 gowns invoke lush cliches of surprise and humility scripted by publicists, etc. – the whole cynical post-modern deal – but we all still seem to watch. To care. Even though the hypocrisy hurts, even though opening grosses and marketing strategies are now bigger news than the movies themselves, even though Cannes and Sundance have become nothing more than enterprise zones…the whole mainstream celebrity culture is rushing to cash in and all the while congratulating itself on pretending not to cash in. Underneath it all, though, we know the whole thing sucks.
Japan Quick Hits
Reading through this week’s edition of Metrolopis (Japan’s number one English magazine) and came across a few tidbits that I found worth sharing:
- The family of a 60-year old man who suffered fatal injuries after being tossed into the air by colleagues celebrating his retirement party filed a criminal complaint alleging gross negligence.
- It was reported that increasing numbers of Japanese tourists are traveling to the Palestinian village of Bil’in to participate in demonstrations against Israel “out of curiosity”.
- A survey by a grocers association found that 35% of Japanese parents can’t cut slices of apple in the shape of rabbit ears – a staple bento item for generations of Japanese schoolkids.
- A newspaper survey found that 67% of Americans think that Japan is “trustworthy” but only 32% of Japanese return the sentiment in kind.
Slice Of Awesome
I’m going old school on ya’ll with this one, which I dedicate to the dishonorable Blago down in Springfield. As the man MC Breed said himself:
Man
There ain’t no future in your frontin
Never was, cuz
There ain’t no future in your frontin
Barking Spiders
There is probably nothing more amusing in our little world than watching our dog, Hurley Sue, scare the bejeezus out of herself each time she farts. Each toot is followed by a quick jerk as if something snuck up behind her and pinched her on the ass, followed by a short investigation of her surroundings that inevitably turns up nothing, the culprit having vanished…like a fart in the wind. Good stuff.
Doing The Singapore Sling
Just sorting through my drafts and realized I never got around to publishing this one from several weeks back. Enjoy!
I’m in Singapore again and getting better acquainted with the pros and cons of this place. On the pro side, the city is safe, clean, and everyone speaks English. Kind of like your local Republican Party branch. Plus, there is a vibrancy here that is hard to find in Japan, where the vibe can by comparison be described as zombie-like. Indeed, the energy is palpable in Singapore, which may stem from the hawker nature of the country’s consumerism. Everywhere one looks, there are sights of what I would call small box retail – food stands, electronics boutiques, tiny fabric outlets. And the food is fantastic, particularly for those of us who are fans of all things spicy. By fate of location, there is some fantastic Indian, Thai, Chinese and Malaysian fare here, most of which is priced more Wal-Mart than Whole Foods (like Tokyo).
On the negative side, the weather is tough to handle. It is typically very hot and humid, and there isn’t much fluctuation in temperature throughout the year. This problem is exacerbated by the fact that every taxi you enter is driven by someone who refuses to use deodorant, a phenomenon I will never fully understand. Of course, there are days like today – overcast and actually quite pleasant with a breeze. But even those days are interrupted by torrential downpours that come and go. Then there’s the noise. Walking along the streets in Singapore is certainly cause for earplugs. There is so much construction and directing of street traffic taking place around you, the decible level is among the highest I have ever experienced. Probably equivalent to sitting underneath the stands at Camp Nou when Real Madrid comes to town. And don’t even think about chatting on the mobile while you walk, not unless you want to test the patience of the person on the other end (something my lovely wife gets to enjoy from time-to-time). The conversation will be dominated by yelled requests of repitition that will only end in frustrated hang-ups, I assure you. Then there’s shopping. Though myriad in its choices, shopping in Singapore sometimes grates. While I appreciate the fact that there is an abundance of Western-style shopping, the execution is highly annoying. Specifically, each time you enter a store, you are immediately set upon by an over-eager salesperson who insists on following you throughout the store as you peruse the goods. And too often the employee-to-customer ratio is way too high, leaving plenty of people to pester you when really all you want to do is kill time before your next meeting. Seriously, why can’t one shop in peace? Do they honestly think that this encourages people to buy? We must put an end to such heavy-handed tactics. Consumers of the world, unite!
On a quirkier note, I was drawn out of my hotel last night by the sound of live music. Typing away on my laptop on the 15th floor, I heard what sounded like a live band playing somewhere below, which shouldn’t come as much of a surprise since it was a Friday night. Curious, I stumbled outside and followed the noise (I wouldn’t describe it as music per se, so noise is more than appropriate) and was surprised to see a four-piece band scratching out some form of what may or may not have been heavy metal (the only clues as to the type of music were the hairstyles and heavy guitar abuse). The grossly amateurish band was set up on a makeshift stage situated just outside of a little strip mall that sat next to my hotel, maybe 100 yards from the entrance. Watching the band was an odd collection of what looked to be retirees, bored shopowners, high school kids who were congregating outside of the nearby KFC or Carl’s Jr., and confused and disheveled Western business travelers who couldn’t help but be drawn to the ruckus (like moths to a flame!). Once the noisemakers (I can’t bring myself to call them musicians) mercifully finished their set – which couldn’t have been longer than two or three songs – the band took a fifteen minute break, giving way to the site’s other source of “entertainment” which, in retrospect, must have been the main event. Located just next to the stage was a huge screen that flickered to life when the band relieved our auditory suffering. The small crowd, which had settled itself into cheap plastic chairs in front of the stage, was then treated to a public service announcement disguised as a mini soap opera. The one I watched consisted of two men, whom I presume were very dear friends, discussing the need to be more fiscally responsible given the current economic environment (as you may know, Singapore is in the midst of a serious downturn). The “show” was part commercial, part drama, part big brother cares. Besides the strange setting and presentation, I was taken by how nonchalant the two guys were in discussing their fiscal matters, going so far as to have the two sit down so the smart guy could help his slower friend draw up a monthly budget. Apparently, in Singapore, such discussions are as natural as me sitting down with my friends to compare/discuss our fantasy football teams. What amazed me even more was the fact that most of those in attendance sat with eyes transfixed on the screen, staying quietly still as they took in all of the awkward episode, only averting their attention when the band returned. Perhaps it was a welcome respite from the awful scratching, banging and yelling that would follow onstage?
Confused and bemused, I returned to my room, turned up the volume on CNN…and checked my fantasy squad.
All Aboard!
Read an interesting piece in the NY Times yesterday that got my atheist wheels turning, so to speak. In a spark of supreme ingenuity, a British comic started a new marketing campaign designed to combat the slew of religious slogans one is bound to see in various forms of advert, including on certain types of public transport. The end result was, in this author’s humble opinion, quite brilliant – the Atheist Bus Campaign. Starting this month, the streets of London will be flooded with 800 buses carrying the following slogan: There’s probably no God. Now stop worrying and enjoy your life. How great is that?
And here’s a picture of atheist biologist extraordinaire, Richard Dawkins, proudly posing in front of one of said buses:
The Wheel
The Way Of The Samurai
Round two in my series of tidbits from the book Hakagure: The Way of the Samurai.
To calm one’s mind, one swallows his saliva. This is a secret matter. When one becomes angry, it is the same. Putting spittle on one’s forehead is also good. In the Yoshida school of archery, swallowing one’s spittle is the secret principle of the art.
