Clutching a notebook and a pencil, Yuna and her classmates occupied the front row of the crowd Wednesday, bending forward to watch a 10-metre (33-foot) animal — the town’s first catch of the three-month season — be dismembered.
“Look! That’s her heart!” Yuna said to her friends with her face half covered by her hand. “Oh no, so much blood is gushing out.” LINK
I went to see Indiana Jones at the weekend. “I’ll probably cry at the end - it being the last one.” I joked, just before going in. And then right at the end, as the stirring strains of the Indiana Jones theme started up for the last time and Harrison Ford seized his hat from “Junior”’s hands before striding out the church, and because you know there is, and can only be, one Indy Jones to wear that hat or crack that whip, I felt little pin-pricks of moisture spring to my eyes and trickle down my cheeks. I enjoyed the movie (although it did have some incredibly silly moments). I don’t think it’s as good as the earlier Indiana Jones movies but it’s still a good addition to the series and I enjoyed it.
Then last night I was watching the penultimate Doctor Who of this series and it does look an awful lot like the Doctor is regenerating. But then, there’s no word on the net (nothing I can find anyway) about David Tennant quitting or anyone else taking over the role so… is he? A shame if Tennant does quit, because he’s a good Doctor. That and as the last two Doctors have been really good, I’m afraid the next one will be a Colin Baker type or even worse… a Sylvester McCoy. Eek. By the way, never watch Doctor Who just before going to sleep. I had the Doctor and Indiana Jones running through some very vivid dreams last night and woke up completely exhausted this morning.
Here’s the latest song from Michael Franti. Not one of his best but still Michael Franti, so who cares?
J-Pop Diva and everyone’s favorite cutey-pie Amuro Namie has teamed up with Japan’s slinky queen of R&B Double and the results are jaw-droppingly hot. Listen out for a 懐かしい echo of Double’s legendary “Shake“.
(lyrics are here if you want to sing along) Update: The video keeps disappearing from Youtube but you can still watch a bigger and crystal clear one here.
This looks fun. Your own customized jukebox; just enter all your favorite bands, hover your cursor over the band you want to hear and press play. Doesn’t seem to be a random play function though. Pity. And after trying to post it with the jukebox embedded, I discover, not too surprisingly, that wordpress doesn’t like the code and it messes up my page. Darn. Here’s a link anyway: jango.
I had a visit from Udo and Fumi yesterday, which was nice, and we went to Shimogamo shrine and took some pictures. Hover your mouse over for extra info:
Note the three-legged crows. I was curious about these and it seemed like a good excuse for a chat with one of the lovely shrine maidens so I asked. There is a story in the Nihongi, she said, that the first Emperor Jimmu, lost in the mountains with his army and not knowing what to do with himself, was visited in a dream by the sun-goddess Amaterasu who then sent a three legged crow Yatagarasu (八咫烏) to show him the way. Jimmu then went on to subjugate his enemies and found the Imperial line of Japan, and being very grateful set up Shimogamo Shrine to give thanks for the celestial assistance. Of course, said the shrine maiden, it’s not really true you know. It’s a myth. There aren’t really any three legged crows.
There’s an interview with Dan le Sac vs. Scroobius Pip up on BoingboingTV which is worth a look and if you don’t know who they are, they are the guys who did this:
And you can hear more tracks up on their myspace page. Letter from God to Man being most brilliant.
Browsing Gizmodo this evening, (slogan: so much in love with shiny new toys it’s unnatural) I came across this very silly and thereby highly amusing soya sauce bottle. LINK.
And here’s an admirable man who somehow manages to combine religious belief with a creditable degree of common sense: LINK.
Welcome to the new blog. Why a new blog? Well, for one thing the URL is a lot simpler. But mainly because whereas BLOGGER owned the last site - this one is all mine and cannot be taken away from me. Why WordPress? Because my good friend Rik Abel told me to, and he knows about these things. It has better “functionality” apparently, but I haven’t gotten to grips with that yet seeing as I’m a stupid Luddite. (He often tells me that too). One thing I have noticed though, is the Archives button on the header there. Click on that and you can find your way around the blog either by seeing what catches your eye in the tag cloud, or in the list of categories. I haven’t finished tagging and categorising yet (only managed a 157 posts so far!) but I am basically organising it so that categories are more general (movies, poetry etc) and tags are more specific (007, Yeats etc). Also, people I talk about regularly should be able to see their own name in the tag cloud and click on that for a trip down memory lane. I’m a bit embarrassed about the size of Philippe’s tag though. I need to see more people.
And for the first post here on mikeylambe.com I present for your delectation and delight the final video from Banya’s performance at Gojo Guesthouse Cafe last week. Enjoy!
There’s no particular reason for this picture really. Just my students wanted their picture taken and then after I took it and said “Do you want to be on my blog?” - they said yes to that too. As you can see these are friendly students. My favorite kind.
Continuing on from yesterday’s video here is a very nice shamisen solo from “Banya”’s performance at Gojo Guesthouse Cafe on Saturday night. I like to see how happy this guy is when he plays. More to follow!
Here’s a video for you of last night’s performance at Gojo Guesthouse Cafe by “Banya”. This isn’t the smoothest performance of the evening but definitely the cutest, as the singer keeps forgetting the words and everyone has to sing along to help her out. I’ll post more - later.
