I’m not sure how this got started or whose idea it was (probably Yutaka’s) but we (Betty, Mewby, Yoshida-kun, Yutaka and me) had a kind of impromptu takoyaki party at my house last Saturday. A lot of booze was consumed. And a lot of octopus balls. And then the experimentation began… Shrimp balls were quite popular. And Mewby’s chocolate banana cake-mix balls were an absolute hit. My cheesy tomato pizza balls were not so well received however. Here are some pictures:
It’s a wonderful thing to know that there are people in this world prepared put so much love and effort into creating 5 and half minutes of perfection – and then offer it up online for free! Watch this! Just watch it!
Alma from Rodrigo Blaas on Vimeo.
It’s January 6th already – Twelfth Night no less – and time to take down the Christmas tree. Back to work the day after tomorrow – but still, only two more months till Spring vacation. (sighs - thinks, “What an awesome job”) Here’s a couple of piccies of our Mewby at Shimogamo shrine last Sunday.
It is of course the year of the Tiger.
The Shimogamo area is one of my favorite places in Kyoto – a great place for a stroll in the woods and lots of great cafes and restaurants in the area. We went to antighseinsse for dinner and had one of Horie’s handmade pizzas – he puts the basil into the dough. And I had two pints of delicious chocolatey-rich tasting Tokyo Black real ale. But we didn’t like the gormless and charmless twit Horie has working with him now, so we retreated to Sheeps and I had a savoury pint of Yona Yona real ale followed by a glass of Jamesons (as the beer was getting heavy). And then we felt like seeing Se-chan so we went to Kisui and I started on nihonshu… And then I woke up the next day with a sore head. Silly me.
Now yesterday I went to the Kampo museum to look at some super psychedelic Huichol yarn paintings – but if you want to read about that, you’ll have to click here.
The year and a decade (arguably) is coming to an end! Busy busy! Time to clean up the house and sweep out all the corners! It’s been a good year for me – I got to work with these two chaps (Chris and Andrew)
- and enjoyed the experience greatly (they are sirs of the kind variety). And I moved to a great location (tho my new apartment is as messy as my old one). Also I started karate and tho I’m still quite terrible and clumsy – am still going! A tiny miracle of sorts for lazy old me. In recent days I’ve been to an onsen, eaten at a posh restaurant and had a very nice Boxing Day lunch… All of which you can read about on DK. Also, on Christmas Day, I saw this (with very heavy 3D glasses) -
A visual (and visceral) feast – but somewhat lacking in the visionary department. There’s much discussion of it here and Greg Egan has reviewed it here too. My own two pennies worth is that the story is unimaginative/derivative (very dances-with-wolvesian complete with alien war whoops) misses an excellent opportunity to explore one’s sense of self identity… and instead serves up a dose of Disney-like isn’t nature lovely and we are all one Pocahontas type guff. But I still enjoyed it.
I also liked this (not the stupid Hollywood style trailer mind you but the actual movie):
Spooky and (though it has its fairly obvious plotholes) ultimately heartbreaking.
And I’m looking forward to the final episode of Doctor Who with David Tennant as the Doctor… Really John Simm makes an excellent Master. I hope he doesn’t regenerate. And the Time Lords are back with Timothy Dalton in charge. Golly.
So all that’s left to say is yoi otoshi wo and a Happy New Year to you all. See you in 2010! I’m off to Joao!
Great party the other night. The most memorable thing though was discovering that Massun is in fact Edward Furlong. Here are a couple of pictures for your perusal. I won’t even bother labeling them because they are so clearly the same person.
This is my favorite picture of the evening though.
You can see the rest here:
Every year in December I give myself a Christmas present. Throughout the year, when I see a book I want to read, I add it to my amazon wishlist and then wait… Then come December, I study the ridiculously long list it has become and ask myself “How much do I really want this?” and if I’m still interested, I order it just in time for Xmas and the winter holidays. Anyway we got our bonus last Thursday, I placed the order on Friday and seven of the books came today. Aren’t they lovely?
It’s an odd mix I suppose. I’ve enjoyed “The Year’s Best Fantasy & Horror” collections in previous years but missed out in 2008 as Junkudo didn’t stock it, so I ordered that one. Then it seems the editor Ellen Datlow has gone solo with “The Best Horror of the Year 2009″ so I ordered that one too. I love to read something creepy at Christmas. The Van Gogh book – which is both beautiful and immense! – I bought because we’ve been doing a chapter on his life in reading class at school and I became intrigued and wanted to read and see more. As for the others they are mostly Japan or Kyoto related because I live here (and write a blog called Deep Kyoto) – so I figure I ought to really. Here are the first seven (plus a couple more that haven’t arrived yet) in a handy little browsable widget.
Last night Mewby and I went to see the illuminated aumtumn leaves at Kodaiji temple. It was the last night of the illuminations so it was pretty crowded. The crowds do tend to take away from the experience a bit – but what can you do? This is Japan. Here are some pictures.
Ha! Ghastly November is finally over! Actually I realised that part of my gloom last month was simply down to a lack of exercise. Catching a cold and feeling terrible kept me out of the gym for almost 3 weeks. When I got back in there I did exactly 6 squats and then immediately felt the effects of the endorphins coursing through my body and into my brain. All of a sudden I was all happy and positive and rushing from weight machine to weight machine like a giddy child running round a playground. So that’s good then. Here are some pictures from the weekend.
Neon SoundCollage: When we finally made it to Collage on Friday night, we were just in time to be told by pretty much everybody that Satoko had just finished her set (moments earlier) and how very very brilliant it was. Which was a shame. And somewhat galling. However, Yamada-san himself was in very high spirits as the event was clearly a great success. Lots of people were there and some of them were even dancing. Wow! I however, drank exactly 3 beers and took exactly one picture. Here it is:
Saturday was boy’s night at Joao.
Taisho in an especially jolly mood, broke out the guitars and we had a singalong.
One last picture. Jeff Trambley posted this on facebook today and made me laugh out loud. It’s a picture from 1998 of he and I performing some Madonna at the Fukushima Jets Leavers’ Party. Those were the days!
And don’t I look skinny!
I don’t like November. The sudden sharp shift from warm blue October skies to day after day of grey cold drear (and my school’s refusal to turn on the heating) leads me to one inevitable conclusion: this is the long dark dentist’s waiting room of the soul. And on top of my seasonal gloom add self pity; I’ve had a nasty lingering chest cold for over two weeks now, which no amount of syrups, pills, antibiotics, hot lemony drinks or cough sweets have done anything to improve. I want rid of it and I want December to hurry up and cheer me with it’s bright and tawdry festive ways. Still, I reluctantly admit there have been one or two bright moments this month too. Here belatedly are pictures from Taisho’s birthday party, over two weeks back:
And here are a few pictures from a pleasant day out with Mewby at Uji Botanical Gardens one week later:
Many apologies for their tardy appearance – I’m lazy.
I know this is traditionally the time of year when people complain about how early the Christmas decorations have gone up, but this Brooks Brothers Xmas tree made us laugh when we saw it yesterday.
