Szkandelous.archive.march15_27

You are going to make me update at 1:30 in the morning even though I'm tired aren’t you. I guess this is punishment for not updating yesterday (sorry about that).

I cannot stress enough how frustrating it is to not be able to complete anything. Lately I have had a lot of time, but have only been able to start things. Like, today I started on a review, but in the middle of writing found I had wrote two pages of extraneous material.

It seems everyone has stopped emailing me, which makes me sad. Make a Dan happy, email.

Anyway, yesterday Maya came down with Green Velvet Crapper. We all went to a show at Heaven's Door and then drinking. It was all very fun, as well as some much-needed Japanese practice.

Today in order to save myself from my teach-myself-random-computer-programs grade boredom I ran to Tsutaya, and rented a movie called "Stereo Future".

However, on the way home I stumbled into a conversation with my friend Hanna who I hadn't seen for several weeks. I invited her up to see the movie, but we ended up just talking until about 20 minutes ago.

It was nice talking to someone. I am going to sleep now, so happy surfing the web while at work. -Dan

"kawaii kawaii sora to taiyou hikihanasu demo hikihanasu, kanashii me o shite yo...gomen ne, kowareru mono demo kashinainoyo" -Chara

Sudden realization. I was not made to teach young kids. There is now a mutual understanding between my pupils and I that I have no power of authority. It’s loss is lamentable.

So, the start of our lesson today:

Me: Okay, so how was your vacation (in Japanese)?

Kids: (the sound of wind)

Or perhaps the actual lesson:

Me: Alright, "There was a farmer, had a dog and…"

Kids: Old McDonald had a farm. Ha ha ha.

Or perhaps the end of the lesson:

Me: All right that's all; I'll see you guys later. Bye!

Kids: (The sound of the Buddhist void)

Kekkyoku, Kids 3, Dan 0.

"Hey, I'm music fighter. Okay?" -Judy and Mary

Hey all, I just completed another review. This one is called "Fission Mailed: Metal Gear Solid 2, Sons of Liberty". Click the link or "Features" button for more info.

I know what you're thinking...

…but, better late than never, right?

"This is a story about a turkey, this is not about Christmas day however." -Buffalo Daughter

How true it is Kahimi. No longer is it summer in Tokyo, but cold, rainy spring. Is time moving backwards?

Hotmail has been taking obscene amounts of time giving me my mail. In fact, Szkandelous.com loads faster than Microsoft's Hotmail.com. It could just be my own crazy opinion, but it might be all of the entirely pointless pages their server fields you through (and has to serve up itself) that are slowing down their servers.

In the down time I've discovered bored.com. There isn't much new, so I will go.

"For seven and a half years I've worked alongside President Reagan. We've had triumphs. Made some mistakes. We've had some sex...uh...setbacks." -George Bush Sr.

"Education is my top priority. However, education is not my top priority." - George W. Bush

"I am not part of the problem. I am a Republican." -Dan Quayle

Woohoo, hit 1000 yesterday/today. Special shout out to Eric, number 1000.

I played Xenogears for another few hours and then worked on my game. I now have a ghetto pause function and the some animations are slowed down so that you can see them better. I am tired and not much is new. Good night.

"I still remember a summer garland why was it over so fast. I still remember when we said goodbye, why can't our summer times last." -Kahimi Karie

And here is a graphical representation what it felt like to write the last update.

The sumo wrestler on www.weezer.com's "Weezer Fight" is a cheater. That is all.

I am trying to write a review for Natsume Soseki's "Diary of a Mad Old Man" but am thoroughly incapable of starting. I tried reading some other people's web pages to gain inspiration but, alas, it just made me want to update with a real opinion, no review.

Would have kept trying too, except that I got an email on my cell phone. Junk mail, but in the process of deleting I realized that my phone talks back to me in slang. How do I feel about my phone talking like a Japanese jock or Tidus from FFX?

It reminds me of an occasion where I received a voice mail message spoken in a Southern accent (back in the US) from an automated dialing system.

Selfish me wants to believe that the developers were trying to pander to my "southern" roots. If so, they need better research, I, and I would claim a significant number of Californians don't particularly enjoy the sound of a Southern accent.

Which leaves only the possibility that the programmers felt that a Southern accent was a better expression of the nature of the message. The voice construct has its own style.

Why does each of the "actors" in that old All You Base video have individual voices?

Esoteric, perhaps but it's fun to think that even bodiless computer programs have a style. Go ahead, what sort of voice would MS Office have?

I'm still having these visions of talking to the Finn in some corner of Sangenjaya one day.

"Does you way of life need a room??" -Takako Minekawa

I have completed and posted my review of the Momus concert (finally). You can find it here, or just click the "Features" button and go there like a normal person.

Also added a gallery for the show accessible here, through the review, or in the galleries page. Other galleries have been updated to reflect the new photos I've added in the last couple of weeks and/or the photos from the concert. Later esse.

Note to my San Jose friends: I am going to have to send my own fleet of large, angry looking mechs to whoop your geography misunderstanding ass if you keep sending me your chain letters. People keep cleverly leaving off my name under the "friend that lives the farthest away" question, only to fill it in with someone who lives in the continental US. So far I have had two people do such a thing (this would be Eric and Sean, I know where you live) and, although I feel I handled it decently the first time around I am getting increasingly hostile. Frankly, it hurts me *sniff*.

I am about halfway through my review of the Momus concert so expect it tomorrow. Today I got a haircut, bought some more hazelnut coffee, and watched Brian kill the last boss of Sotsugeki. He's now 3/7 on the game.

I am full of pizza and am quite content with going to bed at 11:30. Later.

"Another lonely night, stare at the TV screen. I don't know what to do. I need a rendezvous...computer love." -Kraftwerk

As I touch this keyboard my body seems trying to remind me that I am tired. I just spent a couple of hours reading, before which Brian, June and I went out for gyoza at Osho and then June went back to Momoishi. I fear that if I don't seize this opportunity to talk about the Momus show in a way that is not in review form the evening may in fact die. But I am feeling slightly weary, and so I will keep this short.

Yesterday (two days now actually) we tried to get into a Stereolab show. Since there was only an hour left to the concert and they still wanted $60 we concluded that our time was better spent at Mr. Donut waiting for the Momus show to open.

Being in public has a strange power over people that can overcome boundaries of distance and language. On this one occasion Brian had been taking this opportunity at "San Francisco's Finest Donut" to mock both the placemat and the newest member to the Donut family, the "Winter Rabbit", a cleverly shaped donut-ball with rabbit ears. Seeing a woman with two of these “rabbits” on her tray, Brian leaned over to us (June and I) and said, "Look what she has" at which point the rabbit-handling women turned to us and stared at Brian. But this was not a stare of anger or hurt, just some sort of strange acknowledgement of the absurdity of a rabbit-donut.

Previously that day we had gone again to TGIFriday's where a reoccurring waitress stared at us. This was a stare that both Brian and I felt keenly.

Anyway, the Momus concert is a bittersweet memory of a melodramatic one-eyed man, his ibook and a demented opening band that would not shut up. There was a high foreigner to Japanese ratio, which always spells trouble.

Somewhere in there was an electric cabaret of Marc Almond videos and enough old synth-pop to make me think I was still going out with Riana. They even played the video for "Cars". We got sucked into a debate over who each band was, eventually culminating in us wading through a Marc Almond live concert. åI believe it was Marc Almond night.

There was something else to say, but my tiredness has won out today, maybe tomorrow.

"She's got colors to spare and I don't care what they choose. I've got nothing to do and nothing like you left to lose" -Hum

"I was walking up the stairs, something moved in silence. I could feel his mind decaying only inches away from me. And I disconnect from you." -Gary Numan

People are weird. I’m surf the net trying to kill time before I meet June for dinner. Somehow, I come across this link to a discussion about how the traditional Japanese religion Shinto was influenced by Judaism a long time ago (I believe there is a hint that somehow the Israelites came to Japan too) I shall give you a quote, because this is perhaps the most poorly written thing I've read in the last month...

"In the Japanese mythology, after the first Shinto god Ameno-minaka-nusino-kami, gods were born one after another and one of them were Amaterasu and Susanou. The ancient pagan religion of Baal, which the Israelites often inclined to, resembled this. In the religion of Baal, for the master god El, first invented was his "wife" Ashtaroth (Asherah) , and then the myth became that a son Baal was born to them. Later people worshiped Baal who is a god of richness, and Ashtaroth who is a goddess of productiveness and pleasure rather than worshipping the master god El."

"Thus the scheme that gods were born to the master god is the same as the scheme of the Shinto mythology. It is possible to think that the Japanese mythology includes a remnant of the ancient religion of Baal."

-- "It is possible" what does that mean? It is also possible to think that most polytheistic religions have a similar pattern of deo-genesis (for example, ancient Greece's native religion or the Roman religion that stemmed from it). Actually, I can't think of many polytheistic religions that don't follow this pattern. It is possible that they are all related. Or it is possible that this pattern is indicative of an inner desire within the nature of human beings to start explaining things from a nuclear standpoint and then expand the scope until it encompasses everything (like the Christian creation myths and the big bang). Of course, "it is possible" that all religions came from aliens, as well as it is possible that this man clearly has no real analytical capabilities. Let's cut back to the tape.

"Archaeologists state that the religions of Babylon and Egypt had originally believed in one god called "the god of sky," who seemed to have a connection to the Biblical "God of heaven." Later, their religions degraded to the polytheism."

--Ok.

"I think that we can safely say the same thing happened to the Shinto religion."

--Yeah, I feel safe saying that. Does this author believe that by saying "we can safely say" he is allowed to present baseless data? This isn't even logical. Ok, maybe he'll give proof in the next bit...

"I suppose that the ancient Shinto religion had the belief in God Yahweh, but later degenerated into polytheism. I believe that the Japanese people should come back to believe in one true God whom the Bible teaches."

Anyway, I'll leave you guys to your own MST3000 episode on this.

Just wanted to write something to keep up precedent. Back from the Momus concert, which was cool for the most part. I am tired and will be going to bed shortly. I have a few pictures too.

Yeah, I have no intention of continuing this post right now, good night.

"I could never touch you, I think it would be wrong. I've got your letter, you've got my song."-Weezer

Little kids scare me. It's not that I don't like them (actually, I think they are kinda cool). They just have this power to see through any pretenses I throw up that I am a teacher. I start to teach and suddenly they're jumping, they're nearly poking their eye out with a pencil or they're running off to another room to play. If I were a real teacher, I could take this opportunity to show the kids my Theodore Roosevelt "Big Stick" but since I am merely a tutor teaching two children, I can only sit and say "stop, please come to the table" which is something like telling Germany not to invade France.

Today was day three of my teaching career and day-by-day my authority is decreasing. Even with the parents I am finding myself unable to explain sentence patterns like "comes in a variety of flavors" and wont even start on how my recent degradation in spelling ability has come back to attack me. And then the computer I printed out on decided to chop off significant portions of the dialog that I wazawaza put together. If this weren't a set four-lesson gig I might think of getting a real textbook.

Aside from that, I've begun enjoying my newfound outside tendencies as a result of Dan's visit. It was the last time we could see Dan before he returned to Sendai, so we all went out for omelets. The weather was beautiful for the two hours we sat at that second story restaurant looking out the window at Sancha

Around four the sky grayed over and the air got a little colder and damp. It reminded me of summer camp on a beach in Aptos; like a bittersweet reminder that I live closer to the beach now then I ever did back in California.

Lately many things have been appealing to me in place of updating my website and sleeping. Yesterday I returned a CD to Tsutaya and updated the ID3 tags on all of my mp3s. Ranking even higher on the dork scale, today I decided to finally re-do all the midi patch names (something like 500) that were lost on my software synths due to the move from my old computer to the laptop. I did start a new post page because the other one was getting close to 30k and it's been a week and I feel like starting a new one. The old page is, of course, accessible through the archive. But really, I promise, on Richard Bustos' grave, that I will update with all of the f'n reviews and pictures that I have within the next week. And if I don't, you can have my Xbox.

"I got electric guitar, I play my stupid songs, I write these stupid words, and I love everyone waiting there for me, yes I do." -Weezer

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