American Gaijin
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I Love how Japanese Women Talk
It’s funny how, in all my studies of Japanese, and their obsession with all things cute, the thing I love the most is how some Japanese women say “ka”. They pronounce it “kaw”, and it’s the cutest thing ever. It’s funny because the Japanese have built entire industries on being cute. Idol culture, schoolgirls, kawaii…
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Systems Vs. Goals
As you might have gathered at this point, I listen to the Scott Adams podcast. He’s a pretty intelligent guy and generally I respect intelligence. Of course he has a few blind spots of his own, but he’s only human, I suppose. His opinions in theology and philosophy are generally useless, but he makes up…
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Texas
Probably one of the most frequent questions that’s never been asked of me, but probably would be if people felt comfortable asking me questions, would be “what’s it like living in Texas”? Well, specifically for my foreign friends, let me answer that question. Texas is big. I mean really big. It’s one and a half…
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Akimoto Yasushi – a Second Take.
A couple of years ago, I wrote a post about Akimoto Yasushi, the guy who founded the AKB48 jpop empire. Akimoto Yasushi – Good or Evil? I want to revisit that post now. As I’ve become more familiar with Japanese culture, I’ve begun to see nuances that I didn’t before. Are my previous criticisms valid?…
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Ants
I have a bit of an ant problem in my house. Dunno where they came from but I started finding them everywhere. Little blighters that get into everything in search for that next bit of food. Harmless but annoying. So I got some Terro. It is a sweet liquid that ants love, mixed with borax.…
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Liminality
This is the third post I’ve written on this topic. I abandoned the first two. Hopefully this one works out. In my life, I have had several times when I experienced something I could not put a word to. It is a feeling of unreality, of crushing loneliness, like something is subtly but catastrophically wrong.…
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Memories: College
This is the second in a series of posts where I recall some memories of earlier in my life. Think of it as memoirs no one wants to read. The memories are as accurate as I can make them, though they may be slightly embellished due to faded memory, and may merge several related memories…
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Memories: Going to the Feast
I am going to write a series of posts where I recount memories. They may be slightly embellished or multiple memories merged together, but will be completely accurate in their essence. It was the day we were to leave for the feast in Dayton, Ohio. The feast (or Festival of Tabernacles) was a seven day…