Is the holiday half empty, or half full?

5 days down, 5 to go.

I just spent 5 minutes looking for my glasses. I was already wearing them.

I have achieved very little in the last 5 days. I have, however, had the chance to go to power yoga almost everyday. This has had the twin effects of:
(a) I feel very relaxed about life in general (not that I was a worrywart to begin with) and;
(b) I have taken to wearing my pyjamas almost 24 hours a day.

Since I have been able to go to the afternoon class of power yoga rather than the evening class, I remain in my PJs all morning. Now there is no sense getting a nice clean set of clothes dirty when I'm only go to wear them for a few hours, is there? Since I'm using dodgy, old tracksuits for PJs I then go to the class in them, with my new PJs in my backpack. After the class I shower and change into my new set. Ready for bed and it's only half past 3 in the arvo! Does life get any better (sadder?) than this. I think not.

I believe that shopping in one's PJs on the way home from the gym is acceptable. It is good preparation for the twilight years.

I shouldn't really undervalue my achievements of the last few days. I did see National Treasure.

The Movie Maven
National Treasure is not a bad action film. It's just not a good one either. It is the Lost in Translation of action movies in that it begins at a certain pace, continues with that pace, and then finishes at that same pace. This is ok for a quirky character piece like Lost in Translation, but is the death of an action movie.

Somebody forgot to tack a climax onto National Treasure. There is no showdown between good/evil, rich/poor, or in this case the short hair/wavy locks of Mr. Cage and Mr. Bean. The first hour did a passable job of shifting gears between first and second as the over-the-top premise is set up and then run with. And so with that done I was waiting for the film to change into high gear. Well I was left waiting as it continued to coast on down to the credits, hardly making any effort at increasing the excitement.

For those of a gentle disposition.

How do I love thee Firefox?

I am so happy with Mozilla’s browser Firefox. I made the change at Xmas time and haven’t looked back. I love the tabbed browsing. I recommend the Foxy Tunes extension. It makes listening to Triple J an uncluttered experience on the computer. After some advice from Miss Linda I also looked into this young people’s RSS/Atom stuff. So now I use the Sage extension and with one click I can tell whose blogs have been updated. No more disappointment from visiting someone’s blog to see no change. If anyone has other useful Firefox extensions, please let me know.

BTW, ten days of holidays begin now.

Despite Dave's advice on Sunday I'll be making my way to see National Treasure with movie buddy Allan in tow. Although I should really say that I am in tow, as Allan did most of the organizing. I'm not trying to shift blame, just giving credit where it's due. Cause you know I'll go and watch almost any old shit. Especially if it's on DVD and I'm renting it on half price Tuesday. And with that...

The Movie Maven

Starship Troopers 2
What would happen if the bugs declared war, and nobody came? Starship Troopers 2 is essentially a gory haunted house flick with bugs book ending the affair. In this I thought the Starship Trooper duo were a twist on the first two Alien movies. Alien is a haunted house in space, Aliens is a war movie. The Starship Trooper films reverse this, and the effect is not so stunning. Diminishing the numerical threat of the bugs is a bit of a let down after the ludicrousness of the first movie. It’s another sequel that doesn't live up to the first. What a surprise.

For fanboys who like blood on their tits.

Sex and the City
Finally all the seasons have been watched. Watching all of Sex and the City is like eating 5 King Size Kit Kats followed by a steak dinner. It seems like a good idea as you start out sweet and full of sugary fun, but by the 5th bar one is getting a little queasy in the stomach. And so by the end of the 5th season I'd pretty much had my fill of the neurotic, rich, white chicks from the Big Apple. There were many singular moments I’d enjoyed and laughed at, but mostly their greatest crisis in life was whining about which wealthy man one should commit to. It's really hard to give a shit about them. Sure it was always witty and well written, but I kept waiting for it to say something real about life that wasn’t a reprocessed pun.

Thank you baby Jesus for the steak dinner that was the 6th and final season. Finally the writers decided to give the ladies lives that the viewer could sink their teeth into.

For those who have never seen the superb This Life.

But more than dodgy videos has transpired since you last ventured here. Monday was a holiday, and so the 3 days off necessitated a trip to Mari’s folks. I won’t go into the great food we ate (steak, fried pork cutlets), for I’d like to mention Mari’s nephew.

Kairi, is now 18 months old. He’s becoming pretty entertaining. He can’t consistently say any words yet, but continuously makes noises that can easily be interpreted as words related to what he’s pointing at, wanting, etc. And what he wants is whichever one of his toys you’ve picked up. It’s really funny how even though he’s got 15 matchbox cars in front of him, he wants the one that you’ve picked up a few seconds ago. But he doesn’t try to get it from you himself; he gets another person to do his dirty work.

At first he looks at you and grunts. When this doesn’t result in the return of the toy, he grabs someone else’s trouser leg, sleeve etc. and by grunts and pointing directs their attention to the toy thief. This continues until the return of the toy. Yes, the baby is using the adult as muscle. What are you gonna do about it, whitey?

The other day Mari and I went to a Shabu Shabu restaurant. Shabu Shabu is a very thin strip of meat that is cooked by dipping it into boiling water for a few seconds. As there are a few types of sauces that can be put on the strip, and the usual assortment of Japanese vegetables, it is a healthy and tasty affair. I’ve had it a few times before, but this restaurant had a twist. Instead of the aforementioned boiling water, it offered the option of boiling soymilk.

Never having had this before I wanted to give it a try. Well after the milk formed a skin we took this off and dipped it in one of the sauces. Yummy! Next a strip was tried. With a sesame sauce it was absolutely delicious. Japanese food is so great.

Today is so sunny I feel I should change out of my PJs and go and have a look see. I’ve had my anti-hay fever tablets, so reality is slowly regressing into the hazy distance. That means I can walk outside sans runny nose and itchy eyes for the next few hours.

Guess I better seize the daylight.

The Search for the Truth Continues

I've been watching season 8 of the X-Files, and I can tell you I've been pleasantly surprised. I had been lead to believe that it wasn't so good. But this is not the case. The previous season, the seventh season, struggled a bit. The series really looked like it was wandering around, and frankly the story that opened season 7 tanked. The writing for that story was very self-indulgent, and the story itself was too drawn out. Most of the rest of the season looked expensive, but the stories weren't happening. The nadir was the Lara Croft rip-off one.

But the new direction of season 8 has been great. Especially the additional cast member has brought something new. I was dreading these final two seasons because of the bad press, but actually it looks like the X-Files has got a second wind, at least enough to get it to the finish line.

Bugs, bugs, don't get 'em
Not so with Starship Troopers 2. I don’t know what I was thinking when I was at the video store. I tell myself that it had to be watched sometime. But that time was not now. It lasted 1/2 an hour before the stop button on the remote was pressed. Maybe I can finish it tomorrow. Appallingly bad acting, and it looks like it was filmed on video by a bunch of mates with no idea. At all. About anything. Not even worth FFing.

And with that mention of Film Forensics he segued into a shameless act of self-promotion.

I’ve FFed Battlestar Galactica.
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Food, food, get it
The gym has been closed all week due to renovations. Because of this, and a serious lack of self-control at the all you can eat pizza restaurant for lunch on Sunday, followed by a big bowl of very spicy pork cutlet ramen for dinner, as I suspected the 2 kilos were merely misplaced. Back to square ver. 1.0.

Feel New Spring

The billboard for the spring collection of women's clothes at the station has been suggesting this for the past few weeks. Yesterday it finally came true. Walked outside with my coat on, turned around, went back in and left it inside. The sun was shining and the temperature, while not warm, was no cold either. I think we call it cool.

Glad I did leave my coat, as the train was pretty warm. As usual the heaters were on even though the car was full of people wearing big coats. By four o'clock in the arvo the cooler weather had returned, but that was ok. I'd rather have a five-minute walk home in the cold than two hours sweltering on the train.

What I also felt was New Hay Fever. Watery eyes and a runny nose were the prevailing fashion for the day. I must now begin to lookout for the campaign girls who give away tissue packs in front of the station. The packs contain about 10 tissues and a leaflet advertising something or other that gets binned immediately. But the tissues are mighty handy, being pocket size and free.

Juiced up

Bought some Mocha Italian coffee on the way home. Put too much into the percolator and it felt like my first night at Fight Club - I had to fight.

Gym gymminy, gym gyminny

But instead took it out on Power Yoga. Or rather it took it out on me. I think that there is some progress happening at the gym. I weighed myself and found that I've misplaced 2 kilos. I won't be so confident as to say lost. I think misplaced is closer to the truth, as I'm sure the aforementioned kilos will turn up again in the future.

And yet to look in the mirror one wouldn't know that 2 kilos have mysteriously evaporated. The stomach is at best "saggy", and the third chin could be described as "pending". Despite a lack of visual encouragement physique wise, I am really enjoying the Power Yoga. Some of the positions are less painful than before, but any position that has the word "warrior" in it should be renamed "surrender monkey". These "warrior / surrender monkey" positions are really quite painful on the legs. They're like fencing stances, but rather than the brief second they would be held for as in fencing, one remains in them for a minute or more. Que the wobbly legs.

It is nice to do something physical that is not competitive. I used to like to play only a handful of sports - fencing and squash. Not really a handful is it. More like two fingerfuls. It could be represented as either a peace sign (overly used by women in Japanese photographs) or turn it around, palm towards your face for a nice little "fuck u" (overly used by men in Australian photographs). Whichever, it doesn't say much for my sporting prowess. However, both those sports I enjoyed with the passion of an ungifted amateur. There was a certain camaraderie that came from playing sport for fun with one's friends. It really didn’t matter whom one or lost, the journey itself was really satisfying.

Unless it was Ted and squash. I just had to beat him.
Or Mr. Henderson and squash or fencing. No way was I going to lose to him.
Or Alix and fencing. Damn I'd get angry if she beat me.
Ditto for Werner.
Losing a squash match against a Versace boy was really, really hard to take.
Ditto for Mr. Logic.
Waa and squash. To lose a point was embarrassing. How is that backhand Big Waa?
And it was always fun to beat Canadian Fred, because he'd just go off.

So really, apart from these few exceptions that brought out the competitive spirit in me, I think that I took pleasure just in the doing.

It's different with Power Yoga. Like in life and some sporting goods slogans, there is no first prize in Power Yoga. There is no reason to look around the room and compare oneself to the other players and think, "Ha. No way is she going to be able to do 'Downward Facing Dog'. That's one point for me.”

Yes, there is no confidence-boosting win. Just the endless parade of shame as yet again Man Fails to Balance on One Leg.


Power Yoga - it's vogueing for masochists. Just do it.

My Woman Rocks

Due to a blanket thrown over the media, my birthday last week went mostly unnoticed by the general public. Despite threatening to forget it, Mari was one who eventually did remember it.

She said she wanted to take me out to dinner on Thursday night, and so we ventured into Ginza. Ginza is the swankiest area of Tokyo - even a cup of Doutour coffee (the salaryman's Starbuck's) costs twice as much there for some reason. Maybe it's because it is replete with the headquarters of brand names. It's also got a very nice Italian restaurant that we tried out.

However we didn't try it out alone. She'd secretly invited a few old friends to celebrate. It was a very nice surprise as these friends (except Allan) I hadn't seen for periods ranging from 3 months to about a year. Time goes by so fast and it is easy to lose contact with people. Not only did I get to eat some of the nicest pizza I've ever eaten, I got to make off with a little booty too in the form of some presents. It was such a good time I'm thinking of having another birthday next week at the same place.

But it didn't stop there. Mari said that my present would arrive on the weekend. I thought that she meant that a courier service might be delivering something. Maybe it was some more food?

I was rudely awoken at 4:30 on Saturday morning by the alarm which Mari had set. I apparently mumbled something crazy before I realized that she was telling me I had to get up and get dressed. I also had to pack a change of clothes as we were going away for the night. Where were we going? Well we had tickets on the first flight out of Haneda airport bound for Kumamoto. Kumamoto is on the island of Kyushu, in western Japan.

It has long been a dream of mine to visit Kumamoto. One of our close friends, Chika, hails from there. Also one of my favorite ramens comes from Kumamoto. I have long wanted to try it in the town of its origin. It is basically pig fat soup, with two big pieces of pig fat pork. Drowning in this is some garnish of shredded cabbage, half a boiled egg, and some green things (either mutant beans of mutant seaweed). Were it sold overseas I'm pretty sure it would have a warning from the Surgeon General plastered on the side.

The Saturday was spent driving around to a few places. It was however cold - very, very cold. We would venture from the warmth of rent-a-car's air-conditioning for a few seconds before racing back. We saw a crater that still has a worrying amount of gas coming from it, went to an onsen, ate the greatest soba set for lunch, and took an excursion to adventure courtesy of the car's GPS system.

I'm losing faith in this modern technological wonder, the GPS. If you're familiar with the story of my move to Tama Plaza you'll know that the GPS enlisted there failed to perform. In this instance it performed, I'm just not sure what it was performing on. It constantly wanted us to deviate from the highway to take courses up into the mountains. Maybe the mountain routes it was suggesting were shorter in distance than taking the highway. Much like as in a Western you can "head them off at the pass". Or perhaps it was programmed by mountain men to lure hapless travelers to their squeal-like-a-pig festivals.

The first time we foolishly followed the GPS’ advice we found ourselves driving down a mountain road increasingly being covered in snow that was so narrow that even a 15-point turn put one in fear of plummeting. After not plummeting and then returning to the highway we reached our destination in under 5 minutes. I don't know how much time the GPS thought it was saving us. The second time left us again in the mountains, this time facing a road closed sign and a ten minute return drive to the highway. At least I enjoyed the adventure and got to see some of the pristine nature in the mountains of Kyushu.

The other oddity of the GPS was that it offered E.S.Ts based on the occult. In one instance we had a seventy-five kilometer drive before us. Previously we had been achieving an average speed of around 60kph. It gave an estimated travel time of over 2 hours. I sneered at its stupidity. Eerily though it turned out to be right. Due to an accident the traffic was for a time reduced to a crawl, and we ended up arriving just shy of its estimation. I sense a supernatural hand at work. Or maybe the mountain men, alerted by the GPS, came down from the mountain and caused the accident to trap us. Could we nearly have been victims of The Cars that Ate Kumamoto?

The Sunday was spent in Kumamoto, mostly at Kumamoto castle and the surrounding area. Kumamoto castle ties with Shuri castle as the best I've seen in Japan. Its grounds are huge and beautifully maintained. Also the castle itself it well presented, although it should be for most of it was rebuilt in the 1960s after it had been burned to the ground in an abortive civil war a little over a hundred years ago. It is thought of as one of the best 3 castles in Japan. If there is ever an agreement between myself and Blogger about pictures, I'll post them up.

After the castle came a museum, the ramen, a trip to a garden, coffee, and a return to the airport to catch our flight home. It was then that we were informed that the flight was cancelled. They were having a problem with the plane that just couldn't be fixed (I assumed they meant “at the moment” and not “ever”). As it was a technical problem I'm not too sorry that they cancelled the flight. It was pretty funny though, as this company had also canceled the flight to Kumamoto as well. They had done this on the Friday, and contacted Mari with a ticket on an alternate carrier to cover her booking. This first cancellation all happened behind the scenes to me. This late on Sunday night though there was no alternative carrier. As soon as the information came on Mari jumped straight up and grabbed the closest guy in a suit who worked for the airline to sort out the problem. In five minutes we were in a taxi to (coincidently) the same hotel that we had not long ago checked out of, all at the airline's expense. We returned to Tokyo on the first flight (with an alternate carrier) on Monday morning. So we ended up making neither flight with the booked airline. Unfortunately for me I had only morning classes on Monday, and so I was left with a day off. Boohoo, another long weekend.

And so for the reasons listed above, and countless others unlisted, my woman rocks.