kEn'S tWiStEd rAnT: May 2007

Poor girl!

She has every reason to look in pain... there she was, minding her own business on a Japanese comedy show when all of a sudden a man in a dog suit appeared, flipped her over and put her in a painful wrestling hold. Sore back in the morning and no mistake...

Bad day at the office...

Grrr... one of those days... why does it always rain on me, born under a bad sign, etc... what happened? here's the low down...

- woke up late, had to get up without the usual coffee and contemplation infront of the internet time.

- found that my handlebars are almost falling off, due to a loose bolt.. also tyres very soft.

- train to work was cancelled.. and the next one was 20 minutes late, so i had to miss one lesson and thus one lesson's worth of money.

- taught a boy who doesn't speak. 40 minutes of me asking him closed questions.

- needed some time for office admin, but things kept cropping up. called boss for a quick question, ended up speaking for whole lunchbreak.

- almost had an open lesson at end in which to do much needed paperwork, but a student turned up with 20 minutes to go.

- contact lens almost fell out on walk to train station.

- no coffee in house.

True, there have been worse days... and I quite enjoy being able to complain...

Japan, Japan, Japan...

Where but in Japan could you find the following things?

First of all, the worst shoes imaginable, so laughable and pretentious that no more needs to be said.

And second, in a contry of bizarre posters, something that even a seasoned ex-pat would do a double take at... a girl, eating a massive shaved ice thing (I think), being waited on by a sheep?... only in Japan!

Another lazy weekend...

Ahh, the weekend.. a time for lazing about, sipping at coffee and sofa time with the wife. That and more this weekend, with firstly the alarmingly middle aged pleasure to be had in finishing a jigsaw puzzle yesterday.

And then today, a little sojourn to the local art museum for an exhibition of nudes...

Admittedly, I am no real fan of art museums. I'd rather go to an art museum than watch motorsport or motorbike racing, but then I'd rather eat wet dog shit out of Jocelyn Wildenstein's hand than watch that. It was an ok exhibition though, bar one thing... the group of salarymen on an outing who kept shouting and laughing and acting like arses throughout. Every painting was greeted with "aahhh!" and stupid comments about their offices. Here's a photo of them posing for a group photo outside.

One of them did have a stupendous wig though, which was by far the most interesting thing about the visit. Following the art, there came the obligatory taking photos of flowers...

Viewing the average Japanese photo album is a very mundane affair... all you see is photos of people giving peace signs in front of various landmarks, fireworks and flowers up close...

Mixed emotions...

I woke this morning at 4.30am, early but not early enough to catch the first half of the Champions League final... to my dismay, Liverpool couldn't win it, and Milan celebrated their 7th European crown.

In low spirits, I went back to bed, trying not to wake my wife...

Waking up a few hours later, my feeling was still low, especially when my wife pointed out that Liverpool lost because I had overslept (curse her Eastern zen mindset!). However, things suddenly took a turn for the better, when she presented me with a package from England. A birthday gift from Diamond, and what a gift! Ninja Warrior on vhs! Perhaps the worst film ever made, yet essential for just that fact! To honour the greatness of this gift, here is the jacket...

I really want to put together a full movie review, in the style of Matt from x-entertainment, but for now all I will say is look at the blurb, laugh, and then look again at who is in this movie...

Ken. Watanabe. Yes, THE Ken Watanabe! I'll bet this one isn't on his cv...

------------UPDATE------------------------

Apparently, this is NOT the famous Ken Watanabe but someone else... sorry Ken-san!

Laughing fit!

It hadn't happened to me for a long time... the last time I had a really good laugh was whilst watching an episode of the Japanese show "Silent Library", but that wasn't a bona fide laughing fit, more of a suppressed giggle with a watery eye..

The last proper laughing fit was probably when I was at Sixth Form and me, Ian Drakard and a few others were in a music assembly. The time before that was at primary school, when Liam Price gave an assembly about Bonny Prince Charlie, causing Richard Godfrey and myself to nearly die of hysterics...

Well, it finally happened again, this time at 1.19pm on a Monday afternoon in Omuta... a combination of thinking about some of the more humorous students we were going to teach and some of the witty adlibs in the teachers room sent me tittering over the edge. It was quite a sight.. I was bent over at the waist, eyes streaming and trying not to die, the bell frantically ringing... walking into the first class, the deadpan look on the face of my highschool student had the same effect, and with a muffled apology I put my head on the desk and wetted it with my shoulder-heaving giggle tears.

I somehow made it through the day, and later learned that another teacher, Jenny, had a similar experience a few lessons after, laughing so much that her chest hurt. It was a day of one-liners and belly laughs, doubling over and booming with laughter until the tears wouldn't come any more. And it was WONDERFUL!

Some things that are on the tip of my tongue...

- will the security guys be ultra arsey today, or just usual-arsey?
- will YMT finally replenish their stock of non sugar cafe latte?
- when will the weather finally ascend into summer heatedness?
- how on earth am i going to complete challenges 22, 26 and 27 of Perfect Dark?
- how many young Japanese people realise that Japanese pop culture is utterly superficial and shallow?

Update: Jessica Alba Queen of the Mouth now, but still a pale second next to Natalie Imbruglia circa 1997-1998...

What would you do with a time machine?

i have to admit that the first thing that came to mind was to go back to late 1998 and start taping the entire output of 4later...

(What's 4later? Are you kidding?? 4later was channel 4's late night lineup from 1998 until sometime in 2001, running at around 10pm-5am, Thursday to Sunday. Including such shows as Vidz, Bits, Exploitica, Late Night Poker and many others, it was a an integral part of University life back then...)

This just in...

Bobby "Borris" Pickett, singer of The Monster Mash, is dead... he was 69, and succumbed to leukaemia...

Those of you in Kurume who head to karaoke nights with that ragtaggle swathe of Novaites will know that the song in question is my juu-hachi ban (十八番）, or number 18, or "go-to song"... the big bash on May 15th will see a rendition in tribute, no doubt...

In Kurume...

The new dentist's surgery to the side of Hanabatake Station looks great, and more like something from a Lynch cheese dream...

Whenever I take the inlaws dogs for a walk, I end up with one of my father in law's questionable shirts to stave off the cold, and end up resembling a poor extra from Miami Vice, whereas the fragrant Kate always looks effortlessly cool, in this case a vision in 70s chic...

A few thoughts...

1. You are in a cable car with a pro bodybuilder and a pro gymnast, and suddenly it lurches and you topple out, hanging by the fingertips of one hand. Who would you want to pull you to safety - the bodybuilder or the gymnast? (Got to be the gymnast... infinitely stronger)

2. Which famous person's face would you like to smack the most? (Tough one...)

3. Coffee and cheese before bed is glorious.

4. The next time I see a ridiculous wig in Kurume/Omuta I'm going to take it off the person's head and hide it somewhere.

5. It's quite late and it'll be a struggle during tomorrow's early jog.

Bike troubles...

I have a love hate relationship with my latest mama chari (grandma style) bike... it's very comfortable, and has gears... but the chain has an annoying habit of coming off and getting wedged in the gears... the wedging is annoying, but not nearly as much as the fact that it always seems to happen at really inopportune moments, such as when i am in a hurry, or, as was the case on Saturday, when it was pissing down with rain...

Yes, the rain was tumbling down, yes, I wanted to get home early, and yes, my chain had come off and had lodged itself all greasy and black in the gears... yes, it was messy to fix it, yes, it did take about 20 minutes (no tools), and yes, not a few old ladies stopped to say "it's raining."

At this moment I hate my bike chain.. so much so that I have decided to post a photo of it next to one of UB40, a scathing blow if ever there was one..

Why why why...

... would anyone in their right mind pay the better part of 6 quid for a small bottle of fruit juice???

Things of note recently...

Another manager change at work... Yumi, pictured here next to my spectacular shirt and tie combination, is off to Kagoshima, so that means a bit of a shakeup...