Mitsuko and I were watching one of the TV shows common here in Japan, with the TV talents happily eating something or other, with extreme expressions of joy as they chew and swallow, followed by ecstatic declarations of how tasty it was... Which is when I realized that there's something wrong with us ( Read more... )

This morning the news had a short piece about a group doing their practice emergency drone flights. I missed the location, but this is an area that has had some kind of major disaster in the recent past. The guy was showing us pictures from that -- looked like a flood or mudslide, might have been an avalanche? And he was explaining that one of the ( Read more... )

Morning news had a brief piece about a new vending machine here in Japan.  Basically, it looks like a billboard, with the vendor or other information on it, until a customer gets close enough. Then it switches over to a display of the various offerings. You have to know enough to press the offering (I think they should have put clearly marked " ( Read more... )

Well, that was funny. At the Christmas Eve service, we met a young mother we know, and her two boys, about five and three years old. Mitsuko had bought a present for them, four little play trucks. The boys had a great time playing with them. But the mother asked me what they were called in English. Which is when I realized I wasn't sure!

I ( Read more... )

I think I'm missing something. One of the news items we have recently had here in Japan concerns a young couple and their child. They apparently went to the government, trying to get the child added to their family record, as is customary here. That's where the trouble started. Apparently the government so far is arguing that they cannot register ( Read more... )

I've seen a pile of these ads, with a young woman wearing what looked like earmuffs of curled braids, and then the various sheep in the background, often with some kind of large numeral one. One had her and the sheep apparently going into the base of the one, towering over the field. Usually the ad ends with the name Musee Platinum. But there was ( Read more... )

The news had a short piece about the new products out in the stationary stores right now -- it is the start of the school year here in Japan, so the stationary stores have a lot of new stuff. One item caught my attention, mostly because I had never thought about it. It's a left-handed ruler, with the numbers running from right to left rather than ( Read more... )

Sometimes Japan comes up with really interesting twists. The news had a piece about a new ... I want to call it a museum, but that's not quite right. A place for kids to play? Kind of. For example, at one area, the kids were handed real fire extinguishers, and got to put out a real fire! In another area, the parents and kids got a chance to run or ( Read more... )

They had a short piece on TV about a man, I believe in New York, who collects houcho ­­ the kitchen knives, here in Japan. Of course, he's collecting the hand­made beautiful ones that are descended from the katana, the samurai swords. He has over 200, and knows the story of each one. So they had them arrayed across a table, and he was showing us ( Read more... )

This evening, there's a made-for-TV show on. It's Hisatsu Shigotonin 2013. I'll probably watch it, although I have to admit, I don't think the movies have been as good as the series used to be. But I enjoy trying to understand the story, and contemplating just why this particular genre scratches an itch for us.
( listen to the whistle of the sword... )