Taste Of Home (Sorta), STAT's Goggles

I guess one my aunts down here suspected that I was missing America, so she bought me some food from McDonald's and a bunch of American snacks.



It's not that I was particularly craving any of the above, but it was a really quirky, thoughtful gesture.



I’m actually kind of digging Amare's goggles. I’m glad he elected to go with the Bo Outlaw look instead of the Horace Grant one.

伴都美子 「Van.」

伴都美子がニューアルバム「Van.」を12月10日にリリースすることになった。

先ごろDo As Infinityとしての活動を再開させた彼女。ひさしぶりのオリジナルアルバムとなる本作には、2006年6月発売の1stソロシングル 「Flower」から今年6月にリリースされた「東京日和」までの全シングルのほか、初めて作曲にチャレンジした新曲などを収録。“ソロアーティスト・伴 都美子”の魅力あふれる、等身大の内容となっている。ある意味、ソロ活動3年間の集大成といえるアルバム「Van.」。Do As Infinityでの彼女とはひと味違った歌世界を、この作品からじっくり味わってほしい。

本人の名前をイメージさせるアルバムタイトルだが、ほかにも“ヴァンガード（先駆者）”という意味を示すとのこと。タイトルに込めた彼女の強い意思と姿勢を感じ取ってみよう。

http://news.livedoor.com/article/detail/3862049/

Air Penny II

12 years later, the Penny II remains my favorite sneaker of all time. Now I'm just waiting on Nike to retro the blue ones.










And just in case anybody forgot how damn good Penny was...

Things That I Miss About Living Back Home

Top 20, in no particular order:

1. Roads wide enough to accommodate cars traveling both ways.
2. My shoes. My ultimate fear is that I’ll snap and start a second sneaker collection down here.
3. My subwoofers.
4. Ala Moana shopping center. I was initially excited when I heard that there was a mall across from my apartment. Unfortunately, by “mall,” they apparently meant “massive furniture store.”
5. Pop-Tarts.
6. Driving through Waiks at night.
7. Automated teller machines that I can understand.
8. DVDs that don’t cost 5,000 yen a pop. I never thought I’d miss Best Buy as much as I currently do.
9. Not having to divide my rubbish into a billion different sub-categories w/ corresponding color-coded trash bags.
10. Fruits. Everything will cost you an arm and a leg here.
11. My dog.
12. Paper towels in public restrooms. I still haven’t gotten into the swing of carrying a handkerchief with me whenever I go out.
13. Jason’s couch.
14. SportsCenter.
15. Watching SportsCenter on Jason’s couch.
16. The weather. Not that I was particularly fond of the weather back in Hawaii or anything, just that the weather here is sort of bizarre.
17. Tylenol.
18. The gas prices. Yeah, it’s that expensive over here.
19. Non-McDonalds fast food joints. I’m gonna live at the BK Lounge when I get back home.
20. Speaking English.

Things That I Love About Living Here

Top 20, in no particular order:

1. Rocking Dunks that are $80 USD, but 16,000 JPY to everyone else.
2. Having a convenience store across the street.
3. 丸一唐揚げ chicken. Pretty much the best fried chicken that I’ve eaten. Ever.
4. The really nice people.
5. 100 yen stores, because sometimes you really need both a spatula and some magnets ASAP.
6. Actually being able to make meaningful purchases with coins.
7. People at work cutting you slack because you’re a foreigner. Regardless of your job, you’re bound to make mistakes at one point or another, so it’s always nice when people interpret your stupidity or carelessness as a “cultural misunderstanding.”
8. The snacks.
9. The shoe game. Nothing beats being in the states, but I guess that you can find decent kicks anywhere if you look hard enough.
10. Afternoon drives along the 58.
11. Never having to worry about finding a public restroom or a vending machine.
12. Okinawa soba.
13. Being able to pick up new CDs and manga on the day that they drop. No place quite like Japan to satiate a case of shameless fanaticism.
14. UNIQLO.
15. Having an air conditioner in my room. I literally run that thing all day on the weekends.
16. Japanese television. Even the nature programs over here kick ass.
17. The stray animals everywhere. I’ve seen turtles strolling along the road, cats with bow ties outside of my apartment, and dogs running around in the supermarket. It’s like Ace Ventura left his door open.
    
18. Being able to drink in public. I haven’t done it yet, but one day when I’m feeling particularly wistful, I’ll probably walk across the street to the store, grab some awamori, walk over to the beach, and watch the sunset.
19. Getting crazy gas mileage on my go-cart.
20. How safe my town is. I often see kids from the elementary school riding their bikes around in the middle of night. It's kind of surreal.
    

ネオパーク

I’ve been making it a point to visit some of the places from my childhood memories, including this old bird park way up in Nago. The exotic birds walking around all over the place initially makes for a cool experience, but all the birds kind of start to look the same after a while. There used to be a pretty amazing toucan exhibit there, where the birds would fly down from the trees and perch on your shoulders so you could feed them, but I guess something happened to one of the birds (or one of the humans), because all the toucans are chilling out in cages now. I'm nonetheless a sucker for any kind of zoo or aquarium, so I quite enjoyed myself.



I distinctly remember the place being much larger when I was 6, but I guess it was just one of those cases of the world appearing much bigger to you as a child.



They’ve also got giant fishes.



And pigs. I didn’t come to Okinawa to study animals or bask in the nature, but I’ve been getting substantial doses of both. When I go to the local athletic park for a jog at night, I have to keep a cautious eye out for poisonous snakes and low flying bats. Seriously.

Tekken 6 Console Release - Fall 09

Looks like we won't be seeing a console release of the standard Tekken 6 after all. Instead, Namco has announced a Fall 2009 release of Tekken 6: Bloodline Rebellion for both the Playstation 3 and Xbox 360. Bloodline Rebellion, much like T5's Dark Resurrection, will likely fix balancing issues that T6 had, and will feature a pair (at least) of new characters. I was excited until I actually saw what the new characters looked like.





I'm a die hard Tekken fan, but these character designs look somewhat retarded. Lars Alexandersson (top) dresses like a vampire from the future, and Alisa Bosconovitch (bottom), who's apparently a cyborg of some sort, looks more like she belongs in Xenosaga or something. Logic suggests that she's likely related to related Dr. Bosconovitch in some way, hence the "Bloodline Rebellion" title.

Guilty Pleasure

Listening to:
Allister
Guilty Pleasures
"チェリー"

I went to a club the other weekend, where I remained absolutely sober for a good 4 hours. Maybe it’s because I’m used to clubs full of idiots who know that Soulja Boy dance by heart, or maybe it’s because I was in a club in a foreign country for the first time (or maybe it was the total absence of alcohol in me), but it turned out to be an interesting experience. One thing that caught me off guard was the DJ playing a rock version of Spitz's「チェリー」. I did a little bit of research when I got back to my place, and it turns out that the cover was done by the band Allister, of “Moper” fame. I distinctly remember listening to them late in our high school lives and hating on their cover of “I Want it That Way” with Ono, so Allister is probably the last band that I thought I'd be revisiting in my mid-twenties. Their take on「チェリー」is really great stuff, and I actually like their version better than Van Tomiko's (and that’s saying a lot). Granted, it’s kind of hard to mess up a great song like「チェリー」, but there’s nothing wrong with calling a good cover what it is.

Playing Like Erick Dampier

I played basketball with my students the other day, and was thoroughly gassed within 5 minutes. I’d been in fairly decent shape prior to coming over here, but I guess two months of lounging around and eating exorbitant dinners can take a toll. I’m thinking that I’ll have to start running again, if only because I don’t want the girls basketball squad to be leaving me in the dust on a weekly basis. I prefer to play with the boys team, because there’s just something inherently wrong about swatting a 13-year-old girl’s shot into the stands. Then again, as someone with the stamina of a 70-year-old man, I guess I’m not in a position to be picky. I didn’t come here with the intent to train, but on the other hand, there’s a lot worse that I could do with my free time.

Oh, and I'm back in the game.

Do As 復活

Listening to:
Do As Infinity
TRUE SONG

So Do As Infinity played their first real post-reunion set last week, and word is that they haven’t missed a beat. They apparently plan to do live shows for the remainder of the year, and will then hit the studio to work on new material for next spring. With another Van Tomiko solo album slated to drop later this year, I’m really quite excited about all the DAI-related releases coming up. I’m still in the midst of finishing up my complete Do As Infinity discography (all singles, albums, comps, DVD lives), but having some new releases on that calendar is really what makes being a fan so fun.



According to Ryo, they’re “never breaking up again,” so that means I’ll get the opportunity to finally see my favorite band live.



But maybe not for a little while.

Hyperdunk STAT PE

I was planning passing on the Hyperdunks (and probably still will), but these Amare Stoudemire PEs are mighty fine looking.



If anything, I might just wait on the Hypermax. It's totally a "power forward" shoe, but a really sleek looking one. Must be the flywire.

Me vs Yoshimitsu's Flag

There's one of those weird Japanese flags attached to a concrete pillar next to my parking stall. It's pretty much one of those things that Yoshimitsu has attached to his back in the Soul Calibur games. I don't know how else to describe it.



Anyway, some kind of engineering savant apparently decided that it would be sensible to erect the flag using nothing but a couple of feet of chicken wire. With the typhoon winds coming and going, the dumb flag would get blown horizontally into my car's path on a semi-daily basis. I finally sick of fixing the thing and drove right through it this morning, effectively knocking the flag & pole clear off the pillar and onto the curb somewhere. I don't care particularly much for my car, and I hated the bloody flag, so it wasn't a real difficult decision to make. I just hope it's not getting added to next month's rent.