Sad To Say That...

Listening to:
倖田來未
TRICK
track: JUST THE WAY YOU ARE

...it's finally happened. I recently came across "JUST THE WAY YOU ARE," a Koda Kumi song that I actually kind of like. It’s more the strings in the backing track than anything that Koda Kumi is doing, but it’s still a pretty solid number. If only she didn’t look and talk like a gorilla. Upon being subjected to a Koda Kumi interview on television, I usually turn on GTAIV, arm myself with a baseball bat, and go looking for a woman resembling her. I’m still trying to figure out whether or not Liberty City has a zoo that I can explore, because that would certainly make things a lot simpler. Koda Kumi has also unfortunately most recently released a song called "Bling Bling Bling," which I’m absolutely certain is the worst song in the history of music. No really, it probably is.

Bowling, Beer, Basketball

Listening to:
Murs
Murs For President

I went bowling with about a dozen other teachers from school, whom I’m now convinced are the rowdiest people on the entire planet. I bowled an 81 while sober, which is straight up embarrassing, but went on to bowl a 133 once I had a little beer in me. It's not a great score, but pretty damn good by my standards. I think I might stick to it and go bowling once in a while on the weekends, more or less because it’s a sport that requires minimal running, something that really isn’t my strongest suit.

I’d been jogging to keep in shape, but I ended up putting that on hold because it just got too damn cold in December. The good thing is that all that jogging paid off last month, since I had worked myself into decent enough shape to play a really good stretch of basketball when we had the district tournament for teachers. I suppose that there’s only so much that you can gather from me saying that I played “really good,” but when that fadeaway jumper is falling, believe me, it’s on. I probably should have been laboring out there, but you don’t really feel those tired legs when your students are in the stands yelling and beating on taiko drums. I unfortunately can’t get up nearly high enough to dunk, a point of great disappointment for the boy’s basketball team, but I managed to send the gym into a minor frenzy by blocking a bunch of shots emphatically. Let’s just say that I don’t bother to keep the ball in play. You know how I do. ;-)

An interesting quirk of Japanese society is that people treat you considerably differently if you do well in sports. Especially in a rural town, “cool” is measured not by the car you drive or the shoes on your feet, but by your skills with a soccer ball or your time in the 100-meter dash. Materialistic old me found it a little odd at first, but it’s actually kind of a nice, quaint way to go about living your life.

Walking On Sunshine

You'll have to excuse me for getting a tad sappy, but this is just beautiful:



I just hope that my future wife will let me rock my Old Love Jordan XX3s when we get married. Actually, since that’s apparently been done already, my plan is to wear Royal ½ Cents and get Black ½ Cents for all of my groomsmen. That’d be pretty insane, right? I’m having way too much fun right now being single to even think about a serious relationship, never mind marriage, but I’m honestly planning on putting ½ Cents in the wedding budget when that day comes. You probably think I’m crazy, but it’s going to happen.

That Salary Looks A Little Baggy On You

Listening to:
Lily Allen
It's Not Me, It's You

I was invited to sit in on an English department meeting at the local BOE the other day. When discussing the budget, the director offhandedly mentioned how much money I made over the course of the year, and one of the teachers from a neighboring elementary school gasped and sort of covered her face for the next five minutes or so. I’ve never ruined someone’s day before by merely being present, but I suppose that there’s a first time for everything. I really don’t feel like I’m making an excessive sum of money, but I guess that in Japan it’s a pretty hefty amount for someone my age. From the perspective of a Japanese instructor who’s likely been working hard for 10 years, it probably doesn’t seem fair that a foreigner in his twenties is making so much more than her, especially one with virtually no teaching experience and considerably fewer responsibilities. I’m not looking to renegotiate my contract or anything, but I can definitely understand where she’s coming from.

Oh, It Just Keeps Getting Better...

Mere days after deciding not to trade him, the Suns lose Amare Stoudemire for the rest of the regular season due to an eye injury.



Um, maybe the Bulls will decide to release Tim Thomas again? I guess the team just goes small and hopes that Barbs and J-Rich play out of their minds. I wouldn't sweat it if Boris were still around, but...oh well.

The Return Of The Phoenix Suns (Hopefully) & Junior

Joe Johnson posed an interesting question over the weekend: “Who knows how many rings we would have had (had the Suns re-signed him)?” Probably at least one. Even with Amare out for the 05-06 season, the presence of Johnson would have been enough to push Phoenix past Dallas, and they would have likely succeeded in running past Miami in the Finals. With Johnson on the payroll they wouldn’t have been able to ink a lot of free agents to fill out the bench, but some of the draft picks that they traded away for cash turned out to be solid players like Sergio Rodriguez, Nate Robinson and Rajon Rondo. With guys like those on their rookie contracts and the core still intact, they probably would have at least had a ring or two by now. Part of the blame goes to Mike D’Antoni for refusing to give minutes to any rookies not named Leandro Barbosa, but most goes to Robert Sarver for being unwilling to pay money to keep the team’s core intact, even when they probably had 4 of the top 20 players in the league on their roster. Worse still, he was largely responsible for chasing Bryan Colangelo out of town, which eventually led to the hiring of Steve Kerr. Of course, Kerr proceeded to do his best to destroy the team, and here we are today. At times I can't help but wonder if Kerr is still secretly working for the Spurs.

The good news is that it looks like the Suns have dusted off the old 7 seconds or less philosophy, but the bad news is that there’s just a shade over 30 games left in the season with the Suns sitting in 9th place. I still have faith that this team can make the postseason and do some damage, especially since it’s apparent that Alvin Gentry still remembers how to run D’Antoni’s sets. They say that defense wins championships, an adage so routinely repeated over the years that it's become banal and commonplace, but it doesn't take a genius to see that some teams are built to play defense, some are built to run. I mean, if you're going to drop 500k on a Ferrari, you'd may as well let it loose. Beating a shorthanded Clippers team twice is nothing to to celebrate about, but scoring 140 and 142 points in regulation certainly is, if only because it means that the old Suns are back, hopefully for good.



It’s gonna be cool seeing Ken Griffey Jr. in a Mariners uniform again. Now we won’t have to worry about Nike putting out the Air Griffey in Atlanta Braves colors. Hopefully he’ll still be playing when they inevitably release the classic Griffey 2.

Turmoil, All-Star Festivities In Phoenix

Listening to:
MF Doom
Nastradoomus

So, it looks like Terry Porter could be out as Suns' head coach come Monday. I've never been a huge advocate of mid-season firings, but the players have clearly stopped responding to Porter, and really, the team's record is unacceptable given the assemblage of contracts and talent. Unfortunately, this doesn't change the fact that the team's GM has no clue what he's doing. A lot of Amare Stoudemire trade rumors have been floating around, some interesting, some laughable. I would have been happy with the Amare for Marion/Beasley trade (not happening with Trix in Toronto), and a swap with the Pistons involving Sheed, Jason Maxiell + draft picks also doesn't sound too bad right about now. Should be an interesting couple of days.

I'm not a real big Nate Robinson fan, but those neon green "kryptonite" Foamosite Lites on his feet during the dunk contest were wild.



They probably won't see a general release, but I imagine that the sneaker community will be buzzing about them for a while.