On the recommendation of Good Friend Barbara, I convinced Kris and Steve to take a trek out of Tokyo today, up to the mountain-side shrine of Oyama.
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It’s been a mad busy couple of days. Steve, Kris and I have checked out Asakusa, Kappabashi-dori, Ueno’s Ameya Yokocho, Ikebukkuro, visited the Japanese Sword Museum, ninja-esque in its secretiveness, and saw the much-ballyhooed Roppongi Hills Mori Art Museum.

Oh, and we saw “House of the Flying Daggers,” or “Lovers,” ironically a less romantic title, and unfortunately the one used here in Japan.

Oh, and Kris and Steve joined me for a class with a private student.

Oh, and… nevermind. But I want to get a few words in on the sword and art museums, since I’ve been to the other places before.
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Due to a fantastic brainfart on my part, Kris, Kazuyo and I did not get to check out the fire festival in Fujiyoshida.

However, we did see a very culo mikoshi matsuri, a portable shrine festival. But these things are portable much in the same way that a baby elephant is portable. They’re massive.

Also massive was the torrential typhoon that hit Japan today. When it rains it snows, as the song goes, but weather mistakes, stupid brain tricks and Steve-o’s arrival getting pushed back a day still couldn’t put a damper on a fun day out.

Click below for two more photos, and hit them to see about 10 more from today.
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I’ve got two of my favorite people from my Boston days coming to visit tomorrow – Kris and Steve-o – so updates between the 26th and the 5th might be a bit spotty – especially since the three of us could probably talk the balls off a rhinoceros.

Living in a country with royalty is just about as strange as screwy governmental systems could be.

Depsite the best efforts of friends, students and the most brilliant schemers this side of the Tama River, I just can’t figure ‘em out. They’re a huge drain on the economy, they have absolutely no social value whatsoever since they’re constantly hidden from their “subjects” – except for perhaps asinine gossip – and the empire they purportedly represent didn’t even last a century.

Feh. Just let the poor woman go be a diplomat and be done with it. This is like Princess Diana II: Electric Boogaloo.

Last Friday night’s adventure involved me taking my good friend Bon-Bon Rodriquez to an izakaya in Shimokitazawa. I forgot the place’s name, but I know how to get there – infinitely more important than what it’s called.

They serve a wonderful takezake – sake held in frozen bamboo pitchers – and on this particular Friday night, they also served free sushi to everyone in the packed joint.

It must have been Koizumi’s birthday.

Unfortunately, Ralph the Masseuse also made an appearance. At the table. Hopefully they’ll forget about the incident and let me back in.

In this wondefully technological age, where binary might seems sometimes to be just a hair short of magic, I’m being confronted by a problem as old as dirt and as as new as the microchip.

My system’s buggy.
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