To celebrate having been in Kyoto six months, Greg, Uwachan, Nakamura-san and I all headed out for dinner to one of my favourite kushikatsu places in Kyoto. The idea that I have more than one favourite “deep-fried everything on sticks” place may seem a bit odd, but I know no less than 5 places that are good kushikatsu places. Naturally drinking alcohol also featured on this night, consisting of two great bars I had never been to before, but heard of even as early as me arriving here.
I was considering taking part in two events that occur in November on an annual basis – Movember and Nanowrimo – but I’m finding it difficult to even squeeze in the time to write these blog posts as it is and work prefers me to be cleanshaven. Both of those reasons are thinly-veiled excuses because I can’t really be arsed writing more than I currently am and facial hair maintenance for someone as hirsute as me is like fighting a bear with an orange.
Instead I’m going to write about other things. All of the other things. Things that didn’t even know they were things until I started writing about them.*
*potentially inflated statement deployed for dramatic purposes
Kodomo Keisatsu
This TV show is brilliant. Here’s the plot – there’s a criminal organisation named Red Venus and a crack squad of police have been investigating them for the longest time. Just as this group of hardened cops think they’ve got Red Venus dead to rights, Red Venus releases a mysterious gas, turning the entire group of detectives into children.
Regardless of their instant infantisation, the powers that be decide that the only way Red Venus will be caught is if these kids continue investigating them while posing as elementary school students. Because that makes perfect sense.
It goes without saying, but I’ll say it anyway because self-referential signposting is the “in thing” these days (or is it the whole doubt-what-one-is-writing-while-writing in the form of kicking the wall down between the narrator and reader by openly questioning yourself and your motives in parentheses?), that this show is hilarious.
The Adventures of Buckaroo Banzai Across the 8th Dimension
I couldn’t believe that I hadn’t seen this film as a kid. This film is unashamedly ’80s but holds up over time on sheer incredulity alone. Buckaroo Banzai (played by Peter Weller, of Robocop fame) is a half-Japanese, half-American quantum physicist/neurosurgeon/rock star who has developed the ability to travel through solid matter and access alternate dimensions. If that sentence isn’t enough of a reason to check out this film, I’ll talk about the cast.
The cast is one of those A-grade level “that guy!” casts – Peter Weller, Jeff Goldblum, Christopher Lloyd, John Lithgow and Clancy Brown (before he was “that guy!” status). Goldblum spends most of the film in garish red cowboy attire, but his character’s name is New Jersey. Convinced yet?
Just watch the damn movie. It’s entertaining as all hell as long as you don’t expect anything conventional and/or serious. I don’t want to say anymore about this film, because its almost too quotable and some of the character names are just too awesome to spoil for people who haven’t seen it yet. And it has one of the strangest, but awesome credit sequences ever.
I’m not sure if this film ever received the MST3K treatment, but I doubt it did because this film knows exactly what it is – entertainment and nothing more.
NBA
The NBA season has kicked off and I purchased the league pass for the second year in a row. I already feel like the money was well spent, because I’ve been, well… addicted. I’ve been watching as many games as I can, as often as I can. So here I am, an Australian living in Japan writing about American basketball.
This next section is going to read somewhat like aspergers in action, so feel free to skim over it if it bores you.
My Bulls haven’t had a spectacular start to the season, especially given how crisp we looked in preseason. That said, we’re still winning games and not getting blown out, so its a case of people expecting the return of Derrick Rose to equal instawins. Alas, basketball isn’t like that. We’re virtually the same team on paper, but we hit quite a stride last season in terms of running Joakim Noah in the high post as the primary playmaker. Now we have Rose back, but we’re not running many isolation plays for him, which means the bulk of our offensive sets are somewhat stagnant. There have been enough flashes of Rose to feel comfortable knowing that it’s only a matter of time that we put it all together and find our stride. Mike Dunleavy Jr. has been a great addition to the squad, providing long-distance shooting and veteran experience off the bench.
This is the Bulls year to win it all. This team will not remain intact after this season. Enough basketball talk for now.
This week marked the first time I wasn’t around for my father’s birthday. File this under another one of those “Damn, I really miss my family” moments that I’m sure most people experience while living overseas. Anyhow, we Skyped on my lunch break at work, which was great because I at least got to talk to him for a while. Most of the family was around, so it was a good chance to quickly touch base with everyone, including my nephew Darcy.
Darcy gave me high-fives via Skype, saying “yay!” and then “more?” in one of the most ridiculously cute things I’ve ever experienced.
Until next week! (Also, life has been so strangely busy over here I didn’t even realise two weeks had passed since my last entry)