California Dreamin'

You'd think that after five days in California I might have managed to take a few interesting pictures. Sadly, no. In fact, it seemed I did more driving than anything else. This picture, taken from my hotel room, pretty much captures the image of California that I returned to Japan with.


In fairness, this has more to do with a busy work schedule than with California "sucking" or anything like that. A couple of (very subjective) general observations:

--Aside from a few security types (especially at the airport), this trip really reinforced my perception of Americans as being incredibly friendly, generous, and kind to visitors. I've been to Boston, New York, several New England states, and now Los Angeles/Southern California. Every encounter I've had with Americans in America has been a positive experience. Maybe being Canadian allows me to "pass as American," but still...

--I found this strange, especially in a place like California: the salads I had at restaurants were awful. It was the lettuce. It seemed somewhat off, or at least not very fresh. I had one very good spinach salad, though. Everything else I ate was awesome.

--At my hotel, at the malls, pretty much everywhere I went, the service staff were Spanish-speaking people (I assume from Mexico). This in itself is not very troubling to me, but I hope that these peoples' kids at least have the chance to go to university, etc.

--This probably has more to do with me being an English-speaker and a Canadian than anything, but I clearly felt more comfortable on this trip than my Japanese colleagues. It sometimes seemed to me that, for them, anything less than complete obsequiousness from wait staff, for example, was to be interpreted as outright hostility. Personally, I quite enjoy it if someone in a shitty job can find a clever, subtle way of letting me know that I'm being an idiot. I'm not talking about general rudeness, I'm talking about an intelligent person reminding me that he/she is my fucking equal, regardless of the current circumstances. It's one thing I miss about Canada, and frankly Japan could use more of this.

--I didn't get a chance to spend an evening in a bar, meeting and talking to people. On a personal level this trip was a failure.

Tonight...

Tonight, still jet-lagged, I'm staying put in my hotel room. I have, of course, the necessary libations to offer the gods of travel (and my own bottomless depravity), but still... I can't shake the feeling that I'm somehow being beckoned to a more interesting place, a better place... Oh, alright, a fucking fun place. Someplace like this...

It ain't easy being an aging rocker...

Angel Stadium

From my hotel room I can see Angel Stadium, home of the Los Angeles Angels of Anaheim [clears throat...].

In-N-Out

You know you're in California when...


... you have lunch at an In-N-Out.

A strange thing happened just after taking this shot. I had no sooner snapped it when some sort of security person scooted up to me in a golf-cart-type vehicle and told me that it was forbidden to take pictures. Having no desire to be deported back to Canada via Guantanamo, I meekly turned off my camera and put it back into its case. I suppose the "no pictures" rule may have had something to do with the fact that I was technically on a university campus (UC Irvine). Nevertheless, North America seems weirder to me every time I come back...

Tree Branches in the Evening (2)

California!

Fighting through severe jet lag, exhaustion, etc. to write this, but I'll probably be up all night anyway, so what the hell...

Arrived at LAX at about 10:00 this morning and, at the risk of offending my American friends, I have to say that the process of clearing US customs and immigration must be the slowest and most inefficient in the world. Please, will somebody in the American government go over and see how the Japanese do it? They have a similar fingerprint, photo, anal probe, etc. system, and it's never taken me more than 20-30 minutes to clear customs there. (Bonus for Canadian travelers: the anal probe is optional, no doubt due to the special relationship we have with our American overlords friends.)

Not being a big city guy, it's always a bit of a rush to stumble out of the front doors of the airport of a big city; jet-lagged, exhausted, stinking, and stunned, the sheer magnitude of the apparent chaos that confronts me outside makes it seem as if I've stepped onto the surface of another planet. I like to soak it in for a few moments as I get my bearings (a strategy that I've found prevents me from losing my mind completely when dealing with sensory overload). It always seems to me that I'm the only person there who hasn't got a fucking clue where he's supposed to be going...

Eventually we (I'm traveling with a couple of Japanese staff members) made our way to the shuttle bus that would take us to the car rental place. We had to rent a car and then drive down to Orange, where we're staying. In my somewhat shell-shocked state I didn't really feel like driving, but the looks of terror on my companions' faces told me that maybe I'd better and, with the GPS programmed, we headed out onto the freeway! Here I was, cruising down a California freeway! Now, in my mind I'd always kinda pictured this scene involving a beautiful blond-haired woman, the windows down, The Eagles or something on the radio... You know, the usual crap. In fact, it was more a white-knuckle ride into terror (although my fellow travelers seemed genuinely impressed that a) I had the air of someone who actually had half a clue about what he was doing, b) we neither struck nor were struck by other cars, and c) I didn't make a single wrong turn). We arrived at our hotel in one piece. Mission accomplished...

Each time I come back to North America I seem to experience an increased sense of reverse culture shock. It's really weird how the smallest, most mundane things can momentarily paralyze me, leave me trying to remember how I'm supposed to act, what I'm supposed to do, in this or that situation. In Japan, for example, there's no tipping anywhere, so I've gotten out of the habit. Now when I find myself in a tipping environment my mind seems to go into some sort of "calculation loop" as I frantically try to figure out how much to give as a tip. This used to be almost second nature to me. Another thing is North American food portions. Tonight, as I was struggling to finish my $10 side of beef and bushel and a half of potatoes it became clear to me why the Japanese are, by and large, a lot slimmer than Westerners.

Of course there's one cultural aspect of North America that trumps pretty much everything else: I can speak English. I can read the signs. I'm not illiterate (in fact here I might be considered an extremely literate fellow, if I do say so myself...). I can get into the background chatter at a bar or restaurant or wherever. I understand what people are saying to me and I understand what the fuck is going on. There's no confusion, and therefore no headaches. I would never say that I'm not able to relax in Japan, but here in North America I can relax in a different way.

Tree Branches in the Evening (1)

I was very busy for a while. Then I was very tired. This was followed by being kinda sick. Now, tomorrow morning I'm hopping on a plane to spend a few days in southern California on work-related stuff....

Anyway, maybe I'll blog a bit from California. In the meantime...

Hmm...

Rainbows

Roof

Public Toilet

Train Spot

Layers of Wire

Shrink Rap

It has become apparent to me that it's about time for the establishment of some sort of officially recognized hierarchy in the world of quacks. Read (and watch!) in wonder and awe as Scientology blames Al-Qaeda terrorism on psychiatry:

Chairman of CCHR Florida [a "Scientology front group"] Dave Figueroa claims that terrorism is inextricably linked to psychiatry. As he puts it: “behind those individual acts of mayhem you find psychiatrists, you find psychologists and their drugs." In bin Laden’s case it was Zawahiri: “that ideology of terror was coming from bin Laden who was influenced by a psychiatrist and that really is the bottom line."

I can't wait for the Tom Cruise docudrama...

[Link via Daimnation!.]

Nunchaku!

Words cannot express how utterly envious I am of the guy in this video:


Nothing says "attitude" like nunchaku!

[Via Japan Probe.]

By the River

A little sick and very tired these days. A couple of cell phone pics...




I suppose the argument could be made that standing around in the rain smoking cigarettes and snapping pics on one's cell phone might play some small part in causing one to be "a little sick"...

Newsreading Tip

When you're reading a news story with a headline like 'Atlantis' spotted on ocean floor off Africa, if the story includes a picture of Patrick Duffy (The Man from Atlantis), there's a distinct possibility that the "facts" of the story are not to be trusted.

Ship

Hotel

Walking on Air

It's harder than it looks...

Footprints

"The Beartles"

In Passing...

A couple of genuine rock 'n' roll luminaries died recently...

It's pretty hard to find a video of The Stooges that features Ron Asheton, their original guitar (and later bass) player. Iggy's a bit of a camera hog...



[Asheton's work with Destroy All Monsters also comes with Kyklops' highest recommendation.]

Lux Interior also died recently. Being the lead singer of The Cramps, he was always at the front of the stage.



"I've got 96 tears and 96 eyes" (from "Human Fly"): yeah!

Obligatory Valentine's Day Post

Taken in December at Nyutabaru Air Show.




Click here if you're curious about Valentine's Day in Japan.

Strawberry Letter 23

Since hearing this song a couple of weeks ago (for the first time in a long time), it's been stuck in my head. I mean, it's a great tune and all, but make it go away! Maybe if I do some funky Ringu-type hex (i.e. get someone else to listen to it), my brain can resume its regular background noise of death metal and stuff...

Shuggie Otis-Strawberry Letter 23ALT. LINK
Did you listen? Did you? You have to listen...

Yuck

As a brief follow-up to some comments I made a couple of weeks ago about inept users of Google, I give you:

I WASH MY MOTHER FUCK

Yeah, caps and all... Whatever, dude...

Rock!

You can make your own here.

Rock

Are You Really that Stupid?

As each post-Obama-election day passes it becomes increasingly clear that the American "right" consists of nothing more than a bunch of whiners and sissies. Big Hollywood is probably the best example of what I'm talking about. How the right can drone on about a "free market" while crying about Hollywood making money on (allegedly) "leftist" movies is quite beyond me.

And really, it's ridiculous and pathetic at the same time to read something like this:

Nowhere is Hollywood bias more blatant than at awards shows. The nominations and prizes provide a remarkable window into the political leanings of the industry. The snub of Clint Eastwood for Best Actor in “Gran Torino” is symptomatic of that overwhelming bias.

Now, as anyone who's been watching movies since anytime before, say, yesterday, knows, Clint Eastwood has been nominated eleven times for Academy Awards (he's won best director and best picture twice, as well as a lifetime achievement award--that's five Academy Awards).

What really pisses me off, however, about the above-linked piece-of-shit-posing-as-political-commentary, is the attempt to whore-out, as it were, a true American icon like Clint Eastwood (and by "true" I mean real, not some bullshit facsimile).

I don't give two flying fucks what Clint Eastwood's actual political leanings are. In fact, since I only "know" Clint Eastwood through his movies, I have no idea how he votes. I have no idea what Eastwood thinks of abortion, of the stimulus package, and a whole bunch of other shit (well, OK, I'm pretty sure he likes jazz).

I'm a huge, and I mean fucking gigantic, fan of Clint Eastwood's body of work. Unforgiven is an existential masterpiece by my reckoning ("It ain't got nothin' to do with deservin'..." Damn!).

Apparently I'm the only guy on the planet who had no idea that Clint Eastwood was/is a political conservative. How can that be? I'll tell you how that can be, in case it isn't so obvious to you. I know Clint Eastwood through his art. He's a fucking artist, not some shill for a bunch of Christ-bothering, knuckle-dragging, racist, sexist, ultimately fucking stupid bunch of losers who wouldn't know a good movie if it came up and bit them on their sorry asses.

Pocket of Light

Cell phone pic.

The Bad Plus

Great band with a stunning cover of a Pink Floyd classic. The Bad Plus is basically a 3-piece jazz band (piano, drums, bass) that primarily covers rock and pop tunes. They do an admirable job of avoiding shtick and staying true to the core of the tunes they cover (they do a version of Sabbath's "Iron Man" that beggars description). On their latest album, For All I Care, they've added a very fine-sounding vocalist.

Give this a chance. In particular, as the song builds in the second half, the juxtaposition of the haunting vocals and the band seemingly going off the rails does a nice job of conveying both the beauty and the horror of someone losing his/her mind.

The Bad Plus--Comfortably NumbAlt. Link

Jugs o' Whiskey

I guess there's nothing particularly unusual about a 4 liter jug o' whiskey (mmm... whiskey...), but I was mildly surprised to come across a booze section while shopping at the newest Yamada Denki here in Miyazaki.


Yamada Denki is Japan's largest chain of electronics shops. Their stores tend to be really big--imagine a WalMart with nothing but electronics--and this new one, aside from being huge, also has a pharmacy, sells kitchenware, booze, and designer goods. Need a new watch? Here they start at about a buck and go all the way up to a Rolex. Pretty clever, if you ask me. The store I was in yesterday recently opened across the street from a competitor's shop (Kojima), which itself had opened less than a year ago.

Pond

Moon

Friends

Things You Learn as You Get Older...

You know all that lame, stupid shit that used to drive you crazy when you were younger?

Guess what. You're doomed. Doomed, I say, to teach it to your kids.

Tonight, out of the fucking blue, I taught my daughter the "Chicken Dance."



You've gotta believe me. I had no fucking idea that I even knew the chicken dance. I was, like, just playing around with my kid and, next thing I knew, I was teaching her the chicken dance. What have I done? What kind of future am I giving my daughter?



[If you didn't at least crack a smile at that second video, well, have a nice day in hell! Thank you, YouTube.]

Please Don't Adjust Your Sets...

A minor program note for the 3 or 4 of you who drop by here regularly: I've decided that it's a bit awkward and cumbersome to make people who actually know my name refer to me as "Kyklops." Therefore, although this blog will likely always be named Kyklops, posts will now be signed by my real name--Rick...

Huh? Just one name? (you're asking yourselves--or not). Yeah, just one name. I'm like one of those Brazilian soccer players, you know... In fact, if I were a pro hockey player, I think I'd just go by "Rick." Of course, if I were in the NHL using only my first name I'd probably get the shit kicked out of me about 20 times before the end of the first period of the first game I played.

This is just a blog, though...

About 8,392 Kilometers

A Piece of Public Art Near My Place

82-1

Cell phone pic.

More Reflections

At the Art Museum

This past Sunday I went with my family to the Miyazaki Prefectural Art Museum. There was a big exhibition of young, local artists from all over the city. It must have been quite a thrill for these young artists to have their work displayed on the same walls where frequently hang the works of Monet, van Gogh, Picasso, and the like.

As (I believe) with most museums, the taking of photographs is generally frowned upon. I had to surreptitiously snap the ones below with my cell phone, so I apologize for the poor quality. You can click any of the photos to get a larger view.

As the images below make clear, young Japanese artists have many artistic influences, and follow many of the great artistic "schools." It's quite common for most of these young artists to work together in one large room while honing their craft. Not being especially artistically inclined myself, and having no formal training in the fine arts or art history, it's beyond me to pinpoint the specific influences of each of the artistic groupings you see below. Perhaps you, gentle readers, can help me?








Here's one of the young artists hamming it up for the camera:


And here's a sampling of her work:

Eating Sweet Potatoes after Digging Them Up
and Roasting Them over an Open Fire
Apparently one of the young artists (I think his name was Escher...) was so highly regarded that they put a number of his works in their own room just down the hall.


Maybe next week we'll go check out this Escher fellow...

A Minute or So by the Shore

Just what the post title says...

Wash & Dry

Cell phone pic.

Swingin'

At the playground. Very short clip.

Levitation

She's been practicing...