Not nearly the same as being on mlb.com
but The News Chick who blogs for Seattle's KIRO Radio asked me if she could use a photo I took of Ryan Rowland-Smith a few years ago, so here I am with another photo credit. Hooray!
Well, being back here in Japan isn't the most exciting thing so far. I went and paid bills and rent today, bought some baseball magazines, had sushi for lunch at Heiroku... oh, one exciting thing is that I'll be going to see the B'z in concert on March 3rd. Unfortunately I have no clue how this 管理番号 thing works on my ticket (I got the cheapest ticket possible, so by the entry gate at the Tokyo Dome I know it will be in the upper deck nosebleeds, but it doesn't have a seat assignment, just that kanri-bango and a section). It won't be the same as seeing them from 10 feet back from the stage like at the Showbox in 2003... but I'm pretty sure it'll still rock since they are awesome. What sucks is that when I got back to Japan I had an email from a former GEOS student of mine saying she had fan club tickets to the shows on the 6th and 7th... but she'd sent it in late January, so she's already found someone to go with, and her tickets are like, on the floor level :( Maybe I'll ask her how the seat assignments work.
Paying bills was a bit of an adventure as all of the deadlines had passed. I went to the convenience store and babbled about how I'd been out of the country for a month and just got all my bills and ZOMG. The dude at the counter's like "Calm down, let's see if they scan", went ahead and scanned them all, and they did! I was surprised, but I'll take it. Much better than having to call places. UNfortunately, one of the things in my mailbox when I got back was a delivery slip saying the Fighters sent me a package... and that was on Jan 13th. The day after I left. So that is way gone. I think I may have to mail my friend who worked for the Fighters fan club and see if he can help me.
Another thing that was in my mailbox was my JLPT 2-kyu results, and sure enough, I failed. Ugh.
Oddly I am also largely unpacked despite not making a huge effort -- 95% of my stuff is out of my luggage now and in somewhat correct places around the house. I didn't really bring back a lot of categories of stuff though, so that isn't too weird ("okay, soap goes here, clothes go here, chocolate goes here, books go here...")
I went to get some stuff at Ito Yokado today and found that THE ARCADE ON THE 6TH FLOOR UPGRADED TO POP'N'MUSIC 18! It's called "sengoku retsuden" for whatever reason, and I am completely nonplussed by the new song selection, BUT on the other hand this means I can play the Pop'n 17 songs there finally. I wasn't even aware that a new Pop'n had come out while I was in the US, so it was a nice surprise that it had, and that the IY arcade had upgraded, although it's still 100 yen per play and they have no cardreader, so hopefully it won't be too crowded there. (Nobody ever used the Pop'n machine there because it was still pop'n 16 when the entire country was on 17.)
Also, Japan finally came out with another BBQ flavor of Pringles. It's actually not bad. Funny thing: it's still not all that much cheaper for me to buy the Japanese BBQ brand than it is for me to go find an import store and buy an import can of real BBQ chips.
I'm jet-lagged but mostly due to apathy. Yesterday and today I've gone to sleep at 7:30pm or so -- or more like, I've just felt like lying down at 7:30pm and had nothing better to do -- and then found myself unable to move for the next 5 hours. But getting up at midnight is a little less than ideal. Yesterday (my Wed->Thu night) I was able to make myself stay asleep until 6:30am, but today, having gone to nap at 7:30pm Thursday, I now find it to be midnight on Friday, which is like 7am in Seattle, and no real desire to go back to sleep. Oops.
Not too much to say about the actual travel here, either. Mike dropped me off at the airport in Seattle, which was sad, but then when I got to the gate I found![[profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
dleung8, who was on the same flight as me, so I talked to him for a while. I didn't really sleep on the flight but instead watched the Drew Barrymore movie "Whip It" about roller derby, twice, and I also watched "More Than A Game" which was about some Ohio basketball kids, and "The Boys are Back" which was a Clive Owen movie and not all that exciting. I didn't really have any trouble with security in either airport, aside from, after I exchanged some traveler's checks in Narita, a security dude came up to me and demanded to see my passport, and copied down my name and number and country. I asked him in Japanese WTF was going on and he was like "Wait, you live here?" and I'm like "...yeah..." "Oh, so you were coming back to the country rather than just visiting?" "...yeah, I was gone for a month or so" and he was like "Whoops, my bad. We're doing some spot checks for immigration because of some recent incidents. How are you getting home?" "By train." "Hope I didn't make you late! I'm sorry!"
That was weird, but I did make the next train and then sat there for forever with all my crap. When I finally got back to Akabane I took a taxi home and got like the nicest driver I've EVER gotten here -- not only did he help me lift my huge bag, which weighed 50.5 pounds, into the trunk, but when I told him where I live, and asked "...do you know where that is?" he admitted he had no clue, but figured it was on the hill, and I said it was and that I'd give him directions. So we got home by the most efficient route and it only cost me the base 710 yen AND he helped me get the bag back out of the trunk afterwards. This is as opposed to the last taxi driver I had, who got angry at me when I told him he was going the wrong way, and refused to help me with any of my bags.
Still, it is quite weird to be back.
Well, being back here in Japan isn't the most exciting thing so far. I went and paid bills and rent today, bought some baseball magazines, had sushi for lunch at Heiroku... oh, one exciting thing is that I'll be going to see the B'z in concert on March 3rd. Unfortunately I have no clue how this 管理番号 thing works on my ticket (I got the cheapest ticket possible, so by the entry gate at the Tokyo Dome I know it will be in the upper deck nosebleeds, but it doesn't have a seat assignment, just that kanri-bango and a section). It won't be the same as seeing them from 10 feet back from the stage like at the Showbox in 2003... but I'm pretty sure it'll still rock since they are awesome. What sucks is that when I got back to Japan I had an email from a former GEOS student of mine saying she had fan club tickets to the shows on the 6th and 7th... but she'd sent it in late January, so she's already found someone to go with, and her tickets are like, on the floor level :( Maybe I'll ask her how the seat assignments work.
Paying bills was a bit of an adventure as all of the deadlines had passed. I went to the convenience store and babbled about how I'd been out of the country for a month and just got all my bills and ZOMG. The dude at the counter's like "Calm down, let's see if they scan", went ahead and scanned them all, and they did! I was surprised, but I'll take it. Much better than having to call places. UNfortunately, one of the things in my mailbox when I got back was a delivery slip saying the Fighters sent me a package... and that was on Jan 13th. The day after I left. So that is way gone. I think I may have to mail my friend who worked for the Fighters fan club and see if he can help me.
Another thing that was in my mailbox was my JLPT 2-kyu results, and sure enough, I failed. Ugh.
Oddly I am also largely unpacked despite not making a huge effort -- 95% of my stuff is out of my luggage now and in somewhat correct places around the house. I didn't really bring back a lot of categories of stuff though, so that isn't too weird ("okay, soap goes here, clothes go here, chocolate goes here, books go here...")
I went to get some stuff at Ito Yokado today and found that THE ARCADE ON THE 6TH FLOOR UPGRADED TO POP'N'MUSIC 18! It's called "sengoku retsuden" for whatever reason, and I am completely nonplussed by the new song selection, BUT on the other hand this means I can play the Pop'n 17 songs there finally. I wasn't even aware that a new Pop'n had come out while I was in the US, so it was a nice surprise that it had, and that the IY arcade had upgraded, although it's still 100 yen per play and they have no cardreader, so hopefully it won't be too crowded there. (Nobody ever used the Pop'n machine there because it was still pop'n 16 when the entire country was on 17.)
Also, Japan finally came out with another BBQ flavor of Pringles. It's actually not bad. Funny thing: it's still not all that much cheaper for me to buy the Japanese BBQ brand than it is for me to go find an import store and buy an import can of real BBQ chips.
I'm jet-lagged but mostly due to apathy. Yesterday and today I've gone to sleep at 7:30pm or so -- or more like, I've just felt like lying down at 7:30pm and had nothing better to do -- and then found myself unable to move for the next 5 hours. But getting up at midnight is a little less than ideal. Yesterday (my Wed->Thu night) I was able to make myself stay asleep until 6:30am, but today, having gone to nap at 7:30pm Thursday, I now find it to be midnight on Friday, which is like 7am in Seattle, and no real desire to go back to sleep. Oops.
Not too much to say about the actual travel here, either. Mike dropped me off at the airport in Seattle, which was sad, but then when I got to the gate I found
dleung8, who was on the same flight as me, so I talked to him for a while. I didn't really sleep on the flight but instead watched the Drew Barrymore movie "Whip It" about roller derby, twice, and I also watched "More Than A Game" which was about some Ohio basketball kids, and "The Boys are Back" which was a Clive Owen movie and not all that exciting. I didn't really have any trouble with security in either airport, aside from, after I exchanged some traveler's checks in Narita, a security dude came up to me and demanded to see my passport, and copied down my name and number and country. I asked him in Japanese WTF was going on and he was like "Wait, you live here?" and I'm like "...yeah..." "Oh, so you were coming back to the country rather than just visiting?" "...yeah, I was gone for a month or so" and he was like "Whoops, my bad. We're doing some spot checks for immigration because of some recent incidents. How are you getting home?" "By train." "Hope I didn't make you late! I'm sorry!"That was weird, but I did make the next train and then sat there for forever with all my crap. When I finally got back to Akabane I took a taxi home and got like the nicest driver I've EVER gotten here -- not only did he help me lift my huge bag, which weighed 50.5 pounds, into the trunk, but when I told him where I live, and asked "...do you know where that is?" he admitted he had no clue, but figured it was on the hill, and I said it was and that I'd give him directions. So we got home by the most efficient route and it only cost me the base 710 yen AND he helped me get the bag back out of the trunk afterwards. This is as opposed to the last taxi driver I had, who got angry at me when I told him he was going the wrong way, and refused to help me with any of my bags.
Still, it is quite weird to be back.
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Hmm, there are bunches of concerts while you are here, we'll have to see if any of them have tickets that it's possible to get. I really just want to go see Spitz, could give or take the others (one is that Do As Infinity seems to be doing a reunion tour, things like that)
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Lob band names at me, and we'll see if I know them.
I'd be up for seeing SMAP, Arashi, Kimura Kaela, B'z, Utada Hikaru, Girl Next Door, or Tokio, off the top of my head.