as promised

this should help to see who, if anyone, checks this anymore



just in case you haven't caught on yet
that's jo's hand.

Guinness anyone??

off again

so we said goodbye to Japan.
and relaxed with several summer movies in KL
London brought more relaxing, some frisbee
some video games, and some pubs. Next up comes
Dublin. Jo's family, Guinness and Irish things.

more super exciting earth shattering news ...
coming soon!

almost out

SO the last saturday has come and gone,
my farewell party was a great time
had some yakiniku and maybe some beer!
afterwards, the diehards headed out to
karaoke... until 5am. ah yes, good times

the last week was hectic and flew by, as
i figured it would, I didn't really eat
that well, slept way too little and as a
result, I think i have a cold, but i've
been lazily relaxing / cleaning all day
knocking back the old Oj and vitamin C
drinks.

time to head for a quick bite to eat and
back to cleaning. see you soon.

natto

natto is fermented soy beans
it's gooey, smells like, well
rotten soy beans, and the taste
texture... I'll just say it's one
of two Japanese food stuffs that
I do not like. Yes Sarah I've had
natto. It's nasty.

the other thing i can't do is
tororo i think, its a rice dish
with grated mountain potato or
something and it's also nasty.

and if you look at that video clip
sarah left in the last comment. that
guy is huge here, comics, tv, everything
you can rent his costume at some karaoke
places. Japan loves the crazy daytime
variety shows. later

shakes

neither of us were anywhere near the earthquake, still plan to leave
in about 2 weeks. that's all.

winding down

that's right, cleaning...
it's not so much fun.
anyway...
last night was the big typhoon
students asked me if i had water
and acted like it would be a full
blown hurricane. well, it got a little windy
and there was rain, yep and that's about it.
big let down on the storm front, good that
it wasnt really big enough to hurt anything
so...
this post is basically i'm in the middle of
doing laundry. yeah. anyone up for doing
anything when i get back should leave a
comment.

go for a drink, I guess there's a new
japanese place in Aswaubenon. hang out.
play the wii, I'll probably be getting
an xbox 360, so kill some monsters etc.
even go for some taco bell. it'll
probably be a little shocking getting
back to the west. anyway... see you
soon... ish

comin home

it's true, and for those of you who don't know.

Aug 1 to Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia
Aug 6ish to London, England
Aug 9ish to Dublin, Ireland
Aug 14 to the US

see you soon, I'm also semi planning to be in the GB area for maybe a couple years, that's right. funny how things work eh?

Also, I'll hopefully be throwing a little I'm home party catered by myself with all of the Japanese goodies I've learned how to make ( don't worry if you are scared of sushi, I've gotten quite good at westernizing Japanese cuisine).

see you soon.

spin me round

ultimate / disc golf ds

floating gates

We also went to Miya-Jima, most known for its
Floating torii.




we also went for a hike to the top of Mt. Misen.





and saw plenty of wildlife












good times

more pictures here

tabemono

On a lighter note.

Hiroshima is now a very much alive city.

One of the things that is famous in Hiroshima is

okonomiyaki, a kind of pancake meal.

Hiroshima changes up the typical okonomiyaki by
adding noodles to the mix. and it's tasty.

i didnt take any pictures but someone has a photo

click here for a walk through with pictures on how to make it

uploading

right now my pictures from Hiroshima and Miya-jima are uploading.

Hiroshima is an amazing city that's come back from massive destruction.
some parts get a bit graphic, you were warned.

The Peace Park was a very sobering place,

The Centograph for A-bomb victims.




the remains of the A-bomb dome.



The Children's Peace Monument.



A little girl name Sadako was dying from the radiation
and she had heard that if you make 1,000 paper cranes
you get a wish granted, so she made cranes, lots of them
and people all over the world sent cranes to show support.


The National Peace Memorial Hall for A-bomb victims.



Here you can read accounts of the day written by survivors.
Even though they were different, they all included the regret
and horror of leaving people behind, hearing the screams and
not being able to do anything. Even though some swore their
hatred for America, most everyone was/is against any form of
war because no one should have to endure that.


The National Peace Museum.

This museum has many videos, artifacts and things related to
August 6, 1945 at 8:15 a.m. and beyond. Information about
the heat, the force, the radiation and the destruction.
There were pictures and actual artifacts that showed how shadows
were permanently burnt onto things where people were sitting at
the time.

There was a small exhibit of sculptures of people with their skin
melting off of their body from the heat blast followed by old photos
of actual victims. It was fairly graphic.

It all just nails home how terrible it was and still is.

more pictures here

i went to korea

pictures are online, finally click the food below to check them out



more from Fukuoka and Hiroshima to come

whatever

so, still have to upload the korea pics... yeah, that'll happen.....

anyway this past weekend jo and i went to Tokyo Disney.

Disney Sea on sunday and Disneyland on monday. good times

enameru neibi

that's enamel navy!
which is also the color of my nifty new ds lite!
nice huh. of course if it dies in the states im in trouble, but i dont care much.

So, for anyone who owns a ds i'd like to highlight a fun "interactive noir novel" game. It's called Hotel Dusk. It has a sketch style character design that may remind you of that amazing ah-ha video from back in the day. Anyway, you take the role of a retired detective out to find his old partner who double crossed him. He works as an on the road salesman who moonlights as a private dick type. The writing is very much in character with the gritty noir male type. Which more often than not are just funny. Anyway this game takes you through Hotel Dusk as you learn about the other guests and work to trace your ex partner. the game is fully stylus driven and you hold the ds on it's side with a 3d map on the left screen and a top down view on the touch screen where you move your character. It's not so much big on action, and the story is semi predictable, but its fun nonetheless. And if you ever played Trace Memory, this is by the same developer but the game is much better.
That'd be about it for now.

Korea will be posted eventually, maybe. Oh and pokemon Diamond is sucking up all my time. never thought i'd get sucked in.

I'm well, yes it's good.

This is a reply to a comment asking about working in Japan ... Enjoy or Ignore

"Seems like your experiences have been abundant and wonderful, but, were they indeed wonderful?" - Scott

The short answer is, yes it's been wonderful. It's radically different from the places I've lived / been in the world. Japan is an absolutely amazing place to live and work. Aeon, well Aeon is a Japanese company... which at times will drive you absolutely insane. My experience has been overall positive but I've heard crazy stories about passive aggressive, deceptive, cut throat and sometimes just insane or ridiculous. A good place for horror / glory stories is an eikaiwa journal
site. I rarely read it, but my girlfriend checks it out fairly often, it can be informative, sometimes entertaining.

Aeon also has many campaigns aimed at supplementing income during the slow periods and to "help your students" which unfortunately can take a backseat to the money. It's business though, you've got to pay to live right? These campaigns can be difficult especially when you are new and have no idea how anything will help your students and it seems that arbitrarily recommending that they buy something (often very expensive) really seems to undermine your teacher - student relationship. But as you get more experience it's really not a big deal, just a little messed up at first. so be prepared to feel like a trashy used car salesman (no offense aimed at any used car salesman!).

Next, I work in Kanie, which is in the Chubu area Aeon Central Japan. Tokyo is Aeon East Japan. I have heard from trainers that the teaching style is different. So I'm not exactly sure how it works out there. One of the guys who was in my training group has transfered to AEJ so check his blog maybe he have something to say about it.

My experience in Tokyo is very, very limited, the eikaiwa will have more info. Tokyo was fun when i visited, but I love being in a smaller town near Nagoya, because I'm to a Shinkansen in 10 minutes and I'm in central Japan, Kyoto is 40 min away Osaka less than 2 hours tokyo about 2 hours or so. So central has its perks. Plus the largest area I've ever lived in is a suburb of Milwaukee or of DC, so I'm used to smaller communities close to larger urban areas. Tokyo might drive me crazy, but i doubt it because life can be so convenient. But Tokyo is insane!!

Aeon's benefits are getting worse, not that it matters to new teachers ::
Aeon pays my way home, they won't pay your way home.
My contract is 29.5 teaching hours a week and if my first class isn't until 2 or 3 pm, i don't go in until 145 or 245, you'll have to be in at 12 or one everyday.
My rent is subsidized and I don't pay into the pension system, your rent will still be subsidized, but your rent'll be higher, so will your base salary, but the added pension and hours makes you earn less (or so i believe, it doesn't matter to me since it's not my contract so i didn't really pay too much attention)
And there's something different about the bonus system, but for the real details just check Aeon's site, which I'm guessing you have already done.

Having said all of that, the students are almost always amazing people. The Japanese are almost always amazing people. The food here is amazing, transportation is almost always amazing. The culture is so crazy sometimes but usually in an amazing way.

Aeon's teaching method is pretty good and after you get into yourself here it gets much easier, especially if you teach adults only (i teach kids and adults) I think I would get bored if only taught adults. what are you planning? A or B or Amity?

Long story getting shorter:

It's a job. Japan is amazing. Japanese is a pain (KANJI), especially when you decide not to renew your contract and the end is in sight, which is why i quit actively learning.
Apply, why not. I think Aeon is better than NOVA again the eikaiwa is full of that.

No idea on teaching in Korea, and I'm tainted by living in the passive Japanese culture.
I will say that Hangul is so much easier to learn to read than kana and kanji.

well thata was a fun sunday morning

back to Japan!

Yep, we're back!
Work's back in the mix and crazy. The next couple months, scratch that, the last couple months are going to fly. Anyway, we are back from Korea, a very nice place, and there are pictures.
As always I think you should check out Jo's site first, she's better about things like that, but i'll get it out soon.

Anyone have any questions about Korea? In my 9 days there I got a feel for things.
Fire away

oops, one more

if anyone gets any strange emails from me, might be spam/virus, the computer I'm on seems to have some trojans on it, unfortunately the software wants me to to pay some won to actually delete it, i think, i can read hangul but i don't have any idea what it means, hehe, gotta love these asian languages!

so sorry again if you get anything from me, delete it!

other highlights include

well after a year in japan waiting and wanting....
i gots me some pizza!!!!

not the squid/mayo/crap cheese/tortilla esqe crust pizza you find in japan

but real (more passable) go pizza hut!!!

and!

Burger King!!

that's all...

oh yeah, we saw Spiderman 3 too!
after eating Pizza Hut!

that's all all

hangul

Hello from Gyeongju, South Korea. We are down here for a couple days to do some sights, some hiking and some relaxing. There will be more details coming later. If you saw Jo's post you may have seen that we went into North Korea. On our tour of the DMZ we went into one of the buildings used for signings etc and half of the building is on the south side of the actual line and half is on the north. So we walked over and i got my picture taken next to one of the ROK (republic of korea) soldier. Intense... if i touched him i might be in a hospital now, if i went close to a certain door maybe i'd be a captive in the north. Very intense. pictures to come!

Initial impressions of Korea are a healthy mix of Japan and a more American/aggressive attitude

great food, equally crap beer, nice people, less expensive, great food on the streets in stalls, sides and backs of cars.

having fun.

away message

I'm out of the country from 4/29 ~ 5/7.
Hopefully be enjoying some spicy kimchi
visiting the DMZ between the North and
South and enjoying not being in Japan.

with love
from Korea

let's go to the movies

and eat octopus balls! no, not actual octopus balls, but kind of dough nut holes filled with octopus and onion.

here we go. If you haven't seen it, I think you should at least give Little Miss Sunshine a rental, if it's out on video yet ..., not sure, anyway its great!

on to the takoyaki (fried balls filled with octopus bits and more!)

It's something you should really try if you come to Japan, and especially if you visit Osaka.

(1)
You mix some batter of fish sauce-ish water, egg and flour. Then you cut up various ingredients

octopus should be boiled first.
we also used shrimp, chicken and negi (green onions)

(2)

pour batter into the takoyaki grill and add ingredients

(3)

once they're ready, flip and let finish

(4)

remove from the grill and add garnish
common choices are takoyaki sauce, mayo or bonito (dried fish shavings)

(5)

the bonito flakes dance because of the rising heat form the takoyaki
(that might not be true at all, but they do dance)

anyway, we are borrowing the grill form Jo's manager so we might be experimenting with other styles, neither of us are really big fans of octopus. They are just little balls of dough and
fillings, add some sugar and its desert, maybe some breakfast types, ham and egg.

Everyone at work thinks im crazy because i change japanese recipes to my liking.

that's all, but in case you missed it Jo and I will be in Korea from April 29 until May 7 or 8.
Golden week vacation! yes! last year we hung out around here and I was sick, this year will be better!

you can always check out the pics and more at my flickr page

japan ultimate

to kick this off, jo and i have been in Japan for over a year! whoah! and happy easter to those who are eastering!

the following is a fairly... well, if you don't play ultimate or aren't familiar, feel free to skim the net chunk!

cheers

let's see, so this weekend, well sunday only, I played in an ultimate tournament in Okazaki. Iwas one of 2 foreigners on the team and the one with the least Japanese. Which made some things very very difficult. I have a decent level of experience with the game but a lot of the time it felt like i was playing... I'm not really sure. stall counts were in English, even though Japanese numbers are not an issue, pick, foul, travel the same, just with a heavy katakana feel. flick is called side and backhand is back. no break is ura, strike is either inside or open, and i think straight up is FM... i think. oh, the games are timed 50 mins and stop. even if you are tied the disc is in the air you jump catch (buzzer) you land, NO POINT, time ended before you touched down. After each game both teams line up facing each other and listen to someone read the scores and then you bow and say arigato gozaimashita (thank you very much), shake hands with the person across, arigato gozaimashita and then do the traditional line shake arigato gozaimashita, arigato gozaimashita, arigato gozaimashita. then you circle up for the cheer, which is the other team name then shout something, then your team name shout something. very fun.

we played zone, sweedish, ho stack, stack, man.
great group of guys, very fun, and since it's been... a very very long time since i've played
my legs are sore and tight today.

I had to work saturday so i missed out on the 1st 2 games, they lost, then on sunday we won the first two mainly due to the other teams' incompetence to convert our mistakes and then lost to the third team.

I played ok, few big mistakes, some great flow moments and a couple worthy d points.
not bad

as much fun as it was, im not sure i'd like to play another tourney mainly due to the language barrier (my bad for being not so great at japanese)

but i may start practicing with the guys

sweet.

anyway, if any of you disc fellows have any questions, feel free to ask!

see you japan

well, so far ive manged a less than amazing grasp of the japanese language and now im moving on to another one, thats right I've almost got the Korean vowels down!
why you ask....?
Jo and I are going to Seoul for 8 days in early may.

me likes vacations

rumble

earthquake today in the low 7's on the west coast of the main island. Jo and i felt it, but everything in our areas seems fine.

we're ok

thank you nipon biru

that's right, all thanks to my good friends asahi and enjuku i have been spotted once again by those rat... well they dont have a russian accent, but im in russia, i think. Oh right, I'm back into Metal Gear Solid 3: Snake Eater and im playing rather sloppily right now, which means im typing on a little thing i like to call alert-evasion-caution break. For those of you who don't know MGS is a tactical espionage type game, with heavy emphasis on stealth as you main weapon. Needless to say im not so stealthy right now!... so imagine a large chunk of time went by.
any way check out the photos from Kyoto, some nifty night shots















not sure where any of these are from?
enjoy

check more @ my pics

four?

Things have been quiet on the home front...

only heard from one person about the onigiri...
ah well...

so this time itll be mellow.

so this one is great for anyone who has to travel a lot, as long as you aren't driving.
item one - nintendo DS Lite

i know i know, you don't like games
well, this is where it gets fun.

first game: Elite Beat Agents

this one is a rhythm action game i guess.
you tap or drag along the touch screen to the song following numbered spots, the game has a good number of songs and varying levels of difficulty. The way it works is you find a help spot on the globe and then you watch a comic book style depiction of how someone gets into trouble, whether it be a pug who falls asleep on a pickup truck who wakes to find himself miles away from home or an oil tycoon who needs to rebuild his fortune. The pre-story alwasy ends with the character yelling HELP!!, that's when commander Kahn dispatches the Elite beat agents who jetpack, zeppelin, car, bike etc off to the rescue. During the song there are little story bits playing on the top screen that change depending on how you do touching the numbered circles on the bottom screen, which is where the EBAs are dancing up a storm! The comics scenes are really funny, sometimes a bit rude humor but other than that over the top super fun for all ( rated E for everyone: crude humor, cartoon violence, suggestive themes and lyrics, thanks ESRB!!) This is one of Nintendo's Touch Generations games which means the gameplay focuses on touching and not buttons. you can play this one without touching a single button. It is so so so much fun, here's the track list, keep in mind none of these tracks are by the original artists, but it's not the end of the world.

1. Walkie Talkie Man - Steriogram
2. ABC - Jackson Five
3. Sk8er Boi - Avril Lavigne
4. I Was Born to Love You - Queen
5. Rock This Town - Stray Cats
6. Highway Star - Deep Purple
7. Y.M.C.A. - Village People
8. September - Earth, Wind and Fire
9. Canned Heat - Jamiroquai
10. Material Girl - Madonna
11. La La - Ashlee Simpson
12. You're the Inspiration - Chicago
13. Survivor - Destiny's Child
14. Without a Fight - Hoobastank
15. Believe - Cher
16. Let's Dance - David Bowie
17. Jumpin Jack Flash - Rolling Stones
18. Makes No Difference - Sum 41
19. The Anthem - Good Charlotte

Now some of these songs are unlockables so they aren't available until you sink a healthy amount of time into the game but it goes by fast.

I highly recommend this one to anyone who owns a DS and like music.

there are other games that i've talked about in the past but im done for now!

anyone

is anyone out there bored, tell me about it

no really, tell me about it

leave a comment

RECs n' tasy effects #3

so far i know that at least one person has tried the black bean soup, or thought about trying as it...
anyway, prompted by our dinner tonight, here comes our 3rd rec of the thing with the thing!

onigiri ( oh knee gear-y) = rice ball!

this one's quick, easy, a great lunch and tasty!!!
===========================
First this is what you'll need:
- 2 cups boiled rice
- assorted fillings: ham, shrimp, tuna,
chicken whatever you think BBQ chicken
could be good
- tablespoon vinegar
- salt
- nori (dried seaweed) strips about 8 in by
2 in are fine.
- 2 bowls
===========================

now i know what some of you may be saying, eeeeeeewww
seaweed, ick. to be honest it's only used to keep your fingers
from actually touching the rice while eating, so if you wanted
you could skip it or only use two 1-in squares on either side.
it's not that bad and its healthy
===========================
the how to! how to ... with style!

to do the rice check the packaging,
different types need different preparation.

one thing that most packs wont tell you to do is RINSE the rice, get all that
nasty starch off! so ...
put the rice in a container add water then stir,
drain and repeat until the run off is relatively clear.
about 2 or three times should do it

next, cook the rice! try to be careful not to scorch the
bottom but it's difficult to do, try to keep the heat
lowish.

ok, while the rice is cooking, you should prep your fillings!
for dinner tonight i did fried shrimp with miso sauce! delicious.
here are some other ideas:

ham, scrambled egg, tuna, tuna salad, chicken, salmon...
really anything will work
it's essentially a ball of rice with goodies stuffed inside!

next prepare :
a water vinegar solution, about a tablespoon vinegar to a
bowl of water, this is to keep the rice from sticking to your
hands and to cool the rice so it doesn't burn your hands it'll
be hot when you take it out of the pot

a pile of salt, this is to rub on your hands after the water
to reduce the stickiness of the rice

anyway, once the rice is done,

put some into the bowl 3 - 4 tablespoons will be ok,
the more the rice the larger the onigiri

then put the fillings into the center and cover with more rice.

wet your hands with the water-vinegar solution and rub some salt in
take the rice out of the bowl and start to softly pack it into a ball or a triangle
don't mash it too much and apply water-vinegar / salt as needed

pack until it seems pretty solid, then wrap nori (dried seaweed strips)
around it, or put squares on the sides

repeat until the rice is all used and then enjoy!!!
---------------------------------------------------------------
the results!!!

wonderful!
its pretty simple since you just set the rice cooking, prep some stuff pack it together and
enjoy! Something to note is that the first time we made some we wrapped them and refrigerated them overnight for lunch the next day and the next day they were a little dry from the time in the fridge. so they are best enjoyed later that day or right away! smoked salmon makes one tasty rice ball!

good luck and please try it and let me know what you made, how it went etc etc. i lifted that restriction on comments so anyone can comment again! yay! good luck

help me please

so, thanks to something that i dont like very much and my own stupidity in haste...

can people please please send me an email with any and all contact information you have for yourselves.

I have lost everything/one in my address book.

vcards LDIF and text files are all acceptable and preferable.

If that's confusing then please just send me an email with your info

gimmejunkmale@gmail.com

rec it! duece, ni, dos, do, deux, zwei, II, do ... two

It's back! yay!!!!

so this time part of this rec is stolen / borrowed / something from this handsome gentlemen

And here we go:
(from 250 State Blog)

Big Billy Bob's Buckin'

Black Bean Soup

ingredients:
1 red onion
3 garlic cloves
1 tomato
green chile (amount is totally up to you, canned or fresh roasted and diced is better)
1 veggie bouillion cube or substitute
1 can buckin' black beans (no, buckin' is not a brand name)
1 can hominy
1 tsp cumin
2 tsp cayenne
1 tsp chili powder
chicken or beef optional...

If using meat, cook it first, then add the onions and garlic. Fry the diced red onion, tomato, green chile, and garlic in some olive oil. Add the spices before they turn brown. Then add the beans and hominy (drain the hominy first). Add 3 or 4 cups of water and the veggie cube. Add a bay leaf, and salt and pepper to taste (add more cayenne for more spiceyness!). Basically all of this stuff is variable...if you like thick soup, use less water, if you like it mild, use less cayenne, etc...but don't ever reduce the cumin. Cumin is a carminative or something and counteracts the gas giving properties of the beans. Tomatoes are the same way. Unless you want to ruin your romantic evening.

Best served hot with a tortilla (pronounced "tortiya" not "wrap") with butter.

=======================

Well thank you to Mr. sunglasses up there. Next up we have a, what's that you say, that's right a DOUBLE feature, in honor of the #2

Shaun of the Dead

Of course i know this is an "older movie" now, but if you haven't seen it you REALLY REALLY should, honestly, a ROMantic COMedy with ZOMbies! it's a flawless recipe with spectacular execution! I'd write more but instead ill refer you to Earth's biggest movie database (insert TM symbol) IMDB .

NEXT!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Hot Fuzz

Same main actors, same insanity i'm sure, I've seen the trailer
@ Apple Movie Trailers. It looks like it'll be a ridiculously fun
ride with action, satire, sarcasm, and British things!

I'm not sure what the website looks like because right now
my computer decided to say no thank you to any attempt at
upgrading to flashplayer9, so.... i'll be reinstalling my OS as soon as soon as i'm finished backing up, off we go!

So to take a look back for those of you with short memories

we have Black bean greatness
Shaun of the Dead
Hot Fuzz
IMDB
Apple movie trailers

that's a total of 4, wow they just get better and better!
lemme know what ya'll think

look out for robots with swords

Dave's Recs! ichiban

So here's the new deal, i write about something i like, that, well
maybe you haven't heard of before, and i provide some method to
get a taste of it. then you hit the fun little comment button, and
let me and everyone else know what you think. yep, im out of video games!

so todays rec is: Nizlopi

from Nizlopi.com :

Nizlopi is Luke Concannon and John Parker, two friends who’ve been writing and playing music together since their early teens. Luke handles the heartfelt lyrics, the endlessly soulful vocals, and his beloved guitar, while JP sets jaws-dropping with his masterful double-bass playing, his breathtaking human beat-boxing, and a little extra guitar playing of his own for good measure. Together these boys have created a genre defying sound all of their own that’s earned them plenty of love around the UK, and now America and Europe!
---------------------------------------
I first heard of these guys when i was in Ireland
sometime a year or so ago, I actually saw their video for the JCB song you should definitely check it out. The video is super cute/cool and their music
is chill and interesting, different enough to be fresh and similar enough to be easy listening. Right now my favorites are "The JCB Song" and "Freedom", "long Distance" is a fun little track as well and a bit more upbeat.
---------------------------------------
Look out! It's the premiere Rec post double threat!

next up we have a nice little rec on how to further enjoy the sounds!! (those under legal drinking age in their respective country read no further ;-0)
---------------------------------------
Who is this friendly delicious looking bear to our left?
Well let's call him Oscar! And he is the answer to anyone terrified by the thought of the imitation "beer" that WI is so well associated with. That's right, not only does our friend Oscar here have adark, mysterious character & charisma (and weighs in around 4.0% abv) , he's also a WI native. Lets look behind the label. This beer serves up a tasty blend of chocolate and oatmeal, delivering a very satisfying stout experience. For more reviews check out: an online review.

If you are in the Wisconsin area it shouldn't be that difficult to track a bottle down.

I guess this concludes this broadcast day!
let me know what you think

notes from bed

listening to an NPR podcast, sitting in bed, nose running
Jo's sister arrived on friday and we went to Tokyo Sun.
Today, Mon. I'm back home sick with a cold. hooray.

late last week i got another contract offer from Aeon, they are offering
another year... and that's funny, and it's no! we are definitely not staying past
the july extension.

as far as what's next, not sure.

Wii be done

so ive beaten all of the wii games i have, overall they were a lot of fun
even the broken Red Steel where glitches make it so they can hurt you
but you can't shoot them, or you get locked inside an invisible/ transparent
box, then you get the bad ending because you just want it all to end.

Zelda is a ton of fun but same as pretty much every other zelda, too easy.

rayman is fun, and definitely has replay/fun value that neither Zelda or
Red steel have. At least there's always Wii Sports, roll me some bowling balls

so as far as worth playing, Zelda-yes, Rayman-yes, Red Steel - does anyone want my copy?

as usual not much going on right here right now, killing time before i start to get ready for work, hooray, you should however look at Jo's Blog to see some silly pictures of her from when we went snowboarding, the place was decent sized, the weather was warm and the snow, wet and ice chunky in areas, but overall it was a sunny fun day.

that's all for now.

I'm still alive!

and this will be very, very brief:

pictures from the vacation to Okinawa (Japan's HI)
We went to Naha, Ishigaki, Taketomi, and Iriomote.
We camped for about 5 days, hotel for two and a little
house type thing stay for one.

I have to go back to work tomorrow and right now Jo
is hogging the Wii playing Zelda. here are the photos!

Okinawa Pictures

there are a lot of them and as it went on i got less picky about
which ones made the cut and the descriptions they got

if you are into it check jo's site