Our summer vacation got underway today. It was off to a bit of a late start to begin with, but was slightly complicated when we found out Gerlie had strep. We were planning to stay at her pad in Northridge, but that was off. She sounded terrible, I hope she is at home getting lots of rest and fluids.
We were able to call our hotel and have our hotel extended a day, but the real issue was we were an hour behind schedule and looking at driving into Anaheim now instead of Northridge. Sure enough, we (meaning "I") hit some massive traffic on I-5 near downtown that never really stopped until we got to Anaheim.
We are at the Holiday Inn Express Anaheim Maingate, and I have to say it's not too shabby. For the price and location (about two blocks from the convention center), it can't be beat. TripAdvisor seems to have hit the mark for me, again.
Apropos of nothing, the cookies at the Harris Ranch gift shop are hella good. The baker's dozen won't make it back to the Bay Area.
After checking in and settling in a little, we bumped up our trip to Costa Mesa planned for tomorrow and went to Book-Off to do some pre-Anime Expo bargain hunting. I was pretty stoked to get the Asian Kung-Fu Generation DVD I have been eyeing for months but did not have the gall to pay $60 for. It was $35. Rhonda and Sara each picked up some CDs. If we have time, we might hit the Gardena one on July 4th (provided it's open).
After that, we drove to The Lab, a self-described "anti-mall", on the recommendation of my former co-worker Xochitl. We all bought a t-shirt at Great Laundry, a Japanese t-shirt company. Rhonda got the "Samurai" shirt, I got the "Dragon" shirt, and Sara got the "Shinobi" shirt. All legitimately awesome.
Our first meal in Anaheim was Taco Bell. Not earth-shattering, but better than nothing. Looking forward to those cinnamon rolls they like to talk about here in a few hours. Dinner with Xochitl is the only thing on our agenda for tomorrow, so it might be a relaxing day in advance of all the chaos.
Friday, June 30, 2006
Thursday, June 29, 2006
Can you feel that hybrid rainbow?
Day one of vacation kicked off with a visit to San Francisco from one of my favorite bands, J-rock or otherwise, the pillows.
My previous attempt to see the band in action is well-documented. I was not determined to make the same mistake twice.
Luckily, they announced a Q&A with the band at the Kinokuniya Books in Japantown. And we were there.
Sara and I got autographs from the band, although we were both a little star-struck.
After dinner and a stop to pick up earplugs, we went to Slim's to catch the concert. After the opening acts, the real show started. In a word, the performance was electric.
Good mix of old stuff and new. I wanted to hear "One Life" but that's OK. The crowd was pumped up and the place was rocking every time an FLCL song came on. Sawao signed off with a cheerful, "See you next year!" So it looks like the pillows will be back to The City, which is a good thing.
Next stop: sunny Southern California!
My previous attempt to see the band in action is well-documented. I was not determined to make the same mistake twice.
Luckily, they announced a Q&A with the band at the Kinokuniya Books in Japantown. And we were there.
Sara and I got autographs from the band, although we were both a little star-struck.
After dinner and a stop to pick up earplugs, we went to Slim's to catch the concert. After the opening acts, the real show started. In a word, the performance was electric.
Good mix of old stuff and new. I wanted to hear "One Life" but that's OK. The crowd was pumped up and the place was rocking every time an FLCL song came on. Sawao signed off with a cheerful, "See you next year!" So it looks like the pillows will be back to The City, which is a good thing.
Next stop: sunny Southern California!
Wednesday, June 28, 2006
Saturday, June 24, 2006
What I'm up to
DRINKING! Well, at least, Rhonda is drinking iced green tea using Kirkland green tea. Yes, you read that right, Kirkland green tea - made exclusively for Costco by Ito En. It even has matcha in it. I've had it hot, and it's really good. Although drinking any iced tea, Japanese or otherwise, without any sweetener makes me wince.
WATCHING! Last weekend, flipping through channels in bed, we stumbled on Viking: The Ultimate Obstacle Course Challenge on ESPN2, and were hooked. It's a three-stage obstacle course only the Japanese could invent, complete with mental challenges (such as adding two random two-digit numbers) as well as physical challenges. It's a little like MXC on Spike TV, only the ESPN announcers give it more legitimacy (and dignity). Which it deserves, as the challenges (and, you might argue, the challengers) are totally insane. Highly recommended.
We also both really enjoyed Studio Ghibli's My Neighbors, The Yamadas. It's too easy to describe this as a Japanese "Simpsons", and it doesn't have that show's random quirkiness. It follows a typical Japanese family and while their life is fairly typical, the hiccups in their family lives are played up for high comedy. It's almost entirely appropriate for the whole family, minus one (hilarious) scene involving the teenage son buying some porn. For the most part, though, the humor is less for kids than it is for adults. It drags a little in the last half, but it's still a lot of fun. Finally, this is an anime I think even my folks would enjoy.
SURFING! to my new favorite site, Lifehacker. With the motto, "Don't live to geek; geek to live," Lifehacker supplies all the useful information to make life easier, such as how to build your own backyard deck, how to clean your garbage disposal, matting your own art or photos, and creating a false identity.
I don't really surf to this site, but Last.fm is a social networking site (think MySpace) that is build around your music tastes. You can download a plug-in that tracks all the stuff you listen to in iTunes, and it takes that data and builds charts, just like a radio station. It can let you know other people with similar listening tastes, and does an effective job of recommending other artists (since it has all that data on the users' listening habits. It even lets you generate an image file of your charts for display on your website.
LISTENING! to:
(I love that CD. Dude, can you blame me?)
What I was previously up to (6/3/06).
WATCHING! Last weekend, flipping through channels in bed, we stumbled on Viking: The Ultimate Obstacle Course Challenge on ESPN2, and were hooked. It's a three-stage obstacle course only the Japanese could invent, complete with mental challenges (such as adding two random two-digit numbers) as well as physical challenges. It's a little like MXC on Spike TV, only the ESPN announcers give it more legitimacy (and dignity). Which it deserves, as the challenges (and, you might argue, the challengers) are totally insane. Highly recommended.We also both really enjoyed Studio Ghibli's My Neighbors, The Yamadas. It's too easy to describe this as a Japanese "Simpsons", and it doesn't have that show's random quirkiness. It follows a typical Japanese family and while their life is fairly typical, the hiccups in their family lives are played up for high comedy. It's almost entirely appropriate for the whole family, minus one (hilarious) scene involving the teenage son buying some porn. For the most part, though, the humor is less for kids than it is for adults. It drags a little in the last half, but it's still a lot of fun. Finally, this is an anime I think even my folks would enjoy.SURFING! to my new favorite site, Lifehacker. With the motto, "Don't live to geek; geek to live," Lifehacker supplies all the useful information to make life easier, such as how to build your own backyard deck, how to clean your garbage disposal, matting your own art or photos, and creating a false identity.
I don't really surf to this site, but Last.fm is a social networking site (think MySpace) that is build around your music tastes. You can download a plug-in that tracks all the stuff you listen to in iTunes, and it takes that data and builds charts, just like a radio station. It can let you know other people with similar listening tastes, and does an effective job of recommending other artists (since it has all that data on the users' listening habits. It even lets you generate an image file of your charts for display on your website.
LISTENING! to:
(I love that CD. Dude, can you blame me?)
What I was previously up to (6/3/06).
Home Sweat Home
It's been an interesting week, layoff rumors aside. Rhonda has been pressing to get a gym membership and on Sunday, I finally caved. We are now members at Right Stuff, about a mile away on Blossom Hill and Kooser. Rhonda gets to work out with her friends/ex-co-workers, so she is happy.
I surprised her, not only by signing her up, but myself as well. I figure the financial cost is motivation enough to keep myself going, since I need to lower my cholesterol and drop about 25 or 30 pounds. It also keeps us out of more costly places, like malls and bookstores.
I've already been 3 times this week, not bad since I didn't go until Wednesday. Rhonda went a bunch of times as well. On top of that, we went swimming at Becky's pool Thursday night (the only night since Wednesday I skipped the gym), and got a visit from the overheated Shaw family Friday, leading to our first trip to the community pool (on our 360th day here).
I am pretty psyched I had already lost about five pounds last Wednesday - I haven't weighed myself in a couple months because there were magazines piled on the bathroom scale. For about a month we have been eating a lot more salads and fruit, and I stopped buying cookies and crap. I figure with our short-term financial future a bit cloudy, it made sense to fill up on salad (cheap) and try to stretch the main courses (expensive) into more leftovers. Seems to be working, as I found out I didn't really need two chicken breasts to get full at dinner.
So things are on the upswing healthwise. I even thought about buying some Pocari Sweat at Mitsuwa today. Now I should be able to go to Anime Expo next week without having a coronary.
I surprised her, not only by signing her up, but myself as well. I figure the financial cost is motivation enough to keep myself going, since I need to lower my cholesterol and drop about 25 or 30 pounds. It also keeps us out of more costly places, like malls and bookstores.
I've already been 3 times this week, not bad since I didn't go until Wednesday. Rhonda went a bunch of times as well. On top of that, we went swimming at Becky's pool Thursday night (the only night since Wednesday I skipped the gym), and got a visit from the overheated Shaw family Friday, leading to our first trip to the community pool (on our 360th day here).
I am pretty psyched I had already lost about five pounds last Wednesday - I haven't weighed myself in a couple months because there were magazines piled on the bathroom scale. For about a month we have been eating a lot more salads and fruit, and I stopped buying cookies and crap. I figure with our short-term financial future a bit cloudy, it made sense to fill up on salad (cheap) and try to stretch the main courses (expensive) into more leftovers. Seems to be working, as I found out I didn't really need two chicken breasts to get full at dinner.
So things are on the upswing healthwise. I even thought about buying some Pocari Sweat at Mitsuwa today. Now I should be able to go to Anime Expo next week without having a coronary.
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