Catch-22

Life before graduation is a strange thing.  For most of us, we spend that time at the whims of someone else's pocketbook.  We are mocked by an abundance of time at tension with a dearth of finances.  Time is money, and child labor laws are immutable.  Except, of course, at Wal-Mart.

But time marches on, and even man-children grow up.

 

Like this gentleman

We graduate college and, at the tender young age of 22, most of us enter the work force and achieve stable employment (my deepest apologies to liberal arts majors).  For most of us, that $40K a year is more money than we know what to do with (or, if you're an eikaiwa employee, 17 yen and a strand of yarn).  But with that sudden gainful employment comes the indentured servitude of the first-year employee.  So earnest are we to prove our quality that we jump at overtime and spend our weekends at the office.  Bank accounts burgeon (or at least develop a baby bump) with new-found stability.  Life is good.

But time is the stuff life is made of, and we have traded ours away for coin.  We come to discover that, in the pursuit of the finances necessary to enjoy our time, there is no time left to enjoy them.  This is our Catch-22.

As even a cursory glance at the top of this page will tell you, I'm a gamer.  An evening spent virtually inert in front of a TV screen scavenging the post-apocalyptic wasteland for ammunition or shoryukening the piss out of someone is my idea of an evening well-spent.  Sadly, though, the demands of work, married life, and the myriad of obligations in between have gradually pushed gaming from the thing I did before, during, and after the times I was drunk to something that I have to sneak in wherever I can.

Much like getting drunk now, actually.

Gaming is a sadly time-intensive, attention-demanding hobby.  To be a gamer is to commit time.  It is a hobby sadly incompatible with much of what goes on post-matriculation.

The answer?  Find a hobby that you integrates seamlessly with that which life demands of you.  Cyclists bike to work.  Writers turn to journalism or book authoring.  Hedonists fuck during their morning shower.  NASA astronauts drink on the job.  And, in the true American spirit, I solved my problem the way all Americans solve their problems: by eating.

Behold: the humble beginnings of what will no doubt be a truly monumental shame spiral. 

Not pictured: agonizing, flaming diarrhea

And, admittedly, it's not much of a collection compared to a lot of true chiliheads out there, but realize that this is what I'm working with, with regards to storage capacity:

 

Also, the lady of the house likes to cook or something

Hobby and necessity, friends again!  As they say, "man cannot survive on bread alone.  Bread and volcanic ass-fire in a bottle, yes, but not just bread."

Japan is not a very hospitable environment for the aspiring chili-head.  Despite Godzilla being singularly inspired by the discovery of wasabi, Japanese, by-and-large are quite sensitive to the sting of mistress capsaicin's whip, making the novice scoville hunter's job doubly difficult.

I was scraping by on Tabasco, to be sure, sucking up whatever came along.  I'd hit my french fries, pizza, and scrambled eggs with a couple shots of the good stuff.  But for anyone interested in developing a true leather tongue, there gets a point where you're dropping a quarter to a half-bottle a day just to get the same endorphin fix of the first taste.  I needed something stronger to push me through this gateway.

                                                                                             

The streets were dry.  No one was selling.  Even the restaurants were cutting their stuff with water to turn a little extra profit.  The slums of the condiment aisles looked like 23rd and Locust after a sting operation, save for a couple of rough-looking old dudes pimping out Dijon mustard, two for 400 yen.

Salvation came through a not-entirely-unexpected source: Kaldi Coffee Farm.  For the uninitiated, this is the hook-up.  These guys run everything in and out of the 'Pan.  You want Doritos?  These guys will hook you up with all kinds of flavors.  Tim-Tams, Dad's Root Beer, Brer Rabbit Molasses... they've got you covered.  Yeah, it'll cost you, but if you need the strong stuff, they're holding.

Since committing to this lifestyle, every trip to my 'hood's mini-mall consists of a compulsory visit to my supplier.  Shuffling in the store, head down, looking for the latest flavor.  Something that makes my face tingle and numbs the tongue.  The comfortable sting of pain as I reward the dopamine receptors in my brain and get a fresh fix of chemically-induced endorphins.  Something to help me cope with the loss of my friends Ryu and Ken.

But beyond the thrill of the search lies in the even greater thrill of experimentation.  Habanero Tabasco goes great on burritos.  Mama Africa's makes a great marinade and gives teeth to meat dishes' customary savoriness.  Thai Kick adds complexity to the fried chicken lover's palate.  Blair's Salsa de la Muerte goes with everything.  Flavors and combinations yet undiscovered, dormant in the aether, anxiously waiting to be summoned into existence by one intrepid enough to dare their senses.

And with each, a different brand of nuclear poop soon to follow.

That part's not as much fun.

It's very easy to feel a very palpable loss at the sudden outflow of time and opportunities that accompany a full-time job.  But instead of lamenting the loss of quality time spent in digital escapism (Lord knows I still am), still more experiences remain to be had in the analog universe!  Employ your assets!  They say money can't make you happy.  I say, anyone who says that just doesn't know how to spend it.  For most of us, graduation marks the beginning of a 45-year-long forced march.  But if you don't occasionally stop to eat the mushrooms, who knows what you might miss?

When it seems like the conflicts of work and pleasure seat themselves in the pit of your being, heavy in your bowels, your passion burning inside of you, twisting, churning, bubbling and molten, agonizing for release.  Do you remain stationary, quailing at the thought of suddenly and explosively upsetting the delicate balance within and making a mess of things, or to follow your gut instinct and make a mad dash to release the harsh pressure welling up inside you?

It's a Catch-22.

Play it again, Sam

So last week I was in Osaka, and an unusual thing happened.

I had been playing Final Fantasy Tactics, an old favorite of mine, on my PSP during my stay at my then-fianceé's house.  Finally, after a couple of sessions on the bus, on the train, and there in the house, I hit the "confirm" button, plunged my Excalibur into the heart of god (again) and watched the end credits roll.  I had made good time in winding my way through the 30-hour epic.  I reset my PSP, and thought to myself for a second as my cursor hovered tentatively over "New Game," and with one more button press, I was back on my way to the land of Ivalice.  God, after all, wasn't just going to stab himself.

In many ways, a decent game is much more immersive than a good movie or book.  Movies are a "cold" medium (did... did I actually just use something I learned in my major?).  They're passive entertainment.  Pop the DVD in the tray and sit back and enjoy the program.  Problem is, you're not a captive audience.  You can get up and go to the bathroom or make popcorn, and the story keeps telling itself without ever noticing you're gone.  The true masterpieces are those that involve the audience in the narrative in some way.  They weave complex and compelling yarns with multifaceted characters motivated by real emotions, enticing you into a world where infants--nay, mere babies--are in fact geniuses.  A world where naps are history.

Books and games, by contrast, are "hot" mediums (holy shit, professor Klukovski are you seeing this?).  Books don't read themselves.  Games don't play themselves.  If you want to get to the end, you have to work for it.  Reading, therefore, is its own reward.  Much more of a reader's time and energy is invested in the narrative, making the payoff that much sweeter upon seeing the story through to its completion.  After all, isn't finding out that Bella and Edward have a baby and Jacob becoming forever attached to their daughter (oops spoilers sorry) so much more satisfying when you've slogged your way barefoot through over a thousand pages of literary sewage to find out?

What's more, it's much easier to get attached to a book because it isn't a temporal medium.  The author can create an atmosphere over several hundred pages, flesh out characters much more realistically, and ultimately tell the story he or she wants to tell much more precisely than he or she could with a medium that's generally confined to two hours of run-time.

Games are very much the best of both worlds.  They offer the sights and sounds of a visual medium, but they let us take control.  We are given the tools we need to solve any problem within the context of the game.  All that remains between the start screen and the end credits is the question "can you do it?"  They immerse us in the narrative by making us a part of the story.  A beginning and end are strung together by the player's actions and decisions.  And while Roger Ebert embroiled himself in controversy by claiming that games are not art, then later backtracking and saying that they are art, but not "high art," have you ever seen anyone walk out of Casablanca crying like this bitch?  Clearly, there is a level of immersion and emotional investment in video games that cannot be denied.

Shigeru Miyamoto, creator of the Mario Bros. series (and many, many other titles) once said that "games are like favorite playgrounds, places you become attached to and go back to again and again." Thank you, Small, Funny-looking Japanese Man, for making my entire point for me.  And making it characteristically smaller and more efficient than mine.  Why not just add a clock radio to it and cock-slap my grandma while you're at it?

I'm not trying to say that games are better than books or movies (we gamers are still waiting for our Gone with the Wind and Citizen Kane).  But, as a thesis statement, games take us places.  The medium, by its very nature, transports us somewhere.

My first meaningful experience with a game came in 1994, when my best friend came over to my house for a Cub Scout meeting that my dad was presiding over for the evening.  I remember that the theme for that night's meeting was cryptography.  We had to decipher a secret message that my dad had written in code using a phone book as a key.

Dad, if you're reading this, I'm sorry.  For the life of me now, I cannot remember what that message was.  I know how much of a disappointment I am to you.

What I do remember from that meeting is that my best friend brought over a copy of Final Fantasy III that night, and I fell in love (with the game, not my friend).

While my dad was doing the last-minute preparations to ensure a smooth troop meeting, our scout pack of two (even at a young age, we were fucking outcasts) frantically plugged away as my friend filled me in on the story so far.  When our expedition of the Imperial encampment ground to a halt so we could pledge to my father how loyal, cheerful, brave, and thrifty we would be, my mind was still there in that encampment.  As my friend and I poured over that code my father encrypted, we knew that every error made cost us precious seconds in the race against time and his dad's minivan coming to pick him up from my house.  Our fathers were keeping us from our new favorite playground.

We were kind of pathetic that way.

And when my friend finally retired home that night and the glow of my TV gave way to placid oblivion, I went to bed that night wondering what would become of Sabin and Cyan, and our recently acquired character Gau, as they scrambled to rejoin their friends.

Every day at school was a new update from the home-front.  My best friend related in painstaking detail every major conflict and story development.  A regular fifth-grade war journalist.  And when I finally got my hands on a copy of the game, I dropped it into my Super Nintendo slot with trembling anticipation of finally being able to re-live my obsession firsthand.

 

Much like my chance of getting laid before my 20th birthday...

Almost fifteen years have passed between now and then.  I have beaten Final Fantasy III at least fifty times.  I am a very, very sick person.  I have beaten it by using all fourteen characters individually, beaten it without learning magic, beaten it without gaining levels, beaten it twice in the same day, and beaten it without learning magic or gaining levels at the same time.  Hell, I wrote the first guide on how to do it.  I can't even play Final Fantasy III anymore on my Super Nintendo.  I need to play it on the computer so I can use a fast-forward button.  No, I'm not kidding.

But, as I'm sure everyone reading this is asking themselves, "why?" (alternately, the longer: "why am I reading the blog of the world's least talented autistic?")  There are hundreds of thousands of games out there.  Board games, computer games, card games, console games, and, of course, Terry Tate's favorite kind of games.  Why would I--or anyone--play the same game into the ground years upon years after its release?  Why would anyone willingly commit to thousands of hours to the same story, knowing that operating within a closed system like a game, book, or movie, the outcome is exactly the same?  Is it as the definition of insanity suggests: doing the same thing repeatedly expecting different outcomes?  Am I insane?  Is my behavior that of a crazy person?

My belief is that it's as far from that as you can get.

 

Also known as the "rubber vs. glue" defense

 
It's the comfort of familiarity.  It is the state of querencia--a place of strength where we know exactly who and what we are.  When you pick up a game--any game--for the first time, you are an infant.  There is little connection between the input device in your hands and the game.  Your skills are tested and tried until you display enough proficiency and/or tenacity to beat it.  Often, this is the point at which we move on and find a new playground to explore.  But those devoted enough to stick around find a new level of comfort and familiarity, an intangible bond between themselves and their on-screen personification.  It is through that connection that one can do amazing things.  Self-actualization made manifest in one's digital counterpoint.

Think of it this way: you can spend enough time with a person and get to know them well enough to marry them.  But if you devote enough time to that person, get to know them on a deep enough level, then together your one mind is of two bodies.  Your soul and theirs breathe of one breath.  You can see right through them.  You can communicate with each other without so much as a word.  You can shit with the door open.

That connection is a difficult thing to let go.  If love is romantic intimacy with another and friendship is comfortable intimacy with another, what I am describing is intimacy with a system.  It's the reason that there are still Street Fighter II tournaments being played over fifteen years after its release.  It's the reason that Everquest still exists and has just released its sixteenth expansion (despite Everquest 2 having been released in 2004).  It's the reason a text-based MUD has survived since 1992.

It's the reason chess is still relevant.

Gaming and gamers have matured a lot over the years.  Maybe we've both grown up too fast.  But it's important not to forget where you came from, and the places--both real and imaginary--that shaped you.  Don't be afraid to play like the child you were.  Long summers that, reaching on until forever, begged to be squandered in front of a TV set.  You can still dust off that old, beautiful playground.

It's still waiting for you.

Wedlock is padlock

Did you know that in Japanese, the word for "married" and "prisoner" are identical, save for extension of a single vowel sound?

I think they're trying to tell us something: "we have no fucking idea how to make a language."

The movies make getting married out to be a cute, lovey-dovey gigglefest with hearts and rainbows and unicorns.  This is incorrect.  Weddings are beautiful, heartfelt ceremonies that celebrate lifelong love and commitment.  A tapestry of joy and sadness, fulfillment and melancholy loomed of the fabric of two hearts.  But that's not what I'm talking about.  I'm talking about getting married.

Lest we forget, marriage is not only a sacrament (for the Catholically-inclined among you), but a legal institution.  That's the thing all those nice gay rights folks are fighting for.  And I'm not going to make the obvious joke about how we should all just let the gays be as miserable as we married folks are (frankly, I haven't been married long enough to make that joke), but honestly I don't think the movement has considered the sheer volume of paperwork they're getting themselves into.

Actually, I did make the obvious joke and I apologize.  That was really, really lazy of me.

So instead of getting married, say... here:

We instead went to City Hall on Sunday morning, February 14th.  And filed our paperwork...

 

...here.

No, I'm not kidding.

Sadly, a realistic appraisal of our budget didn't allow for a wedding ceremony of any kind here in the 'Pan, beautiful as it would no doubt have been.

But for all that, the photocopying of passports, collecting of witness signatures, and 8AM trips to the U.S. Embassy, I can still say one thing: it was, bar-none, the greatest decision of my life.  Waking up the next morning penned into a single-size bed, pins and needles rippling across the left side of my body indicating I was either suffering a debilitating stroke or that the love of my life had been compressing me into the box springs for the past six hours, I looked into her eyes and knew that this beautiful, charming, intelligent, blanket-stealing woman was mine forever, and I hers, our hearts shackled together in the bindings of love and matrimony.

I just wish our cell had a bigger bunk.

Japan, American football, and you

Did everyone have a good Super Bowl Sunday?  I didn't.

Not that I didn't enjoy watching sweet, sweet tears rolling down Peyton Manning's horse-face.  I really loved every second of that.  I just didn't like that, for me, it happened at 8AM, Monday morning.  What an ungodly hour for a football game.

It's tough being a football fan in the 'Pan.  Gone are the lazy Sundays spent lounging in front of a TV with a bowl of nachos and watching a couple of games.  In Japan, being a football fan means choosing between watching a single game or showing up to work the next day resembling something other than John Romero's grizzly depiction of the not-too-distant future.  Games come on late or not at all in Japan.  Sure, very occasionally you'll luck out and get a game coming on around 7PM... I say you will and not I will because I have to work until 9PM every night and I get home just in time for the winning team to take a final knee.

If you enjoy talking football, you find yourself in even smaller company.  So many times have I found myself in this conversation:

Japanese person: So, do you like sports?
Merican: Yeah, I'm a big fan of American football.
Japanese person: Me too!  I love American football!
Merican: What's your favorite team?
Japanese person: I... don't know.

And so it goes.  Not that I'm criticizing Japanese sports fans.  On the contrary.  If you ask a Japanese baseball fan about their team, the tidal wave of stats, roster analysis, and locker-room controversy they'll launch your way will rival an episode of Sports Center in depth and scope (oh God, I just reminded myself of how much I miss Sports Center).

For the football fan in Japan, there is one occasion unparalleled in glory, for whom all reverence and worship is unequivocally due: the Rice Bowl.  The mere mention of its name sets my buttocks atingle with excitement, cheeks quaking in anticipation.  It is the holy grail, the mecca, the pilgrimage, and other religious stuff that all football fans anticipate with the coming of every new year.

The Rice Bowl is played every year on January 3rd.  In the Japanese American football world, there is no championship greater; a true test of mettle between the Japanese club champion and collegiate champion teams.  Although, to give you an indication of the level of skill on display here, imagine the Super Bowl champion squaring off against the Rose Bowl champion and the absolute slaughter that would ensue.  But in Japan, the teams are generally evenly matched.

Watching the Rice Bowl for an intricate chess match between two disciplined, well-coached teams is like listening to John Madden for the insightful commentary.  In both cases, what you're really tuning in for is "I think it's safe to say that we're going to see some FOOTBALL!!"

Remember when the Saints did that gutsy onside kick to start the second half and recovered, swinging the momentum in their favor to start the second half?  The very first Rice Bowl I went to featured--I'm not exaggerating--75% onside kicks.  None of which were recovered.  I have to think play-calling like that stems from the Japanese baseball culture where the sacrifice bunt is a major part of the game.

Runner on first with no outs?  Bunt.  Runners on first and second with one out?  Bunt.  Runner on second with no outs?  Bunt.  Runner on first with two outs?  Bunt that son of a bitch.

Japanese football, same deal.  Only with onside kicks.

That sort of idea, the small gain leading to the big play, is pervasive throughout the Japanese style of game.  In the 2010 Rice Bowl, the Kajima Deers (not Deer, Deers) faced an intimidating 3rd and 28 staring down the barrel of a 13-0 deficit minutes before halftime.  Clearly, if ever a big play was needed, this was the time.  The response?  A five-yard out route that was quickly smothered and resulted in a punt.  Why?  Why?  I propose a new offensive coordinator for the Kajima Deers: anyone who has ever played a full season of any Madden game.  Hell, even Mutant League Football.

For all its faults in terms of quality of play, the Rice Bowl more than makes up for it in spectacle, accessibility, and creepy middle-aged dudes with high-end cameras taking pictures of cheerleaders less than half their age.

Despite the fact that most Japanese people know little about an admittedly rule-heavy game (imagine attending a cricket championship at Yankee Stadium), the Rice Bowl caters to the first-time spectator.  Before the start of the game, Tokyo Dome jumbo-tron displays a 15-minute introduction to the game, explaining in detail everything from the first down, to the positions, penalties, turnovers, and scoring system (a program that aired again on Japanese cable television prior to the Super Bowl).  Penalties are explained to the audience by the announcer on every flag, ensuring that nothing seems arbitrary to the uninitiated football fan.  The Japanese football association goes to great lengths to make the audience feel included in the action.

Often, it seems like the announcer should be the guy down on the field actually making the calls.  The referees' unfamiliarity with the rules is glaring to a regular fan of the American game, with penalties often being incorrectly assessed (or in the case of a team calling consecutive time-outs to freeze the kicker at the end of the most recent championship game, not called at all), and ultimately affecting the outcome of the game.  The past two championships actually wound up in the wrong hands due to sloppy refereeing, but what can you do?  At least it's football.

For the avid fan, the Rice Bowl festivities extend a full day.  Rest assured, American ex-pats starving for football action are invited to binge on their favorite pastime starting from the junior and flag-football championships beginning in the morning, with the main event to follow.  My fianceé came with me the past two years and sat in the stands for seven straight hours, allowing me to get my fix.  And only one of those times did she actually have a ring on her finger.  Keeper material, that one.

For the past year-and-a-half, I've had the unique pleasure of teaching English to a member of the defending champion flag-football team.  He generously got my girlfriend and I a pair of tickets so we could come to the event for free and watch he and his team steamroll their competition and earn a place in the flag-football World Cup game taking place in Canada later this year.  Watching he and his team hoist the trophy after a one-sided, sadistic drubbing is one of the memories of Japan that will last a lifetime.

And to truly test the zoom and high-speed capabilities of the creepy dudes' expensive SLR cameras, the women's championship takes place shortly after the conclusion of the main awards ceremony.  Rest assured, those dudes' arms are going to be very, very tired that night.

From snapping all those pictures and holding those heavy cameras.

(And beating off)

For the past three years, the Rice Bowl has been a staple of my New Year's vacation.  It's difficult to think of somehow ringing in 2011 without the muddled revelry of sloppy, amateurish, high school-level play.

I wonder if the Lions play the Rams next year...

The Onsen Survival Guide for Foreigners

Or: How to Sit Next to a Fat, Middle-Aged, Naked Man and Enjoy It (More Than Usual)

Ah, the onsen.  One of Japan's most exotic traditions.  To indulge in the public bath is to indulge oneself in Japanese culture.  Few of life's pleasures rival stewing in 104 (F) degree natural mineral water during a long vacation.  Indeed, entire vacations can be designed around Japan's offerings of hot springs framed by picturesque natural scenery.

But how can you enjoy yourself without feeling grody next to a bunch of old naked dudes?  Fortunately, dear reader, I have an answer.  And being that I am currently on the mend and unable to indulge firsthand, I can at least console myself by talking about a pastime that I have come to enjoy during my time in Japan.  And who knows?  One of us might just learn something (probably you).

Before we get started, there are a few things to be aware of to ensure that your time spent in the bath will be as relaxing as possible.  This includes parts of Japanese culture that one might not know to expect, as well as a bit of terminology and manners.

First, learn the terminology.  An onsen is a naturally occurring hot spring.  A sento is a public bath where the hot water has been imported from somewhere else.  Boy will your face be red if you mix this one up.

Next, be culturally sensitive.  For dudes, that means getting used to seeing other dudes who might... have a bit more going on than you're used to.  You know, turtle-neck-wise.  Whereas circumcision became popular in the US in the decades following the end of the Second World War outside of its traditional religious uses, it never caught on in Japan.  If you're coming from Europe, this isn't going to be much of a thing.  For women, it means lots and lots and lots of hair.  Try not to sneak a peek of anyone's junk unless you're at least 90% sure it's going to make you feel better about yourself.  The hot spring isn't just for purging sweat and "toxins" from your body, it's also for purging a crippling sense of inadequacy.

I can only speak for what goes on in the men's baths when I say this but, be prepared to possibly see someone's very young daughter (age 0-10).  Parents bring their children (regardless of gender) to the public bath.  Apparently Japanese parents seem to think it's better than leaving their kids somewhere.  I'm still undecided as to whether this is superior to the Proud American Tradition of locking children in the car.  For whatever reason, no one in Japan thinks it's weird when a woman cleans the men's room or sento shower room, either--even when men are using it.

So you've finally overcome your anxiety surrounding exposing your pitiful, withered, naked shame (God's curse on you for being so ugly) to all of Japan (everyone's going to judge you).  You brought your towel, possibly a change of clothes, any soaps or shampoos that your dainty ass might desire, and the nice lady across the counter just handed you a key.

Alas, it's not for a box of money.  It's for your shoes, dummy!  Japan is all about taking off their shoes everywhere they go (in all seriousness, when I went to the hospital for surgery, I had to take off my shoes and put on a pair of hospital slippers, whereupon I walked ten feet to the next room, and changed my slippers again.  I don't know).  This is one of those times.  Take off your shoes (you may later receive another key to a separate locker for your belongings, but let's move along) and step intrepidly across the breach.

You're now in the changing/locker room.  If you came with friends or guests, be sure to strip as quickly as possible.  This will establish you as the alpha male of the group.  If possible, wait for a moment when your party is distracted or turns their heads.  You're like backwards Superman!  And, like Superman, many things in this room can paralyze you.  With fear!  Not the least of which is the fact that tons of naked dudes are coming back in from the bath and ready to put their clothes back on.  Like a handful of change held tightly in a fist, the quarters are close.  One false move and you can go ass to wet, naked ass without the slightest warning.  And, with all due respect to Clerks 2 and especially Requiem for a Dream, you never, ever go ass-to-ass.

Now, it's time to take the plunge.  Not the actual plunge, that comes later.  For right now, you're filthy.  Instead, take the metaphorical plunge and stride into the mists, confident now in your cultural understanding and ready to relax with a hot shower and then allow your cares and worries melt away in the sublime warmth of Japan's natural serenity.

Wait.  Stop.  Hold everything.  Did you remember to bring a hand-towel?  Oh man, you're going to look like the biggest poser in school if you forgot to bring one.  Quick, run back into the locker room and grab one out of the basket, maybe nobody noticed.  But don't run run, what if somebody sees you?  You're supposed to be carrying yourself with effortless dignity!  Got your hand towel?  Your dainty soaps?  Great.  Get back out there and be graceful about it!

The next thing you'll notice once your heart rate normalizes is row upon cascading row of (usually) sit-down shower stalls.  You stink, so sit down on the stool and give yourself a nice wash and rinse.  Try not to stare at the guy brushing his teeth and angrily blowing snot out his nostrils every few seconds, and get out of there quickly.  Still have your hand towel?  You're almost there.  Approach the pool of water in front of you, take a deep breath, and step in.  The next thing you will notice is the biting, icy chill of Jack Frost's own blood as it tears into the fabric of your soul.  Stand up and get out.  That was the "cold" hot spring, clocking in at a modest 64 degrees.  You weren't supposed to get into that one.  That's for old people.

Look for a bath with a digital thermometer with a display reading between 39 and 41 degrees (Celsius) and, this time, test the water before you get in.  Nice and warm, right?  Feel as the warmth crawls up your foot, embracing your leg and beckoning you come in.  Find a seat next to the wall and allow the balmy blanket envelop you as the stingers of a thousand angry hornets tear into your backside, chainsawing away at your very flesh.  Stand up and get out.  That is the electric tub.  You weren't supposed to get into that one.  That, too, is for old people.

Look for another tub.  Quickly!  Your girlish, agonized screams likely attracted attention, but perhaps they were lost in the echoes and fog long enough for you to escape unnoticed.  Do you still have your hand towel?  Too late, forget about it!  Save yourself!  Finally, you shuffle outside into the pristine wild.  Soggy, broken, a shell of your former self.  The cool air smacks your senses as you breathe deeply of the fresh mountain air.  Your bare feet pad across the ground with renewed vigor as you approach your watery salvation and sink into the intoxicating placidity.  Simple and rich, the bath water folds around you, a cocoon of warmth and joy and everything right with the world.

Closing your eyes, off in the distance you swear you hear the sound of water slapping rock, laughing as it plays through the gullies and streams, making its way here to this place, this sanctuary from the stresses and worries of the outside world.  The chuckle of the water treading its path through the thirsty land becomes stronger, a dull roar, washing over you on all sides as your body pulses with life and joy and harmony with all creation.  The laughter is alive!  All around you!  You open your eyes once again to allow your soul to dance in unity with Gaia, the earth spirit, and the laughter manifests and becomes real!

Everyone's staring at the jackass who forgot his hand towel.

Here's one you may have missed

Word of mouth travels fast*.  From one Internet source to my best friend to me came the recommendation to check out an independent horror film that slipped by unnoticed: Pontypool.  And while I'd like to write up a synopsis of the film, I think I'd be doing both of my readers a great disservice by revealing much of the story, so you'll have to excuse me as I only outline the basics.

The entirety of the story takes place inside a radio station, with much of the action happening inside the DJ booth.  We follow the beginnings of a normal day for the new DJ Grant Mazzy (Stephen McHattie), his station manager Laurel-Ann Drummond (Georgina Reilly), who has just returned from a tour in Afghanistan, and their producer Sydney Briar (Lisa Houle) devolve into madness as chilling and spotty accounts of acts of mob violence trickle in through the phone lines.

Each phone call--most frequently from the radio station's "chopper" weatherman Ken Loney (Rick Roberts)--provides a a glimpse of the sudden "insurgency" in the small Canadian town of Pontypool.  The audience never sees the majority of the action (and nothing that happens outside the station's walls), but Loney acts as our eyes and ears in the field, and great pains have been taken with the script to ensure that despite "telling rather than showing" the action outside, the narration is visceral and urgent.  Scenes of muddled, chanting caricatures of humanity congesting the streets and meting out acts of bizarre violence are told in vivid imagery, without feeling like they're being soliloquized from above the carnage.  Most of the outside narrative comes from a character in middle of it all, and as he describes it, it feels like he's in the guts of something miserable.

Giving no more information than is revealed on the DVD case, the "insurgency" is actually yet another zombie Armageddon (the first one for the characters in the movie, but for the viewer, the four-thousandth or so).  Director Bruce McDonald takes full advantage of the action being set inside a radio station and the interplay of the setting and story.  Grant Mazzy is restricted from speculating to his listening audience on the cause of the nightmare simmering just outside--he is a reporter making do with scant information--giving Briar and Drummond plausible reason to initially believe that the sparse and conflicting accounts add up to a hoax.  Whereas in many zombie films the characters seem skeptical of the situation, even when the situation is sinking its teeth into their trachea, Pontypool allows the audience to dabble in the realms of security for a bit longer, unsure of when swarming, bloodthirsty inevitability will claw its way into the studio.

And while Pontypool could have slid by on being yet another member of The Night of the Living Dead's horde of clones, the script is admirable in that the plot is just as much about how the zombie infection is spread as it is the characters trying to survive it.  It's a truly creative effort and a new take on the zombocalypse, and is ultimately both the movie's biggest strength and weakness.  Midway into the second act, the audience and characters are told--firsthand--how the zombie plague spreads.  And yet, the characters "discover" this during a tense standoff in the third act, by which point it seems extraneous.

Understandably, the characters don't have the insight to know that they're inside a movie and that the information they received anonymously half an hour ago is the key to their situation now, but the conversation wherein one of the characters pieces together the explanation to a heretofore unknown virus drops more technobabble on the audience than an episode of The Next Generation.  The audience was already told once firsthand, and bogging the climax down to have this information so agonizingly and unnecessarily repeated seems like the writer and director wanted to make sure to speak slowly and in simple words for us idiots in the audience.

Similarly, the scene where the "cure" to the zombie infection is discovered seems like all the key components of a good horror movie came together, but without any way to wrap it up.  One of the characters succumbs to the infection and, at the zero-hour, is miraculously saved from transformation in a moment that stands out as cheesy even by horror movie standards, shoe-horning an absolutely unexpected romance angle in during the final ten minutes, giving it no time to develop or have any real significance.

Now, allow a full 180 in the review and to add that, in spite of the corniness of the aforementioned scene, it does give our protagonists an opportunity take to the airwaves one last time to deliver one of the most poignant monologues to ever end with the words "you cocksuckers."  Gotta give it points for that.  Also there's a pretty good message in there about not being incited into violent retribution in the face of terrorism if you're into that sort of thing.

If you're a fan of the horror genre and are looking for something different, Pontypool will deliver.  It's short on cheap scares, but Rick Roberts did a fantastic job as the frantic call-in weatherman Ken Loney and delivers chills by the dozens.  And while the effects budget was slim, Pontypool oozes atmosphere what it lacks in raw gore.  Definitely check it out.  You could do a lot, lot worse.  Like paying money to watch Saw 3 through 6.  Please don't do that.

*If you see the movie, you'll see what I did there.

Home sweet Japanese home

There's a lot you miss when confined to your apartment.

The sights, sounds, and smells of the world around you somehow seem less vivid when experienced through six inches of drywall and insulation.  Funny how that happens.  Alas, still confined to my apartment due to still being on the rehab from surgery, cabin fever is starting to set in.  The occasional stroll pitiful hobble to the doctor's office at 6PM sharp every day leaves very little time for the sights and sounds.  Smells are right out.

Indeed, there is a lot to miss about my neighborhood, and neighborhoods in Japan.  Whereas life in the suburbs is a quiet, sterile thing, Japanese neighborhoods throb with activity--the kind of throbbing that leaves me feeling uncomfortable with my masculinity.  My apartment is situated on a red brick road.  Suitable for a Kansan; we feel at home within close proximity of a brick road of any primary color.  I didn't choose this place--my company did--and I can't help but feel that whoever made the decision to pick the apartment within spitting distance of a McDonald's and a fried chicken stand did so largely due to my nationality.

Not that I'm complaining.  If stereotypes like this worked out in my favor more often, I'm sure a lot less people would ask to see me dance at parties.  It's not pretty.  Like a two-headed snake on mescaline.  Little kicks.

But beneath the quiet exterior lies an unprecedented level of diversity, particularly for a 99% ethnically homogenous society.  Here I've met Australian, Canadian, American, Nepali, Kazakhstani, Ghanan (sic?), Indian, Korean, and Chinese people all sharing the same place.  And Japanese, of course.

Whereas most American suburbs meditate in silence and the quiet purr of traffic, Japanese neighborhoods are a rich blend of glorious noise.  The sound of friends meeting and striking up a conversation, people walking their dogs, the neighborhood butcher calling out the price of his latest freshly dissected carcass, children actually playing outside.  And, the ebb and flow of karmic balance being what it is, the inglorious din of trucks blaring an ungodly wail from their speakers as they hawk steamed sweet potatoes, the constant reminder of the bargain price of your rent vis-a-vis your neighbor's awful taste in house techno penetrating the wall and your skull at three in the morning.  The neighbor's dog which doesn't bark so much as it screams a horrific wail like a velociraptor being strangled.  And I think my upstairs neighbor devotes the hours of 8PM to 2AM to fucking his girlfriend, practicing judo, moving furniture, and playing Dance Dance Revolution.  At the same time.

Campaign season is the worst for those who like to sleep in.  Whereas in the US, campaigning is done by broadcast or by those quaint signs seemingly designed to both be obnoxious and lower your property value, Japanese campaigning is obnoxious in a much louder, more obtrusive way.  Every morning, at 9 AM, onward come the campaign trucks.  Tiny, plodding things with megaphones heaped on the back in the shape of an oversized pine-cone belting empty promises through the morning air.  Sometimes they even come back the morning after election day.

Nobody knows why.

Yes, neighborhood life is woven of ups, downs, and often the inexplicable.  The local ceremony where a bunch of old dudes hoist portable shrines on their shoulders and parade around the city circuit for hours on end, chanting as they bear their burden.  The myriad of smells and promises of flavors to come beckoning from every small restaurant along the humble red brick road.  My God damn judo-practicing, DDR-addict, porn-star, piano-moving upstairs neighbor.  And I count myself lucky to experience it.

Except my neighbor.  Fuck that guy.