Category Archives: Personal

One Twice Three Times a Driver

Leave a reply

I’ve written before about how I am, at best, on a good day, an average driver. This is probably why, to get my first license, I had to take my driver’s test three times. Well, that and the family car.

We had, at the time, what I think was a 1979 Ford Ltd. that even people who work on the USS Nimitz thought was excessively big. The math, therefore, wasn’t in my favor: giant car plus big city (well, when you’ve just moved from a town of 1,200, Salina, Kansas looks like a city) plus tendency to panic and overthink equals bad result.

My first test started with me acing the written test and then filling out a lot of paperwork. After that, I got a chance to do the driving test which starts with testing officer explaining “If you break one law, you fail. If I die, you fail and go to jail. (Something like that.) My test had some issues: I drove way too far to the right; I didn’t maintain the speed limit; my “emergency breaking” involved an impressive skid mark (on the road and I’m not sure about the testing officer because I can’t smell); and driving up on the sidewalk during parallel parking. Basically, I failed on points and the testing officer said it would take too long to list everything I did wrong so she only told me what I did correctly: I set the mirrors and put on the seat belt.

I seem to remember having to wait a few weeks or months before I could test again. That time I was still slow to change lanes after turning onto a cross street but I even impressed myself with my parallel parking and no testing officers were nearly jettisoned through the front window during  the “emergency breaking” procedure. However, during the test, I fell for a trap. I was directed to a stop sign at an intersection that offered no view to the left. I slowly rolled up until I could get a look and then drove on. At the end of the test, when I was feeling pretty good about things, I was told I failed because my “rolling California stop” counted as running a stop sign.

I argued that the California stop is merely an a priori adjunct of non-naturalistic ethics and that categorical imperative is holding that ontologically it exists only in the imagination. (Yes, that’s right, I stole from Monty Python) The testing officer, lacking a sense of vision and philosophy just repeated “You ran a stop sign. You fail.”

A few/weeks months later I went back, passed the test and finally got my license.

I’ve hated California ever since.

The Perils of Public Transportation Busses

Leave a reply

When I was in Albania I rode the train exactly once. It took nearly two hours to cover the 38 kilometers (23.6 miles) from Tirana to Durres. Basically, it moved slowly and stopped frequently.

As result, if you wanted to go somewhere in Albania you either splurged for a taxi (which would deliver you to another town for the right price) or you took a bus. Taking a bus was fraught with its own perils.

First, the buses assembled in fields and it took a while to figure out which bus was going where and which was leaving first. After figuring out which bus was leaving next in your direction. You acquired a seat and waited. The bus would only leave when the bus was full, and by “full” I mean every seat had to have a butt in it as did every “jump” seat between the regular seats. If even one “jump” seat was empty, the bus would wait. This filling process could take a few minutes or it could take over an hour.

I remember one bus taking so long that I and another passenger started a revolt. We said we’d go to the next bus and I would pay double my fare. A bunch of passengers started agreeing with us and the next bus driver climbed on and started counting passengers with one of the largest grins I’ve ever seen on a bus driver. Finally, our bus driver huffed and got going and did exactly what we all new he would do: he stopped to pick people up on the side of the road. One person was carrying a goat. (Don’t know if the goat had to pay full fare.)

On another bus ride, from Tirana to Shkoder I nearly had a fight with the ticket taker. Usually, I tryied to sit at the back of the bus but every now and then one of the staff offered me the “honor” seat up behind the driver. This would have been fine, especially as it had more legroom, but every now and then someone wanted to talk when I wanted to read. On this day, the ticket taker wanted to talk in a bad way. Even though I said I had work to do and actively started ignoring him by reading, he kept tapping my leg. After one tap too many I grabbed his hand and twisted it around and we about came to blows. Finally a cop intervened and I got a different seat and learned several new colorful Albanian phrases for describing unreasonable people.

On another trip from Berat back to Tirana, our bus suddenly stopped in the middle of nowhere and we were apparently supposed to change busses but nobody seemed to be moving. I walked up and went into “don’t understand if it’s not convenient mode” and pretended I couldn’t speak much Albanian to find out if the bus was going to Tirana (yes) and get my way onto the bus. Of course, I got the “honor” seat, but since I’d established I couldn’t speak much Albanian I didn’t have to talk.

However, about half way back to Tirana, the bus stopped again, this time for lunch. The bus driver bought me lunch and beer and suddenly I could remember a few phrases in Albanian and hold a decent conversation.

 

 

Beer Pizza Sports and Instruments

Leave a reply

Today’s is random memories and I’m not even sure how many of them are accurate, but one of the best things about growing up in the ’70s was political correctness and “if you do this you will end up deadness” and the precautionary principle hadn’t yet ruined discourse and the ability to have fun. The worst thing that could happen to you was putting an eye out someday. We brought knives to school to show off and playing shooting games didn’t yet result in therapy and lock downs. You could even bring BB guns on school grounds in the summer without involving SWAT teams and suspension.

The other thing you could do was take overnight school trips and, while you were on the trip you could visit breweries. I do not remember why we went there, and I don’t remember what grade we were, but I remember visiting the Coors Brewery in Golden, Colorado on one school trip. The thing that stands out the most was hearing that the hops room (or the grain room) was kept at a high temperature and 100% humidity. I remember my friend Shawn and I pondering what that meant. Was the room full of liquid? (Now that I live in a humid region I can tell you that the room was #@%&ing nasty inside, that’s what it was.)

I also seem to remember that the teachers were able to sample some of the, um, local produce, although they did it whilst we students were on the tour. None of them, to my knowledge, were ever fired, although I may have just revealed a major secret.

The other trips I remember were some sort of band trip that involved eating apple crepes somewhere downtown, sleeping during a classical music performance and a trip to Celebrity Sports Center, which seemed like one of the largest places in the world at the time. I bowled a little and played some games. I wasn’t good at any of it but I had fun. (This was before the days when everybody had to be good at something or you weren’t allowed to do it.)

I also remember eating at the Organ Grinder pizza parlor which featured a two story pipe organ and a couple professional pipe organists (if that’s an actual phrase). I don’t remember the food at all, but I remember the show. I also remember the performers hitting a mechanical monkey every now and then when it wouldn’t stop playing the cymbals.

Either that, or I had sampled some of the local produce without realizing it.

Reckless Self Behavior Destruction Vices

1 Reply

When I was in Albania, one of the things I noticed was a propensity for volunteers, myself included, to suddenly engage in self-destructive behavior of one sort or another. Some of them involved basic vices while some of them involved automobiles.

Partly as a result of culture shock, and partly as a form of self-defense, volunteers who’d never smoked before they came to Albania suddenly became smokers. Volunteers who had smoked before they came to Albania became chain smokers. Granted, when you’re surround by groups of locals chain smoking, and science says secondhand smoke is more dangerous than smoking, it is actually safer for you to start smoking cigarettes. (Something like that.)

Alcohol consumption sky-rocketed (one of my favorite vices at first) especially because the prices were relatively low. Skenderbeg Cognac was especially popular, but I tended to stick to beer, raki and cheap vodka (I think it was 15 cents a bottle but it might have been cheaper).

My other vices were
1) Chasing the wrong woman and ignoring the right one (a novel would be required to explain more) which is something I was prone to do before (another novel) and it got worse in Albania.
2) Being cheap. The latter involved always managing to let other people pay for things and never volunteering to pay for the group when a bunch of us met for coffee (total cost for everyone, 50 cents to 1 dollar). As you might imagine, that didn’t win me many friends, especially among the Albanians with us.
3) Blather and Gossip. Not only can I talk a lot without seeming to breathe, but for a brief time I was the guy you told things to when you wanted everyone to know (but God help you if you told me and you didn’t want people to know).

The other thing that happened, especially in our second year was we started to get reckless. Albanian traffic was a remarkable thing as it was made up of people who’d just earned their licenses and were finally able to acquire cars. This made them a group of teenagers who believed the rules, in so far as they understand them, were mere suggestions. Despite this, it was normal for groups of us to suddenly cross the street without looking, often to the horror of newcomers who’d made the mistake of trying to follow us. (It was their own fault for not looking.)

We used to talk about why, and I’m not sure we reached any conclusions. I always joked (constantly that I did it because if they killed me I’d go to a better place (most likely although this blog may be held against me) and if they didn’t I’d still get to go to  a better place when I was airlifted to Germany.

I think, though, it was an odd symptom of culture shock. Albania was an exhausting and frustrating place to work and overtime that frustration built to a low level anger and everything around us. I suspect we were playing chicken with the country. Daring it to try to knock us out if it could. We wanted to go home but we didn’t want to quit.

Eventually it would knock me out temporarily, but I did get to go to a better place for three weeks.

Itsy Bitsy Noiseless Patient Spider Agreements

Leave a reply

As I have become the designated bug killer in my house, I thought today I’d talk about bugs, or more specifically, spiders.

When I lived in Nou-machi, my apartment was surrounded by large green and black spiders. We quickly made an arrangement, the spiders and I: If they didn’t come inside my apartment, I wouldn’t kill them.

This agreement would, however, undergo a few modifications.

First you have to understand the spiders’ size. They were about 3-5 centimeters (1 1/3 – 2 inches) across. Their legs would just about reach across the width of an iPhone without having to stretch. They built their webs around the walkway lights and around my door light, which meant getting from the steps to my front door was rather like walking through a tunnel in lost Carcosa. The webs themselves were surprisingly strong and could move your cap a bit before they broke.

This led to the first modification: I would tear out any web that hit me in the face or head as I walked to and from my apartment, even if the web wasn’t in front of my door. I would also tear away any webs that touched my door, although I let them have the front window.

The second modification was that they couldn’t build any webs on the laundry pole on the back balcony where I was supposed to hang my laundry.

However, the third modification was a rescission of the second modification. This was done because the “balcony” was little more than an unsupported plastic shelf stuck to the side of the building, I wasn’t confident walking around on it, so I ended up drying my laundry indoors next to the window and using a fan. This actually worked better than putting laundry outdoors in three of four seasons (Pleasant, Humid and Static). (My adult students were convinced I was crazy, but I had dry clothes and they didn’t, so there.)

What I earned from this bargain with the spiders was a nearly mosquito free existence. My apartment had a rice paddy right in front of it (that I once fell into; long story, especially since I was sober when I did it). and a rice paddy next to it. There was a third rice paddy on the far side of the parking lot. These weren’t as bad as you’d think because they had frogs and crawfish eating a lot of the mosquitoes, but Nou-machi could still be overwhelmed with the little bloodsuckers especially during the Season in Which It Rains.

I only found spiders inside twice. They died.

Special Things and Unspecial Things

Leave a reply

Tonight’s topic is based on this probably apocryphal conversation:
Isadora Duncan to Anatole France: Imagine a child with my beauty and your brains!
Anatole France to Isadora Duncan: Yes, but imagine a child with my beauty and your brains!

I think it’s a truism that if you want to know what you love about your spouse, imagine what features of theirs you hope your children inherit. If you want to know what you hate about yourself, imagine what features of yours you hope your children don’t inherit.

Since we already have kids, I spend a lot of my time watching them and going: lucky, lucky, lucky, push, damn sorry about that, and well, it could be worse.

Luckily for the girls they inherited most of She Who Must Be Obeyed’s face. Especially important is they actually have lips, which is something I was pretty much denied which makes me look pensive even when I’m not, um, pensed. They both did, more or less, inherit a version of my nose, but that could be worse. They also inherited my creased eyelids which will save them a lot of make up and/or plastic surgery in the future.

The push is that they both seem to have inherited my height. Our oldest is already taller than her mother and the youngest is getting closer and closer. The oldest has big feet, which makes this a push. Being tall is a mixed blessing in Japan, especially when you try to buy shoes.

Unfortunately our oldest inherited my oily skin and the youngest at least some of my allergies. The odds are more or less against their hair. She Who Must Be Obeyed’s hair went completely white at a young age and white hair runs in my family. Mine waited a while, but is getting there slowly. My Dad’s hair was completely white by the time he was my age.

They both have good eyesight, which comes from me, but have inherited She Who Must Be Obeyed’s inner ear disturbance which makes it difficult for them to hear and understand the male voice.

Our oldest has inherited my propensity for putting off until tomorrow what is due the day after tomorrow. She’s already pulled her first almost-all-nighter and is, as I write this, finishing up the homework she had all summer to finish. (It’s 11:45 Japan time.) The youngest inherited She Who Must Be Obeyed’s work ethic, mostly. She likes to help out, but mainly on her own terms and she distracts easily, which she got from both of her parents.

Our oldest has a well developed back-talking skill, which she got from me, and she frustrates easily, which she also got from me. These are things of mine I really wish she hadn’t inherited.

Our youngest has a remarkable ability to make a small mess into a big mess when she doesn’t want to clean something. She didn’t get that from me as my skill is stretching a small five minute project into a seven day project, which means she must have got that from She Who Must Be Obeyed.

They are both much more aggressive about getting out and making friends than I am. They aren’t exactly extroverts, but they seem to enjoy people. They also aren’t easy to push around. I’m glad they inherited all that from She Who Must Be Obeyed. What they would have got from me wouldn’t have been as helpful to them.

Business Dreams and Breaking Down

1 Reply

Because I tend to dabble in writing, put off doing a lot of stuff while I over think it and, until recently, had way too many hobbies, the handful of business ideas I’ve had usually end up filed away somewhere until someone else does them. However back in the early aughts, a year or so after I moved to Tokyo, I attempted to start a small side business. This is miraculous enough, but that I attempted to exploit connections to do it is also a small miracle.

Not much else about the endeavor was miraculous.

What happened is I learned that teachers in Tokyo were going to be forced to attend “Four Skills” training. (Reading, Writing, Speaking, Listening) and the company I work for was planning on competing for the contract. My mad idea was that such things would probably happen in other prefectures and if I could get organized enough, I might be able to get similar courses started in Niigata. The teachers could then tell the government: see, we already did that.

I contacted a friend from Niigata who besides being a good Japanese English Teacher, was also very well connected in the prefectural education department. I pitched the idea to her and we started working on the preliminaries. I put together fliers and the curriculum (in my free time, of course, not on company time) and she was going to contact her contacts in both the prefectural and regional education departments and get back to me.

She didn’t get back to me. I sent her a copy of the fliers and information and waited. I didn’t want to be too pushy partly because I knew she was usually rather busy.  After a few weeks I received a letter dripping with, well, nervous breakdown.

I won’t get into details but let’s just say, as a rule, it’s a bad omen when your future business partner begins decrying money and materialism in what is supposed to be commentary on future business propaganda materials. I called her and it’s the second time in my life I’ve spoken to a person who was so upset her voice had changed. (The first was a good friend who wasn’t having a good time in her first year of teaching in my hometown.)

I was able to determine that my future former business partner had encountered some direct verbal bullying and had suffered a whisper campaign that had pretty much freaked her out and more or less caused her to burn her bridges with her prefectural connections.

The business never happened, as I suddenly found myself without any contacts in the prefecture. Luckily it only cost me some postage, a couple phone calls, some time and some printer ink. I realize that I should have immediately gone to Niigata and said “take me to its leaders” rather than letting things get put off. Although I have my moments, I don’t know if I could have pulled that off, but at least it would have been an active mistake and perhaps left me with a few contacts of my own. (If that makes sense.) I also realize that I needed to be more aggressive in pushing my business partner.

I did end up teaching a lot of the four skills classes when my company got the contract. (Those will require another post to describe. Preview: huffing and sighing, “Fuck you,” and “I’m sorry you misunderstood.”)

Also, for the record, my curriculum was better.

 

Quite Comically Droll Really

Leave a reply

I have a couple hundred things I could and should have done today but rather than waste time playing World of Tanks or other games, I decided to waste it binge watching Inspector Morse and that has me thinking about British television and the odd influence it’s had on my life.

When I was growing up, I would occasionally catch snippets of British TV on PBS. Please remember, we only had four channels at the time, one of which was “educational” The first show I remember seeing and being freaked out by was The Tomorrow People. which is basically the X-Men with annoyingly perfect people and lots of 70’s hair and clothing.

There was also bits of The Benny Hill Show, which I’m still not actually sure I was supposed to watch. I mostly remember him not speaking very much and him being surrounded by lots of occasionally clad women. I also learned the many meanings of “crumpet” from that show.

The other comedy show was Monty Python’s Flying Circus which I mostly remember for the Spam sketch and people getting hit with fish. Later I would see all the Python movies. Yes, I can recite them all word for word, and no, I’m not going to do it now. The best part about Python was revisiting the shows years later and finally getting the jokes.

I also remember, a late 70’s series called Blake’s 7 which was gruelingly pessimistic, full of moral ambiguity, didn’t have seven people, got rid of Blake for a while and wasn’t afraid to kill off main characters. That said, it’s the kind of show that I suspect I’d hate if I watched it again. (Which means I have a moral obligation to watch it again. I’ll add it to the procrastination viewing list.)

The biggest show, though, was and remains Doctor Who. It was another show that I’d watch in fits and starts because, in those days, a week was a long time to have to remember the time something was on. It was also the first show I remember triggering a “What the hell is that?” when I saw a version with a different Doctor. (I didn’t yet know yet that Time Lords regenerate as a new person when they die/ask for more money per episode.)

The first Doctor I saw was Tom Baker and, quite frankly, he’s still the best Doctor. David Tennant did a great impersonation of him as did Matt Smith, but only Tom Baker could properly deliver a line like “I say, what a wonderful butler. He’s so violent.” He was also good at being the clown and then suddenly getting dark and moody. The worst Doctor was Colin Baker followed closely by the guy who had celery on his jacket.

Since then I’ve seen, I think, every available episode of Doctor Who and a couple webisodes. I’ve even watched bits of The Sarah Jane Adventures, based around former Doctor Who Companion Sarah Jane Smith after Elisabeth Sladen’s dazzling return to Doctor Who.

I’m not sure why I liked British TV. I think it was just different enough to count as vaguely exotic and I tended to latch on to things most other people didn’t like or didn’t yet get (Styx; dark beer; sci fi; mustard on French fries; potato chips on sandwiches; peanut butter on celery; Christopher Eccleston as Doctor Who).

Now, if you’ll excuse me, I’ve got more Inspector Morse to watch. I just wish I had a pint of real ale nearby.

 

Hard Work With Mere Fantasy

Leave a reply

One of the things I’ve generally tried to avoid, partly because it seems too much effort for the pay off, is participation in fantasy sports leagues. That said, I have participated in two leagues before and have been recently been persuaded to join another one.

One of the things that’s kept me from taking part in fantasy leagues is how serious some of the participants take it. The first time I remember meeting a serious player was when an acquaintance of mine used paid holidays to fly back the USA from Japan for the fantasy baseball draft.To me this seems like something you don’t do unless lots of money, drugs or hookers are involved. Whatever was involved, the most surprising part was it made perfectly good sense to him to spend real money to fly back for a fantasy draft and his wife was supportive of it, in a kind of “you boys” sort of way.

A few years later I would be coaxed into joining a fantasy hockey league with a few Canadians and a couple Scotsmen. It is important to understand that despite their reputation for being nice, when it come to Hockey (they always capitalize it) they are as ruthless as the most bloodthirsty people you can imagine, even in a fantasy league. When they discus teams like the Leafs (Leaves?), Canadiens (Canadians?) and the Senators (Crooks?) which are the only teams I’ve heard them discuss, they lose all sense of humor but retain all their snark.

In the league, they started by stacking the rules to favor them: you select a team and you are only a allowed a few trades. (The game we joined allowed unlimited trades.) This hampered those of us who’d been on skates only once, thought you dribbled the puck and actually thought the highlighted puck on US sports channels was a good idea. Despite this, I managed to finish second in the pool. I was first for a while but a trip to dial-up land (my in-laws) prevented me from making an important substitution.

The next year we played again, but allowed unlimited trades. Once again I was first towards the end and once again was sabotaged by my in-laws (who I suspect were bribed by Canadians). Once again I finished second. Both years I had the Canadians (Canadiens? Habs?) worried but in the end one of them prevailed which is why I am still alive to write these posts.

Now, for the first time, I’m part of an NFL fantasy league and actually had to participate in the draft. Proving, once again, that I’d rather be lucky than good, my team is picked to win our league.

This means I won’t even finish in the top five in our league of four teams. I’m optimistic that way–and not that good at math.

Half Done is, Well, Begun

Leave a reply

Today marks blog post 183, which means by the end of it I’ll be over half done with this daily project. 183 down; 182 to go. I’ve tried to write at least 400 or so words each time (more or less) which means I’ve already got at least 72,800 words on this blog (some of which actually make sense and are spelled correctly.)

I remain shocked that I’ve been able to keep up with it. For the last few weeks it’s been a particular chore. A bunch of posts were written, quite literally, in front of the in-laws, who didn’t seem to understand why I was swearing at myself and telling them to shut up so I could concentrate. (At least one of those statements is not true.)

My rules remain the same: Post before midnight Japan time (10 a.m. Kansas time) and spend no more than one hour writing the post. Unfortunately, life and life related things–and computer games–generally have pushed back my start time until after 10:00 each night, which is not always the best time to write, especially if it’s been a hectic day. I also don’t always have a clear topic.

One time I was playing World of Tanks about 10:00 at night and, via TeamSpeak, one of my friends asked me what the topic of the day was. I said I didn’t know yet. I’m not sure he realized I was serious.

I’ve opened up the “Add New Post” form at 11:15 at night still not knowing what topic I wanted to write about. Quarter by Quarter Dollar By Dollar and The Politics of Work Sustaining Energy Shots came out of nowhere. Others went nowhere. Some were just strange although I kind of liked them. I still don’t know where The Application is Half the Battle came from.

Some of them have been pleasant surprises. I’m especially happy with the recent No Good Idea Goes Unpunished and Let’s Have a Drink and a Chunk of Your Wallet which also came out of nowhere. (If you have any favorites, please tell me which ones they are as my goal is to assemble the best posts into a book when this year is done.)

I, too, have been shocked at the large number of drunk blogs.

I have about a third of a small notebook full of possible topics, but I’ve been holding off on those. Some of them are seasonal and some are for the dark places when all other lights go out.

I’ve also been holding off doing other kinds of posts on the site–photography, hobbies, reviews, random bits of randomness–mostly so I don’t mess up the nice and neat post count. However, the long term plan for this site is to start doing things like that.

I’ve made feeble attempts at monetization. I have PayPal donation button and, at the suggestion of a friend, included a Bitcoin donation plugin, but I didn’t like that the Bitcoin donation link was almost as large as some of the posts so I pulled it. (If I learn how to adjust the size, I may put it back on.) Instead I’ve added a wallet number in the sidebar for those who 1) find it and 2) understand it. For the future, I may add a page of recommended books with Amazon Affiliate links and encourage everyone to shop through those.

I’ve also noticed that I tend to go in phases in posts about Japan. I’ve tried to stagger those out more, but, well, 11:15 p.m. and no topic. My long term goal is still to modernize The Crazy Japan Times which right now can’t be read on most mobile devices and start a daily Japan related post there.

Readership has been small but consistent, but that’s partly because I’ve not been expanding the subject matter beyond myself. Some of the random posts about pens and notebooks have been picked up by the Pen Addict but that’s only provided short bursts of new readers. Russian spammers remain my most loyal commenters.

I remain torn about how honest and revealing to get in the posts. There are topics I’ve been putting off because they might dredge up unpleasant history even if I don’t name names, but, well, we’ll see. There are also topics that push the edge of political, which I’ve also been avoiding. (Hint, think of where I live and the big events that happened in August in 1945.)

That’s an hour, now, so it’s time to stop. For those who’ve stuck around since the first post, thanks. I hope I haven’t wasted your time and I hope you’ll stick around until the end.