Whomever said happily married was an oxymoron must have been smoking crack. Either that or married to the wrong person. Here's to another five.

Punch you in the face?

Bark like a dog, then punch you in the face.

Not a whole lot. Having never had a Klondike Bar I would be hesitant to "do something" for one, though the idea that others would preform some sort of task other then paying for a Klondike Bar does make them more appealing. That said, I wouldn't go out of my way.

Hold you and your colleagues hostage on the 20th floor of the Internal Affairs headquarters until the truth comes out showing I was framed for the murder of my partner as well as pension fund embezzlement.

Go down to the corner store and buy one. About $1.50 or so sounds reasonable.

"Records searched by historian and author J. G. MacGregor indicate that about 1560 gold seekers passed through Edmonton in 1897/1898. Of these, about 775 tried the Klondike Trail through Fort Assiniboine and over the Swan Hills. Of these, 160 reached the Yukon, 580 turned back or stayed in the area, and 35 died on the Trail. Records show that about 4000 horses left Edmonton for the Yukon on the overland trail. Only half reached Peace River, and not one reached the Yukon. Many of these horses died on the trail over the Swan Hills, and a hill near Deer Mountain was said to be white with horse bones." - The Klondike Trail Society.
Mmmm, who wants an ice cream?

Eat runny eggs in slow motion. I've always wanted to write that, and this seemed like the best opportunity I was going to get.

Stick needle in eye. Preferably not my own.

Set fire to an orphanage. Klondike Bar? Sorry, I thought you said [inaudible]. How embarrassing.

There are some interesting comments at Signal vs. Noise where they've asked what their readers think about self published books. Most are positive, or simply don't notice the difference between self published books and books from the larger publishing houses. As long as it can be found via Amazon who cares right.

The trend is obviously changing, but I find it odd how self publishing is looked down on as something that was not good enough to be picked up by a large publisher. Compare that to the music and film industries where independent bands and film makers are considered hip and underground when they self produce and distribute their works. Yet for writers this some how shows their work wasn't "good enough" to have been picked by a *real* publisher.

I find taking photos of strangers incredibly difficult (read: introvert + prime lens) and shooting candids in public with a telephoto just seems wrong, wrong, wrong. I'm hesitant to stick my lens in a strangers face --- and I need to work on that. What this means is that I end up with mostly backs of heads, feet and mirrored reflections. But what if you could get strangers to volunteer having their street portrait taken?

Check out Zach's and Youngna's portraits as well as Neil's series starting here. Anyone in Tokyo interested? Manjyu and Strangers? Senbei? Louis Vuitton bags (small ones)?

Under the proper conditions, enough light, a steady hand, and a bit of creativity my mobile phone can produce some nice photos.

This is not one of them. Just me lunch.

A pox! A pox on those who use the cargo elevator for non cargo related activies, like I don't know --- a cigerette break on the rooftop. Some of us have work to do (then bitch in our weblog about it). Make way for my trolley wheezy!

The average consumer is bombarded with something like 3000 advertisements a day, so I've always wondered why people would want to add to the noise and tag their own personal space (this case websites) with more advertising. I don't care if google allows you to customize the text and border colours of their ads, it still looks crappy, and the financial gain just can't be worth it. And I've also thought it kind of lame when people use paypal links on their sites asking readers to help pay for hosting costs and whatnot. I mean, I could think of a million other places to donate money other than someone's hobby of maintaining a personal website. That goes double for websites that just plain suck.

But on the other hand...

If you're absolutely bent on sending some of your hard earned funds my way I'll only say no once. After that I'll just have to recommend you buying me one of these (in silver please). And if you can pony up another $300 we'd also accept the larger Francis! Francis! X1 model. I'll even throw in the honour of my presence for an espresso beverage of your choice, though you must promptly finish your drink and leave, no chit chat. I'm a busy man, and I we couldn't possibly have much to talk about.

This morning we met up with some friends for a picnic in the park. One friend was entertaining his ex-boss for the day, the head sommelier for the Maldives Hilton in town to help put together a wine list for the Tokyo Hilton. Yes, they fly people around the world to put together wine lists. I'm as shocked as you are. Conversation about wine petered out before we got to the park when I jokingly commented on the AM PM's remarkable selection of chilled Suntory reds, which didn't go across as well as I thought it should have. In fact, if anyone has a time machine they don't mind me borrowing, I could really use it for the day. I promise not to alter any major events in history, but I would like to go back to my wine comprehension class and actually pay attention this time.

Looking for recipes to use up my hummus tonight I decided on making paprika sirloin steak wraps. I find cooking out of any western cook book in Japan is all about learning how to substitute. The Cook's Thesaurus is your friend.

Anyway back to the wraps. Rub your your sirloin steak with extra virgin olive oil and score each side. Add a teaspoon of paprika, pinch of sea salt, ground pepper and finish cooking to your liking. In a separate bowl chop up a ripe tomato with some arugula (I substituted for mizuna) and mix with extra virgin olive oil and lemon juice. Warm up tortillas in a pan, slice up the steak and serve all together with soured cream and hummus.

After reading about the Starbucks Delocator on BoingBoing last night I was going to write something about all the Anti-Starbucks rhetoric but this morning see Kurt Easterwood already did a splendid job of laying out what I wanted to say. He quotes the delocator.net Why Delocate? page and goes on to say: Kurt also links to Adam Greenfield's Anti-Anti Starbucks/Ikea rant Ikeaphobia and its discontents, an article I've pointed quite a few people to in the past. I certainly don't see anything wrong in searching for alternatives, or even independent alternatives but criticizing a successful business like starbucks for "making all of the stores identical: the same beverages, food, ambient sounds and smells" seems to miss the point why people frequent them, consistency. And in Japan that also means a smoke free environment, which is worth the price alone. A completely smoke free environment is a rarity in Japan and while other businesses changed their policies to allow smoking (Subway I'm looking at you) Starbucks didn't budge keeping every store smoke free.

Personally I'd like to see more energy focused on the origins of the raw product itself. We don't all have the privilege of living in uber-progressive centers where Fair Trade, organic or shade grown coffee is readily available, so for the rest of us who don't want to buy Folgers and care where our coffee comes from a Starbucks is a welcome sight.

How'd I miss this one? Last I heard Ilford was looking for a buyer and if they couldn't find one might have to start closing production facilities. The new Ilford management also stated that they would be ‘The last man standing’ where black & white products are concerned. That's great news, but it sure gives you the feeling (and you'd be right) like film makers are being picked off one by one.

I had my first taste of hummus during Christmas last year, and I've been putting off making it at home ever since. I made a small batch tonight using one can of beans, and the way we eat it (spread very thin on toasted bagels and other breads) it should last us 6-8 months. Hummus is very simple to make and although everyone seems to have their own recipe the main ingredients remain the same: garbanzo beans, tahini (sesame seed paste, nerigoma in Japan), garlic, lemon, olive oil and a few other spices.

Apologies go out to my fellow commuters, garlic's now on the breakfast menu.

Japan's got to be the only country in the world where the little old ladies dye their hair purple, and the punker teens are dying theirs grey. Fire Engine Red, Smurf Blue, Radioactive Green and Geriatric Grey? The Sunday afternoon bingo crowd looks like they're heading to a D.O.A. concert and shawls with gold beaded eyeglass chains are hip among schoolgirls.

Completely unrelated, but if I see another sideways trucker-cap I think I'm going to vomit, right after I kick the offending party in the back of the knee. My dad used to bring us those from the paper mill he worked at. They were lame back then and still are today.