A family Mii portrait on our shiny new Wii. To trade Wii numbers send me an email!

Jonas trying to hold back the excitement yesterday during his first experience on the tigger bouncer.

Jonas Kaito Hegge arrived early Thursday afternoon weighing in at 3.34 kg and 52 cm tall, much larger than predicted by our many ultrasound visits. Born happy and healthy despite a rather stressful incident near the end of delivery involving his neck and the umbilical cord (five million years of human evolution, you'd think we could have worked this one out). Masako and Jonas came home last night from the hospital and Frankie is absolutely in love with her little brother, as are we all.

Frankie turns the big 2 today. I can't believe only two years ago she couldn't hold her head up on her own, and now she's correcting my Japanese. Happy Birthday Frankie!

Not to steal the limelight from the birthday girl, but I might as well toss in one more announcement I've been holding off on. Masako is 13 weeks pregnant with our second child, and due in early January. We couldn't be happier.

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.

This year, one by one, all three of us received an influenza shot. And without fail, all three of us came down with the flu. Mine came shortly after making me take a few days off work, Masako just recovered from her bout, and now unfortunately it's Frankie's turn. Our bedroom permanently smells of Vicks VapoRub, which isn't such a bad smell but nevertheless wouldn't be something you'd want to make into a candle scent or air freshener.

Last night I changed my hosting account to a business plan for the desperately needed diskspace and bandwidth upgrade. I held off upgrading for some time because I was previously told by my host that I'd have to transfer to a different server, which meant re-installing all web apps including Moveable Type. Now they're making the exception and just adding the extras to my existing account. I'm now able to restore all previous video files as well as post a clip from the episode of Millionaire the other night.

The question she turned over to her brains (lifelines) was, "Where was John Lennon killed?" and the choices were Liverpool, San Francisco, Los Angeles and New York. I figured that was common knowledge, but I guess my perception of common knowledge is slightly distorted. If you want the video (40MB Quicktime) choose from the following.

Here's a torrent file (use that if you can) or if you're not familiar with bit torrent you can grab the direct download here. If you have problems with the torrent file let me know as I just installed Blog Torrent and there may be a few kinks to iron out.

Update: Anyone have luck with the torrent?

If you're in front of the tube tomorrow evening check out Millionaire on channel 8 (Fuji TV) at 7pm. They will air the episode which Masako's friend Hiroko competes on. They will also air video of Masako, Frankie and the rest of her brains as there was a camera on them in Hiroko's home during the entire show. And please folks, do not adjust your television set. Frankie really is that cute.

Update: 2,500,000 yen ($24,000) ain't too shabby eh? I've got the video in Quicktime but don't have the diskspace to host it just yet. The video is here.

I forgot to mention this earlier but Masako and two other sets of sweaty palms are currently awaiting a call from Fuji TV studios where they're taping an episode of Millionaire (the Japanese variant of the famous British game show "Who want�s to be a Millionaire?"). Her friend was picked to audition for the show, passed and picked Masako as one of her three lifelines, or brains as their called in Japan. I've never seen this show so I really don't know what to expect.

Masako's friend Hiroko was picked for the show because of her family�s current situation as well. Her husband, and a friend of mine, is from the Maldives and while his family survived the Tsunami they also lost everything. They're planning on going back to help rebuild their town in the next few months, so the added funds would really help. Keeping my fingers crossed.

We spent a brisk Saturday afternoon at Enoshima watching hawks circle and dive bomb people eating lunch on the beach steps. We were very careful, making sure not expose any food to the sky and still one of the huge birds swooped down going for what I guess was Frankie's milk box. No crowds, no vendors, and no speakers blasting Coca-cola jingles repeated ad nauseam. The Shibuya crowd can have Enoshima for their few weeks in the summer, and we'll take it the rest of the year. Just wish they'd leave it a bit cleaner.

What better way to spend a beautiful sunny day than at an indoor aquarium. Well I guess we could have gone bowling...

Frankie was really able to appreciate the aquarium exhibits this time. She bounced on my knee and clapped through the entire dolphin show, though I could have done without the whole "look, it thinks it's people!" aspect of the show. It may not be the most authentic wildlife experience for her, but until she can take the Zodiac ride out whale watching in the Strait of Juan de Fuca, this will have to do.

The two of us decorated our pygmy douglas fir last night. The other, well she was content in taking it down at about half the rate we were putting it up, and tossing baubles into the kitchen. Charlie Brown would have been proud.

You simply haven't lived until you've been Christmas shopping with a 18 month old who just learned how to run, and wants to grab everything in sight. You simply have not lived.

Saturday morning with Fran -- the absolute best part of my week. And of course, the extra hour sleep doesn't hurt either.

In the past few weeks Frankie has started walking on her own, up to six steps before proudly falling back on her bum. During her peak playtime hours our apartment looks like it�s been hit by a smaller, albeit dryer, hurricane Frances with books and toys strewn across our 3LDK. In an effort to create more walking/falling space for her I removed the kotatsu (low Japanese table) from the living room and to help create some balance replaced it with an overflowing book case that was tucked away in our spare room.

I've built up a sizable collection of books during my half decade in Japan and it feels great to display them nicely in the living room where we spend the majority of our time. And of course the bottom shelf is reserved for the likes of Curious George, Dr. Seuss, Winnie the Pooh and other fine board and sponge books. I�m amazed how much this small case has opened up the apartment and of course created more space for all the walking, walking, falling, head-on-ledge bumping and crying.

I've never met him, but will have the oppertunity to do so this weekend under the most unfortunate circumstances. His daughter tragically passed away due to heart and lung problems last Friday after a month long battle in the ICU. She was almost nine month old.

I could never know the pain and grief her parents must be feeling right now, but I'm in a relatively similar stage in my life with a daugher born only a few months earlier and when I try to put myself in their shoes I fall to pieces. She will be greatly missed, and even as a casual reader of his weblog I can tell she made them very proud to be her parents.

A couple times a week I try to eat an ultra-healthy dinner to make up for all the fatty foods I eat during the rush-rush Monday through Friday work week. Last night we made a really nice green salad - lettuce, cherry tomatoes, spinach, carrots, avocado, green peppers and baby cucumbers with a Japanese soy based (wafu) onion dressing topped with tuna. Sounds good doesn't it? Now wipe that drool from your chin.

While taking in large mouthfuls of salad and keeping up an interesting conversation with my one year old daughter regarding some mysterious thing only she could see on the ceiling and the baby picture on her Gerber brand jar of pureed prunes, I took a big bite out of my tongue.

I've never experienced that type of pain in that region of my face, or body for that matter. It would be the equivalent on a pain scale to being kicked in the privates. Yet on top of that you only have your self to blame where as it would be an incredible feat to bag oneself in the cojones.

I doubled over in pain, and out poured a mouthful of half chewed lettuce, cherry tomatoes, spinach, carrots, avocado, green peppers and baby cucumbers with a Japanese soy based onion dressing and a little bit of tuna. I rushed over to the kitchen sink and spit out blood, and for the rest of dinner I kept a wad of paper towel to the tip of my wounded tongue.

Speaking only in vowels I never did get a chance to ask Fran what she was talking about on the kitchen ceiling or if she recognized the Gerber baby from the hospital.

Ever since birth Frankie has been developing her own unique language, and last weekend she decided it was time to take it out of beta testing and release it to the public (Masako and I). I can't quite put my finger on it, sometimes I hear a hint of German then Chinese and a touch of Elvish and Punjabi with a thick Irish accent. Now imagine all these languages mashed together, spoken backwards with a mouthful of marbles and you don't even come close to her little linguistic creation.

Only on a handful of occasions either I or her mother have been the target of Frankie's unique verbal tongue-lashing, as most of her conversations are between her stuffed animals, the cat and a bag of potatoes.

Frankie, I can't believe it's already been a year since you first came into our lives. I remember the details of that day well but what sticks in my mind most was the walk from the hospital and the train ride home.

You were the second last of eight babies born that day so I was able to work out a deal with the nursing staff to let me stay with you a bit after visiting hours finished. An hour later a nurse came and took you away, took you mother to her bed and brought her a well deserved meal as I led myself out into the darkened hospital hallway and out the back door. During the walk from the hospital to the train station I felt something change inside of me and it wasn't just the proud glow of being a father. In the narrow (non existent) side walk I saw a greater threat from on coming cars, in the smokers around the station I saw something I needed to protect you from, and in the teenage girl waiting on the platform I no longer saw just a person but as someone's daughter. From that point on the the way I thought about the world changed. A quote from U2's Bono best describes the way I feel.



So I guess what I'm trying to say is thanks for the wake up call. Happy Birthday, love Papa.

I received the most unexpected Father's day gift on Sunday, the sound of the word "Papa" for the first time. Frankie has been calling everything Dada for the past month or so making me wonder who this "Dada" character really is, sparking just a little jealousy. See I've never gone by Dad, Daddy or Dada so this mystery Dada is just that, a mystery. Now I understand why most fathers go by Dada as it's just easier for children to pronounce. Sunday, after Frankie's bath, she looked up at me with lips pushed together and with lots of visible effort spit out Pa-pa, Pa-pa. Those two syllables were a great gift to wrap up the weekend with my daughter.

The United States gained yet another critic of its worldwide military empire today. Sources from home say that my 11 month old daughter Frankie reportedly pointed outside and "made a big frown" directed at a US military jet flying loudly directly overhead. She was not available for comment, mainly because she can't speak, at least not English or any other recognizable form of human dialect. But our correspondent on the ground said quote, "the finger pointing and frown spoke for it self."

last night as I was lying on the floor watching Frankie play with her blocks and half watching JNN (24h Japanese news channel) she turned to me and gave me a little peck on the cheek! She immediately turned to Masako and smiled. She kept giving me these cute little kisses over and over again. Too cute for words.

Today at lunch I made my usual call home to see how everything was and it seems Frankie has gone on an all out kiss-fest with her toys smooching anything within her little reach.

My personal observation is that parents kissing their children and vice versa is very uncommon here. Compared to my own childhood memories "Oh come on, you’re never too old to give your Grandma/Nana a kiss!" When Frankie was born I was amazed to see that no family in Japan wanted to give her a kiss but after witnessing me giving her 100 little pecks a day they slowly changed their ways. Now she can do all the kissing.

Last summer my mother and her husband spent 3 weeks traveling through out England, Scotland, Wales, Ireland and France. I got a call a few days after they arrived home and 90% of the conversation revolved around an incident in Paris. This was saved as a draft but somehow I forgot to publish it, so here it is. I asked them to write it in their own words.

"While on our trip to Paris, Elaine and i walked miles seeing the many historic sights of this beautiful and exciting city. One sunny day on a busy street we were approached by an excited Japanese couple who literally swarmed us and began pleading for help. Through hand signals and a brochure they held plus a few English words which seemed to consist largely of " thank you very much ",it became clear what they wanted.The brochure featured a display of designer handbags which were on sale for exorbient prices in a trendy and expensive looking store [luis vuitton] across the street.It was the kind of store i would normally avoid at all costs.

They wanted us to buy two purses for them. Apparently it was store policy to limit one to a customer, and since they had already bought one each they could buy no more. They desparately wanted another two, desparate enough to peal out 700 Euro dollars from a large roll and press it upon two astonished strangers. Elaine and i considered for a moment and with a shrug said " okay, what the heck". The store was staffed by well dressed and snobish looking sales people and security guards. We were informed it would be an hour wait in a long line; an hour we could ill afford from our precious time in Paris. However the deed was done and completed by handong over the purses and change to two very grateful Japanese. 700 Euros is over $1000 Canadian. It would have been so easy to walk away with it. However, they had chosen wisely.

The very next day we were astounded to be approached by another Asian couple making a similar request. Needless to say, we politely refused and walked quickly away. "

a few weeks back masako was walking through the station square with frankie on her back when she was aproched by a stranger. she introduced herself as a recruiter for children's modeling agency and wanted frankie to come in for an audition because as she put it "had a face like a doll". masako refused the offer politely and told the head-hunter that we were not interested. she told masako to "talk it over with your husband", they swapped numbers and she gave masako her card and said to expect a call from her office in a few days.

masako and i have discussed this before and both of us are strongly against selling frankie's image to any corporation whether it be for diapers, disney or a tobacco company. i don't believe child modeling is any different in canada but what makes it even worse in japan is way children are "classified" according to race, or is that nationality? well what ever it is they wouldn't list my daughter as either "japanese" nor "international" but "half". half? wtf is that!? half what? calling someone half in canada would result in a can of whoop ass being opened, but here it's thrown around like some sick badge of honour. if we are going to "classify" our children by fractions then let's get it right and do it across the board. children with 100% japanese blood will now be called 1 or whole or we could use the decimal system for a technically correct 01.0 (too bad there is no such thing as a 100% pure race but shhhhh... don't tell anyone) but wait, are we "grouping" by nationality here or by race? oh who cares! many people here seem to think they are one in the same anyway! so kids of 3 different backgrounds will be 1/3rds and so on. how about this, i propose that instead of taking away part of their identify when adding a nationality or race that we add a number like instead of half we would say double. yeah that sounds better! or an even better solution would be to STOP classifying and segregating our children period!

excerpt from "culture jam" by kalle lasn, founder of adbusters magazine

"half of all exotic dancers were once beauty-pageant contestants. that's a surprising statistic when you first hear it. it's hard to bridge the distance between the wholesome, naive, small town cavalcade queen who plays "the volga boatman" on the accordion and wants to be a vet, to the hardened stripper with seen-it-all-eyes grinding in red light on the stage of number five orange."

so sorry mom, you won't see frankie in any sears catalog, diaper ad or switch long distance telephone carrier commercials, at least while i still have a pulse.

broadcast me a joyful noise unto the times, lord,
count your blessings.
the papers wouldn't lie!
i sigh. not one more

it's been a bad day.
please don't take a picture
its been a bad day.
please

bad day r.e.m.

back in tokyo enjoying the rest of the new years holiday. frankie is really missing the fresh air, parks and family back in victoria. lots more photos to come from our trip once I get them back from the lab and get a hold of a scanner.

tomorrow evening masako, frankie and i are catching a plane to victoria to spend christmas with gramma and grandpa. and by complete coincidence my good friend for close to 5 years in japan will be on the same flight to vancouver with us. see ya at narita dave!

it's been almost 5 months since i've made a post dedicated to frankie and it's well overdue. all photos taken with my new nikon fm3a on cheap 100 yen rolls of film from costco.

My mother got back to Canada after a great week and a half spent with Frankie, Masako and I. She wrote this in her email the other day.
I'm amazed that doesn't happen more often. Right from the time you board the plane you listen to announcements, "this is a no smoking flight" "no smoking on this flight" "welcome aboard our smoke-free cabin" all the while you have a mini ash tray built into your arm rest on most flights, and no smoking signs are absolutely everywhere. This leads smokers to, well... think about smoking! As an ex-smoker I remember how hard it was to keep smoking out of my mind for the 10 hour journey across the pacific and could really have done with out all the little reminders.

First off, sorry it has been some time since my last post but we have been busy with our house guest. My mother has come from Victoria, Canada to be with her new grandchild. On Wednesday we attended a small ceremony at Minomiya Shrine in Odawara for Frances that marks the first month of her life called Omiya mairi.

I have a lot more stories floating around in me head but will close with these photos for now.

A small typhoon hit yesterday when Masako, her parents, Frances and I were on our way to Masako's grandparent's home to show off Frankie. Some hairy moments while on the Tomei Expressway with visibility almost zero.

Not too often do you see a photo with 4 generations together in one shot. This is one to go on the wall. Also some photos of during and after the rains taken from the car and from their front yard.

Frankie is recently started making cute little noises like she is trying to talk and she is also smiling more often... I'm tying hard not to seem like an "oya baka" I really am, trust me on this. I fill my mom's email inbox every couple of days with the days cutest photos.

seems my site has just turned from mostly text and only a few images to mostly images and little text. No big deal, nobody was listening anyway. enjoy the photos

Tomorrow Frances (aka. Frankie, Fran-chan, Franco) will be one month old. She is such a joy. We will celebrate with a hug, kiss and trip to Costco while Jiji (aka. Oto-san, Toshi) and Baba (aka. Oka-san, Machi) babysit for us.

*black and white shots taken with Toshi's Canon New EOS Kiss

It has been a long weekend full of visitors cooing over Frances, pooping, changing, feeding, sleeping, sleeping, feeding, pooping, changing... opps pooping again, then changing, and it's time for feeding again.

*some photos taken around june in Shinjuku and girl in Bush "Not my President" T-shirt at noborito sta. can be purchased from Fat Wreck Chords

I'm back to work and Okasan is back for another week helping Masako with the house work. It seems common for most new Japanese mothers to stay at their parents home for up to a month after giving birth. I try my best to accept the customs here but that was one was too much for me. Masako's parents live an hour by train from us away from the city and there was no way I was either going to commute an extra 2 hours (already close to 3 hours) a day to see Frankie or just not see her until the weekends. Her parents understood my problem with that so Okasan (Masako's mother) has come to stay with us.

Frances is getting sweeter by the day. Her eyes wide open when I come home from work ready for papa to bathe and play with her.

On a side note it was my friend and coworker's birthday today, so we checked to see what other famous people share his birthday. No big names for him but for mine there was Pat Buchanan, Burt Lancaster, k.d. lang and rapper Nelly who shares not only the same birth day as me but the same year as well. Well gotta go, it's getting hot in herre

I've enjoyed my week off with Masako and Frances immensely to say the least, and now it's back to the office starting tomorrow. Okasan has been staying with us since Masako and Frances came home, doing most if not all the cooking and cleaning. It's great seeing that she has to be one of the best cooks I know and not having to worry about the dishes or laundry all week has given mamma and papa time to bond with Frankie.

I don't normally recommend movies via my blog but Dinner Rush is one of the best films I have seen recently. I see it came out in 2000 but my local video store stocked it as a new release, were a little bit behind out here.

I always get a odd reaction when people ask me what my daughters name is. "Frances?" they say waiting for some kind of explanation. Frances is the name of my grandmother on my mother's side or Nana as I have always called her. I also like the classic feel of Frances and names that can be used for a boy or girl . We tossed around a few names but Frances was always at the top of the list. One important thing for me in choosing a name were the nick names she would get. Here is what family and friends have been calling her so far, Frances, Fran, Franny, Fran-chan, Franny-chan, Frankie (my favourite), Francine, and yes even Franco (not a fan of that one). There is not much of a story behind the name Shiori, just sounds cute.

In an effort to not let this turn into a dedicated baby site I have set up an album of baby photos. Those needing their daily fix of Frankie can check it out.

*above photos taken while playing around with DSC-F707 and of course slipped in a photo of our little sweetheart.

I miscalculated and thought Masako and Frances were coming home on Monday but actually they are coming home tomorrow. To say that I will be happy to have them at home would be a huge understatement. Like I said before I only got to spend 2 hours with Frances when she was born and since then the closest I could get to her was from behind an inch of foggy glass, hence the soft photos. I still have many things to get ready before tomorrow morning so I will leave you with a few of my favourite photos from the past few days.

Our daughter Frances Shiori Hegge was born today at 6:52pm and weighing in at 3,100g or 6.8 lbs. Masako is recovering quickly and most of all Frances is healthy, full of energy and really, really cute. I am very tired so I will just let the photos speak for themselves.

We've waited 9 months, bought crib, stroller, and tiny little cloths. Cameras are charged with plenty of memory and video tape. Made room in our home, our lives and hearts. Now all we can do is wait. The first chance I get I will post a photo of our newborn baby in my moblog side panel and some shots before that in the moblog and mobile shots gallery as well.

bye for now.

Today was Masako's last hospital visit before she gives birth. The doctor again reasured us that the baby is very healthy and active. It doesn't seem like too long ago when we were spreading the news of Masako's pregnancy when she was less then one month pregnant. How time does fly.

oh yeah, what do you think of my new design? I really got sick of the default and even modified 3 column version you get with MT because when you resized the page all the text and photos changed position. At the office I only open most browser windows half screen and hated the fact that my columns would overlap and photos would be repositioned every time I resize the page.

Masako received one free ticket to Hibakusha for July 4th and 5th in Nakano. If you would like a free ticket please send me an email with a mailing address or if you live in the area let me know.

For the first time in my life today I came to realize how others are going to depend on me. I spoke with someone in human resources at my company on how I add another name under my health insurance. The forms will be filled out by our doctor after the baby is born and will have health coverage under my plan. That gave me a warm feeling inside, knowing that I will soon be playing the roll of parent and provider. Someone is going to depend on me, and not just financially but for every aspect of their life. Still feels strange, but in a good way that we will be parents for the rest of our lives.

*the photos above were taken in Harajuku and Omotesando last weekend.

My father got into photography many years ago when a friend gave him some camera equipment he had won. At the time he had no real interest in photography so he was trying to find a buyer for the equipment. During that time he began to play around with the cameras and it slowly developed into a hobby. A few years before he passed away my father opened up his own portrait studio called Giant Bay Portraits downtown Thunder Bay. I kind of regret not going to see him at his studio when Masako and I came back to Canada for the first time in 3 years and didn't see it until I came home in November for his funeral and was amazed to see that he had made the jump to digital. He had purchased a Dell PC, scanner and was even running photoshop! Along with the change to digital photography came a Sony Cybershot DSC-F707. I remember seeing it at the studio, kind of stuck out seeing it was the only non-film/SLR and non-Canon there. It never crossed my mind to ask for it but when I got back to Japan I knew it was just going to be sold off for a fraction of the value and thought I would get better use out of it. I had just learned that Masako was pregnant the day I left to Thunder Bay so having a quality digital camera before the baby was born has been a high priority for me. Eight months later I now have my father's first digital camera and will be taking the first photos of our baby with it. Photos above are some of my first practice shots of Masako with the Cybershot.

This might sound silly but one of the concerns both Masako and I have after she gives birth is how our other family member will take the news. A few weeks before my birthday three years ago Masako and I were shopping around Machida Sta. when we stopped to take a look at the cats that were up for adoption by a local group called "Friends of Animals". The friends of animals and other animal rescue groups take in abandoned cats, and bring them to major stations in hopes of finding the kittens new homes. Masako has always loved animals, but a pet other than hamsters or fish in most Japanese apartments is strictly forbidden. We came to realize that many tenants kept pets in our building including dogs even though the rule was in place. The next week we went back to the same spot under the walkway in front of Tokyu department store and met Momo for the first time. We donated 2,000 yen and arranged a date a few days later for the group to come to our appartment for inspection. This really showed that they cared what kind of homes their animals went to, and we had to agree and pay for Momo to be spayed. Over the years she has become a close member of our family, mind you the conversations don't really get anywhere but nevertheless she feels like our first baby. I have heard too many horror stories of new parents having to give up snowball or rex because they either pee all over the house or even snap at their newborns. This doesn't seem like our cat but life will change drastically soon and she might also.

Something I neglected to post about yesterday, I was almost killed, seriously. When Masako and I got to Minami-rinkan yesterday we spilt up and were to meet up again at the hospital lobby. My job was to get the morning Mr. Donuts coffee. As I was making my way back toward the hospital with bag-o-coffee in hand I stupidly thought that I, as a pedestrian, would have the right of way at the crosswalk. Well Ms. Heavy foot-san didn't think so and nearly ran over my foot. Did I say "almost killed"? okay maybe it was more like "almost badly hurt my foot" I was wearing birkenstocks you know!

I feel like I've gone from one extreme to another extreme to another here in Japan. In my home town of Thunder Bay, Ontario I clearly remember our drivers-ed teacher telling us that we didn't have to worry about crosswalks on the drivers test because there was only 2 Xwalks in the entire city but we were still taught that the pedestrian always has the right of way. When I moved out to Victoria, BC I was shocked to see how many crosswalks there were and how bold the pedestrians were when crossing. Pedestrians in Victoria just cut out in front of you while jogging with their baby carriage (you know the type with the bicycle wheel up front) with out even looking and call you a Nazi when you have to hit the breaks hard cause you didn't see them coming! And Japan, were you are lucky if anyone lets you cross at all. There must be a rule they have here regarding crosswalks like the red plus three rule.

Well I'm glad to say that we had a very eventful day. The day started early with our bi-monthly visit to Aiku Hospital. We got to the hospital at 8:45 and was able to leave a little after 10:30 so it was not as bad a wait as 2 weeks ago. Baby is facing the right way and all systems go. We only get an ultrasound done every second visit but today sensei gave us a "service ultrasound" very quickly. We saw a side angle of baby's head and the doctor remarded that the baby seemed to have a highter nose, (like her dad). Next week we will discuss the delivery date with the doctor.

Then it was off to the MATRIX Reloaded. Masako got us great center seats in the largest theater they had. How did I like the movie?, well I liked it fine but I'm still going to have to see it one more time to form a solid opinion on it. I'm sure glad I was told to stay till the end of the credits for the Revolutions preview.

And I finished the day over a few pints discussing digi-cams with Marcel. Marcel owns the CyberShot F707, which is the same camera I am getting from my dad. I have been looking at getting a compact camera that I can carry with me where ever I go. The list has come down to the Sony DSC-V1 and the new not yet realeased Canon Powershot G5. They both have 5 Mega Pixals, I have a 2MP sony now but I've read a lot of good things about the Powershot G3 so I thought it might be worth waiting for the G5.

As for the site, you will see many changes going on especially with the lay out of photos within the blog. Right now i am just experimenting with some styles and will be changing this every few days so please give me your feed back.

thanks!

Masako and I went to see the doctor yesterday and it took 3 hours from the time we walked it to the time we could pay and leave. The problem see is that even though Aiku Hospital is very beautiful and clean they do not take appointments. Yeah, this is not a typo. They do not take appointments! Everyone just shows up as early as they can and waits for their turn. They give you a wrist band that vibrates when it is your turn to move up to your next station. So basically you end up using up half your day waiting to see the doctor for 10 min. Complaining aside, I forget all about it when I can listen to my daughters' heart beat and see her wiggling around on the ultrasound. I took a short video of the doppler heart beat check. If you would like to view you can download it here.

It's been a while since I've been into the city. Masako and I headed up to Ebisu to see Masako's friend from Victoria and her year old daughter Moe. First time for me to meet her, and what a cutie she is! To get back to the ketai story, I went to Hit Shop last night to get the new A1301S. When the clerk found out that my current phone was only 4 months old he just said "Muri" and I could not get the discount on the phone and end up paying 40,000 yen for it! ... that was it. So we walked out confused. It is a very strange feeling when someone will not take your money, its like, I give you money... you give me a product or service... simple, no. Turns out that AU requires you to have your ketai for 10 months or more before you can upgrade you phone. We visited the AU shop in Sagamiono later today and they were much more help then the dropouts at Hit Shop. She explained that I could just cancel my contract with AU, pay a 1,000 yen fine, and sign up again. That way I can get a new phone at discounted price but have to get a new # a 080 number no doubt. She told me to wait for the new A5402S that will be coming out sometime next month. So I think I'll wait to see that new one and by that time the A1301S will be even cheaper. I REALLY wanna get moblogging soon.