0. My parenthetical asides have always been way out of hand, but only just now did I decide to try to do something about it. Footnotes. Now you can avoid the juiciest morsels of my run-on banter if you so desire. Let me know what you think.
1. I've discovered two things I can sort of read in Japanese newspapers: baseball articles and comics.
Rather than the classic American multi-page spread of mind-boggling non-humor, semi-religious treacle and the occasional work of genius[1], the Japanese use comics very sparingly - one or two per issue.
Are newspapers measured in issues, or something else? Another sign of my slipping mental abilities.
Anyway, today I read a comic whose first panel featured two schoolgirls begging two just-graduated male classmates for the second button of their school uniform. Second button? Second...button...zuh??? I re-read it at least five times to be sure. Totally confused, I consulted an expert and found I was not crazy. Apparently giving a girl the second button from your school uniform on the day of graduation is a sign of crazy mad love. I can't decide if this is incredibly cute or totally ridiculous.
2. Speaking of graduation, it was this Monday. Japanese graduation ceremonies are pretty ordinary. Audience assembles. Awed hush falls over the crowd as the graduates parade in. National anthem plays[2]. School song is sung[3]. Principal gives speech, PTA President gives speech, graduating student council president gives speech, incoming student council president gives speech. Graduates get their diplomas. Non-graduating students sing well-wishing song to graduates. All students sing song of mutual disdain for Japan's grueling compulsory education system. Graduates sing farewell song to non-graduates, at which point most graduates are crying or otherwise visibly upset. Now a bawling mess of snot and tears, graduates parade out. After the ceremony, graduates leave the school one last time, flanked by applauding teachers and students. Kinda neat, really.
3. I was beginning to find web browsing more and more like watching TV, in that increasingly obnoxious ads were being shoved in my face. Then I found the joy and happiness that is Firefox. It has many nifty features, most of which are surprisingly simple. Like simultaneously opening all bookmarks within a category. Which would seem like a bad idea as it would open N new windows which would make your taskbar a confused mess, if not for another feature, tabbed browsing. Rather than new windows, Firefox just adds tabs to the top of your browser. Best of all, you can download numerous extensions which allow you much greater control over the content that webservers attempt to dump on you. The days of soiling myself due to incredibly loud offscreen Flash ads are over, baby!
4. Barring bad stuff, I will be coming home for a two-week tour of boozing in July. Probably July 10-24 or thereabouts. Lock up your daughters! Hell, lock up your sons, too, I've probably been polluted by homosexuals, vile, subhuman creatures that they are, repressing the pure shiny Christian Love that will set them free. Fuck you, Bush.
1. Read the foreword to the last collection of original stuff Watterson published if you want to be really confused - the last thing I expected the guy to be was insanely bitter.
2. I love the national anthem, or Kimigayo. It's short, the melody is simple, beautiful, and strikingly sad. But I have yet to meet a Japanese who likes it! It's actually a pretty interesting issue. The problem is the lyrics, which are from an ancient 和歌 (waka, "Japanese song" translated very literally by me). One translation:
"May the reign of the Emperor continue for a thousand, nay, eight thousand generations and for the eternity that it takes for small pebbles to grow into a great rock and become covered with moss."
This reverence for the Emperor - and by extension, Japan's often imperialistic and warmongering past - seems to be a source of shame to most Japanese. However, this general dislike hasn't yielded the political impetus necessary to change the song, so chances are Kimigayo will be in place for a long time. Which suits me just fine, because it's a welcome change from the drawn-out bombast of most other nations' anthems.
Further info about the Kimigayo issue can be found here. If you want to hear the anthem (which you do because it's rad), go here, download and listen.
3. Nakajima's school song is awesome - it starts in 6/4, but the melody sometimes feels like 2/4 and sometimes 3/4. Eventually the song switches to proper common time (4/4). You've got to love meter changes in a freaking school song. Edina Hornets fight fight fight, my ass.