Putting up some holiday stories, slowly

Gonna be trying to remember half of my adventures in places like Korea, Egypt, Indonesia, Jordan, Czech Republic, Germany, Transylvania, Hungary, etc...

Here's a quick taster of what you can expect:
Bugger. The picture won't upload.
Hang on.

Oh...arse!

Caught a cockroach yesterday and ID'd it.

It's a German Cockroach. Probably the worst kind to have.
More on this HERE.

Gonna start writing soon

Just thought I should try to put my experiences on holidays on paper - sorry, the internet.
Started it a few times.
Here's one of my efforts, from my time in Texas and travelling down through Mexico and Belize, into Guatemala - click HERE.
Didn't finish it. Will try to finish this one and many others soon.
The US/Guatemala webpages I wrote myself, using simple HTML I learned in a few days. Nothing special. Easy stuff.

The photo galleries were written in code from scratch. Simple code, but lots of it.
Think I'll use the blog functions to write about someother holidays. This blog thing lets me use as much space as I want (I hope so) and also allows easy incorporation of photos and movies (via YouTube or GoogleVideo), so things should go smoother.
I just have to remmeber all the things that happened way back then...

I'll try to put the memories on another blog post thingy.

Pink Panther: Peter Sellers

Classic fight scene between Inspector Clusoue and Kato.


If you liked that one, here's more classic stuff from the Inspector:

Tyre salespitch from Tommy Boy

Interesting sales technique

A white ninja, demonstrating the secret art of stealth

Quality is not great, but it's a great clip.

How to talk to women

Just follow the advice from 40 year old virgin and answer a question with another question:

It's not about butthole pleasures...it's about LOVE!

From 40year old virgin (not suitable for children):

Tonights stuff (new futon, beer and the sentinel)

Well, as you may guess, I bought a new futon (finally), drank some beer (suprise, suprise) and watched The Sentinel, on... ...well, let's just say it wasn't at the movies.

First, the futon.
I've been umming and ahhing for ages now on wether to buy this futon I saw in my local department store. It's a good one, made by Ishikawa (a good brand). But it wasn't cheap. I won't say how much it cost me, but it wasn't cheap. I also went the whole hog and got a matress, too. Now, I can sleep on a nice new futon.
Ladies, invitations are now open, to test this baby out!

Well, after setting up my futon, I sat down, or rather, lay down and watched The Sentinel, with a nice beer and some desserts.

The beer was a nice German Weltenberger Barock Dunkel.
Not bad (500yen at Yamaya).

The desserts were, good and not good. The caramel custard/pudding thing was nice. The other one was not what I expected.
You can see the pics below.


After that, I had another beer (suprised?).

This time, a good old YonaYona ale.
Also, I ate some traditional Japanese beer food, to go with my beer.




Can you guess what it is?

Think about it.


I expect only those who have lived in Japan will know the answer.

It's good and healthy and goes well with beer.

The answer is...

Edamame - soy beans!
Lovely little things. you squeeze them out and they shoot into your mouth (or your eyes, or the floor).
Nice!

Okay, done all that, what next? Another beer? Oh, the power of the dark side is strong...

What happened after my all nighter with Neil?

Okay, first thing's first- I'm getting a beer.
A lovely porter style beer from Yohobrewing, in Karuizawa, Japan.

A National Trust Porter.
This baby is nice! Smooth, well roasted malts, caramel tones, slightest hint of coffee (sweet coffee). Good body, nice, lasting creamy foamy head (that also isn't too big).
Hope I'm not talking like an idiot who doesn't know a thing about beer but is desperately trying to sound like he does.
Oh well, sod it if I do.
Nice beer. 7.5/10. Slight bitter aftertaste but some people will like that. to be honest, I've never been dissapionted with a Yoho brew. They are the oens that make YonaYona ale, probably the frist real ale in Japan. The owner guy is more or less responsible for bringing real ale to this country - thank you!

Okay, back to my post:
What was it? Oh yes, the events succeeding my day of golf (earlier post).
Well, I came home at about 8ish. Got to Hiyoshi station and walked the short distance to where I'd parked my bike. Bugger- it's not there.

"Hang on, Chris, don't panic. You're still drunk. you must have forgotten where you parked it or it's still at home or something. Letsh...lesh not be hasty...hic!"

Nope, I thought and thought till both my brain cells were ready to burst and realised that yes, in fact, my bike was gone. Bugger.
A quick examination of the surrounding area revealed a small red notice that informed the public that, a few hours or so ago, all bicycles in the are were colected and taken to the bicycle pound.
Total of bicycles collected: 1 - mine. Bugger.
I knew (from experience) that the pound was quite a long way from my home and I needed to take a bus (although I couldn't remember which one {c'mon brain, work with me here!}) from Tsunashima and then cycle home on what I hoped would be my bicycle.

Then, I walked home, very tired and sleepy (hadn't had any sleep the night before). Upon arriving at my door, I fished into my pockets, to get my keys.
Bugger. No keys. I looked in my bag. No keys. I emptied everything and looked again - no keys.
Nuts. Lost my keys (house key, bike lock key, etc!).
Luckily, I had a spare set (the mystery as to how I got my hands on these shall remain just that) and I was able to enter my apartment.
But I still needed to find my keys.

It was gettting late.
I called the golf club, in Tskuba, but no answer. I would try again in the morning.
I mailed Kuniko, my friend who drove us to the golf course, the next day and told her about my calamity. She mailed me back and said she found some keys, in her car.


She then mailed me this photo, with her cell phone:
A quick examination confirmed yes, they were indeed my keys! Yes!!!!
So, I arranged to meet her, in Ebisu, Tokyo, later that evening.

Needless to say, I was a little late.

I arrived already 3/4 the way into an Anchor Porter (lovely beer from Seattle, USA).

I drank it whilst walking from the station to the Ebisu Garden Place.
Here's a pic of me, with my beer, on the moving walkway (just overtook a pair of old ladies).

I met her and she gave me my lovely keys. Thank you, Kuniko! Then we went for a walk around the area. I thought I would show her the Beer Museum, as she has never been there. But I couldn't find it (maybe the Anchor porter was kicking in?). Instead, I conveniently found a Mitsukoshi department store and hence found some interesting beers (including the satsuma beers - earlier post).

After that, we did indeed come across the one and only beer museum!
But it was closed.

Still, found time for Kuniko to pose with a standard Japanese sized beer (or rather happoshu - beer with rice as part of the malt make up).
Who said Japanese people are small?
No, it's just that the beer is friggin huge!
(She finished it in 10 minutes)


Then, we went into the Beer Station, for some... ...beer.
I also ordered some food, because I hadn't eaten that day.

We had some nice beer. I got a jug of Yebisu (nice all malt lager).
Kuniko opted for the special premium ale.
You can see it to the left.
Both beers were very nice.

Soon after, my friend, Neil arrived (damn).
He had just been for a Nancy Analyst job interview with Goldman Sucks.
Hope he gets it.
Here you can see our table for three!
much meriment was had by all. We had about three big beers each. Eventually, it was time to move on.

We walked Kuniko to the station and Neil and I decided to head on down to Yokohama town and have another drinkskie.

So, we got on the Hibiya line and boarded our train, all the way to Yokohama.
But something wasn't right.
I couldn't quite put my finger on it, but something just wasn't right.
See if you can fingure it out, by looking at the picture I took of Neil, in the train carriage.

Got it? Look closely...

Maybe you need another clue.
Check out this picture, I took of the floor of the train. Neil is standing in the centre.
look at what is surrounding him (and us).

Yep. That's it, you guessed it.
We were in the ladies' only carriage
Bugger.
Still, no one complained to us and actually, it has it's perks.

• Plenty of space for one.
• No nasty smells of smoke or terrible breath or sweaty body odors.
• No idiotic uncaring old men, coughing all over you.
• No terstosterone tripping grouchy foreigner haitng guys.
• Nobody physically stronger than us (wait, that sounds bad).
• And... ...other reasons that I can't seem to bring to mind, right now (tee hee!).

I must say, in parts, the landscape was glorious.
Some pwettty wittle wadies were sitting awound us.
We stayed in that car, all the way to Yokohama.
Oh, the humanity!

Well, we got to Yokohama and eventually the smiles wore off our faces (after a few hours).
We walked ot the Tavern, butit was closed.
We walked to Cheers, butit was closed.
So, we walked to the Green Sheep and had a beer. I had the YonaYona real ale, but it was not good. They made a mistake pouring it. There was just no gas in it. Neil's Killkenny was ok. I won't be going back there in a hurry. It didn't seem like the bar satff knew what they were doing. They were nice enough, butt I would like a nice beer, for 950yen.
After that, we walked to Sakuragicho and eventually Kannai and then headed into a karoke place (After grabbing a few more beers - apart from the oens we'd been drinking, wehilst walking down the streets of Kannai and avoiding the "you want S-E-X, mister?" Chinese pimps that frequent the area at that time of night. I almost secured a night with some animals - Neil wanted a mouse, but I think the pimp was just confused and didn't really have a farm animal and a mouse in his place- or maybe he did?).
We sang the ngiht away and made total fools of ourselves but enjoyed. Then, to cut a short story even shorter, I walked to the station and came home.
Badabing.

Yo...you're crazy, man

Best clip from Old School, with Will Ferrel.
Funny stuff (I thought so, anyhoos):


Also, remember this song?
Great stuff, subtly done at first.
(not suitable for children)

'aint beer brilliant?!?!

Tonight, I shall be undertaking the immense task of performing a mini drinking session of various beers.
I'm sorry, I've already started.
I drank this baby:

It's just what it says on the can.
Fantastic. Can't go wrong.
Pretty cheap, for Japan standards. About...hang on, let me find the reciept...
188yen! Pretty cheap. And it's 100%malt (no rice or corn starch, baby).

First impressions: it looks like pee.
But smells ok. Tastes pretty good. Actually, tastes better than alot of much more expensive beers out there. Value. aAlso, if this was on tap, I'd drink it, over guinness or any of the big 4 Japanese brews or the American ones (Bud, Coors, MGD, etc).
Nice. When I go back to this shop (I found it by accident today - long story - later), I'll grab me a few of these. 6.5-7/10!!!!
Gott go! gotta run and grab some cooking oil before the shops close!
Gonna cook me up some tonkatsu, champingions (how do you spell that freakin word?), and fried chicken.
Good food with beer and I'm gonna be drinking so much f**kin' beer!

As I was cooking, I enjoyed another beer.
A kingfisher, from India. But 298yen from the shop near me.
Lovely beer. Good quality, too. (7/10)
Hopped and dry taste. A pilsner, perhaps?

Right, finished cooking and as I write this, there's a huge storm going on overhead. Awesome!

Cooked my food. It looks and tastes grrrreat!!!

Probably remove 3years off my life (together with the beer), but what the heck, you only die once.

Here are some more picks for you:


Fried chicken and champignons
(left)

Tonkatsu (pork cutlet fried in breadcrumbs):

All together! Nice! Meat!!!
(all animals were harmed in the making of this meal - sorry)




About time for my next beer, methinks.
A sunsun!!!! (235yen)
"Here comes the sunsun again,
sliding down my throat like an organic beer!"
This baby is also quite nice. Little sharp but very very nice.
Nice bit of malty taste for me. 6/10.



Oookay...finished the food and the beer. Ah, sh*t! tthe f**kin colr thing is still on and the bold and the sh*t and sh*t!!!
F**k!
There F**k! Ah, there you go. No problem.
Like I wasn't saying, now I'm downloading some TRailer Park Boys .Great stuff, from Canda (ay?). Gonna make the long, arduous, perilous trek to the fridge and grab me another brewskie...

While I'm gone, why not entertain yerself with this baby, eh?



I'm back!
Dreher, an Italian lager (298yen).
Really nothing special. Tastes very light.
4/10. Morretti is much better, as,
if memory serves me correct, is Nastro Azzurro.



My next beer, however, is anything but ordinary.
Satsuma gold, is a lager made using satsuma and/or sweet potatoes? That's what I think I says on the bottle, anyway.
A stange aroma that at first hinted that the beer may have gone bad, but then...no. It's supposed to smell that way.
The satsuma is detectable, as a fruity, orangey tangy, semi putridity that seems to belnd into the background flavors of the beer. Interesting. The sweet potato flavor combines wonerfully with the rpange to hide each other within the complexities of this most usuaual brew. An lamost orange, golden hue reinforces it's name solidly. I msut say, I was suprised by this one. I didn't actually realise that there were satsumas or sweet potatoes in it! Hence my confusion, when I was expecting a golden ale taste and aroma.
But now, it's warming to me. It's ok, if a little light. 5.5/10. I think one is enough. Not bad, though (about 350yen?)
Brewery is from Kagoshima, I think. I tried their Munich weissen and I liked it.

Next is a Hitachino Nest Amber Ale.
Very dark color. Darker than amber, I thought.
Using English premium barley and bitter hops. Roasted malts come through in the flavor. Complex taste. Tastes sronger than 5%. Not bad. I'm not the biggest fan of Hitachino Nest, but this one's notbad. 6/10.
Incidentally, Hitachino Nest is the only place I found where you can go there and actually make your own beer. I may try that, someday. For the link, click here.
Anyway, I'm halfway through this beer now, so better post this and get on with the all important drinking. (cost me 350yen)

One more fer ye (not suitable for children).


One more for you:
Hitachino Nest, Sweet Stout:
THe bottle says creamy and I kind of agree, but in a very light way. 4% alc. It tastes it, too. Slightly malted aroma but lack of hops in this. Roasted malts not too strong, but they dominate the taste. I can see a little sediment in the beer. Nice, dark porter style color. Tastes almost like a 'weak porter' would.
Still, not bad. Would prefer a littel more 'weight' to my beer, though. Just a little. Still sweet, perhaps due to lack of bitterness from the hops. 5.5-6/10. 350yen.

Hang on, I aint finished...

Here's one more for you!
Satsuma black - and it is.
Very black. I think this is also a 'happoushu' i.i. a beer made with less than aboot 50% malt and includes something else like rice or corn starch, etc.
This baby has satsuma sweet potato (I have no idea what that is).
I think it feels like a brwon ale that has gone strange. Strange taste. doesn't win me over.
Interesting to try, but I'd rather drink something nicer. 4/10 (for curiosity). Doesn't really work. There's a roasted feel to the flavor but it's kinda screwed up wth everything else. An indescisive beer...perhaps.

Finishing off with a nice one.

A pint of Murphy's Irish Stout (but I think this is brewed in England):

Very, very (if not, 'too') creamy.
Scarily long head retention.
Smooth pint.
However, this one tastes not quite as good as I'd expected it to.
Maybe I' getting drunk.
Oh well, gonna watch the rest of Alien now.
Later, dudes and dudettes.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

It's time for pancakes!

Check it out:

Today, woke up about 2:30pm. Back to sleep, up again about 6pm.
Not good.
Out all night last night with my friend, Neil.
We were screaming out the Beastie boys at 4am.
Came back about 7ish.
Golf on Monday was cool. Pics and a few videos online soon.
Worst thing about that day was...well, you'll now soon enough.
Next post.

Let there be rock!

Friggin awesome stuff, from ACDC.
Pretty good live, too. Good old days.

Have you seen Bungle's twanger?

Based on 'Rainbow', a popular children's programme in the UK when I was a child.
This was a special episode.

"Have you got your twangers out? And remember, you can bounce your balls at the same time, if you like. And if you haven't got any balls, you can ask a friend if you can play with his."

The number of the beast

Which reminds me, I should call my mother soon.
...or she'll kill me.

Run to the hills!

One of my favourites. Heck of a song.
(Expect a few more of my favs in future posts.)

This is just a tribute:

Video to Tenacious D's Tribute. Enjoy.

Thunder & lightning!

Very very frightening!
Around lunchtime today,
there was a thunderstorm above my home.
I tried to capture some of it on video for you guys.

It was cool.
I went out on my balcony, in the rain and got some reasonable footage.
Some of the lightning strikes were awesome!
But I missed most of them (wouldn't you know?)
I've put some videos below. If you like, you cna press the small play button on the bottom left and watch them from within this blog.
Or, you can click on the link below each video and go to the larger version, on the UTube site.
Or you can not watch them at all. It's your move.
...ah, Bishop's finger to Queen's knee - I didn't see that one coming.


(click for UTube link) It's a storm, so it is.


(UTube link) Getting psyched up.


(UTube link) Embarrassing myself, again.


(UTube link) Got a flash at last!

Trying to update this entry, but my friggin computer keeps restarting.
Got a situation here!

Hmm...

Okay, some pics of lightning strikes!!
I had to do this by first pausing the movie on my computer screen, then taking a photo of the screen, using my digital camera, then cropping the photo and sticking it on this blog! - Phew!










You can just about see the actual lightning. On the 2nd photo, it appears to strike a TV antenna/ariel, on top of the building. Cool. Also, that building is just a few 100m away.
I know this by no way compares to what people are experiencing over in Lebanon and Northern Israel right now, but wow, some of those thunder claps really made me jump.
Imagine if it was so much louder, and closer and coupled with a huge explosion that kills and maims indiscriminantly.
Nasty stuff, over there.
Hope it ceases soon.
____________
Okay, a few more videos of me waffling.
Hey, you don't have to watch them!


(Utube) Some theatrical timing, by Mother nature herself.


(Utube) You seen those black CIA trucks?


(Utube) Waffle: Includes my father's shotgun story.


(Utube) 3 minutes of your life, gone.

There you go.
Did you watch them all?
Still resonably sane?
Have a good day. Gonna have to hit the gym, if I can.
Need to exercise, 'cos I have a feeling I won't be doing much, next week.
(Could be drinkin'!)
________________________

Okay, some meandering thoughts...

What's the time, Mr.Wolf?
Shit, almost 1am.
What to write about? Hmm... some people would say "Just write about whatever comes into your mind." Most people who know me, however, would advise against that. Could be here for a long rollercoaster ride.
Well, for a start, I'm listening to this song (takes you to a new window that should play the song). Really nice tune. Lyrics, well... ...let's just say they are not suitable for children.

Okay, it's Friday- correction, Saturday morning.
finished a bottle of wine (more aclohol).
I'm painfully aware of how much alcohol and how often this stuff is going into my system recently.
Tomorrow, I'll try to go to a hash (more beer, again).

I'll try to keep an eye on how much I drink but the only way I can make up for it is to do more excersise before and after (also stressing my body). Hope my kidneys, liver, brain etc can forgive me for this continouos onslaught.
Also, my gym will be closed for three days, from Sunday to Tuesday. Buggers. No discount in the membership for that month either, I might add.
I have about 3 weeks of holiday left. I won't travel, because it's too expensive (though I've had some great offers of guides and places to stay from many good friends in places as far away as Seattle, Poland, Germany, Afghanistan, Jordan, Egypt, Boston, London, etc.).
I think I should do something constructive.

• Study Japanese again.
• Keep exercising.
• Readjust my body clock/circadian rhythm. I'm often awake at night and sleepy in the day. Plus, I exercise late at around 9pm or so. Not good. My body's energy starts to peak late at night.
• Read books.
• Plan my wreck of a life.
• Etc...

Better sleep.

Had dinner and I drank again (wine, this time)

I finally opened my bottle of Hungarian bikaver (bull's blood: click for more info). Nice wine. Hungary is often overlooked for good wine. When I was in Budapest, i availed myself of quite a few local wines. The beer there is not so good, I reckons, but the wine is more than making upper for thatter, sort of thing.
I'm not drunk.
Had help, drinking the bottle.
Cooked me sum steak, with vegetables and everything.

Here's the steak.
Che-che-che-che-che-che-check it out!
This is wha-wha-wha-wah-what's it all about!
A veritable beastie boy of a steak.


Avocado and steak is a pretty good combination
(as is anything and wine).

A couple of more pics from tonight's din dins:

Opening up my SD card:

Nurse, retractors. Now, take off your blouse. Now, nurse, now! ...exxcellennnnt...
I somehow managed to break off the locking tab on the side of my 512mb (it just had to be the big, expensive one, didn't it?) SD memory card. Nuts.
Now, it still works, but it's permanently in the locked state. i.e. I can't read or write to it.
Screw it, I decided to open the baby up and take a looksie inside. See if I can fix the problem or at least get a look at the internals.

First thing's first, split the bugger open:
I did this, using a very complex tool, slowly and painstakingly designed and redesigned and improved over the millenia : my fingers and my amazing opposable thumbs.
Once ripped open, the internal flash memory just pops right out (right out, onto the floor).
I put the internal flash in a safe place, making sure to smudge my greasy fingers all over the surface.

Next, take a look at what we've got:
Well, you can see what appears to be streets of some sort (possibly superhighways, for tiny little trucks and cars, but probably not for things such as bicycles and scooters - that would just be silly), leading to some kind of collection of huge skyscrapers, towering up into the electronic sky.
Or, it could be the external circuitry of the flash memory module.
See the large gap cut in the right side? That's where the lock should be, sliding up and down. It probably provides a bridging contact, somewhere in the circuitry. Until I know where, it would be dangerous to attempt a 'chuwy fix'.
I still like the idea of little minature trucks, hurtling down the electronic highway, listening to their electronic country & western music...

From another angle:
Can you see the contact points? If you click on the picture, you can see the full size photo. You can see the small scratches, from repested usage. This shouldn't be a problem, as long as there is still metal to make contact. It's kind of cool to see inside the SD card (although you can't actually see that much, but I start to get an idea of the contrsuction).

Let's flip this baby over and check out the rear (ooer!):
Well, first thing I see is that I need to cut my nails.
On second inspection, I notice...sod all. Just a small circle with '1D6' imprinted on it.
A message from superior beings, perhaps (of course, with me, that's just about anybody)?
"Not much to see or do here, let's move along, people!"

Putting it all back together and fingers crossed:
I reassembled the SD card (trying to remove as much dust, fine hairs and grease as I could, whilst at the same time, probably adding even more) as best I could with the limited knowledge, experience and attention span available to me. Next, time to test if it still 'more or less works'...

Test results:
Woohoo!!!! \(^_^)/
At least, not a 'doh!' (>_<) Back to how it was before I tore it asunder. Not bad. I got to open the baby up and look 'inside' and no damage is done (as far as I know). I just hope the SD card company doesn't check this blog. Gotta find the guarantee card. Where did I put it?
_________________________________________________

Pics from Kamakura!

Kamakura hanabi

Aug 10, 2006 - 190 Photos
(Click on photo or title to open new window)

Well, the fireworks were okay (sand everywhere, of course).

My sandal broke. Had to walk about a kilometre with half a strap on my right sandal. But then I noticed someone was having a house sale and there were a pair of black sandals, for sale! Only 100yen! And in my size! Sweet.
Well, I'm home now.
I've been downloading the pics and movies I took tonight, to my computer. It's getting on to...whoa! 1am! Time to get some z's.
Will start to label pics in the morning and get them on this blog (if I can figure out how to do it). Otherwise, I'll just post the link to the gallery address.

Today, I'll be mostly eating bourbon buiscits

Actually, I'll be going to the seaside town of Kamakura, to see the hanabi (fireworks), on the beach. They have the fireworks going off from the ocean, a few hundred feet from the beach. It's an impressive sight. Kamakura hanabi are some of the best I've seen in Japan.

(Here's a picture from last year's hanabi. I managed to get the beer bottle just in the right position. Nice beer - a smoked weissen.)
I'll be leaving soon, to claim my place on the beach, along with thousands of other expectant spectators (phew!).

First post

Hello, all.
My name is Chris (Huw/Chuwy).
Right now, I'm starting my first BLOG.
This is entry numero uno.
Hopefully, this blog thing will become a way for many people to be updated on what's going on in this guy's life, so to speak.
Hopefully there'll be some inisightful entries and interesting pictures, to help illustrate my experiences.
Let's see where it takes us...