Subtitled version.

Hayao Miyazaki continues to deliver his brand of animation Stateside through Disney. I went to see it at the El Capitan over the weekend and was not disappointed. Overall, a good film with a good cast of characters. The story wanders a bit, much like Kiki’s Delivery Service (Majo no takkyubin), but the population provides enough entertainment to keep it going. I can’t say this is my favorite Miyazaki film. It’s certainly populated with the weirdest and creepiest creatures he’s ever put on screen, but no, I still hold Porco Rosso (Kurenai no buta) nearer and dearer.

Probably because I like planes.

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One year ago I got laid off from Zeborg. I met up with Joseph and Paul at the Manhattan Beach Brewing Co. for dinner and catchup last night to celebrate. It was a nice evening, and we got to talk about old times. Ah, back in the day.

It’s been a crazy 365 days.

Shitty morning drive. Black Miata cut me off by merging without signalling. I got out of the way by merging to another lane, but as I merged I noticed a gray pickup truck honking as he merged into the same lane behind me without signalling. He kept honking and honking, coming up and tailgating me, flashing his high beams. Oh, I see, it’s my fault. I cut you off. I signalled I was merging and merged, and you without signalling and on a far lane I cannot see decide to try to beat me to the open space, lose, and now want to make a situation dangerous by tailgating my ass on a freeway at high speed. Fucking bastard. I flash my signals left, then right, then left and right again, wondering if he understood what I meant. He did — and got pissed. He merged to the left lane (without signalling) and was trying to overtake. In traffic. I had enough of it, so I merged right (signalling), then right again and got off on my exit. Asshole.

Pet peeves on the road:
People who don’t signal when merging. Oh, wait, I’m supposed to be psychic and know that you’re going to cut into the space in front of me. Right, I’m a goddamn cypher.
People who come to a complete stop in the middle of the intersection THEN turn on their fucking turn signal. 100 fucking feet, assholes.
People who beat a yellow light in heavy traffic and end up blocking the intersection. Yeah, you really made it now. You’re ten feet from where you were ’cause you beat the light. Retard.
People who don’t keep clear of the part of the road marked KEEP CLEAR. Fucking illiterate sons of bitches.

Traffic is a bitch. It’s more of a bitch because assholes don’t obey these simple rules that make traffic flow at a regulated pace. Don’t be an ass. Driving is a privilege, not a right.

Damn it, I wish I drank coffee.

Yay for me. Managed to play three games of disc on Sunday and didn’t have to sub out. I did slow down and get pretty tired in the second game, but hey, at least I didn’t fall on my knees and feel like vomiting — yes, that did happen last time I was out on that field. Exercising almost daily has definitely helped. I’m starting to figure out how to get the most of that contraption sitting in my living room.

All that aside, there were two birthday parties to attend over the weekend. The first was Kim’s surprise bash care of Alex, who I hadn’t seen in years. She called up out of the blue a few days before and told me she’d stolen Kim’s cell phone and was inviting the people in the device’s phone book to come over Friday evening to surprise the shit outta Kim. How could I say no? Pictures are here. The second party was Erik’s on Sunday evening. People from the ol’ EAP gang plus his workmates from the Dutch consulate had dinner at Lares on Pico between 29th and 30th in Santa Monica, and afterward, spent some time chilling and watching Erik open his presents at his and Tommy’s place in Westwood. Pictures of that one are here.

All in all a rather full weekend. I even did the laundry.

by Connie Willis

I have to say that on second read this book was much better. The first time I went through it I suppose I wasn’t in the mood for the type of humor presented, much like when I first read Jerome K. Jerome’s Three Men in a Boat: To Say Nothing of the Dog (if you don’t realize there’s a connection then there’s nothing more I can do for you). Willis does a nice job of recalling the humor found in that book, as well as other books from that period (pick an Austen book… any Austen book), blending it with modern situations and comedic prose, and shoving the whole thing into a book that, if anything, IS an Austen novel in that it ends with boy and girl deciding to get married. When was the last time you read a book, a sci-fi book at that, where the protagonist MARRIES? So hey, ever wonder what would happen if Jane Austen wrote sci-fi? Try this one.

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The problem with getting drunk is that I never know if it’ll end up for the worse.

Unfortunately, here I am, for the worse.

Satomi.

I haven’t written that in a long time.

Satomi.

Yeah. Still hurts. Fuck me.

Didn’t lie.

The Scratch DVD came out yesterday, but Best Buy wasn’t carrying it. Bastards. Guess I’ll deepdiscount it later on. Yes, as far as I’m concerned, it’s a verb. It means: to purchase at a low price with no tax or shipping surcharge, to be delivered anytime between 10 and 14 days.

Angie made a delicious dinner last night. She made chicken on a bed of couscous with asparagus. That’s the short description. The long description is that she took some chicken thighs, took off the skin (nooooo!), sprinkled some herbs and spices on one side, then fried that side up for a few minutes to make a nice crust. Then she placed it in a baking pan to simmer in a a concoction made of whole cream and herbs inside the oven. Notice how I escape detail by just saying herbs and spices. This is because I usually can’t be bothered to remember what the names of these things are, especially since I usually can’t name them anyway. The couscous was cooked not using that flavor packet that comes in the box. Instead, she used vegetable broth with onions and yellow bell pepper slices. The asparagus was sprinkled with, you guess it, herbs and spices.. okay, fine, and salt and oil, then placed in the oven along with the chicken. When the chicken was done, the sauce was reduced to a nice, thick consistency. Food presentation, something I never have the patience for when I actually cook outside of having the meat on top and the starch on bottom (the opposite of what restaurants in the States do, which means I usually turn the plate around when they give it to me), is important for our dear friend Angie. On her nice set of white cermic plates she placed the couscous in the center, laid the chicken on top of it, and bordered the meal with aspargus on four sides, each side boasting three sprigs. Then she lightly drizzled the reduced sauce over the meal. Very pretty, and when I got to it, very delicious.

While chatting and debating the possibilities of ice cream with chocolate crackle, Jo called. She was out to dinner with Ernesto, who was in LA for the week… minutes later we were at the YuuYuu karaoke on Sawtelle. The usual songs ended up in the mix… Jo and Angie continue to enter Take On Me, a Roxette song, On The Street Where You Live, and a couple other ones for me to tackle… though I think Angie wanted to sing the Roxette bit herself. Angie did a perfect rendition of Midler’s The Rose; Ernesto amazed as with his ability to turn any love song into an angst-ridden wail against said love song; Jo went jazzy. I decided to try and pick songs I never picked, and they worked about half the time. Smoke Gets In Your Eyes I actually nailed, though the last time I tried it at my uncle’s house in Palmdale my voice cracked under the pressure. Plugged in Summer Nights, a tip of the hat to Sue who has an Olivia fixation. We were there for two and a half hours. That meant there was no way I was getting up at seven in the morning with only four hours of sleep in me and getting on my damn exercise glider. I slept in, got up at 8:20, and got ready for work. Not to be denied, I will get on that thing when I get home from work today. Really.

No lie.

My program was in the LA Times last Friday: UCLA to Scrutinize Records of Some Foreign Graduate Students

Oooooo.

My small part? I tried a bit of tracing on the anonymous email. Didn’t get very far – didn’t expect to. But I did get to talk to some nice people in Germany. Ah, tracert, how you take me places.

Anyhow, this story just beginning to come up, so there’ll be more news in the future. As for me, well I saw all this happening back in 1996 and 1998 when I was in China, so it wasn’t a real big shock. A few rotten apples….

It’s funny how comfortable I am watching these films. I guess you could say I not only get the “”in”" humor beyond universal humor, but I get just a little nostalgic about my days in high school.
This is not to say I was an asian version of the white barber in the movie or anything. On the contrary, I stuck out like a sore thumb… but I did know and grow up in that culture. And as the years go by, the less it looks as if I grew up in that culture (though if I ever show you my old greencard picture back before I got naturalized, you’d have seen why the police frisked my ass in Westwood back in 1989).
So yeah, this movie was not only hilarious and touching, but comfortable and nostalgic.

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