japan seems like a strange place

Japan: http://www.ifilm.com/video/2809150?ns=1

the NY up[date

Some a y'all know I went snowboardin over xmas. That was pretty fahn cool. Details? Why, sure!

So on Saturday morning I met up with YeonJi and her cousins in Gumi, then we all piled into cars and drove up to the condo. I spent a good amount of the drive reading "The Scarlet Pimpernal" (shit) and making a big snowboarding playlist on the iPod. The condo, it turns out, was a huge octagonal one-room-and-akitchen-and bathroom place. Freezing! We had some lunch and then the 14 of us settled down for a nap. Woke up around 5pm and got our gear sorted and finally hit the slopes around 7pm.
How can I describe the awesomeness of being high on a snowy mountain on a freezing black night with so many lights and so many people, with some wicked sounds in my ears as I flew down the mountain on my board time and again. Sure, I took a couple of tumbles and I think one guy knocked himself out for a second when he plowed into me but I finally managed to sort my balance and turns to the degree where by the end I was going from start to finish with no problems. I accidently had a crack at the experts' slope (a horrible, slow descent on icy hardpack) and when I came back to the easier area it seemed flat, like a wide plain of snow with people struggling along. So strong was my perception of flatness that I was afraid to slow down lest I lose momentum and come to a stop, so I breezed past dozens of learners. It was great.
Some of the songs that really hit at good moments were:
Cloud City - Concord Dawn
Banquet - Bloc Party
Final home - DJ Krush
King for a Day - Faith no more
Slow flame - Sequoia
Shakawkaw - Infected Mushrooms
Love is a Battlefield - Pat Benatar
Battle without honour or humanity - Tomoyasu Hotei
The opening refrain of each of these songs was a "FUCK, yeah!" moment. There were more but oh well.

So I had a good time.

Sad point was: except for the snowboarding, my weekend was basically an abortion. When we were hanging out at the condo barbequing oysters and beef, or doing anything in fact, I was flat-out ignored. I stood by rather awkwardly as they had conversations about what was happening next as they laid out the mattresses or got table ready for food. The only communication I had with anyone was, once the food was out, YeonJi would say things like "Glenn! Eat lots!".Grrr.
I tried speaking some Korean with miniimal success.
Anyway, when we got back from snowboarding I brought out the chocolate cake I had bought and the bottle of wine. they also grabbed theirs (did I mention there were about 15 people, all told (maybe 7 of them kids) and we had a sortof party before I got bored and slept.

Meh.

...some stars and planets in scale

man, some stuff is pretty big. wow.

Henry Rollins

My sentiments exactly