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While son was transfixed with the morning news/weather broadcast, his mind must have wandered off on to yesterday and his Japanese class, for he said;

"Dad, for informal Japanese, you don't put the fairy stuff on the end of a sentence, right?'

"The what??!!"

"The fairy stuff, you know, polite Japanese."

"Ah, no, you don't. Why?"

"Oh, we had a PALS test in Japanese yesterday on informal Japanese.  I wanted to make sure."

"Well I am sure you did well since informal Japanese is pretty much all you speak."

"Yeah, the rest of the class was complaining how hard it was to use informal Japanese."  [That's a surprise for me as intuitively you'd think a test on more formal, honorific Japanese would be more challenging]

With stuff like this, I don't need to watch the Comedy Channel for entertainment.

The weather forecast for Washington DC and metro area for Saturday is for in newsspeak, 'a significant winter event' (why the hell can't you just say, snow?!) for all day Saturday, which disappoints son since he's looking to start winter break early, and has me concerned as I know we've got no rock salt left to spread on the driveway and sidewalks.

Now what this may mean as far as accumulation is another story; people here go into a panic when there's even 2 inches on the ground which makes us the butt of much  humor/scorn from people whose winter snow accumulation is measured in not if snow falls, but how much.

Anyway, need to hit Home Depot or Lowe's today for rock salt, though I will not be surprised if stock has been cleaned out already.

Son has gotten 90% of his college applications out of the way and we're hoping the test scores will be good this time.

Of the colleges he's applied for, 2 are out of state (Ohio) and the rest in-state, but a distance from home.  I think in his heart of hearts he's hoping to get a letter of acceptance from one or both of the Ohio colleges and I am too. 

Both have Japanese language programs and the one because of its size, has links to and study abroad opportunities with some pretty decent Japanese universities (Hokkudai, Tsukuba & Nanzan are the ones I can remember) and also a deeper Japanese studies program.

However, son last night stated that he's not going to take Japanese in college, wherever he goes to. I'm sure that's part of his still teenage immaturity, and family stubbornness kicking in, but he's got to understand that the more diverse or versatile one comes out from college, the more attractive one is to an employer (the final goal, right?) and more $$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$.  This I see is particularly crucial if one wants to have a decent career in the field he wants to pursue, engineering.  It is truly a world-wide profession now.

With his Japanese language skills he could probably work out a TA position for intro Japanese course too, saving him/us $$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$. And study abroad would allow him to plug himself back into to the other side of his heritage and forge connections that could serve him well later on.  But right now he's focused on getting a paintball gun, so I guess he can see the forest for the trees.

What you see below is a shot wife took of her 'parking' at the house the other day when she returned home from work. I guess she feels its noteworthy as she only brushed ever so slightly the garage door with the front of the Quaalude when she could have just as easily rammed  into it.. 

IMG_3198

One could say in her defense that with the relatively steep incline our driveway is paved on, one might overshoot the mark, but hell we've been here for over 11 years now and you'd think that would not be an issue.   Wife has a lead foot and despite being a driver now  for almost as long as son has been alive, her modulation of the accelerator is heavy, very jerky and disquieting for son and I if we happen to be riding with her.  And if such is pointed out to her, boy does the defensive mode kick in.

Given our financial/my unemployed situation right now, one of the very last things we need is to fix a damaged garage door.

A couple of days ago, this article  was posted on the WSJ's website about an American, who has found himself cast as headman for a teeny weenie  hamlet, Tsuchikure  (土喰　BTW) in Southern Kyushu.

The man, Jeffrey Irish, an American, has an interesting past, first as a warrior in corporate Japan, then 3 years working on a fishing boat and now village headman.  (BTW, the WSJ article lists him as a Yale grad., but a Japanese language article says he's a Harvard grad. Hmmm)

Interesting choice he's made.   Living out in the sticks in Japan is not for everyone particularly with the social obligations that come with choosing to live in such places.  For example, prior to returning home, I and family lived in a still very rural area (the hundreds of frogs in the surrounding rice paddies kept us up at night from spring to early fall)  north of the city which bears the name of large international automobile #1.  One such obligation was that in the event of a death in one of the families in this village, all adults were expected, regardless of work obligations, to take 3 days off to help out with the funereal arrangements and mourning. Something that had its roots when all were involved in agriculture, but now, when the male inhabitants are mostly directly or indirectly employed by large international automobile #1, asking one's supervisor for 3 consecutive days off for village obligations is, well, awkward I would think; I couldn't imagine asking any of the supervisors I worked for that sort of time off.

Still he's living a life I sometimes wistfully looked at when I lived in Japan.  Being a corporate warrior for 13 years in Japan was boundlessly educational   but on the other hand, in many ways, very frustrating and I my 'age' aside, I don't think I'd ever want to return to that environment. Remember once watching with much   envy of Japanese who escaped from corporate Japan, moved his family to a small island somewhere between Kyushu & Okinawa, where the climate is temperate enough to grow tropical fruit and in his case, his own coffee beans.

It is a bit sad to read that rather than let newcomers in and upset their village 'harmony' that the villagers would rather let their village become extinct (if that happens, who is going to look after the graves of those buried there?).  Among the things that come with certainty in life is change.  Having new people come in would certainty drive change in this village, but at the same time it would also mold or perhaps remold those who come there to live. 

I've did some web snooping to see if this guy has his own homepage/blog or whatever, but either I've looked in the wrong place or he doesn't do the internet, which given his location, may not be by choice.

A while back, son sold his latest and greatest paintball gun, pocketed the money (actually put in his bank account) and from there I thought he had plans to find a job and use what he has now as his own money to put down for a vehicle.

Well, that's not the case.  He's been looking on-line now for another paintball gun, being driven I believe that a friend from jr. high, who is now in Japan, plans to come back over the holidays to visit with his family here (its a long story so....)  and that they want to go out to a paintball field while he is there.  So rather than be embarrassed by renting a paintball gun for the day (they are crappy), he's looking.

He's shown me a couple of paintball guns for sale on Craigslist & EBay which if he bought, would pretty much clean out his bank account.  His money or not, I've said, 'No!'  But it dawned on me that....

There is a kid in his high school, the same year, who son went to school with in elementary school.  This kid was the butt of much meanness son told me, including being the recipient of a swirly while in elementary school, but lo and behold, like the ugly duckling, this kid has overcome adversity, is now a pro, sponsored paintball player, goes all over the country and sometimes aboard, for meets son tells me.  I'm guessing the kid now has more girlfriends than he can deal with too.

But anyway, it struck me that son should contact this kid since they were in class together back in the day, to see if there might be something that could be worked out to provide him with a paintball gun at a good deal.

Oh, no!  I can't do that, says son.  I don't 'know' him anymore; he's probably too busy, not allowed to do this, in short every possible excuse for not at least asking.  Hell, the worst this kid could tell son is, 'Hey, dude, I can't help you.'

Son can still provide unintentional moments of mirth as with this morning.  He comes downstairs at his usual time, but unusually, was still in his training shorts and Tee which he uses as pajamas.   

I was on the couch with my de rigueur cup of coffee, watching the local news broadcast and for a split second was puzzled but then I understood.  Told son "Nope, we are on the wrong side of the mountains "(The Appalachians), meaning all the snow and ice had/is falling much west of us, and unlike the students there, he has school as scheduled today.

The look on his face as worth a photo as he slowly turned to head back upstairs to shower and get dressed for school.

Have mentioned a few times in this blog about Sake Dojo Alumni and while I was rummaging through a box of old letters the other day, I discovered a photo I had taken in 2005 I think, during a business trip to Japan of the very place.

Sake dojo 001

The Sake Dojo is just off of the Keihan line's 牧野駅 In Osaka. As you can see its small, seating perhaps a dozen or so people only at a time.  It was well situated being on the main path to and from the station to the nearby university we 留学生 and Japanese went to.  But in recent years, customer traffic I am told has slacked off as the university moved its main campus elsewhere and the owner runs it more as a hobby now than a business.

As I said, it small, opens only in the evenings and is very earthy (a nice way of saying grubby).  Cleaning as I recall was not done very regularly for I swear remembering there was at least a 1/4 inch of grease on the walls.  And on my first trip in, I was 'greeted' by a ゴキブリ which climbed out of the はしたて in front of me.

But the joki's of draft beer were cheap and the yaki-soba memorable. One Sake dojo Alumni actually met his wife there.   I didn't, but when we were dating, I took my wife there for the experience and afterwards she said she'd never set foot in the place again.  Still I wouldn't mind another trip back, even if I am greeted again by a ゴキブリ   climbing out of the はしたて.

Had a debate with brother Pound Salt, the trigger being me grousing about a company which advertised a position, to which I applied for, only to be 'told' a couple hours later, that I wasn't who they were looking for.

Given that fast turnaround, my resume was parsed by a computer program, not seen/judged by human eyes.  The impersonalness of the process is what I was unhappy about.

Pound Salt told me that the resume was thrown out probably because it did not contain key words the program looks for.  Fair enough, I understand that. But where we diverged is that he has said repeatedly I should add in my resume I am proficient with Microsoft Office applications - continue to be used to being unemployed.

For a job such as an administrative assistant, certainly, that's pretty relevant, but for a white-collar, manager or above position, saying one is proficient with Microsoft Office seems to me like adding in the resume, one can also read and write. 

 Or am I off my rocker?

Son found this while on the Net (he was supposed to be doing his homeowrk too!) and thought, with tongue very much in cheek, that this would be a nice holiday present for his uncle, Pound Salt.

A gun nut nor gun hater I be, but this is not just over the top, but waaaaay over the fence.