Category: general

Catching up on Andy Gray’s blog, I found a really insightful post about marriage.

Practically speaking, marriage is hard work. Of course, you can hear this a thousand times, but when you’re “in love” you’ll know beyond a shadow of a doubt that it doesn’t apply to you. That’s a mistake. It applies to everyone who wants to build a great marriage. There will come a day in the future when you look at the other person and think, “Who is this that I have married?” “What have I done?” And that’s when you really begin something extraordinary. Or it’s the beginning of the end. Hopefully, you’ll be ready when that moment arrives.

If being married to someone from your own culture is hard work, then being married to someone from another culture is harder work. Committment and communication (not the warm feelings of first love) are the keys to making a marriage that will last. But effective communication will require overcoming language and culture gaps — and you may not see the gaps in advance (even if you should). These gaps are significant even for my wife and I. She is fluent in English and quite attuned to American culture, but we still have different ways of seeing and saying things that have deep roots in our identities. We must make an intentional, ongoing effort to communicate to overcome the gaps and communicate well. I can’t imagine where we would be if we didn’t share at least one strong language and culture between us. Or where we would be without our committment to marriage and our common faith?

The post received quite a few comments, and Andy continued to share his insights there:

It’s amazing to realize how easy it would be to get married, isn’t it? You could actually get married this summer. Wow. But after a year or two of marriage, all those exciting feelings will have passed, and you’ll realize that time is one thing you have in very large supply. You will have decades together potentially (hopefully). I’m pretty sure that you’ll eventually wish you had taken more time dating, building trust, working through many issues (including issues you still aren’t aware of).

I’m glad that Sean and I were forced by circumstances to wait awhile before we got married–it gave us a chance to cool off a little and get to know each other. I do think we should have worked a few things out better before we got married. Maybe we should have moved to the same city but waited a little longer before actually getting married. I don’t know.

I do know that I am committed to him, that regardless of my other desires I will stay with him always. Our marriage is a promise to work at our relationship; it isn’t just a piece of paper.

Global Voices Online mentions a blog post that could be rather cool:

Bakanja, an African monk, writes about sex having been reduced to and exploited for pleasure rather than being honored as a sacred practice and act of worship. He bases his argument in traditional African beliefs.

However…I totally don’t speak Kiswahili!

Siku hizi kuna maelezo mengi katika vyombo vya habari juu ya kujamiana au kufanya mapenzi kama wengine wanavyopenda kuiita tendo hili.Katika bahari hii kubwa ya maelezo ingefaa tujiulize ni nini mtazamo wa Mwafrika wa kale kuhusu tendo hili la kujamiana?

Yeah…what he said. ^^;;;

I just watched episode 93 today. Eight episodes to go.

I imagine that the following will occur:

1. Meisei will make it to the Koushien.
2. Minami and Tatsuya will overcome the issues that are keeping them apart, and become a couple.
3. Kashiwaba will overcome his traumatic past and turn into the great person he is inside. He will reconcile with his brother, and see Meisei become the champion under his watch. (In a way, he will have kept the promise to his brother, only years later!)
4. Tatsuya and Nitta Akio will have some sort of climactic rival battle. I think they will probably be fairly evenly matched, and it’ll be pretty intense, but in the end Tatsuya will have to pull through–otherwise Meisei won’t go to the Koushien. (It’s too bad that Meisei and Sumi can’t both go.)

I doubt that the show will progress so far as Tatsuya and Minami’s graduation from high school. It doesn’t seem like there is enough time to even cover the Koushien. I’m expecting that the show will end with all of the above resolved nicely just before a silhouetted shot of the team marching out of the lower levels of the Koushien stadium and into the bright, sun-lit field. Then the screen will fade to white and the show will be over. (Maybe Kazuya’s smiling face will appear?)

I would like to know what ends up happening to them after high school, though. Will Tatsuya go pro? Will Minami continue gymnastics, or become a doting wife? What will Harada do? :>

Of lesser concern, but still something I would like to see, is Nitta the Younger getting a personality transplant. God, she is such a bitch. I hate her so much. She doesn’t deserve that one kid’s affections, but I imagine what will happen is she will come to appreciate him, and they will live happily ever after.

However it all turns out, though, I’m definitely looking forward to watching it.

Only eight more episodes. Man, it’s been a good run.

For now, the site is pretty simple. The purpose at this point is to highlight the song “Outcast, Unclean”. To that end, we have a sketch by Daniel Weinstock that will become a full-blown oil painting for the CD liner art, the lyrics, and an mp3 that you can download either via bittorrent, or directly. (Go for the bittorrent, I want to know how well it works! Plus, I’m the only one seeding right now, and that’s a very lonely existence.)

If you’re a fan of music at all, check out the song. I’d be interested in hearing your comments, and I’m sure AJ would be too.

The summer 2005 issue of Kentucky Alumni magazine has some great articles in it, and I’d like to highlight two of them here. Unfortunately, this content isn’t included or even excerpted on the UK Alumni Assocation homepage (I suppose to encourage people to buy the magazine). If you want to read the articles in full, I guess you’ll have to find someone who subscribes.

The first is a feature article called “A Five-month Lease on the Appalachian Trail”, and it’s the story of two brothers, Nick and Vince Tomecek, who decided to put off settling down into serious lives and jobs after graduation long enough to hike the entire Appalachian Trail, from Georgia to Maine. There are some beautiful pictures in the article of the green, misty forests of the eastern U.S. that I love so much.

The following part of the article reminded me of AJ’s camping group, and their continued attempts to build the perfect packs for their gear:

[M]any hikers start the trail with packs weighing 50 to 60 pounds. After three days, they have thrown most of the fancy trinkets away or quit the trail altogether. Our goal pack weight was 30 pounds, and we religiously adhered to the limit, even cutting labels off our clothing and sawing off spoon and toothbrush handles.

The brothers endured blisters and bee stings bad enough to send them to the hospital, and barely escaped hypothermia. Towns along the way offered respite: showers, hot meals, supplies, and beer. (Mustn’t forget the beer!) But despite the hardships they endured, they never thought of quitting. The idea that this was their last chance, that once they left the “AT” they would have to be grownups, kept them moving through the pain and exhaustion.

The story really speaks to me. I know that wanderlust feeling, that desire to do something outrageous before having to settle down. Sean and I were having a talk about that sort of thing last month, about how I want to live in Japan and explore the world. He was quiet for awhile, and I asked him what he was thinking. He said, “You married me too soon.”

I don’t know that being married means I have to give up my dreams of travel, but it certainly has made getting out of the country more difficult. I spent a long time this morning at Cynical Traveller (linked from Sushicam). The snide commentary, pictures, and facts were great, but what was really appealing was simply the idea that this guy has travelled to so many different countries since 1998–including four years of living in Japan, assuming this page is up to date. That’s a lot of travel in a small amount of time.

I find myself wishing a lot that I had the freedom to just bum from country to country for months or years at a time. Sean is totally uninterested in doing that; he wants to stay put and earn towards retirement, and the only thing that will move him is a job that makes a pension plan unnecessary. Bumming around, unfortunately, doesn’t pay that much, so I’m in kind of a quandary.

These guys, the Tomecek brothers, saw their chance, and they took it, and I envy and admire them.

The second article that really grabbed me from Kentucky Alumni was the feature “Jon Carloftis: Gardening Guru Takes Gardens to New Heights”, by Robin Roenker. From the article:

It all started in the summer of 1988, when, fresh out of classes at UK, he traveled to New York for the summer and printed some business cards billing himself as a rooftop garden designer–despite the fact that he’d never previously stepped foot in one.

[…]

Having completed a degree in communications from UK in 1986 and realizing that any jobs in that field would mean staying indoors–“not my thing,” he emphasizes–he decided to follow his true passion. So he came back to UK for a year and a half, taking a sampling of art history, horticulture, and landscape design clases. Next thing he knew he was in New York’s Upper East Side, passing out business cards to doormen at some of the city’s most elite buildings. Noted art collectors Barbara and Eugene Schwartz gave him his first chance, hiring him to design one rooftop container. That was all it took. He’s had as many clients as he can handle simply through word of mouth, ever since.

I mean, just…wow.

He knew what he wanted to do. He already had skills, but he studied to get even better. And then he just put himself out there, and let his work speak for itself.

That’s what I want.

I want to know what I want to do. Something that uses my inherent abilities. Something I can learn more about. Something I want to do so passionately that I have the confidence to sell myself. And I want to just do it.

I’m tired of talking about how I want to achieve greatness. I’m tired of letting everything pass me by. I’m tired of being a slug, of not paying my own way, of stagnating, of dreaming instead of doing.

I’m tired of the fact that when the going gets tough, I get scared and timid and start freaking out, like I did this week.

I said in one of those silly quizzes recently that I thought I was strong. But I’m really not so sure now. When have I ever stuck anything out? When have I ever completed a challenge without failing to meet my own expectations? When have I not let stress interfere with my work?

The reason I don’t follow my dreams is because I am terrified of failure. That feeling does more than paralyze me. It makes me physically ill. It makes me depressive and angry. It makes me want to go to bed.

I’m tired of that.

A Japanese journalist is trying once again to clear his name concerning an alleged government cover-up he attempted to reveal over 30 years ago, and the subsequent scandals that discredited him. Recent declassified U.S. government documents seem to support what Takichi Nishiyama has been saying for years, and now raise the question of what exactly is being covered up. There is speculation that the United States agreed to return Okinawa to Japan only after securing the right to store nuclear weapons in the island prefecture. Asahi.com has the story.

Dawn and Sam have both indulged in a new (to me) Internet “meme” (sigh). It runs as follows:

Ask me four questions.

Any four, no matter how personal, private or random.
I have to answer them honestly. I have to answer them all.
In turn, you post this message in your own journal and you have to answer the questions that are asked to you.

Both of them have stipulations, which is understandable given that this little “meme” makes people extremely vulnerable.

This seems like something that I would be eager to participate in. And I am interested in seeing what four questions people would ask me. I don’t have any stipulations, either…you can post anonymously if you want, and I don’t care if you don’t put the questions on your own journal.

But I’m not so thrilled about the part where I have to ask other people four questions. It somehow seems strange to me, discussing private things in a vacuum like that. Using an Internet quiz to get to the meaty matters that typically fall beneath the surface of normal conversation.

I guess I prefer to ask my impertinent questions without the assistance (read: safety zone) of structure.

In any event, if anyone out there wants to ask me any questions, I’ll answer honestly, as always. But I think I’ll have to ponder awhile before I can come up with questions for anyone else.

Apparently traditional undergarments for men are coming back into style in Japan. JP at Japundit explains:

A fundoshi consists of a long piece of cloth, with a cloth string along one end. You tie the two ends of the band around your waist, with the knot on your belly and the strip of cloth hanging over your buttocks. Then you reach between your legs to grab the cloth, pulling it up to the front and tucking it under the band running across your belly.

I personally think that kind of undergarment would be pretty practical when dealing with those accursed trench-toilets. Just slip the flap out from the front and tuck it in the back, and it’s effectively out of your way.

I’d buy some for Sean, but all he would do is stare at me incredulously and then never wear them. Alas.

It looks like somebody in Japan is interested in causing indiscriminate injury. I hope they can prove that inserting sharp shards of metal into guardrails is a crime under current Japanese law. Maybe that will stop the perps, or at least slow them down. I am really baffled by the things some people do…

The National Police Agency of Japan is working on a database for the DNA of criminal suspects:

The NPA’s new database will allow all prefectural police departments to retrieve DNA information on suspects believed to have been involved in other crimes across prefectural borders, the officials said.

In addition, the NPA will set no limits on the types of crimes requiring DNA samples from suspects. Police plan to obtain court-issued warrants to take DNA samples considered vital to any kind of investigation.

The article implies that we already do that in the United States. I don’t know the specifics, but I hope the part at the end is true for us as well as for Japan–that when a person is cleared, their DNA information is destroyed.

I’m feeling better.

The friend mentioned in my previous post–Brooke–puts up with me because I’m not always a bitch. She let me vent to her about what happened with Jazz. (That’s all I’ll say on the subject here. If you really want to know, you can ask me privately. My biographers can just read my chat logs and old emails.) Ultimately, Brooke said what I needed to hear, and we commiserated a little.

Brooke ended up treating me to lunch today, too. We went to the Village Deli over in Daniel Village. It’s a neat little place. We were lucky enough to get a table before the lunch rush truly began, so we got to sit and eat and enjoy ourselves rather than waiting forever. I had a cup of lobster bisque and an egg salad sandwich in a pita, and Brooke had a turkey sandwich on wheatberry bread, and we split a huge plate of cheese fries and a multi-layered chocolate and peanut butter cake with chocolate and caramel syrup. (Holy crap.) It was all really good, and it was great just to spend time with Brooke in person. Sometimes I just need to be around people, I think.

It’s raining, but I’m calm. I feel loved. I feel like it will be okay. I’m listening to Conrad’s Theme, but now I hear the gentleness of it, the love and support, rather than the echo of tragedy. The theme says many things, but the clearest message right now is that things do get better, and all we can really do is survive and move on.

Start to vaguely come out of a black mood, and then alienate one of your best friends by making a snappish comment about a touchy situation.

Yeah, that’s the ticket, Heather.

So, on Wednesday, I claim that I don’t know anything about music, that I just listen to it. And then, this morning, I start evaluating the music from Kyou Kara Maou.

It’s just like what happened at Audra’s get-together. I made an uberdeal (seriously, I was way too vehement) about the fact that I haven’t seen any movies, and then I ended up getting a zillion questions correct in Scene It.

It seems that I have a lot of knowledge in subgenres. So I can’t really say that I don’t know music, or that I don’t know movies. I suppose I can still claim that I generally don’t know them, though.

If anyone wants to hang out, that’s fine, but I haven’t even begun to plan any sort of party. I’m too emotionally weary to fool with it.

I just watched the three clips they’ve got up over at kyokaramaoh.com, and I gotta say…ew.

It’s just not the same without everyone yelling “Heika!” all the time.

God (?) Save Our Subtitles! ;P

There seem to be certain techniques that recur often enough in anime that they can be used to quickly and easily express ideas. This goes for sound effects, facial expressions, and even descriptors used in speech (such as “seishun”, in phrases like “seishun da!”, which, when translated, seems a little weird. “It’s passionate youth!” just isn’t something one would normally say in English). So I’m not sure why I’m surprised to find it in music, too.

“Yuuri’s Theme” from Kyou Kara Maou, rendered in piano and strings, evokes both busy city life and a sort of calm–you might imagine the scene from Full Metal Panic? Fumoffu in which Sousuke and Kaname are rushing by bicycle to get back to school, and they take a shortcut down a narrow side street and end up gliding alongside seemingly endless rice paddies, the sky bright blue overhead, and everything still, all the world’s beauty captured in that fleeting instant. It’s high school. It’s a world filled with activity and promise, and the briefest of moments that remind you of comfort and home. (The full title of the piece is “Seishun ~Yuuri’s Theme~”.)

At first I was disappointed by this piece, compared to the beauty and complexity of some of the others. “Kaisou”, with its mournful piano; “Seisou ~Conrad’s Theme~”, and its skilled, folksy, comforting yet somehow haunting guitar; “Hisou”, with piano trills like falling tears; “Tsuioku”, with strings and bells swelling to bring the promise of goodness in the world. (Those titles roughly translate to “Reminiscence”, “Refreshing”, “Tragic”, and “Recollection”, respectively.)

I originally thought of “Tsuioku” as being more Yuuri’s theme than “Seishun”, because that’s the music that plays when he’s calm and confident and secure, when he’s being a leader and making tough choices based on love. But there is something comforting about “Seishun” that I can appreciate now. Musically, it’s set apart from the other pieces–it, and others that involve Yuuri (like “Seigi” [“Justice”], the self-parody cowboy/feudal hero music played when he “punishes” someone), invokes Japan more than the other pieces, which are written in a more European/classical style. “Kourin” (“Advent”), the music of the power of the Maou, is unlike any of the other pieces, for good reason.

Ultimately, all of these pieces bring out different parts of Yuuri…and, given that, I can understand why “Seishun” is labeled as his theme. “Seishun” is who he is in his heart. It’s his core, it’s his personality, it’s what made him right to be the Maou. “Tsuioku” is how he expresses his core. “Kourin” is his raw power and potential. And “Seigi” is how his personality deals with having that much power–with self-deprecating flamboyance. He knows who he is–a “wimp”, in Wolfram’s words–and he has trouble taking himself, and the idea of being a demon king, seriously.

Which is, of course, yet another reason why he is such a great ruler.

7-year-old suspected of beating infant sister to death