Yeah, I know I do this every year.  I pick my favorite games for the past year and then make every else do the same.  Well we’re doing it again.  Why?  Cause its awesome.  Deal with it.  The rules are, as always, pick 5 games released this year that you liked.  Can’t find 5? Just list what you can.  I won’t think less of you.  Ok I will, but you can pretend I don’t.

Top 5 Games of the Year:

5.  Red Faction: Guerrilla – Any game where the default weapon is a sledge hammer is good in my book.    The single player game is fun although flawed (unlimited spawning of bad guys = boo), but the online mode is a great update to the old stand bys.  The first time I stopped someone from c capturing a flag by dropping a building on them, I knew this game was for me.

4. Street Fighter 4 – I just wanted to hug this game.  The one game I wanted most this year and it certainly lived up to the hype.  The only draw back?  A really cheap end boss.  Otherwise lovely.

3. Plants vs Zombies – The guys at pop cap know how addict people.  This is a really a great tower defense game.  It does start slow, but a few levels in and you start seeing how deep things can get.  I think new it goes for 10 bucks.  Everyone should have it.

2. Super Mario Brothers Wii – Half classic Mario game, half super smash brothers, all ultimate party game.  Somehow this game manages to improve on the  8 and 16 bit greats.  The level design is just amazing.  Plus it’s the ultimate game to screw with people.  I’m hoping some day to find some folks to be play the competitive modes with.

1. Batman Arkham Asylum –  Pretty easily the best game of the year for me.  A great story with great controls, I could sneak up on thugs all day.  Loved it.  The best license game in history.

Runners up:
splosion Man
Little Kings Story
Wii sports resort
Torch Light

Best games of the Year that should probably be on that list I just haven’t played enough of yet

I’m old and missed a lot of great games this year.  Here are the ones I played for an hour or two, just not longer to give a final review for.

5. Shadow Complex
4. Infamous
3. Halo ODST
2. Left of Dead 2
1. Uncharted 2 – I’m a few hours in and can easily say it’s a great game.  If it keeps up this pace it may give batman a run for its money.

Games that should have sucked but just didn’t

1. 50 Cent: Blood on the Sand – No idea why this game rocked as much as it did, but wow did it ever rock.  I would add it to my best of the year list, but I think I would just feel too dirty.  Still if you love a good action game , you have to play it.  Just turn the music down.

2. EA Sports Active – This game really isn’t that fun, but its actually a decent workout.  The punching mini games alone make me happy.  All the motion stuff seems to work as well.  Odd.  Did EA just out Nintendo Nintendo? Someone check Hell.

5 Biggest disappointments

1. Bionic Commando – A classic remake gone bad.  With ReArmed being so good, I had hope.  But nope, this game bites.  At least the company that made it went out of business.  That what you get for ruining my childhood dreams ya punks!

2. Wolverine – This actually isn’t a bad game, it just has some major annoying aspects that keep it down.  Talk about painfully repetitive bad guys.  If I have to jump on the back on one more bad guy… ugh.    Still rent it, play it for 4 hours, and just don’t bother finishing it.

3. Fat Princess – I wanted to like this game.  It had some cool ideas.  Sorta like Team fortress with fat people and cake.  Turns out though kinda dull and flat.  Even sweet sweet cake could not save it.

4. Marvel vs Capcom 2 – A classic game, I mean classic.  But no update to the graphics at all?   No unlocking new characters?  Talk about lazy releases.  Booo.

5. Punch Out – I dream of the day of getting a good boxing game for the Wii.  Instead I get this 8 bit game with better graphics.  Some old school games are better left off in the past.

Honorable Mention:  Mad World – I really wanted to like this ultra violent Wii game.  Truth is, it gets boring … quick.  Fun in short bursts, but certainly not worth the hype.

5 more reasons why the Wii doesn’t suck.

So the wii is always taking crap for having no good games and every year I try and defend it.  Last year was pretty tough, but this year was ,in fact, a really good year for Wii software.  As usual, I try and avoid the Nintendo made ones, since everyone knows they rock.  There are actually quite a few more than 5 games, but we’ll keep it simple.

5.  Little Kings Story – A really nice twist on the city building genre. It seems all cute and cuddly until you realize this little boy in bent on world domination.  He also gets people to do his bidding by throwing them around.

4. Excite Bike World Rally – This is a minimal update to the classic 8 bit excite bike game but somehow they made it as addicting as crack.  It can’t be explained only experienced.

3. House of the Dead: Over Kill – The winner of the most swear words in a video game ever.   You shoot zombies with a friend.  Do I need to say more?

2. Swords and Soldiers – A group of Vikings on a search for great BBQ. A 2d RTS that works like a charm Awesome.

1. Contra: Rebirth – New contra!   You jump, you shoot, its wacky.  You’ll love it.

So that’s it in my opinion.  What are your picks?

I have a reoccurring dream.  Well more like dream mini series.  The gist of it is this, I’m apparently a writer who has to gets throw into challenges.  A new challenge every week.  One was a writing contest with no other then Pauly Shore to write a script for a “How it’s made” type show.  Another one I had to write an episode of “Cops” (and you thought that was all real).  The most recent however was the most bizarre and completely worth sharing.

It’s fairly odd to wake up in “a dream”.  But the dreams always start just like that, me waking up in bed, fully dressed and wearing glasses. Its not my bed nor my glasses, but dreams don’t really care about those kinda details.  From there I always do the same thing, get out of bed and head to the closet.  There I find a red note with the instructions for today’s challenge.   Now ever sense I was young and saw a particularly educational episode of “Batman: the Animated series”, I’ve know someone can’t actually read in a dream.  Luckily, this note is automatically read aloud by a woman with an English accent.

“Dear Mr. Laube,

So far you have done well in my challenges and today as a reward I relieve my true identity and present you with biggest challenge yet.  Meet me in the next room.

Yours truly,

The Puzzler.”

At last to meet the mysterious Puzzler , who has been throwing all this bizarre challenges at me for these past few weeks.  It was like the big season finale reveal.

The next room was a dining room with 3 chairs, a table, and a large plate a bacon.  I took my place at the head of the table.  The moment I sat down, 2 people entered the room from opposite sides and sat down at the exact same instant.  It was Marcia and Jay doing their best synchronized sitting act.  Jay raised his fist, which I politely bumped.

“Umm, Hi guys.”

“Hello,  Mr. Laube” Marcia in a perfect English accent.  My jaw dropped.

“You?  You are the Puzzler! “

Marcia laughed.

“I am!”

“Wow, I have to say, your English accent rocks, very James Bond.  Well Money penny, but still good show!”

“I know, right?”  Marcia was obviously proud.   Of course that still left the real question.

“But why ?”  I stammered.

“Well I read your book.”

“Really?  Did you like it?” I asked.

“Horrid, complete waste of time.”  For a moment there was silence, while  Jay sat eating the plate of bacon.

“Oh” was my only response, I actually felt myself deflate a bit.

“So I decided you needed practice.  Thus this.” Marcia waved her arms to note the room. “And today, I have you biggest challenge yet.”

“Oh, whattcha got this time?”  I asked.

“A cooking show.  Well its about tea really.”

“A cooking show?  I really don’t much about cooking short of mac and cheese unless I can use my grill“

“Nonsense you’ll do fine, after its all about Tea and we all know tea is…”

And with that Marcia , Jay, and the plate of bacon vanished.  In the center of the table appeared one blue and white sign.  The only thing it said was “Good Eats”.

“OOOh I get it.  Well done well done.  That was just  like the show ‘Good Eats’”  I said to the empty room.  Marcia really was quite good at this.

A moment later, none other than Alton Brown entered the room.

“Matthew Laube, I have to say it’s an honor sir, an Honor!” he said to me.  He quickly fixed his glasses and gave my hand a shake.

“It is?”  I asked.

“Of course, I read your book.”

“You did?  Did you like it?”

“No, Horrid stuff. “

“Ah, I hear that a lot.” I noted. Mr Brown continued.

“But no bother, I think you are perfect to help out with todays show”

“It’s about tea right?  I thought you did an episode about tea already?”  I asked.

“Sure, but everyone loves a sequel and we are going all out here.  I mean it’s a huge budget, massive special effects.  “

“Really?”

“Well no not really, but we do have the entire cast of the muppets”

At the moment Kermit the frog popped up to my left.

“Hi Ho, Kermit the Frog here.”

Then he vanished.

“Oh,” I said.  “Well that’s something, to say the least.  Well what can I do for you?  I mean its not like I can tell you how to cook.”

“Of course not, that would be like me telling how to write lousy novels.”  This was getting rather hurtful, but Mr. Brown continued. “No what I need you is the big finish.  The grand finale!”

I thought about it for a moment, fiddling with the glasses that were not mine.  Beeker ran past, his hair on fire.

“Meeeeep!!!”

“Well Jim Henson once said, when he was stuck when coming up with an ending for a skit, he just blew something up.”

“Blow something up, blow something up, blow something up.” Animal chanted as he entered the room.

“Well,” Mr Brown began “I was never one to argue with Animal.”

“Me either.”  I agreed, stepping out of Animal’s way.

“Well then lets see what happens.”  Alton Brown whipped out a old fashion plunger like they used in the old tom and jerry cartoons to set off explosions.  With a wink, he slammed the plunger down and the world exploded into white.

Then I woke up.

So we knew we were in trouble when me and my side kick, Josh “da player” Laube rolled into the parking lot.  It was, as expected, a mad house.  Issue one was finding a parking space.  There wasn’t one to be seen and I’m not one to stalk exiting shoppers for a space.  You know the folks I mean, the ones that find a victim and slowly follow them around the lot.  It’s one of those slow mo police chases.  Really really sad.  The first spot I found was nearing Planet Honda (and for those not local, that’s pretty damn far).  No worries though, walking is good for you, and I only needed one item.  Easy.

Josh is old enough he likes to walk, which is good, but then we are locked into the 3 year old speed.  Which , for those without access to a 3 year old, is just a bit faster than old person with a cane speed and just a bit slower then molasses going uphill in the winter.  It short it takes awhile.  In the parking lot we narrowly avoided being run down by two civics and something that looked a bit like big foot (the truck, not the Yeti).

Once inside, I passed on a cart, again only needing the one item.  We cut through the electronics, doing our manly duty of “ooh”ing and “aah”ing at the 60 inch TVs.  It was quickly clear as we approached the food area, Josh was still small to be seen by those people with carts.  A keen eye was needed to shepherd the boy through the crowd.

Bratwursts were acquired in one particularly busy row, in which Josh was nearly crushed by a cranky older woman who decided 3 year old speed was just too slow, and it was best to go through the child.  Collision was averted and we made our way towards the front of the store.  On the way, I spotted Charcoal.  I had forgotten I had needed that, and this being Costco, you can’t buy just one bag.  So I grabbed 32 pounds of charcoal, balanced my bratwurst on top, had my son hold on to my belt and we were off again.

The checkout lines were a site to behold.  People were everywhere in lines that went nowhere.  Of course Josh and I got on the slowest line possible as apparently the folks a few people in front of us had decided to buy out the entire store.   The charcoal, a meager 32 pounds a few minutes ago was slowly gaining mass.  Gravity is a cruel mistress.

In front of us was a woman with a cart (smart) and a four year old girl in front.  I know she was four because when we first got in line she said “Hi, I am four years old.  Not four and a half”. She repeated this greeting another 4 times and then followed up with “Hi, I am four and a half years old, not four.” And then corrected herself again.  She was obviously trying to get a response from Josh (already a lady killer at three and a half).  He didn’t know what to make of this strange parrot girl.

At last the girl switched tactics and said “My Daddy is better than your Daddy.”  This was not insulting to me, as I often had to prove my supreme Daddy-ness in Mortal Combat (and sometimes Street Fighter).  Josh still didn’t bite though.  Ever being to shy, or simply to smart to reply.  The mother, though, stepped in at this point and explained that this was not nice.  The little girl did not stop.  Instead to her mother she said “I will tell you why.”  And then in the way little kids tell secrets by “whispering” (aka shouting with their hands over their mouths) she explained to her mother why her daddy was better.

“My Daddy is better because he is fat!”

The mother slapped her own palm against her head, turning pink from embarrassment.

Mercifully we had made it to end of the line, the woman and parrot girl were distracted by the ceremonial placing of items on the belt.  It was about then I noticed Josh was doing a little dance.  Perhaps a little “Thank god that girl shut up and went away” dance?  No of course not, that was the “I gotto go, I gotto go right now dance”.

“Josh… is there something you would like to ask?”

“No”  Josh’s standard response fired back.

“Do you have to go to the bathroom?”

“Yes Dadda” Of course.

This would be Josh and I’s first trip to the men’s room there as he was only potty trained a few days.  And honestly we rarely went shopping together.  Instead focusing on fun things.  Aka anything but shopping.  Well ok how bad could it be?  It was our turn then and I was at last free of my charcoal which has somehow increased its weight to at least a hundred pounds.  After paying, I left my items with the cashier and headed off to the bathroom.   We just barely missed being crushed by an Asian family and an overweight woman intend on buying out the worlds dog food supply.

The instant inside the men’s room Josh started to strip.  Somehow getting one sandaled foot out from his pants and underwear, but not the other.   He spotted the urinal.

“Ohh Dadda,  I want to use the special toilet!”

“Sure, why not?”  I responded.  Josh proceeded to hope over to the urinal, spin around, and made to sit on the urinal!  I grabbed him just in time.

“You know, why don’t we just use the normal one today”

Using standard toilet technology we took care of the issue, flushed, washed our hands and headed out.  We then had to work out the miracle of getting the sandal back through the underwear and shorts.

First trip to the men’s room was a success.  Although a close thing.  On the way out we were almost run down by an old man’s cart.  Dangerous place this Costco.

I picked up the massive charcoal and headed to the door, Josh in front of him so I could shout directions for him to jump to avoid incoming carts.  Once outside I decided to get a cart, to protect my son and carry the now 4 mega tons of charcoal in my possession.  Of course another man jumped in front of me the last moment, because he had to get his cart first.  Otherwise the world would end.

So you want to be a writer? No? Not interested? Well, ok, then I want to be a writer. No, not as a full time job, I have one of those, and it keeps me plenty busy. This would be just for fun on the weekends and the nights when there is nothing good on the telly. Over the last year or so, I’ve tried to take it up a notch and really practice my (other) craft. Of course to be a real writer you need to be published. This is a tricky thing. It takes time, money, contacts, and talent. Sadly I have none of those things. That’s where the site www.createspace.com comes in.

CreateSpace is a self publishing company. You can use the site to create your own music, movies, and books, and then sell them on www.amazon.com (you may have heard of them). Now I can only vouch for the book creation aspect, but that is pretty impressive. The tools are free; you need only to be able to provide your book in a PDF format. They give you a cover creation application, but you can also upload your own cover as a separate PDF file. For books they will provide you with your own ISBN as well as review your PDFs and let you know if they will actually print correctly. For actually printing size, they cover the basics pretty well, and let you have a choice of seven sizes. You can apparently do others, but they are not supported by the cover creator.

The actual printing process for me actually took a few tries to get right. This was mostly due to my own massive incompetence. However with the review process in place I didn’t waste any trees (or money) printing out books with one word per page or upside down covers. As you can see from the pictures, the end result is a book, just like you would find at your book store of choice.

Money wise you can expect to bring home about 40% of the price of your book (before taxes). Pretty fair I think for a free site. You are also welcome to just print your book out though the service without sharing it with the rest of the world.

So far my experience with the site has been great. My own book, Ancient Awakening, goes on sale in September. I think at that point I will have to give a part two of this review and let you know how that side of the experience goes. But for folks looking to get their work out there, www.createspace.com looks like a great place to start.

Note: This comic was stolen from my brother.  Cause I’m just evil like that.

You will enjoy the Wolverine movie more if you

1.have never read any Marvel comics

2.have yet to see the X-men movies

3.don’t think that hard about it (most important of all)

Its not that Wolverine is bad movie. It’s not. It’s just completely ignores everything from the source material. So it’s hard as a long time X-men fan to watch the movie and not notice all the things they do wrong in the plot. It is acceptable that movies don’t follow the comics exactly, but here its harder to swallow, cause it’s just SO different. However, at times they really nail the characters. Sabertooth and Wolverine are pretty much perfect. That’s actually enjoyable to watch, and the high point of the film. Gambit is passable. The rest … meh. Overall Wolverine is a solid start to the Summer movie season and not a bad comic movie. However it’s safe to wait till it’s on DVD.

Other opinions:

http://www.metacritic.com/film/titles/wolverine

Work.  That was the main goal behind this trip and we did lots of it.  Just in case you are not in the know, I am a computer programmer and I work for a company called AMANO CINCINNATI.  The company is originally Japanese and our new product was actually designed in Japan.  So before we can take over the project, we need to learn from the masters that originally created it.  Thus the trip to Japan.

And now we bow our heads…. 12 – 13 –04
In the office a bit early this morning.  They start playing classical music about 8:15, then it goes into the little morning work out (I’ve only heard it, never seen it.  I guess it’s mostly for the factory workers).  At 8:30 we do the morning meeting.  Which means we march up to Pay station central (3 floors up in the building next door) and have one of the higher up talks at us for a few minutes.  It’s usually brief and I never understand a word of it.  I consider it almost like a morning prayer.  I just bow my head and wait until everyone says something.  Then I head back to my desk.  Hiro generally lets me know if something important is said.  Meetings don’t start until 10. So I generally have time to tinker with one of my work related projects. At some point I usually hit one of the many many vending machines for either some Mt. Fuji water or some of that coffee in a can stuff.  Coffee in a can isn’t as bad as you might think, but it’s not really all that good either. It’s always very warm, which is the nice thing, since its generally freezing in the office.  Everyone smokes, so they leave the windows open.  And since it is winter, it does get cold (oddly enough).  Dang smokers.

More on the Schedule 1-12-04
So I know I have mentioned this before, but it still amuses me to some degree.  The schedule here is just so different.  We get here early and the music kicks in for the morning work out.  Its not modern music mind you, it sounds like something from a movie in the 30s.  Like someone, somewhere, starts everyday by putting one of those really thick old records on the phonograph and lets it crank.  I try not to giggle every time I hear it.  There’s someone going through the workout too.  I think its just stretching, but I still haven’t seen it.  I could stretch.  I certainly could use it.  I’m really looking forward to get back into my work out routine, but that’s an aside for a different email.

So after the morning workout, the tone rings for the morning meeting to start.  It’s less of a tone and more of a short jingle.  It works on the same concept that everything here in Japan has its own theme music.  Its one of 4 tones during the day.  There’s the “run to the meeting tone”, the “run to the lunch room and eat as fast as possible tone”, the “you should be back at your desk and working tone (or lunch is over)”  and my fav, the “you could leave work if you are a lazy bum tone”  which goes off at 5:15 to mark the end of the day.  No one every pays attention to this.  Generally people don’t start leaving until about 7.  But its nice of the office to remind you, that you could leave….if you wanted to be fired.

Morning meetings or the prayers as I have labeled them (see past emails) are generally short.  But its the mad dash to them which takes the most effort. Everyone one runs to one meeting area.  well there are probably others that I don’t see, its a big place.  But the one place is of course on the top floor of a building so everyone dashes up the stairs and though the maze that is the Amano office compound.  Once arriving to the meetings most people are generally short on breath.  Which ok cause its a short meeting.  Someone says 5 or 6 words, and then we all dash off back to our separate areas. Just enough time to breath so you can run again.  It occurs to me that this is a good way to stay in shape.   We really need this back in the US.  Plus more stairs.

The first of these short meetings was the worse.  Arriving here on the first day, I had let my guard down after meeting the president and all the higher ups, I thought I was in the clear.  But during the meeting all eyes turn to Harry and I.  Apparently its proper tradition to introduce yourself to the (large) group.  Harry, prepared for this, rattles off a short introduction of himself in Japanese.  Me on the other hand, caught of guard and scared to death of public speaking, managed a hello.  In English….That was it. Luckily the meeting moved ahead anyway.  And I haven’t again had to interact.  That’s good.  That’s  the way I like.

Introduction:
Being that this was a business trip, I didn’t really get to much time to travel and look around.  However, on the weekends and a few nights we dashed off on one wacky adventure after another.

Tokyo. First Impression. Big 12-11-04
We had fun kicking around the Tokyo area.  Its a much more interesting area of Japan.  Kinda like Times square but a whole city.  We did the temples, which was neat.  I have lots of pics.  But we ended up spending most of the time just wondering around the big city.  We did lots of shopping and saw lots of interesting things.  So many people!  And the subway system is huge, I can’t make heads or tails of it.

We ended up at this huge mall complex, which I think it was made to confuse.  Its a massive 4  floor maze.  I’ve seen bigger malls, but none this baffling.  There was no store I had seen before (except star bucks damn you star bucks!), that was cool, but nothing that I could afford.  It was kinda like shopping at the short hills mall, but much more expensive.  I saw a set of scissors, 200 bucks.  A record player …15,000!  Not yen, American dollars.  It was nuts.   I spent 110 bucks on dinner.   Still it was interesting.  Very pretty at night.
So speaking of dinner.  I had squid, It’s not so bad, but you can’t look at it.  Looks really nasty.  Also had snow crab and this Korean dish.  Now the Korean dish was really good but we had to cook it ourselves!  Now I had to pay a lot for this meal, I would at least like it to be cooked.  They bring it on this big grill and you do it yourself.  Tasty but different.  It comes as this big stack of raw beef and onion.  Kind of like a tasty pyramid.     Also had Indian food for lunch.  Chicken curry and non (Nan?), it was nice to use a fork again.

The Arcade: A geeks home away from home 12-12-04
Finally after much searching I have found my first decent Japanese Arcade.  It was much more of challenge then I thought it would be.  Most “Arcades” here are mostly slot machines (pachislo and pachinko).  Lots and lots of slot machines.  Japanese people love them.  At least here in Yokohama.  Tokyo might be different.  The actually traditional arcade is a bit more rare, but they are still around.  They have a different look then the American ones.  They are sit down machines, not like a big fancy cabinet like San Fran Rush just a little bench.  And they all have ash trays, cause everyone here smokes like a fiend.
Anyway, here they have the normal rhythm games (guitar, drum, even turn table),Virtual Fighter, Guilty Gear XX, plus the latest street fighter vs (the one that just came out for ps2 like last month).  I did find some very cool old school shooters, but none of them had English names (or even some English characters) so I could tell what I played.  I did get to play Raiden Fighters 2 which is like 9 years old.  Still was a good time though.  Plus there’s some new Gundam game, which might be decent, if you can figure out the controls.  But they come in banks of 6 and you can play with a large group.  Vs games here are a bit different.  Instead of standing next to some one ,at say Street fighter, you sit directly across from them.  You have your own screen and everything.  I actually played some street fighter like this.  Took me a few moments to realize that I was actually playing a real person.  An interesting way to do it.  The coolest game I’ve seen so far is kinda like a 3d Diablo clone called the Quest of D.  4 people play it at once.  There’s a joy stick , 3 buttons , and a touch screen.  So when you kill a monster you have to tap the screen to pick up items and such it dropped.  Its also has a card system, so you can create a character and reuse it every time you play.  You can buy extra cards for upgraded weapons and such.  The kids I was watching had whole stacks of cards, it almost looked like they where playing magic.  The action though is all hack and slash.  It was very cool.  And if I could read Japanese I would certainly have tried to play.
So thats my report so far.  At least from the arcade front.  I probably wont get another chance to roam around looking for arcades again, since they keep trying to make me actually work.  Maybe on my next trip here, next month.  I need to bring more money though, Japan is crazy expensive.  Some things are literally twice as much as they are in the States.  Its nuts.

Shin Yokohama:  A day in the Rain (no date)
So this morning I over slept.  I mean by a lot.  It was past 10 when I finally woke up.   And past 11 by the time I got downstairs.  I guess I really needed the sleep since I didn’t wake up once.  The weather was miserable, so I decide to switch up my plans a bit.  Instead of doing the Bullet train thing I decided head off further into town on foot.  I’m not sure why I did this.  It was cold and damp.  But I did it anyway.  So I walked about 2 miles from the hotel, just generally checking out the area.  I found some cool shops along the way.   It was away from the Tourist centers so it was more normal Japanese.  Prices where much more reasonable, and I came very close to picking up a new digital camera.  Its was 4 mega pixel camera about the size of 3 of my fingers and it was just under 300 bucks.  Really just a neat little gadget, but I behaved.  I had MacDonald’s for lunch since it was simple.  I wanted a meal that was cooked and didn’t stare back at me.  It was ok, still a bit different from home.  They had a sandwich called the Grand royal.  It had this odd tangy ranch like dressing on it, but it was good and not as greasy as I thought it might be.  Also it was easy, cause I could just point to the picture.  In an interesting twist most people can read English here, just not speak it.  So there an interesting way to communicate if need be.  One of the Indian programmers let me in on that secret.  Very handy to know.  Anyway, I tried a few of the local coffee shops.  None where so interesting.  They seem to be trying to clone Starbucks (which is all over here like some disease)  and not doing a good job of it.  Your better off drinking the can coffee that comes out of the vending machines.  That doesn’t taste so great, but the amount of caffeine packed into is impressive.  I played some new and different stuff at the local arcade.  That was nice.  Pricey though, 100 yen per game (1.00 dollar).  So I didn’t play to much.  I did find the new version of street fighter to mess with.
After wandering all day, I ended up back at the hotel around 5:30 and had dinner there.  Not to bad.  Dinner was about 20 bucks (although it was very small) which include beer.  I wanted good old fashion red wine, but I got beer.  Ah well.  I’m beat now.
Japan is nice I suppose, but I’m starting to get home sick.

Yokohoma Harbor Area: Where Tourists Go 12-15-04
We were off wondering though the Harbor area of Yokohoma.  You know I went though 2 huge malls and not one toy store?  Yeeesh, what does a person have to do to buy toys around here.   But we did find some cool other stuff.  We ate at Hard Rock Yokohama (they all speak English there).  Remind me never to have my birthday there.  Cause not only do you have to hear the waiter announce your name over the loud speaker, your suppose to clap along with the rest of the place to this terrible rock version of happy birthday.  Yeesh.  No thanks.  The food was ok.  The beer was 10.50 and my dinner was 17 bucks (I had the shredded pork).  Harry actual ask me if I wanted another drink.  No thank you.  Course that was the only place we’ve seen that had American beer.

Anyway we found a cool train shop (600 bucks for a model engine!) and bunch of American chains.  We even went to Snoopy town.  Found some Charlie brown chop sticks.   Nice….  After that we wonder down by this really cool amusement park (which was closed, bummer) and then down to the harbor, where we saw “Ground Angel” .  Some Artist project that projects Art of angels in the middle of this giant court yard.  It seem kinda silly to me. But what ever. I did pick a CD (a steal for 25 bucks, no its not a double CD).  Mostly cause it had a cool ninja guy on the front.   And I felt I should bring something back from japan.   Anyway my feet are killing me.  And it’s late, so I gotta get me some sleep.

2009 Editors Note: That CD turned out to be a decent deal as I still listen to it on a regular basis.

Mt Fuji or bust 12-16-04

Harry and I are on a quest to see Mt Fuji before we leave.  We’ve failed every time so far.  We managed to get on to the roof of our hotel thinking that perhaps there at least, it would live up to the name Fuji view.  However many buildings have been built after the hotel and they completely block the view.  So we tried at the office.  Went to the top floor of the highest building in the complex.  But that again was block by massive buildings. So answer me this?  How the frell is some one suppose to see Godzilla coming?  I mean really…  Don’t people plan these things out?  Heck he could be taking a nap 4 blocks from here and I would never know.

Yokohama: Lands of Arcades, Toys shops, and strip joints 1-19-05
It had been a point of discussion at dinner for several days in a row.  What would we do for Saturdays site seeing?  The issue was Harry had been to pretty much all the site seeing spots that Hiro knew how to get too.   Plus the weather was suppose to be snowy and cold.  I guess as some point Hiro had decide to simply take up shopping.  Easier for him, and it would keep us some what out of the weather (thinking back on this we where actually outside in the rain and the snow a lot, so the plan didn’t work out so well). Hiro had notice the Gundam models I had pointed out at the Tokyo temples (yes they sell Gundam at temples, why wouldn’t they) and decided to take us to shop that specialized in plastic models.  A hobby shop if you well. Harry was excited about the idea.  This meant he could get a few more gifts for back home and a few new models to assemble.   This suited me fine. Considering that one of my original goals was to come home with new toys from Japan, that you couldn’t get in the US.  A fine goal.  One that had almost completely failed on the first trip.  So it was set, that for the lack of something better we would go toy shopping, I’m sorry, plastic model shopping in down town Yokohama.

Saturday morning came, and I woke up at a decent time.  I spent a few hours watching Japanese cartoons, most of which where sponsored by toy companies. So Takara sponsored the new Galaxy Force Transformers, Capcom sponsored Viewtiful Joe and Rock man Neo.  On every commercial break there was a constant stream of commercials from the company that sponsored the show. This was ok for Capcom, who has a bunch of products,  but Takara only had one, and they repeated it constantly.  I couldn’t understand a word that was being said, but that didn’t really matter.  Cartoons are generally pretty easy to understand in any language.  It’s part of their magic.

That day it was in fact snowing, and raining, and just being generally miserable out.   A perfect excuse to break out my new umbrella that I had gotten at the 100 yen store a few weeks back on the first journey to Japan.  Now as an aside, I never had an umbrella my entire adult life.  It was always just one more thing to carry, and I had my trusty rain coat.  Well here in Japan, I had no rain coat, and I was walking every where.  So I thought I would join the civilized world and get one of those new fangled umbrella inventions.  Progress!

Japan: It’s all about the trains 12-17-04
I have my express train ticket to the train station.  They have 3 speeds of train.  Normal (which is pretty fast, this comes in Local and Express versions), Express version, and super alpha express extreme (2).  So yes that means you have a Normal Express, Express, and Super Express.  The super express is the bullet train and can hit about 150 (we figure.  They don’t really work in MPH here).  Tomorrow we take the express train.  It will be interesting to see how that rates in the whole scheme of things.  It’s about an hour and half ride to the airport, which is a bit north of Tokyo.  Well kinda North west if I understand correctly. So if the bullet train can get us to Tokyo in 15 minutes (it can’t hit top speed due to noise restrictions in that area, an amazing thing, cause I’ve heard that thing pass, if that’s the quiet mode, I would hate to hear the normal mode) where does that put this train?  I’ll try and work out the math.  It should be pretty quick though.  Since the local trains seem faster then the ones back home.

SO no Mt. Fuji.  Its just impossible.  There are far far to many massive buildings in the way.  Oh and Godzilla, but I cant see him either.  I hear the area around Mt. Fuji is nice.  Its not a City like there, more like a suburb AKA like NJ.  So there is lots of buildings and people, just low to the ground.  Sounds nice…well nicer.  I can’t imagine living in the city like Yokohama.  The amount of people would drive me mad.  Even if it is WAY cleaner here

Adult Day (no its not that you perv) 1-10-05
So I found out all about Adult day yesterday.  I actually think it’s the holiday that takes place at the beginning of Mulan.  Kids in Japan are considered adults at age 20 (so they can drink, smoke, and vote).  So on adult day everyone one who is 20 years old dresses up (at least the girls all wear the tradition dress, I’m not sure what the boys do) and go through a special ceremony where they become adults.  When we where wandering around yesterday (train hoping) we saw many girls all dressed up in the traditional
Japanese Dress).  It was a bit like Halloween.

Introduction:
The food here in Japan is, in a word, interesting.  Not to say its bad… its not.  It’s just very different then what I’m used to.  I sent reports almost every day of my latest culinary experience to my wife. 2009  Editors Note:  The sauce of legend is most likely Tonkatsu sauce, but I’ve never found any in the US that was nearly as good.

Enter the Sauce:
Breaded Pork chops for lunch with rice and cabbage.  MMMMmmmm Matt like.   The Japanese have this very tasty sauce (which they call “Sauce” believe it or not).  It’s like a cross between barbecue and soy.  Its looks like soy, but its much better tasting (tangy).  It’s very good on fish and pork. It must have another name, but how do I figure it out?  It’s a puzzle.

I like booze and chocolate 12-8-04
Wednesday looks like nice weather with a strong chance of meetings followed by heavy drinking in the evening.  We’ve done so much drinking I swear I’m in a frat.  It’s just crazy.   I had chicken skin and liver for dinner.  As well as Japanese “Vodka” which has no taste and no burn, its really just there to get you drunk, a stealth booze if you will.  Also some kind of fish.  I really can’t tell the fish apart.  They all kinda taste the same, unless its sushi.  Then I can tell.   Also I had a giant radish, which actually tasted ok (for a radish).  I realize that I could never live here.  They have no chocolate!  Well very little.  Kinda sad. You would think that this would make them healthier, but between the drinking and smoking, I’m pretty sure they’re still pretty unhealthy.   Luckily there is still the American chocolate.  I can always get me a snickers.

Broccoli-san 12-15-04
It’s was a normal lunch, well as normal as the Japanese lunches get anyway. A chicken soup of sort, with a cream base and lots of veggies.  At first glance it seemed safe then Dish choice #2, fish with several unknown slimy items on the side.  But there was more going on than I first suspected.

I began to eat my prepared lunch as usual (my usually approach with food here is to eat first and never ask questions later).  But then I notice a familiar shape.  The vegetable that must not be named!  Its hideous green trunk with its drier fuzz like branches was all over my soup like little evil tree shaped land mines, Just waiting for me.  For the last few weeks I had not seen a slimy green trace of the veggie that must not be named.  But here it was, and in full force.  Apparently it had followed me to the land of Godzilla and cartoons about Ninja School girls.  Is there nowhere that is safe from its evil world domination schemes!   Luckily I was equipped with the latest in Chop stick technology (brown plastic simulating wood, only the best here) I was able to pick my way though the mine field of a soup.  And now I know it’s out there…. waiting….

<insert dramatic music here>

The other “Hard Boiled” 12-16-04
So I think we had the Japanese version of spaghetti and meatballs for lunch. The meatballs where ground beef with a hard boiled egg in the middle (minus the shell, duh).  It was ok.  I put more of that “Sauce” on it, which helps a lot (it was REALLY dry).  I still really like that stuff.  Maybe I can find it in the super market and I can do some chemical break down or something.

Of Mackerel and Tuna 1-10-05
Baked Mackerel (that white fish) with a side of tofu mixed with beef(an odd mix, but whatever).   A salad (with mini croutons), miso soup (heavy on the sea weed today), and of course rice.

The 2nd choice (which I passed on) was scrambled eggs mixed with chicken and pork with bamboo shoots.  I thoughts the eggs might have milk in them.  And we’re not quite back into dairy products after last nights stomach rebellion.

I’m trying to decide what fish I like, and what I don’t.  I don’t like salmon much, but mackerel is good.  There’s another random white fish I’ve had fried a few times which is tasty as well.  Sadly there is no English translation for it.  That happens a lot (see example “Sauce”).   I know I like shark and Tuna.  Maybe I can define a few more before I go home.  Seems like a reasonable quest.  Its better then my “see a real live ninja” one.

That is all… for now.  Carry on…

God save the fish 1-11-05
So today’s lunch was an odd one, but was almost seafood free,  which is unusual. Barbecue chicken served over white rice, shredding egg, peas, and sea weed. The soup was an egg based.  The fact that it wasn’t Miso was a bit of a letdown.  I like Miso soup.   Still it was ok.  It seem like it would be less food, but somehow I felt pretty full when I was done.  Which is good, cause I was hungry and if yesterday was an example, its going to be a long time before I eat again.

The other option was a baked fish.  It looked like leftovers from yesterday.  While I like fish, the idea of day old fish didn’t interest me. The lack of a truly odd and or gruesome aspect to my lunch is a bit disturbing.  That means I’m heading for a really gruesome dinner.  Well if my usually luck holds.  Perhaps this trip will be different

Extra gruesome edition.1-12-04
Today we had the still beating hearts of baby puppies with a heaping side of cute monkey brains.
Mmmmmmm.

Ok ok not really.  I’m just trying to make up for yesterdays poor performance.  Its all a ratings game after all.  What I really had for lunch was fried shrimp.  But not like you would normally have fried shrimp.  This is Japan, they do it different here.  This fried shrimp seems to have been created by rolling a large number of shrimp together, smashing it down into a patty, then frying it.  It ends up looking like a pork chop.  But its shrimp.  Really.  All pink and shell fish like inside.  I checked.  This was served with a curried potato.  This is green and also fried.  Its tastes good, kinda like twice baked, if it was twice baked, fried and then green. Thinking back on that sentence, it doesn’t make much sense.  I’ll move along and pretend it didn’t happen.  There was also a salad, miso soup (heavy on tofu), and rice.

Now as an aside, another mission of mine this time around (yes from the hunters guild) is to gross out the Japanese people with their own food.  How you ask?  It seems there are set ways things are meant to be eaten.  Mixing things out of orders disturbs the people of the land of the rising sun. This makes me happy.  For example, today there was tarter sauce.  Which is good.  But the “sauce” sauce is awesome.  Unsure what to do, I combine them. The general response… “I think that it tastes baaad”.  It helps if you read that last line like the big muppet from “Labyrinth”.  Yeah the “Smell baaad” guy.  I think that’s a bunch of bonus XP for sure.

The other choice for lunch will remain unnamed.  I looked at it for some time.  I could not comprehend.  It was just a large bowl of stuff I did not recognize.  Like my brain saw it, but fail to translate it. I could look right at it, and still couldn’t see it.  It was like it was a SEP.  I asked Hiro.  He stammered around a bit.  But then shrugged and said he didn’t know.  I think it was a very tiny UFO.  That must be it.

Moooo 1-13-05
Ok, get this, start out with a cow.  Take all the muscle off the bones…now pay attention this gets tricky, then grind said muscle into something like ground turkey.  Then flatten out into a small round serving, lets call it a patty.   Its almost like …like a hamburger!  But to make it even weirder add some onion!  Ok ok so it’s just a hamburger.  But the side dish , now that was crazy.  Its hard even to explain it!  See you take potatoes… and you ..smash.. them… up.  Add a bit of milk…. and …ok ok it was just mashed potatoes.  They did add some pickles though, that’s a little off.  And the hamburger was served with brown gravy.  There was also an egg, cooked into the shape of a star.  I don’t know why, I don’t ask questions.  We again had Miso soup (with sprouts of some sort added) and rice.  Cause you have to have rice.  It is where they add the pills that keep the people from asking to many questions about the weird star eggs.

The second dish was fish soup.  White fish with white veggies with a clear broth. <Yawn>  It is like the interesting monster came and sucked anything remotely interesting out of the lunch.  It was so boring; I got sleepy looking at it.  In fact I’m drinking coffee right now.  Just to stay awake. From seeing the soup…. really.