Japan Tobacco

This is from a series of ads promoting polite smoking in Japan. Thank you, JT, for letting me know just how rude I really am. Not only did I smoke like a chimney for most of my time in Tokyo, but I don't think I've ever once looked behind me before creating a brown cloud. Or in this case, green polka dots. Even Japanese farts are cute.

Bjorn Turoque has a posse

Meet Bjorn Turoque, the 2nd best Air Guitar champion in the US of A. It makes sense that if there's competitive poker, competitive spelling bees, competitive rock-paper-scissors, then there also has to be competitive air guitar. And really, which one of those sounds the most entertaining? Fuck yeah, it's air guitar.
Bjorn is also the creator of Aireoke, giving both karaoke and videoke a run for their money, and there is mention of air groupies on his website. Somehow I'm both terrified and intrigued...

Rodeoboy

I just got word that some friends in Japan bought this. It's the Rodeoboy, the latest in Japanese fitness equipment. Considering that these are the same friends that bought a russian-roulette-style electric shock game, I'm not sure if I should try it out. The shock game was a circular contraption a group of people would all put one finger into, as it randomly chose one person to shock the fuck out of. If the shock wasn't strong enough, it also provided metal finger cuffs (decorated with lightning bolts) for you to enhance your playing time. The Rodeoboy looks a little less threatening to me. More like a vibrating trashcan. How bad could that be?

You Can't Help What You Dream, Right?

I am severely disturbed. I woke up Sunday morning after having a way too friendly dream featuring...... Jeff "Skunk" Baxter of Steely Dan and the Doobie Brothers. If I take this to the next (pretzel) logical level, and have a dream about Michael McDonald, I swear to god I will kill myself.

Caddyshack 2006

Okay, just to let everyone know how sad my life has become, I waged war on a squirrel last night. I've seen this squirrel around my apartment ever since I've moved in. He's everywhere. But ever since I've gotten my dog Abby back from my folks, this squirrel has exhibited some pretty nasty behavior: he has decided that my balcony is his personal sun porch. This wouldn't be a problem at all except that it leaves Abby trapped in my apartment, behind a sliding glass door while this squirrel taunts her. He walks right up to the glass in front of her which makes my dog whimper, snort, and generally panic. So last night, in the spirit of Carl Spackler, I decided that "the only good varmint poontang is dead varmint poontang," and I chased that squirrel around the apartment building with a waterbottle and squirted the thing. I don't want to kill the squirrel, I just want to send him a message. It truly was Caddyshack night at my house. I would squirt the water around a corner, and the squirrel would escape only to poke his head around the corner a few times to let me know I didn't get him. That fucker! If the tauntings of this squirrel don't drive me crazy over the next week, then surely the Kenny Loggins going through my head while I chase him will.

Kung Fu. Not Good For You.

Have I mentioned that I'm really into a few songs by Thee Headcoatees? Along with dreaming of singing them for karaoke, I also had this other idea that their song, "Jackie Chan Does Kung Fu" could be the theme song for a new tv show: Anyone who is from the Dallas area remembers growing up and watching Kung Fu on Channel 39. (They talk about it a bit in that movie Office Space.) All day long Saturdays and Sundays it was non-stop Kung Fu. Nowadays it's hard to find that kind of high-quality weekend entertainment on free tv. So I was thinking about making my own show. A nice kung-fu show that could highlight some of the lesser-known-but-yet-totally-badass kung fu movies. Like Shaolin Chamber of Death. And it could kinda have a sort of Elvira-ish or MST3K kind of vibe with a bit of vareity, chit-chat, or guest kung fu-ers. Don't you think it makes total sense to mix a kind of low-rent, gothy, late-nite horrorshow kind of theme with blood-spurting old 70's Jackie Chan movies? That right there is money in the bank.

Two Men Enter! One Man Leaves!

Thanks are in order again, this time to Jason for inviting me out to meet his friends for a night on the town in Houston. Dammit, the more cool places I see in this town, the more I like it here. Too bad I'm leaving in a few weeks.
And there are special thanks to Richard for bringing up the subject that will plague my mind for weeks: Videoke. This is just like karaoke, but with clips of movies and no singing. I can see this going either way... I can picture it kinda like high school, with people in your AP English class who stayed up a little too late to watch Monty Python on Sunday night and now won't stop talking about Spam or Lumberjacks. But I can also see it being pretty cool too.
Richard and I were trying to come up with good scenes (I think he was disappointed when I brought up West Side Story and dance-fighting). Richard's contributions were Buckaroo Banzai and Mad Max Beyond Thunderdome. Fuck Yeah! Anything I could possibly suggest after that would pale in comparison to a greased-up Mel Gibson and a blonde Tina Turner. So far this morning, I've thought of maybe something from Death to Smoochy or Lady Snowblood, the best kung-fu mafia-princess flick ever.