Flash

I got my other flash that I ordered back in August just today. KMD was nice enough to ship it to me, but by the grace of the post office, it took quite a while to get here.

I've been playing with it a bit and I certainly like it, but I haven't had a chance to directly compare it against my Vivitar 285HV. The SB-600 can be triggered using CLS, which my D80 handily can be used as a commander for, or by my handy-dandy wireless trigger. CLS allows me to use i-TTL, Nikon's auto-exposure stuff, but I imagine I'll probably use the rather more simplistic wireless trigger. I will definitely be using this as my on-camera flash, though, as it's considerably smaller than the rather massive 285HV and is autofocus. The idea that a flash can be autofocus still kind of boggles my mind.

The coolest feature is the auto-FP sync. I was just poking at it, and it looks like I can get a decent amount of light even at 1/2000th of a second, while my 285HV is limited to 1/200th of a second normally, or 1/400th maybe if you use some silly tricks.

Also, the automatic focus (zoom) of the Sb-600 seems to be much more effective than the manual one on the 285HV, even at similar settings.

For downsides, I don't think the SB-600 has the pure light outputting power of the 285HV. I mean, putting the same batteries in each one, the SB-600 recycles about twice to three times as fast, and you can only pull so much power from those batteries in a three-second period. Combined with the fact that you could buy two 285HVs, triggering gear, and some gels for the cost of a single SB-600, and I certainly don't think the 285HV is a waste of money. Mine probably won't be seeing nearly as much use as it did before, since I can't use both flashes at the sime time without buying about $40 more gear, plus shipping. That's not in my budget at this point.

Since I have this handy extra SB-400 as well, I'll probably buy two more receivers (if/) when I have enough money, and then I'll have three flashes to play with. That seems like it can only be a good thing. Oh, except the minor fact that the SB-400 can't be triggered without i-TTL.
Grr.

For future reference, I would recommend generally against the SB-400 for anyone looking to do anything beyond bounce flash with it. If all you want it for is so you can bounce your flash, it's a good deal, as it has decent power in a small size and without a bunch of expensive features you don't want. But given its lack of an optical slave unit, its reliance on i-TTL and incompatibility with the Nikon CLS, and the funny looks you get from people using real flashes, I would recommend a different flash for someone shopping for anything beyond bounce.

Again, the SB-400 is great if you just want the ability to bounce your flash.

"I'm Not Dead Yet!" or 「いけない！」

I'm not dead, just busy. I left my computer for a whole day and I have 41 unread email conversations. Woooow. In any case, I've had three kanji tests in the last three days, with another tomorrow. I'm glad I have the next week off. I don't really understand why we have it off, but I'm not complaining.

This next bit will have a bunch of hiragana and katakana, but it make it nearly unreadable to romanize it all, so if you don't read the Japanese syllabaries, I apologize.

In other news, all the various phrases you can construct with the てはいけない and such things. It was always kind of a mystery to me, until I somehow managed to discover that いけない really means ダメ. For clarification, here's a formula you can use:

Condition	＋	Result
すると
すれば		ならない （動詞）
して （は）		いけない（名詞）
しなければ		ダメ（名詞）
しないと		あかん （大阪弁）
しなくて（は）

So to construct a "you must (not)" sentence, you simply take a phrase from the first column, and pick one from the second. It's really that simple. The meaning is pretty simple to work out, too: two red words (negatives) together mean that you must do something, while a red and a black mean you must not.

I asked yesterday, and it turns out that the は here doesn't change the meaning, so much as it is somewhat optional - always use it if you're trying to be formal or polite, but only with て. Then again, who are you going to giving strong commands or admonitions to that you can't speak in plain form with? I don't think you use は with ならない because ならない isn't a noun, but the negative non-past of なる.
[Edit: It turns out you can still do this, as what ever is before the は just ends up becoming the agent of ならない, so it's all good. According to my teacher, anyway.]

I can't get these to line up without using tables, and tables with the freaky way Blogger interprets HTML are too much of a pain, so here's a... splotch of examples.

そう　すると　いけない
[that] [if you do] [is wrong]
You must not do that!

そう　しなくては　ダメ
[that] [you don't, so] [no good]
You have to do that!

Further, remember that you can also swap ては for ちゃ if you're speaking informally: そうしなくちゃダメ is just fine.

I've used the word "condition" simply because conditional forms are common, as seen with the ～ば and ～と forms and I didn't have a better way of saying it. The ～て form is used here in the causative sense, so it may have a different connotation than the others. Also keep in mind that と has a strong 当然 connotation, so you probably don't use it with complex things. In other words, I think it may be limited to simple, fairly natural things or things that the speaker thinks are obvious.

Stomach Rumbles

I made some breakfast.
I used half of an onion,
Now my stomach turns.

Judo Goodness Plus!

Today was really good.

I got a perfect score on my doom kanji test and managed to one-up Valentina in the process. She finished before me, but made some silly mistake and missed a single point. It's petty, I know, but she's just so good that it's hard not to be happy.

I had a long lunch break, so I was able to come home and prepare a lunch with fresh veggies and stuff,

We finished up Princess Mononoke in Special Japanese today, and I only made a complete fool of myself a couple of times. By halfway through the class, the teacher was finishing about half of her sentences with a pointed look at me and a "Do you all understand?" I managed to get a couple of really good answers in, though, and she stopped by the end of the class.

I got some tasty mochi at the store and ate them. They were tasty.

In judo, I got to try a bunch of new stuff and was really excited and energetic the entire time. My partners were all worn out and half-dead while I was like... er... I don't know how to say it in English. It was good, anyway.

The best part of the whole day is when one of my throws did that thing that happens when you do something right. It was on the smallest girl there, but if I could replicate this throw on someone larger, it would've worked just fine.

If you've ever been golfing, or even just to a driving range, you know there's a certain sound that has a very distinctive quality, and you only hear this sound when someone hits the ball perfectly.

This was kind of like that. My throw was smooth, effortless, and graceful. It just... was.

No work on my part whatsoever. Just "Hi - you seem to be on the ground." My partner felt it, too, and laid on the floor for a second saying "No way..."
I think I should mention now that this throw came from a one-handed grip that was exactly backwards from normal, and without any setup.

Just bam, and there was judo.

New Sack

I'm not certain what spurred it, exactly, but my dad sent me some cash to by a new backpack. "What's wrong with your normal backpack?" you might ask. The answer is "Nothing... in Ellensburg." My black and grey Pacific Crest backpack has served me well for quite a while and I intend to continue using it to transport my laptop and whatnot.

The primary problem lies in the foam padding on the side of the bag that rests against my back. Because it's a very soft, comfy foam, it conforms to fit my back just right. While fine and dandy in many circumstances, that's less than ideal when 100% humidity is considered to be fairly low. (That's only mostly a joke.) The solution is to get a back that is somewhat separated from your body, utilizing either an external frame or a combination of hard foam pads and an internal frame.

After about six and a half hours spread over two days of looking at bags in a local hiking shop and having already checked prices elsewhere, I ended up picking the Deuter Navajo 35, which is a very simple bag, but it's got twin sets of compression straps, shoulder straps that are adjustable from both ends, pockets on both sides (something my black and grey bag doesn't have, for some unknown reason) that are both big enough to put a one-liter bottle of water in, and it's rated to hold 35L of loot. Now, those are just extra features that are really, really nice. What makes it simple is that it has one main compartment with two places to access it from, and a zipper that allows you to separate the bottom 1/3 of the bag from the rest. That's all. No weird little pockets or anything as yet, though I may look into strapping some on the side or on the daisy chain.

Left: Me, being round.

Right: See the hard foam strips?
They're magical.

Now, this bag uses a flexible internal frame with a layer of medium-soft foam on top of that, with two strips of fairly hard foam that keep the bag about 3/4 of an inch off of your back. When you combine that with the fact that you can distribute load and place the bag much more precisely, it makes this bag much easier to wear. I wore it to school today it was very comfortable.

In this picture of Kilik at right, the bag has two 1.5L bottles of water in the side pockets, two in the bottom pocket with a 1L as well. The main compartment has all of my school stuff in it. You might take notice of the fact that it looks nearly empty, despite having seven liters of water and a stack of books and papers about 6" thick in it.

The bag itself weighs something like 700 grams (1.5 pounds), I think, which puts it in the middle to light range.

Anyway, I like it.

Thanks, dad!

Shopping Wander with Fish and "Lady's Only"

I went out and did some shopping in Kawaramachi today. I should've gone to club practice, but I just didn't feel up to it.
So I went via Sanjo street because it has long portions that are covered and it was raining pretty decently. I was wearing my rain gear, so I wasn't getting wet, but the opportunity to undo my jacket and cool off was certainly justified the choice. Further, I found these delicious fishes. Some were filled with cream and some with bean paste. Kind of expensive, but something I've wanted to try for a while. They were decent.

I also found this sticker on the side of a public telephone. The red-outlined stuff is my appended translations. I'm not quite sure what to make of the whole thing, but the whole thing was worth it for the "Banana Milk" bit.

Numbers have a couple of ways of being read and you can take advantage of this to create mnemonics to help remember them, such as they have done here.

A Little Late, But Good Enough

I want to start this post off by saying that I'm straight. That is to say, chix FTW.
While Japanese men and women are about one pair of genitals apart, that's a topic for another time.

So last Tuesday, a bunch of the the 留学生 (study-abroad students) went out to an 居酒屋 (kind of like a bar) and for dinner. The people I was sitting with (seated at lower left in the picture later) decided to leave early and go get ice cream.

I later discovered that the reason we had gone to this particular place was because four of the five girls I was with had a crush on one of the guys working there. Now, these people are all fairly new to Japan and are not quite comfortable with the language.

This led to me using my Japanese for something I never expected to: asking a Japanese guy out.

...

Yeah, it was for Maggie, who stood there the whole time and made little noises at random times, but still... Well, at least I know I can ask out a Japanese girl now, if I need or want to, 'cause there's no way that could be more awkward than this.

I took a bunch of pictures while we were out at okonomiyaki, but didn't gel my flash, so they all came out kind of lame. Random picture from the set that I stitched together:

Jidai Matsuri

Gallery links at the bottom of this post!

Jidai Matsuri (時代祭り) is a parade that includes elements from the 1,100 years or so that Kyoto was the capital of Japan. For perspective, this is nearly five times the length that the United States has been recognized as a country. On the other hand, Commodore Perry might have a couple of things to say about these kinds of things.

In any case, there's really not much more that can be said about the parade. I think I prefer Apple Blossom over this one, as at least the Grand Parade has girls in short skirts in quantity. Massed cheerleaders are awfully hard to beat, you know?

I think my favorite part of the Jidai Matsuri parade was when one guy's horse decided he wanted to go the other way for a while. They stopped the whole remaining part of the procession while the handlers got the horse to turn around. This happened with three or four of them, but one took the entire six-lane street to turn around.
There were a couple of touchy spots where I was worried about the stability of the horses, as they kept ending up going sideways by the corner, and if you've been around horses, you know they don't strafe well.
Actually, I think you can circle-strafe in Dynasty Warriors, but... Well, you can do a lot of things in Dynasty Warriors.

Galleries

The first gallery contains all the pictures I thought were particularly good. This is the gallery I'd recommend to anybody in general. This is the top 20% or so of the pictures I took, and I really like some of them. If you just need more pictures of the parade than are here, there's the...

Second gallery, which includes the first gallery and a further ~150 of the pictures that I took at Jidai Matsuri. It consists of pretty much all the pictures I thought weren't boring. I took another 200 or so that came out just fine, but they're not worth including due to space restrictions and me being lazy. Mostly the latter.
My email is at the bottom of this page if you have any questions, and you should also feel free to leave a comment. Either way.

(ヴァレンテナと言う直おばあさんになる人が読んでいたら、このページのギャラリーを無視してもいいよ。ばあさんのためのギャラリーも準備できているんだからね)

Matsuri-try

There was a festival today.

People marched.
I took pictures.

It rained.
I'm wet.

Some horses came by.
I have 600 pictures.

There is another festival today.

Test

Test of doooom.

Busy Days

So the three days prior to today were busy. This is going to be a messy summarization of what's gone on, and it's may not make a lot of sense or be particularly well-connected.

Thursday was a trip, but further information on it is secret pending my Evil Scheme©, but it started at 8:30AM and we got back some time around 6PM. With the other stuff I had to do before I left school, it ended up being nearly 8PM before I got any peace.
So then I worked on Evil Scheme© with a friend and got back here around midnight, when I started working on my presentation for Friday morning. Oh, and I ate a maple メロンパン, which was yummy.

Friday, we give presentations and do some random stuff, and take a break. Halfway through the second period of Basic Japanese, I get a call from a teacher at the school who wants me to teach English for him because he has a television appearance that came up suddenly. We'll call him Jay:
Jay: How'd you like $100? Are you busy tomorrow afternoon?
Me: Not anymore, I'm not.
Jay: You want to teach some English?
Me: I'd love to!
Jay: There will be little kids.
Me: ... [through only slightly gritted teeth] I'd... love to!
Jay: Cool, come on by, then, and I'll show you what to do.

So I come back to class after answering my phone - I wouldn't normally, but I figure if someone's calling me twice in immediate succession, they probably have a good reason.

Class was largely uneventful after that, but I did manage to get a good picture of Valentina. Or at least, I think it's good. She doesn't, but her boyfriend in Italy does, so we've got her outvoted. Ha!
This could've been improved with a a hair light high left, I think, but I'm not about to start setting up light stands in the middle of class.

[Edit: Apparently, I like this picture so much that I've used in two posts... I didn't notice before, but I used it in the previous post as well.]

And then...

Paid my phone bill, tried to find some information, called Jay again to actually have the rest of the conversation transcribed above, and about 2PM finally ate something. Screwed around for about ten minutes, then got ready for work.

Work was... Money? It was work-ish. When you're in a room where there are 30 people and two of them are married teachers, there's one other guy your age, and the remaining 90% are attractive, largely eligible women who want to talk to you, work can only be so bad.

Friday night, I did something until midnight, but I don't know what it was.

Saturday, I got up around 8AM, got prepared for the tea ceremony thing and the work that was to ensue, but was worried about time, and not only at one juncture.

See, I left to get to the tea ceremony place around 11AM, and I was supposed to be there at 11:30AM. I originally had planned to get there ten minutes early, but then I looked at a map one last time and realized that it would take quite a bit more than half an hour if I didn't hurry, and that short a time only if I didn't get lost once and could find the place. Half an hour later, I get there right on time, out of breath, covered in a nice layer of sweat, with the sleeves of my T-shirt rolled up to my shoulders. The greeter, with his suit and tie, did not look particularly impressed, but told me exactly what I should do with my bike and indicated that he didn't think I understood.

So I came back, now wearing a button shirt with a collar and sans one bucket of sweat, and go in.

We went in and sat for a while, bowing every so often to people I couldn't see. After maybe ten minutes, they brought out some little candies, which were pretty good, but there was, unfortunately, only one for each of us.

The woman at left in the purple is the one that [verb]ed my tea. Replace "[verb]" with whatever you verb you use for combining hot water with a powder, and proceeding to whip it with a bamboo whisk. "Made" might be an option.

After everybody had their tea, we were allowed to go (and I got these two ladies at right to pose for me) and they gave us some candy and a free admission ticket to a museum that nobody in my group of friends was able to find.

I'm trying to brief with these, but I still haven't gotten the box of underwear from my parents... By the way, pretty much all clothes are expensive here.

I got a lot of pictures like this one of the chick in the pink kimono. She never served anybody near me tea, so all the pictures of her are either while she's walking - and there was too little light to take pictures while they were walking without getting serious motion blur - or of her butt because she's sitting in seiza, which is when you fold your legs straight under you.

The older lady in the next picture (left) gave a little talk while the tea and candy were being distributed. She was definitely American, but I couldn't place her accent well. I'd guess midwest or Pacific northwest, though, given that.

These two ladies (right) were just kind of milling around in front of the place the tea ceremony was held in, rather disturbingly like characters in an RPG. Just kind of wandering back and forth, not for any apparent reason.

This lady (left) was doing pretty much the same thing in a temple right next to the place where I was taking pictures, so I asked for her picture.

She couldn't decide whether or not to include the umbrella, which I think is funny. I have a picture that came out better in terms of lighting and composition, but her expression is weird, so... しょうがない

The temple entrance at right is one of my favorite temple pictures, and I was happy that I got the road and other stuff out of the shot. I guess I didn't quite get that bush at low-right out, though. In case you're wondering, this is the temple that the other pictures were taken in, not a different one. The tea ceremony was in a nont-temple-related building next door.

Another shot inside the temple. Just me playing with my flash. I drained my rechargables trying to get this shot, so I felt I had to do something with it.

And last is a random picture I got while heading to work. I asked her permission first, and she seemed pleasantly surprised.

I got some more pictures, and I hope to get them up soon, but the test tomorrow may prevent that.

And that's what happened weekend-ish.

Workin' on a Post

I'm detailing what's gone on the past few days that has kept me so busy, but it's late and I have class in the morning, so I'll see about getting posted tomorrow (Monday). That'll help me procrastinate on studying for the big test on Tuesday!

People Pictures

We had presentations today and I thought I would take some pictures. You can see that, as usual, my 50mm lens just makes everything good. That combined with some rather blunt digital darkroom business and you get these. Nothing amazing, but I think these are pretty decent. More importantly, these aren't just the good ones, but some of them. Only two pictures out of this set of 20 or so didn't come out well, both due to subject motion, something completely outside of my control.

At least, until I buy a Tazer. But that's neither here nor there, given Japanese weapon laws.

At left is Sara, my class's token Australian. She, of course, has a really cool accent. She also is very studious and very rarely comes to class unprepared.

At right you can see Kilik (right) and the teacher I call 元気先生 genki-sensei because I don't know his name. He's our only male teacher and always seems really excited, which is kind of cool. He's really supportive and his explanations generally make sense, though I have some difficulty with his accent.
You can see here that he's wearing a dress shirt with a tie and whatnot, but what you can't see is the slippers he's wearing. So I took the second shot (inside right) which is one of the couple different pairs of slippers he wears to class. I'm not sure what the story is behind them, but I think it has something to do with the uncomfortability of dress shoes. Maybe.

The guy on the left is "Mun-jii-san" called with the title for an old man because he's, like, 27 or something. He's the 2nd oldest of the study-abroad students that I know.

He's pretty cool, and he's studied in some kind of martial art, though I can't tell which and he doesn't talk about it.

He's Korean, in case you're wondering.

I got two pictures of Kilik that I just couldn't help picking because I really like both of them. Sometimes, I really like my camera. Most of the time. I worry about it a little when it's rainy, but it lets me take pictures like these that just wouldn't look quite the same from a point and shoot, even if the composition were the exact same.

Kilik is from Peru and is the one that drew me looking like Bill Gates.

Hopefully these pictures will line up the way I want them to, or this will look a little weird.

Here are the other two Koreans in our class: Seu Jeung Park (left, standing) and "Minji" (left- sitting). Seu Jeung organizes most of the parties and reads almost as poorly as I do, while Minji never says a word unless called on, but can read pretty much everything. I've only heard her miss one kanji thus far semester.

The last two people I took pictures of - and whose pictures I will post now - are Valentina Mazzeo and Ai Nishizaki.

Valentina is very nice and is one of those people that is always smiling. She's studying Japanese and Chinese right now, but has very passable English and natively speaks Italian. She's very supportive and kind, and helpful to boot. One of the things I like most about her is that she's engaged, and she doesn't drink alcohol or smoke anything. Her only vice as far as I know, is coffee...

She never quite looks herself in pictures, somehow. I don't really get it.

Okay, last picture before I try to go to sleep some more!

Ai Nishizaki (left, with the mic) is a student from the class I work with. Her English is so-so, but I think she's a Chinese major. She's kinda cute, I think, and has a strange something in her voice that I haven't heard anywhere else before.

Just fell asleep sitting here, so it's time for bed.
...
Zzzz...

Ninja

We went on an official trip today and I took a bunch of pictures. As much as I want to post some, I have a presentation to get ready for tomorrow. I'll see about getting some of the pictures up after work and before the party.

I'm also trying to get pictures from other people who took them, and I'm going to try and get them all on a DVD.

Played with my flash a lot while we were working on pottery, and I'm looking forward to seeing how some of those came out.

Earthquake

What a completely random earthquake. If I didn't know any better, I'd be expecting a blast front about ten seconds ago.

Food Costs

On Wednesdays, I usually go get udon at a nearby place that's really cheap, but I'm trying to save money wherever possible, and I was in the mood for something pretty filling, so I came home and decided to cook some lunch.

Step one: Turn on the frying pan, because everything I cook gets cooked by that one frying pan. Damned good $10 investment, that.

Step two: Grab some tofu and take 1/3 of the block and toss it in the frying pan. $0.10 I'll never see again. Woe.
As a note, it takes some doing to get something composed of 50% to burn.

Step three: Some oil.
Step three point five: Get bored waiting for the tofu to do something and start playing with it.

Step four: More oil, more playing around. Maybe 2 cents worth of oil by now.

Step five: Drop an egg in 'cause I have them handy. $0.15 there.

Step six: Add some amount of rice. Probably about $0.10 worth, though that's less than you might think.

So 40 cents later I have a nice big lunch. Total amount saved by biking home and cooking for myself? About $2.
Oh, and I actually got some nutrition, as opposed to wheat noodles in salt-soup. I guess mine's higher in fat, though.

Most of One of Those Days...

Today was just one of those days where nothing goes right... for the most part. I was doing fine until lunch. After some messy eating, I found out that I had a kanji test in Basic Japanese. Level 4 kanji tests are usually 20 new kanji for writing and about 30 new kanji for reading. Not something I'm able to pull off in twenty minutes right before class. That said, I managed to get 11/15, and two of those points were due to my own inattentiveness and the rule I keep forgetting about with 送り仮名 (the syllabary characters after words with kanji). As a bonus, I also didn't have time to find out what any of the words meant, which killed me later in class, as today - coincidentally? - was the first time we actually did anything relating to the meanings of words on the tests. I swear the teachers are psychic or something. Maybe they're ninja. Psychic ninja?

Unfortunately, I also forgot to do the eight-page packet we were assigned over the weekend. Oh, and research someplace in Japan to want to go. Oh, and read the assigned parts of the book. Oh, and... actually, I think that's it. Normally, forgetting to do your homework wouldn't be such a painful experience, but when class drags out for three hours, it's at least three times as agonizing.

Very Good Guesses?

I don't know what it is that allows them to do it, but Japanese teachers are always prepared. It doesn't matter what you're going to talk about or what random question you might ask, they will have printed off twenty copies of stuff related to it and hand it out.

I need to start writing down when this kind of stuff happens, as I don't have many good examples. But I have got one from Friday...

After class, I noticed one of my teachers in the teacher prep room and he's just kind of sipping his coffee and reading book. So I knock and whatnot, and I go in and ask him a completely inane, out-of-nowhere grammar question. He thinks about it for a second, flips through a couple of the files that he brought with him to class and pulls out a 20-page packet about what I wanted to know about.

I don't know if the Japanese teacher training program also acts as a psychic test bed or what, but they are good.

Left Behind

I left some camera gear back at the party last night, which is 4.2 miles (6.7km) ( away, according to Google Maps, on the route we take. Multiply that by two for 8.4 miles (13.4km) round trip and it's a great way to start the day!

I'm kidding, in case that's not obvious. Bleh.

On the bright side, I found a place that has even betterdango than the soba place I've mentioned. Same price, slightly smaller amount, but they know how to cook them perfectly and you can buy as many as you want instead of just plates of three.

Oh, and I found not only my missing camera bits, but a friend's lens cap. Bonus.

It Doesn't Go?

From the party last night. I'm still recovering and don't have much to say about it.
Mun is holding the flash off in the distance, which is how that nova happened.

It Came from the Miso

I'm pretty sure I just made a new dish. If I didn't, the person who made it before me needs mental help.
The basic process went like this:
"I like miso soup, but I don't want to wait to boil water, and I'm too lazy to stand and stir it. Shimpei said never to boil miso, but it shouldn't make anything too poisonous, so..." And I took about a tablespoon of soup mix and tossed it in the frying pan, then put the pan on high heat.
"But that's just going to burn and make an awful stench if I don't give it something to dissolve in..." In goes a tablespoon of oil and some random amount of water.
"I have judo in a bit, so I need some kind of protein. I know tofu goes well with miso..." So I cut up half a block of tofu and put it in the pan. Stir.
I turned down the pan to medium-high and came back in a few minutes, stirred again, and came back a few minutes later. I was getting hungry, and just took some out.

Meh.

Add some pepper. Tastes like... chicken.
Not kidding at all.

So the tofu wasn't firming up at all, so after I took out about half, I cracked a large egg and tossed it in, too. It helped, but it still tastes like chicken.

Anyway, it's definitely edible, and it... is... probably not too poisonous. I won't go so far as to suggest that it might be healthy, but...

Warning: If you try this, you should do so with the knowledge that I will not be held responsible for the following bout of death that insues. And it probably will.

Part-Time Job Interview

I had a kind of interview today for a job teaching English. It went really, really well, as far as I can tell. By "really, really well" I mean to say that I think if she didn't have someone teaching the class right now, she would've had me start right then and just start teaching.

Unfortunately, the reason she wanted to find a replacement for the current teacher is because he's leaving in December. With me leaving in March, it's too short a time to be worth the trouble of getting all the paperwork done. She said she'd keep me in mind if she needed a class covered or something since my visa allows occasional, random work. We're just not allowed to enter into real, contractual jobs, I think.

As an aside, I originally had some strange ideas about how it might go since I thought she was interviewing me at her apartment, but it turns out that she just runs the school there. She was fairly pretty, and I understand she has a daughter my age, as well... (Included for the sake of my ever-lecherous father who "wants some grandchildren already, damn it."

She said since I didn't have any experience, she'd only be able to pay me about $25 an hour, plus transportation fees. I wouldn't mind an extra $100 a week in return for getting more practice with Japanese. It is not to be, unfortunately.

Alas.

Interesting Choice of Words

Looking up a compound for some homework, I discovered that there's a kanji compound that means "business" and is pronounced けいき keiki. This is effectively the same way that you say "cake" (ケーキ keeki). Anyway, I was a little curious, and apparently there's a whole list of words prounced "cake" in Japanese:
契機 【けいき】 (n) opportunity, chance, (P)
景気 【けいき】 (n) condition, state, business (condition), (P)
計器 【けいき】 (n) meter, gauge, (P)
刑期 【けいき】 (n) prison term
継起 【けいき】 (n,vs) occurring in succession
軽機 【けいき】 (n) light machine gun
Now I will never know whether or not I want to eat some cake in Japanese again. I'm not going to take the chance that the person's talking about an LMG. Hopefully, I won't find anything dangerous that's pronounced クリームパン kuriimu pan, you know?

Yum.

Kilik... Strikes Back?

Kilik and I were assigned each other for a little interview thing, and we were supposed to draw the other person or take their picture. I, of course, wanted to take pictures, but everybody else wanted to draw, so we did. My drawing of Kilik is a circle with two lines for eyes and a dot of a mouth. It's like a stick-figure face.

Well, Kilik is an art major, and I spent as long posing as I did answering questions, but I'm glad to have a drawing of me by someone as good as he is. He knocked this out in about two minutes in class on a piece of scratch paper the teacher gave us, and a lot of detail was lost when it was copied, as well as some when I used my "scanner" (ie, my camera) to digitize it. Them's the breaks.

Eh, I like it anyway, even if it makes me look like Bill Gates.

Playing with Myself

I went out today in my black jacket, and happened to grab my hat and gloves, so I was being scary again today, though Chise says I wasn't. And that my hat smells bad. I dunno. Anyway, I took nearly 50 pictures of myself, and it was kind of fun. I'd much rather have someone else posing and be able to actually compose the pictures, but until I have enough spare money to pay people to model for me... Beggars can't be choosers, they say.

In any case, I thought I would show that I'm doing my part to give Americans a bad name. I wouldn't want anybody to think I'm slacking in that department. At right is the best shot I got, evil-wise.
I made no major alterations, though I did cool it down a little to add the extra zombie feeling to my face.

I'm totally not posting any of the full resolution ones, but - as much as I detest it when people use GIFs like this - here's a little GIF showing all of the ones I didn't just delete out of hand.
Examples of those are shots of just the curtain, or where you can't see anything 'cause I pressed the button without realizing, and then fiddled with something on the camera, blocking everything.

どこにおいてあった？

Where does the sky keep all this water?
(It's raining.)

Today

Today has been... rainy.

So I donned my rain gear and crossed town to go to club, finished up a bit before five and headed home, donning my rain gear once again.

I found a small mom and pop meat shop on the way back, and they were selling コロケ for cheap, so I got two of them, and I fully expect they both took a year off of my life, looking at the oil they were fried in. But they were pretty decent and I'm always in favor of deep frying things.

Got home, studied a little, watched a little anime, and jogged to the store to get some groceries: Kagome, tofu, more Kagome, a few bars of chocolate, and nearly a kilogram of strawberry jam that was on sale for $2. Used my small umbrella on the way back and have been lounging about studying and watching anime. I'm most of the way done with the grammar, but I'd like to put half an hour or so into practicing kanji before I go to bed as well, so the sooner I finish going through the grammar, the better. Tomorrow, I'll practice the kanji some more and read through some of the compositions if time permits.

Anyway.

Today has been... rainy.

Rice Cooker, Translated

I don't know why I never did this post before and I feel a little silly just getting around to it now, but I put the diagrams together over the past hour so. I think spent half the time playing around with fonts and stuff, and trying to figure out how to label all the stuff and make everything fit, with the remaining time devoted to looking up kanji and actually positioning the labels.

I finally decided on using two separate pictures, as I can't realistically fit all the labels on one picture unless I overlap with the labels themselves, which would defeat the purpose of the entire thing.

First up is the buttons, since they're the most important. Everything should be pretty self-explanatory.Second are the translations for all the various labels. No, I've never used most of the modes. I just use timer-cook and the start button. It'll start on its own though if you leave it alone for about two minutes after setting a timer.
I've also never made okayu.

Flash

One of the biggest steps you can take to allow yourself a wider range of options photographically is to get an external flash for your camera. Very high-end or prosumer digital cameras will usually allow you to do this (eg: Canon G Series - >$300 used) and I have never seen an SLR or DSLR that doesn't at least have a hotshoe. High-end SLRs will have a PC Sync port (at right), as well.

External flashes will usually allow you to tilt the flash head itself, which gives you the ability to bounce your flash off of the ceiling or walls. It really helps to alleviate the whole "This is a picture" feeling that direct, on-camera flash (at left) gives. It tends to give much more natural-feeling light due to the fact that we, as humans, are use to light coming from above us. The sun, most room lights, etc, are all above our heads, so we spend our whole lives accustomed to lighting from above. When you take a picture and use the on-camera flash your main light is now on the camera. How often do you have lights behind your retinas? "Retinae"?

Further, an external flash can be used with all sorts of lighting gear, such as remote triggers, umbrellas, snoots, grids... people... With a flash and a remote trigger (eg: PocketWizard - ~$400/pair), you're able to hand your flash to someone (preferably a friend, so they don't run off with it) and use them as an emergency tripod. This setup is sometimes referred to as using a "Voice Activated Tripod". "Fred, turn left, would you?", and such. You're then much more likely to get what you see at the right.

And then there's the downside to doing all of this on the cheap: it's all manual. You're not using any i-TTL, or CLS, or anything like that. You're directly controlling the flash power (Full, 1/2, 1/4, etc) and the exposure. You can leave the exposure on auto sometimes, but the camera doesn't know what the flash is doing, so it usually won't work right.

At left is an example why you don't let the camera figure exposure when you use off-camera lighting. There are other and better reasons, but those are a topic for a blog of their own.

Thanks to Kilik for unknowingly providing me with examples.

Oreo Wafers?

I have a new partner at work now, apparently. I don't really know anything about her except that she speaks Chinese natively, speaks Japanese far better than I do, and has a decent command of English on top of that.

We were sitting around, waiting for the students to take a test and we somehow started talking about cookies I guess. She totally thought Oreos were made by a Chinese company, so I pulled my usual Wikipedia trick and was victorious. (There's not really a trick, it's just that people are really shocked when I have an article about something up within seconds of them mentioning it.)

So she gave me one of the packages (above) of Oreos that she had brought with her since she was on her way to a party. You can see that it is not what you might normally think of as an Oreo.

If you've ever bought those really, really cheap wafer snacks at Safeway that come in a pack of about 30 for $1, you're on the right track. Now take normal Oreo filling, minus 1/3 of the sugar, and coat the whole thing in chocolate. That's the Chinese version of an Oreo cookie.

I don't recall seeing any kanji-ish business on the wrapper, though, which seems weird because I understand that she bought them in China. I'm somewhat worried about whether or not they're a dairy product, but not so much.

Class-Work

So when we're picking classes, they hand us a schedule that has all of the available classes listed in the day/time slots that they are in. Classes are an hour and a half long, so there are four slots in the day (plus one hour of lunch) and five days during which there are classes, so we effectively have 20 time slots at our disposal. 10 of these are taken up with "Foundational Japanese" the required lecture class.

Of those, I have five slots remaining. I'm taking a lot fewer classes than I had meant to, but it's 24 hours of classtime a week. To top that off, I have nine hours of club activities spread over the week, plus the time to get to them and prepare and whatnot. I'm currently only working three hours a week, but I'm in the process of getting some more work.

Foundational Japanese

If you took Okada's class, imagine something entirely unlike that, for three hours each day, and you're getting the right idea.
Even this school's most basic classes are in Japanese, from what I understand, and we do a wide variety of things each day, and that variety changes everyday.

Today, we had the guy I call 元気先生 genki-sensei because he's really excited about half the time, and he's kind of loud. Also, he wears bright green slippers in class with his white shirt, tie, and slacks. He's our only male teacher in level four, as well. We did quite a bit of listening stuff, read a newspaper review of some movies, and did generally 一級 stuff that was way over all of our heads, but is good practice. It's really painful to do this kind of stuff on your own, because when you run into grammar you don't know, you have to hope you can find an explanation in a book or on the web. Having someone there to ask is really nice.

We have different teachers for that class every day, and my level has reading/writing kanji tests every other day. It's only 15-30 compounds, so twenty minutes of studying is usually enough to get a decent score.

All of this is a lot simpler than what normal students have to deal with, but is like this because it's a "Special Course in Japanese" as described by the school. We're welcome to sign up for normal classes if we so desire, but that makes things slightly more complicated. I'm signed up for two slots of normal classes that I didn't include in the calculations earlier, so tack another three hours a week onto that, if you like.

I didn't think about it before, but we're kind of getting screwed on credits. I mean, one credit usually means 1 week-hour of classtime, right? Each class we take should be 1.5 credits (1.5 hours), and then multiplied by 1.5 when we transfer because Japan uses a Semester schedule. I should end up transferring these back to Central for... a little over 50 quarter credits. I figure I have another .75 (1x1.5x1.5=2.25-1.5=.75) credits per base credit coming to me in a fair world.

Alas.

Results

Well, I did say that it was a small DIY project. Here's a picture of the final product.

It's basically a big, sticky version of the little Velcro cable ties from the dollar store.

It's a... Good... Too Good... Day?

Today has gone scarily well. I'm not kidding.

To start with, I woke up early. That's a good thing, by the way.

Then, I made breakfast and it just, you know, worked. It was delicious, the texture was nice, and it actually looked appealing. The seasoning worked well, and all the flavors blended nicely. Rare indeed for my cooking.

Did I mention that my school has the day off due to some freaky PE festival that we don't have to go to? I should mention that. It means I basically get my very own holiday, but without the crowds that ruin holidays here.

Next, I was helping Jes get some stuff set up on her computer, so she was actually talking to me. Problems that popped up promptly vanished for no known reason and without us really doing anything. I had solutions for most of them, but it was really nice to be overprepared for once.

So then I start reading about some DIY stuff and I'm in a particularly good mood from talking to Jes, so I exercise a little, grab a shower, and head down to the mall. Well, I went to the cycle shop I go to all the time, and he was more than happy to give me an old bike tube. In fact, he asked "Are you sure you only want one?" and we chatted for a few minutes. On my way out, I filled up my front bike tire, so the rest of the time riding around was extra comfy and easy.

So I deposit the tube at my bike and go into the mall to get some tasty treats. Because no trip to the mall is complete without tasty treats, right? Right! I ask for one tsubuan, which is kind of a shorthand way of saying that I want a two pieces of mochi (gelatinized rice) wrapped around a filling of tsubuan (red bean paste with a little bean texture left) and fried. When I tried to give her money to pay for it, she refused and said. "That's not necessary, you come here all the time. Go on, now." I checked once more and thanked her, happily on my way.

A few feet away is another shop that sells a different kind of mochi and I tried a new flavor of mochi that I honestly have no clue what it was supposed to be. That store always has issues with spelling, but even I can't figure out what flavor "Seeqester" is. It was frozen, so I couldn't eat it right away. Eh.

I head down to the hardware store to get some majikku teepu ("Velcro"). It's kind of pricey at $4.50 for a matched set of hook and loop sides that are each about 2"x3". I found it in bulk and asked someone who works there to help me figure out how much would cost how much. As it turned out, I was able to get about twice as much for two-thirds the cost that way, and it was the perfect size for what I wanted it for.
To top it off, I found some non-slip pads that I've been looking for and some glue that together were less than $2, so I have a second project for a little later. All told, I got out of there for less than $5.
How cool is that?

So I'm on my way home and I discover a new bakery that has pretty much just the stuff I like, and a bunch of new things I've never seen before - "leaf pie", for example, is some kind of thin strudel-like thing sprinkled with sugar in the shape of a piece of pizza. On top of that, they're all really, really cheap. Most bakeries here charge between $1.30 and $2.50 for their various bits. The most expensive thing I saw here was a new kind of fluffy クリームパン kuriimu pan ("delicious") and that was $1.16, which I of course bought. It was extra delicious.

So I'm about to get started on my little project. Here's what I got on my outing, minus the food, which I kind of... consumed.
The reason that today is scarily good is because things going this smoothly makes me worry about what's going to happen tomorrow.

But... I can't do anything about that, so on to hacking together some pieces!

A New Store

I just discovered that there's a hardware store about ten minutes away from me on a very simple path. Today is a day for some DIY, I think!

Bank Not L33t

I'm just a little bit short of having l33t cash in my account. It's l33t enough (99.55%) to pay rent, though!