Did I mention...?

So my B.F.F.L. Jon is giving it all up and moving to Vietnam next month. Apparently, I made the orient cool again. He's volunteering to help save the planet, or at least give us a few more seconds of clean air before it all goes to shit. You can read a much better explanation of why he's going and what he's doing here, on his blog. Before he goes he's coming to Japan for a few days, which is like sticking your toe in the pool to check the temperature before you jump in.

Jon is the biggest eco-freak I've ever met, since high school, before "green" was printed on t-shirts, he was packing me waste free lunches and sighing at me when I didn't recycle properly. And recycling is just the tip of the iceberg for Jon. Like any modern eco-freakian (just coined that, it will catch on soon), he doesn't smell like patchouli or smoke pot (usually), he doesnt own Birkenstocks or have a beard. You could like this guy.

So, go read about Jon's interesting fund raising techniques (waffles and haircuts) and leave a supportive comment (or even more supportive donation) at Chronicles of the Next Floor.

Did It!

The day we've all been waiting for has arrived! Motto and I adopted a bunny! Her name is Raspberry-chan and she's the cutest bunny in this prefecture. She enjoys chewing cords, pooping in her litter box dutifully, and biting feet. She dislikes sudden movements, bananas, and when I hit her in the head with the door. I taught her one trick already, too.

Reading Rainbow

I've self-tagged myself after reading D's book post.

Here are the rules:
Go to your nearest bookshelf. On the top shelf (or highest shelf with books) what book is fifth from the right and why did you love it? Now go to the bottom shelf (or lowest shelf with books). Tell us about the fifth book from the left.

Kanji Starter
by Daiki Kusuya
I think this is the first book I ever bought to help me try and understand Japanese. It's small and easy to understand. Each page has one or two kanji and takes it from the picture the kanji represents to the Chinese character. It's good for visual learners, and flipping through it once or twice helped me recognize a bunch of kanji. The drawback is it doesn't really help you memorize how to say each kanji in Japanese, even though it's written below the English. It's good if you wanna learn 山　equals "mountain" and simple stuff like that.

My Voice Is Sexy When You Close Your Eyes or, Whatever Happened To That Guy Kevin!?
by Kelly Froh
This was a bonus insert in Kelly's mini-comic Slither #5. I've read a bunch of her stuff and I recommend it highly. She's been kind enough to send her comics to me with the promise that one day I'll send her mine(...). This particular story is about this guy she meets on the internet, and I guess in the days before one knew any better, agrees to meet him after only seeing a tiny 72 dpi thumbnail photo. Classic coming-of-age story in the days where social networking was too (you know, 2005).
I found it hilarious and relatable, way too honest and embarrassing, which how I like me comic.

Obviously, as was done before me, I'm not tagging anyone, cause people hate that shit.

The Post About Twitter

I followed a link on Mattias Ink's blog that said Blogging Is Dead, pull the plug! It says Facebook, Flickr, MySpace, and Twitter are much faster and easier ways to keep everyone involved in your life, and they're easy on the ol' attention span.

Obviously after reading this I realized that I am lacking one of the four major self-publishing, self-loving memberships, and instantly signed up with http://twitter.com (no www's, that's so 2004), here I am at http://twitter.com/jeannetto.

Im not sure how Twitter will save my life yet, it seems a lot like the Facebook "status" thing (which I hardly ever update, right now mine says "Jeannette is planning her summer vay-kay to Mt Fuji...woohoo SPRING BREAK '97! OMGLOLz!" or something like that). But, Im thinking having more ways to make myself seem important by sharing my thoughts with people I met at a party once while I was in Montreal might be the push I need to get me back to the masturbation that is blogging regularly, which might ultimately lead to a breakdown of this block that has kept me from drawing anything neat in the last few weeks (ok, months). People need to know what I, Jeannette, think about all of this. I need to remind myself of how important I am. For my art.

Tweet. Tweet.

今日はほんと寒いね？

I love my new job.

I have too much free time, it can't be good for me. And now winter vacation is coming. I have about three weeks off and no money to go anywhere. My only plans so far are to finish a website I've been working on and possibly do my dishes more than once.

It's like my life has absolutely no purpose and I have no idea what to do next. But it's great.

Dancin in the Street

One of the weirder things I've seen since coming here.

There was no hat or tip cup. It mustve been 100 degrees out that day, too.

Motto's First Sloppy Joe

It took a lot of explaining. First, I had to describe what a Sloppy Joe actually was. Then, why it is so important. He couldn't believe it was vegetarian. He kept picking up little bits with his chopsticks and screaming, "THIS IS MEAT!" He loved them, and his awe for all things American grew along with his belly.

If any of you would like to help me feed this skinny Japanese boy, please send a box of Fantastic brand vegetarian Sloppy Joe mix my way. Every box helps.

To blog or not to blog...

The trend with blogs seems to be, you start a blog, pick a name, write a first post, email all your friends and relatives with the news, "I have a new blog! I am amazing!" Then, you continue writing, people somehow find it, they read yours, you read theirs. You start counting comments. You being thinking about life in terms of how what you're experiencing can be turned into a blog post. Then, all of a sudden, a slump hits. There's no time for blogging. You didn't blog about a vacation or two and feel like you've totally ruined this online narrative of your life. Or, as the angry mob starts commenting, "what happened to your once-interesting-insightful-funny-blog?," you begin to ask yourself, "why do I even write on this thing at all?"

My life is just as interesting without it. Just, no one else knows.

I started this blog to write about my crazy "Year In Japan." As that year is turning into two, and I'm growing more and more accustomed to this backward culture, I am left wondering why am I blogging at all?

My sketchblog, on the other hand, could use some attention.

Rainy Day

I love podcasts. I never have time to listen to them, but they can save your life when you miss a train and the next one isnt for another hour.

I'm Like, Busy

...and yet at the same time, not at all. My new job is sweet. The hours are short, but for the first few weeks it will be chaos. I moved into an excellent new apartment. The view of the smokestacks is breathtaking. I spend my free time taking bus trips to 100 Yen shops to furnish the place.

And there's the freelance project, and answering emails when someone lets me use their internet (we're back to that again).

And then there are the hours of reading comics, followed by even more hours of stomach-churning depression over the realization that I might be physically and mentally unable to ever finish anything.

And then it's donut time.

(Oh, and then there's my stalker/b.i.f.f.l.'s art show, Darryl Berger.)