Cutting Back.

I am trying (again) to spend less time on the internet. I am addicted to the internet in the same way some people reach for a cigarette--blindly, as a sedating answer to every single question out there.

I remember in some class that I bullshitted my way through that a good way to help fulfill your goals is by making them public. I can't remember why it matters, but to me, it makes it more real, and it makes me less likely to stick in loopholes. So here I am.

I've also been reviewing my surfing habits, ignoring fark and leaving boingboing until last. I usually hit the BBC news third (after my sister's blog and another blog) to see if anything's blown up while I was asleep. And that's not even the cynical answer.

I will not surf in the mornings. My computer will remain off unless I need to research something specific, like Cambodia or colleges for my teacher's friend's daughter. So far I'm 4 for 4, 2 of 4 for not even turning on my computer at all.

I will not turn on my computer after school for one hour. Instead I will putter or throw away more crap in my apartment (like today, where I think I found my car tax sheet, which was due in May...).

If I can do this for a month, starting in January, I think I can be okay. That's how I kicked my solitaire habit.

Mock me all you want, but I've never been an exciting person. Hangnails are catastrophic. I agonize over light bulbs. I just want to be a bit more normal in my internetting habits.

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Let Me Whine.

I don't like the music on my computer, because it's all newish stuff I've downloaded in the past two years. Three Chicane albums? Bluegrass Green Day covers? What was I thinking? Oh bittorrent, you're such an irresistible siren.

To be fair, I have found some really great stuff, like a lovely cover of Prince's Kiss. Snagged it from some music blog, and although the description was witty and clever, all I can think of when I hear that song is a bunch of gyrating leather daddies, like our good friend Hard Gay. It's a fantastic song.

Also, it sometimes bothers me that I don't know all the words to the songs on my computer. At times, I find myself getting really bored listening to music I can't sing along to. My solution? Burn an mp3 CD and play it in my car (on my ghetto ghetto speakers) until I learn at least a few of them. Right now, unfortunately, I'm at that point where I spend more time scanning for the songs I like (muttering "Asshole music, asshole music...more asshole music..." as I search) rather than singing along. Meh. I wonder how much this will change once I get a damn iPod. I'll do it soon, I swear.

Oh yeah, and they caught the guy who killed that other guy. He's "crazy" and bought the murder weapon (a kitchen knife) at the 100yen store. Apparently it was random. Gee, now I can sleep easy again.

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Kaela 4You

So this student wanted to borrow my Nightmare Before Christmas DVD, and I said sure. But why don't you bring me one in exchange? Ingenious. So he brought me a concert of one of his favorite singers, Kaela Kimura.

Check me out, I'm gonna do a DVD review. Blow by blow.

Somewhere around the 4 minute mark, the show actually started. And she's terrible. My ear isn't the best, but she pushes her top range and dips flat for the low notes. At the 8 minute mark, not much has changed, except you can hear the strain in her voice.

She's wearing a tie dye-ish shirt. There's shirtless guy with a mohawk on guitar, and I just saw a guy go crowdsurfing. So that makes her...punk? Well she's wearing sneakers, so probably.

Hmm, it seems this isn't a concert as much as highlights from her 2005 tour. Gee, track 2 equally meh. The chorus seems to be mostly la la la la la. I think I'm glad I don't understand the lyrics, I might be more disappointed.

21:37 Hmm, I think she's singing in English. She's cute enough, but not a strong enough singer. Damn the greedy assholes that signed her even though she's kind of lame. I wonder what she sounds like after a studio session.

In other news, my $10 pants say that I can dry clean them, if I feel so inclined. Hmm, dry cleaning will cost about half as much as the pants did. NOPE.

I'm considering st....

[12.12 update: After falling asleep on two separate evenings with the lights on and the DVD blaring, I finally finished the damn thing. And no, it's not worth reviewing. The End.]

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Dammit, this is not LA.

Today the elementary school principal called a staff meeting between 5th and 6th period. I tried my hardest to catch every word I could. It didn't seem like they were going to send the students home early due to weather--it wasn't raining by then. I caught something about my grocery store and this really awesome tonkatsu restaurant. They're about 10 minutes away from my house by bike, and that's being generous. Unlike most staff meetings, everyone was looking at the principal, opposed to grading papers or nodding off.

Turns out a man was murdered there, perhaps during 5th period--in the 1:45-2:45 range. He was 28, from Kochi, and worked at the parking lot near the airport. The guy who did it wasn't caught. The kids weren't being sent home early, but all after school activities were cancelled. I even think the 1st, 2nd, and 3rd graders were driven home.

It's a bit eerie, that someone was murdered so close to my town. On the news, there was a chalk outline on the asphalt, and a faint spatter of blood on a car fender.

Back home-home, the biggest thing that happened in the neighborhood was a dead guy found in a trunk, or a really big drug bust. And this is semi-inaka Japan! The worst thing that happens here concerns kids breaking bones and forgetting aprons at home. Mendable things. After the announcement, I finally got around to laminating some old teaching materials, because I felt like I had to do something productive instead of thinking about this guy I don't even know. Interesting that I thought more about the murderer and how he used to be a kid in a school like mine. I guess it's because I worry about the random kids that don't fit in here, too.

I am rather irritated that I don't really want to go near the area. The guy should be long gone by now, or at least laying low. I want vegetables, I want to drop off my dry cleaning. But I think finding out in the elementary school staff room made me a lot more sensitive to the potential dangers.

I guess today will be laundry day.

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Stir it up.

Oh so stagnant. It's time to try this "blog" thing for reals. Again. (If you can name all of the blogs I've had, I'll write a post in your honor.) I remember lifetimes ago vowing to be interesting, and to never talk about what color my socks are, but to hell with the old rules.

Right now I am wearing thick blue socks. These are not sexy socks. In fact, they're snowboarding socks, that I just might've used all of twice for snowboarding. They're great staffroom socks though, I tell ya.

Moving on before I start up the banal weather chitchat. Though it will come up later, I assure you.

I have memories of overgrown sweatpea plants in my backyard. We brought them home one Mother's Day in styrofoam cups, and let them multiply. I marveled at the smooth round brown seeds at the end of the season, but for some reason didn't try to eat the green pods until many years later. Occasionally there would be a big, almost Japan-worthy spider suspended in between, and I would feed it ants, picking them up one by one, trying to get them to stick in the right places. Yep, I was one of those kids.

Those were some good memories. Thanks ants.

Thants.

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