I've been listening to Tom Waits's Mule Variations quite a bit over the last few days, and it is quite excellent. What's really nice about it is that it has quite a bit of variety. Tom started out his career basically as a lounge singer, trying to capture the essence of Saturday night, with somewhat limited success. The early albums are rather hit and miss, with an occasional great ballad or amusing bit like The Piano Has Been Drinking, but with a lot of filler tracks. I think he either got bored with doing that or he just realized that since his voice is pretty much terrible, he couldn't really make it as a crooner. He started doing more and more crazy stuff, and eventually came out with Mule Variations. I should also mention that Bone Machine is pretty out there, too, but I think it's kind of overrated and MV is much better.
Some tracks of special interest:
Big in Japan - features Primus and Tom doing some kind of weird beatboxing or something. It's also a lot of him basically yelling out somewhat ridiculous lines. His evil gruff voice really works for this one.
Hold On - Very poppy by Tom Waits standards, but very good. The first lines are the best; "They put a sign up in our town/If you live it up, you won't live it down."
Get Behind the Mule - Tom does blues right.
Cold Water - Tom sounds right as a hobo, sleeping with the snakes and the bugs, happy to find an old dog.
What's He Building? - I don't usually like spoken word stuff, but this one's rather amusing and has a lot of bizarre sounds. However, like most spoken word stuff, it gets boring after a listen or two, so I end up skipping it all the time.
Picture in a Frame - Sometimes he really hits the mark with a ballad, and this is one of those times.
Filipino Box Spring Hog - Bizarre and wonderful in a way that only he can do.
Take It with Me - Another nice love song from Tom.
Come On Up to the House - A scenic march through Tom's old world, cracked and broken vagrant spirituality that ends the album on a perfect up and down note.
Monday, May 26, 2008
Tuesday, May 20, 2008
Some Stuff I Did
Sorry that there haven't been any updates in a while. I've been busy and tired when I've not been busy. A few days ago, at the turtle school, they were having a club day. In elementary school, they have clubs, but they only meet something like once a month, whereas junior high kids meet every day, as far as I can tell, and stay at school until around 21:00 playing tennis or arranging flowers or whatever it is that they do.
So, anyway, they asked me to come to the kateika club, which is like the home ec. club. They were doing chatsumi,茶摘, which is picking tea. So, we went out to somebody's garden with the leader of the community center and some old woman (?) and picked tea for a few minutes. Then we came back and made tea, which basically just meant microwaving the leaves, smashing them, microwaving them a second time, smashing them again, and then putting them into teapots with hot water. It was very good tea. It was ocha,お茶, or green tea, but supposedly, in the fall, the same leaves can be made into bancha,番茶, which is some other kind of tea. The vice-principal gave me the school's camera and asked me to take pictures, so I did that instead of actually making the tea. I also took pictures with my cell phone, so maybe I'll upload those soon.
And just two days ago, I got to do some taue,田植え, which is rice planting with a fifth grade class. Usually they tell me about these kinds of things weeks in advance, but this day, they just called at around 8 in the morning and asked me to bring shorts and whatnot. It was cool.
I don't have any pictures of that because I was actually doing it, and it's not really possible to work a camera and plant rice at the same time. Planting rice involves standing in shin-depth mud and putting little seedlings in the mud and water, as guided by a wooden triangle frame thing, to ensure that everything stays pretty much in line. You form a whole line of people, and take turns being in charge. It goes like this:
everyone plants rice
leader: dekita? (done?)
everyone: dekita! (done!)
leader: isseinode! (ready, go!)
everyone rolls the triangle frame over and plants next row of rice
Good times were had by all. But now, I have a track meet to get to!
So, anyway, they asked me to come to the kateika club, which is like the home ec. club. They were doing chatsumi,茶摘, which is picking tea. So, we went out to somebody's garden with the leader of the community center and some old woman (?) and picked tea for a few minutes. Then we came back and made tea, which basically just meant microwaving the leaves, smashing them, microwaving them a second time, smashing them again, and then putting them into teapots with hot water. It was very good tea. It was ocha,お茶, or green tea, but supposedly, in the fall, the same leaves can be made into bancha,番茶, which is some other kind of tea. The vice-principal gave me the school's camera and asked me to take pictures, so I did that instead of actually making the tea. I also took pictures with my cell phone, so maybe I'll upload those soon.
And just two days ago, I got to do some taue,田植え, which is rice planting with a fifth grade class. Usually they tell me about these kinds of things weeks in advance, but this day, they just called at around 8 in the morning and asked me to bring shorts and whatnot. It was cool.
I don't have any pictures of that because I was actually doing it, and it's not really possible to work a camera and plant rice at the same time. Planting rice involves standing in shin-depth mud and putting little seedlings in the mud and water, as guided by a wooden triangle frame thing, to ensure that everything stays pretty much in line. You form a whole line of people, and take turns being in charge. It goes like this:
everyone plants rice
leader: dekita? (done?)
everyone: dekita! (done!)
leader: isseinode! (ready, go!)
everyone rolls the triangle frame over and plants next row of rice
Good times were had by all. But now, I have a track meet to get to!
Sunday, May 11, 2008
A Taste of Honey
Or special sauce, actually. Behold, the Mega Mac:
That's from a few weeks ago, actually, but I just got around to putting it up. Nothing particularly fascinating is going on right now.
That's from a few weeks ago, actually, but I just got around to putting it up. Nothing particularly fascinating is going on right now.
Sunday, May 4, 2008
Long Awaited Update
I know I said I'd get to that Hanami update and then didn't do it, so here you go, finally. I went to hanami, which means flower viewing, in Kisuki, a nearby town, and one of the top 100 sites in Japan for doing so. Kisuki lies on the banks of the might Hiikawa river:
Sorry about that one being sideways. Those are just shots of a little footbridge across the river. Here's one of the famous line of trees seen from across the river:
It's far more impressive than my cellphone camera can display. So, what is flower viewing all about? Basically it is a chance for people to have picnics. Here's a picture of some people I don't know picnicking. I didn't get to have a picnic or anything, but I did at least get to eat some good soup stuff which is supposedly a very country-side dish.
Of course, this being a festival, there were tons of places selling festival food, which is basically all terrible for you, and a stage with dancing and music, only half of which is traditionally Japanese. There was even a jazz band that I have to say put ol' c-ville's to shame.
Again, sorry about the pictures. There was also a koto concert, which was nice. The koto is basically a strange looking Japanese harp. Pretty neat, anyway. I'll leave you with a couple of pictures of the cherry blossoms. They've all fallen off the trees now. There's something poetic in there but I'm not going to bother with it because it's so obvious.
Sorry about that one being sideways. Those are just shots of a little footbridge across the river. Here's one of the famous line of trees seen from across the river:
It's far more impressive than my cellphone camera can display. So, what is flower viewing all about? Basically it is a chance for people to have picnics. Here's a picture of some people I don't know picnicking. I didn't get to have a picnic or anything, but I did at least get to eat some good soup stuff which is supposedly a very country-side dish.
Of course, this being a festival, there were tons of places selling festival food, which is basically all terrible for you, and a stage with dancing and music, only half of which is traditionally Japanese. There was even a jazz band that I have to say put ol' c-ville's to shame.
Again, sorry about the pictures. There was also a koto concert, which was nice. The koto is basically a strange looking Japanese harp. Pretty neat, anyway. I'll leave you with a couple of pictures of the cherry blossoms. They've all fallen off the trees now. There's something poetic in there but I'm not going to bother with it because it's so obvious.
Thursday, May 1, 2008
Recent Events
I haven't updated in a while, sorry.
It is becoming rather hot here. It has reached 27 degrees Celsius a few times in the last few days and that really sucks. I can deal with the cold a lot easier than the heat. Also it is hayfever season, I guess, and I seem to have developed allergies in the last couple years, so that is kind of miserable. The Japanese word for hayfever is kafunshou, 花粉症if you were wondering.
I had a couple of fun events in the last week. Tuesday was Showa Day, which is a national holiday, so I had it off, but one of the schools asked me to come to their taiikutaikai, 体育大会, which is basically a track meet but with crazy relay races, too. So, I went to that, and it was a lot of fun, but I forgot my sunscreen and so I got sunburnt. It wasn't too bad, but I've been red for the last few days, though it doesn't hurt any more.
On Thursday, that same school and two other ones had an ensoku, 遠足, which is just a long walk, basically. It was like a field trip day, where we all walked from one of the schools to a big park and spent the rest of the school day playing various games and whatnot. On Thursday night, the staff of those schools had a party thing that I went to and that was fun, too.
Today I am just sitting at the BOE, pretty much doing nothing. It's alright and I was pretty tired, anyway, plus my supervisor just gave me a piece of chocolate, which was nice.
Up next is Golden Week, which is a series of holidays here, during which everyone goes on vacation, so I'm going to be avoiding the roads. I hear that travel afterwards is really cheap, which makes sense, but we'll have to see about that. I will probably just be catching up on sleep on my days off. Later!
It is becoming rather hot here. It has reached 27 degrees Celsius a few times in the last few days and that really sucks. I can deal with the cold a lot easier than the heat. Also it is hayfever season, I guess, and I seem to have developed allergies in the last couple years, so that is kind of miserable. The Japanese word for hayfever is kafunshou, 花粉症if you were wondering.
I had a couple of fun events in the last week. Tuesday was Showa Day, which is a national holiday, so I had it off, but one of the schools asked me to come to their taiikutaikai, 体育大会, which is basically a track meet but with crazy relay races, too. So, I went to that, and it was a lot of fun, but I forgot my sunscreen and so I got sunburnt. It wasn't too bad, but I've been red for the last few days, though it doesn't hurt any more.
On Thursday, that same school and two other ones had an ensoku, 遠足, which is just a long walk, basically. It was like a field trip day, where we all walked from one of the schools to a big park and spent the rest of the school day playing various games and whatnot. On Thursday night, the staff of those schools had a party thing that I went to and that was fun, too.
Today I am just sitting at the BOE, pretty much doing nothing. It's alright and I was pretty tired, anyway, plus my supervisor just gave me a piece of chocolate, which was nice.
Up next is Golden Week, which is a series of holidays here, during which everyone goes on vacation, so I'm going to be avoiding the roads. I hear that travel afterwards is really cheap, which makes sense, but we'll have to see about that. I will probably just be catching up on sleep on my days off. Later!
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
Posts
