Press Release

Dated July 11, 2007

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

This notification is to confirm that, as of 7 PM on the tenth day of the seventh month of the year 2007, one Little Miss Manami bought a plane ticket to O'Hare International Airport. She will be with us August 13 through August 21, and therefore will be accounted for at one Miss Mom's 60th birthday extravagana*. Let's all be excited and looking forward to this monumental event.

*Please note, it's not really an extravaganza, but more of a family affair. This footnote provided in the event of any Mustique readers wondering if it's a huge party they weren't invited to. I assure you, it's not.

In other news (and in a less fabricated format), I have pictures from last weekend. So let's see em shall we?

Alright, Friday was my Saitama buddy Blair's birthday. Blair never drinks, EVER, he's never been drunk. Power to him. The reason I mention this is because, well, we didn't get drunk for his birthday. We went ramen eating and bowling!!

This was some of the best ramen I've had in Japan, seriously. It's ridiculous how good ramen is in japan, while in america, if an average person thinks of ramen, they think Cup O' Noodle (which, by the way is just called "Cup Noodle" in japan and has a ton more flavors, like curry). There's gotta be some money to be made in America with that, eh?


Okay, I lied, we drank a little bit. But check out the spectrum of Asahi you can buy. From small to big.


Then we did the bowling thing. But who wants to see pictures of that? NOT ME! Instead, look at how cool the bowling shoes in Japan are!

Of course, those are Manami's legs on the right, mine on the LEFT.

Here are my two buddies. Their names are dave and dave. Dave is from Canada and Dave is from England. You try and figure out which one is which. You'll notice that Dave is also modeling a small Asahi, in addition to the wonderfully named "Hope" cigarettes. Because we all know, tobacco and its associated poisons give everyone hope!


Fairly early night, next day came around, went shopping, spent too much money on two badASS t-shirts. Then Manami went off to a wedding party and I met up with my Shibuya friends Seth and Johann. Seth is a buddy from studying abroad last summer, while Johann is a Swedish lad who used to live at the same gaijin house as Seth when Seth came back this winter. Confusing? GOOD! We walked around a bit then Manami met up with us and we flew to America...see? look in the picture?

GOT YOU FUCKERS! They have wendey's in Japan too!

Then we went out. In Japan they have things called "tatsunomiya" which means "standing drinking places." They're bars with no seats. Everybody stands and they usually get crowded. The one we went to in particular is a gaijin-friendly standing bar. Do they have standing bars in America?? Can anyone help me out here?

Met some nice dudes from Zambia who were studying in Tokyo. English is their native language, and they were happy to communicate with other English speakers. They were big fans of Lucky Dube and Third World, so we had a little bit of a singing session. Good times.


Here's some Japanese dudes, me, Seth, and Johann. No story here really.


Here's Seth and Johann again with adorable, cute, drunk little Manami. How cute is that!?


And finally, a kick ass store I found recently has tons of t-shirts by the artist who does all the Ed Banger Records artwork, a man named So Me. In this store they have these awesome Daft Punk dolls. The guys who work there are really nice to talk to and were totally cool with my taking pictures.


That's all. See many of you 12 days!! Amy and Nikki, PLEASE BRING THE Nintendo Wii!!!!