NCIS Reruns comments

Lebanon, alas, has ceased to be a real country and become a crazy quilt of private armies and religious movements. This anarchy is likely to continue for the foreseeable future. I visited there in the late 1950s when it was still a nice place, with a functioning government.

The perp has now been named as Cui (崔). One of the most common last names in China, about 28% of the population. Not yet confirmed but very likely Chinese.

Sorry, but that's wrong. Cui isn't even in the top 50 of Chinese surnames. However that name is quite common in the two Koreas, where it is read Choi. And Jilin province has a large population of ethnic Koreans.

I suppose we'll find out one way or the other, soon enough.

In a 1965 essay, professor Edward Seidensticker described Japan as "a crowded, lonely land." He certainly got that one right.

This morning I spotted two-way (rain and sun) folding umbrellas for sale in my local 7-Eleven, priced at around ¥1,500. Unfortunately they are only 55cm diameter, which is not really suitable for a six-footer such as yours truly. I generally need 65cm minimum, and prefer 70cm when I can find it.

I passed through Shibuya at around 4:00 p.m. yesterday. In addition to its usual congestion there is construction going on all over the place, and vehicles were barely able to move even after two or three traffic light changes. So while it's a tough call, I would be inclined to give the bus driver a pass on this one.

Cell phone-related mishaps are basically a dog-bites-man story.

WMD = Weapons of Mass Disgust

 Mizkan's "Natto Effect Intestinal Care"

Er, would that be a reference to sound effects, which are a well known by-product of consuming legumes?

a 301-page hardcover book by Satoshi Yokoyama.

How the heck can you write 300 pages on the subject of natto??

Clean public toilets have made a huge contribution.

As examples of the Olympics' decline, now gold medals get awarded to 14-year-old girls in leotards who toss rubber balls into the air, turn somersaults and then catch them. I refuse to acknowledge this as a sport. Likewise for curling in the winter olympics, which is almost as silly. Beach volleyball, ping pong and badminton are borderline. Likewise team sports like baseball and basketball played by professional athletes. My response is to unplug my TV for the duration.

Based on the original Greek spirit, the games were to be suspended in times of war. That was the case up to 1944, but certainly not for 2024, alas.

These days whenever whales open their mouths to feed on krill they also scoop up accumulated microplastics that humans have discarded into their habitat by the ton.

Yet another reason why it's a not a good time to be a whale.

The low interest rates have contributed to yet another real estate "bubble," with rising costs for houses and condominiums (while millions of residences sit empty), and sleek new office buildings in central Tokyo keep springing up, which companies can't afford to rent. It always seems Japan's economy faces a no-way-out, damned-if-you-do, damned-if-you-don't situation.

Wecht appears in lots of YouTube videos about the JFK assassination. I tried to keep an open mind and listened to the various arguments, but over 60 years have passed since that day in 1963, and the forensic scientists aren't any closer to providing a satisfactory explanation that eliminates Lee Harvey Oswald from the equation.

There are ethical issues. Josei 7 recounts the “resurrection” of enka singer Misora Hibari (1937-89) – by NHK in 2019 for its annual year-end songfest Kohaku Uta Gassen. Hibari’s virtual persona was given a new song to sing, and critics were outraged. 

Heck, I was outraged too, considering the shabby treatment meted out to Hibari by NHK. Through no fault of her own, her gangster brother got himself arrested and she was summarily treated by the network as a pariah.

"Personal attacks" pretty much describes Trump's political style. It's effective too, as it has most of the Republican party completely intimidated. To be denounced by Trump is basically a career killer. Look at ex-Congresspersons Liz Cheney and Adam Kinzinger, to name two examples.

I grew up watching The Twilight Zone, and remember many of its episodes. The show was sponsored by a tobacco company, and its creator, Serling, usually appeared on screen with a lit cigarette between his fingers. He was a 5-pack-a-day man, and in the end smoking killed him.

In some EC countries, temp-help and part time workers who work at a company for a certain length of time (six months I think I read somewhere), have the option of becoming regular staff workers with the full compensation, welfare and pension package. Even if that's not practical for Japan, I'd like to see the law changed to improve workers' lot. Some don't even receive a transportation allowance, let along perks like bonus and paid leave.

The names of the old provinces can be a bit confusing. Gunma Prefecture, formerly Kozuke, is written with the same characters as Ueno Park (上野).

For instance, experimental restaurants with no tables or chairs began springing up, relying entirely on customer pickups and home delivery. 

Around my neighborhood, it's been going the other direction, with Domino's Pizza places providing tables and a counter for customers to eat in. Whatever floats your boat, I suppose.

While I'm in China, how come I can't log on to YouTube, or Google, or Yahoo! or the Washington Post? Seems to me the "open" internet ought to be reciprocal, not one-way.

I'd be interested in seeing statistics, if they exist, for compulsive gamblers in Asian countries, where cockfights, fighting fish, etc. are popular. And of course mahjongg.

Yet another? Seems to be the new fad in Japan.

Nothing new about it. The word for this phenomenon in Japanese is kyogen hanzai. Kyogen, written with characters meaning "wild speech," is a comic form of the Noh drama.

It will be banned in mainland China. Absolutely.

None of these concerns are new. The Japanese equivalent of "the Devil finds work for idle hands" goes 小人は閑居して、不善を為す (shojin wa kankyo shite, fuzen wo nasu). Literally, ordinary mortals, having nothing to do, will do evil.

He or she will just be a hitchhiker since Japan's own aerospace programs have been riddled with failures.

https://japantoday.com/category/features/kuchikomi/Japan%27s-aerospace-industries-falling-further-behind

 the problem is not having any people left for checking suspicious people in a few years ahead.

Facial recognition and other types of AI are likely to be adopted eventually, with potentially problematic results for both Japanese and foreigners.

Perhaps he was desperate to use a Washlet and had to settle for the next best thing.

Many times, Japanese parents have remarked to me that their children had the ambition to become manga illustrators. I guess it's sort of like teenagers in the US who hope their garage band will be noticed and they'll be invited to cut a record. Both these industries are extremely competitive and the chances of earning a profit or carving out a livelihood are not encouraging. Sure, there's nothing wrong with having a dream, but at a certain time one needs to be realistic and let go. Or if determined, they can study industrial arts and go into more practical pursuits like publishing or graphic design.

Once I happened to be with my wife when she was fondled by a middle-aged man while seated on a bus. Her response was to deliver a very hard elbow jab to his sternum. He shakily got up and disembarked at the next stop. "What happened?" I asked her. "He touched me!" came the reply. I wonder if her action dissuaded the gentleman from future perverted urges.