2011 Jun 08
I love this song. Kaze Wo Atsumete by Happy End.
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Viewing Category: Living
2011 May 22
I like this cover by Anna Tsuchiya! 2011 Apr 25
Last night I was watching the movie Grown Ups 2011 Apr 11
Tonight we went to see Oyama x Nitta Duo perform for a Japan relief fundraiser here in Austin, organized by JASGA. It was amazing! The award-winning duo play tsugaru-shamisen, which is a traditional instrument that I’m sure you’ve heard before. It was incredible to hear and see live. We sat only several feet away so you could really feel the power of that instrument. Later on we got to meet the duo and take some photos with them. It was a great concert for a worthy cause. 100% of the proceeds will go to a relief fund for the disaster-stricken areas of Japan.    2011 Mar 28
My favorite song by Capsule. 2011 Mar 24
How is it I’ve never seen this? Two of my all-time favorite bands playing together. 2011 Mar 22
 This past weekend we went camping at Pedernales Falls State Park. We’ve visited here a few times, but never stayed overnight. The park ranger asked if it was our first time there, and since it was, she assigned us to campsite #8. She said it was a nice one but if we didn’t like it we could select another site. Well, campsite #8 was great! In fact, most of the sites looked really nice. Each one had an electric hook-up if you needed it, a fire-ring, water faucet, picnic table, and open area for a tent. Our campsite had an open area underneath the trees, so we pitched our ”castle” back there. After a lunch of submarine sandwiches and chips, we headed to the falls for some fishing. Of course I had forgotten the nightcrawlers back home, so we had to use some cheese as bait. While we didn’t catch any fish, we had fun climbing around the rocks and dipping our feet in the water. After that we decided to head to the wading/swimming area to cool off. The weather, by the way, was perfect: light clouds and a temp of 80°F. The water was nice and cool, but not too cold. The kids splashed around a bunch, and I had fun making underwater videos.  When we returned to the campsite, we started up the fire and made a great dinner of gyu-don (beef bowl). Cooking rice at the campsite was pretty new to me but is really easy if you have the right cooking pot. We also enjoyed some wine in small containers. They looked like large juice-boxes and were so convenient for discreet consumption at the campsite. After a dessert of smores we retired to the tent and slept well. The next day we went back to the falls for some more hiking and fishing. We walked up-river and found a lot of cool little fishing holes but unfortunately we were unsuccessful landing any fish, although Mariko had something big on her line at one time. We left the park at about 2pm and headed home, tired but happy. Pedernales Falls is not the most popular state park, but I have to say it was one of the better campsites and had some fun activities. It’s not far from Austin and would make a nice daytrip as well. We will surely come back! You can check out some more video that I took over at Pedernales Falls at my YouTube Channel, or see more pictures at my Flickr set. 2011 Mar 20
 Back when I was in High School, my parents went on vacation to Europe and one of the gifts they brought back for me was this cool Swiss Army Knife, engraved with my name. I still have it and use it whenever we go camping. The corkscrew has come in extra handy! 2011 Mar 16
One of my favorite songs by one of my favorite singers, Hajime Chitose. |
with my wife and kids. It was rated PG-13 which is usually ok for the kids. Most of the adult humor was just silliness, however there was one part where I was regretting having the kids watch. It was when Salma Hayek’s character reveals that there is no Tooth Fairy. I’m not sure if the kids caught on because the dialog was a little vague, and they didn’t say anything to us about it. But that got me thinking about another incident in which we were watching 
and Phoebe Cates’ character is telling a story and then says something like, “...and that was when I realized that there was no Santa Claus.” Again, the kids didn’t say anything. But dang, I wish there was some kind of notification for this. Probably there’s a website out there that lists movies with spoilers of this kind? Bay’s about the age where he’s going to stop believing in this sort of thing, so I guess it’s ok if he sees these but still, it’s kind of cute how he woke up extra-early this morning to see if the Easter Bunny left a basket. It’ll be a little sad when he grows out of this phase.
Besides that I’d say the can opener and bottle opener have been the most used tools. Of course I lost the tweezers ages ago, but surprisingly, the toothpick is still with the knife! When my boys are in High School, I’d like to get them their own engraved Swiss Army Knives.