Car alarms are unmistakable. You know the one I'm thinking of, right? The different siren noises that repeat endlessly ( Read more... )

Birdwatchers are all crazy. I'm told this as often by my fellow birders as I am by the uninitiated. I must confess, there are times when I find myself in an unlikely and uncomfortable position, gripping my binoculars in fierce excitement, that I feel quite mad ( Read more... )

The whirlwind has been raging for nine months since I left Japan. My Journey started in Northern Japan, then took me back to Tokyo, on to California, and into Nevada. From then on it's been back and forth from my new home in Silicon Valley to New York, Boston, Washington DC, Alabama, Kingston, LA, Florida, Detroit, Calgary, Toronto, and some more ( Read more... )

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If you close your eyes on a Sunday afternoon in Yoyogi Park, it sounds like a circus, a rock concert, a stadium, and a nature sanctuary. All at the same time. I spent my last Sunday in Tokyo walking the familiar paths of the park with my friend ( Read more... )

My Japanese cell phone is amazing, with great features, long battery life, and perfect convinience. However, I'm not sure it lives up to the lofty goals proclaimed by my cell phone company on their English Homepage:

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My time in Asia is drawing to a close; in two weeks I’ll be moving to Northern California. I’m packing up my project in the Tokyo office and taking it stateside to join a big, new tri-continent program, which I’ve been part of creating. It’s been an exiting and wonderful year in Japan. I’m sad to be leaving, but looking forward to new adventures

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There's a brand new baby girl in Tokyo, born last Saturday to my friend and his wife. She's fat and healthy and he is beaming with happiness. So what on earth, I asked him, was he doing in the office ( Read more... )

Girlfriends and hot spring spas are a great combination. whale_girl and I shot north on the bullet train to the tranquil mountain resort of Sakunami. The past few weeks of grueling work melted out of us into lava-heated water. We lay, liquefied, in open rocky pools, looking down on the icy mountain river flowing past us through the forest.


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