Japan Day 6: Fushimi Inari Taisha, Trains, and Giant Salamanders
This morning I headed to Fushimi Inari Taisha, a head Shinto shrine famous for its thousand red torii gates of various sizes, hundreds of which form tunnels. There are fox...
Japan Day 5: Bamboo, Monkeys, and the Toei Movie Studio Park
I got up rather early this morning, and had a bit of a struggle finding the local train I wanted, but made it in the end. It was absolutely packed,...
Japan Day 4: Traveling to Kyoto
Meandered through the streets of Hiroshima to the train station. I continue to be amazed how most city streets are single-lane affairs shared by cars, bicycles, and pedestrians. I found...
Japan Day 3: Miyajima Island and Hiroshima
I’m staying in a space cat themed hostel in what is essentially a capsule hotel style mixed dormitory. The capsule has a light, charging USB and electric outlet, a small...
Japan Day 2: Arrival and More Travel
I cannot sleep on airplanes, even when a bevy of advantages are thrown my way. The plane was not very full, meaning the seat next to me was completely empty....
Japan Day 1: Airports and Airplanes
Made it through security at the airport quickly, so watched the Budweiser Brew House begin its morning opening routine while wondering who wants a beer or Cutwater canned cocktail at...
Japan Trip 2023: It's Finally Happening!
I will be traveling through Japan this October! Please be sure to check out this page starting October 3rd as I blog my adventures. I will be visiting Hiroshima, Kyoto,...
Vintage Base Ball
While on a walk through St. Louis's Lafayette Park this past weekend, we encountered a game of vintage base ball. There are four vintage base ball teams in St. Louis...
Art: Ass
Happy Pride month! It's also Shakespeare season, and I had butts on the brain, so although our local Shakespeare in the Park is performing Twelfth Night, here's a little Midsummer...
Art: Desire
I watched a “Bizarre Beasts” YouTube video on eels. In short, eels do not have a functional reproductive system until the end of their lives, at which point their digestive...
Art: Superb Starling
This weekend's painting was based on a photo I took while visiting the Saint Louis Zoo a few weekends ago. I took a picture of this Superb Starling (talk about...
Art: Smile
I’m trying to find a creative outlet. My brain is suffering from just focusing on work and doomscrolling each morning through the news and my state’s dedicated attempts to restrict...
Kanji Connect-the-Dots
The last time I was at Kinokuniya, I impulsively bought a puzzle magazine called 漢字てんつなぎ, or “Kanji Connect-the-Dot.” It contains 200 puzzles, most of which ask a question with three...
Gauss
I am taking a class on linear algebra at the moment, which means that I am breathing in matrices and Gaussian elimination on a daily basis. There is a footnote...
Octopus
In anticipation of playing Octodad: Dadliest Catch with kiddo this weekend, I decided to look up some octopus-related facts to pepper throughout our gaming time, which we will hopefully be...
Building Stuff - Mini Strandbeest
I acquired a Gakken 大人の科学 (Science for Adults) kit - this is a sort-of magazine/science construction kit for adults. They have lots of really cool kits, which are normally $50-100...
Pneumatic Tubes
As a child, I didn't particularly like having to ride along with my mom whenever she would drive to the bank, but one thing I did like were the tubes...
Building Stuff - Studium Lentum (Adabox017)
As I mentioned a couple of months ago, I subscribed to Adafruit's Adabox subscription service and I received my first box last week! The packaging is very beautiful. The theme...
Kanji of the Year 2020
Every year members of the Japan Kanji Aptitude Testing Foundation (日本漢字能力検定協会), the group that administers both the Kanji Kentei (Kanken) and the Business Japanese Proficiency Test, submit their votes for...
Building Stuff - Cardboard Proud Parent Robot
I really love Simone Giertz's YouTube channel. And I particularly love her Proud Parent Machine: I was at MicroCenter recently, and I saw that they had the "Adafruit Industries Dial...
New Clear Explanation Japanese Dictionary (2020)
General Details Title: 新迷解国語辞典 第八版 (New Clear Explanation Japanese Dictionary 8th Edition) Volumes: 1 Language: Japanese Publisher: 三省堂 (Sanseido) Year: 2020 Pages: 1,741 The eighth edition of the Shin Meikai (Clear...
This Year's New Words 2020 (今年の新語２０２０)
Calling all 国語辞典マニア (kokugojiten mania, Japanese dictionary enthusiasts) - a special event was held November 30th in Tokyo called "This Year's New Words 2020 meets Japanese Dictionary Night" (今年の新語２０２０ meets 国語辞典ナイト)....
Building Stuff - RGB Matrix Wall Display
I'm not sure where I first saw the RGB Matrices that Adadfruit sells. Probably Twitter. I know I saw a few people post about their last subscription box, which contained...
Photo Tour of Downtown St Louis (Rare Pandemic Alone Time)
I took the day off from my 8-5 today. The kiddo, still having (virtual) school today, stayed home with my spouse while I took a rare non-grocery-store excursion this morning....
Round 2 - Games + Poetry: Stephen Crane
Here's another round of Mutant Mudds Deluxe. The gimmick, as I explained in my last post, is that I read a poem by Stephen Crane every time my character Max...