General melancholia

I remember listening to the Chameleons a lot in college, and hearing them played at SF goth clubs. Never hear them played at Neo, though. Takes me right back to 1999.



This video's been out for a year, but I just saw it- it floored me.

This video post brought to you by procrastination and PMS!

Shameless self promotion.

My article about Japanese food in Chicago is on the cover of the Time Out Chicago site today.

Check it out!

My secret inner Japanese person

I lived in Japan from ages twenty through twenty five, with a year long break when I was 21. Sometimes I think I want to move back, but all things considered life is easier in America- easier to find a job (at least in terms of bureaucracy and discrimination, I could make a lot more money in Japan but it would be dull work with long hours), easier to date, easier to not loathe myself for being an unmarried 28 year old woman who wears a size 18 (this just isn't socially acceptable in Japan)...

Anyway, I just found myself cleaning the business cards I'd collected over the course of the past few weeks out of my purse and filing them away in my business card organizer. Yes, I am totally obsessed with business cards, and unlike a lot of people, I don't lose them or throw them away, even if they're not filed in any particular order (there's still a lot of cards from random people I met in Japan in my file). You never know who you'll need to contact in future, I'm quite squirrelly about it, and I think that's a habit I picked up in Japan even though I was quite lazy about carrying my own cards, because I didn't need to do the kind of professional networking there that I do here. Now I try to always keep some in my purse. They're also good when flirting with folks at bars- a less sleazy way of giving someone your number (although it's always the wrong ones who call...) which is why I leave my address off the card, just my phone, pen name and email.

The other Japanism that I can't seem to shake is the sense of giri- which means preserving the balance of give and take within social relationships, another thing I was terrible at while living in Japan. Japanese people keep a mentally tally of the kindnesses and generosity they've been shown and try to repay it in kind, even if that repayment takes place over years. I still think this way- and as a result have been accused of "having strings attached" to my actions, but it's more like I want to keep things balanced and fair in my relationships and close friendships. The ones who call it "strings attached" are usually selfish gits who aren't worth bothering with anyway. (the irony is in Japanese you literally say "cut ties" with someone- en wo kiru- and there's this concept of an invisible "red thread" that connects you to the people you are close with. So I guess in a bizarre way there are "strings attached" but not in the way that you'd think...)