It feels like I've been home a lot longer than a week. I must miss everyone more than I thought. Time to start looking into that TESOL thing. A little sooner than I originally planned what the heck.

Saturday was recovery day. For some reason I was just not motivated to do anything at all. To be perfectly honest today I was not motivated to do anything either and am feeling a little under the weather. It's all Eric's fault, he told me about this new flu that is sweeping through Tokyo and how his sound engineer had it and was in hospital and that peoples brains where boiling with a 40 degree temp. So today I woke up at 8 and then went back to sleep till 2. Then I went all over the local area trying to find a post office before finding out it was a national holiday so the post office was close along with everything else that was fun. When I got back to my room I noticed that I was feeling a little ill. I don't have a temp or aches and pains but after hearing the stories about this flu I convinced myself I was feeling flu like symptoms. Turns out the Soba I ate yesterday was not at wheat free as claimed and the so called "fever" was nothing more than a little dehydration and the fact that it gets very dry this time of year and the air-conditioner in my room was left on over night wasn't helping the matter. It took a liter of water to figure that out.

But Sunday was good. It was a late start to the day. I was thinking of going to Ueno zoo but when I saw the line to the gates I made a quite turn about and ended up on the Yamanote to Yoyogi. I was originally going to jump off at Harajuku station but decided at the last moment to get off the train at Yoyogi instead and walk from that side of the park. It turned out to be a good move for two reasons. One, Harajuku station as I later found out was packed with people. You could barely move. And two, I ran into a group of English teachers who where here for a semester and they invited me to join them for a walk around the park. It was a lucky coincidence for them as they spoke zero Japanese and had no idea where they were. Anyway, they where a good group, two Americans, one Brit and a Kiwi. We spent a good two hours in the park talking about their travels and what they where up to. I found out that -30 celsius is also -30 fahrenheit. How that works I'm not sure. Something about the conversion being double and then +30 but you can't double 0 or something like that.

Anyway, some photos.







So the plan for the rest of tonight. Study. My sensei would be very disapointed in my Japanese at the moment. I know I am not fluent and after only a year no one expects me to be but I thought I was a little better than this.

Tomorrow I am going to go to Shibuya for some window shopping and people watching.

So Thursday as I mentioned back handedly was a day of rest. I was, lets see, hung over for the most part and in despirate need of a good long sleep. I managed that and then some.

Yesterday I went to Asakusa to see the temple again. It looked different this time around because they where doing some restoration work but I also found little bits of the temple that I didn't know existed or maybe didn't notice last year.

Here are shots of what I do not remember from the last trip.





After the saunter around the temple I was still feeling a little tired from the day before and decided that a nap before heading to Shibuya would be a good idea. To be perfectly honest I also had not eaten a full meal since Wednesday afternoon as I just didn't really feel I had the taste for anything at all. But before I headed back to the hotel I did stop at Starbucks for coffee and cheese cake. A winning combination I think.

So I was back in Iriya and remembered that I had been saying to myself, "I HAVE to take a picture of that", so I wipped out the camera and this is what I captured.



For all those out there who think "you know what, my consumerism is simply not convenient enough at my current super market" this is the store for you. And before you ask, yes, I have shopped here.

So I had myself a really awesome nap from 1 till 3 and then it was time to head out to Shibuya to watch bloom. The set was awesome it was a shame however that they were on at like 6:15 and that Anis was playing an accoustic show at Plug just down the street. But still, the die hard Bloom UnderGround fans where there and you could tell that the boys where having a good time. Big smiles from Eric and Shinya was working that bass like no ones business. The new drummer Taku is a really great guy and puts his whole self into playing the drums. Bloom are on to a good thing with him I think.

The set was short, only a half hour which is almost unheard of. But the song where Holiday, Find You, Wonderland, I know and.......and..... OH Crap, I forgot what the fifth song was. Shit. I'm sure it will come to me later. The thing is with Bloom is they play a tight set so even though the time was short it was full, and their songs are not like 3 min little ditties either, there these epic jam rock songs that seem to go for ever. Bloom are great when it comes to layering sounds live and the wall of sound that they create with only 3 people on stage, amazing. They should be far more popular than they are but it is only a matter of time in my opinion.

So I didn't take to many shots of the live because my cameras flash has the bad habit of washing out lighting and the bloom show has some awesome lighting that adds to the performance. It would have been a shame not to capture that. But here are the better photos I did take.

Shinya


Eric


Me and Eric at the bar, Jeez, I am so f'ing pale. Bring on the Australian summer so I can get a little colour on my face.

Not much longer now until I am back in Tokyo for fun.

Right up until the day I jump on the plane I will be busy at work. I have to train some of the other people I work with to be able to do my job because this time they are not getting a temp in to replace me while I am away. I am of two minds as to if that is a great decision on the companies part. The pro's of having a temp come in is that it will mean that the rest of the teams daily work load wont increase and it will be far less stressful on the team. The con's are that it will cost more for the company to have an extra team member for the month and then when they leave I'll have no one to go to when I find something that needs fixing from when I was away. Although I do feel really bad for the guys who are stepping into parts of my job. It's kind of difficult for them because I am the only person who does what I do in the whole country. I'm sure they'll be fine though and will be very happy when I get home and they don't have to do the job again, or at least not have to do it again until the next time I go away, lol.

So yeah, the next few weeks at work seem to be going along like this. This week is teaching one daily task, next week is two daily tasks. The third week will be teaching all the little bits and bobs that pop up during the day and then the fourth week I will sit back and let the team basically do my work while I hover around making sure it's all done right. I think thats a good plan.

So work aside, I have other things that will keep me on my toes and help September chug along at a steady pace. Japanese semester finishes on the 19th so I have another three classes to go. I have a birthday party on the 12th and my going away party on the 26th. OH and then there is a going away night out with work for my old manager thats finishing up in about 2 weeks and moving up to Queensland. What else? Oh yeah, band stuff also.

Wow, this holiday couldn't come sooner.

So I'm thinking about getting a tattoo while I'm in Tokyo but can't decide on exactly what I want.

Here is where I'm leaning towards.



So this is the treble clef cat that I really like but I'm thinking since I want the tattoo to be on the back of my left hip this one may be a little to bland. It really looks more like an ankle or base of the neck tattoo to me.




I really like this one to and it's the right size and the right amount of detail for where I want it but it's still not 100% what I want. I think the cat sitting on a sakura branch would be a lot nicer and then the cat can be highlighted to match the pink of the sakura.




And this is the last of the ones I like so far. I love the sakura and the water but a carp. Yeah, not to sure about that one.


So who's up for a little help in finding the right design for me.

Something to do with cats and sakura would be perfect.

UPDATE:
I was playing around on a note book and came up with this design.



It will look better with some colour. 

 So first things first, a mini Japanese lesson. 肉　niku is Japanese for meat. じゃが　jyaga is Japanese for potatoes. So the litteral translation for this dish is Meat and Potatoes but in reality the dish would be called Japanese Stew in English. So I'm a pescaterian so there will be no meat in my receipe that I make but I'll let you meat eaters out there know when the meat should be added. 

What You'll Need:

Potatoes
Onion
Carrots
Peas
Mushrooms
Rice Noodles
Mirin
Soy Sauce
Brown Sugar
Vegetable or Chicken stock
Olive Oil
Garlic
and for the meat eaters some steak. 

What You'll Need to do with them:

First thing is to cut up the carrot, potato, mushrooms (and meat) into bit size pieces and put to the side, then slice the onion. Pop a sauce pan on the stove and heat the oil then put in your onion and stir fry until soft. If you are adding meat fry the meat before you add the onion. Pop in the potato's and carrot next and give them a stir until the carrot starts to brighten up. You don't want to cook the carrot all the way through before the soy, mirin and stock go in. Add the garlic and stir for one minute.

Add about a  couble of table spoons to a 1/4 cup of sugar (you can use less as the mirin is kind of sweet) then a 1/4 cut of mirin and a 1/4 cup of soy sauce, stir for a moment to mix them up then add enough stock to cover the vegetables. Cover and simmer for about 10 to 15 minutes. Add the peas and simmer for another 5 minutes then add the mushrooms and simmer until the potato is cooked. 

About 2 minutes before serving add the rice noodles to the pan and once they are cooked serve. 

You may want to let it sit for a minute or two before eating because the dish can be hot. Also be warned, mirin is alcoholic so if you have something against the consumption of alcohol, even in cooking, don't make this dish. 

What It Should Taste Like:

Basically it will taste and smell sweet and be a very dark soy colour. If you don't like sweet tasting foods you can use less sugar but personally I like it that way. Traditionally garlic would not be used in this dish but I also really like garlic so take that Japanese cuisine. 

Howdy,

So a big thanks goes out the one of my class mates from last semester who recommended a site for me to blog in Japanese on. It's called lang-8 and the cool thing about this site is you can blog in what ever language you are learning and have native speakers correct your entries for you. I only have one short blog there at the moment introducing myself and within half an hour of posting it I already had 4 corrections (and some new fans of The Weight and the Sea). I highly recommend anyone learning a second language (or third, I'm looking at you Kiki) go take a look around the site and start posting there.

In other news I have also uploaded a new YouTube video. This one is in Japanese and I hope that it will be first of many as my Japanese ability increases.



I have also posted a new blog on the ezbloom community page for fans of all things Eric Zay. Join in on the community if you are  a fan of Eric or are Eric curious. 

I have been far to busy these last weeks. I didn't even notice how much I have been doing until the last few days.

Japanese class went back two and a half weeks ago and I am now on 1 two hour class a week (Saturdays to be exact). I find that the one class a week has it's pro's and con's.

Pro's:
*We are learning Kanji.
*I have more time during the week to jump on smart.fm and cram the new vocab into my head
*I no longer struggle to wake up in time for work the following day.
*I can spend some time wondering around the city before and after class (now that people have finally come home from Europe this is a great pro).
*I can catch public transport into the city rather than driving everywhere so that's a little extra exercise.
*There is more of an expectation in our ability to understand the language which means more of the lesson is in Japanese.

Cons:
*We are learning Kanji (lol)
*Two hours in class is really tough, especially since it has been a fair amount of time since I finished Uni so I'm not used to that long a stretch of time sitting in a class room.
*I don't think the time frame lends itself to really being able to take in the information. I know this sounds strange because it's not like I am spending less time in class from last semester, it's just that everything gets thrown at me in one hit so I don't know. My brain needs that one day break to take in the information from the previous hour properly.
*My weekend is very hectic as a result of being out and about most of Saturday.

Now some other cons that don't actually have anything to do with the new time so much as a couple of fellow students. Don't get me wrong, these students are really nice. They're a married couple who spend there vacation in Japan each year and they know their grammar and vocab. My only (two) issues (or annoyances) I have with them is that they can NOT pronounce anything correctly and that when the teacher is asking me or another student for an answer they spend the whole time mumbling the answer themselves. I can forgive the pronunciation thing, everyone has issues with that but for christ sake, when the teacher is asking me how to say something to test my knowledge SHUT THE FUCK UP!!!!!!! It's just rude in my opinion. If you have to go over what you think the answer should be do it quietly. At the last class it distracted me so much that I had to (nicely) ask them to cut it out.
"Sorry, I can't consentrait when people are talking next to me like that"
"Oh, sorry"
**so you should be**

What else has kept me busy. Well, there is some more recording coming up in two weeks time so I've been playing my bass getting ready for that and writing some more lyrics and melodies for some new songs for later on. I haven't been writing anything longer because I can't do lyrics and stories at the same time but I have started working out a new plot to start during my Tokyo trip and finish during NaNoWriMo this year. I'll tell you all about it in a few weeks time but it's a bit of a trip.

Only a few more months before I am back in Tokyo. I'm looking forward to this holiday even more than the last. Not only will I get to hang out with Eric again which is always good it looks like I'll also get a chance to meet Ken again and pick up a new CD for my effort. In all honesty though I'm not entirely sure I will get to hang with Ken, he says he's looking forward to catching up and hanging out properly this time around but I think he's just being nice because we have a friend in common. I've only met the guy once so in reality I am a complete stranger and in his position he can't afford to just hang out because we know the same person. But he is a sweet heart so like I said to Cassis "he's to nice a guy not to want to meet a second time" and it would be good to get to know him better rather than just relying on a first impression and the word of others.

OH, I bought a new skirt. It's awesomely made of awesome. It's black, it's short, it was $20 and it is made of pleather. Oh yeah, thats a hot sounding skirt.

so this is all Svox's fault. I am on twitter.

WHY, DEAR GOD WHY?

Follow me as I take you on an adventure of the mundane @aussielung

Vegetable Paster Soup.

This one is a little fiddlier than my other soup's but that just makes it so much more yummy.

What You'll Need:
one carrot diced
one stick of celery diced
half an onion sliced
half cup of frozen sweet corn (has to be sweet)
half cup of peas
45g tin of four bean mix or alternatively you can soak some dried red kidney beans, chick peas, butter beans and broad beans but the juice from the tinned helps with the base of the soup.
4 tomatoes (not tinned) chopped
Spaghetti broken into one inch lengths.
1 to 2 cups of Stock (beef or vegetable will do)
Parsley
Oregano
Basil


Optional Extra's
quarter cup of Pearl Barley
one small potato diced.

What You Need To Do With Them:

First things first. In a saucepan boil some salted water and throw the tomatoes in. Let them boil till the tomatoes are soft then crush them with a potato masher.

In a large saucepan heat olive oil and fry onions, when soft add carrot, then add celery. Stir fry for a few minuted before adding the peas and corn then add bean mix and juice. Stir in your crushed tomatoes and the stock and let simmer for a few minutes.

Add spaghetti and herbs and then let simmer until the paster is al-dente.

The soup should be a pale colour rather than tomatoe coloured and thanks the juice from the beans the soup should also be quick thick.

Enjoy.

I had one of those penny dropping moments of clarity at Japanese today.

I *FINALY* get te form.

Yay for me.

Chocolaty Rice Pudding.

This is easy. It's just my rice pudding recipe with chocolate goodness inside. But for those who need reminding, here the recipe.

What You'll Need:
Arborio/Risotto rice (as much as you want, about half a cup to a cup will do you)
Two tea spoons of brown sugar
one tea spoon cooking Coco
half tea spoon cinnamon
half tea spoon nutmeg
Water
Milk
Margarine

What To Do With Them:

First melt a good table spoon of margarine into a pot and add the rice. Stir through till the rice becomes shinny.

Add enough water to just cover the rice. Stir until soaked in.

Add Sugar, coco, nutmeg and cinnamon and stir quickly then add some more water to cover and stir till soaked in.

At this point check to make sure the rice is almost cooked through. If the rice is still crunch then add a little more water and check again.

Add milk (about a cup at a time) mixing in until soaked up. You'll do this only twice but if you want to pudding to be extra creamy you can add a cup of cream instead of the second cup of milk or add an extra cup.

Serve in a BIG bowl because you worked hard and need the deliciousness (or you can share with another person who didn't lift a finger to make it and there for are unworthy of the deliciousness).

If you vegan try replacing the milk with a nut milk and let me know how it went.

I watched stories on You Tube about Karen Carpenter, a vocalist who's struggle with anorexia lead to her un-timely death at the age of 32. Her voice and music was wonderful and I can't help but wonder and mourn the loss of her talent to the world of music. Due to watching these video's I have suddenly found You Tube putting all these Thin-spiration and Pro Ana videos into the Recommended for You section.

After watching a few of these I found that there are thousands and thousands of these video's on You Tube and each and every one have thousands of comments by girls who are seriously under weight complaining about how fat they are.

It makes me sad that these girls and boys are watching these video's and thinking this about themselves. So with that said I have a new on-line passion. To flag and have as many of these video's removed from the site for harmful content.

Anyone out there with a You Tube account please join me in this fight. Sure it wont help the people who are already struggling with an eating disorder but at the very least I hope that it will stop more impressionable and fragile people from going down the anorexia road.

Anorexia is a disease, not a diet or a life style choice.

Another installment in the 'aussielung recipe corner'. This one is such a great winter warmer and is fantastic if you're feeling a little under the weather.

Vegetarian Chili Con Carne.
What You'll Need:
Olive Oil
Red Kidney beans
Berlotti Beans
Chick Peas
Green Peas
Carrot
Onion
Red and Green Capsicum (Bell peppers for the yanks out there)
Garlic
Red Chili
Cayenne Pepper
Sea Salt
Coriander
Thyme
Oregano
Cumin
Chopped tomatoes (tinned)
What to do with them:

If you're using tinned beans just drain and rinse the beans and leave to the side. If you're using dried beans let soak for 6 to 8 hours then boil for 20 minutes, once boiled drain and leave to the side.

Dice carrot, onion, capsicum, garlic and chili and fry up in a wok or large sauce pan. When the onion is soft add the other herbs and stir through till you can smell the aroma of the herbs. Add beans and two tins of chopped tomatoes. Add peas.

Simmer for about 20 minutes. Taste test to make sure the taste is right. You should be able to get a good kick from the chili and taste the other herbs. If you get more heat than flavoure add more herbs and mix again.

Serve with either mashed potatoes (my favorite) or rice.

Oh man. I am shaking like a leaf right now. There I was at the stove cooking up some rice pudding when I hear a strange sound from the living room. I turn to see blue and yellow flames licking the top of my little electric heater. of course I darted from kitchen to living room in a flash and kicked the plug out of the wall. I am waiting for the heater to cool down enough to take a look inside but it looks like a little bit of tinsel fell inside and burnt up on the element. I think it broke the element which is why the fire just put itself out with no damage to carpet or wall.

And to think, the last two nights I have left the heater on while I was asleep to keep the place warm overnight. That was a lucky, if not kind of scary, moment of chance.

For those who are to lazy to go find it your self, here is my You Tube channel.

http://www.youtube.com/user/aussielung

And here is my latest video.



Do you dare challenge me?

Well technically I DID do this years ago but it didn't work out quite as well as it is this time around. Maybe my knowledge of food has matured to a level that has allowed me to be able to go from a die hard meat eater to a semi vegitarian (I still eat fish). But I think it's been close to a three weeks now and I have to admite that I feel realy good. For the first few months of this year I have been feeling quite terrible. I was sick with flues and alergies and not sleeping well. I was also finding that when I did get a good long sleep I was waking up tired and all that other annoying stuff. Admittedly I was getting a little worried about it as I have had these symptoms before (yes, symptoms, those who know me know what I mean). Other than an unrelated stress due to work I have to say I am feeling much better about things and am almost ready to get back to being the social version of me again. Now I don't believe that I will be a vegetarian for ever. It's working for me now but the moment it stops working for me (health wise) I'll be getting myself a good sized piece of cow to nosh on. Now I am going to wait patiently for the extra kilo's of....padding or insulation, which ever has the least self loathing to it....have dropped.

A big sorry hug to everyone I have been neglecting this year so far. Lets go out and have some fun for a change.

Hey there. My Tokyo or Bust YouTube series has begun.

It's quite a bit earlier than originally planned but after reading the comments on other Tokyo related video's I thought that I may as well get the FAQ episode over and done with.

So what is the plan for Tokyo of Bust series. Well once I get back to the city it will be a whole bunch of video's about the site of the city and some must know information. Since I wont be in Tokyo for another 6 months the first few episodes will be the planning of the trip. Budgeting idea and that sort of thing.

Taken a look if you're interested and please leave a comment if there is something you want to know now, before I am in town again.

So I have been feeling very creative of late because I have been in a foul mood for a while. It's because I quite smoking again a few weeks back and I turn into a surly bitch for the first month or so. It is going OK though. But one of my cures for the blues is creative outlets. It takes your mind off the day to day grind stone that drags you down and occupies the mind from trivial annoyances that would normally not affect you when in a happy frame of mind.

I'm writing new stuff for solo production when I move next year. I figure since I'll be in a new city I may as well make a new start as a solo artist. Thats not to say that I will turn my back on playing in groups. I love group dynamics when writing and producing music. When ever your in a creative rut you know that you can depend on your band mates to pull you out of it. But since I will be starting all over again there is no reason to sit around and wait until I meet that perfect group of people to work with. I'll start playing around with keyboards again once I have the spare cash to get myself a second hand keyboard. I was looking as Casio and Roland when I'm ready to take the plunge although cost wise has me leaning towards Casio as they are cheap and functional.

Another creative outlet has been my Youtube account. I actually have been a little quiet on there from time to time. This is because I am in the process of writing and producing new video's but haven't the time in the day to actually film them at the moment. The filming and editing take longer than the writing with my planned videos, even my quick little crap video's that play for only a few minutes take around 3 hours to film and edit. But I am getting better at the editing. iMovie is actually far easier to use than the Windows Movie Maker I used to use on the old PC.

So as you can imagine I love my Mac for all sorts of creative reasons. One is that website building is freaking easy on it. I am currently (as in, I finished for the night right before blogging) working on the layout and content of a new site I will launch later in the year. It's dedicated to my time in Tokyo. At the moment it will be dealing mainly with travel advice for tourists on a shoe string budget but will eventually become a cultural information site for other 'gaijin' to visit whether they are traveling or living in Tokyo. Of course, the later incarnation of the site wont be completed in full until well into 2010, 2011 as I am not living in Tokyo yet and will also include a gig guide and maybe interviews on people in the industry over there ("Ken Lloyd interview?" I hear you ask sheepishly. I'll see what I can do).

And of course there is writing happening. I have a few projects in the works which I will have to organize so I can work on them in the most time efficient manner possible.

Anyway, off for the night. Repeats of Buffy are playing and I need my fix. God I loved that series.