I’ve been back in the States for a few days now and I’ve been meaning to1 write a little something reflecting back on the trip; however with jet lag and what not2, I’ve been a bit too tired to write anything up. Since I received a friendly reminder about it from AWelkin; I figure I better hurry up and write something. First off, let’s get the gushy fan-boyishness out of the way. Going to Japan was an amazing experience and something that I am very glad that I had the opportunity to do. Now that we’ve got that out of the way, here are some of the impressions that I’m left with from my visit to Japan.
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Tag: mental
This morning was another sweltering day and after a short hop on the train; we walked up to Osamu Tezuka Productions. When you first step off the street towards their door; there’s a marble (maybe granite) status of Astro Boy. Then you walk inside and immediately you’re surrounded by merchandise, mostly from Astro Boy but also from some of Tezuka’s other series, such as Princess Knight. Then it was up the stairs and we split up with half of us touring of the offices while the other half watched a video. I went on the tour and the wonderful people there let me video tape it; so I won’t talk about it here. Then we went back to the waiting area and watched some of Tezuka’s animation work while the other group go the tour. It was a very nice environmental work with no words set to one of Tchaikovsky’s operas. Then they brought in one of Tezuka’s former assistants and he gave a short presentation about what it was like to be an assistant. I was still suffering from the heat, so my fried brains couldn’t think of a question before the presentation was over. On the other hand, at least I wasn’t sleeping with my head on the table through the presentation.
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Like many an American when I go into my bathroom at home to take care of business; I frequently like to have something to occupy my mind while the rest of me is busy. Occasionally I’ll take whatever book I’m reading at the moment with me, but I don’t like to do that because I tend to get caught up in the book and don’t leave the bathroom until my legs are asleep. I’ve found that taking a magazine in with me works better, as I can finish my business and read through an article at the same time.
I used to subscribe to CPU Magazine but my subscription is running out now and I don’t plan on renewing it. I’ve known for a while that I can basically get all the same info that’s in the magazine before the magazine goes to print by surfing the web. That didn’t bother me so much when the magazine was newer but the last several issues were completely dull. Maybe that’s because the whole tech industry is getting to be boring; I don’t know. What I do know is if I’m going to read dull information; I sure as hell don’t want to pay for the privilege.
So what am I reading these days? Well, first off there’s American Bungalow. I really love this magazine as it’s full of great photographs of lovely houses nd has articles about restoration projects. And let’s face it after abut 11 years of apartment living; I’m being totally consumed by house-envy. This magazine doesn’t help me with that in any way, shape or form but it does give me these crazy & exciting ideas of what I want in a house and what I’ll do to a house once I finally buy one. The only downsides to this magazine are that it only comes out quarterly and it’s rather expensive (~$12). So I tend to buy it at our local B&N, so I can use our membership card for the discount. Plus by getting it at the store, I don’t have to worry about our mailman shredding it in our mailbox; which has happened more than a few times. *grumble, grumble*
The other magazine that I’ve just started reading is mental_floss. I heard about this one about a week ago while blog-hopping1 and it sounded interesting. So the next time Ariesna & I were in B&N; I bought a copy of it. Basically, the magazine is full of trivia and wacky/interesting information. So far it seems like it will be a fun mag and I’ll probably pick up the next issue when it comes out (since it only costs ~$5). If the next one is also fun; then I might end up subscribing to this one and hence will have plenty of bathroom reading handy. 😛
1 Blog-hopping (verb): The process by which a person reads an article one blog and then proceeds to follow links from the blog that they are currently reading to another blog.