http://www.snopes.com/inboxer/missing/ashleylewis.asp

Messages seek help in finding a 14-year-girl named Ashley Lewis gone missing from Kannapolis, NC.

Pepsi is one of those things that I'd never ever want to change, but someone over at the Japanese question obviously begs to differ. When I first landed on the island Pepsi White was all the rage in Family Marts around Okinawa, combining Pepsi with the refreshing taste of yogurt. Then summer came and there was Pepsi Shiso clogging up the shelves with its green tea flavored shenanigans. Now, with the dawn of the new year, we have Pepsi Azuki. Like it's brethren before it, Pepsi Azuki takes the familiar Pepsi taste and combines it with an odd, strangely fucked up flavor in the form of azuki beans. When will the tomfoolery end? And who the hell keeps buying these things to justify their existence? Funny thing is all the places that stock these off-kilter Pepsi's don't normally stock regular tried and true Pepsi, a true injustice if there ever was one.

Yeah, how about not anymore!

Pearls Before Swine - January 5, 2010

http://www.snopes.com/photos/architecture/kclibrary.asp

Photograph purportedly shows a library facade lined with giant-sized representations of books.

Even more so than 2008, 2009 was fraught with a great deal of change. The year started off with me being uncertain about my job situation and future in Japan and is ending on a similar note. Inbetween all that a ton of notable things happened, including my first visit to a snack bar, Gumball Rally, going to mainland, my 26th birthday, and moving on up to Agarihama. Looking back on it all, these were the moments that defined 2009 in my life.

#25 DOUBLE QUARTER POUNDER COMES TO OKINAWA



This might not be important to all you people in the rest of the world, but Japan had been quarter pounder less for like the entirety of McDonald's history until 2009. It became a regular part of the menu back in March.

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#24 ADVENTURES IN HAIRCUTTING



I remember the day I cut my own hair like it was yesterday...probably because it was coincidentally also around the time of me and MaryAnn's 1st anniversary. As a Black person in Japan, knowing how to cut your own hair is as important a skill as knowing how to start a fire with two rocks and a stick, or knowing how to defend yourself from a crowd of crazed zombies. Had I not learned when I did, I would be walking around with an unruly afro right about now. Sure, all the Japanese people would think it was the coolest thing they'd ever seen. But all the Black people would know that that shit just ain't right.

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#23 THE KICKBOXER



Saw my first live kickboxing match this year, and as an added bonus it was between some bad ass dude and one of my students (a wannabe bad ass dude from Nago). One day he'll be the champion...one day.

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#22 NAGO SAKURA MATSURI



Being a former DC resident, it's not like I'm a stranger to cherry blossoms. But there was something about them here, in Japan, that made it a billion times more special.

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#21 VALENTINE'S DAY



I was still hella broke at the time, so for Valentine's Day last year I made MaryAnn the above gift and cooked her breakfast in bed. Later on we went out to Crocodile, a restaurant in Chatan that specializes in (what else?) crocodile dishes.

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#20 MARYANN'S 27TH BIRTHDAY @ SALSATINA



MaryAnn might find this memorable for a bunch of other reasons, namely because I got insanely drunk, threw up in an izakaya bathroom, and damn near passed out on the street. I like to think about the time before all that when we were salsa dancing at the bar and people kept buying us drinks.

( Numbers 1-20... )

Pearls Before Swine - January 4, 2010

http://www.snopes.com/inboxer/household/fireants.asp

Will pouring club soda on a fire ant mound kill the colony?

http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/MichaelIanBlack/~3/6HWTGAOSjD8/sunday.html

Sundays are very good because they grant Biblical authority to my already instinctive laziness. God says “Rest,” so I rest. It’s eight o’clock in the morning, and the only reason I am up at all is so that I can...

Pearls Before Swine - January 3, 2010

http://www.snopes.com/medical/emergent/mowed.asp

Punk rocker's 'Keep off the grass' tattoo is disrespected by a surgeon.

I need some help, fellow cat people.

I love my kitties during the day. They are the sweetest kitties running. But at night, Zaphod turns into a holy terror.

Mostly he scratches the box spring on the bed. Sometimes he'll come up on the bed and start aggressively headbutting me. Both of these are not terribly conducive to sleeping.

Any thoughts? It's starting to drive Des and I up one wall and down the other. (And we can't just keep them out of the bedroom at night - their litter is in our bathroom.

Happy New Year! If you're reading this now its probably from the safety of your bed as you recover from a lingering hangover. I thought I'd be doing the same thing, but I guess all that Okinawan soba soaked the Orion and awamori floating around in my system right up.

MaryAnn and I spent most of the day chillaxin in bed watching episodes of Bleach, but in the afternoon her supervisor, Matayoshi sensei picked us up and we went over to his family's place for a huge dinner with a hilarious cast of characters. Matayoshi sensei has a rather large family, including four brothers, a sister, a wife, and a whole rack of kids...not to mention his own parents. Everyone was present and accounted for. His English is the best out of the group, but everyone else ain't half bad themselves Fun fact: apparently when Japanese people get together in large groups, they generally divide themselves into boys and girls groups. All the women were in one room talking about...whatever, while the guys (and MaryAnn) were in another room drinking and watching wacky ass Japanese game shows. I wonder if they're really wacky, or if they just come across that way because I don't understand all the Japanese being said and the hosts are usually yelling out things accompanied by weird camera angles and cartoonish sound effects...

And now the question is will I be in Japan a third year to celebrate New Year's on foreign soil again in 2011?

Pearls Before Swine - January 2, 2010

Last year we spent New Year's Eve on the beaches of Thailand, walking along the sand, lighting hot air balloon lanterns, and watching fireworks with a bunch of other (mostly European) tourists. This year we stayed in Okinawa and kicked it with out downstairs neighbors, Tetsuhisa and Erika, and a few of their friends. I'm glad we did, because while last year was a pretty magical and unforgettable way to ring in the new year, there ain't no party like an Okinawan New Year's celebration.



First order of business: drink a dude's dad under the table. Mission accomplished. The first stop on our whirlwind New Year's celebration was to Tetsuhisa's family home in Ozato, where we watched the beginnings of the annual New Year's Eve K-1 tournament and ate Okinawan soba with his mom and dad. Inbetween slurping on noodles we drank a some beer and sipped on the fine awamori from Kume-jima. It's a fact that in Okinawa, outdrinking someone is the quickest way to earn their respect. Also, telling them that their awamori is the best ever works as well. I did both so it's only a matter of time before I'm adopted into the family.



Afterwards we bounced over to the spot of one of Tetsuhisa and Erika's old high school friends, Tetsuji, to drink some more and kill time playing video games. I impressed the two possibly otaku dudes with my mad Medal of Honor: Airborne skills, but got my ass handed to me when it came time to play Biohazard (Resident Evil) 5. Man, I totally failed zombie apocalypse training 101.



Around 10 we piled into Erika's car and drove south to the Heiwakinen Peace Memorial Park in Itoman for the final countdown to New Year's Day. The scene was reminiscent of a second season episode of True Blood, with the huge crowd of torch bearing revelers looking like a MaryAnn worshipping cult. I half expected people to get buck naked and start doin it on the grass while some bullheaded woman vibrated and made sacrifices or something. SadlyThankfully that didn't happen and the countdown went off without any fatalities. We even ran into a couple of JETs while we were there and paid our respects to the giant buddha residing in the Peace Tower.





But no Okinawan New Year's celebration is complete without the requisite visit to the shrine to pray for good luck, wealth, and health in the new year. We drove into Naha and visited a shrine buried deep within Onoyama Koen. I kind of thought it would be low-key, but heeeell no. The whole thing was set up just like every other festival I've been to in Okinawa, with stalls for buying food lining the path leading towards the shrine. Beyond those were stalls selling fortunes for 200 yen, and for whatever reason there was a cross-dressing radio personality doing...something. In the end, though, we finally made it to our destination, tossed in our lucky 5 yen coins, and said our prayes. Here's hoping they come true.