Made in Japan

I’m getting ready to travel to Japan next month. I’m fascinated by Japan and its modern history. Well, at least its modern history from 1947 onwards, if you know what I mean. I’ve been looking around to see what sights are worth seeing, and I think I’ve found a few. See what you think.

First of all, there’s the International Godzilla Observatory at Naha, Okinawa. It’s a bit off the beaten track but it does have the highest number of confirmed Godzilla sightings in the entire Japanese archipelago, and to be honest, going to Japan and not seeing Godzilla would be a bit like visiting Loch Ness and not seeing the alcoholic inbreds. Or Nessie. Apparently there’s a great Godzilla museum and visitor’s centre nearby with lots of interactive exhibits where you can trample over badly constructed cardboard cities. It should be easy to pick up some souvenirs there too, like models and toys etc. After all, I regularly receive emails telling me where I can buy a 12 inch Cockzilla at a bargain price (I think Cockzilla is one Godzilla’s enemies, even though I can’t find him mentioned anywhere on the Internet Movie Database)

More central is the newly-opened Japan National Museum of Robots Wearing Schoolgirl Uniforms in Nagoya. This state of the art facility combines two of Japan’s more recent contributions to international culture. I’m hoping to catch a sight of Shizuka Fujioka who was recently appointed an Ambassador of Cute and promotes the culture of grown women wearing schoolgirl uniforms in the west. So that makes it all right then.

Shizuka Fujioka. She's an ambassador and everything

Finally, and perhaps most poignantly, there’s the International Friendship Centre for Devastated Industries at Hiroshima. This beautifully designed museum contains many (often harrowing) images from western companies that were destroyed by the Japanese economic boom of the 60s and 70s. The displays devoted to British Leyland are supposed to be so moving that you emerge from the museum in tears, shaking your head and muttering “Never Again.” Closed Tuesdays.

Well, that’s what’s on the Agenda so far. Perhaps you have some ideas?

Shoogly Peg

If there are any regular readers left of this blog they will have noticed a distinct lack of activity lately. The posts have been coming much less frequently and they’ve been even worse than before. Frankly, as we say in Scotland, The Earl of Hell’s Waistcoat has been on a shoogly peg.

I’ve enjoyed writing the blog over the last year or so, but I’ve come to the point where, if I’m going to continue with this blogging lark I think it makes sense to keep a blog that covers a specific theme instead of jumping from Mars Bars Suppers to Stripping Italian Housewives, passing obscure 80s Heavy Metal Bands on the way.

So I’ve decided to start a blog about Italy and Italian Culture. It’ll be probably be different from this blog: the posts will be shorter, but (hopefully) more frequent. The idea will be simply to share some stuff that I run into over here and may not be widely known outside of Italy. I’ve just started it, it’s called Spootfish and I hope to see you over there in the future.

I haven’t decided what I’ll do with this blog yet, but I don’t think I’ll be posting much here in the foreseeable future. So in case i do delete it, let me thank everyone who has posted a comment on it: I’ve enjoyed this year or so of blogging, and I’ve always enjoyed the comments part more than the writing part.

33% Hetero

Buggeration! I’ve just put my Twitter Feed into this Hetero Calculator produced by the Stockholm Pride folks and it’s trying to tell me that I’m 33% Hetero! Me! Analyzing the results, it seems that the words that knocked my score down include bugger, shop, rainbow, flower and brilliant. Hmm, it seems that this Tweet from a couple of weeks back may have done a lot of damage:

Bugger me it’s hot today

Dammit, I was just saying it was hot! I wasn’t really inviting people to bugger me! If I were going to do that I would at least have left my telephone number, can’t they see that?!? In the future, I’m going to have to watch what I say; perhaps I should start using more homely asexual expressions such as “Blow me down!” or “Shiver my Timbers!” Actually, come to think of it, I don’t think Blow me Down will help my cause much, and Shiver my timbers if anything sounds worse; I don’t like the idea of anyone making my timbers shiver, to be honest.

No, this needs a dedicated action plan with timings (*opens Excel*). In order to bump that score up a bit, I’m going to make a few changes to my Twitter account, such as

1. Posting tweets during football matches (come on Celtic, this shower are pish!)
2. Using words such as knockers, jugs, jahoobies and gazongas much more frequently
3. Following Ted Nugent

That should do the trick. I bet I wouldn’t have the same score if it was calculated on this blog, with all its post on 80s Heavy Metal bands. After all, what coould be more heterosexual than listening to Manowar (below)?

Stories I Have Tried to Write

I can’t think of anything to blog about. Nothing. Nada. Hee-Haw.

This has never stopped me posting lame muck before of course, but at this point I really can’t think of anything that I want to sit down and write a post about. There’s no real reason for it: I’m busy at work, but isn’t everyone? Maybe this blog has reached the end of the line and it’s time to close the doors and start something new.  So I thought in the meantime, I’d take a look in the Drafts Folder and post the stuff that I started but couldn’t finish (yes, I’m writing a post about posts I wasn’t able to write). I reckon you should think of it as a portmanteau post (and definitely not a jumble of ragtag muck that I’ve been too lazy to work up properly).

My Contribution to the Boo Fucking Hoo Literary Genre

This was to have been a post about how, if that Irish bloke can make a fortune out of maudlin rubbish like Angela’s Ashes, then surely I could come up with a similar memoir based on my childhood in the Highlands? I would have presented selected excerpts from Aye, Dad’s Pissing in the Sink Again, describing heartbreaking moments such as having to eat Red Pudding Suppers, watch Cannon &  Ball on TV, and worst of all, go on holidays to Aberdeen. Then I realised that my childhood was probably neither deprived or depraved enough to fill the 300 pages or so I’d need to get on the shelves at Tesco, so I gave up.

Dead Pope’s Society

This was to have been a serious discussion about how I happened to be in Rome on the day the last Pope died and what that was like and how Italy went very weird indeed in the week or two afterward. Then I decided to write this silly crap about my favourite popes from history instead.

Weird Italian Magazines

Walking past a news stand a few weeks back I noticed this magazine on display:

Wow, I thought, a magazine entirely devoted to Wild Boars! Why, I bet it covers them all: brown ones, black ones, tame ones, ornery ones; it’s a magazine that meets all your wild boar needs. Probably worth buying for the recipes for sausages. Then I thought I could get a post about all the weird and wonderful magazines that you find over here. Until I realised that, actually there aren’t that many worth writing about, apart from maybe the ones on wristwatch porn.

Thumper Plowman Performance Appraisal 2008/09 Feedback Form

Hello there, well we’re coming to the end of another year here at The Earl of Hell’s Waistcoat, which means that I am obliged to ask for feedback on my performance ahead of my annual review. While I appreciate that you’re all busy folk, I’m hoping that you’ll take a minute or two out of your busy schedule to give me some quality and candid 360 degrees feedback that will enable me to maximise my performance next year. The Feedback Form is the same as always and is below:

THE EARL OF HELL’S WAISTCOAT FEEDBACK FORM

FULL NAME: Thumper Charles Edward Stuart Plowman

OVERALL APPRAISAL (What has this person delivered? Is he/she ready to take on additional resposnsibilities? Or should his/her next assignment involve shopping trolleys, the car park and a fluorescent bib?)

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A) STRENGTHS: What are his/her 1-2 Key Strengths? (What would you like to see more of from this person? Cheap Nostalgia? Stripping Italian Housewives?)

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B) IMPROVEMENT AREA: What is the one thing this person could do to Maximise their Effectiveness? (Stop all that “Over here in Italy…” muck? Remove Mr. H’s blogs from the Blogroll?)

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Thanks for taking the time, and remember, for me all Feedback is a gift. And not a Hai Karate Body Talc and After Shave Gift, I mean a proper, Oddbins gift voucher gift.