quixotica

Donki Hote (i'm pretty sure it's a nihonglified version of Don Quixote as in the Man of la Mancha) is the most ranom store on the planet. you can find porn and fake Gucci bags right alongside the electronics which are next to the toiletries and porn adjacent to the winter hats and halloween costumes in any season in close proximity to the alcohol, snack foods and porn. it's a technicolor dream house of consumerism and no taste, and an unmitigated hell in a hangover.

did i mention they have porn?

but anyway, it's a sad state of affairs when... the "cool" thing to do in Oita on a Friday night is to dress like a tart and prance around inside Donki Hote. or if you're a guy, to hang out by the bike racks with cheap scooters while (actually not) watching the tartily dressed girls walk in and out of the store.

i need to start drinking on Friday nights again. preferably not in the Donki Hote parking lot.

20% fault

the saga of my car accident continues. today i went to the police station to finalize everything, and the same officer pretty much said the same shit to me that he did a week ago. including this little gem: roughly translated, it's along the lines of "you have to take care at intersections and slow down, and you shouldn't have assumed that the other driver was going to stop at the stop sign."

assume that someone would stop at a stop sign? how utterly daft of me! imagine that!

i mean we got a DOG!

this morning i woke up to some rustling outside my screen door. i ignored it for a while until it got really annoying and disconcerting. i looked outside and… there was a poodle with a little doggy jacket on sniffing around on my porch, eating my spearmint plant.

now, this wouldn’t seem so odd except… i live on the 5th floor of a (theoretically) no-pets-allowed apartment building.

turns out my neighbor’s girlfriend was over visiting last night, and brought her little dog. unfortunately, there are very few Japanese books that include the phrases “Excuse me, do you have a dog? he’s on my veranda eating my plants. please remove him. no, i won’t tell the landlord, but if the dog scratches up my screen you’re paying for it.”

so i’m totally getting a cat. yeah.