Hamsters caught my attention when a friend showed me this picture:
from the site:
http://www.novaksblog.com/2007/08/26/stumble-on-sunday-3rd-part/
And in a search to find out just how much hamsters can really stuff into their pouches I came across these irresistibly cute videos:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rfqNXADl3kU
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P-l-jshNYkA
So then my brother purchased one for me for Christmas. She’s quite cute and usually entertaining, at least when she isn’t preoccupied with being ornery and/or escaping from her cage.
My cat hardly seems to notice her unless, for instance, she is climbing on her back. This usually makes my cat angry, but only if she sees the hamster in action and so knows what it is back there digging claws into her side. Or perhaps it is humiliating to have food items nest on one’s self.
Posted in Humor, Random, Short Post.
By Ryan
February 25, 2009
Kasou Taishou (In hiragana that would be かそうたいしょう, but see the footnote*…) has become one of my favorite Japanese shows. It has been around Japanese television for quite a few years, and I came across it while looking for videos where I could hear Japanese being spoken on YouTube, and there are many episodes on there now. The premise is that it is a gameshow in which anyone can enter. Contestants use costume and props in order to enact a scene of some sort, from every day things to imaginary situations; but the show format encourages a great amount of creativity in presentation, especially in visual ‘effects’ which might be easy to do with video editing but are in most cases quite elaborate when done ‘live’ in front of the small studio audience. So for instance a character might float in the air by means of being held up by people dressed in black who blend into the background (sometimes referred to as ‘ninjas’).
There is a panel of judges who dish out points based on how good they think the skit was. They seem to be quite generous and the point system does not seem to mean much – so long as they get over 14 points they are given a medal by a Japanese woman dressed as a bunny…There are reasons I have a soft spot for Japan, you know…
The show really needs to be seen to understood. If you are fluent in Japanese or able to figure out how to click on the links, the television station website for it is at:
http://www.ntv.co.jp/kasoh/past/index.html
Below are just a few of the skits that really stood out to me, but I could list plenty more!
* I’m very new to writing out Japanese, and the hiragana above doesn’t seem to pull up proper search engine results. It means something like, "masquerade prize" with the kanji choices 仮装 and 大賞 and a lot of help from the awesome translation site http://www.csse.monash.edu.au/~jwb/cgi-bin/wwwjdic.cgi . Apparently my choice of kanji is close, given the Japanese from Wikipedia: "欽ちゃん and 香取慎吾の全日本仮装大賞; Kinchan and Katori Shingo’s All Japan Costume Grand Prix"
Posted in Humor, Japan, Random.
Tagged with game, meme.
By Ryan
February 24, 2009
Woodcarving has been a hobby of mine since discovering that I could do it a number of years ago. It is one of the rare things that came naturally to me; most of my other hobbies have taken years of work to get to any decent level of skill. Most of my carvings end up as gifts for friends or family, although I am thinking more and more about making some to sell.
This is the first carving I made, and I titled it "Abstract." It has a loose ball on the bottom corner, and a suspended ball in a cage, held by an arm of wood on the side. I was very fortunate to find this piece of driftwood when I started, as it was very easy to carve and has a wonderful color and texture. This piece is fragile, and has gotten dropped and so has a few parts which have been glued back together.
This one is titled "On the Verge of Something," because as I was carving it I kept feeling that it was going to become something else…yet it never quite got there.
"Twist" is the title I gave to this piece. There is a loose ball contained at the top.
Posted in Art, Projects.
By Ryan
February 14, 2009
