Why I Oughta...

Imagine my delight when I walk into the train station in Nagoya to be greeted with this Garrett's (as I call it) popcorn shop.  They sell the Chicago Mix as you'd expect.  And the place was very popular.  I didn't stop in, but I hear that the Matcha flavored corn is a big hit - which wouldn't surprise me based on all the various, weird popcorns I came across at Tokyo Disneyland/DisneySea .  There are these big multi-national organizations that one expects to see in international cities.  Think things like McDonalds and KFC.  And heck...even Disney.  But, I kind of considered Garrett's (I know...that's wrong, there is no 's in the name), a Chicago thing.  How wrong am I.  V ery wrong . 

I spent some time last month back in Japan, this time in Nagoya.  This was my second time in Nagoya - the first was a few years ago when I visited for the Cherry Blossoms . Sure, there are plenty of things to see around town, but let's start with the Marriott Associa Hotel.  I stayed on an upper floor and had a room with a twin bed.  But the carpet in the hallway right by the elevators?  Beautiful, isn't it? Reminds me of Spaceship Earth.   Am I nuts?  Or just Disney Drunk? Or maybe the pyramid that the holistic healer placed over George's head?

I found myself in a Japanese hardware store in Ginza and discovered that a lot of the products are just like ours:  made in China.  But, there was a section that had some signage that proclaimed:  Made in Japan.  That's where I spent my time poking around to try to find something small and inexpensive that I could bring home for myself and for my tool-loving family members who had birthdays coming up.  There on the rack were a series of these precision screwdrivers.  Or "micro precision drivers" as I think they were billed.  This Phillips head driver from Vessel has that red padded section that you can use to twist the screw into place while applying pressure to the base.  I have a set of precision drivers, but they're stuck in a case and it always takes me a second to pull them out.  Now I have a driver that I can keep in the coffee mug on my desk at home along with my most-used regular-sized driver and a pair of needle nose pliers.  You can buy a full set of

I don't think I've mentioned how the addition of a Toto Toilet to our master bathroom has fundamentally altered my life.  And, that's probably best.  If she is reading this, Nat is seriously cringing right now.  So, I'll just move along.  TMI, Nat?  Sorry!  Briefly...I'll just say this: Yes...I'm proud to be totally #TeamToto. But, before I move along, I wanted to flag this for all of you:  some of the public area toilets (think....bathrooms that are adjacent to a multi-tenant high-rise office building) have not just the normal front/rear wash and pressure but also the button marked 'privacy'?  And the 'volume' toggle underneath it?  That's basically a white noise function.  White noise, chimes and bird chirps.  For real. During my time in Tokyo, I didn't come across this very often so I'm not sure if this feature is rare? The first time I came across Toto's in public was during my time at Google.  Here's a post from

Just like street trees , there's a whole world of Web content related to manhole covers in Tokyo .  And for good reason.  Above is a photo of one of the many covers that I came across on my walks around the Ginza neighborhood on my recent trip to Tokyo.   Based on this post from Japan Visitor , is either a combined sewage system or water supply cover and has the four icons in the middle light up in colors of orange, green and blue.  And the variety of covers that one could come across in Tokyo are there by design.  Literally.  From this story Japan Wonderland comes this description : According to some sources, in the late 1980s, there was a Construction Specialist from the Public Sewer Division, Ministry of Construction who advocated the use original designs for each municipality in the hope that it would improve the image of the sewage industry and make it more appealing to the general community. Everyone seemed to think that that’s a great idea. Almost every year compe

This is the view that I was greeted with most of the days I was in the office in Tokyo doing meetings and client work on my trip in February.  In the foreground where you see the yellowish/tanish ground is the Kōkyo-gaien or "Outer Garden" of the Tokyo Imperial Palace.  If you move your eyes more towards the upper portion of the photo, you'll see the buildings of the Imperial Palace grounds with the large stone driveway area in between the two.  The public grounds is the part that mere mortals like me are able to wander around in, but I think you can make your way around the Palace grounds and take in some nature.  Due to time constraints and uncertainty, I was only able to enjoy the front, public outer gardens you see with the yellow/tan grounds.   And that part was pretty spectacular.  There's tons of things written on the Web about the plants/trees and animals that live in and around the Imperial Garden, but you can start with this entry on Wikipedia that

Down at the Epcot Center in Florida, there is a store in the Japan pavilion that sells all sorts of novelty items from Japan including a live oyster/pearl tank where you can pick out an oyster and once opened, discover a pearl.  That store is called Mitsukoshi.  I had been going to the store for a couple of years until Natalie told me that it was called Mitsukoshi and that it is a department store in Japan.  Like...this isn't just a 'shop' in the Japan Pavilion, it is actually a location of this department store .  Having been to Japan a few times now for work, on my most recent trip, I decided to try to get into one of the Tokyo locations.  Turns out, the Ginza location was located on the walk between my hotel and the office I was working in all week.  You can see the store in the photo above:  the *older* store is the main portion located on the corner.  A bit down to the right, you can see the *newer* addition they've added.  Here's a look at that new s

Earlier this Spring, I spent time in Tokyo where in addition to heading to Tokyo Disneyland and checking out the fish market, we were also there during the peak Cherry Blossom season.  I wrote about the trees here on the blog back in April .  I've been enamored with the trees ever since.  And trees have been on my mind lately as we continue to think about our yard.  I'm trying to get an early start on trees, because unlike sod or even flowers or bushes, trees take much longer to mature to the point to where they've grown into their size.  I've already posted about how we picked up a Dawn Redwood tree and planted it.   I also posted about the space we're going to fill in with either flowering pear trees or perhaps European Hornbeams along our northside.  And, of course, there's the Linden trees that I'm going to try to espalier .   (At what point, can we start calling it an arboretum??) For Mother's Day, I also picked up Nat a Japanese flowering

I posted about the beer I drank in Tokyo last week and I've covered a bunch of my trip to Tokyo Disney in various posts over the past few weeks, but this coffee experience seemed like it warranted it's own post.  Coffee? In a can?  That looks like a Mickey's bottle from my college days? Yeah. We were there in Japan on-site working on a client project in a few of their facilities; one of them an office building and the other a more of an assembly or manufacturing plant.  That's where I came across this Premium Boss Black Coffee in a hand-grenade can.  It came out of a vending machine (I forget how many yen it was), but what was cool was that there were two options:  hot or cold.  You got, what I think is the same exact can and same exact coffee, only one of the cans was piping hot and the other was ice cold.  Pretty neat.

Despite what it seems like based on the posts here, it wasn't all Disney during my time in Tokyo.  Besides the work proper, we also took in a bunch of the local sights and places.  One of them was the Tsukiji Market where we spent time in both parts - the inner market where we wandered around amongst fork lifts and workers and the outer market where they sell more retail items from food to household products.  And that's where I came across this Tawashi Scrubbing Brush.  It is billed as being "made by Traditional Craftsman of Japan" and as you can see, they even list the guy's name:  Shinichi Sagara.  It seemed like a nice, unique item to bring home that wouldn't sit on a shelf, but that we'd actually use. You can find these online like in this Japanese Restaurant supply shop where they describe their own version of the product thusly: This biodegradable, all-natural scrubbing brush has been around in Japanese households for over 100 years and i

I came home with a bunch of stuff for the kids from my visit to both Tokyo Disneyland and Tokyo Disneysea including pins and easter stuff , but above you see both park maps.  I'm writing this post to go along with the deposit I'm making in my 'stash box'. Having gone to these two parks was on my Disney Bucket list and having gone to them both, I can now check them off.  Into the stash box they go, with this reminder of why they're there. It isn't used for the 'stash' you're probably thinking of, but rather is just a collection of my personal effects and items that I've come across and accumulated over the years.  Everything from race medals to cufflinks that were given to me as a gift to a bunch of lapel pins (fraternity, secret service cleared, etc).  There's a few paper items in there as well.  And now, it will include these maps.  Speaking of my stash box, I think it might be time to upgrade it in size.  Having a small one has been

Despite Beer Advocate giving this Asahi Super "Dry" a 'poor' rating , I found it quite drinkable at the various dinners and evening activities that we took on during my stay in Tokyo and Nagoya.  When we weren't drinking sake, I defaulted to beer and more often than not, it seemed that this Asahi Super "Dry" was amongst the beers available.

My trip to Tokyo was timed perfectly - in terms of seeing the famed Cherry Blossom trees in all their glory .  If you have ready anything about them this year, there was concern that they were emerging 'early' - officially - five days earlier than average .  Here in Illinois, we have our little 'blossom season' going on with the widely planted Cleveland Pear tree.  They're the trees that are blooming white flowers like crazy all over the suburbs.  They're a common tree planted in the front of new houses and in parkways and along parking lots.  They grow in a tight area and they are quite show-y during this period of time.   We had a Cleveland Select Pear tree in the front yard our old house and I loved it .  Loved it so much that I bought a few more.  (And we've included one in our plan for the new place.) But, back to these Cherry Blossoms.  We don't live in Seattle or DC - where these things are present.  So, I haven't really experienced '

As I mentioned yesterday in a post , I spent a few days recently in Tokyo.  Part of that trip included an escape to see both Disney parks located there of course.  Yeah...I went to Tokyo.  And I went to their two Disney parks.  The first park I visited was Tokyo DisneySea.  Pretty incredible place and unlike any other Disney Park I've ever been to.  Over a bunch of posts, I'll share more of that experience including some of the things I saw and rode.  But for now?  Take a look at their Carousel.  It is back in the far corner of the park in the Arabian Coast land that features the Agrabah Marketplace and flying carpets from Aladdin. But that carousel?  First, it is two stories tall.  And then they've built this beautiful building around it.  Just magnificent. Here's the ride listing from the official Tokyo DisneySea site .  They list both the ride duration (2.5 minutes), the capacity (190 persons) and the number of mounts (126).  That's something that the d

I experienced the one that I think everyone likely does:  having to raise the shower head up to actually my height. But, also this one:  a sky lounge.   We were up there on a Sunday night and it was still packed.  Couples, groups.  And us.  Three American dudes and a Canadian.  I had 3/4 of a beer before I had to call it a night.  Loads of fun and quite a few deposits into the memory bank.