Callistonian.net

I returned from Japan a few weeks ago. I love Japan, and it was great fun, but …

I was ill. I had a wretched cough and no voice. I almost died several times due to laughter induced coughing fits. The worst was when a friend forced me to laugh with one of his 2,331,223,294,394,233,231 unsponsored iPod Touch advertisements. After hearing about how this less than one week old iPod Touch was so slim, about how it had wireless, about how it had Skype, about how it could be used to display random facts, about how it could be used as a light saber, about how it could (not) be used as a dictionary, about how it could be used as a flashlight, etc. 12,123, 239, 223 times in a less than three day span, this happened.

An approximate re-telling of the particularly offensive commercial:
setting: the lights are out & its late at night

a: what’s that noise?
b: my iPod Touch makes soothing wave sounds. they help you fall asleep.
i laugh and almost die as the obsession can no longer be denied.
a *after recovering from her own laughter*: o_O wtf?
b: do you want to hear forest noises instead?
a: …

The sound goes on for about 2 minutes.

For the record, there was nothing soothing about those ocean noises. The sound looped every 8 or so seconds. It stopped abruptly, in a terribly jarring way, and then started again. -___-;

a: TURN IT OFF!

Anyway, I was sick. My friend, his iPod, and my other friend took the hotel shuttle to Tokyo Disney early the next morning. As I was sick, I was going to go to the pharmacy when it opened, get some meds, and take the train to Disney (the shuttle only ran from the hotel to the park during morning hours), and meet them in front of the Haunted Mansion in the afternoon. Things didn’t quite work out.

I wen to the pharmacy. I got my medicine (aka souped up cough drops). So far, so good. When I was trying to get to Tokyo Disney, the trains randomly broke down—thank goodness I could understand Japanese—my 30 minute trip turned into 4 hours of … something terrible. I didn’t even get lost, though.

I got my refund from the people working at the station. I walked to another one (yay detour?). I got on another train. I walked to the Disney bus stop and thought, “OMG!”—the bus line was hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of people long. T_T  After 240 minutes or thereabouts, I finally reached Disney. Nonetheless, it sucked because I couldn’t find my friends.

I spent my time at Disney all alone. I rode one ride (it’s A Small World). I also wasted about 63 minutes vainly searching for familiar faces. Finally, I decided enough was enough. I left.

I spent another 240 minutes getting back to my hotel—Just kidding. Actually, there was no way I was enduring those kinds of epic lines again. I took the limousine bus/shuttle bus back to my hotel. I didn’t know if the driver was going to let me on the bus, because I didn’t do anything you were supposed to in regards to that (e.g. get a ticket). So I was upfront with him, and said things like “Hi! :) I don’t have a ticket. I didn’t make a reservation, either. :) But I’m staying at this hotel. I have a key. :) Here it is. PLEASE let me on the bus. Thank you.”

In the midst of all that, I lost my $400 dictionary. No joke.

Three slightly random tidbits from the last 60,840 minutes of my life (i.e. what’s been going on since I last blogged).

JAPAN—I’ll spend a few humid days during July and August in Japan. My tentative list of things to do is quite schizophrenic (because I’m going with friends and our personalities are different). So far, must-dos include visiting Tokyo Disneyland, the notorious Yasukuni Shrine, and an aquarium. Mountain climbing is also under serious consideration. If you have any suggestions let me know.

VOLUNTEER—Maybe I’m a little psychotic, but I haven’t done any noteworthy extracurricular or volunteer activities for a few months now. I haven’t been bored, but me not volunteering (or participating in some kind of crazy thing like sacrificing my fingers and learning to play an instrument no one has ever heard of) is like a caffeine addict going for weeks without coffee or soda. It’s unsustainable and enough to make me crazy. So, I’m ecstatic that an opportunity has finally presented itself—it involves teaching English, which is definitely kind of bleh and run-of-the-mill, but it has potential. I’m skeptical about the whole thing working out, though, because I’ve had things fall through before.

RANDOM OBSERVATION—Keyboards. I realized something. I don’t know where the keys on my keyboard are. My fingers know, but on paper I cannot draw a keyboard with correctly placed keys. Is this strange or just a by-product of never looking at the keys while typing?

Even with my walk, I’m giving you hints
I’m not immodest
(Don’t Stop!) I’m not a child
°C-ute’s Tokaikko Junjou

I am not prudish but, seriously, °C-ute’s cover is a bit much. Isn’t it far more sexy than it is cute? The group’s name is °C-ute, so they should stick to being cute. When they get a bit older, they can change their name to °S-exy and sing things like, “Don’t stop! I’m not a child,” but until then they should avoid such inappropriateness.

You may think I’ve lost it, and that I’m really going too far when I label the cover inappropriate. They’re not showing any clevage; their expressions aren’t exceedingly sultry; they don’t have on a lot of makeup.

A combination of things (their ages, their clothes/makeup/poses, and their fanbase), not one thing, leads me to believe that this cover is inappropriate. The second girl from the left, the one rocking the lovely golden peep-toe heels, turned TWELVE last month. The others are a bit older, but they’re all under 17. What are pre-teens going to think, when they look at their role models and see them dressed like this?

Honestly, I don’t know if this group has a lot of young girl fans. They must have some fans their age and younger, but it’s hard to spot them at °C-ute events. What’s easy to spot? The hordes of older men.  Watch the first few seconds of this video and look at the crowd.

Their latest cover seems to discourage younger fans and  to encourage older men to join the already existent mob of older men fans. For various reasons, I’m not entirely comfortable with the group going more in that direction.

What do you think? Is the cover inappropriate?