I took my lunch down at the pond today. The lily pads are flowering. I didn't have my camera with me, so I had to use my cell phone.
Do not swallow.
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Upon examination of this pic, the little speck to the far left caught my attention. This is a 10 second exposure, what could be floating so still in mid air like that? Then it came to me, there's a spider in my neighbor's TV antenna.
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I rode my bike down to the ocean tonight. An interesting thing about bicycles in Japan is that most have an old-fashioned self-powering light in the front. Well, apparently mine couldn't handle the intense voltage pumped into it by my ludicrous speed, and it popped. So I found myself in complete darkness on a country highway with a broken light. A troublesome situation. Well, worry not-- I needed only pull out my mobile phone and switch on the camera light. Not terribly bright, but effective. I finished my quest to the ocean, and took a few night shots, including the one here.
I needed a little vacation from work, so I took Monday and Tuesday off this week. Today, I went to Ueno park with my ?? and we enjoyed a nice break from work and university life respectively.
This is a picture from the monorail on the way to Odaiba, a chic part of Tokyo. There's a Mexican restaurant here, and while it's quite expensive, it makes the second time I've had a burrito since August 2004. It was worth every yen. This picture turned out funky, so naturally I took a second shot. However, I kind of like the funkiness, so I'll use it anyway.
Have you ever eaten a quail egg? This was my first time, and they are delicious! I bought a pack of 10 for 71 yen and hard-boiled them. Tiny and difficult to de-shell, but very tasty! I recommend them highly!
Very dark scene and a mobile phone camera. I guess it will be a mystery.
Update: Feb 2015
I ran the photo through a threshold filter and this was the result. It's probably just sensor noise.
We've had some intense moped spin-out action going on in the school courtyard.
Starting from today, my website updates have been out of commission. This photo should explain why.
Fish, miso, and rice soup. It's actually considered bad manners to pour miso soup on rice, although I don't know why.
There was a large kyuudo tournament held at the school today.
This is Kurochan, one of the three kittens our school cat has had. You can see a picture of the mother back on January 17th. I've never seen the other two.
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Myris wanted to see my new monitor. As you can see, it is very useful right now.
A gloomy, rainy day.
It's hard to see in this cell phone picture, but I was trying to take a picture of the cab driver sitting in his trunk. They all looked pretty bored.
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Today was the first day of the semester's Sports day. There's a full day of goofing around to be had by all. There is also a championship half day, which will be either tomorrow or Thursday depending on the weather. I'm hoping for nice weather tomorrow so I can take it easy. ^__^ My school has started a seven class schedule this semester. Twice a week, students have to stay an extra hour and attend an additional class. So tomorrow will be either a half day or an unrighteously long day depending on the weather. For the children's sake, try not to wash your car tonight.
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I heard a crazy sound coming from these plants this afternoon. This is from the pond with the one female duck you may remember from March 3rd. It sounded like a cello being played with a banana. Was is the duck? Or maybe a large bullfrog?
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This thing scared the crap out of me! When I opened my apartment door after work today, this huge moth flew at me. Insects and arachnids don't mess around in Japan, everything is huge. Anyway, this thing gave me the hugest adrenaline rush ever; heart pounding, senses in spiderman mode, able to turn over light trucks to save loved ones. All excitement aside, the coloration of this moth is very interesting. Excluding the wings, we have an example of Batesian mimicry. The body of this (assumably) harmless moth looks like a dangerous bee. However the wings are camouflaged like a more typical moth. One can imagine many benefits to this arrangement.
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Is it a Martian toad? Nope, it's a Mt. Fuji lava rock with plastic eyes. I was having trouble getting an interesting shot of this rock (understandable since it's just a rock), so I turned off the lights and took a 30 second exposure with only the ambient glow of my powerbook in the corner of the room as illumination. Does it look like the default OSX wallpaper color?
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This is just a picture on the way home from dinner in Chiba city with a friend of mine. I have to bicycle about 10 minutes from the station to get home.
This is the Chiba Monorail. I took it around town just for fun.
I use a program called "Genius" to study Japanese vocabulary. If you have a Mac, I'd recommend giving it a try. It's freeware, and available anywhere. The only fault I find with the application is the inability to change the font size. Reading unfamiliar Chinese characters at the default font size is difficult.
My desk at work. Two fans, no air conditioner. The heat index in my office was 99'F or 37'C. I had a terrible day. Thank heavens the forecast calls for rain for the next few days. I'll take drenching rain to sweltering heat any day of the week. Today around noon, I asked my boss if I could bring a Kiddy-Pool into work. I was being dead-serious, but I assume he was joking around when he agreed it was a good idea. If they cost $8.95 like they do at home, I might bring one in just for a laugh.
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Lightening makes for cool lighting.
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I rode my bike down a back road on the school grounds today. I found a few interesting things. This random wall was one. A water basin containing a dozen or so tadpoles was the other. As much as I'd love to take one home, it's best to leave them be. Due to all the standing water rice fields, frogs have a relatively leisurely life in Japan. These tadpoles are swimming in a temporary small pool on the top of a substantial hill however. Meaning they are most likely baby toads. Toads (with a few exceptions) live primarily on dry land. Unlike rice fields, untouched dry land is at a premium. I have yet to spot a live adult toad in Japan (And I have looked!) Good luck my toad friends.