The innocence of youth

Warning: This video may have you smiling and causing your coworkers concern.

I do love my baby nephew. And my lovely sister. And their stupid games.

Helicopter

On a backstreet in south Osaka,
the boy stumbled upon the holy grail.

Warning: This post kicks like a mule.

So the older of the youngers came to visit for a few days lately, and much fun was had. So much fun, in fact, that I'm almost glad he left. No way could I keep that schedule up for another week.

Bought a funky new camera for him to use on his travels - a Canon Powershot 910IS (called the SD870IS in America). This is an outdated camera - the 920 came out recently - but the nice thing about that is it was half the price. And to be honest, I don't think the 920 could have been much better.

One of the nice things about it (and there are many) was the superior video quality, blowing my Olympus out of the photo bath. Of course, with great quality comes great megabyte-age, and 100mb per min of film is a little difficult to get up on youtube (especially these days: am I the only one who's noticed how deathly slow uploading is there lately?). However, I was able to get a few vids up over the weekend.

The first of these is at Cafe Absinthe (which I may have mentioned before), where my Israeli bartending friend demonstrates one of the more complicated cocktails on their menu: the Helicopter. Made of (I assume) absinthe & black sambuca, the kick on it is only topped by trying to inhale the remaining fumes afterwards. As Luke's reaction shows, it's not really for the faint of heart.
Cheers.

Good Morning Caleb

Warning: This post only features births, not deaths or marriages.


Caleb Isaac Fieldes-Booth
Born 11.50pm June 11th 2008 NZT, to Hannah Fieldes and Ramon Booth.
No complications (unless you call not having a name for 4 days a complication).
So far is prone to sleeping and looking like a scrunched up human being.

Welcome. Just so you know, I'm the cool uncle. Not the other two jokers. They're my wingmen.

The time my mother had to remind her of her own birthday

You'll never meet a more awesome 49 year old angel. Nor one as sneaky.

Here's a story about my mother.

Too bad if you don't want to read it, because I'm not writing anything else. Go read something less indulging if you've got such a problem with mother-boy cheese. I think A Clockwork Orange, 1984 and the like are light on respect for mothers. I don't suggest Hamlet or anything by Freud - they tend to take it to the next level.

Anyway, this woman I know - quite well actually, as she happens to be my mother - is a rather respectable individual.
...Respectable? That's the kind of word to use to describe a donation, or hierarchical status. To make matters worse, "individual" is the kind of word used for garden variety members of society. I'm not off to such a good start. I don't think of my mother as big on hierarchy, nor is she at all anything as common as to come from a garden. All the varieties of my mother are far more...gourmet.
Indeed, gourmet. A tasty chick. Oh crap, did it again, let me rephrase. "If you were to eat my mother, you.."...you know what, lets just drop the food analogies.

One interesting fact about this woman is for all that I think she's worth (see: Mastercard ads), she's actually probably not "worth" much at all. Ah ah ah - what I mean is, I don't think I've ever really seen her indulge time and money on something just for herself. Every dollar or afternoon she spends tends to be used to help someone, especially her spoilt-rotten kids. Well, besides her book collection. But then again, she's a librarian, so we'll give her that under "work resources". In order for me to claim the same, I'd have to be a film directing, software developing, bar-tending musician. Who owned a clothing outlet.
Oh yes, she's kind. But sure, lots of people are kind. Mother Teresa was kind. Lassie was kind. But my mum's no bitch. 3 reasons my mother is better than Lassie:
- My mother isn't arrogant enough to have multiple films made about herself (I can't even get her to star in vacation videos)
- My mother would never stand outside and yap until you paid attention to her
- Her glossy long curls don't have fleas

Plus, have you ever slept in the same bed as a dog before? My mum is way better to sleep with. Ahhhhh Where's the delete key on this Japanese keyboard?

My mother would also be my favoured choice to be stranded on a desert island with, because I have a feeling that no matter how deserted it was, she'd still cook for 6 people and find SOME way to make cookies. I wouldn't even have to be on the island - she'd probably mail them to me.

So when February 7 rolls around, I always try and take some time of my busy "me-schedule" to give her some love and respect(able individuality) she deserves. Doesn't matter if I'm not in the country - a mail and a chat would do her just fine. But what did I have to do? I had to go and get busy and forget what day it was. I'd only been staring at the calendar all day, trying to figure out how to expedite our production lead-time. There it was, the 7 staring at me like a lucky roll on a craps table. Lucky seven. Lucky me, to have such a great mum. But all I could see was weeks in advance: 18s and 25s and Marchs (well, just the one).
Don't blame me too much. Like my mum, the 7 wasn't yapping. It was smiling secretly, bemused and slightly proud of my distinguished concentration-lines on my forehead. It was probably thinking that I shouldn't have shaved my beard the other day, because it thinks a bit of stubble suits me.
What did my mother do after the 7 reminded her there was only a few hours left for her son to call her on her birthday, and that she might want to do something about it? Oh not much - just sidled up on MSN and popped me a subtle message: "February 7 is a great day, isn't it". Ho-shit.
Since WHEN is it already Feb 7? Was I in a coma? I remember it being Feb 1, and thinking "righto, a week to get your act together boyo". But time did a number on me (namely 7), and suddenly I was staring down the dual barrels of guilt and shame. "After all your mother's done for you...", "She never asks for much..." "Just a simple phone call - it doesn't cost the world, does it?" went the invisible parental figure in my head. Not my mother - no way would she ever say something like that. I think I probably created an alter-ego mum in my mind years ago, that says all the annoying mum things she never would - otherwise I'd have turned out a complete self-infatuated prick who truly believed I was the greatest thing in the world. My mum is sneaky like that - she'd never say whinging things like that, so all the guilt I build on myself can't be blamed on her. Tricky little thing, isn't she.

Anyway, for all the feelings of self-worthlessness and stupidity, and with all the humble pie choking my throat, was I worried? Depressed, that I might have let her down? Apprehensive about what she might think?

....
nah. My mum's easy to deal with. Just tell her you love her and there's no way she'd hold anything against you.

Happy Birthday Mum.

21 Reasons My Brother Is Cooler Than Me

Speeches from Luke's 21st in November last year:

Start/Mum's greeting:


My speech:


Hopefully I'll add more later.

Christmas

So, another Christmas devoid of the family (my 3rd ever). Last time I had a girlfriend to soften the blow, and the time before I at least had a date. But this time it's no family, no girlfriend, no Sam, nothing!
Oh well, guess we'll have to find a new family.

I do have a few filial connections in Japan, one of them being Mio's parents in Mie (near Nagoya). So in a spur-of-the-moment kind of thing on Saturday night, I decided to pay them a visit. It's only a 2 hour express train ride to Nagoya (about 3,500yen, or US$30). And in a spur-of-the-moment kind of thing, they decided to give me a Japanese yukata jacket! I forget the proper name.



Mint.