My Biggest Fan

So after the game against Secom I met the sponsors of IBM (besides the company itself) who had turned up for the big game at the national stadium (Chichibunomiya).  Those guys aside, I also met my biggest fan - click here to see.

My second biggest fan was this girl and her parents, along with her friends.

The youngster was practically thrown at me as we were leaving.

The woman on the right is the wife of one of our props, an exceptionally nice guy (as seems to be the case with the tight five in any team) who writes his own blog about food in Japan.  Occasionally he writes about boxing, but seeing as boxing is a dying art and food will never be so, there's a lot more to write about in the world of cakes than the ring.

Purely as an academic exercise as to how often and how much he writes, here is his blog:

http://ameblo.jp/shimoyaman2009/

It's incredible how much he writes.  Of course I can't tell you how good the content is or if his foodie credentials are up to snuff, but I assume through sheer force of volume, he has at least figured a few things out about noodles.

As another purely academic exercise (although this one involves some pictures) here is the blog I stole the picture of me from:

http://ameblo.jp/emifit/entry-11944727753.html

I include this because it has a number of pictures of the team, and the stadium, and from a neutral perspective it might be interesting to see the scale of the place and some other faces in the team - to gain a context for IBM rugby and the league we play in.

It's also my intention to write a review of the recent books I've finished.  The lack of sleep decimates critical thinking, but does wonders for working through backlogs of books.

To try and trigger a google search, here are the names of the books I've recently gone through:

The Hobbit

(The) Silmarillion

Ancillary Justice

Revelation Space

London Falling

So as per my usual timetable, those reviews will be up this time next year.

Sitting in Gohyun Bus Terminal

So I'm sitting in Gohyun bus terminal, on my way to Seoul.  It's a five hour trip from the terminal in which I currently reside, to the door at my final destination.  From door to door it's more like six.

At this stage I feel like I've seen everything Seoul has to offer, despite only seeing a fraction of what is there.  I have been promised dog tomorrow though, and that should make things somewhat  more interesting.

I've manage to go however many months without a single venture into the grand world of canine delicacies.

I must admit, I love the fact that Korea is one of the only places in the world where canine delicacy can have different meanings.

One of the two new arrivals joined the group today.  It was his initiation (of sorts) into the group, as we had dinner in a restaurant (again, of sorts).  The pseudo-restaurant is nice enough, and a fun enough time was had.

I decided to break with social convention somewhat, by skipping the boring hours long smalltalk people use to seem interesting.  I arrived half an hour late, but was the first to dole out the spicy gossip, in a palm sized bundle.  Up to this point the conversation, while brisk, revolved around trivial nonsense.  I could tell this within the first two minutes of my arrival, and the looks every exhibited.  (Suicidal, in case you were wondering.)

The juicy gossip included all the stupid shit people have done in the office, and some of the stupid shit they've done outside the office.  This freed things up nicely, and everyone was embarrassed.  Everyone is going to be embarrassed at some stage when their secrets are found out, so why not just get the bullshit out of the way first, and focus on the people behind the nonsense?

Why would I do this?  I was forced to come to the dinner, despite the enforcer knowing I wanted to go to Seoul.  The upshot, I won't be forced to dinner against my will again, unless crossfire and casualties are expected.

Petty?  Yes, but more fun than I thought it would be.  Obviously I'm not beyond ridicule, I received a healthy dose, but I learned more about the new guy in this one hour dinner, than two weeks of pussy-footing and social mores.

The upshot - when you are bored and feeling like a child, act like a child.  It might be substantially more interesting than you thought it would be.


On a completely unrelated side-note:  I wrote this using public, unsecured wifi.  Logging onto any service via such a network is not recommended, and I'm such a nerd for this kind of thing that I'm going to change all my password tomorrow.  Less be, to all ye who listen.