More food!

Sorry, I forgot to take pics of tonights wonderful tastes.
This eve we had one of my favorite Japanese foods - OKONOMIYAKI. This is basically a pancake made of flour, cabbage, shrimp/chicken/whatever (we had shrimp), green onions, onion ... and covered with a brown sauce and mayo. Mmmmm. We also had homemade Miso Soup and Chicken Caesar salad. Yum!

Choco Banana

In lieu of other updates, I figured I might as well start blogging the delicious creations of Asako. If the way to our hearts is through our stomachs, than she certainly has me heart and soul! I have been amazed at her ability to come up with a variety of foods, both western and asian. Maybe part of it is because, while I enjoy cooking, I never did much alone so watching her go to the 'fridge and pull out random things to make a tasty dish has been fun to watch.

Tonight we had a Korean soup made from scratch ... beef, tofu, spinach, cabbage, green onion, all in a very very spicy red pepper broth. UMAI!!!
Even better was the desert ... banana chocolate (and a little bit of ICHIGO (strawberry)) cake! Warmed in the microwave and served with a scoop of vanilla ice cream ... Mmmmmmm...

Backloggery

The PA forums pointed me to a pretty neat site for keeping track of my gaming backlog and progress - The Backloggery.

I will have to spend some time updating my profile, but you can track my progress here.

Too Much Excitement, Too Early

I've been up since around 3:30 this morning. It was at that time that the most vicious fucking thunderstorm I have been in was right on top of where I live. It was movie lighting ... where you hear and see it at the same time. Because it was right fucking on top of us.

One bolt hit a tree behind the apartment 2 away from mine, causing the tree to explode, and arced into the apartment's back bed room, hitting a socket and starting a fire. The fire pretty much destroyed that room, but was contained and did not spread further, and no one was hurt. Other than the pervasive smell of damp burnt wood from that apartment everywhere in the area, my apartment is ok.

Another bolt, witnessed by someone from the apartment that was hit, struck my neighbor's car, and then arced up over the building, setting off the car alarm. These strikes were shaking the fucking building like I've never felt.

Yet another bolt apparently struck another building in the complex, starting a fire in the dryer vent there.

So yea... in work early today.

Memory Music

Another goal gets checked off ... I finally unlocked all the songs available in SSBB. This game has one of the best soundtracks ever assembled for a game, and is a treat for the ears. Well worth the time it took to unlock all the songs :)

Crysis Complete

Last night I finished playing through Crysis, for the PC.
Overall, it was a lot of fun. I was prepared for the "let's-leave-it-open-for-a-sequel-ending," so that didn't bother me.
I tend to agree with the general consensus - the first 2/3 of the game is pure sex, while the last 1/3 is an enjoyable and pretty, if rather standard FPS.
So the Boof Rating for the first 2/3 is Awesome and for the last 1/3 is Fun.

Slimes!

The past few weeks, I have been doing a full court press on the Japanese studying. I want to eventually become fluent ... a lofty goal, but one I feel I can reach. Of course, the best way to reach that goal would be to live for a few years in Japan. A tantalizing option, but unless I can find a job that is not a low-wage English teaching job, it would be a difficult option. For now, I must content myself with a variety of books, software, and conversations with my fiancee.

One fun supplement I just added to my arsenal is playing through the Japanese PS2 release of Dragon Quest 5. I picked this up a couple years ago on it's release day in Japan for the novelty factor (the fact that I found a place with it on release was the big novelty - as Dragon Quest games tend to sell out rather quickly and induce much skipping of school/work in the Japanese gaming populace. This game has never seen release in the US (although the DS rerelease should be making its way here eventually).

When I got the game, I started into it, but then lost focus and stopped playing. This time, I have restarted, with my handy DS J-E dictionary and kanji lookup in hand(awesome software where I can draw an kanji (chinese-derived Japanese characters) on my DS to lookup what it is ... and it is amazing how well it does and getting my horribly written kanji. Asako bought me this software ... she rocks so much). Even without the dictionary, it is amazing how much more I am understanding than just a few years ago, which is encouraging. Yes, it is slow playing through, but still fun (I love old-school RPGs) and a great supplement to my text book/software learning.