Japanese Tobacco Singers

Today mrguy bought me a present: my second Japanese LP whose cover features a smoking man.


Here's the first:


And in a nostalgic tip of the hat to the Fairness Doctrine, another lp from my collection:


The new record is very fabulous. Draw yourself an aural picture of mournful crooning with strings, cornet and clarinet that is almost eastern European, then take a left turn with Raymond Scott-style Bugs Bunny Ali Baba percussion. Add random arpeggios on clavioline, and stir well.

When this record was being produced, smoking in Japan was 6 years away from its peak. In 1966, 83% of Japanese men smoked.

I think my chances of increasing the Japanese Tobacco Singers collection are pretty good.

Tanglefoot

'Tis the season.

The fruit trees will start to bloom soon, and it's now or never in pest preventionville. My modest goal is to enjoy more of our fruit than the apple worms do this year.

To this end, I'm trying Tanglefoot.

It's a goopy layer of green-friendly sludge that you smammy onto the trunks of fruit-bearing trees. It prevents bugs from crawling up them and doing their bug business. What kind of bug business, you ask? Aphid farming. Egg laying. Stuff that people who own fruit trees don't like.

It's war. But a gentle war, because mrguy doesn't believe in pesticides.

So out I went yesterday in the drizzle. Here's the result:

After I admired my work, I remembered that this was basically the same procedure they used in the beautiful garden we visited in Japan. The gardeners wrapped some of the pine trees in straw matting in the fall, which they'll remove and burn in the spring. And Bob's your uncle.

At harvest I will report back. In the meantime, I'm hoping that there will be some visible progress in the form of bug bodies ensnared as if in a Hieronymus Bosch painting.

Is it too much to ask? 

Calbee's New Potato Chips

While shopping for Oskah! goodies at the fish store, I noticed a new package in the chip aisle: Calbee Sakura Shio.

It's subtle and delicious, almost like a crispy potato shortbread. It contains cherry leaves and plum, and is vaguely perfumy and faintly sweet, but not overpoweringly so.

This is a seasonal special, so make sure to grab some when you get to your Japanese market.

Chin Ho In The House

It was one final interesting day driving the mighty Chevy Cobalt.

Lack of a locking gas cap meant that I filled up this morning *and* this afternoon.

But that's over, the Cobalt has gone back to Hertz.

Chin Ho is home and as beautiful as ever. I wanted to kiss him, but he's a car.

Repairing my body will take a little more time but I, too, am on the mend.

[update 2/21/09: I turned on the stereo for the first time today, proving my theory that the accident happened to the tune of Kaulana O Hilo Hanakahi. I couldn't get that song out of my head for days afterward.]