Author: Justin

The Ring of Fire

When I was a kid I used to make miniature gladiator rings in my backyard by digging a ring in the hard-packed dirt and filling it with water, so the gladiators inside the ring could not escape. The gladiators, of course, were ants, because ants are just badass. I used to hold these fights between red ants and black ants, in a ratio of about 10:1 because the red ants were so much bigger and stronger. The black ants basically acted like a bunch of sissies until the red ants started tearing them apart – then the group mind thing would kick in, and the black ants would swarm the red ones all at once, throwing themselves on their much larger and aggressive attackers.
The red ants could bite the black ones in half when they could get a hold of them, but the black ones would ride on their backs, out of reach. Pretty soon there would be a stalemate because the red ants didn’t try to help each other out. Which is where the Beam of Death (via my trusty plastic magnifying glass) and Ring of Fire (lighter fluid in the “moat”) came into play. The creed of the Ring of Fire was of course that All Must Die. All Must Be Purified with Fire (spoken, you will note, like a true pyro).
Back then, the concept of karma was still pretty much unknown to me. But it still felt wrong, somehow. Not as wrong as watching my friends shoot songbirds off of telephone wires with BB guns. Nor as wrong as the time this guy I was walking to the bus stop with threw a big rock at a horse, hitting it square in the chest, and stating afterward, simply, “fucking horses,” but still – wrong on some inexplicable yet instinctive level…
It is interesting that I wrote this post with a completely different ending in mind, but fitting that it shall should end like this.

Baby Got Banjo

Possibly the best cover of Baby Got Back (I hate that fucking song) ever made:
Thing a Week 5 – Baby Got Back
In the proud tradition of many white Americans who came before me I hereby steal and white-ify this thick and juicy piece of black culture. Watch for my album “Jonathan Coulton Sings Songs by Black People.”
I think I like this version even better that Richard Cheese’s. But RC’s Man in the Box still reigns supreme.

A nice Sunday

Yesterday Nam and I set out in the morning for a day in Osaka. My little brother has been studying capoeira with a group that practices in Shinsaibashi, and they were holding a west Japan tournament in Minatomachi. (My photos will hopefully be posted tonight.)
So we got to Osaka by utilizing the cheapest method available to individuals or small groups of people living on Awaji island for day trips to the mainland – the recently established one-day return ticket on the hydrofoil to KIX (2500 yen, including free parking).
We had lunch at Bombay Kitchen in Shinsaibashi (after all, God forgives sinners on the Sabbath as long as they eat at least two kinds of curry), and went to the capoeira tourney. I will leave my description of it to the photos I plan to post later, but overall it was pretty cool. There was a guy who was pulling flips and twists I would not have thought possible without using a wire. Anyways, that stuff comes later.
What I really want to get to is a conversation I had with my pal T, recently returned from Uzbekistan via Bangkok via Hong Kong. T has recently become bored with his incense importation/wholesaling and is curious to see how other people live. So he signed up with a temp agency and does temporary shit jobs just for kicks, even though he doesn’t need the minimum wage paychecks. Very inverse-punk. Or something.
So the job he’s doing today is at a kimchi factory near Tennoji. When I heard that, I told him it was his sacred duty to steal a vanful of rejected product from their dumpsters, but he declined. I guess middle age does that to you. So I settled for an employee discount that he mailed me about and will soon be the literal consumer of 1.2 kilos of kimchi for 1,000 yen (ten bucks). Awesome.
The best thing, though is the e-mail he just sent me to my cellphone. We had been ribbing him all yesterday about how much he was going to smell, how the garlicky tang of fresh kimchi is like Brut to Korean chicks, and how he should go to try hooking up in Tsuruhashi after work, etc. As it turns out, his biggest challenge is lunch in the factory cafeteria:
“I AM IN THE KIMCHI WORLD NOW、 A FUCKINGGOOD OBACHAN PUT A HUGE AMOUNT OF KIMCHI ON MY RICE. I CAN’T EAT ALL THIS SHIT BUT I SAID THANK YOU ANYWAY”.
Fucking priceless, I tell you.

Dream Job

When I quit working in Osaka five years ago, this would have been my dream job:
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As the worldwide leader and innovator in the creation of interactive entertainment, Nintendo Co. Ltd., of Kyoto, Japan, manufactures and markets hardware and software for its popular home video game systems. The systems include Game Boy?, Nintendo? 64, Game Boy Advance and the NINTENDO GAMECUBE. Since the release of its first home video game system in 1985, Nintendo has sold more than 1.4 billion video games worldwide, creating enduring industry icons such as Mario and Donkey Kong and launching such franchises as Zelda and Pokemon. As a wholly owned subsidiary, Nintendo of America Inc., based in Redmond, Wash., serves as headquarters for Nintendo’s operations in the Western Hemisphere.
We are looking to fill 6 Contract Bilingual Technical Writer/Translator positions.
Description of Duties
– Coordinates the production and distribution of technical documentation related to manufacturing, repair, and quality control of Nintendo products
– Translates/localizes manufacturing engineering and quality control documentation issued by the parent company and other technicaldocumentation
– Coordinates document project priorities and scheduling
– Assigns and archives localized documentation in the document control system (AGILE)
– Maintains the accuracy and quality of technical documentation localized from Japanese to English
– Researches and formulates technical information for publication
– Coordinates translation activities
– Initiates new publishing and localization procedures that improve current practices
– Supports other technical writing, translation, and localization projects as required
– Provides assistance on quality control and manufacturing engineering projects
Qualifications
– 3-5 years translation experience
– Written and verbal fluency in Japanese and English
– Excellent writing skills
– In-depth knowledge of Japanese and English, grammar, spelling and punctuation
– Ability to ascertain and formulate the information needed to complete localization of technical publications and content required to support English/Japanese and Japanese/English translations
– Excellent organizational and project management skills
– Ability to work independently with minimal supervision
– Experience using various document publishing software (Microsoft Word, Microsoft Excel, Microsoft PowerPoint, Microsoft Visio, Adobe FrameMaker, Adobe Acrobat, Adobe Photoshop, Adobe Illustrator)
– Familiarity with Agile CM
– Experience in a technical environment is desirable
Education
– Undergraduate degree in English/Business or equivalent
** Applications and resumes will only be accepted through Nintendo’s website at http://www.nintendo.com/corp/jobs.jsp as we no longer accept paper, faxed, or emailed resumes.
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Luckily, I found another one, pink shirts be damned. I wonder what Nintendo company uniforms look like, though. I’m guessing something like this:
mariozelda.jpg