Monthly Archives: March 2007

Ponyo on a Cliff


The new Miyazaki movie, Ponyo on a Cliff has been announced. Scheduled for Summer 2008, it’s about a boy and a goldfish princess, Ponyo, who wants to become human. It will be done in a watercolor and pastel animation style, which should be awesome. I loved Tonari no Yamada-kun, which was like conte drawings and sketches. It was very cool. What intrigues me about the new film, besides the artwork, is that the main character, Sosuke, is five-years old, which is the same age as Bay.

I am really hoping for a film more in the vein of Tonari no Totoro or Kiki’s Delivery Service, rather than the more recent film, Howl’s Moving Castle. While I enjoy the more adult-themed recent movies, the innocence of movies like Totoro and Kiki needs to make a comeback, in my opinion.

Costco: Cheap CF Card

That’s a lot of C’s in the title… anyways, bought a new Sandisk Extreme II 2GB compact flash card for the camera yesterday at Costco. Now I can comfortably shoot in RAW! The 2GB card was only $35, while the 1GB that was right next to it was going for $45. Go figure.

Sore Throat Go Away

On Wednesday of last week I started getting a sore throat, and it has stayed with me all weekend, getting so painful that it would keep me awake at night. I’d have to take some tylenol, and also got some numbing throat spray and cough drops. I felt pretty good otherwise, just this damn sore throat. Today, it seems to be less severe, so tomorrow it should be gone. So far, Mariko and the kids have been immune, let’s hope they don’t catch my sore throat.

Teppo Japanese Restaurant, Dallas TX


During our trip to Dallas, we had dinner at Teppo, a small Japanese restaurant that was pretty close to the hotel we were staying at. What was crazy was that we went on St. Patrick’s Day, and the street that Teppo is located on was swarming with partyers! It was like a mini 6th Street at Mardi Gras. Consequently, we had to pay $20 for parking, as the lot for Teppo patrons was all full. The restaurant itself was pretty much empty, and we had reservations for 5:30pm, right when they opened.

Continued…

Quick Observations about Dallas

  • It’s bizarre that you can change neighborhoods so quickly. Was driving thru a pretty run-down area, then a block later, there were huge mansions.
  • There are a lot more obese people in Dallas than in Austin.
  • Dallas drivers are crazy. This is coming from someone who grew up in SoCal, btw.
  • There is a CVS on every corner in Dallas.

    • Himitsu no Hanazono (ヒミツの花園) Episode 10

    Wow, talk about a cliffhanger! This series is consistently great, but I do have one gripe about it. During the title sequence, when they are showing the credits and play the theme song, they throw in some scenes from the episode. This is bad. If I don’t want to know what happens later, I gotta look away quickly, but I often forget, and see some spoilers. It’s a minor annoyance, but still… and then at the end, they will throw in a preview of next week’s episode. That also sucks, but I can usually remember to look away or turn off the video before I see anything revealing. Actually, they do these spoilers on most dramas, I guess it’s kind of the norm.

    Anyways, this dorama is almost over, and the main plot, as well as the subplots are set up to conclude shortly. The last big secret is supposed to be revealed. It’s a strange drama, because there are three secrets, not just the obvious one that we know about from the first episode.