Wow! Apple has done it again with their new iPod Mini. Its tiny, and has a decent 4GB capacity. And it looks totally cool! But, in true Apple form, it costs way too much ($249)! For around the same price, you can get a 20 or 30GB player from Creative. A cool design is one thing, but cold, hard cash is another. Still, you gotta love Apple for creating beatifully designed products that leave everyone else playing catch-up.

This week, Bay has started going to a new daycare center, so my morning commute has taken me on a different route: Old Spicewood Spring Road. It is fantastic! It is a small two-lane road that winds through hill country, crossing several streams, and finally takes me to Highway 360. I believe the road continues on, and I will have to follow it one of these days. It is a joy to drive on, because of its many curves and interesting scenery. It’s much nicer than looking at tail lights on 360. An added bonus is that not many people take that way, at least not in the time I have traveled on it. A couple coworkers told me to look out for traffic cops with their radar-guns, though.

Today it has been in the 30’s. Right now the weather site says 37° (feels like 30°). Glad we will be nice and warm at home tonight!

Please help me find my 128MB CF card. I took it out of the card reader that we use on the laptop and was going to put it back in the camera. But on the way there (probably 15 ft) I got sidetracked and lost it. Bay was no help, although I bet he was the one who sidetracked me. Now I am suspecting the cats. Mariko had a bad back and couldn’t move, so she is not one of the suspects. Of course I realize that the blame is fully with me and it is just sitting there somewhere, and will be found by the cleaners probably…

We ate some traditional and not-so-traditional food today. It was so good! Mariko, Eriko, and Kevin made the food. I just ate. We also had sake and beer and watched the entire Kouhaku which I had taped the night before.

We are eating soba and watching Kouhaku! Yay!

While on Maui last week, my brothers, father, and I stopped by a ukulele store in Wailuku. Mele Ukulele has some beautiful instruments and a really nice staff. The price of their instruments is a little out of my range, since I am just a beginner, but it was nice to see some quality koa ukuleles and be able to hear them first-hand. While talking to one of the guys who “seemed” to work there (maybe he was just hanging out), he recommended I get a concert size ukulele to play, rather than the standard size. He said they sound fuller and will be more versatile.

I already have a really cheap Johnson standard ukulele which I broke, so I wanted a new one. The bridge snapped off, and although I was able to reattach and glue it cleanly, it is out of tune. Plus the tuning pegs were terrible and it never really stayed in tune for more than a minute or two. Bay still likes to play that one, though. It’s his “guitar”.

Anyways, today I ordered a concert ukulele, Hilo brand. It is not expensive, but seems to be ok for a student. It was $39.99+shipping. I will play around with it and see if I stick with the ukulele.

I was checking out Mie’s webpage Kokochi, and she has this cool Nokia pen that she used to jot down messages, and then the messages can be emailed to her blog using her keitai. It’s pretty sweet!

That got me thinking about my own crazy handwriting, which is not too different from hers. You can see some of it in the title banner at the top of this page. I like my handwriting, except when I have to write an uppercase “M”. It always ends up looking like an “H”. So when I write Mariko’s name, it looks like “Hariko”. Maybe I should try a different style “M”, sort of like lowercase, only with uppercase size… How complicated my life is.

Over vacation, I found out a lot about where my family came from. My blood is pretty mixed up, but the breakdown looks like this:

62.5% Chinese
25% Japanese
6.25% Hawaiian
6.25% English

My brothers and I always thought that we had Irish blood in us, but it seems that our great great grandfather was actually from England. I also found out that another great grandfather of ours was from Yanai in Yamaguchi pref. in Japan. I’d love to find out more about our family in Japan and China.