Below are the 20 most recent journal entries recorded in Jedi Aji Nomoto's LiveJournal:

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Saturday, June 20th, 2009
11:12 am	Dan P and the Bricks I finally got around to seeing Dan Potthast and the Bricks last week at Nickel City. They were a bit undermanned, but still ruled. I managed to stand still long enough to shoot video on two songs ("I've Set Sail" and "Foot Down"). ( Read more... ) Also, I saw assorted PNP acts play acoustic at Caffe Trieste last night. It was nice to see everyone, since I hadn't seen most of them since before Classics and Love (Mike, Morgan, Max and Jesse Michaels) left for the UK tour last month. Finally gave Alex the rock from Japan. The W's are in Taiwan for the summer. My hand has felt better this week. I took the book shelf out of my room. I am two weeks away from 10 years at the library. Current Mood: hungry (11 Comments |Comment on this)
Saturday, June 6th, 2009
9:34 am	大須 大須・仁王門通商店街 (Comment on this)
Friday, June 5th, 2009
11:32 pm	Swimming holes The Sunnyvale Art and Wine Festival is this weekend, which means there will probably be no parking at the library when I go in to work. There are several employee parking spaces, but the public always ignore the signs and there's no real way to regulate it. Looks like I'll be leaving this house early. In last night's dream, I left the house (a relative's house in Hawaii, if I remembered correctly) and walked over a nearby hill and into a farmer's field (thing Of Mice and Men). The first thing I noticed was that there were wind turbines everywhere - more than I could count, stretching out to the horizon. The second thing I noticed was a wooden building with about a dozen mattresses and box springs stacked against it. I was confused until I looked out at the field and saw a guy going around talking to all of his kids, who he had planting stuff and telling them that they would finally have a decent place to sleep. Walking west about a mile down the long, straight dirt road that divided the field, I eventually end up at a bridge that had a ton of Japanese tourists taking pictures. The bridge wasn't that high above the water, so people started jumping in and I was afraid that I might have to jump in to rescue some fools, but that need never arose. It was later explained to me that the water was coming from a historically important natural spring and that's why people were taking pictures. Moreover, people were wading in the water because it supposedly had healing properties. I've also had several dreams over the past few weeks in which I was playing drums behind Joe Strummer, either with the Clash or the Mescaleros. Meanwhile, I've been listening to the newer songs on the Huxtables myspace and am annoyed that the album still isn't out yet. Granted, the newer stuff doesn't really match the bratty awesomeness of the early Huxtables, but I still like them. I've decided to start a letter writing campaign to Colt until the album comes out. Hopefully it'll light a fire under them. I mean, how long has "Heart" been around? At least 5 years. Gah. Current Mood: tired (1 Comment |Comment on this)
Tuesday, June 2nd, 2009
1:24 am	Chindon-ya Last night involved a dream about another fictional PNP group. I don't remember the entire lineup, just that Jon was playing drums, with Bob and I playing trombone. We were prepping for a show and I had the jitters because we were on a bill with Asakusa Jinta, who I'm really into. In the dream, I was talking to some of them about how nervous I was and they said not to worry and that they're always nervous before playing but as soon as they walk on stage it all goes away. And speaking of Asakusa Jinta, they were on a show called PLAYLIST a while back. Their segment can be seen below. Alot of it is filmed in good old Asakusa. ------------- Meanwhile, I got a really weird pep talk last friday that actually left me feeling as if I had been scolded. There was a lot of information to process rather quickly and stuff that came up in the conversation actually had me on the defensive rather early on. The shell shock left me in a daze for a while as I tried to figure out what the hell had just happened. Current Mood: tired (1 Comment |Comment on this)
Wednesday, May 27th, 2009
10:27 pm	Bounty Hunters I had lunch with Zhou yesterday in downtown Mountain View and did the whole catch up thing. Talked about work and family and China and Japan and the Philippines. Two hours later, Zhou decided to start keeping better tabs on me and act as some sort of "parole officer" for the time being. Last week I fell asleep on my glasses and they snapped in half at the bridge of the nose. I picked up my new pair this afternoon, as well as a couple boxes of contacts. Prescriptions for both were written up last week as they had both expired quite a while ago. The dude from Comcast came today to try and figure out why our cable has been so screwed up the last couple months. You name it, we've had it. Poor picture quality. Channels dropping out unexpectedly. Sound, but no picture. Frozen pictures. He eventually suggested that we get a signal amplifier and get all the outlets rewired. That should solve all our problems. If not, there will be hell to pay. James wrote back, explaining the "S.W.A.L.K." thing that appears at the end of "Letterhead" in the liner notes. Sealed With A Loving Kiss. Not too exciting, but at least the mystery is solved. And speaking of those guys, my sister and I went to see the Super Huxtables on friday and were joined about about a dozen other people. That's it! A tough night for the bands and for Eric, but they still put on a good show. Still no mention of when the new album will come out. I bought a cheap cruiser bicycle off of craiglist last week. It's a bit too small on the small side, but it'll take me to the store and back, which is all I really need it for. I'll need to get a basket, though. I'm still on the fence as to whether to keep it or not. It's the perfect size for a few of my nephews, so I just might pass it on to them. ------------- The video isn't embeddable, but I am completely dorking out to this version of 結婚しようよ (kekkon shiyou yo) and, to a lesser extent, Kawai Naoko in general. Current Mood: amused Current Music: U Roy - Natty Rebel (Comment on this)
Thursday, May 14th, 2009
7:40 am	"He somehow got stuck between the sofa cushion and the arm" I had a series of plane crash dreams a few nights ago. Nothing horrific. Sure, the planes would knock over walls and pillars and trees and things when they hit the ground, but no one died. After each crash, the survivors, myself included, fanned out to look for supplies. Sometimes the town we landed near was populated and we were able to buy whatever we needed from the appropriated shops. Other times, the towns were abandoned and we just took whatever we needed. It wasn't like the abandoned towns were in disrepair or anything, it just seemed like the citizens had suddenly disappeared when the planes crashed. I don't remember much beyond that. The next night I had a dream in which I I just gotten out of class and made my way to a street that was lined with markets and booths run by small vendors. I took and muffin out of my bag and started picking at it as I walked around, going into shops and looking over their wares. In one tiny, dimly lit shop, some dude kept absentmindedly bumping into me, even though there was plenty of room for both of us to maneuver freely. After the third or fourth time, I ended up yelling at the guy and throwing what was left of my muffin at him before walking out. However, I was still kinda hungry, so I trekked over to a pastry shop and bought more food. As I sat there eating, I looked out the window and saw Patty and all of her friends window shopping and invited them over to sit down. However, as they made their way over, I realized that I was late for yet another class, so I ended up buying them all something and left as soon as they got their food. ------------- Conversations with my aunt in Japan and my mom (who's currently in the Philippines, taking care of my grandparents) always include the same question and the answer is always the same. No. Changes are occurring at work that may postpone my hand from falling off. And speaking of work, I helped Ibarra last night, who I may have gone to middle and high school with, but honestly can't remember talking to since elementary school. She came to the desk and said, "Isn't your name Jeff?" and I told her that my name was Jason, but told her that I used to hang out with a dude named Jeff a whole ton. I then said, "I know you, you're ______, we went to Lakewood together" and she was amazed that I could remember that far back. She was with a friend that was renewing a card, so while I taking care of that, they started talking about elementary school things and her friend didn't believe her whens he said that we'd get in trouble if we didn't dot our "I's" and I confirmed it and said that Mrs. Tong, our third grade teacher really got on our cases about it. We then shared a laugh as we recalled how evil Mrs. Tong was and how Ibarra's mom actually yelled at her one time. Current Mood: awake (1 Comment |Comment on this)
Saturday, May 9th, 2009
3:00 am	"She's just trying to protect you." A post-Dairy Belle cheeseburger nap has screwed up my sleep patterns again, so I'm a bit annoyed. Still, they gave me extra fries for free, so that was pretty cool. I think they were annoyed with the girls that ordered before me, shorted them a few fries each and get the extras to me. I also saw Grover and Ohara there. Neither recognized me, which doesn't surprise me. I haven't seen either of them in almost 10 years. Maybe more. And speaking of high school, Carolyn informed me that she got some info about the reunion. Up until now, I didn't realize there was gonna be one. Alas, I never changed my address with the alumni association, so I got no information. I see everyone that's still in Sunnyvale (or their parents, at least) anyway. It's been 10 years. ------------- While I totally sucked at making stock for ramen, I've decided that I'm gonna try to pull some soba some time in the future. I'll probably screw that up too, but whatever. If anything, it'll show me what not to do. ------------- Aside from martial arts, are there any individual sports that involve physical contact with an opponent? I've been trying to figure that out and have yet to come up with one. I'm got some pent up frustration that I'd like to unleash, but I don't really have an outlet. Ideally, it'd be via hockey or football or something like that, but my options are rather limited at this point. Basketball, maybe. Or soccer. Not quite collision sports, but contact for sure. Fighting for position and all. I don't know. Not to say that I'm angry or anything, just frustrated. Also, running or biking won't help because I'll just get annoyed that I'm not running into something or someone eventually. It would be like swinging at a baseball and missing. Maybe I should go chop down a tree or something. Current Mood: blah (1 Comment |Comment on this)
Friday, May 8th, 2009
1:26 am	Unknown changes In the last two weeks, a couple people have told me that there's something different about me that they can't really put a finger on. They've all said that I look older, which is weird because I don't think I've changed much, appearance wise, in a while. In fact, I had someone else tell me that, aside from the longer hair, I look the same as I did 5 years ago. Maybe it's something in my demeanor or how I've been carrying myself lately. Hong did tell me yesterday that I always look sad when I'm not listening or talking to someone; when there's a pause in a conversation or when it's obvious that I'm caught in my own thoughts. I didn't have a ready explanation, but eventually told her that when my brain isn't otherwise occupied, I have a tendency to think about conversations and decisions from the (sometimes distant) past that had less than desirable outcomes and feel bad and maybe even guilty about them. ------------- My left hand, fingers and wrist still bug the hell out of me. I'll probably have to get it looked at by a specialist at some point. Or change jobs. The strange thing is that I've cut back on my computer usage and video gaming a ton over the last month and work hasn't been any busier yet my appendage still feels like crap. One patron, who had surgery on his wrist, suggested that getting back into yoga and making sure to stretch out my neck and shoulders before I start work might help because it's all connected. It probably wouldn't hurt if I didn't worry so much, either. A quarter of the way through the third Dresden Files book, I managed to misplace it and have thus taken up reading the latest Star Wars storyline, Legacy of the Force. I'm currently on the second book and, following the events of the New Jedi Order story arc, I can see this as the next logical step. It doesn't mean I have to like it, though. Last night's dream featured a very drunk Matt Keegan trying to tear open a vending machine because he was out of money. Current Mood: hungry (Comment on this)
Sunday, May 3rd, 2009
4:07 pm	Cravings An exchange from April 19th, 2009 Me: "What do you miss about San Jose? Her: "Burritos*" SO TRUE! I've been back for two weeks and have yet to get one! This will change today! Also, horchata! Besides, I already got the pizza craving out of the way on thursday. * And by "burritos" she meant a burrito from a taqueria, not Taco Bell or Chipotle. In particular, she was speaking of La Victoria, near SJSU, but would have settled for pretty much anything. We then talked about how she had heard that the quality of La Vics had gone down and I confirmed the rumor, informing her that they had changed meat vendors. So next time, we'll be going to either El Abuelo, the place near my house or the place near my middle school, all of which I'm pretty down with. Current Mood: hungry Current Music: Natty Rebel - U Roy (3 Comments |Comment on this)
2:09 am	TVT I've had better dreams lately. Strange as it may seem, it took watching a new-ish lineup of the Velvet Teen last week to sorta shake me out of my grumpy mood. You may remember that I was once really into the Velvet Teen and for a while, they filled the void that was created when Slow Gherkin broke up. When Logan left the band (and later passed away), I stopped caring about the band. Sure, their songs would come up in the shuffle from time to time, but I stopped actively listening to them. I never heard anything that they recorded with Casey (the new drummer) and never saw them perform with him, either. Part of it had to do with me being so stubborn about seeing the band without Logan on drums. Another part was my own laziness. After years of being at shows every other weekend and seeing my favorite bands either breaking up or evolving into things I wasn't excited about, I was just worn out. Luckily, old favorites like the Huxtables played infrequently enough that going to one of their shows were more like a treat than an obligation. Still, from 2004 on, I never saw the Velvet Teen perform, so I missed out on a couple lineup changes. Before I left for my trip, Eric told me that he had booked them for a show and that Josh was back in the band (he had left the band in 2006 to focus on his own band, The New Trust). At the time, I said that I'd go, but wasn't sure if I was actually going to. I came back from my trip in a weird mood and during the week, decided that I'd go, if only for the distraction in the form of my happy memories of a great band. I don't really want to get into the gory details of the show but I will say that I was pretty indifferent the whole time. I think the only I perked up was when they played Logan-era songs and even then it was kinda bittersweet. However, something about being at that show helped me refocus and I, for the most part, stopped being all blah. (The funny thing about the Velvet Teen is that even though they have some incredibly uplifting and happy songs, they also have some really sad and depressing ones, so I easily could have gone the opposite way and become even more bummed out. Still, the contrast makes it easy when it comes to making a mix cd, regardless of what mood I'm in.) ------------- In other news, Shuffle broke his leg playing soccer. I have yet to talk to him about it, but apparently he's not in any extreme pain, so that's good. He's in a walking cast for the weekend and will get a real one on monday. One of the big wigs at work told me that one of her husband's friends mentioned me by name and said that I'm always really nice and helpful when they come in. She didn't say who the friend was, so I spent the rest of the day trying to figure that out. If they knew my name, it had to be one of the regular patrons because I don't go around telling my name to just anyone. Unfortunately, I go no other clues which means I remain stumped. That said, it's nice to know that I'm doing something right at work. Today's clip (この世の限り) is from last year's Ringo Expo concert. I won't lie. This song helped, too. Current Music: I've Set Sail - Dan Potthast (2 Comments |Comment on this)
Monday, April 27th, 2009
11:11 pm	La Cité des enfants perdus I've had discouraging dreams all week. Meanwhile, it appears that Boboso is down with Yoshida Takurou, so I guess I've got that going for me. But is he down with Kawai Naoko? Current Mood: amused (Comment on this)
Friday, April 24th, 2009
3:54 am	George Gissing "Mrs. Frothingham's sister, who lived near Basingstoke, gave a warm welcome to little Hugh Rolfe; and Mrs. Frothingham, who had all but forgotten that the child was not really her grandson, took charge of him with pride and joy. He stayed a week ; he stayed a fortnight;—he stayed two months. For when the Carnabys—who landed in Plymouth and rested there for a couple of days—made known their intention of straightway taking a flat in town, it seemed to Alma that the very best > thing for her health would be to spend a week or two in London, and see her old friends, and go to a few concerts. " ------------- So much for being over the jet lag! Current Mood: annoyed (Comment on this)
Thursday, April 23rd, 2009
1:10 am	"Only sad songs come to mind when I think of you..." Two weeks away from the office didn't do jack in terms of allowing my wrist and fingers to heal. It also doesn't help that I can't find my wrist support. I e-mailed James on monday, asking him to explain something that I've been curious about for 7 years. It was only on sunday when the riddle really started to bug me and I decided to go straight to the source. ------------ In other news: Sayonara, hajimemashite. Current Mood: tired (Comment on this)
Wednesday, April 22nd, 2009
2:57 am	Not that I'm thinking like this at all but.... I've had this in my head for the past two days: And, to a lesser extent, this: As uncool as it might be (I have no idea how people these days perceive him, but I can see how some people might find him cheesy), Yoshida Takurō wrote some pretty tight music. ------------- Of course, the Slow Gherkin song "Letterhead" creeps in there from time to time, as well. Current Music: 結婚しようよ (Let's Get Married) - 吉田拓郎 (Yoshida Takurō) (Comment on this)
Tuesday, March 31st, 2009
7:15 am	Regulations New rule: I need to have just gotten my haircut every time I see Yumico. We're batting 1.000 so far this year! Current Mood: amused (Comment on this)
Friday, March 20th, 2009
1:44 am	Gah! Last night, I decided to put my feet up for a few minutes before I went about looking for food. A few minutes turned into 7 hours and now I don't feel tired at all! This means I won't be going to sleep for a few hours. I have work at 9, so we'll see if the little nap screws up my day. Current Mood: annoyed (2 Comments |Comment on this)
Tuesday, March 17th, 2009
1:45 pm	Free Runaway Five show tonight! The Runaway Five plays between 1 and 3 times a year and this is one of those times! Come see Bob before he goes back to Japan and enjoy some great musical acts, including the kavanaugh brothers celtic experience. Open mic starts at 7, so bring your instrument if you're interesting in performing. We're planning on playing at 9, but may end up going on a little bit earlier. In addition, you can get one of the ultra-rare Runaway Five cds while you're there! Cafe Trieste - 315 South First Street, San Jose CA. Cost: $0.00 www.myspace.com/therunawayfive Current Mood: excited (Comment on this)
Saturday, March 7th, 2009
5:16 pm	Food - a response Ending up eating a ton of salad and butternut squash bisque at Fresh Choice for lunch yesterday and then skipped eating dinner, which isn't out of the ordinary. ------------- The ice cream truck in our neighborhood plays La Cucaracha. ------------- The Good Hustle and the Huxtables at Nickel City tonight! (1 Comment |Comment on this)
Thursday, March 5th, 2009
6:54 pm	Food I was gonna make houtou (ほうとう) for dinner tomorrow, but I can't find the recipe that I used when I made it last year (see below). So now I don't know what to eat for dinner tomorrow that will be Lent-friendly. Cheese pizza, I guess. I also can't remember how I made those orange crepes. :-/ Current Mood: annoyed (Comment on this)
Monday, March 2nd, 2009
3:45 pm	"I'm not the one that's friends with her, so I don't talk to her" Another dream at the Gargamel House, with most of the same cast members. This time, Matt had harvested his garden and was grilling them in the back yard. I came late to the party, so by the time I got there, all he had to offer me were yams and radishes. The Huxtables play at Nickel City on saturday. ------------- The pile at work keeps growing. At least I know I'm earning my paycheck. (Comment on this)