acchan, cats, and hair with a mind of its own

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march 2-3, 2010

chill out days.

march 4, 2010

went to mac store in shibuya to get new macbook. helped by very nice guy. at one point, when he was looking at my old computer, he looked at my wallpaper and was like "is that a japanese band?" and i was like "yeah, it's l'arc~en~ciel." he asked me if they're popular in the u.s. and i told him that they're well known among the anime fans and that they played a concert in america. it was kind of like "are your really asking me what band that is?" because the same exact image as my wallpaper is on a humongous billboard not two streets over. left my old computer at the store so that the mac geniuses could transfer my files to my new computer. before i left, he gave me his business card. when i looked at it later, it made me laugh because his name is "atsushi." although atsushi is a fairly common japanese name, i always associate it with the lead singer from "buck-tick" ( www.youtube.com/watch?v=tOvf0s… ).

because no computer, ended up looking through some of the magazines i've bought over the months. a while back bought bass magazine special edition featuring tetsuya (tetsu from l'arc~en~ciel). ended up reading entire multi-page interview and understood ninety percent. one really entertaining thing about reading l'arc~en~ciel interviews is that the band is from kansai region (around osaka) so they occasionally slip into dialect. this usually happens when they quote themselves or other members of the band, and it always ends up sounding very snarky when they do it. excited because tetsuya announced solo tour in july ( www.youtube.com/watch?v=ugVHvk… ), maybe i could go see?

march 5, 2010

met ashley in ikebukuro. had lunch at deny's.

ashley is a huge "buck-tick" fan, so told her about atsushi at the mac store and had a good laugh over it. she told me i should call him "acchan," a nickname fans call atsushi of "buck-tick."

then went to "nekobukuro" to pet cats. lots of very nice cats to pet. particularly liked a grey cat with thick black markings that slept in a little ball on top of a cat tower. another cat, kinda ugly smoosh-faced cat with weird curly light brown fur that ashley called "grandpa" sitting on a little shelf. kept saying "grandpa's still on the shelf" to ashley and we laughed.

afterwards, had parfaits at "milky way."  then made our way to shibuya. went to the mac store, but having problems transferring my files from my old macbook to my new one, so need more time. atsushi seemed really upset that we had come all the way to the store, but the macbook wasn't ready. i told him that it was really no problem.

had dinner at "freshness burger." explored "tower records." chatted in a cafe for a little bit. made plans for indies concert tomorrow.

while in mammoth intersection in front of shibuya station, television screens played l'arc~en~ciel pepsi commercial ( www.youtube.com/watch?v=mTD3e9… ), very excited!

march 6, 2010

today, indies concert featuring valuna (ヴァルナ), lycaon, and alsdead (all bands i've seen before).

met ashley at hachiko in shibuya. had lunch at hawaiin burger place. had b.l.t. with avocado and swiss cheese.

then chilled out at starbucks for a while. ashley has very colorful language and some western guy sitting nearby kept staring over at us whenever she used certain words.

went over to concert venue. separated from ashley because she already had a ticket and i didn't. ended up talking to german girl in line. when got into venue, found ashley. as usual, second row on left side in order to see kirimaru (crazy oral fixation "dalmatian-san" bassist) from valuna and satoshi (crazy mad hatter guitarist) from lycaon. german girl came over to talk with us. caroline found us later.

ashley has incredibly long hair, which has been known to attack and strangle people when she headbangs. during valuna, ashley's hair snatched my glasses and flung them across the room. had to wait until valuna finished to try and find them. we asked some of the japanese girls in the audience if they had seen my glasses and a huge group of them started chanting "megane?" (glasses?) and searching the floor. they didn't find them, but it was really sweet of them to try.

ended up watching rest of concert glasses-less. during lycaon, mio (crazy bondage bassist) grabbed ashley and me simultaneously by the wrist and dragged us up towards the stage. he then proceeded to ruffle my hair. i ended up on the very end of the front row on the bar. while i was "throwing the horns" as they say (which is proper indies concert etiquette to show appreciation for the band's performance), mio accidentally knocked my hand. at least he didn't plant a foot on my shoulder like he did to some of the girls. over the course of the show, both mio and satoshi both ended up falling into the audience and the audience had to collectively push them up onto the stage.

after the show, asked a staff member about my glasses. when i told him that my glasses "tonjatte..." (unfortunately flew), he laughed. he told me to wait and he'd go search the stage. he came back with a pair of sunglasses which of course weren't mine. while he went back to look again, the german girl couldn't find her drink ticket so i gave her mine because i didn't really want anything and i didn't want to waste the ticket. then the german girl found my glasses tucked away in a corner on the other side of the stage. talk about good karma! i couldn't believe that i found my glasses and that they weren't crushed or even scratched!! outside of venue, saw lycaon pack up their van and drive off. this was particularly hilarious and disturbing because we discovered that mad-hatter satoshi is their driver.

ashley, caroline, german girl, and i ended up at "first kitchen" for a little snack/dinner. next indies concert on wednesday, march 10th with "exist†trace" and kaya.

march 7, 2010

talked with dk house staff today. wife asked me about okinawa. told her my plans. she told me to be sure to have sunglasses. husband made some comment about x-men and shooting lasers from sunglasses. we all laughed.

hung out at kinokuniya in shinjuku for a little while. then went to shibuya to pick up my new macbook. staff lady who helped me was very helpful and friendly. when she told me (in english) that they had to transfer my files from my old macbook to my new one manually, i told her "taihen desu ne" (which means some like "that's a pain, isn't it?"). we laughed.

had to carry my old and new macbooks in my backpack through the wind and rain. very exhausted when i got home.

***

p.s. this music video makes me feel incredibly claustrophobic ( www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZAvOiE… ).
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