I don't watch much TV in Japan and didn't really watch all that much in the US before moving. But I admit that I was looking forward to being able to enjoy a few of the shows that entertain me (aka the Simpsons) as well as surfing the Discovery and History Channels. I watched a bit here and there, but I was blown away at the commercial industry.

Advertising in its current incarnation is the bane of humanity, in my opinion. There isn't anything inherently evil about promoting a product or idea or competing for a particular market share. Both of these aspects of advertising contribute to better products and empower consumers to exercise the power of their dollar. But advertising in the U.S. at least (and probably in many other places as well) goes beyond product promotion. Modern advertising works in ways to make you want goods that you didn't know existed, desire goods that you didn't want, buy goods you don't need. Pure psychological manipulation contributing to rampant consumerism. It's wasteful, it's hypocritical, and it's unhealthy.

A good example of this (and the incident that sparked this oh-so-inspiring article): Brand name drug advertisements. One of the first things I saw on TV was a slick commercial for a new drug that not only presented itself as the cure for a disease, but actually fabricated the disease right in front of you. A beautiful nature scene provided the backdrop for a soothing paternal announcer who asked a few questions about your state of health (Do you get hungry during the day? Do you find yourself using the bathroom outside of the house? Do you get tired at night?) that while not as obvious as my examples are nevertheless entirely useless and inappropriate for identifying a malady in need of chemical remediation. We are then informed that if we answered yes to any of these questions, we may be suffering from a "New Disease You Haven't Heard of but Sounds Like Something You Might Have [and might need to get new and expensive drugs for!]." All you have to do is ask your doctor about this wonder drug that can solve your problems.

The trick here is that many people in this day and age are unsatisfied with their lives in one way or another. Marketing magic waves its sleight-of-hand and describes an illness that is non-descript enough to cover just about all of us in one way or another. Advertisers in this case slip into our wallets by tapping into our tendency to accept a medical cause for our problems. The drugs they market are actually mind-numbing anti-depressants with minimal side-effects (who needs a sex drive when you aren't depressed anyway!). The real kicker though, is that the doctors that prescribe this medicine are as often as not shareholders in the companies that produce them. For every pill you buy, they get a return on their investment. Can you spell c-o-n-f-l-i-c-t o-f i-n-t-e-r-e-s-t????

(Don't you think it is odd that America hates certain self-medicated recreational drugs, but loves, desires, endorses, supports, subsidizes, yearns, seeks, believes in, has a fucking bill of rights for, prescription drugs? If you feel a little down about life, you can get a prescription for a designer anti-depressant, but if you decide to relax by smoking a particular plant instead, you get jail time. This is all the more surprising in light of a recent survey indicates that death due to prescription medication mishaps may be one of the top five killers of Americans. Funky, huh?)

None of this is new to any of you I'm sure, but I can't help but think that some of you have become so accustomed to it all that you fail to realize how incredibly insidious it has become.
Advertising has become astronomically competitive at the same time as the industry has gained intricate knowledge of human culture and psychology. Advertisers are no longer content to promote their products and inform consumers but aim instead to create "Brand consumers," people who identify personally with a particular product and thus consistently (and loyally) buy it ALL the time.

Many of the evils laid at the doorstep of capitalism are products not so much of the capitalistic economic system per se but are more accurately outgrowths of advertising run amok. Admittedly this is likely an inevitable outcome of competitive capitalism, as the pressures involved in profit enhancement are vented via psychological manipulation of the populace. But it is reaching incredibly far into our lives, beyond the waste and illegitimacy of branded consumables and has begun affect us on deeper levels.

Laid over in L.A. on my way to Idaho, I found a USA Today newspaper abandoned in the terminal. The cover article of the business section was all about companies' efforts to attract and retain kids on their websites. Not only was I shocked to discover the blatant efforts at psychological manipulation, but I was stunned that they were at ease enough with it to detail this to a major national newspaper. The article describes their efforts to turn kids into brand consumers at the earliest possible moment.

As if this type of literal cognitive-branding wasn't bad enough, the article discussed the methods that they use to entice and retain kids' eyeballs. One thing that really disturbed me was the choice to reduce text and make more graphically oriented pages. I understand that kids can't read so well when they are 3,4,5 years old (the target age of these advertisers), but considering the time that kids spend gaming, watching TV and using the internet, it is scary that they can function in life without reading. This is a perfect example of how the monetary bottom line sells out kids to economics of modern life.

I am perhaps guiltier than most for spouting off endlessly about the problems of the world while contributing very little to the solutions. But this one is easy, folks. I beg, plead, urge, advise, cajole, ask, beseech, command, dictate, and otherwise impress upon you to think long and hard at the type of advertising you are exposed to. Think about what product is being endorsed and what techniques (celebrity heads, hardbodies, Image with a capital I, etc.) Have you ever paid attention to the sex in advertising? The blatant use of sex to sell is well known and documented (remember the Swedish Bikini Team?), but if you watch, you'll find it much more subtly in many, many places where you won't notice unless you are looking.

My wife didn't believe me at first when I told her about the irrelevant use of sex to attract your attention and tug at your pursestrings. I then pointed out to her all the times that sex was needlessly used in a product promotion. I haven't run the statistics, but at least 2/3 of advertisements use sex or other tools that are unaffiliated with the products or services sold to garner your attention and your loyalty. Among the rest, a large portion are image sales pitches (many of which have sexual undertones).

For example, many sporting clothes companies sell an image of "coolness" which sports (ha!) an underlying association with health, beauty, and ultimately attractiveness regarding the opposite sex. I need to rein myself in here to avoid going off on a tangent completely, but let me leave you with something else to chew on. Everyone knows and agrees that modern (American and Japanese at least) society is incredibly preoccupied with particular conceptions of what is beautiful and attractive. We all know that this is primarily driven by the media images we are immersed in. But did you ever stop to realize that it was mostly fabricated to create consumables? Diet plans, health club memberships, sportswear: all driven by manufactured propaganda who's sole purpose is to transfer the monetary fruits of our labor to a company's bank account.

As I said before, this is not really new or revolutionary at all. If you already think about this stuff, I would apologize but I figure you deserve if it you've read this far. If you are interested in reading up more on this topic, I highly recommend Doug Rushkoff's book "Coercion." The author spent a couple years hanging out with the advertisers of the world and then wrote a book all about the techniques and methods they use to influence your buying behaviors. You will be shocked and learn quite a bit, I guarantee. I hear that Noam Chomsky's "Manufactured Consent" is also very good, but I haven't read it yet. The Primer on Revolution also lays out a plan for combating the powers that seek to think for you.

Think about what you buy and why you buy it. Resist the urge to play the consumerism game. I am not a saint in any respect here as well, but every attempt to influence you via advertising that is resisted is a step in the right direction. Pay attention to the pervasiveness and subtleties of advertising. Watch for the tricks they pull to garner your attention and get you to associate positive but irrelevant images with their product. Take control of your purchasing decisions. Fight the power!!

As you all must have noticed by now, MooP is missing. I and I alone know where he is right now. Yes, he has been abducted by me, but the rumors that this is just a lark or sexually motivated prank are patently false. MooP is still alive, but there are no guarantees at how long that will last. If the Asylum doesn’t acquiesce to my demands, MooP’s outlook is not good. A deep sea burial in his future, if you catch my not-so-subtle point.

Many of you are wondering why Nutrimentia, such a nice upstanding member of the community, would partake in obviously treasonous behavior. If you have seen the movie Mishima you may understand. This "treason" is anything but. I am an Asylum Patriot through and through and am willing to give my life so that it may live. I am fully aware that this action may incite many of you to attempt to terminate my command with extreme prejudice (I have already destroyed those mail bombs you tried). But for the sake of the Asylum, I do what I do. I am prepared to let history be the judge of my actions, for I know that I will be revered as a hero and seen as the savior that I am.

When the Asylum started, it was a refuge. A refuge from that cesspool known as SPF, which itself was a refuge from the real world, a steaming pile of shit so horrid that we chose to immerse ourselves in the world of Jay Stile to get away from it. The Asylum was a dream community, full of frolicking freedom and unfettered fun.

Alas, all good things must come to an end and the Asylum now hangs by the neck from a tenuous tether. This place has been infected and effectively destroyed. What are we now? Where are we now? This is supposed to be a place for socializing and meeting people, but those days are long gone.

We profess to desire new membership, but we crucify newbies mercilessly. We claim to give bewbie points fairly, but avondale had to force Dingle’s hand (away from his greasy funstick) to get any points. We claim to be a bastion of freedom, but the Natsi Admins constantly are moving threads and deleting posts.

GoFuckYourselves infects every thread, every post, every comment, with dry wretched humor. PaintCHiPs waxes eternally on every fucking subject to the point of causing brain aneurysms in anyone foolish enough to begin reading his tripe. Rav and Chelle prance ruthlessly throughout the forum, and who knows what would happen if we didn’t have flood control? WastedPotential slaughters everyone in trivia and then flouts his savantism in our faces. Founder tack has seen the problems and tried to save us from ourselves, but the powers that be quickly snuffed out that point of light and ray of hope.

The site almost went down a few weeks ago because wonderaz broke his desk being a fuckwit. We have been foolish to place our trust in reckless fools who don’t value the life and longevity of the site. Remember what it was like when Stile shut down his forum because we were acting like babies? Imagine the pain and frustration involved in a site shutdown caused by inattentive administration and lax concern for the hardware that we reside in. At least stile was thinking about us; wonderaz just cares for his birds and that shiteating mutt he calls a dog.

Things must change, and I am the one to do so. I have taken MooP from the confines of the asylum and brought him here with me. I am currently taking my frustration out on the poor bastard. My frustrations with life, with you, and perhaps most of all with MooP himself. I had planned to let you all sweat it out a little bit before I made my demands, but I can only take so much of this crap. I know you want him back, you need him back, so listen up:

Demand "1: I want the site name changed back to asylumwhores. This place was better when we all had degrading self-perceptions and felt that we were worthless disease infested nobodies. Now that we identify ourselves as a "nation," we are all proud and xenophobic and shit.

Demand #2: I want the keys and passcodes to peer. I debated dismissing the admin team outright, but realized that I can’t handle it all on my own and decided to let them stay on under my command. But I require full unfettered access to peer in order to begin cleaning up the crap. Registered members will rejoice to hear that I will immediately end all peer-related IRC connection resets, as well as revoking the admins ability to move threads, delete posts, edit comments, or otherwise fold, spindle, or mutilate our content.

Demand #3: I want stile as moderator of the TLF. He really knows how to run a forum and getting rid of the prior mods to make room for a moderator of stile’s caliber can only make things better.

Demand #4: WastedPotential (and any variation of that nick/ personality, etc.) is banned from all trivia events, forever. WastedP’s new role in trivia related events is as score-keeper and repository of information. Anyone wishing to host a trivia event need only to think of questions and then go get the answers from WastedPotential (he has them, trust me).

Demand #5: Streaming webcams. All you people with cams may need to buy new hardware and upgrade your internet connections, but the current once-a-month update situation is just unacceptable. When we visit the cam page, we should be able to see you in action, not just trapped in some glassy-eyed pose. Streaming webcams will make inter-cam interactions more exciting as well.

Demand #6: This is the only selfish demand I have. I require a new computer, a non-Mac. I know that Macs are the best and will continue to use my current computer, but since so many fools here seem to think that windows and linux machines are better, I figure I should have one. If nothing else, it will enable me to play more games and give me a chance to familiarize myself with these machines so I can better convince fiend and macker that my mac-hine is truly superior. I don’t care if you decide to pool your resources and send me the box or just want to send cash and I’ll buy the computer over here. As long as it is a 25Ghz Pentium Athlon Mega with a terabyte optical RadeoForceX graphics chip, I’m happy.

Demand #7: Free Samples of Store Stock. We can start with the toilet brush, but as additional inventory is added to the store, I want complimentary samples. Forever. This is an ongoing demand.

Demand #8: 15 "demand credits." I can’t think of any more demands right now and my foot is sore from holding MooP down while I type. But I know that there is more that I want and more changes need to be made, so I need guarantees that my future desires (for the good of the Asylum, of course) will be honored and implemented.

That’s it, plain and simple folks. As soon as I get confirmation that these requests are complete, I will return little ‘ole MooP and you can go back to your blissfully ignorant lives. The Asylum will be rejuvenated with this fresh start I am giving it.

A final word of warning: Those who choose to characterize this as a "coup" should refrain from voicing such obviously ignorant and confrontational opinions until these alterations have been implemented. I am not dictatorial or power hungry here. If it should turn out that these changes do not improve the state of the Asylum, I will promptly return it to the condition it was when I took over tried to save you from yourselves.

And don’t try to save MooP without my permission. I have implanted a tiny detonation device that will kill him if he is taken out of range. Only I know the code to disable this device, so any attempt to kill or otherwise disable me or to snatch MooP back would be dreadfully ineffective.

We all know we live in a time of progress, but consider the kind of progress that surrounds us. It is all scientific, technological progress. There has been philosophical progress on arcane issues of knowledge and whatnot, and social science has regular paradigm shifts. We are learning more and more about the physical universe we live in and advertisers are finding better ways to get us to buy their stuff. But what kind of social progress have we made? What about learning from the experiences of others? I think a convincing argument could be made that society has devolved in as many respects as it has advanced.

It seems to me that so much of what we know in life comes from two places: school and self-experience. Of course we learn things from family and friends, but if you look at the way that smaller societies integrate the incoming and outgoing generations, I can’t help but think that we are missing something. There is no need for us to re-invent the wheel, but it seems that is what we must do in this day and age. Not to open the can of worms about school violence, but part of the problems stem from poor environments that kids are raised in. This isn’t a critique of parents so much as an observation that the cycle of birth through growth and learning to aged wisdom and teaching no longer functions as it did.

Think about how much wiser and mature you are than you were 2, 3, 5, 10 years ago. That developmental process doesn’t really end, you know. People in their 60s are a full decade older, wiser, and experienced than those in their 50s. But it is more than just acquisition of experience and perception. They lived in an entirely different political and social climate, which gives them a unique perspective on life.

Sometimes friends sit around and ponder life without certain comforts, but many of our elders actually know what that was like. You literally can travel back in time when you talk to old people. Take my grandpa, for example. My grandpa is one of the coolest people I know. I lived with him for a summer and even when I wasn’t staying there, I always made a point to go spend an afternoon chatting with him.

He was born in 1923. I never talked to him about what he did before WWII, but I know that he fought the war for three years. We talked of his experiences sometimes, but he didn’t really like to glorify those days. He would bring it up now and again when it was relevant, but mostly we just talked about stuff. He had traveled the world in the war, but had also been all over the U.S. afterwards. He was a farmer. He moved his family of 6 to North Idaho and grew it to 14. 6 boys and 6 girls. Good Catholics.

He was the caretaker of The Old Mission State Park in Northern Idaho, home of the oldest building in the state. He was also a postman and served in the Peace Corps in the Philippines. He always had a small livestock farm and a decent garden that produced stuff for sale at the local farmer’s market. He smoked unfiltered cigarettes, usually generics that he pulled the filters off of and smoked backwards. He was a smart, funny guy who lived a good life.

I learned a lot from talking to him. Just as we are products of our generations so are our elders. The value of talking to them isn’t just "So…… what was life like before cable?" but rather just the perspective they can provide about things. Of course being old doesn’t mean you are a valuable vault of knowledge (take wonderaz, for example). But the image of old people as senile, incompetent, grouchy bastards who can’t drive (again, take wonderaz, for example) deserves to be re-evaluated.

In pre-modern society, elder's lives were learned from and used as examples of morality, integrity, and character. In modern society, we have become so enamored with our own little life-space and the value of technological progress, we have neglected to harvest the bounty of experience that resides in the older generation. There may be some who would ask what we can learn from the fuddy-duddies who lived in a world so unlike what we inhabit today. Modern society, they say, is too new, too versatile, too fast for the past to mean anything.

Of course we think of today as the fastest moments in history, and to a degree this is not inaccurate. But it is foolish to think that just because a generation didn’t go through the Internet revolution they lived a static life. My Grandpa was born in the Roaring 20’s, lived his childhood during the Depression, grew up amidst WWII and then raised a family in the ensuing decades of change from the dawn to the close of the Cold War. Don’t even try to tell me that the people that lived through all that aren’t experienced when it comes to change.

A lot of us spend time talking about this, that and the other, and I think that we could learn a lot from talking about the same stuff with old people. My grandpa was always down for talk about society and politics, international relations and human nature. He always had an anecdote or an old Irish rhyme that was entertaining and relevant. My grandpa impressed me with his knowledge and overall comfort with the world. He knew more about the way people are than many of the anthropologists and psychologists that I study with.

I think that in his day, kids and adults had better rapport than today. I think a lot of the character issues modern society struggles with are partially due to this lack of inspiration and interaction between the old-wise and the young-foolish. Not that talking to an old lady is going to make you a better person, but for me at least, talking to people who have lived a whole life while I have barely started mine is humbling, inspiring, and I respect them.

The connection that I feel to my grandfather and his generation gives me a reverence for the past. I yearn to provide the same time of link to my present (but the future’s past) when I am old. This drives me to lead a good life, a life that not only serves as an example but also helps preserve the world for the future.

What is the point of having unconnected eras? So what if we have faster travel, instantaneous communication? Society is no better off if it cannot build on, or at least continue, the traditions and knowledge of those who came before. Perhaps that is the most pressing threat to modern society?

My grandpa died last summer. He was 77 years old. I miss him, but I learned so much from him that I feel that he lives on with me and through me. My other grandpa died about 10 years ago, before I had a chance to get to know him. As I learned more about him I really miss him because I know of all the things that he could have shown me. I know that knowing my grandpa has made me a better person and honors him with a legacy. I hope that I can do the same someday, but if we don’t re-instate a tradition of knowing our elders, I suspect that opportunity will never come to pass. Society may advance on certain levels, but in other important ways, it will just spin its wheels.

The feelings that I have about this guy kind of perplex me. After all, he is a good friend, but when I really think about it, there isn’t much history between us. We kind of knew each other in junior high, but then I left for a few years, moved out of state. I eventually started coming back for summers and holiday parties and got to know this guy again. He and I are good friends now and I would do anything I can to ever help him out, but when I stop to think, this strength of friendship based on so little time spent together somewhat surprises me.

Then I realized that I can’t help being friends with people. None of us can. We need people like we need oxygen, food, and high-speed Internet connections. If we don’t have them, we wish we did and all we can think about is how to get them.

You all know the story: 12-20 billion years ago, a little spot of nothing blew up into a whole lot of something else. By and by, about 6 billion years ago, there came to be a certain rock floating around a certain ball of burning gas in a certain arm of a certain galaxy, all pretty much in the middle of nowhere. About 2 billion years after this, life appeared on this rock. All sorts of life swarmed all over the rock, fucking and eating mostly. It so developed that one peculiar form of life we call primates started hanging around on the ground a lot. This is about where my story picks up (there is a point, I swear!).

As these early apes began to come out of the trees, they ran into problems. More accurately, problems began to run into them, usually after stalking them for a while. While it would have been nice to have extra sets of eyes and better sniffers and all, that takes too long to evolve. So much easier to make friends with somebody. They can help keep an eye out for you as well as come to your rescue when you need it. Those who made friends and were good friends did better in life and had kids who in turn were good friends and all. By and by through the wonderful process of evolution, we ended up with a species of "people" (strangely we don’t considers ourselves apes anymore….) with innate tendencies to be friends with each other.

As a young kid in a grade school class of about 25-30 kids (Hell, my hometown had an official population of only around 70), I assumed a role near the bottom of the hierarchy that inevitably develops out of a group of social apes, especially males. You may be familiar with the drinking game "asshole" (or maybe presidents and assholes): Everyone sits in a rank order wherein anyone with a higher rank can make anyone with a lower rank drink whenever they want. Obviously the President has no one above him/her and never has to drink and the Asshole has no below but is below everyone so he/she never gets to give orders and is always catching shit from everyone. My life in grade school was like this sometimes, only we never drank and I wasn’t at the very bottom. There were just a couple kids who incessantly picked on me and gave me this complex about doubting myself and my value as a person.

It was so confusing for me because I thought I was a pretty good friend to have. Since some of these guys who picked on me were also my friends, I had a weird world where my friends would rank me out every other day. I learned to value the real friends I had, friends that I have until this day and will have until I die. But I also learned the value of being a friend. I learned how to recognize what makes a person a good friend and I know how to be a good friend. If anything, I may be too good a friend at times, to the point of being annoying about it.

The group of friends that I have right now are family. They are not like family, they are family. We have all been through tough times; you can grow up in North Idaho and not go through tough times. We are friends because we know the value of having and being friends. There is nothing I wouldn’t do for these guys (but there are some I won’t lend money too!) and I know they are there when I need them, either to go drinking with or to talk shit about the world with. My life has more meaning to me when I have close friends like this.

Although the friend who has started heroin and I don’t have a lot of history, he is my friend and I am his. We are friends because we both know the value of friendship and enjoy upholding those values for the other. This is a guy that got stabbed twice in the back by an ex-girlfriend but checked out of intensive care to come testify at the court hearings of another friend. We look out for each other.

That is why I am scared as shit that he may have finally taken a step down a path that he won’t be able to come back from. From what I hear, heroin is a fucking tough monkey to get off your back. I’ve seen him crawl out of a stiff meth habit and know that he is pretty intelligent, in spite of all the dumb-as-fuck shit he gets into. He has only been loving the needle for a month or so now, and some friends are on the intervention path to get him out of the scene ASAP. Who knows what the future holds for him? I feel somber at the thought that he may never kick the heroin habit and that it will color our relationship forever, in effect destroying the life we had. But I will always stand by him as best I can, because that's what friends do.

I didn’t really know where I was going as I wrote this, but I think I was trying to make a point about the value of friendship and how much we need it. Not to get too gushy on you all, but take time to appreciate your friends. Tell them how much they mean. Always look out for them because they are looking out for you. If you have a friend you haven’t heard from in a long time but still think about from time to time, go find them and get in touch. I’m sure they think about you too and would like to hear from you.

And although you, the Asylum whores, will never be as close to me as my flesh-and-blood cohorts from the lead lined valleys of Idaho are, you are also friends. You are here for me to vent my anger, to hear my pleas, to answer my questions, to respond to my posts. You help to fill the social void that exists when you live 7000 miles away from your friends. Thank you.

I hope I didn't take on a depressing or whiny note here, but dammit, people. Love one another and your friends.

That’s all that life is: family and friends. Without them, you ain’t got shit.

Anyway, he took me golfing. I really didn’t know what to expect. My golfing experience consists of 9 holes 10 years ago with 2 12-year friends of my brother. I smashed some balls at the driving range a couple times in the last year with my father-in-law, but for all practical purposes I am a total and complete newbie.

I borrowed a old set of clubs from my father-in-law, who was pretty worried about the whole ordeal. He is a serious button-down type of guy who takes golf as seriously as heart surgery (that’s what he did before he went into hospital administration). He was concerned that I would foul the course so he took me to the driving range to practice a week before the actual golfing date. After hitting a couple hundred balls, I actually improved my swing quite a bit, but unfortunately this new knowledge apparently got left at the driving range. It wasn’t with me on the fairway, at least.

Golf day arrives. I take a bullet train out to the area where the course is and someone picks me up. Our group is about 20 people from his flock. I had met a couple of them before, but it was the first time I had seen most of them. We broke up into foursomes and started off.

The game itself really isn’t any different from the American game I don’t think. Same little ball into the same little hole. Due to high utilities' costs though, the fairways don’t get a lot of water and were rather brown and dry. Or maybe that is standard on American courses too. I dunno.

One really, really cool thing is the caddy system here. In Japan, you NEVER carry your own clubs and you never have to tip your caddy! There are no carts for the players, but the clubs are on a cart that runs on a track around the course. The cool thing is that the carts can steer themselves!! Our caddy was a female, and while she would ride the cart a little bit, more often she would just push a button on her belt and the cart would start up, drive along the track, and then stop at the right spot. I was entranced with this little auto-pilot display throughout the entire 18 holes. Totally cool.

There was a pit stop after the fourth and 14 holes. Steamed wet towels and a quick beer later, we are back on our feet. Lunch between the front and back nine was udon noodles and a big mug of beer and then back out we traipsed.

I think I did pretty good for never having golfed before. I ended the day at double par, 144. 74 on the front, 70 on the back. I did have a couple nice drives and a great putt, so I was happy. Everyone agreed the greens were extremely fast at this course, which only made me feel better about my score.

The real fun started that night though. We all stayed at a local inn run by another member of Hishida’s flock. We checked in and headed straight for the bath.

Japanese make a big deal out of baths. They are often a group affair, occasionally coed, but usually not. I did go to one coed onsen once but was extremely disappointed when the only women there were about 80 years old and shaped like bowling balls.

The bath at this inn was normal: a bunch of little "stalls" with a faucet and shower head on a hose, soap, shampoo, and mirror. Each station also had a little stool to sit on and a bucket to splash with. There was also a hot water pool, a cool water pool, and an outdoor pool. Everyone also gets a small towel about the size of a hand towel that you can hold in front of you to keep people from either oogling your manhood or cackling at your lack thereof.

Japanese baths are not for washing in; they are for soaking in. You must first rinse your body before getting in so you don’t bring a bunch of sweat, grease, and blood with you and pollute the water. After soaking for a bit, you get out and wash up, then get back in a soak for some more. Some baths also have a stream of falling water that is nice to sit under and get a natural falling water massage on the shoulders. Don’t let the water hit you on the face though. Eyelids are not a very effective defense against falling water pounding your eyeballs.

After bathing, we hustled back to our room and donned the yukata, a Japanese style robe. Mine of course was a touch too small, but what the hell was I supposed to do? Thusly attired and knees sticking out, we trundled off to dinner.

Dinner rocked. A full-course Japanese dinner, complete with sashimi, sukiyaki and of course, rice. We all sat in a large horseshoe on the floor with little floor chairs to prop our backs on. Dinner was served on these neat little tv-tray like stands. At the open end of the horseshoe was stage that later served as ground central for the singing and shouting that no Japanese party is complete without. While we were starting, one guy who served as MC talked about what a great day it was and how lucky we were to be able to enjoy golf. We were all drinking and having a grand time.

Then they handed out awards. There was best score, best score w/ handicap, longest putt, closest to the pin, and other such awards. I was recipient of one of the two most interesting awards. I don’t know if this is a peculiar Japanese award or not, but the second to last person gets the boo-bee (bewbie?) award. The winner and the second-to-the-last person get the two biggest awards actually. Unfortunately, I didn’t get the boo-bee award; I got the may-kah (maker) award for being last. I, in effect, enabled or "made" the boo-bee winner get their position and was awarded duly.

But the real fun started at the after-dinner party. We all went downstairs to the lounge for more karaoke and drinking. We had only beer and sake for dinner and now they switched into whisky mode. Whisky & Water is popular among them, but I prefer straight on the rocks.

The interesting thing about this is that Japanese people act according to the situation. The special deal about this second party is that it is a time designated as totally informal, no-holds-barred type of thing. Usually people are very careful about what they say and do, but in the after hours party, every thing that happens there stays there. People really let loose and it is crazy.

Most people were in their forties and were pretty straight and serious up to this point. I saw one lady doing a semi-strip tease for the guys, not really showing it all, but behaving in a way you would never see outside of this type of party. I was content to sit in the corner and get smashed as quietly as possible, but they kept dragging me out to dance.

This one lady was pretty small, so I picked her up and swung her around like a little kid. She clamped her legs around my waist like a bull rider, and started bucking like she was full of electricity. I have to admit it caused a flurry of circus activity down there and I had to quickly sit down to conceal the tent pole.

I was absolutely amazed at the difference in behavior among these people. It was like the switch for "college behavior" was turned on when they stepped into the lounge. I was very comfortable with it all, as I felt that I was finally able to interact without fear of causing a bad impression or offending someone.

It really was cool; it felt like a bunch of Americans, in a way. The next morning of course though, no one said anything about it. What happens there, stays there. The most you could say was how much fun it was, but it is taboo to bring up specifics or even comment on behavior in general.

All in all, a very fun and educational time. Although I have lived here for over 2 years all together and live with a Japanese woman, the way the Japanese think and act is still somewhat mysterious to me. But I do know that no matter how differently people think and behave, we are all similar at the end of that day. We all like to have fun with friends, and that is something you can take to the bank.

Certain physical characteristics are sexually selected in animals; certain behaviors are as well. For example, a peacock’s feathers and mating dance are characteristics and behavior that were selected for by females over evolutionary time. Certain characteristics of human anatomy give us some powerful tools for understanding how our ancestors behaved as well as explaining some of our modern behaviors.

Three of these characteristics are sexual dimorphism, cryptic ovulation and concealed estrus, and penis and testicle sizes. Sexual dimorphism refers to average size differences between males and females of a species. Cryptic ovulation and concealed estrus means that it is very hard, if not impossible, to know when a female is ovulating and thus fertile. Penis and testicle size refers to.. well, I think you know what that refers to.

Why are these things relevant to humans? The first, sexual dimorphism, bears directly on the number of female mates a male member has, or more precisely, on the degree of polygamy in a species. For most animals in general, the hypothesis is that if males compete for females, larger bodies are more likely to prevail in male-male competition and larger males are able to monopolize several females. This idea is supported in nature: the more females in a group, the larger the difference between the body sizes of males and females. Animals characterized by harems, such as gorillas and elephant seals, exemplify this. A male mountain gorilla may have a harem of perhaps 10 or more females led by a single silverback male who is the sole impregnator of the females in the troop and outweighs the females by a factor of 2 or 3. Male elephant seals may outweigh their female couterparts by a factor of 10, and they may mate with over 100 females in a breeding period.

Conversely, in species where the males and females are the same size, monogamy is the usual form of reproduction. There is no competition between males trying to get more than a single mate and thus no pressure to select for larger, stronger males.

Sexual dimorphism is thus a reliable indicator of the degree of polygamy that happens under natural conditions. Same body size = monogamy. Extreme differences in male-female body sizes = extremely polygamy. Moderate differences in body sizes usually indicate a moderate degree of polygamy. This is exactly what we see in humans. Males are on average larger than females and tend to cheat or have multiple wives.

Cryptic ovulation and concealed estrus was a big change for our human ancestors as well. In most primate species, when a female starts ovulating, glands around her genitals swell up and turns red, a big sign that she is fertile. In humans however, there is no similar sign. This changed sexual relations in three major ways. One, it gives women more control over mate choice, two, it obscures paternity, and three it induces greater sociality. In a polygamous species, being able to identify when the female is in heat allowed the dominant males to, well, dominate the females and keep other males from getting a chance to inseminate them.

With concealed estrus, however, no one knows when anyone is fertile or not. All males benefit from treating females nicer at all times and some of the smaller (i.e. weaker) males have a chance to get in with the females. Also, since no one knows who the father is, it opens the door for greater offspring survival. In lions, when a new male takes over the pride, he kills as the babies. The mothers then go into heat and he has the opportunity to reproduce with them. But if no one knows who the father is, males are less likely to kill offspring like this for fear of killing their own progeny. (By the way, genetic paternity tests indicate that as many as 1/3 of human babies are born to fathers other than the husband.)

Penis and testicle size is an interesting indicator of social structure as well. How big do you think a gorilla's penis is? On average about 1.2 inches with 1 ounce testicles. Humans have 5.12 inch penises and 1.42 ounce testes, but chimpanzees have 3.15 inch penises and massive 4.17 ounce testicles. The explanation? Gorilla males have no competition for females once they establish themselves at the head of a harem. That takes physcial size and strength and is unrelated to genitals. Once they are established with a receptive group of females, there is no need for a large penis or testicles: their sperm is all there is.

Humans and chimpanzees however, traditionally lived in larger social groups with sexual competition. With cryptic ovulation and concealed estrus in humans, there is no way to know if you are copulating at the right time. Even if you are at the right time, of course it is optimal to be the first to fertilize the egg. A longer penis gets the swimmers that much closer at blastoff, shortening the total distance they have to travel as well increasing the probability that some may live longer.

From the chimpanzee perspective, large testicles are useful for the hit-and-run approach to reproduction. Chimpanzee culture has a pretty strict male hierarchy and the males at the top tend to have more copulations. But the little guy on the bottom has devised a strategy to get some though: We know it as Wham! Bam! Thank you ma'am! strategy. Chimps have very short copulation periods, about 15 seconds or so. They also have been known to have up to 20 or more copulations in a day. The large testicles make it possible to send a fruitful package with every copulation as well as provide large numbers of swimmers that can compete with other males' sperm.

All of these issues are relevant to human society and behavior, but we have to keep in mind that this type of analysis in no way suggests that humans HAVE to act a certain way. Just because our sexual asymmetry indicates we are a mildly polygamous species does not give men the right to defend infidelity or to think that it is their natural perogative to sleep around. The behaviors that we project on to humanity from anthriolutionary perspectives describe inclinations that humans may have for acting in a certain way. Biologically predicted behaviors are expected when people act without thinking, but culture and symbolic cognition interact to create systems of thought and meaning that change the whole scenario from a non-human natural setting to a human-specific setting. We have systems of meanings and expectations, as well as memories, morals, and manners that we can be expected to adhere to.

Conscious thought and language are the major characteristics that set the human animal apart from other animals. Some people oppose evolutionary explanations of behavior because they fear that those explanations would be used to argue that innate behaviors are "natural," "excusable," and "desireable." This is-ought fallacy shouldn't worry us though, because exploring some of our natural tendencies give us the ability to identify behaviors that may occur unless we are aware of our natural inclinations towards them.

I learned a lot about the sport that year. I had been a casual pro football fan for a few years, but never really understood the game beyond the basics. These guys taught me some of the finer points. Football is more than just passing and interceptions, rushing and fumbles. At first that’s all you see, but as you learn, you begin to appreciate the art of being a lineman.

Linemen are the hidden jewel of pro football. It is their job to either set up or destroy plays for the offense or defense. A good line controls the opposing team’s line. Two aspects to a good line: the initial impact and the subsequent scuffling.

Sumo wrestling distills this to an art: Two men line up across from each other and try to put the other man down.

Yeah, I know that Sumo is saddled with the image of fat guys pushing each other around, but there is a lot more to it. It’s a technical sport with simple rules: stay on your feet inside the ring. No punching, biting or kicking. Get the other down via pushing, slapping, throwing, or tripping. And it is more than the isolated matchups; Sumo is an event that you have to follow day to day.

I have been watching Sumo for about three years now. One of the first things I learned is that each tournament is 15 days long. Each wrestler has one bout per day and the best record at the end wins. The first day I watched it, I was disappointed. Many matches end quickly and it felt very anti-climatic. But after watching the tournament in its entirety, the drama of the 15 days makes it great. There is a dynamic to it that is unique in sports.

Sumo obviously is an individualized sport. Each wrestler has their own particular style. Strength and size have a lot to do with winning, but technique and surprise play their part as well. As in any professional sport, you must have technique to compete, but in Sumo, technique is more than just who has the best footwork. The initial tachi-ai (stand and meet) when the wrestlers leap from the line and smash into each other takes on many forms. Once impact is made, one can choose to slap away at the opponent’s chest and face or go inside for a grip on the belt and try to get a throw in.

The tachi-ai is absolutely amazing to watch. If you think that football lineman are tough, imagine what it takes to do the same thing without pads and a helmet. Sumo wrestlers often butt heads directly, and when you have a combined weight of over 600 pounds crashing into each other, it is impressive. I am surprised there aren’t more broken noses or bloodied foreheads.

Because there are so many wrestlers of various shapes and sizes and because everyday the matchups are different, each day of the tournament has something new and exciting to offer. Upsets abound and over the course of the first 10 days certain wrestlers get momentum that carries them through some of the bigger matchups.

The sport is much more fun to watch once you learn a few of the wrestlers’ names and styles. Once you have a few favorites, its exciting to keep track of their progress and how they perform against certain wrestlers.

There is a purists aspect to the game as well, of course. Because these guys are so big, when someone gets a big throw or other impressive move, one cannot help but be impressed with the grace and finesse of the winner wrestler. There is so much strength and athleticism involved, its really easy to get excited.

Sumo is a lifelong pursuit. Wrestlers start as young as 15. Every day of the tournament starts early with the lower beginning ranks and culminates in the afternoon bouts among the upper echelon. There are about 40 wrestlers in the top division, divided into 4 classes. The top rank, yokozuna, is for life. The only way out is to retire. All the other wrestlers’ ranks are adjusted after every tournament based on their record. Each tournament, everyone is fighting to improve their rank, hopefully to make it to yokozuna.

The wrestler with the best record after fifteen days gets the yusho, the championship. It's really rare for someone to win with a perfect record. The yokozuna often but not always win the tournaments. The yokozuna matches are the last of the day. If the yokozuna loses to a lower ranked wrestler, the air quickly fills with flying zabuton, the cushions that ring side patrons sit on. Kind of like in hockey when people through their hats on the ice for a hat trick, fans celebrate the upset of the yokozuna with a flying zabuton frenzy. It's cool to see, but I wouldn’t throw mine unless it was the last match. Otherwise you don’t have anything to sit on after that!

Many of the high profile matches are sponsored by companies as well. Prior to the start of the match, company banners are paraded around the ring. Each banner is worth about $600, the sum of which goes to the winning wrestler. Some of those guys walk off the dohyo (ring) with over $6000 some times.

Sumo is very old, starting somewhere around 1500 years ago. The stamping ritual the wrestlers do before their match is intended to stamp out demons. They also always toss salt into the ring to purify it before entering. A brief intro to the history, rules, and other stuffis can be found here. It’s a pretty cool sport with a mix of history, philosophy, symbolism combined with strength, power, finesse, and strategy.

I doubt that Sumo will catch on as a worldwide phenomenon, but its worth checking out. It takes a little bit of watching at first to get a feel for it, but once you get past the initial disorientation and start to understand what is going on, it’s a really great sport. I look forward to every tournament, 6 a year in the odd months. If anyone is really interested, let me know and maybe we can work out something so I can send you a tournament on video.

I sense the sation
feel the pride, hubris of indulgence
Anticipation of the crack
- of a seal
- of an ice upon immersion

it comes
A wavy scent of heat on a highway
assault the sense of taste, smell, thought

whee-la!! we’re drinking……..

A tiny sip
roll it around
taste buds dance, eyes roll back

A swallow, gurgle, choke, swallow
inebriation initiation

find a way
-fly a way

coursing, crazing, cruising, crashing
alcohol fucks you up./

I refill my glass
but it empties again

The better I get, the less I can do
funbling, bumbling, tumbling, boom!

What is it about alcohol that pulls, pushes, drives me?
- I like to smoke pot ## more in control
- I like to trip, LSD, shrooms ## learn much more

An alcoholic high is pure indulgence
--There is nothing to be gained or utilized from alcohol (escape ? (maybe!?!)!)!!!

What is it? = evil incarnate!

I’m not a god fearing man, but of what’s available in my repertoire, I’d have to say that alcohol is the devil’s sputum.

It is human foible distilled (!!!)
-How much is enough? too much?
and released

I dunno…… I’m drunk by now!

(There is no blood but what the gutter gives)

Since I live in Japan, I am not privy to a lot of current US news. I did however get to keep track of the recent Californian power crisis. I don’t know the current status of the their power grid, but I hope that you were all scared shitless by it.

I argued earlier that humanity has messed up the environment so bad that we are not going to be able to pull ourselves out of the tailspin we have gone into. I don’t think that the end is entirely inevitable, but since there is not a massive immediate effort to switch into a sustainable mode of living and producing, I am pretty sure that we will end up running the system into the ground.

Opponents of my first article claimed that human ingenuity would bail us out. Humans are incredibly adaptive and technologically adept, they said, and therefore will be able to surmount any challenges that may arrive. My contention is that the types of solutions needed in the current situation cannot be remedied overnight. Fundamentally our energy use is destructive and finite. We are quickly approaching the end of this finite limit. When that day arrives, there is no more power, anywhere. As California illustrated, new energy cannot be quickly produced.

California serves as a perfect example. When they began to run out of energy, they couldn’t just flip a switch and start generating solar power or geothermal energy. Even traditional power plants take time to build. California was able to survive by leeching power from neighboring regions, and still had to have rolling blackouts. What happens when the neighboring regions cannot fill in the gap?

The West is a bit better off than the East because of nuclear and hydroelectric power. The East is primarily coal-fueled, as far as I know. When the coal runs out, they are screwed.

The answer is to begin building a new renewable energy infrastructure RIGHT NOW. Unfortunately, that isn’t happening. People seem to think that we can just wait until the last minute and then begin to develop these alternative energy sources. Hell, even if we don’t go solar or geothermal, it still takes a long time to build new dams or nuclear power plants.

It is also disturbing to me to hear the Bush administration blaming environmental policy for the Californian energy crisis. It seems that they are going to use that as an excuse to relax some of the environmental limitations on energy procurement, in effects polluting the whole system even more while doing nothing to remedy the inevitable crash. Pure capitalistic irresponsibility.

In 1997 (I think), there was an international conference in Kyoto, Japan about global warming and emissions. The United States agreed to reduce emissions to something along the lines of 10% below 1991 levels. Since that time, emissions have increased by 4% or so. The European Union has decreased their emissions, but the U.S. has actually increased their amount of pollution. My details may be wrong here, but the gist is correct. (By the way, the United States has 5% of the world’s population, but uses 25% of the world’s energy.)

It has been argued that it would be economically impossible to achieve these levels of emissions in the United States. My perspective on it is that if we were really committed to cleaning up the environment, reducing global warming risks and developing a sustainable energy base, we would have at least began a concerted effort to develop alternative renewable non-polluting energy sources. But we didn’t. And with Dubya in the Oval Office, we won’t. That’s at least another 4 years of fiddling while Rome burns.

Unless the whole world immediately begins the switch to renewable/ sustainable energy sources, there is a very ugly crunch waiting in the future, probably in the next few decades. Rising population, global warming, and decreasing resources all point in the same direction.

I don’t relish the idea of having our entire energy grid collapse, but I really think that it will. California showed us that it can. Unfortunately, I suspect that utility companies will not seek to improve the quality of the energy they produce, but rather seek to increase quantity by whatever means possible. The problem with this is that it generally contributes to global warming and depends on resources that are fast dwindling. Pouring gasoline on the fire, can’t you see? They will temporarily reduce the pressure on the energy grid, but this remedy is doomed to fail sooner rather than later because it hastens the overall speed of pollution and consumption of non-renewable resources. A responsible solution would be to force modern society to live within current energy production while we develop and build clean renewable energy sources.

There will not be time to play catch up when the system starts to fail.

I am not predicting the end of humanity; people will survive. There will be a lot of pain, suffering, and death, but people will endure. Current society will not.