Slow living

Nothing happened so far..English getting a bit worse....Not sure if I can write anything good this time.

Reading a lot: some books for joy, some for work. Found book on Adobe Illustrator, tried a bit and cannot stop now - a lot of fun - all these tools, pen tablets, tricks (thanks to all those people who post their tutorial videos on YouTube). However there are a lot to learn for improving skills:  they require skills in almost all imaginable tools - Photoshop, Dreamweaver, HTML5, programming languages..JavaScript will be tricky for me.

Finished吾輩は猫である ("I Am Cat") book by Japanese writer Souseki Natsume. Have been reading it for almost 1 year..Sometimes bloody difficult (he uses not modern Japanese but a bit old one and words). But I liked his witty style, humour and dialogues.Feeling of accomplishment of something big.

And the rest of time- shopping : clothes and furniture - bought sofa today  - and my room looks great now..If I get good bonus I ll have to think about moving finally.

 Some people leaving Japan, changing jobs - feeling a bit lonely but getting used to be lonely all the time...

This  week is 26th birthday....4 years since I left the country...funny but I don't wanna go..

Almost not checking news - read about PussyRiot - not support rock concerts in cathedral, but it is inhuman how they treat them. How they treat their people as whole..But there is no awareness at all in the people. And it is so sad....30 years of forbidden Christianity, but now they find reason to convince people as "not appropriate" actions toward religion...Weird

 Watched Natalia Vodianova interview in Internet - what a bright person - so pure and kind.

Storm, teeth, poor English

   April, 3rd...Today we had so awful storm here in Tokyo...They let us go home at 15:00, so thanks to our company we could avoid all that traffic jam and at 18 I already was at home watching TV...
  Recently there is something wrong with teeth - I see dentist more often than my friends and there is still something left to repair, clean, change, remove ...This Saturday I am going again.

   Trying to spend 1 hour a day learning programming language Python with great book "Learn Python the Hard Way"  - my friend recommended it me.. This Monday finished "Command Line Crash Course" chapter at last -sometimes it was already complicated for me...So we see...

  It is almost 1 year and a half since I joined my company and I feel I just dropped out from social life for this period of time..Promised  myself again to spend weekends as productive as possible  - meeting new people, going out somewhere, just not to think about work...This Friday there is one fancy party in Aoyama.

 Stupid random writings...English is getting worse and worse...Need to read something written in good English for inspiration

Movie: "Amores Perros" (2000)

   Film from director of "Babel" Alejandro González Iñárritu which I found in "We Recommend" corner in Japanese rental store..
   Movie about love and lost  - three stories of 3 people connected by car accident ... Guns, drugs, shootings, Spanish curse words: "Puta madre" every time when you expect "Fuck"...everything seems so unreal in Japan and because of it kinda attractive..
  Second novel about supermodel who had her leg amputated after car crash and who hears her dog climbing under the floor every night ( don`t know how to explain you`d better to watch) is really driving you crazy...
 One more good point: Gael Garcia Bernal wears a whole range of vintage Adidas  in the movie.

 At my company I have buddy who teaches me Spanish a bit...Should ask him for more new words..Spanish language has some amazing mix of passion and loudness...
 Tomorrow is the first working day in April - first day of a new business (school/academical) year in Japan. Tomorrow we have something about 300 new-graduates in my company and everyone from guys who entered company with me feels like one year older, wiser, more professional.....Looking forward to new year as well...

Movie: "Enter The Dragon" (1973)

  As for self-education...Recently I just realised that I`ve never watched movie with Bruce Lee..I remember how in early 90s I saw poster of Bruce Lee in my elder cousin`s room. In 70s Soviet Russia his movies apparently were forbidden as all Western culture..but somehow in late 80s and early 90s they started to run his action movies in theaters all over the country and they had such huge success that  almost all boys had posters, calendars, souvenirs and other goods with Bruce Lee..Soviet and post-soviet teenagers were drawing his images  in notebooks, collected some stickers, cards (wonder how they get them)...there were a lot of fans .....
 There should be some reason for such popularity I thought and decided to watch "Enter the Dragon" (according to Wikipedia the last movie which has been completed while Bruce Lee  was alive)..
  Boring actors play, sometimes almost hillarious story plot, annoying white actors....but all that just forgotten when you watch these Kung Fu scenes...They are really great and he does amazing things - without all special effects, superb camerawork - just worship of martial arts and human physical body abilities..
 

 After watching it I also read article on his abilities and daily training routine and decided to go to gym immediately......kinda of inspiring day
 

Movie: "LOST" Season2

   Yes..I know I know and my friends keep telling: for some people "LOST" is already vintage but to my own surprise I haven`t watched it yet (shame on me)... so (1) to know what all fuzz was about and (2) to make opportunity to study(?) ..ehm..listen  English more I am witching these TV series now.. Last week done with Season 2..story line getting more complicated, last episode was kind of confusing and as far as I know the more the worse, but I anyhow for self-education should do it
Hm...when I was reading "One Hundred Years of Solitude" I felt so easy to write in English now it is hard again (like at school)....should read more good English literature as well...
 

Russia around: Black Matryoshka from MUJI

Bought this black Matryoshka set in Japanese interior store MUJI. In reality they don`t look as good as on the photo but still not bad and perfect for my room.

Reading: Standard Guide to Website Direction (Webディレクション標準ガイド プロジェクト始動からサイトの設計・構築まで )

     These days I am so lazy to do any studying on weekend so it makes me mad...And today again as usual I slept till 13  and except cleaning room did almost nothing....On weekdays on my way to the company and back I try to read though..
  And here is book I completed last week (started in August last year though...): Standard Guide to Website Direction　(or long-long Japanese title)..

   It was quite expensive (50 bucks !!) book but as I happened to be useful reading - it may be interesting even for people who is not in IT industry: in this Guide authors introduce basic knowledge regarding Web Direction workflow: starting from project organization, marketing research, all preparation and finishing site release, operation, information security..All book is in Japanese and to the end of reading it you start feeling sick of all these characters but yep...it was very good reading (in Japan this book is considered to be one of full Introductions to Web Direction (it was first published in 2004 so there is a bit some old information regarding OS, Browsers and almost nothing about Social Networking)).

  Last week I ordered "Don`t make me think" by Steve Krug - true bestseller on User Experience recommended by may of my colleagues..so looking forward to getting it and starting daily reading routine again  :)

  On Saturdays I go to dance school  -instructor is  Oguri Moto from Japanese street dance group "sh**t kingz"..Lessons are really amazing..Although I feel myself so stiff and stupid every time (other participants are really good in  memorizing all combinations ), but I enjoy it every week. Here is one of my favorite part and this song by Raphael Saadiq  "The Answer" is so good.

   Tomorrow is Monday and it means work week will start again...recently thinking a lot if what I am doing now is really what I want to do...Every Sunday trying to motivate myself for a week..Japanese Google with  management system  of 80-90s...sigh...and they are talking about "Empowerment"