Herro Flom Japan

Last night I spent way too much time putting together a wee video clip from my archive of old and unlabeled tapes. I threw it in the chumbucket because it's more of a home video than something insightful about Japan. I don't want to put too much stuff like that in the main feed because I think it might bore some people who for some incomprehensible reason aren't as enamored with my kids as I am.

Every time I work on a video, I wonder how the pros do it for the evening news so quickly. Or how TV and movie editors manage to watch, edit and archive hours and hours of footage. Maybe they don't watch over and over what they're working on like I do.

Chumbucket access rules are to do one of the following:

• Fill out this stupid survey
• Link to me from your blog
• Donate a little money so I can buy Tony a new PSP for Christmas (I don't know what Andy wants yet, besides some new pens.)
• If you've been reading, watching and listening but still haven't introduced yourself, please do so. I often wonder who are the roughly 300-400 subscribers I've never heard from.

Do one of the above, then e-mail me and I'll give you the URL.

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• Take a survey, access the motherload.

Why does every attention-whoring foreigner who stays more than a few months start calling himself "Tokyo" (yournamehere?) And why is it only guys? As far as I know, there's only ever been a "Tokyo Rose" but never a "Tokyo Beth" or "Tokyo Christina."

If anyone ever calls me "Tokyo Rich" I will kick their ass. You've seen me play Wii Boxing, so you know what kind of damage I'm capable of. You've been warned.

So, the subject of this post is TokyoCooney, a popular YouTube vlogger. I've only seen one of his videos so far, and it was only a few minutes ago. I might watch a few more.

On Oliver's last night in Tokyo, he wanted to go to the Tokyo Comedy Store so we went, although I was skeptical that we'd witness anything actually funny, seeing as how Japan is as far from the English language comedy club circuit as you can get.

I was right. It was painfully, annoyingly, unbearably not funny. What was even worse was that people who were painfully, annoyingly, unbearably not funny were attempting improvisational comedy. Not surprisingly, it was a lot like watching people make complete asses of themselves on stage. When we could no longer take any more, Oliver and I paid the bill (over 10,000 yen for cover charge, a few beers and some meager finger food) then went to a convenience store and bought a bottle of whiskey to extricate ourselves from our lingering foul mood.

Perhaps you've noticed that I don't normally complain about or insult people. But the no-talent hacks at the Tokyo Comedy Story really, really sucked. Neither of us could figure out why the audience was laughing at everything. It. Wasn't. Funny.

The only exception was Kevin Cooney. He was genuinely funny and had an excellent stage presence. We quoted his jokes to each other as we passed the whiskey bottle between us. (Oliver drinks whiskey like a pussy, BTW. Can't take a swig without scrunching up his face. Friggin' lightweight.)

In summary, Tokyo Comedy Store: bad. Keven Cooney: good. Oliver: whiskey pussy.

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(February 7, 2006, Part II.)

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(I'm going through all my old video tapes this weekend.)

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As far as a 500 yen can of air goes, there's not a whole lot you can do with it that's interesting. But there you have it.

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