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June 11, 2003
I am late with this news, but I didn't want to let it pass without comment. Last week, the American Film Institute, in its ongoing quest to promote awareness of the American Film Institute, issued its list of the 100 Greatest Heroes and Villains in the last century of cinema. I decided to see who made the list, and I was interested to notice that Mahatma Gandhi came in #22, five spots behind Dirty Harry. Although Gandhi did out-pace Superman, Moses, and Lassie, he got his ass handed to him by Rocky Balboa, a full fifteen spots ahead at #7. This, it must be said, puts the final nail in the coffin for passive resistance as a good-but-not-great form of ass-kicking.

In another hotly-contested race, Man came in two spots behind The Shark on the Villains list. Man can only stare at his opposable thumbs and wonder what might have been until the next century's list comes around.

Wednesday and Thursday are my weekend, so life is chill for me at the moment. Yasuhiro, one of my star pupils, informed me in class on Monday that the rainy season would begin the next day. Sure enough, it did. I became convinced that Yasuhiro was some kind of sorceror, and hinted as much in class the next day. Yasuhiro nodded and said "Yes, I saw news report that said would rain tomorrow, so I thought, this is rainy season." Way to ruin the mystique, Yasuhiro. Evidently, it's going to be raining for the next month or so, and then it will become bastard hot for a couple of months.

I've been informed that yesterday's giant monster was a crab, not a lobster. Seven years of not eating meat has blurred the distinctions between the more consumable members of the animal kingdom. Ah, so it goes.

Here is another picture game for you. Please examine the following advertisement, hundreds of which can be found in the subways of Osaka. Who is the shithead in this picture?

You probably thought that the baby chicken who's jumping around and making a ruckus was the shithead. As it turns out, though, the other baby chicken is the shithead, because he is not offering his seat to the injured, college-educated gorilla. I know, it fooled me, too, but once you think about it, that's the only explanation. The gorilla is apparently under the impression that the baby chicken holds military rank, because he is saluting the chicken. If you look closely, you can see that there is a band-aid on the gorilla's cheek, so he may have suffered a head wound to go along with his broken leg, and his judgment may be impaired. Tough times. There are some things about life that they just don't teach you in college, and I think the gorilla has found out the hard way. Still: does this poster express concern for the handicapped, or for cool varsity jackets?

I wish I could read Japanese.

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