David Cady is on a well-deserved one-week sabbatical. In his place, we have this coffee-related column.

On my occasional early-morning jogs in the park across from Chin Music Press headquarters in Seattle, I come across plenty of evidence that kids today haven't changed all that much. They still drink Olde English 800, for example, and use darkened baseball dugouts as makeshift love hotels. And they still have nowhere to go but the mall in suburban America, so when they tire of all the buying and selling, they slink around in parks after dark, smoking, drinking and flirting, as their parents once did at the corner bar. It's an American rite of passage. And now Starbucks is getting in on the action.

That's right, Starbucks is set to join Olde English 800, Mickey's Wide Mouths and MD 20/20 on the littered playing fields of America. The coffee giant has come up with a new product in cooperation with whiskey maker Jim Beam that is sure to be a hit with the kids: the 40-proof, $23 bottle of Starbucks Coffee Liqueur. Nothing says "party in the park" like a a bottle of Starbucks liqueur. And when canned coffee guru David Cady and family next come through Seattle, I promise to get them all looped on the stuff in honor of his fine Coffee Mondays column.

Tom Wolfe wrote an interesting piece in the Wall Street Journal the other day in which he calls Hunter S. Thompson the 20th century's "greatest comic writer in the English language" and also says Mark Twain was "king of all the gonzo-writers" in the 19th century.

The piece also contains a hilarious anecdote about dining with Hunter S. Thompson, whose dinner consists of four banana dacquiris, four banana splits and a Wild Turkey bourbon for dessert.

Wolfe also places Twain and Thompson on the same trajectory of "comic writers who mined the human comedy of a new chapter in the history of the West, namely, the American story, and wrote in a form that was part journalism and part personal memoir admixed with powers of wild invention, and wilder rhetoric inspired by the bizarre exuberance of a young civilization."

Chin Music Press thinks the next generation of gonzo journalists — writers who can comfortably work in that grey space between "objective" journalism and fiction — will find fertile ground in modern Asia, just as some of Twain's best work was focused on Europe. We don't care about the writer's lifestyle, but we are looking for writers who find the hidden truth in the wild rhetoric. When Hunter S. Thompson says that the US is "just a nation of two hundred million used car salesmen with all the money we need to buy guns and no qualms about killing anybody else in the world who tries to make us uncomfortable," the truth within the hyperbole stings. And when Twain writes "When I think how I have been swindled by books of Oriental travel, I want a tourist for breakfast," we know that, despite many good books written about the region, our appetite for something more from Asia is far from sated.

What we know about pregnancy and childbirth today were largely shaped by the medicalization of birth, following the anti-midwife campaign. Pregnant women, the physicians insisted, were best served by the professional care of obstetricians because childbirth is fraught with risks and dangers that require intervention. Only a very small minority of women were able to give birth naturally and trouble-free, they said. Well, the public ate that up hook, line and sinker. By the late 1960s, midwife-assisted births dropped to an all-time low of under 1%.

When I was born at a Manila hospital in 1965, my mother was so drugged out she could barely recall what had happened. Years later she told me that the only thing she remembered before the painkillers kicked in was how much she had wanted to squat. Her instincts were correct; squatting, which yields to gravity, is one of the most natural birthing positions. But she was overruled in what must have been a common situation back then. You could say ours was a generation practically born to drugged-out mothers in hospitals across the country. I was extracted with forceps; perhaps you were too.

For years, that was how I pictured my own childbirth — at a hospital with drugs. How else was I supposed to give birth? Towards the end of the birth class I attended with my husband, the childbirth educator Elena de Karplus told us that if we should have to literally run into a birth center with the baby's head emerging between our legs or if we ended up giving birth in the car on the way to the hospital, then we should consider ourselves very lucky. "That should be your goal," she said triumphantly. We all thought she was crazy.

It turned out that she was right. And the good news is, the midwifery model of care has been making a small but steady comeback since the 1970s thanks to the hard work of a few dedicated midwives, supportive obstetricians and innovative natural-birth techniques imported from Europe, notably Lamaze. Hospital births still account for 99% of all US births, but today 10% are assisted by midwives. Homebirths account for about 1% of midwife-assisted births.

Also, the rate of episiotomies has been dropping, more babies are being breastfed for longer periods, and the medical establishment is beginning to acknowledge the benefits of midwife-assisted births. These small but significant accomplishments are still dwarfed by the enormous amount of work that requires immediate attention.

We made a rookie mistake that is delaying our official launch in North America: We put the wrong barcode on our bellyband. When Michael Cashin of Consortium called me to tell me this, it was like getting hit in the solar plexus. The rest of the day, I was in a deep, deep funk.

But then some good things happened, and we turned this problem into an opportunity. First of all, designer Bob Garlick in Vancouver offered to make our EAN Bookland barcode for a case of beer. Then he helped us find a printer in Seattle that would do the job without draining our triple-digit bank account.

Our current bellyband (the wrapper around the base of the book) has a blurb from us describing Kuhaku. That's because we didn't go out and get reviews and blurbs while the book was printing like normal publishers. We decided to publish the book first, then show it around to distributors, reviewers, etc. That's largely been a good strategy for us because people take us seriously when they see the book.

But now, with this barcode mistake, we had a chance to do two things: create a super-cheap throwaway bellyband like we envisioned in the beginning but could not quite convey to our printers in Iceland (thus the high-quality off-white paper used for our current bellyband); and include some blurbs from reviews.

This led to a discussion at CMP HQ about the cover. It's a beautiful cover, we believe. But the one thing it doesn't convey is Kuhaku's humor. Cletus in the U (who incidentally is being reprimanded for his rogue blog-post the other day) hints at the book's touches of whimsy, but nowhere is it apparent that inside there are many moments of silliness. Now, with these blurbs on the new bellyband, we think the astute reader will pick up on the humor within:

"The quality and taste of canned coffee are getting better, which ironically makes the brands seem even more similar to most people. That is why it is important for beverage companies to mount effective sales campaigns that can differentiate one brand from another." — From Nikkei Weekly article "Canned Coffee Market Heating Up"

The marketing gurus at Suntory no doubt had differentiation in mind when they came up with Caffeine Shiki. I confess that their tactics worked on this consumer, who has grown weary of the same old offerings from the same old companies. The can's knockout combo of aesthetics and novelty had me digging in my pocket for 120 yen faster than you can say "a river of life." First to grab my attention was the logo: a cartoon face of a man showing what could be extreme concentration or anger, his eyes the bulging orbs of an evil hypnotist. Next to induce the purchase reflex was the word "caffeine," which appears in three places on the front and five on the back — the hypnotist is telling me something, and I like his message. Written prominently on the front label is "160mg of caffeine," which is 30% more than what is contained in other Suntory coffees. Meet the Jolt Cola of the canned coffee world. It describes itself as having a "bitter and dry coffee taste," which I agree with. It is strong and charcoaly — nearly too much so — but a trace of sugar and cream save the day, making this one of my favorite canned coffees yet.

Hello the reader. Allow me to introduce myself. As for writing the web log for me, this is the first time. I am a useful soldier-robot who served publisher and English nobleman Sir Walrus of Routledge in Meiji era Japan. Moreover, I am honored to be on the cover (that is me in the U) and page 8 of Kuhaku. I am a gifted translator, I have a large memory, and of human life, I have seen far too much.

I am writing today because "I Am Not A Jackass" by A.J. Jacobs perplexes me. Why does man say, "I am not a jackass?" Is Joe Queenan a big man? Does he have a large sword? Cannot Jacobs the writer slay Queenan the reviewer? I am getting old, and my software is not the latest. I do not relate to modern man so well.

It is time for the story now by Cletus: Samuel Richardson and a party of foreign and Japanese people passed by some high-level Japanese aides in the first half of the Meiji era. A fight began because the Japanese side felt insulted when someone in Mr./Ms. Richardson's party did not bow very low. One of the parties of Mr./Ms. Richardson was stabbed (I did not remember whether it was Japanese or foreigner because you tend to all seem similar to me). When traveling, the foreigner was more polite since then.

It ends my story. When he told me about 150 years ago, I asked the master Routledge what the moral of this story was. He said, "Man who bows lowest wins." At the time, I was confused, and a system error was caused. But now I think my former master to be a modern man very much.

Seems like we're part of a trend. Two days after I posted my "literary turfer" entry last week taking issue with the misplaced elitism of some reviewers, a funny piece entitled "I Am Not A Jackass" appeared in The New York Times. A.J. Jacobs author of The Know-It-All, fights back after a particularly savage review by Joe Queenan (which "I Am Not A Jackass" provides a link to.)

Midwives have been around since time immemorial. They appear in the Bible and in Shakespeare’s literature. They have been the main providers of maternity care throughout the history of mankind. In most cultures today, a laboring woman can still count on the presence of a skilled midwife.

Labor and childbirth in the U.S. weren’t any different. Though its history is tumultuous, “midwifery was seen as a respectable profession, even warranting priority on ferry boats to the Colony of Massachusetts,” says a website for the Parkland School of Nurse Midwives.

Unfortunately, that would change.

Between the years 1915 and 1940, midwife-assisted births plummeted from about 50% to 10-15%. The drop has been attributed to a number of historical developments; among them were World War I and advances in science and medicine.

But that wasn't all. From around 1910, the US government and the medical establishment began waging a vigorous public campaign against midwives in a nationwide offensive to medicalize the birth industry. Midwives were called filthy and ignorant, and blamed for the country's birth-related fatalities. Other tactics included public PR, where physicians touted the safety and ease of births handled by obstetricians.

“The strategy to abolish the profession of midwifery (as practiced by midwives) was multifaceted and included a legal, legislative and public education approach described as ‘elevating the public conscience,’” writes California midwife Faith Gibson.

On her website, Gibson shares excerpts from documents she uncovered after she was arrested and charged with the illegal practice of midwifery, among other things, even though she was a state-certified midwife. The charges were later dismissed.

While Craig was polishing his Kuhaku pitch in bookstores across Tokyo, I was calling truckers, trying to figure out the best way to get 46 boxes of books to our distributor, Consortium. My first call to a local trucking company turned into a conversation with Bob about a Seinfeld episode where Kramer goes to a fantasy baseball camp and ends up pitching to Joe Pepitone. Here's some of the dialogue:

Kramer: Well, you know, we were playing a game and, you know, I was pitching, and I was really throwing some smoke. And Joe Pepitone, he was up, and man that guy, you know, he was crowding the plate.

Jerry: Wow! Joe Pepitone!

Kramer: Yeah, well, Joe Pepitone or not, I own the inside of that plate. So I throw one, you know, inside, you know, a little chin music, put him right on his pants. Cause I gotta intimidate when I'm on the mound. Well the next pitch, he's right back in the same place. So, I had to plunk him.

Kramer ends up punching Mickey Mantle in the mouth during a fantasy camp bench-clearing brawl. (A nice use of "chin music" here, and we can now add Michael Richards' mug to our pantheon of chin music users).

Back to trucking: Bob's company only hauls freight to Alaska and back, so he referred me to another local company, which quoted a price of $800. Frankly, that was way more than I wanted to pay, but I really had no idea how much this kind of thing costs. I called some more companies and realized I could get the freight to frosty St. Paul for less than $400. But which company to go with? None of the names meant anything to me. The national brands like UPS were all way too expensive. Finally, I came across Freight Quote, a company in Kansas that offers shippers instant online quotes from dozens of freight companies. I signed into their site, began looking around at different functions on the site, and ... the phone rings. It's Rob from Freight Quote ready to walk me through the site. There's something disconcerting about being jarred from your solitary online search by a phone call from the site you're searching, but all the same, Rob was very helpful in explaining shipping terms and helping me figure out the freight class, etc. It seems like a good operation, so, fledgling publishers, when you get to that very exciting state where you're asked to send 1,518 books out the door, I recommend going to Freight Quote first.

Doutor is Japan's largest coffee shop chain, with at least 1,300 smoke-choked outlets nationwide, according to sources close to the matter. They just put one in my train station last week, and I'm still dizzy with the novelty of it all. While passing the shop on my way home from work the other night, I watched a man perhaps in his fifties leave the establishment sporting a wreath of grey hair and a black toupee that was beyond being merely askew. The thing was practically stuck on his cheek. He then plopped a ten-gallon Gilligan hat on his head, wearing it high and proud, and hustled up the escalator to catch a train. I wonder if he drank a can of Doutor Doutor Almond Caramel Latte before stepping out. I'll bet he did. I'll bet the rich, sweet flavors triggered some old memory from the days when he had a stupendous head of hair, back when he was the pick of the fucking litter and would take his girlfriends out for ice cream. The more he sipped, the more he pawed his wig, searching for the old him, the manly him. He grew sad, then frustrated, then rageful, at one point yanking off his toupee and berating it, punctuating his barks with a jabbing, accusatory finger. He then placed the matted toupee on the can of coffee — which was creamy and not too sweet — and scolded the can for looking so idiotic. This made him giggle and his eyes shine. He made up his mind to ditch the hairpiece forever and live as a bald man. Out. Yes, he would quit his job and become a photographer, or maybe open his own coffee shop, one where the customers grind their own beans in small wooden grinders. But when he heard the rumbling of an incoming train overhead, his hands moved faster than his cogitations, and he slapped the toupee in the the vicinity of his head, grabbed his cap and book and left the shop. Hat! He remembered his hat and dropped it into place, nice and high like he liked it. While heading for the escalator, he tried to recall the English word for "rude," because he wanted to communicate to the creepy foreigner slouching by the ticket gate that it was impolite to stare.

Anyone remember the spoof of the Japan Times in the early 1990s? Several renegade staffers cranked out the copies after hours, risking their jobs for the sake of humor. If anyone has a copy, please contact me.

Parts of Kuhaku were made in the same spirit as that spoof Japan Times, except our target wasn't the JT staff, but the gatekeepers — the pundits, reviewers, analysts, et al, who tell us what they think we need to know about Japan. We were out to treat Japan playfully, honestly, sometimes caustically, but not "expertly." This approach always pisses off a certain type of person, and of course, we enjoy that.

Now I'm about to do something that is probably taboo #1 for any small publisher: I'm about to review the reviewers. There are three reasons for this: We started this blog in the spirit of full disclosure, and it would not be honest to hold back this conversation from you; this could actually spark a more interesting dialogue; and lastly, I think you'll find it entertaining.

So far, our reviews have centered on Japan-based publications because, frankly, it's easier to get a book called Kuhaku from an unknown publisher reviewed in them. We are planning to take the momentum of those reviews and push into North American publications.

Up to this point, we have been reviewed in two major Japanese newspapers (English editions), two magazines, one web-based publication, our Amazon site and blogs all over the world.

The reviews on the Internet and in the magazines have been fun to read, interesting and insightful. Some get what we're up to, others don't. But they are sincere in their criticism.

The reviews we received at the papers (one positive, one negative; another just outright refused to review us) have been insightful at times, but the overall impression I have when reading both their praise and their criticism is that they are infused with a misguided elitism. It's as if the gatekeepers don't realize the walls around them have crumbled. I expected this. Too often reviews in Japan's English dailies are written by what I like to call the "literary turfer." The literary turfer is the type of guy who fervently believes that no one gets Japan except for him and Donald Richie.

So the next time you're reading a book review in the Japan Times, Asahi or Yomiuri and you suddenly are overcome by a mild sense of displeasure, check this guide to see if you are indeed in the realm of the literary turfer:

Two-plus years in beautiful Seattle has turned a dyed-in-the-wool urbanite like me into a better balanced soul ("better" being the operative word). Craig's recent revelation here about a high-priced garbage can sent me reeling back to those heady days in Tokyo, when I was the ultimate global consumer, the kind advertising agencies salivated and fought for airtime over. I confused my wants with needs and everything I saw on TV or in magazines, I wanted. Now, when I see that behavior exhibited in our seven-year-old, I am at once sympathetic and appalled.

I recently did a quick mental inventory of all the overpriced things I had purchased and was overwhelmed by the sheer cost of it all. I had to stop when I realized we could actually afford a new car and fix the basement water problem had I not spent the money over the years on things like:

soap dish 4,500 yen (It was made in Italy!)
garbage cans (2) 29,000 yen each (It has a beautiful enamel exterior!)
cashmere sweat pants 60,000 yen (It's cashmere!)
dish rack 12,000 yen (It's aluminum!)
plastic shower curtain 10,000 yen

Plus a plethora of other items that I cannot divulge here because my husband will edit this entry.

Of course they are all insignificant items of vanity. The cashmere sweats didn't help me become a better athlete, in part because I never exercised. But it sure kept me warm on some of the coldest winter days I spent lounging around at home.

The aluminum dish rack gave our diminutive blah kitchen a touch of contemporary sheen, or a dash of vive le paris to Sakurajosui; and the shower curtain...well, it helped keep out the water.

I guess my point could be summed up by a quote from an architect that goes something like: Good design will not bring you happiness, but poor design can bring a whole lot of unhappiness.

As a complete sucker for modern Italian and mid-century modern designs, I had a hard time back then stopping myself from practically giving away my wallet and credit card to boutiques that carried them.

Luckily for our purse strings, we now live in the Land of Crate & Barrel and Pottery Barn (at which place I must admit I ran up a shipping bill even Tokyoites would not believe) — not Cassina and Cappellini. And though I have discovered a wealth of Italian modern in a stretch aptly named "furniture row" right in the heart of downtown, I feel less compelled to throw my money at them. That may be one of the few great things about being part of a publishing startup: You simply can't afford to throw your money around anymore.

I was driving home from the post office yesterday, listening to "Democracy Now" on KBCS, when I heard that Henry Hampton's classic documentary on the civil rights movement, Eyes on the Prize, was so tied up in copyright problems that it hadn't been distributed in the US for the last 10 years. In response, more than 100 screenings of the documentary took place all over the US yesterday.

This crystallizes the debate over copyright, when a cultural treasure like Eyes is kept from the public because of songs and news footage that are under copyright. The production company, Blackside, couldn't afford to renew the copyrights when they expired in 1995, and thus Eyes could only be borrowed from the library (if your local library stocks it) or bought on Amazon for $1,000.

Well, fifteen years ago, when Yuko and I had moved from Japan to Chicago, I taped some of the episodes. I went through my old VHS collection this morning and found five full episodes plus a partial episode (see the list below). If anyone in the Pacific Northwest is interested in seeing these, please let me know.

Fifteen years ago, I lived with my girlfriend Yuko (now my wife) in Rogers Park in Chicago, and it was there that I first realized my bilingual Yuko, a graduate of the American School in Japan, was not so fluent in certain aspects of American culture. She thought it was "nice" that the men across the street always seemed to be hanging out waiting to greet passing cars with a quick handshake. And she needed an interpreter when we watched Do The Right Thing. So when the local PBS station announced that it was showing Eyes in its entirety over several nights, we vowed to watch it all (if only I had the wisdom to tape it all).

After watching all 14 episodes, we both came out of it changed. She had just had a crash course in American culture that would change her perspective forever, and I had been knocked out of my late-twenties cyncism long enough to see that real change comes from the bottom up and with great struggle, not from our fearless leaders at the top. If you've never seen this documentary, find a way to do so.

Here's what we have on VHS tape:

My nonagenarian great aunt is a ball of fire. Toshi-oba (aunt Toshi) has strong and sensitive hands, a hearty laugh and an earthy demeanor. Nobody suspects that this four-foot-tall woman was the recipient of a cultural award from the late Emperor Showa for her outstanding work as a midwife in the rural community where she served.

Toshi-oba is retired now. But I bet in a pinch, like many a midwife who has come before and after her, she would rush to the side of a woman laboring at home.

A good thing too, that Toshi-oba lives in Japan. If she were to venture into a home to assist in a birth in the U.S. today, where midwives and the medical establishment are locked in a sort of obstetrical turf war, she would be walking into a legal minefield — regardless of the outcome of the birth.

From California to New York, midwives are being harrassed with lawsuits and legislation aimed at limiting their scope of activities or their right to practice, especially if they are not working within the parameters set by the medical community. Many have called the midwives' plight a "witch hunt" after the 17th century persecution of women believed to be witches. In fact, midwives were among those who were "charged" as witches and murdered.

The website Wears the Baby carries an interview with legendary U.S. midwife Ina May Gaskin:

“Some midwives have been charged with felons after births which turned out well. There is a California case in which a CNM (certified nurse midwife) was charged — taken from her home in handcuffs and chained to a wall for four hours — after a birth, a good outcome, that took place in her birth center when she was out of the country.”

Here in Seattle, certified nurse midwife Debra O'Conner, who specializes in out-of-hospital births, is appealing charges of negligence levied against her on the basis that her case was not judged by her peers. The case against her was initiated by a hospital midwife, which many out-of-hospital midwives argue is midwifery by name but basically medical profession by practice.

As soon as I spotted this beauty in Chitose Funabashi Station, I knew I had to buy it. It was just after 9:00 a.m. on a Monday and the platform was thick with commuters waiting to begin their 25-minute ride to Shinjuku. A lucky few sat on benches thumbing their cellphones, but most people stood in twos behind arrows indicating where the train doors will open, silent, patient and impeccably dressed. My usual "lucky" spot on the far end of the platform had been getting crowded lately, so I decided to try the opposite end that morning. While heading toward my new roost I passed a drink machine and instinctively scanned the items on display. Mirth — yes, my feeling was one of mirth, the mirth of a richly rewarded butterfly collector — ensued when I saw a can of coffee rocking Alphonse Mucha's "Tete Bysantine Brunette" on its metallic green hide. Art nouveau and canned coffee? Yes, of course! These Ito En people are geniuses. With avid fingers, I slipped 120 yen into the machine and pressed the button. These machines, so selfless, so loyal. The coins set off distant whirs that culminated in the satisfying plonk of the can being disgorged into what shall henceforth be referred to as the dispensing tray. A reverb-rich announcement explained that the train would be arriving shortly and advised us to stay behind the yellow line near the edge of the platform. I put the can in my backpack and strode toward the second-to-last arrow, which I have since made my new lucky spot. Sipping the coffee now, I find it to be too bitter. But I've always been a milk and sugar guy.

Just popped over to Cassina to try and wrangle a big discount on a little leather garbage can. Or actually, not a garbage can, but an "object," which I guess you're simply supposed to put in your corner and feel meditative about. Well, dammit, I was going to use it as a garbage can. But as I haggled with my friend who works there, I realized I really didn't need this thing. I resigned myself to buying it if I could get 25% off, but not a penny less. Feeling like I was back in a sweaty fish-smelling hut in Cambodia, vying with a 12-year-old over a six cent discount on a hand carved opium pipe, back and forth we went until she finally agreed to ask her manager if giving me, her friend, a big discount was OK. Well, it wasn't, and I left without the garbage-can-cum-object, thanking her for her efforts and promising to return soon to buy an overpriced, but very stylish frying pan.

As before, I made the requisite stop by Book and Cafe 246 to check on the shipment I sent a week ago. Amazingly, they had almost completely sold out — only three copies remained. Me, leaving for Europe next week, immediately called Haba-san to arrange a shipment before I left on my trip. Haba-san, answering with a weak voice, bed-stricken with the flu (like so many people in Tokyo now — SARS facemasks abound; I spend my days dodging old-man coughs and little-girl sneezes) couldn't defend against my now polished push for people to purchase our paper product. So the Gods of bookstores are clearly shining their wobbly light on Book 246, helping us sell Kuhaku with a hearty, "Umph."

Open this week's Village Voice here in New York and you are inundated with literary readings high and low — up at the lordly 92nd Street Y, across the river in Williamsburg and Cobble Hill, down in the bowels of the Bowery — happening every bloody night. But literary readings don't happen in Tokyo. To stage one for Kuhaku in that town was a bit of a lark.

The late Harold Brodkey bemoaned the fate of the writer — whose achievements are noted, if ever, in solitude, and are more often greeted by silence. He was speaking to a group of students and professors in the Miller Theater at Columbia University.

He described a basketball game at the McBurney YMCA on 23rd Street. Brodkey had been jogging around the elevated track while the game took place below. In the final minutes, some kid sank a jump shot — and the fans burst into applause, whoops and hollers of joy.

Brodkey thought: No matter how I perform, how well I write, how much I achieve … I'll never hear the likes of that.

Literary readings are performances, of course, one of the few forums in which writers and readers can meet, face to face. The nice and nasty classic quotation conflating writers and children is attributed to Du Marier: "Writers should be read, but neither seen nor heard." As appealing as that truism might be to introverts like me, it has become a romantic anachronism in our hyper-mediated age.

More timely is DeLillo's fictional novelist, Bill Gray, who says of his readers in Mao II: "They've got the writer. Who needs the book?"

I launched myself on yet another round of bookstores recently. I planned on spending just an hour or so hitting up two shops that were on my radar: Cow Books in Nakameguro and Yaesu books next to Tokyo Station. I planned on stopping by Good Day Books as well, but, being Tuesday, it was closed.

Even if you abhor the idea of reading, I highly recommend at least visiting Cow Books. It's located just a short walk from the now anomalously hip Naka-Meguro Station, situated right on the edge of Meguro-gawa. The interior is beautiful — perfectly lit with generous, warm accent lighting. A glowing table down the center of the small shop, set off with a cloth covered, subtly perforated lighting fixture. The walls and back space are done in spotless stainless steel, and, in surprisingly good taste; an LED banner rotates phrases about the whole shop just next to the ceiling. It's sexy.

Just got a call from Libro, a hip little bookshop sponsored (I think) by Parco. They're located in various places across the city — most notably in Shibuya underneath Parco. They house a wide range of magazines and art books. On my way to Kichijoji a week and a half ago, I stopped by Libro and threw down the sales pitch to the book buyer. She was a small, young woman, physically frail but with a sandpaper-like gaze capable of vigorously shaving off your skin and muscle. I fumbled a bit in the pitch, but she seemed interested, her in her tiny but thick-rimmed black-glasses, me in my winter-black Philadelphia working class knit hat, heavy brown suit jacket and cashmere (first cashmere thing I've ever owned — got it cheap in a post-winter department store sale) turtleneck, trying my hardest to project Art Director like qualities. She handled the book with a light grip, flipping through, nodding. She said it would take a while, but she'd ask the floor managers about picking it up.

I left feeling the worse for wear. Maybe they're interested, but they don't want to buy books directly from some random foreign guy, I thought. At best, Kuhaku might occupy some desk space before being thrown in a box of old sandwiches in the corner.

But as it turns out, they are excited and serious. I misread the hardened gaze as antipathy, whereas I should have seen it to clearly mean serious business. Goes to show you: Tower, which intimated stronger interest than almost any other store I've pitched the book to, is taking its time jumping through the hoops of large-store bureaucracy; Libro is on the ball and pushing the sale forward.

AIGA has just put online the past four years of their design competition archives. Of note is the book design category with over 350 entries to browse through. Also of note is that this is one of the better uses of Flash I've seen in a long time. Although, as is the case with Flash, I can only direct you to the main pages. Enjoy.

I recently received an email from Setsuko Yamamura, the head midwife of Tokyo's Aqua Birth House. She wrote me that the birth house, which she founded, was publishing a book to celebrate its 10th anniversary. Would we mind if she included our birth experience in the book? We'd be honored, I replied, and emailed back a Japanese translation of the comments my husband left in the birth house's log book eight years ago when Kimi was born.

As I translated my husband's words, my mind traveled back to that April day in 1997. I recalled the scent of lavender Yamada (she went by her maiden name in those days) sprinkled over my shirt; the drawn curtains; the sound of the drizzling rain; the look on my quiet husband's exhausted face; and how time seemed to have stopped as I writhed in the dark, still hours of the late afternoon.

These are among my fondest, most cherished memories of my life. And if it weren't for a series of disappointing encounters and events, I wouldn't have them.

When I first met Yamada in the winter of 1997, I was six months pregnant, scared and lonely. I had been seeing an obstetrician, but after a few visits I knew this was not where I wanted to deliver. After scolding me for gaining too much weight, he told me all the things that could go wrong if I weren't careful. My paranoia eventually grew to the point where I began to fear that my baby was dead. So, when I heard about Yamada and her birth center, my husband and I promptly made an appointment to meet her.