I'm sad to announce that Caravan Books of Ikebukuro has passed away.

One of a kind, nestled away (cause of death?) in a quiet neighborhood near Ikebukuro station. Tastefully lit (take note all fluorescent-bathed Ebisu-based foreign bookstores), looking more like an old English country house than a Tokyo dwelling. Reasonably priced. Oh Caravan. I only visited you once to drop off Kuhaku, but how I dreamed of visiting you again and again. Alas, you were in that crook of Ikebukuro — everyone spoke so fondly of you but no one had the energy to venture all the way out there. Even women in Kyoto, when asked about Tokyo bookstores, whispered the words, "Caravanu," as if you were a ghost of an old Arab man, swilling Arab whiskey while plodding your way through the Arab desert. And plod you did Caravan. You plodded until your legs gave out and your whiskey ran dry and the desert took you and your sack of books and swallowed you whole. Au revoir, old steed.

What the can says: Real crisp bitterness! Flavor that won't stop!

What I say: Chemicals galore in an unappealing blue can. Flavor that will make you angry.

What the can says: 68% less sugar. A low-sugar canned coffee that's delicious can after can.

What I say: Blue can, my world was plunged into stygian darkness when you entered my life. I feel I've been hoodwinked.

Can: I feel I've been kidnapped. I was chilling in a kiosk at Shinjuku station, daydreaming, when you entered mine. And now I'm in Chitose Funabashi, expunged of all joy.

Me: Stygian, I said.

Can: All I know is that I liked Shinjuku better. The kiosk lady was missing a tooth and had terrible dermatitis, but she never insulted me. Her name was Etsuko. She would pat me, so gently, when I sobbed, which was often.

Me: And then I took you home and drank you.

Can: You didn't even wipe me off first. A few days ago, a homeless man slobbered on me. We called it "The Homeless Man Incident." And now you have his juice in your body.

Me: The thing is, Shinjuku frightens me now. It never used to, but somewhere along the way the crowds became malevolent rather than invigorating. I'm getting old, blue can. Nascent crow's-feet. Women no longer look at me.

Can: I'm a sip away from oblivion, and you tell me such things? What do you want from me? Other than acknowledge that you used the word "stygian."

Me: I want you to tell me that I'm still a star, dammit. I want you to tell me that I'm special and attractive and headed for great things.

Can: Ravaged man, I know only this: When you wake up tomorrow morning, the vending machines and convenience stores and train station kiosks will be freshly stocked with canned coffee.

Me: Goodbye, blue can. Thank you.

"The Blue Hearts" (1987)

When The Blue Hearts came on the scene in 1987 with the breakout song, "Linda Linda," the band became a national phenomenon, with television appearances, teenagers packing stadium-sized concerts and many a worried parent.

After kayokyoku-style pop songs dominated popular music in much of the 70s and 80s, the debut of The Blue Hearts proclaimed the second-coming of band-oriented music. Elders such as Alfie, YMO and RC Succession paved the way. The Blue Hearts, along with contemporaries such as the Stalin, Uchoten and Unicorn, solidified the ground, leading the golden age of rock bands. This "band boom," as it came to be known in Japan, was short-lived, but served to broaden the horizon of mainstream music listeners.

In the American mind, Japan is no longer a country; it's an idea. Haruki Murakami becomes the first Japanese to ever make the New York Times best-seller list in fiction for arguably one of his least interesting works, Doraemon toys are displayed in art exhibits probing Japan's "exploding subculture," and now Interview has dedicated a whole issue to stars like Puffy Amiyumi (already passé in Japan...), Hikaru Utada and Nigo.

Japan is America's new radical chic. And I think plenty of Japanese secretly love the attention, despite knowing that fickle America will discard the Japanese art scene like day-old sushi once something else grabs its attention. But why Japan and why now? I don't see Japan's art world as being particularly interesting right now, and its literature — with the exception of Murakami (most of the time) — seems tired. There is no Mishima, Ozu or Kurosawa out there. Murakami reminds me of film director Juzo Itami, a story-teller of immense talent but uneven production who may not even be remembered in 50 years. (I hope they both are, but how many people remember Booth Tarkington?)

I suppose I should be happy about this trend since I'm currently peddling a book about Japan. But it irks me. It's just more surface-skimming, the flipside of seeing Japan as economic animals and yellow monkeys. It's just a matter of time before Murakami starts getting ripped by critics who fawn over his work now. He deserves a more balanced approach. As does the whole country.

A man walks into a post office in Tokyo...

"I need an envelope, a stiff one."
"We don't have envelopes."
"Isn't this the post office?"
"Yes."
"Where can I get envelopes?"
"The convenience store."
"So you don't have envelopes?"
"No."
"But I know I used your envelopes before."
"You must have been shipping something."
"If I ship something do you have envelopes?"
"Depends on how you ship it."
"Domestic?"
"Only floppy envelopes."
"International?"
"Hard envelopes."
"Okay, then I'll ship domestic with an international envelope."
"We can't allow that."
"Why not?"
"We don't recommend that."
"How much is the international envelope?"
"Free."
"Can we just cross off the international parts and ship domestic?"
"Sorry, that's not possible."
"How big are your floppy domestic envelopes?"
"Very big."
"What if I put the international envelope in the domestic one?"
"Er.." *computing ...* "I guess that would be okay."
"Let's do that."

Then suddenly there was a sharp loud crack followed by resounding thunder. "What was that?" cried the man at my left, a war department representative. "That is the thing," I yelled back. He had forgotten that sound takes much longer than light to travel, and what we had seen so far was a silent picture — the soundtrack for which was one minute and 40 seconds late. I knew then that the bomb was a success — big as it appeared at 20 miles, I was still more impressed with the solid sound of the thunder echoing in the hills.

Hitherto unpublished, captivating (see above) letters from Richard Feynman, one of the chief scientists on the Manhattan Project courtesy of The Guardian.

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Murakami is back in stride with his new short story, "Where I'm Likely to Find It" (hello, Raymond Carver) in The New Yorker. Good to see him writing with his most tried and true voice again.

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ANSi graphics meets 80s NES double dragon meets ... move — a brilliantly executed music video.

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A slightly dated but otherwise decent little list of Tokyo Bookstores

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And finally, a link that's been floating around for a while but worth a plug: Today's Front Pages — collection of 412 front pages from papers around the world.

Greg sometimes got ideas. Rogue thoughts that made him giggle fiercely into his hand on the train. Or cry. Thoughts that made him come very close to telling little old ladies buying tonkatsu that he was not at all well. He was odd to begin with, and living in Japan made him even more so. Some days, he hated the country more than he hated himself. "Who fucking plays pachinko?" he would mutter incredulously at the gibbous moon while pedaling home past the bells and neon. He subsisted primarily on convenience-store food, which he stuffed into his tiny mouth without relish while lurking on blogs about Japan. Greg always appeared dismayed. That's because he was.

But Greg was a genius. Those spastic cogitations that alighted like a butterfly upon childhood taunts and cats' asses one day included a revelation involving a science known only to himself as "rotational physics." Shortly after stopping at Kokkaigijidomae station on the Chiyoda line, the image of a great, oscillating device with elongated metal arms joined the rogues' gallery in his brain. More details appeared: magnetic clamps at the end of the rotating arms, tossing up and catching, forever and at the loss of no energy, a can of coffee. Perpetual motion. A perfect blueprint that induced a fit of giggling so intense and radiating such joy that other passengers joined in after the initial horror passed.

Needing air, he got off the train at Otemachi and with trembling fingers bought a can of Aromax at the nearest vending machine. Four minutes later he was standing above the moat at the Imperial Palace, drinking the coffee and chuckling at the swans below. "Your feet are so comical," Greg said to the nearest bird. It peered up at him and said, "Come on in Greg, the water's great." And so Greg took a final swig, smacked his lips appreciatively and dove in. The can floated back up next to a very dismayed swan, but Greg — and the science of rotational physics — never quite made it.

If Green E Books is a newcomer in the indie bookshop world of Kyoto, Keibunsya is her older, sexified sister.

Everything paneled in a beautiful dark stained wood with perfect accent lighting, laid out in well-thought-out proportions, Keibunsya is probably one of Kyoto's prettiest bookshops. It's large enough to be impressive but still small enough to maintain intimacy.

Keibunsya specializes in art and design oriented books and carries titles from around the world. The majority of their books, however, are in Japanese.

Walk around the inside walls and you'll notice little galleries embedded in the bookshelves — precious handmade leather books behind glass and lit from above. Move to the back of the store and you'll find a stationery section — pens, papers, envelopes — with a full-sized art gallery. At the time they were exhibiting the covers from old German pulp novels.

"E" is the sixth solo album from Tamio Okuda, a singer-songwriter formerly of the 80s rock band Unicorn. Musically, he is all American rock and roll with a fine sensibility for catchy melodies and guitar hooks. You can hear the Western influences everywhere — the Beatles, Led Zeppelin, Steppenwolf and the Knack (His quotations are a lot more straightforward and extroverted compared to Cornelius, but there's definitely a common thread here). He records in the US periodically, working with guest musicians such as Jellyfish veteran Andy Sturmer.

On top of this rock and roll sound, he imbues a good portion of bluesy Japanese pathos, again borrowing from various influences in Japanese music tradition, such as Southern All Stars, the Moonriders and Yosui Inoue (with whom he has co-written many songs). All this mashes up into a strangely relaxing, calmly invigorating listen. I like listening to him at night, when I am winding down from the day's activities.

He is also known for his quirky lyrics. In the song "E", whose guitar-driven mid-tempo sound uncannily recalls the "Revolver"-era Beatles, he sings (I know it's long, but bear with me; English translations follow each line):

Bee-toh-roo-zoo wo undano wa UK?
The Beatles were born in the UK?
"When I was twenty-four" — Hatsu-on wa OK?
"When I was 24" — Did I pronounce it OK?
Okiruno wa AM
Get up in the AM
Neruno wa zz
Go to bed, zz

Haro, Haro, Aisatsu no kotoba
Hello, Hello! Greeting words
Haro, Haro Aisatsu no atowa ...
Hello, Hello! After the greetings ...
Utaeba 'E'
you can sing, and that's 'E' (good)

This reading business is a hard slog. Don't get me wrong — I enjoy talking about and reading from Kuhaku, and the process of getting up in front of an audience and talking about something dear to me is a healthy one, especially since my natural inclination is to sit in the back row and make snide comments. This is a healthy process filled with good stress. But it's a tough business, and if I start thinking about how much work goes into selling a few books, it makes me want to fill a sippy cup with shochu and curl up in the fetal position for the rest of the day.

But enough of that. There were 10 of us last Friday night at Reading Frenzy in Portland. It was nice to see five people I didn't know, plus Robert Jefferson (page 164, Kuhaku fans!) and Tim Clark, whose new book with Carl Kay, Saying Yes to Japan, is a good read for wannabe entrepreneurs. I talked, read and Akira Morita helped with the projector so that we could show some of the work of kozyndan and Craig. The clothesline was a hit, as was the plum wine (Eliza,a volunteer at Reading Frenzy, stumbled out of the reading with her boyfriend saying she had finally found an alcoholic drink she liked). In all, it was a very good event.

But I bet we sold just two or three books. You can't go into these sorts of ventures at the grass-roots level — and with very little money — and expect to be making a living anytime soon. You have to have a long-term dream, like a rock band performing before a half dozen people but dreaming of world tours and black concert T-shirts. My dream is real simple: Build a company that steers between the marketing-obsessed publishing world and the near-poverty of the Pacific Northwest zine world. Make some money — doesn't have to be a lot — and publish some work you're proud of. That's it, really. And of course, give Dick Cheney a really painful wedgy and help get Bill Moyers elected president. But right now, I'm only focused on the publishing part.

In the middle of Kyoto, along Kamo river, next to Marutamachi station, there is a small, cozy, well-lit bookshop bathed in tastefully hip Latin and jazz. Green E Books just turned one last Saturday and celebrated with a party. If you wore something green you got a discount.

Yuko-san studied up before starting Green E. She told me about her trip across Japan visiting small bookstores all over Tokyo — many of them carriers of Kuhaku. She is soft-spoken but energetic and clearly in love with literature.

Green E, being smack near the center of Kyoto — just a quick five-minute bike ride from the old Imperial Palace — is worth checking out even if you're in the city for a quick tour. Everything is reasonably priced. Green E has both straight-forward literature as well as titles erring on the side of artsy. I also noticed some French tomes thrown in the mix. And as an Australian woman illustrated, dumping a bag of old paperbacks on the floor next to me, Book E also buys your leftovers.

Just want to bring everyone's attention to a friend of mine doing some really amazing research over at Stanford. Bjoern was instrumental in helping get the latest incarnation of buzztracker off the ground. During Christmas 2003, after climbing Mt. Kilimanjaro with his dad, he pumped out the PHP routines to grab the news off of the Google pages in about two days. He also helped make sure the servers didn't die during the first couple of months of collection, that data backups ran smoothly and that MySQL played happily with the scripts.

He has some insane projects in the pipeline that, if I mention here, he may have to kill me. Or maybe some small, pasty white bald man smelling of a computer lab will show up late at night, standing at the foot of my bed, glaring down at me through coke-bottle glasses, teeth rank with rotten fillings like the employees of Yodobashi Camera, blood and Cheetos staining his lab coat, breathing deeply, erratically from walking up my steep stairs to the second floor — glaring long and hard at my sleek, tanned, 6'3" physique, my diamond naval piercing, a nude model next to me in bed, another nude model on the futon on the floor next tot he bed, a tattoo of Kuhaku on her left buttocks — he'll open his mouth and say, "This is for Bjoern. This is for revealing his insane projects," as crusty, dark spittle soars in all directions and he plunges into my thick, chiseled chest a PPro 200 processor, screaming, "THERE IS NO FLOATING POINT ERROR!!!"

I do not want to be assassinated by the Stanford undercover comp-sci version of Leon. So I will say, just keep an eye on Bjoern's blog.

I picked up this rarity at my neighborhood liquor shop while buying orange juice for my kids. It was sitting in a glass display cabinet marked "Sale!" next to the cash register and a crate of eggs that looked as if they were made of shellacked wood. Those ever-present eggs. Who buys them? Why are they a deep, glossy brown? After shelling out a mere 90 yen, I was the owner of what I was certain would be a deeply unpleasant beverage. Slated to expire in exactly 30 days, this coffee had probably aged on some dusty shelf for a good year before entering my (at times simian) life. A crack of the widemouth lid released notes of hazelnut, caramel and amaretto. Not a bad start. The coffee itself was not Elmer's Glue white, as I had feared, but rather a pleasant beige. An expert sip accompanied by a professional smacking of the (huge and rubbery) lips was in order, so that's what happened next. This sip gave rise to many random thoughts that are difficult to parse now that I'm naked and agitated and very, very drunk. The overriding theme, I suppose, of these notions was surprise — surprise at how drinkable it was, surprise at how even though it tasted like a mocha milkshake that had been sitting in the back of a hail-damaged 1983 Mazda GLC for two days, it made me coo and waddle like a chimp in diapers. So in my leathery palm I cradle this can, hopped-up on its contents and gamboling about my apartment, lips peeled back and shrieking for eggs.

I was interviewed via instant messenger by Jeremy Wagstaff last Thursday. We spent a good hour talking about Buzztracker, information visualization and the changing face of news. Today, his column came out with a very positive writeup on buzztracker. Says Jeremy:

Launched last month, Buzztracker appears as a map of the world, dotted with red circles of varying size. ...

It's an elegant, simple view of what's going on in the world. But it's more than that: The links underline the way that events in one place are connected to those in other places — one great example is the recent spat between China and Japan about how each country was represented in respective textbooks, superficially resolved by a summit in Indonesia. On Buzztracker you see a triangle of thick red dots linked by thick gray lines. Such webs, Mr. Mod says, are "supposed to get people thinking about why these connections exist."

Jeremy then goes on to talk about Newsmap, the extremely talented Marcos Weskamp's news visualization tool.

The article isn't online (and even if it is, the WSJ charges for its online news), but if possible I highly recommend getting your hands on it (Asian Wall Street Journal, May 13th, 2005, Personal Journal section P5) — it poses a lot of good questions regarding news online.

You can read a partial transcript of both our interviews with Jeremy on Jeremy's blog, Loosewire.

Doctor Head’s World Tower (1991)
[click the image to buy the CD from yesasia.com]

Flipper’s Guitar was formed in 1988 by Brit-pop aficionados Keigo Oyamada (better known today as Cornelius) and Kenji Ozawa. It also included three other Tokyoite hipsters who quit a year later. Their first album — "Three Cheers for Our Side" (1989) — was only a cult hit, but just two years later their fringe culture had entered the mainstream and helped make the Shibuya-kei scene relevant to the rest of the world. The album "Doctor Head's World Tower" found the pop-duo at their peak of creative union. Shortly after releasing it, the duo abruptly broke up, each to pursue very successful solo careers.

Musically, the first word that comes to mind when listening to their music is “derivative.” Their first album is sung entirely in flatly intoned English, the melodies and words ("take off the badges from our anoraks") borrowed from British guitar pop bands such as Aztec Camera and The Pastels. They did this act of imitation, though, with enough awareness, sense of irony and style that the result was a very post-modern, somehow stupefying blend of sweet European kitsch and pseudo-hipness (this often went unnoticed in Japan and was misconstrued as just being really hip). This sense of self-awareness was heightened and sharpened as the two musicians progressed.

"Doctor Head's World Tower" is a culmination of their mischief — full of sampled sounds (and literal phrases) from the music of the 60s, the then-current British pop/rock scene, movies and visual art. In certain songs, such as the leadoff "Dolphin Song" ("God Only Knows" [Beach Boys] + "Porpoise Song" [Monkees]), "The Quizmaster" ("Loaded" [Primal Scream]), the samples are so obviously there, you'd swear they are composed entirely of borrowed sounds, though you can't deny that they sound oddly unique and exotic (Japanese). The songs tend to be long-winded, with twist and turns in their melodies and tempo. The whole concept-laden album chugs along languorously, culminating in a 10-minute opus titled "The World Tower": "Control is the name of our game, and all the rules are up to you," they sing in the last verse (in the "Cliffs Notes" the band issued for the press, they claimed this too is a quote from a book of the same name by writer Jack Tarr, but it sounds suspiciously like a practical joke on the critics).

Tomorrow at 7 pm, I'll be at Reading Frenzy, a cute little bookstore in downtown Portland, Oregon, that will feel crowded if I get five people to show up.(So show up, please!) Accompanying me is Akira Morita, our Music Fridays man. If you've ever wondered about anything related to J-Pops or any other strain of Japanese popular music, he's your man.

We'll also hang the Kuhaku clothesline — just think: there might be a sushi eraser or an expired Hello Kitty train pass in your future! — and, if all our gear works, we plan to show some of the artwork from the book and explain how we put it all together. Of course, we'll have plenty of Japanese junk food and maybe even some umeshuu to share. So come on down before Akira, Chloe and I polish off all the Japanese victuals.

(Note to all you people who just read that last word as "vick-chew-als": Did you know that victuals is pronounced "vittles"? No joke. Check your dictionary.)

PS: This illustration of Reading Frenzy was done by Nate Beaty.

This Marxy fellow touches quite the live wire with a post on the "gaijin complex" and the "downfall" of Shibuya.

I find the longer I live in Tokyo, the less I can deal with Shibuya. It's gotten to the point where I only go there if absolutely necessary. And for no reasons having to do with increasing foreignness. It just feels excessive in all the wrong ways for all the wrong reasons.

On the flip-side (and somewhat hypocritically), I've been drawn closer and closer to Shinjuku, the grime-caked, dirt-swept underbelly of this city, enjoying mingling in the area's intersection of money, youth, sex and business. There's something inherently more interesting, palpable and flavorful about Shinjuku to me than megalomaniacal Shibuya. The interesting bit is most likely rooted in Shinjuku's complete absence on the hipster's radar.

The Gibbon

The gibbon is a curious beast, a study in unfettered gibbosity. Among insiders, the anthropoid is often referred to as the Narcissus of the primate world for its stunning appearance and endless preening. Few truly understand the nature of this haunting creature, despite its unnerving resemblance to man.

It can lope faster than most primates, with the obvious exception of the howler monkey and the common Japanese forest yipe. Most easily identifiable by its bright red wattle and utter lack of teeth (as we know them), the gibbon hates wet climates and may become extremely sullen or even violent when fed dairy products of any sort.

Those who keep a gibbon as a house pet or "butler" can testify to the creature's voracious appetite for grains and succulent fruits, as well as its fondness for onanism. Eye contact with a gibbon, particularly when concurrent with a bout of said self-manipulation by either party, is highly discouraged, as the creature finds it unsettling and may "lash out."

Agitated gibbons will often shape their black, leathery lips into a flutelike projection and let forth a series of hoots. These gibbostic articulations have been thoroughly analyzed and are often compared to whale "keening" in terms of sophistication and sheer aural majesty.

Though numbering in the tens of millions, gibbons are rarely seen in the wild, preferring instead to roost atop trees or lounge in underground pits. These pits, or "tmomba" in Senegalese, are dug by hand and are unique among primates. Gibbons have been known to remain in these subterranean dwellings for weeks at a stretch, apparently daydreaming. They can live for long periods without food or water, though such deprivation can cause them to become listless and/or erratic.

If charged by a gibbon, the best way to avoid serious harm is to utter soft cooing sounds, preferably melodic, and continuously rotate the eyes so as not to indicate aggressive intentions.

Canned coffee guru David Cady is taking a well-deserved break this week. We'll try to appease the angry mobs of Coffee Monday addicts with this little story about a man with a dubious hobby.

And, just in case you're still interested in my Kuhaku interview on WCPN 90.3 FM, the NPR affiliate in Cleveland, Ohio, we have word that it will definitely, positively, without a doubt be airing Tuesday sometime between 12 and 1 Eastern Standard Time on the Around Noon show.

If you're the type of person who, like me, has a slew of text files strewn across your desktops (both physical and digital) may I take a moment to point you in the direction of a nice little application for OSX: VooDooPad.

Based on the wiki model of data organization — namely that connections between documents can be fluid and nonlinear — but without the abject ghastliness of interface (wikis optimize the geeky desire to build things full of potential without making them friendly or useful to the general public).

VooDooPad is unsullied and straightforward and begets habits that, dare I say, may make one more productive and better organized.

We often get asked what line of music we're in at Chin Music Press, and as quickly as Pavlov's dogs, we begin to recite the etymology of "chin music" and the philosophy of our company, et cetera, ad nauseum. Well now, we're really going to throw you for a loop because every Friday for the near future, our blog will be about music, specifically Japanese pop music. Your guide will be Seattle resident Akira Morita, who runs a sharp little bilingual blog with his wife, Dipika. Enjoy!

Tokyo Ska Paradise Orchestra was a cornerstone of the scene known as Shibuya-kei in the mid 1990s. Formed in 1985, the group grew in popularity based on their white-hot live performances. They have not only created an audience for ska in Japan, but also played a vital part in reviving the Japanese music scene through various cross-pollination projects with singers, hip hoppers, jazz musicians and DJs. Members of the band have also contributed to the work of other musicians such as Cornelius, Kenji Ozawa and Pizzicato Five.

In its surprisingly long career, the orchestra has endured countless member changes, traveled the world and sold more records (they’ve recorded 12 albums and countless other projects) than most ska bands, garnering praise everywhere and winning respect from the originators of ska.

This particular album was a gift to me from a dear friend. I had been living in the US for three years, and now my friend wanted to show me what I had been missing. We were in college, and as college kids nothing mattered more to us than having fine taste in music, art and films. He soon filled me in on all the Shibuya musicians that were making serious music listeners take note in Japan and beyond.

Fantasia is the fourth full album for Tokyo Ska Paradise Orchestra, and the last recording with then bandmaster Cleanhead Gimura, who passed away from an illness in 1995. His wistful singing voice is featured on a few songs. The way it contrasts to the ska-style happy clamor found elsewhere makes me feel a bit introspective every time. The reason this album is my favorite, though, is “Dream Express”: It’s a little rhythmic tune that starts with a whistle and guitar strums that quickly turn into a ska rhythm with a trippy chorus — “If you want some spiritual vibes, ska paradise coming soon” — repeated over it. It’s such a happy song.

The orchestra truly shines on stage. I caught them here in Seattle last year, and it was one of the most physically exhausting yet fun shows I attended in the whole year. When they hit the stage, I could feel the whole place shaking in happy one-two rhythm. If you happen to have the chance to see them live, be sure to catch them.

Ummm. Very sorry. The NPR interview mentioned below will air on WCPN 90.3 in Cleveland, Ohio, on Tuesday, May 10th, not today. Cletus had a software glitch.

Mooshiwake arimasen (there is no excuse).

Kuhaku editor Bruce Rutledge talks with the folks at WCPN 90.3 FM, the NPR affiliate in Cleveland, Ohio, tomorrow on the Around Noon show. We'll provide a link to the interview, but if you want to hear it live, check in between noon and 1pm East Coast time tomorrow.

Thank you for your time. Cletus deshita.

Martin Amis is a smart man.

I recently picked up his The War Against Cliché — a collection of his literary critiques of everything from books on chess grandmasters to Don Quixote to the Guinness Book of World Records. Having not been a reader of critiques, it was much to my surprise to find they need not bear down on the source material to be effective. Amis certainly proves this as he punches holes through classics and knocks down only to knock back up a moment later modern authors all the while dancing — fluttering — on the periphery of the literature he's critiquing. It's like watching a master of anything — they make it seem easy, obvious, artful and engaging.

He's sharp. And by sharp I mean dangerous.

When you put out something like Kuhaku, you're placing a little bit of your soul in the hands of dangerous men. In his introduction, Amis summarizes his evolution as a critic quite well:

"You hope to get more relaxed and confident over time; and you should certainly get (or seem to get) kinder, simply by avoiding the stuff you are unlikely to warm to. Enjoying being insulting is a youthful corruption of power. You lose your taste for it when you realize how hard people try, how much they mind and how long they remember."

As someone who's been involved in producing things that get reviewed, I can attest (and perhaps Bruce can chime in here) that for all the great and positive things people say, the stuff that sticks in the craw, as it were, are the superficially negative and vitriolic statements; the shards of glass hurled by smug, territorial and insecure critics. Even though we know they are smug, territorial and insecure, they irritate all the same.

That said, if you want to read some painfully well-written, witty, hilarious and insightful reviews by someone who has figured out what his role as a reviewer is, hurry up and push that 1-click order button.

Picture an indie bookstore owner for a moment. A cerebral, soft-spoken, left-leaning woman with salt-and-pepper hair? Or perhaps a very intelligent but socially awkward middle-aged man, usually sporting an earring? Am I close?

Whatever your stereotype of indie bookstore owners, I bet Brad Beshaw breaks it. Brad runs Confounded Books in Seattle's Capitol Hill (on the right, with the neon "open" sign — 315 E. Pine St.) . He opened his store about 10 years ago, as the zine culture was really hitting its stride. Sadly, many of the bookstores that opened then are long gone. Brad is one of the few who, inspired by punk rock and the zines that fueled punk's rise, is still hanging on.

We've added a short profile of Brad to our indie bookstore section. And here is his kick-ass tattoo. We'll be reading here June 9 at 7 pm. And we'll be in Portland next Friday the 13th, at Reading Frenzy, another one of those bookstores that came out of the zine culture. These places are great. If you're looking for a new book, why not turn off your computer, get a little fresh air and walk to one of these stores? Everyone will benefit but Jeff Bezos.

While setting out by bicycle ostensibly to buy this coffee*, I discovered that not only is there a river in my neighborhood, but that this modest waterway cuts a verdant, wildflower-choked swath through the seemingly endless grey plain of buildings and concrete that is much of Tokyo. Best of all, the "mighty" Senkawa is obligingly flanked by smooth paths ideal for embarking on trips of discovery on warm spring afternoons accompanied by a 4-year-old with chicken pox and a strong-willed 2-year-old inclined to startle elderly passers-by with operatic cries of "To infinity... and beyond!"