Saturday, December 31, 2005

year of the dog

It's been a little over twelve months since this little project ballooned from a lark to a small obsession, and my own little patch of the web has seen around eight thousand visitors. I suppose if I include daily updates on the health of my dog and lists of weird shit I saw in the supermarket I suppose it would be more, but you and I would rather enjoy essays with big chunks of style stolen from Alan Booth and David Sedaris, then sprinkled with a thin veneer of artiness.

I spent the last week holed up in a small room with eight other expats in Kusatsu, one of Japan's most well known and eggiest smelling hot spring resorts. Most of us were long termers, with at least three or four years here and a grasp of the language. Which made us feel at home enough to pelt each other with snowballs while we froliced naked in the outdoor baths. On Christmas eve I grabbed a friend and we cobbled together a Christmas tree and ornaments from pine branches and free flyers left in the lobby of our hotel.

Happy New Year of the Dog.

2 comments:

sbackl said...

Something I have always wanted to do is vistit Japan it is on my wish list but while ever other things consume my money it will have to wait, this time it is conservatory furniture why for god sake do we need a suite in there, we need a vacation thats what we need, I follow this with envy.

Anonymous said...

This Chinese New Year begins on the 29th January 2006. It is the year 4703 – Year of the Dog, the 11th in the Chinese zodiac cycle. More precisely, the element which is prominent this year is Fire, and as such it is the Year of the Fire Dog or Red Dog.

Dogs are traditionally loyal, caring, and strive for justice. This year, we can expect that there will be a focus on creating peace and stamping out injustice. There is likely to be a lot of political debate, and many will speak out on their views of war and environmental issues.