The Sadventures of Rob - Upgrading

Hey all, I have some free time, so I decided to write a bit. I last left off before the thursday holiday (National Foundation Day). Some people prefer to have a day off of Monday or Friday for the 3 day weekend, but for me, since I don't really go on that many trips, when I get days off in the middle of the week, its really cool because it allows me to go to Kobe or Osaka on a weeknight, and then stay over for a night, like a mini-weekend. It divides my week into two smaller weeks. So I had 3 days of work, which went by quickly. After work on Wed, I headed out to Osaka to meet with Andrew, his GF Ibuki, and a friend of hers.

We met up, and hung out, waiting for Ibuki's friend to show up, but she didn't show up when she said she would, and she was unreachable on her cell phone. We went to dinner anyways, and had a good meal at this indonesian resturant or something. It was funny because when we walked in, there were like, a buncha staff members all showing the way to a seat, like, every 2-3 feet, there's a staff member smiling and being all “THIS WAY!” Same thing when we left, everyone lined up and was like “THANK YOU”. Quite interesting. After that, Ibuki's friend showed up, and we met up with her and then went Karaoke for like, an hour. It went by pretty quickly and it was fun. After that, everyone had to leave, so I went to Namba and went to the 12 hour manga cafe. They were out of mat booths, but they had reclining chairs, so I just opted for that. Usually, when I get a reclining chair room, I just sleep on the floor, but this time, there wasn't nearly enough space, so I ended up having to sleep on the chair itself. I usually have problems because its not completely flat, but rather more like a 45 degree angle reclined. However, I managed to position myself comfortably ENOUGH to be able to fall asleep for a good portion of the night. After getting better sleep than I thought, I got up, and reserved the shower room (free shower with the 12 hour pack). About an hour later, they came by, I took a shower, and then went on the internet a little more before I headed out.

I left the manga cafe, and of course, where do I go? Athena. I got there, and there were a few people there already. There was a gdlk Liese player going up against guy-girl. I went around to see who it was, and I recognized him as the Tokyo player Furiita. I also saw Pincho, and a Tokyo Petra player. They only played on cabs that were 2/3 rounds (I guess because Arcana is a way diff game when played 3/5 rounds), so they actually changed one of the machines from 3/5 to 2/3 rounds. I played against Pincho for a bit, and he destroyed me 8-2. It was really fun because he straight up exploited my weaknesses, so I learned a lot from playing, but it felt too short. Oh well. After everyone left, I was getting hungry, so I left too and went to get my usual cheese curry. It was delicious as ever, and since I was already up and about, I decided to walk around the den. Being on the hunt for K-on plushies as usual, I spotted a DX Mugi plush for 1500 yen, and since I was missing her, I picked it up. Now I just need the DX Ritsu plush to have the set. I didn't buy anything else, if I remember correctly.

I went back to Athena, played more Arcana/Melty/Blaz whatever. It was good times overall. They're pretty hardcore there, so I feel like I have to play my best just to hang, but that makes me better in the long run. I was kinda getting bored though, so I headed back a bit early and just hung out at home.

Back in Ono, after having it feel like my weekend is over, it's Friday, and I go to work, and finish it up, and before I know it, it's another weekend! Alex just got back from a trip to Hokkaido, so I haven't seen him or talked to him for like, a week. I wanted to see Dan, too, and since Dan was going to Alex's place in Shiga, I definitely had to go. I set out Friday, but I barely missed the bus (that comes once an hour) by two minutes. So I went to the train station instead, and just missed the train (leaves every 15 minutes) by 1 minute. I got to Sannomiya, and ate a beef bowl with cheese at the Sukiya there before transferring to the 2 and a half hour train to Alex's place. I got to the station, and I walked in, and it turns out, I missed the train by one minute, and now I have to wait a half hour for the next one. Worst train day EVER. Then, I was writing a long email on my cell phone to Alex, when I hit the wrong button, and it all got cleared. So I'm kind of annoyed at this point. However, once I got on the train, and got going, everything was fine. I got to Alex's place, and we just chilled there. While there, FINALLY, after a long time, I beat idolm@ster for the DS. For those who read my blog and pay careful attention to little details that they probably don't care about, you'll remember I bought the Eri character CD a while back. The first song is probably my favorite track on the CD, so I've been listening to it a bunch. This one communication in the game came up, where your producer gives you a piece of paper left by her old boss, and Eri starts reading it, and reads the lyrics to the song. Then, one of those things where they give you 3 options and you have to get it correct came up, and since I knew it was the lyrics, I hit “lyrics” and I was like “hah, for the first time since playing, I'm not just guessing and hoping I hit the right option!” (Because even if I know what they mean, it's sometimes hard to tell which one will be the best answer). It's something dumb, and I was really happy. But, there's always been a song that you can't unlock with Eri. Turns out, the song on the character CD ended up being that song! Awesome! So now that I beat the game, I have the song unlocked in stage mode, so I can just play it whenever I want with Eri. Sweet.

After that, I crawled under Alex's kotatsu and went to sleep there.

We woke up, I got showered and ready, and we headed out to Minami Hikone, which is this area where there's a buncha cool stuff and stores and whatnot. We headed out and went to the train station. We missed the train, so we had to wait for a bit. While we were waiting, this little kid comes up, and apparantly is a student of Alex's. He's like, 1st grade in elementary school. He runs to Alex and does this little kid like GRR ATTACK!!! play thing with him. He then looks at me, and asks me who I am, and asks if I'm a friend of Alex's. I'm like “yeah, I'm another English teacher like him”. He's like “OK!” and then he starts attacking me, too, haha. He sees my bag, and sees this little cross thing stuck on there and tries taking it. Then, he sees my jacket, and I'm like, “isn't it cool?” and he's like “meh”. After that, he uses the fur on my jacket and was making a mustache out of it. It was pretty funny. His older brother (5th grade?) was there, too, and was talking to us for a bit, too, asking where we were going and stuff. His grandmother or whoever looked really apologetic to us like “I'm sorry he's bothering you” and all that stuff, but it was funny, and it killed time spent waiting.

Anyways, we get there and the first place we go is Coco's for Lunch. I got my cheese curry, plus a piece of Nan bread, and it was suuuuuuuuper good. Near the end tho, it pretty much killed me, and I had to struggle to finish the last few bites, but I did it. After that, we went to the big shopping center Vivre. We stopped by the arcade because we wanted to play Taiko, but there were these 6 or 7 high school students. They brought their own sticks, and pretty much set up camp. When one was finished, the next would go, and there was no room for others in this equation. We figured that we would go and come back in a few hours and they would be gone, so we left. We went to these game stores, and checked out prices. At the GEO store, I saw some k-on blue rays for fairly cheap, so I kept note of that, but didn't really see anything else. We went to the book-off/arcade. While looking around for books there, I noticed they had volumes 3-7 of Shikigami no Shiro (originally a shmup) for only 100 yen each! I got vol 1 and 2 a while back, but I couldn't find 3-7 anywhere, much less for cheap. So I got the 5 comics, and they were only 5 bucks for the whole of them! The problem was more carrying these things since it's a pain to carry anything, haha.

After that, we went upstairs to the arcade. I don't know how it stays in business cause it's like, ALWAYS dead, but whatever. Maybe they know something I don't. I saw some guy playing Street Fighter IV, so I played against him. I lost the first match, but then won the next one. He left, and so I started playing the computer. Another guy came up to play me and I ended up winning like, 3 times in a row! He left after that, I beat the game, and then we headed out of there. We went back to the namco arcade (it's been a couple hours at this point, I think?) and they're still there, but they reverted from doing 2 players at the same time, to 1 person playing, and a second person playing on the 2nd drum, but without a score and stuff. So cheap. I didn't feel like waiting around, or getting in there, so we just headed back.
We get back to Alex's place and I just head under the kotatsu and relax there until it's about time to go meet dan. We meet up with him at the Ramen place, have dinner there, and then head to the Red Velvet Lounge. There's a buncha old people there singing Enka like usual. We decided not to bother and went back to Alex's place and play Mahjong. We end up doing a game, and at the end, I get a really good hand and win. We decide to try out the Red Velvet Lounge one more time, in hopes that the old people (who have probably been there all day) would finally have left, but nope, they're STILL there. We hope that if we go there, they'll leave after a bit, but of course, that doesn't work. They've already set up camp. Alex brings this beer and so we drink some and we get a turn every once in a while. We're singing mostly stuff that isn't too “embarassing?” Just normal J-stuff, or popular English songs or whatever. We're then sick of hearing Enka at this point because every song sounds exactly the same, and these people aren't leaving, so me and Alex duet Fuwafuwa time and troll the old people, and then we leave. We play another game of Mahjong and Alex ends up getting a bomb hand and wins the match. It was mad fun, but I had to get up early the next day, so I didn't want to stay up too late.

After I go to bed, I get up, and leave. I do some stuff somewhere, I don't remember. Anyways, after that, Andrew calls me, and says he's meeting up with his friends in Sannomiya and going to eat. I say I'm down, and I go with him. So me, Andrew, and 5 girls (including Ibuki) end up going out to this Indian Resturant. We eat there, it was really good. Afterwards, I have to head back and catch the last bus.

The next week was pretty easy at work, not much going on, just a lotta tales of graces. I caught a cold sometime tuesday, so that was pretty annoying, so I just went home and relaxed and slept more than usual. I felt really bad Thursday night, but I was at about 95% by Saturday. Saturday I didn't do much, but I went to Andrews place and slept over there. We played some SFIV but I suck at it now, so I either have to grin and bear it, and get better, or just straight up stop playing. I can't decide atm which I want to do. Oh well. We went to bed after that.

Sunday, we got up and went to Coco's for some curry. Andrew had some stuff to do in Osaka, and I wanted to go to Sannomiya and play games. I head to Sannomiya, play some games and stuff. I remember that there's a Blazblue CS tourney at the Sannomiya Sanx. I decide to give the game another shot in tourney. I get in a pool with a Litchi, a carl, and a bang. The litchi pretty much owns me. He was good and his character is S+ tier. I beat the carl player. Last is the bang player. He's just this random scrub that I would see around. I beat him first round, but 2nd and 3rd round, because he's bang, he gets high damage off of dumb hits and I end up losing. So yeah, I lost to a Bang and a Litchi in my pool. I leave after that and play some Melty at Magical Space. I see this H-Miyako there, and I'm like “oh man, I can beat this guy” and he owns me 2 games in a row before I beat him. He switches to his main, F-Sion, and we go about 2 wins for him before I win one. Then we go even for a bit, and at the end, he gets two wins, and I call it quits.

After that, I walk around the anime store area of sannomiya, just killing time and whatnot. I meet up with Andrew and stuff. We play at arcades for a bit, then go get some food. We have some time to kill, so I stop in the Sannomiya Labi/Yamada Denki store. I check the TV floor just for kicks. I saw a cheap 90,000 yen TV marked down to 60,000. I decide I'm gonna invest and just get it. We get some food first and I think it over anyways. I go back and ask the guy about it. He says that while the TVs are cheap, they're not exactly high quality. I say I'll think it over and I talk to my friend. We look at more TVs. I see a 37 inch Toshiba TV. Normally 180,000 yen, it's marked down to 134,000 or so for the day. The thing is, you get a bonus 20% points. So you get like, 27,500 worth of points for getting the TV. I decide on it, and after looking at how nice the quality is and everything, I'm like “man, this is awesome,” I gotta do it. So I call the guy over and we get it done. I just bought a big TV to be delivered to my place out in the boonies for free.

Now that I had like, 28,000 yen in points (I had points from before), I used those and just bought a ps3 and paid 1,780 for it. I just carried that home tho, no need to like, have that delivered.

So yeah, interesting turn of events that night went to.

Monday, I got home from work and played a buncha tales of graces. Tuesday, I had errands to run. I went to the dept store and checked out TV stands, but didn't see one I liked. I got some McDonalds for dinner and stuffed it in my bag and left. I biked over to the home improvement store. I saw a TV stand there that I liked and it was reasonably priced. I picked it up and after I bought it, I realized “How the hell am I gonna carry this home?” So I put it on my bike and kinda balanced my bike while pushing it. I did that for about a block before I was like “man, something is gonna fall SOMETIME.” I decided to quit while I was ahead and just park my bike in this empty parking lot, and just carry the darn thing home. I walked maybe a half a block before stopping each time. By the time I got home, I was drenched in sweat, and my arms were numb. But I got it home! I ate my burger, and then got to work. I moved the TV from the main room into my bedroom, and moved the desk from my bedroom into the spare room I don't use. I then built the new TV stand. It was kind of a pain, but I did it, despite instructions being in Japanese. The only thing is, I put one part that was supposed to be facing forward on backwards. It's on the botttom shelf, so it's hard to see, but I was just like “whatever, I'm not taking it apart again. It's fine.” I set up the 360, the ps3, and put my joysticks/controllers etc in their spots. Awesome. I just chilled for the rest of the night.

Wed comes around, and my TV finally shows up. The guys come and they build it and everything. They show me how to use it, and I ask about the games, and they plug the systems in, and talk to me about games. One of the dudes says he has a ps3 too, and was telling me a few games he likes and stuff. It was pretty sweet. I don't have any ps3 games yet, so I can't play it, but I booted up my 360. I fixed the settings, and tried some idolm@ster live for you. It was ok, but I wanted to play some Street Fighter or something. I played online, but did poorly, so I shut it off, and decided to go to the Ono city pool. I'm really out of shape so I want to kinda start getting back into shape, but I don't really want to lift weights, so I figure swimming might be the way to go (at least thats what my friends are saying). I went there, it's really easy, 500 yen to get in, and that's it. I got in, changed, threw my stuff in a locker, and did a few laps back and forth. It was a ton of kids in a swimming class, and then nobody using the “free” lanes. So I pretty much had it all to myself. I guess there are perks to living in a somewhat rural town. Anyways, after maybe 20 minutes or so, I was drained, so I left (don't want to overdo it at first). I biked home and by that time, I was so tired, all I could do was lay in bed motionless. After 20-30 minutes, I felt better tho, and went up to Bill's place and played some TvC.

Yesterday (thursday), I had laundry, so I did that, and since it was too late to go to the pool, I decided to take a bike ride around Ono, since the weather is so nice (It was around 50-60 degrees most of yesterday). There's this one ramen place that I go to sometimes, and while it's really good, I was wondering if there's anything PAST that. I biked past there for maybe a mile or so, but there really wasn't much of anything. Oh well, it was still good exercise. Maybe one of these days I'll try to go to the next city over, which might be like, 40 minutes or so.

Anyways, it's friday! This weekend seems like it'll be pretty epic. I'll hit the pool again tonite, and then just relax with my new giganto TV and some games. Peace!