Men here don't hold doors. For the most part, they don't say thanks when doors are held open for them either. It's a rough life we females lead over here near the International dateline. We're surrounded by brusque, spitting gentlemen and we have to cram our feet into pointy triangle-shaped confines. Thank goodness I bucked my earlier (4 days ago?) conviction and decided to buy a totally-sweet bag instead of totally-chic shoes. Everyone's better off because of it.

I went out last night for 100? beers in Shinjuku, which is a main hub west of downtown Tokyo, and home to such landmarks as . . . as . . . the Lost in Translation hotel. It's very representative of bright-lights-and-crazy-amounts-or-humanity-Japan, and going there reminded me of a phenomenon here that I wanted to mention: Okay, so there are many tall buildings here that have different venues on every floor. For a while, i.e., I frequented an internet cafe on the 7th floor of a building in Tachikawa, and every other floor had its respective business (mostly restaurants). Anyway, one might think that a 6th story venue would receive less patronage than one with street access, but this is not the case. Something about the neon lights and signs completely draws the eyes up away from the earth, which means these higher-story venues do just fine. Interesting, no?


Also interesting: I almost died from crushing and/or suffocation on the train today. Somehow I've managed to avoid overly packed trains until now, but I suppose my initiation to extreme discomfort had to happen eventually. It was awful and stuffy and people kept on squirming their way into the already-packed mass of bodies. Gross. Thank goodness for living in the sticks and not having to deal with that craziness all the time.