Fugu

This is place where you can eat fugu, that poisonous fish that can kill you if you eat the wrong part. I've heard that the liver is both the most delicious and most poisonous part of the fish. I'm not sure how that works. I guess its kind of like how the most delicious thing to point a gun at is the inside of your mouth. Anyway, I ate fugu once. At least I think so. I was drunk at a restaurant and some Japanese dude made me eat some fish that he said was fugu. I suppose it's possible that he was just messy with me. It tasted kind of like fish.

Slit Hot Roll

Apparently the fine folks at StyleOne didn't realize that putting wieners in buns is already hilarious enough.

Japanese Gum Review #3: Boss Special Coffee Gum

I guess Boss is celebrating its 20th Anniversary. By the way, did you know that Tommy Lee Jones often appears in their commercials? He plays an alien who saw a movie and took the form of Tommy Lee Jones. He attempts to understand humanity... and he drinks Boss.

I think the special taste advertised here might translate better as "taste" or "unappealing flavor." Again, there was a slight mint flavor.

Ratings:
Gaybot: 2  The coffee flavor by Fit's was much better.
Girlbot: 1  She spit it out.
Overall: 1.5

Amazing Magician

You can tell the crowd was super into this guy. During the tricks, which were the type of tricks you would expect from your friend in junior high, he kept looking at the crowd like, "Can you believe this is happening?!" After two tricks with little or no reaction, he went back to the box and showed the crowd cards telling them to applaud and say, "Oooooohh!" The best magicians always come prepared.

Japanese Food Review #27: KFC Salty Ginger Chicken Chips

Here's kind of a fun fact for you: Colonel Sanders died less than 10 months before I was born. Because of this, it has been widely speculated that I am the reincarnation of the Colonel.

And on with the food review. KFC in Japan is promoting their new flavor salty ginger. There's a coupon on the back of this bag. All you have to do is carry a greasy part of a chip bag around to save 60 yen on a piece of chicken that will assist you in moving one step forward towards your future death. These chips did have a bit of a ginger flavor, but the good folks at Calbee seem to have mistaken chicken flavor with burnt garbage flavor. It wasn't that bad, but you should still steer clear of the Colonel's latest recipe.

Ratings:
Gaybot: 3
Girlbot: 4
Overall: 3.5
I think we can all agree that the Colonel is spinning in his grave.

Vending Machine Store

I went into a store that only had toy vending machines. It was a really oddly shaped store. You can probably on see a fifth of it in the picture. In the back corner I found this:

It's a girls underpants machine. The cartoon girl is saying, "Please buy...my panties..." At the bottom it says it's new underwear and costs 300 yen. I guess you would buy this if you were too embarrassed to buy women's underwear from a department store. It also says you have to be 18 to buy it. I'm not really sure why, plus this store has zero employees, so I'm guessing a ton of 15-year-old boys shop here. Notice it's sold out. At least they weren't used. Still pretty weird.

Museums

I might be going out on a bit of limb here, but this is probably one of the best tobacco and salt museums in all of East Asia.

Thank you to Natonymous for supplying the photo.

Kool Age (Squared) Style

Hey ladies! If you're willing to pay an unreasonable amount of money, these young gentlemen will talk to you and do their best to pretend they are not disgusted by your presence. It's every girl's paradise.

Hello Kitty Bag Day!

If I can just paraphrase for Kitty-chan here: Suck it, the North Pole!

Magome Juku

Back when people had to travel from Edo (Tokyo) to Kyoto by foot or horse, there were five routes. The most popular route, Tokaido, ran along the sea. Another, Nakasendo, ran inland. The name means inner-mountain road. There were 69 rest areas (I know, hilarious). I went to two of them this weekend. Now they're crazy tourist spots. Magome Juku was stop #43 and the first stop in Gifu. Here's some pics:

There were a couple of cool watermills. It said they produced electricity... just like in the 1600s, I guess.

There were a ton of people walking their dogs there. I guess it's common knowledge that dogs love crowed stone paths.

 A watermill and the post office for your viewing pleasure.

A senbei shop.

Kind of an interesting cultural note: They put carp in the fire cistern so that if ever put out a fire, they know there's fish crap all over the saved structure.

A tour guide getting her stretch on.

Airing out the futons.

A vending machine with beer, coffee, etc.