The Internet is here!

So I have a ton of stuff to report on, the trip via freighter being a very interesting component. Day to day life here still has the shine of newness and peculiarity that hasn't worn off in the same way it used to when I was here for shorter periods of time. School is challenging, mostly because I have poor discipline, but I'm learning, so that's a good thing. My apartment "The shoebox of Solitude" is actually quite comfortable. I'm quite close to the Shinkansen (bullet train) tracks, having been previously unaware that it ever came close to Nishi-Magome, but the aerodynamic profile combined with high precision steel tracks allow the train to rush by as silently as a teflon coated snake. The local trains make quite a bit more noise, although there are no nearby crossings to provide the usually ubiquitous and comforting "Bong-Bong-Bong" sound unique to Japan.

I finally finished the 1085 page Tomas Pynchon tome, "Against the Day." It was my first Pynchon, and I was in disbelief that his editor allowed the paragraph long, overly descriptive writing style that I always do my best to avoid, but would use in a minute if I thought I could get away with it. It was readable, there were too many odd sex things that just seemed gratuitous, the character development was either superficial or when interesting only partially fleshed out, and the various plot strings, wildly ambitious and varied, were never tied back together as I feared they would not be. Some of the more interesting sub-plots and characters were simply forgotten along the way and the payoff's were weak and unsatisfying. I will probably get hammered by Pynchonologists for blasphemy, I will admit that I was surprised by some of his cultural references and little factoids, but I already knew them, so they were more inside jokes than new discoveries. The things I may have missed were not elucidated upon, and without the Internet handy, suspicious passages were not worth my time to note for future research. With 1085 pages he could have made some foot notes and learned us som'tin'. Anyway, now I can read the history of the Laeisz shipping company it the beautiful hardcover book gifted to my by the dear Captain Günther and his lovely wife.