Well I haven't had much motivation to write anything here but a lot of stuff has happened in the last half year or so.
Tonight, we played a little set at this place in town called Penny Lane (a little music cafe).
Here are a few videos, some very recognizable songs :)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YS_Rqyxa69A
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QcrY0W-02Kk
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qp2hPjIr21I
Not perfect, but not bad. We only had two rehearsals this week to prepare, so I think we did pretty well on such short time. Hopefully we'll keep doing this, and get better as we go along.
Saturday, November 14, 2009
Sunday, April 5, 2009
I don't think this needs any explanation...
All is good though. In fact, I pretty much made out like a bandit on this one :)
Sunday, March 1, 2009
New Shocks! And "field seminar."
Today I got some new rear shocks on my bike.
Unfortunately, when I got the bike, all the oil had leaked from the dampers on the originals, rendering them pretty dead... all it did was bounce up and down on the springs, which is not very great for riding.
On the bright side, I was able to get a pair of new, off-brand shocks for about 100 bucks from the 'net, and get 'em installed for about 30 bucks at the shop I always go to. I was gonna try doing it myself, but I'm actually glad I took it to the shop, as there was a small issue that would have made it kind of difficult...
And, I had some issues with the band that holds my muffler in place. A few weeks ago, while I was riding, my muffler hit the ground as I was taking a corner, and scared the piss out of me.. it was at that point that I noticed the band was gone!
I got a temporary fix in place until I could get a new band, but the new one I got was a bit too big. I kind of shit rigged it together with some foam insulation to fill the space, but it didn't quite match up right and also left the muffler in a position where it was slightly rubbing up against the suspension. What an ordeal!
But, when I took the bike in to get the shocks changed out the guy was nice enough to also get the muffler band set up a little better so it's not hitting the shock and the excess space is filled with rubber instead of the spongy insulation crap, so it looks much nicer and is much more proper. Score!
My first semester of the master course is over, meaning I'm halfway done with classes. After that, it's all research/thesis.
I don't know what kind of grades I will get, but I don't think it'll be a problem.. there was only an average of one final assignment for each class, and I got everything done OK, so I think it'll be fine.
In another week or so we have this two-credit "field seminar" where we present our research topics to all the other first-year master students, and are required to attend a certain number of other people's talks, and ask questions... So I've been putting together a talk on my proposed project, which hasn't been too difficult, and has come with the benefit of giving me a little more direction on what I'll be doing for my project after classes are done this next term.
In April it's off to Tokyo to test the balloon project in a low-temp vacuum environment again, later in the year off hokkaido to try flying the balloon for the first time, and who knows what'll happen after that.
Well, that's what I'm up to these days.
Maybe when it gets warmer (still freezing my ass off here...) I'll go for some nice bike rides and get some pictures and stuff.
Unfortunately, when I got the bike, all the oil had leaked from the dampers on the originals, rendering them pretty dead... all it did was bounce up and down on the springs, which is not very great for riding.
On the bright side, I was able to get a pair of new, off-brand shocks for about 100 bucks from the 'net, and get 'em installed for about 30 bucks at the shop I always go to. I was gonna try doing it myself, but I'm actually glad I took it to the shop, as there was a small issue that would have made it kind of difficult...
And, I had some issues with the band that holds my muffler in place. A few weeks ago, while I was riding, my muffler hit the ground as I was taking a corner, and scared the piss out of me.. it was at that point that I noticed the band was gone!
I got a temporary fix in place until I could get a new band, but the new one I got was a bit too big. I kind of shit rigged it together with some foam insulation to fill the space, but it didn't quite match up right and also left the muffler in a position where it was slightly rubbing up against the suspension. What an ordeal!
But, when I took the bike in to get the shocks changed out the guy was nice enough to also get the muffler band set up a little better so it's not hitting the shock and the excess space is filled with rubber instead of the spongy insulation crap, so it looks much nicer and is much more proper. Score!
My first semester of the master course is over, meaning I'm halfway done with classes. After that, it's all research/thesis.
I don't know what kind of grades I will get, but I don't think it'll be a problem.. there was only an average of one final assignment for each class, and I got everything done OK, so I think it'll be fine.
In another week or so we have this two-credit "field seminar" where we present our research topics to all the other first-year master students, and are required to attend a certain number of other people's talks, and ask questions... So I've been putting together a talk on my proposed project, which hasn't been too difficult, and has come with the benefit of giving me a little more direction on what I'll be doing for my project after classes are done this next term.
In April it's off to Tokyo to test the balloon project in a low-temp vacuum environment again, later in the year off hokkaido to try flying the balloon for the first time, and who knows what'll happen after that.
Well, that's what I'm up to these days.
Maybe when it gets warmer (still freezing my ass off here...) I'll go for some nice bike rides and get some pictures and stuff.
Monday, January 19, 2009
Stopped by the five-oh?
Today, I went to the realtor through which I'm getting my apartment... same place some of my buddies went through, and I'm actually moving into the same building as one of my buddies... very VERY close to school, and not 100 meters away from the jazz club practice room, so that's a nice score! I went to discuss a couple of quick things.. next week when I get my monthly stipend, I'll be paying most of what I need for my first month and everything should be good to go!
Now might be a good time to note that my big bike is still in the shop, I put it in to get the mirror mounts fixed, get an oil change, and get a digital speedometer installed in place of the somewhat faulty original one. So, I'm back to riding my little 50 cc.
Anyway, on my way back, I crossed this bridge right before hitting the bottom of the hill that my campus is on, and much to my surprise, a police officer on the side of the road blew his whistle at me and motioned for me to stop. There was a van with about five or six officers parked on the side of the road... for what it seemed they were doing I don't know why they needed to be paying all those guys to stand around, but I guess it is none of my business.
When I was whistled over, I wondered if I was getting a speeding ticket.. on a 50 cc machine, the limit is 30 km/h everywhere, which most people generally do not observe, considering one could go faster than that on a pedal bike. I don't really know if I was going faster than 30 or not, there was a bit of traffic, so I just stayed with the flow of traffic and didn't check the meter at all since I wasn't going that fast.
So, anyway, one of the officers asked "so, does your speedometer work?"
They asked me to hop off my bike and put it on the center stand (which allows the bike to sit with wheels off the ground), so they could spin the front wheel and see if the meter moved. 50cc bikes don't have a center stand (actually, neither does my 400) so they instead decided to have two guys lift the front wheel off the ground by the handlebars to do the test.
I asked if that was all they had stopped me for, still wondering if there was something they were going to ticket me for or something, but then one of the guys just said "Yeah it's illegal to drive without a working meter, so we just wanted to check that."
They then just asked to see my license, one of the guys said "Your tires have cracks in them, you should get new tires" (which I'm aware of but don't want to put money into since I got a bigger bike), and then said "thank you for your time" and let me on my way.
I'm also somewhat surprised that they only asked for my driver's license, and not my foreigner card, as the Japanese police are kind of notorious for randomly asking to see foreigner IDs (and allegedly subsequently trying to rope people into other stuff once they're stopped for the random check) which a lot of people seem to take issue with. I've even read a story of a guy saying that they took him in for hours of interrogation and he ultimately had to go all the way to Tokyo (from somewhere in the countryside) to make a court appearance and try to apologize, simply because he had left his wallet/ID card at home when he was stopped for an ID check.
This is the first time I've ever dealt with the police here, so I have no first-hand experience of that.
But how funny is that? I get stopped for them to check the functionality of *exactly* what my other bike is in the shop for! On the other hand, if I was riding that one and they checked it, it would have passed their simple test, as the needle *did* move when the wheel was spun, it just overestimated the speed by a lot.. probably not enough for them to tell the difference by spinning it to a couple km/h.
Fortunately I wasn't doing anything wrong and I was let on my way after about thirty seconds and that was that.. hey that wasn't so bad.
Now might be a good time to note that my big bike is still in the shop, I put it in to get the mirror mounts fixed, get an oil change, and get a digital speedometer installed in place of the somewhat faulty original one. So, I'm back to riding my little 50 cc.
Anyway, on my way back, I crossed this bridge right before hitting the bottom of the hill that my campus is on, and much to my surprise, a police officer on the side of the road blew his whistle at me and motioned for me to stop. There was a van with about five or six officers parked on the side of the road... for what it seemed they were doing I don't know why they needed to be paying all those guys to stand around, but I guess it is none of my business.
When I was whistled over, I wondered if I was getting a speeding ticket.. on a 50 cc machine, the limit is 30 km/h everywhere, which most people generally do not observe, considering one could go faster than that on a pedal bike. I don't really know if I was going faster than 30 or not, there was a bit of traffic, so I just stayed with the flow of traffic and didn't check the meter at all since I wasn't going that fast.
So, anyway, one of the officers asked "so, does your speedometer work?"
They asked me to hop off my bike and put it on the center stand (which allows the bike to sit with wheels off the ground), so they could spin the front wheel and see if the meter moved. 50cc bikes don't have a center stand (actually, neither does my 400) so they instead decided to have two guys lift the front wheel off the ground by the handlebars to do the test.
I asked if that was all they had stopped me for, still wondering if there was something they were going to ticket me for or something, but then one of the guys just said "Yeah it's illegal to drive without a working meter, so we just wanted to check that."
They then just asked to see my license, one of the guys said "Your tires have cracks in them, you should get new tires" (which I'm aware of but don't want to put money into since I got a bigger bike), and then said "thank you for your time" and let me on my way.
I'm also somewhat surprised that they only asked for my driver's license, and not my foreigner card, as the Japanese police are kind of notorious for randomly asking to see foreigner IDs (and allegedly subsequently trying to rope people into other stuff once they're stopped for the random check) which a lot of people seem to take issue with. I've even read a story of a guy saying that they took him in for hours of interrogation and he ultimately had to go all the way to Tokyo (from somewhere in the countryside) to make a court appearance and try to apologize, simply because he had left his wallet/ID card at home when he was stopped for an ID check.
This is the first time I've ever dealt with the police here, so I have no first-hand experience of that.
But how funny is that? I get stopped for them to check the functionality of *exactly* what my other bike is in the shop for! On the other hand, if I was riding that one and they checked it, it would have passed their simple test, as the needle *did* move when the wheel was spun, it just overestimated the speed by a lot.. probably not enough for them to tell the difference by spinning it to a couple km/h.
Fortunately I wasn't doing anything wrong and I was let on my way after about thirty seconds and that was that.. hey that wasn't so bad.
Monday, December 29, 2008
The scene outside my balcony yesterday.
Sorry for the crappy cell phone camera, but here's what the area around the dorm looked like yesterday at about 9 am:
It just wouldn't stop snowing all weekend! Very cold and windy outside, but I still survived without using the heat too much. Today was much nicer out and most of the snow melted away.
I've been living in a cave in terms of movies over the last couple years, but I needed something to keep me company the last couple days as a lot of people are out of town and the weather was kind of keeping me around the dorm for the most part. So I went and rented a couple of DVDs: The Usual Suspects, and The Departed. I hadn't even heard of The Departed... turns out it won some Oscars, which I pretty much don't pay attention to. Lately I like to shy away from the mainstream hollywood stuff, but I have to say I was very pleased by both of these flicks. When I returned them I picked up Lucky Number Slevin, which was also a surprisingly entertaining movie. I suppose not all recent movies are so crappy after all.
Other than that, I found myself a bike! Yamaha XJR400:
Needs a few bits and pieces; missing a mirror (for which the mount is stripped out), and the speedometer seems to be messed up. But the engine starts up nicely even in the cold, and it sounds and runs ok so far. It has a pretty mean aftermarket carbon fiber exhaust pipe, too.. at the low revs it gives a quiet growl and after 6000 RPM it screams! Since the weather was nicer today I was able to take her for a few laps around the dorm, but I can't ride it on the street just yet... I have to wait until next monday when the long New Year holiday is over, so I can go and get the registration switched to my name. The registration and liability insurance are good until June, then I have to renew.
Good fun, though! Can't wait to hit the street with it!
It just wouldn't stop snowing all weekend! Very cold and windy outside, but I still survived without using the heat too much. Today was much nicer out and most of the snow melted away.
I've been living in a cave in terms of movies over the last couple years, but I needed something to keep me company the last couple days as a lot of people are out of town and the weather was kind of keeping me around the dorm for the most part. So I went and rented a couple of DVDs: The Usual Suspects, and The Departed. I hadn't even heard of The Departed... turns out it won some Oscars, which I pretty much don't pay attention to. Lately I like to shy away from the mainstream hollywood stuff, but I have to say I was very pleased by both of these flicks. When I returned them I picked up Lucky Number Slevin, which was also a surprisingly entertaining movie. I suppose not all recent movies are so crappy after all.
Other than that, I found myself a bike! Yamaha XJR400:
Needs a few bits and pieces; missing a mirror (for which the mount is stripped out), and the speedometer seems to be messed up. But the engine starts up nicely even in the cold, and it sounds and runs ok so far. It has a pretty mean aftermarket carbon fiber exhaust pipe, too.. at the low revs it gives a quiet growl and after 6000 RPM it screams! Since the weather was nicer today I was able to take her for a few laps around the dorm, but I can't ride it on the street just yet... I have to wait until next monday when the long New Year holiday is over, so I can go and get the registration switched to my name. The registration and liability insurance are good until June, then I have to renew.
Good fun, though! Can't wait to hit the street with it!
Monday, December 22, 2008
Got my license!
I set my alarm for 7:30 this morning to try to make it out to the license center between 8:30 and 9... you see, on weekdays, people applying for new licenses need to get to reception by 9:30 at the latest. The schedule for this stuff is very rigid and they process a shitload of people all at the same time.
I had a bit of trouble sleeping last night, though, for some reason, so when I woke up and grabbed my phone I found that it was 8:15, I had overslept my alarm by 45 minutes! Ouch!
Usually I like a nice hot shower to help me wake up but there was no time for that, so I tossed my jeans on, grabbed my documents, and out the door I went bound for the menkyo center. I elected not to take my bike, as it was rainy outside and there'd probably be pretty bad traffic at that hour. A good call I think. I got off the subway station and caught the bus at 10 to 9, and got myself in just in the nick of time. Interestingly, for the car license, new grads of the driving schools still have to take a written test (which I hear is pretty heavy), and a short driving test on an actual road.. even though they had to pass such tests at the driving school prior to graduation. Luckily for me, already having the car license means I got to skip the tests, and go straight to getting the license issued. Nice deal!
The place was overwhelmingly packed with people when I got in at a few minutes past 9, but I got to take advantage of some pretty short lines since I didn't have to sign up for the test and stuff, and I was done by 9:30 and the lobby was pretty empty after that, since everybody had gone upstairs to take the written test or whatever.
The process this time felt like it took relatively less time than when I did the car license thing a few months back. When I finished the quick paperwork and eye test, I was asked to wait until 9:50-ish, when those of us who didn't need to be tested further would be called to have our photos snapped. After the photos, we were handed our licenses after about 30 minutes, and I was out of there not long after 10:30! And I'm now licensed for a manual bike up to 400cc!
Oh yeah, and the photo on my new license is (IMO) better than the last one, because my hair was too short and really goofy... this time the beard isn't as good because I was doing the shave thing up until about three weeks ago, but it is at least satisfactory.
If anyone still reads this, watch for another entry about a bike upgrade, 'cause that might be coming soon!
I had a bit of trouble sleeping last night, though, for some reason, so when I woke up and grabbed my phone I found that it was 8:15, I had overslept my alarm by 45 minutes! Ouch!
Usually I like a nice hot shower to help me wake up but there was no time for that, so I tossed my jeans on, grabbed my documents, and out the door I went bound for the menkyo center. I elected not to take my bike, as it was rainy outside and there'd probably be pretty bad traffic at that hour. A good call I think. I got off the subway station and caught the bus at 10 to 9, and got myself in just in the nick of time. Interestingly, for the car license, new grads of the driving schools still have to take a written test (which I hear is pretty heavy), and a short driving test on an actual road.. even though they had to pass such tests at the driving school prior to graduation. Luckily for me, already having the car license means I got to skip the tests, and go straight to getting the license issued. Nice deal!
The place was overwhelmingly packed with people when I got in at a few minutes past 9, but I got to take advantage of some pretty short lines since I didn't have to sign up for the test and stuff, and I was done by 9:30 and the lobby was pretty empty after that, since everybody had gone upstairs to take the written test or whatever.
The process this time felt like it took relatively less time than when I did the car license thing a few months back. When I finished the quick paperwork and eye test, I was asked to wait until 9:50-ish, when those of us who didn't need to be tested further would be called to have our photos snapped. After the photos, we were handed our licenses after about 30 minutes, and I was out of there not long after 10:30! And I'm now licensed for a manual bike up to 400cc!
Oh yeah, and the photo on my new license is (IMO) better than the last one, because my hair was too short and really goofy... this time the beard isn't as good because I was doing the shave thing up until about three weeks ago, but it is at least satisfactory.
If anyone still reads this, watch for another entry about a bike upgrade, 'cause that might be coming soon!
Saturday, December 20, 2008
Done with driving school!
Took me just three weeks, and I'm done with driving school!
I learned a lot of things about riding, and formed some better habits that I hadn't really picked up from riding the 50cc on my own... They taught me to ride a little more relaxed (with the 50cc sportbike, I have to assume a hunched over position no matter what), take my left hand off the clutch and left foot out from under the gear shifter when not in use, put down the left foot and not right when stopping at a light, etc.
Did all sorts of exercises like figure 8s, slalom, riding as slowly as possible across a narrow beam, S-curve, 90-degree corners, braking from 40 km/h and up, avoiding collision, etc.
Over the three weeks I had quite a lot of fun, too! A couple of the teachers were a bit unpleasant in their strictness, but most of them were really nice...
Going to the classes kind of became a part of my life over the last couple weeks though, so it's going to feel a little weird not going anymore.
Last week on the news, there was a guy in Ishikawa prefecture taking the final test at a driving school for the large-sized bike category who apparently did a wheelie or something in the 90-degree corner part, and lost control of the bike, went flying off the course, crashed into a concrete wall, and died of a head injury. That's a pretty unfortunate way to go, and quite an odd thing to hear just a few days before planning to do my own final test. But I wasn't too worried about it as I had found myself very comfortable with everything in the course (then again, the fellow involved in that incident might have been pretty comfortable too...).
I had plenty of practice time to get used to the bikes and course and was able to do the test at my own pace, so I passed without any problem and I can get my license on monday!
I also got a good bit of money from my first couple months of TA work, so I might be able to make the jump to a bigger/nicer bike pretty soon!
I learned a lot of things about riding, and formed some better habits that I hadn't really picked up from riding the 50cc on my own... They taught me to ride a little more relaxed (with the 50cc sportbike, I have to assume a hunched over position no matter what), take my left hand off the clutch and left foot out from under the gear shifter when not in use, put down the left foot and not right when stopping at a light, etc.
Did all sorts of exercises like figure 8s, slalom, riding as slowly as possible across a narrow beam, S-curve, 90-degree corners, braking from 40 km/h and up, avoiding collision, etc.
Over the three weeks I had quite a lot of fun, too! A couple of the teachers were a bit unpleasant in their strictness, but most of them were really nice...
Going to the classes kind of became a part of my life over the last couple weeks though, so it's going to feel a little weird not going anymore.
Last week on the news, there was a guy in Ishikawa prefecture taking the final test at a driving school for the large-sized bike category who apparently did a wheelie or something in the 90-degree corner part, and lost control of the bike, went flying off the course, crashed into a concrete wall, and died of a head injury. That's a pretty unfortunate way to go, and quite an odd thing to hear just a few days before planning to do my own final test. But I wasn't too worried about it as I had found myself very comfortable with everything in the course (then again, the fellow involved in that incident might have been pretty comfortable too...).
I had plenty of practice time to get used to the bikes and course and was able to do the test at my own pace, so I passed without any problem and I can get my license on monday!
I also got a good bit of money from my first couple months of TA work, so I might be able to make the jump to a bigger/nicer bike pretty soon!
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