Roped By Some Cowboys.

Today's Binder is actually a Card Album, but I have other stuff to talk about, so I'll just make it a quickie. Cowboy Bebop is a pretty awesome anime with great tunes and a funky cast of characters. I'd picked up this Binder/Card Album ages ago cheaply but I have never actually seen the set in question. Here is the front & back cover plus a blow up of the trading card that came with it.

















For my NHK lessons today, I did a follow-up of last weeks Valentine's handout featuring the Meanings of Roses' Colours. It went over well (mainly because I had already translated each of the words) and much to my surprise, one of my early morning students brought in a bouquet of roses representing mostly all of the colours of the print. Here is a copy of the print, plus a few picks of the flowers.













































Which brings us to the finale of the evening which culminated in a viewing of The USA-Canada Olympic hockey match. Thanks to pal, Hitomi, who taped the game, we got to see it at Liga in all its scratchy B&W glory thanks to a tracking problem. After several brews, it was easy to acclimatize our eyes to the proceedings though I wish we hadn't seen Marty Brodeur losing the game for Canada. Despite outshooting the Americans 2-1, Canada managed to lose the game. Granted, though the saves he did make were outstanding, the blunders he made kind of flushed those down the toilette. I'm hoping we'll play Luongo against the Germans so that we can grab a much needed win (though truth be told, it'll be better if we play Fleury so I can rack up some pool-points!)

ps.1: my students stated this morning that 2/22 is considered Twins Day or Cats Day. The twins reference is fairly easy to figure out, but the cat connection is a little more esoteric. The Japanese for MEOW is ニァオ (Nyao) and since 2=ni, 2/22=ni/ni-ni or in ネコ (neko = cat) lingo, "ニァオ, ニァオ, ニァオ" or "niao, niao, niao!" While walking towards the bus stop, I happened to notice a giant cat handing out flyers. I don't think it was just a beer-induced hallucination but it did seem appropriate!

ps.2: I watched the Japanese Curling team fall prey to the powerful and scary German ladies. The Japanese are just so darned cute it was painful to see them lose.
Just so you don't think every sports news today is negative, Mokugohan's Snots won their tournament last night and here is a pic of their trophy. Congrats guys!