This past weekend I went down to Tsukuba to visit Beth, and as usual, on the way back we took the Tsukuba Express back to Tokyo so I could catch my bus back to Fukushima.

Now for the few people who don’t know, Japan tends to pride itself–and with good reason–on having reliable, always-on-time trains. If a train schedule says the train will arrive at 12:34 and depart at 12:37, then it will arrive at 12:34 and depart at 12:37. Usually.

Of course, nothing is perfect. So far during my time here the train has been more than a few minutes late twice. Once it was about ten minutes late, no biggie, and the other time was the Izaka line here in Fukushima that was a good 25 minutes late departing and ended up being 45 minutes late arriving, and don’t forget that traversing the entire length of the line should regularly take about 25 minutes.. Today I added a third notch to my list.

The Tsukuba Express train we were riding left ten minutes late and, now this is the amazing part, arrived in Tokyo (Akihabara) 50 minutes late. Ouch. This was supposed to be a rapid (something like 45 minutes for the whole line), so good job on more than doubling the time and adding a third notch to my “Late Trains of Japan” notch… thing.

To give them credit, apparently there were plenty of train delays in the Tokyo area today due to very high winds. Stupid high winds.

Ok then, on to music stuff.

With some time to kill, Beth and I hung out in Yodobashi (a huge ginormous electronics store), just looking around. We happened to come across a Brilliant Green compilation DVD that Beth decided to buy for me as a belated Christmas present. I ended up getting home started watching it, only to realize that this DVD was released a whole four days ago and actually has two songs by them that I didn’t even realize had been released. Well, yay for being surprised with new material.

Though honestly, out of their three new singles none of them have really caught my fancy. Once again to give some credit, I will say that Stand by Me was much better when performed live.

And oh, this DVD has also features a video of the brilliant green walking around Kyoto. It feels like they gave some guy who’s never touched a camera before a camera and gave the job of editing to some guy who’s never edited before. In other words, they took some poorly shot and edited vacation footage and put it as a special on the DVD.

Still in the music area, a few weeks back I went and saw a Sludgy Bunny concert, and you probably have no idea who they are because they’re a local Fukushima band. Anyway, you should check them out because they have some catchy songs.

I’m going to an Orange Range concert next month in Sendai. Fun will be had.

I may go to a Bump of Chicken concert next month, also in Sendai, if I get off my ass and see if tickets are still available.

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