Obon 1st day

 I got 20 things listed last night and didn't do any painting, as I was tired and decided sleep was more important. But I did some things; I took two tray type boxes and put them in the bathroom to replace the useless large metal first aid kit box that had been in there, and those trays now house cleaning and hygiene supplies, keeping the tabletop a lot less cluttered, only holding things I use often. 

And in the loft, I replaced the ugly black zip ties holding some conduit pipes together, with less-ugly "natural" ones. 

At about 3AM I heard a light rustling sound outside and looked at the video camera screen. It was a female zombie with a bike, who messed around somehow in the one trash enclosure near here and then went behind the one with a dumpster in it (that's kept locked now) and did I-don't-know-what. There's really no hour of the night when one can assume zombies won't come wandering through, is my point. This particular zombie might be Brenda, if she's lost some weight which drugs tend to cause. Her RV has been moved out onto the street, probably because she constantly fights with anyone who's around and apparently has gotten on the outs with the other zombies on the little side street they cluster their "war wagons" on. 

Last night I also rounded up more books, so now the books I'm keeping fit in one banker's box. 

I woke up at a bit past 2, with my computer making sounds because the internet was down, of course. Amazingly, though, it came up after about half an hour. Just another reminder ... for instance right now as I type the entire country of Canada has their internet down, bank cards not working, 911 not working, etc. And the reminder is to take the gallon jugs I have up in the loft that originally held laboratory grade isopropyl alcohol, and fill them with water, and stash them down here in the office. 

I left here with 15 or 20 lbs of books and three gallon Ziploc bags full of over-the-counter remedies. I rode to the used book store and while the bags of pills were going to go to the little free libraries, as I rode towards it I decided to give the bags of pills to the bum camp that's on Santa Clara street where it crosses the Guadalupe River. So I left them on this low cement wall that serves as a bench. 

I handed the books in to the used book store and they only wanted two of them, for $2 cash so I took that. I also spent about $5 of my credit on a little copy of "Japanese Phrases For Dummies". 

I walked over to TAP Plastics and got some large "natural" color zip ties so I don't have to use a ton of little ones in the loft, and got a piece of clear plastic rod that's the right size to use to push the cork out of a standard flute. I'm not messing with the cork in my new $2000 flute but the $200 student one, tally ho. I just have to wait for the shellac I ordered to come in. 

I rode back from the book store, passing the bum camp to see that they'd taken the bags of cold and sniffle and sour stomach pills and shown their appreciation by setting fire to the bushes next to the river. There were fire engines and a "stringer" there (a stringer is someone who goes out and gets news stories, photos, video, etc. on their own to sell to the newspapers and TV stations). 

I took the books I had left over - all but two of the ones I'd started out with - and put them into the little free library with the sign inside it saying something like "books only, please". 

Then I rode over to the Obon festival and locked up the bike, and walked around. The lines for food were crazy, and at Hukilau you couldn't just order a laulau but had to get a big meal with one and tons of other stuff that would have been good for two very hungry people so that was out. I ended up getting a nice fish 'n' seaweed bento and a near-beer from Nijiya and ate, then walked around some more. 

San Jose Taiko were playing and there were all those drums and ... one guy playing a shinobue. That one guy could be heard over the whole thing. It was really impressive. From what I've read, the shinobue sold by the taiko shops is ... OK but nothing great. It's called the furyu shinobue and it's black or dark colored. It looked like that's what this guy was playing but he sounded fine. Eventually the song changed and he stuck that one in his belt and pulled out a lower one, which sounded neat too. 

Taiko is all about "athletic" drum playing, but this shinobue player was working pretty hard too. Frankly it was inspiring. I'm thinking that in taiko, there are tons of people who want to go and bang the drums, but since it's not taiko without the flute any more than it's a drum and fife corps without a fife, maybe they'd welcome another shinobue player. 

Also, I see a sort of thing where, in the West, the shakuhachi is emphasized because it has this romantic mystery around it, the warrior-monks who traveled around using it, and its use as a Zen meditation instrument, etc. But the humble shinobue doesn't have this baggage. 

There were not all the things going on that there would have been a few years ago. The Japanese museum was closed, and there was no jumble sale. Eventually I got in line for food just for something to do, and after a long time, the line moving very, very slowly, a guy came up and told us the actual lines for each thing like tempura, beef, chicken etc. are inside. So I went in and got in the line I thought was for beef. 

I had a lovely time talking with an older Japanese lady who had her foot in a cast who was ahead of me, and an Australian gal who was behind me. And found eventually that I was in the line for chicken, so OK I'd have chicken. I thought it was skewers, and thought it was a little expensive but hey, it's a fund raiser. I got "two" which turned out not to be two skewers but two leg-thigh quarters. 

I could find no where at all to sit down until I ventured back over around the corner from Sushi Kazoo. I ate the drumsticks and saved the thighs, putting them in a bag I hung off the bike handlebar, tied up. I went into Nijiya for another near-beer and decided to get a little package of cucumbers too. The near-beer turned out to be almost $4 so I just got the cucumbers. 

I rode back here and ate the chicken thighs with cucumbers, and put the bones out with the rice from the bento for the birdies. 

It was barely getting dark and I'd just shut the door for the night when I heard a sort of whooping, and it was a zombie on a bike, making a whooping call for some damned zombie reason. This is why I have to be so careful around here.