The Tartan Problem

Yesterday, in a kindhearted attempt to absolve me of my boredom, Tou-san took me to work with him - more specifically, the preschool he cooks for. And it reminded me of two immutable facts of Sara's life:

1. Kids love Sara because her facial expressions are funny.
2. Kids love injuring Sara because her facial expressions are funny.

There was a reason I left my job at the daycare. And it was a very, very good one, if I do say so myself. Though I did glean (to my... fortune) that the less interested you are in children, the more interested they are in you. Good fun. I also watched Cars (Kaasu - really) in Japanese, which was... unusual. Actually, I've been watching quite a bit of Japanese television lately, and the only thing it's told me is that if Japan had a writers' strike, no one would bat an eye, because everything is game shows, comedy shows, and game/comedy-shows. And the rare satsujin jiken (murder mystery) special, one of which I watched today with Kaa-san. Naturally, it was hilarious (as well as very educational - my words today are ayashii (suspicious), fushigina (mysterious), and shougen (witness).)

Also - fashion. After careful observation, I have decided that Japanese fashion is some of the weirdest stuff this side of Nibelheim. For one thing, tartan is popular. For another, tartan is popular. And, lastly, people wear tartan and they are not Scottish or in kilts or both. I'm still a bit puzzled over that last part, but I'm sure some sort of enlightenment will come in the near future. Hopefully.

...Okay, truthfully, the tartan thing is still odd, but more odd is that it's really okay to wear it with stripes or florals or stripes and florals. Nobody matches. Jeans are a rarity. The Japanese like long shirts (empire/babydoll shirts are a hit), puff sleeves, tartan, cowboy boots, kneesocks with ballet flats, wavy hair, bright colors, big costume jewelry, and a multitude of other clashing things. Nobody has their ears pierced but everybody wears hairties with plastic strawberries or ladybugs on them. Shirts are almost always overly long, though this isn't too much of a problem since everybody is thin (why, I have no idea, considering the amounts of rice and other delicious carbs everyone ingests). It's very confusing, but I get the feeling I'm actually rather unfashionable. It makes me wish I'd brought weirder clothes instead of things that actually match.

Anyway, in closing, I gotta say, if I'd known beforehand that I'd be able to walk into a store and get a Deluxe Edition Tsubasa RESERVoir CHRoNiCLE volume for 600 yen or so (less, because they're on sale), I'd have left Randolph decades ago. Which is saying something, because I haven't even been around for decades. And I'm not kidding. You are going to have to use a crowbar to get me out of this country.

...I'll let that sink in for a bit. Yeah, Elise. Cake buffet. AND THEN.