I'm back!!!

It's been over a month since my last post and as you can see, I am busy helping papa type as usual. Papa was away on business in Rome a few weeks ago and has been a little busy lately so he hasn't had time to help me with my blog...but I think that's just an excuse for him being lazy. I try to type by myself sometimes but when I use my nose to hit the keys, papa gets upset because of my snot on his keyboard. I always lick it off afterwards so what's the problem???

Papa really enjoyed Rome. It was his first time to Europe and so Rome was a good place to start. He saw all the sites and was particularly taken with the food. Papa has always loved Italian food and eating in Rome was everything he thought it would be and more.

They closed down my favorite indoor dog run a few weeks ago. One of the last days we went, the place was full of Chihuahuas. As you know, I am not a Chihuahua fan because I am afraid of them and they yap at me all of the time. How many Chihuahuas were there you ask? Count for yourself...and this was only half of them...is there a Chihuahua boom that I haven't heard about?

My last agility class was today. It was fun class for the last 6 weeks. I am getting better at jumps and running through the tunnel. I am also pretty good at the see-saw, and recently I have been improving at the slalom. Papa thinks my improvement is because I have a great handler (him) but I think we all know it's because of my incredible intelligence and agility!

I have a new hiding place...bet you can't find me!!!
Papa is making stew for dinner tonight (but not for me...I get the usual...). When mama and papa went shopping today for groceries, they found some really great deals on fruits. Check out these cherries. At 1,580 yen per cup, it works out to over US$1 per cherry...
And these strawberries are a bargain at 1,980 yen per pack. That's about US$3 per strawberry...they must be famous strawberries...with gold in the centre...and super magical healing powers...and blessed by the pope himself...
Papa says that pound for pound, they are more valuable than me...whatever the heck that means. I think pound for pound, papa's head is full of strawberries...

Tagged

I was tagged by Erin to share 7 weird things about myself and to tag 7 other dogs. Since I don't have very many friends online yet, I will have to wait to tag others but I will share 7 weird things about myself...

1) I have recently taken to barking at the TV. My favorite things to bark at are golf (I like to try to catch the ball on the screen) and Mino Monta. Mama and papa don't know why I bark at Mino Monta...only I do... :-)

2) I love taking walks but whenever I see papa get my leash to take me for a walk, I hide under the table or in my house.

3) Whenever visitors leave, I have to run around the house 3 times and check every room to make sure that nothing has been left behind, no one is still hiding here and absolutely nothing is out of place.

4) Whenever mama and papa are out and then come home together I am OK but if only one of them comes home first, when the other comes home I bark like crazy as if there is an intruder. It drives mama and papa crazy.

5) I can destroy a dog toy in under 30 seconds but I have yet to defeat the children's toys that mama and papa got me from Ikea. Man, are they tough!!!

6) I am afraid of Chihuahuas.

7) Mama and papa think I am part cat. When they are getting ready for work or to go out (without me), I like to rub against their legs and roll onto my back at their feet like a cat. I like to cuddle with them, but only sometimes...whenever I feel like it...I am finicky and selfish like a cat :-) And when they are standing in one place, I love to sit on top of their feet to make sure they don't move without me knowing!

So that's it...there are probably tons of other things that mama and papa think are weird about me, but if you ask me, they are even more weird than I am!!! :-)

Lately, papa has been complaining about the ineffectiveness and incompetence of police in Japan. BTW, what's a "moron"? He uses that word a lot in the same sentence as "police". They sit around doing nothing while people park illegally, run red lights and commit all kinds of misdemeanors. Papa says the Japanese police are dumber than me...whatever the heck that means...if that's true then I would think that most people in the world would qualify as Japanese police. As you can see, they're not my favorite either...

Mama and papa went to see Planet Earth today. They said it was OK but not as good as Deep Blue, another BBC movie. Mama fell asleep for part of Planet Earth.

And finally, another cute billboard...

Almost Famous

A friend of mine was walking down Broadway in NY and found this billboard...what a handsome puppy!!! Even though my name is Roots, mama and papa call me Pooh-chan...I wonder why...
In fact, the pup on the billboard is so handsome that the Canadian post office made a stamp featuring him!!!

Thanks to all the nice folks (and their humans) who have left comments recently. We were thinking about stopping this blog because we thought no one was reading it!

Spoiled??? Who? Me???

Mama and papa have been adding chicken breast to my food for the past few months. Since we were running low, papa made me some chicken today. First he boiled the chicken, then he tore the breasts into small, bite-sized pieces by hand. As you can see, I was very helpful in supervising him...
After that, he divided them into small, 1 day packets which are frozen and thawed out as needed:
Papa calls me spoiled because I get hand made food and he says that I eat better than him. I doubt it...

We've been having so many problems with Windows Vista lately. It is so user unfriendly...the usage is often counter-intuitive and the only parts that have improved are the parts that Microsoft ripped off from Apple. The world would be a much better place without Microsoft so that everyone would use either Linux (papa uses Ubuntu Linux) or Apple. We especially love how Vista corrupts priceless photos when downloading them from a camera and saving them to an external hard drive. Anyhow, papa is going to upgrade mama's laptop from Vista to XP.

Anyhow, time for a nap. I can't help feeling that I might have fleas or ticks...

Season's Greetings!!!

We hope everyone has a very happy holiday season and a healthy and prosperous new year! I had a good Christmas this year and got a lot of presents! Mama and papa bought me a few shirts and sweaters, and my aunt in Canada sent me a stuffed animal toy to play with. I love the toy and wouldn't let anyone touch it for the first hour I had it until I broke it in. Anytime papa came near my new toy, I growled at him and then ran away. After all, what's mine is mine...and what's not mine is still mine :-)

I plan to get a lot of sleep over the holidays and spend time with my friends!!!

Papa is off work for 2 weeks now and he promised to take me for long walks and also to dog runs to play with other dogs.

2 days ago, mama's parents came over for turkey. They really like turkey but it is not really a popular dish in Japan. The turkey was 3.5 kg and was almost as big as me. In fact, I was worried that papa would make a mistake and I would end up in the oven.

Last evening, mama and papa went to visit their friends who just bought a new condo nearby. They said the place was really nice (on the 12th floor) and a lot of the furniture was new and looked great. As for me, well, as you can see, I just chilled at home and caught up on my sleep...

Papa has a new hobby. He has started making his own tsukemono. Actually, nukazuke to be exact. It's only been a few days but papa seems very excited about it. He got the nukadoko from his mother-in-law and has already made pickled carrots. Because the nukadoko is new, the carrots were very salty so papa has to adjust the timing. Today he added more carrots and some cucumber. Tomorrow he is planning on adding eggplant and cabbage. I don't think mama believes that papa can take care of the nukadoko because it has to be cared for daily by mixing it to oxygenate the base and keep the nuka-bed ‘live’, meaning that it contains a culture of active single-celled organisms, mostly lactobacilli and yeast. If papa doesn't care for it daily then the nuka-bed can go bad and get moldy.

Here is a fashion show featuring...ME!!!

Sporting a casual velor jacket embroidered with a skull featuring the words "Bone Eater"...

Wearing a knit sweater to keep me warm on those cold Tokyo winter days...

Looking cool in a gangsta style hoodie...hey, you lookin' at me??? I said HEY, YOU LOOKIN' AT ME???

I Love NY...but not in winter...

Papa's back from his business trip to NY. He went to meetings in upstate NY and then stayed for a few days for meetings in Connecticut. Unfortunately, the hotel he stayed at in upstate NY was terrible. Most of the people present couldn't believe that the company would make them stay in that miserable place. There was barely any hot water and some of the windows wouldn't close all the way...not a good thing when it's about zero degrees Celsius outside.

In NY city, he stayed at the Muse Hotel which he said was excellent!!! Every evening between 5pm and 6pm they have a free wine tasting in the lobby. The decor was modern - very similar to a W Hotel. He had dinner last Thursday at Kittichai (beware that this restaurant's site is extremely slow) and Friday at Cipriani Dolci in Grand Central Station. Both restaurants were very good. Kittichai was a Thai/American fusion restaurant with a good wine list and an interesting menu made up of American style dishes with a Thai twist. Cipriani Dolci had a good selection of traditional Italian dishes but, even with a reservation, papa and his friends had to wait 15 minutes.


After dinner on Friday, papa and his colleagues went to see the Christmas tree at Rockefeller Center. It was nice to see the tree and the people skating in front of it, but it was so cold that they could only stay for a short time before retreating to the warmth of the hotel. For a Canadian, papa doesn't handle cold weather very well.





Earlier on Friday evening, before dinner, papa and his friend went to see the window displays at Macy's and a few other department stores. They are getting more and more sophisticated.




And finally, a word of warning...never, ever ask papa how his flight was...unless you are ready to get an earful. Usually, papa flies on United Airlines to North America but this time, the flight to and from NY on American Airlines left no doubt in papa's mind why the airline industry in the US is in trouble. On the way to NY from Tokyo, papa was upgraded from business class to first class. Unfortunately, first class on American Airlines is far inferior to economy class on Singapore Airlines (and most other airlines for that matter). The seats were broken and uncomfortable, the so-called entertainment system was pathetic. After choosing from a very limited movie list, you have to request an 8mm video tape from the flight attendant and play it in an archaic system that fades in and out at random. The movie was not clear and often skipped parts in between the static. Papa thinks that as a cost savings measure, AA has its employees go to movie theaters and use video cameras to record the movies for the flights. That fits in with their strategy of using 30 year old technology to play the movies. Such was the quality of the movie. We won't even begin to talk about the "food" on the flights. Papa was so disgusted he said it wasn't even suitable for me...whatever the heck that means...

And if things couldn't get any worse, they certainly did on the way back. Papa didn't get the upgrade to first class so he was in business class where the "food" was even worse. He was told that "dinner" was beef but what they didn't tell him was that the "beef" would have the consistency of chewing gum and the taste of...well...nothing...but papa is very grateful that at least he didn't get food poisoning.

Papa could not believe that any airline, even American, would offer such a poor level of service and such unacceptable facilities. The US based attendants were incredibly rude and abrasive, the food was not even fit for me (apparently), and everything from the seats to the entertainment system was not even close to what one would expect even in economy class. Papa would not recommend American Airlines to transport horse manure let alone people. That was the first and last time papa will ever use American Airlines...what a disaster. How could anyone ever be proud to work there???

Stars in Tokyo

On Monday, the folks at Michelin confirmed what we in Tokyo already knew - that Tokyo is the undisputed culinary capital of the world. With a total of 191 stars, the other major cities don't even come close. 8 restaurants received 3 stars, 25 received 2 stars and 117 received 1 star. By comparison, Paris and London only have 148 stars combined, with New York falling far short with only 42. To be fair, it should be mentioned that Tokyo has over 160,000 restaurants compared to 20,000 in Paris and 23,000 in NY. Of course, that doesn't stop all the critics from whining that Michelin was too generous with stars in Tokyo, but I would wager that the complainers have never been to Tokyo to eat at the city's finest restaurants. One trip to Tokyo would convince even the most die hard critics that Tokyo boasts one of the finest culinary experiences anywhere in the world. Japanese chefs are perfectionists when it comes to food, sourcing the freshest ingredients and completely committed to producing the best dishes possible while paying excruciating detail to presentation.

Mama bought the English and Japanese versions of the Michelin guide today and we weren't surprised to find that many of the restaurants they have been to have at least 1 star. Kyubei, the sushi restaurant which I wrote about a few days ago where papa took mama for her birthday last week, even claimed 1 star!!! Conspicuously absent from the list was Gordon Ramsay's restaurant at the Conrad Hotel where papa took mama for her birthday last year.

Tomorrow is a national holiday in Japan so mama and papa are taking me to see the leaves change colours! On Sunday, papa has to go to NY for a few days on business. He said he's not looking forward to going to NY because it must be so sad and dark there with so few stars... :-)

Last week we went to Yoyogi Park and, as usual, I tried to beat up the big dogs...

...until I came across one who was just about my size (I'm the one on the right...I think...)

Happy birthday, mama!!!

Today was mama's birthday! Happy birthday, mama!!! Papa came home early and prepared some of mama's favorite foods like gnocchi in a cream and cheese sauce (made from mozzarella, gorgonzola and parmesan), grilled lamb chops and an appetizer of sushi...yes, it was a bit of a strange combination...papa called it Italian/Japanese fusion...whatever the heck that is...

As for me, well, it was a little cold today so I found myself a nice place to relax and just chilled out...

And then played a little soccer (which papa hates...he says it's a wimpy game for people who aren't tough enough for hockey)

Kyubei

Tomorrow is mama's birthday so yesterday, papa took mama out for her birthday dinner to Kyubei in Ginza which is one of the most famous sushi restaurants in Japan. It was founded in 1936 and was recently featured in the Wall Street Journal. Mama and papa said the sushi was excellent and the atmosphere was very relaxed - the chefs were great and the conversation was lively. The owner, Yosuke Imada, even came to greet mama and papa, as well as the other customers. The chefs pay such great attention to detail, ensuring that everything is perfect. It was a great experience...I just wish that dogs were allowed...




As you can see, it's a little cold in Tokyo now but I am hard at work helping papa with my blog.

We lost...again...

As you can see, I've been following the world volleyball championships these past few weeks. Japan was 6-2 going into today's match against Cuba. Unfortunately, we lost...again...

We won the first set but then lost the next 3. The coach for Japan, Yanagimoto, is one of the worst coaches ever. He is like a tyrant and makes so many errors that it's surprising he is still the coach. Papa thinks he should go to Cuba with the Cuban volleyball team because Yanagimoto has a lot in common with Castro. Yanagimoto runs his team like Castro runs Cuba.

But in all seriousness, it's so unfortunate because Japan has some outstanding players who have a tremendous amount of passion for the game. Too bad they have no leadership. One of Yanagimoto's biggest faults was highlighted today when, inexplicably, he called a time out after Japan had won several consecutive points. By calling the time out, he effectively disrupted the flow of the game when his team had built some momentum and they went on to lose the next point and were never able to recover, losing the last set 25-20. He is one of those coaches who do things automatically without thinking, like when he changes players. He switches certain players in and out according to their position on the court without thinking about the situation of the game. That's just poor, stupid coaching. Every time he made a player change, Japan invariably lost the next point. A great coach is a great leader, motivating the team and adapting to each situation based on experience, constantly refining strategy and bringing out the best from each member of the team. Yanagimoto does the exact opposite...and that's why a great team has become an average team...