Moondog comments

It"S ME wrote:

Even if it is the same cat as her collar would suggestbher behaviour would have changed and it is highly unlikely she would remember her former owners.

I lived with three cats each of whom lived to be 19 years of age. In my experience I would say there is absolutely no doubt that a cat who had shared an abode with certain humans for 12 years (not 15 as one reader seem to have understood) would remember them after an absence of three years.

oikawa wrote:

That's a bit expensive isn't it. 10 times what coke would cost in England, if it even was coke and not speed.

Police always exaggerate the value of drugs they confiscate. It's SOP.

CrazyJoe wrote:

Don't take any food or snacks from someone you don't know.

Really? Who can follow that rule? Farmers?

First of all, why should someone be forced to pay double if they only need 1.25 seats? And if they are paying for a larger seat, then it should be a seat that doesn't have a hump in the middle (as many airline seats do, especially Boeing).

By the same token, why should a passenger have to pay for a full seat when they only need 0.75 seats? And, if some passengers need only 0.75 seats and others need 1.25 or 1.5, why are all economy seats the same size???

Economy seats should come in three sizes, at least. Further, the exact price of the ticket should be based on both the size of the the selected seat and the aggregate weight of the passenger plus their luggage. At check-in the passenger should get on a scale along with his or her luggage and then either pay or receive an adjusted amount. (And also be moved to a larger size if it's clear they won't fit in the size selected.)

Finally, if passengers are going to pay for a larger seat, they should also have access to a larger toilet.

"Wonderful" is not a word that should be applied to "spam." [gag]

I agree with the posters suggesting the 3rd Monday or Friday. Midweek holidays are much less useful.

smithinjapan wrote:

the infamous plane crash of flight 153

I think you mean JAL 123 which hit a mountain in Gumma in 1985.

This horrific accident affected me closely as I had ridden that train line many times. For years before this accident I had a personal policy of avoiding riding in the first two and last two cars of any train I boarded. I hadn't been religious about it, however, and sometimes would be too lazy to walk the extra distance. After seeing the wreckage to the first two cars of this train, the first jammed into the parking garage of an apartment building and the second wrapped around the building and completely pancaked, I never again failed to board one of the middle cars.

The primary error was made by whoever let the students and parents know why the teacher was absent. It's not information they needed and, clearly, giving it to them has led to a mini-scandal. The message should have been that your home room teacher is most unfortunately unable to be present but she will greet you on the first day of classes. XXXX-sensei will attend to you today in her absence. End of story, no scandal.

I'm not buying into the theory that more young people are needed to support the increasing number of older people. There have been huge increases in productivity due to the introduction of computers and robots reducing the need for more workers. That will continue to increase.

In the past you might have fifty or a hundred workers in a company entering invoice figures into books which another large group would add up and enter into account ledgers. The ledgers would be added up and entered into balance books and the results analyzed by accountants. Today it's all done with bar codes and computers and those hundreds of workers have all been replaced but a handful of workers.

This is true at every level and in every department of every company. Two or three are doing work that once required hundreds.

All the profit from the reduction in the number of workers is going to the companies in increased profits. Tax that profit and, bingo, you've got the money needed to support the aging workers.

Welcome to the future, bu-cho. The new kids coming up are less willing to just bend over and take it. Good for them, I say.

It's a damages order, not a fine. The government doesn't get anything except maybe court costs.

When you look at bathtubs back in your home country and think, WTF?

I suggest a compromise: Call it the "Sea of Silly Controversy."

Of the first 20 comments, over half are flat-out positive the man was a nutter, etc. But the truth is, none of you have the slightest clue what actually happened.

One afternoon about 25 years ago, I was walking down a street in Okinawa City as crowds of high schoolers were surging out of a school yard when I happened to notice one student shove a smaller boy who was pushing a bike through the school gate to the ground, kick him and then jump on the bike and speed away.

The bike snatcher was looking back to taunt his victim just as he passed me. All it took was a small shove from me to redirect the bicycle, which was moving a a good clip, right into a fence where the rider face-planted on the chain links before falling to the ground tangled in the bike.

I just kept on walking but now with a muted grin on my face. I suppose I could have been arrested but I like to think that a little instant karma is just what the bully needed.

Sure, the kid in this case swears "I didn't do nuttin', honest" but people are rarely attacked for no reason at all. Until ya'all know what actually happened, you need to lighten up.

Somehow, with their decades-long history of an unending series of screw-ups, cover-ups and more screw-ups at nuclear power plants, I don't see the Japanese Nuclear energy companies are the ones we want developing tools and technology to use to decommission nuclear power plants around the world. Bad idea, this one.

Peacetrain wrote:

I've been bitten by a dog when i was a kid too. Of course the owners said it was my fault. I teased it somehow. By running away!!

Exactly! Running away is the best way to guarantee that you'll get bitten (or worse, depending on what you are running from). Predator animals (dogs, cats, wolves, lions, etc.) cannot help chasing something that is running away from it. It's instinctual. Running communicates that you are weak and defenseless and ... lunch.

If you are confronted by an animal intending to attack, the only thing to do is to stand fast and make it clear to the animal that you fully intend to fight. In most cases they will back down because the way they live is to attack weak animals. They avoid strong animals whenever possible. I have personally done this with a Doberman and a puma (mountain lion).

Occasions where this will not work is when you are too close to their offspring or in a pack. If you are surrounded by a pack, standing your ground is probably not going to work. The best you can hope for is to take one or two of them out before the rest of the pack kills you.

As for the discussion of bad breeds of dogs, I think it's more a case of bad breeds of humans training them. When there is an attack like this, it's the dogs owners who need to be put down.

25psot wrote:

Judge is correct only guilty is the nature and if not tsunami it could be earthquake or asteroid' No one can design nuclear plant prove from everything that might ever happen and no one can by blame for this.

You are right, an asteroid strike could not be predicted. However, the tsunami was not only predictable, it was likely and should be no surprise whatsoever.

Apologies to all who have seen it already but here is a link to a post I wrote in May of 2011 that explains exactly how and why TEPCO had every reason to expect a tsunami that would overwhelm the plant's defenses.

http://www.japantoday.com/category/picture-of-the-day/view/protest#comment_941923

An outrage.

Everyone who has held a rank of Director or higher as well as construction engineers at TEPCO since the plant was build should be chain-ganged to work clean up at the plant until it's fully cleaned up. If they're no longer alive, then their grave markers should be ground into dust and graves plowed over. Ditto for the prosecutors.

But prosecutors decided to exempt all of them, saying in a statement that TEPCO could not predict an earthquake and tsunami of that size...

This is an outrageous lie. It was well known at the time of the construction that the danger of a giant tsunami at that location was high. Tsunami large enough to overwhelm the plant's defenses hit that coast on average once every 40 years. The plant had an estimated life of 50 years so the tsunami was, in fact, quite predictable. Only those who are completely clueless and liars will say otherwise. I'm guessing the 11-member judicial panel and Tokyo prosecutors are not clueless.

I wrote a fairly detailed post on this in May of 2011. You can see it here:

http://www.japantoday.com/category/picture-of-the-day/view/protest#comment_941923

JeffLeeF wrote:

No wonder President Obama once said he can't use an iPhone "because of security problems."

Pres. Obama said that because they won't let him use any mobile device. They took his Blueberry away from him when he became president. His staff takes care of his communications for him.

John Master wrote:

Only reason why Apple computers don't have that much of a prolbem with viruses/securities is because hackers don't even bother to make viruses for Apple computers. Why should they spend hours and hours of work to create a virus for Mac when they represent small group compared to big windows group?

This was one reason in the now gone era when Apple devices were, indeed, relatively rare. But the main reason has always been and still remains the fact that the system is inherently more difficult to compromise. Hackers don't bother because it's difficult.

So the police dropped them at a motel in the desert. Now what are they going to do??

I cannot see them getting back in the car again and they don't speak English so I'm wondering how they're ever going to get home. Ditch the car and take a Greyhound bus back to Salt Lake City? I suspect Bryce Canyon is now off the itinerary.

Reminds me of the wonderful movie "Bagdad Cafe" where a German woman ditches her husband during a drive across the desert and ends up moving into an old motel run by a black woman.

WA4TKG wrote:

I've smoked Cannabis for DECADES, off & on,

Thunderbird replied:

That's nothing to be proud of...

It's also nothing to be ashamed of. It's much better than saying something such as "I've drunk whisky for DECADES."

Who says Amb. Kennedy was not working when she visited the shrine? And, for that matter, who says she's not working when she's "home" at her official residence on Sunday mornings reading The Japan Times and the morning dispatches (her daily 'read file')?

The editors of Shukan Shincho should step back and consider whether of not they "have a clue" before publishing hit pieces.

@zichi wrote:

Because of Softbank/YahooBB the cost of the internet connection dropped, the speed increased and the internet phone became available. Until then it was a NTT monopoly.

That's pretty close to the way it went. I was paying NTT Y32,000/month for a 128 kbps (dual-channel) ISDN unlimited connection when the first ADSL service was offered in 1999 by a tiny outfit called "Tokyo Metallic." They had a 1.5 Mbps connection for about Y5,000. About a year later Metallic was succeeded by Yahoo! BB who were even faster at a lower cost.

The sentence is only 8 years because it was a child. It is customary in Japan to give lighter sentences in cases of murder or manslaughter of children because, well, it's just a child, not a fully formed adult.

I don't think this is going to help save many women from going too far by accident. All the woman's ambitious suitor has to do is skip 2nd base and head for 3rd. Enough activity at 3rd and 2nd base will no doubt come to the conclusion that it's 'true love," releasing the bosom.

AKBfan

Tarantino is anyway overrated. Makes ok B-movie action flicks, but that's all.

Pulp Fiction is a B-movie? On what planet?

Memo to media: When you use the term "Comfort Women" you become part of the problem. It's "Sex Slavery." That is the only term that should ever appear in your articles and headlines. Ever. Time to put "Comfort Women" in the trash can with the N-word where it belongs.

Every new market, every new product, the "experts" and pundits come out with all sorts of explanations why Apple cannot succeed or how they must change, etc., and every time they are wrong. This has been going on for 30 years so there's no reason to expect that the outcome will be any different this time. Ka-ching! Big success for Apple!

Wtfjapan, price discrepancies between different countries is natural, normal and unremarkable. Not everything in a retail price derives from the item itself. Included are things like overhead and labor costs in the retail channel. Storefront rent and clerk wages, for example, as well as the salaries of the truck drivers and warehouse workers. These all contribute to the point-of-sale prices. If those costs are higher in Japan than China, then the retail prices in Japan will be higher.

gogogo

35 million please... Understand not all diamonds are the same but in general Diamonds in Japan are 2.5 times above the rest of the world ...

Actually, all diamonds in the world are overpriced. If the millions of diamonds kept off the market were released, the prices would collapse.