Rrrg!

Everyday this week AVG has done an update that required a reboot.

Everyday.

I’ve had AVG for quite some time now, and it rarely has updates that need reboots. And now it’s everyday.

This is getting annoying.

Thoughts on Japan

Now that it’s been two weeks, I figure I should write this.

The first, and biggest thing, that I’ll remember about Japan was how hard it was to find edible food. Okay, all the food was edible, it just wasn’t anything I liked or even wanted to try. Now, if I had my own place and my own stove, that would be an entirely different issue. There would still be whacked out food prices and extremely expensive fruit, but I could cook things to my taste. However, eating outside of my home would be a pain. And in the case of one or two people, eating out is generally a much realler option than with larger groups. What with the difficulty of cooking for one and all.

Prices for other things were also very different. Some things are more expensive, other things are less. Cigarettes, for instance, were about $2.50 a pack when purchased individually. Fruits was absurdly expensive. Most foodstuffs were of relative comparable prices. Restuarants were cheaper, except for the complete lack of all-you-can-eat places. Books were very cheap. Digital media was extremely expensive, though older and used stuff could be found for reasonable prices. Sometimes even very good prices. Housing is insane.

Everybody spoke at least some English. This made it somewhat difficult to practice Japanese as folks would try to speak English. And if I did get my question out in Japanese and they responded in Japanese, they would go at it like I was a native speaker. Which is not necessarily a bad assumption. If I ask in Japanese, why shouldn’t they assume that I’m prepared for full speed Japanese?

Everyone was nice and helpful. And understanding. There were a few times I said things in a rather inappropriate way for talking to strangers, but I hear the Japanese appriciate any effort to speak their tongue. I may suck, but at least I’m trying to be considerate. But then, most people appriciate things like that.