Gut-Punch Thursday!

I've been known to say that putting one's self in difficult or uncomfortable situations is a good way to rise to the challenge and kick some ass. Or fail. Miserably. But at least learn something. I guess it all started when I was in college and I joined the rowing team as a chubby 17 year old with minimal physical training experience. It continued when I went to Japan as an exchange student and I refused to hang out with anyone but'cept Japanese people to learn the language. I kept at it in the Marines, and part of me taking this job here in Japan was a continuation of it, because even though I didn't lie on my resume or anything to get hired, I had a lot of self doubt about my abilities to be effective at my job. For the most part I've risen to the challenge and done a good job, but today I felt like Corky Thatcher performing River Dance live at the Apollo.

One thing about learning a language is that no matter what you do, there's a lot going on in your brain that you really don't have a lot of control over. It's like a roller coaster. Some days you're on fire -- you cruise around like a ninja, there's no situation that you can't handle, you understand everything, and you feel like a native speaker. Other days, like today, you feel like an idiot and your brain simply won't kick into gear to get the job done.

I don't normally blog about work, but today was kinda comical in a few ways. Comical because, like I said, I felt like a tackling dummy. I haven't felt like I got gut-punched at work this badly since my first day of work, when, after moving my life to Japan, I found out that there was a "mistake" on my official job offer letter and that I'd be taking a $29,000 pay cut. Personnel's official response: "Whoops!" Anyway, I get a kick out of my job mainly because it involves a lot of eccentric personalities in my office, both American and Japanese. Keeps me on my toes. Or knocks me off my feet.

It started off with a meeting in the morning over a project I'm heading up that I almost lost control of, because a guy I work with wouldn't stop talking to me about his experiences working at a car dealership in the USA. I love the guy to death, but in one ear I was listening to 4 Japanese people discussing (in Japanese) one of the processes we were having a problem with as I tried to resolve it, and in the other ear I was listening to a 30 minute tale (in English) about life as a parts manager of a Honda dealership in 1978. By the end of the meeting I was a little bit hosed, so I got a sandwich, went back to my place, and zoned out for 45 minutes.

I came back and my old boss told me he was showing around a group of Japanese folks who were checking out our operation. They came through as scheduled and 20 or so Japanese people piled in the room. I was standing there on the side in my usual lean-on-the-filing-cabinet-looking-bored stance that I typically adopt when guests come through when my old boss says, "Take it away, Paully!" I said, "So, like, are you gonna do this?" and he said, "No, you can tell them about what we do." So I started stammering in Japanese. Like a fucking first year Japanese student. Like an idiot. Like a deaf Gypsy from Turkistan. Finally some dude pipes up and says, "uuuh, I'm an interpreter for these guys....." so I thought "fuggit" and just started speaking in English. Or trying. I don't know which made me look more like a fool -- stammering in Japanese or stammering in my native language. The first sentences sounded something like this:

Uhh, yeah.. Ok.. As you can see here.. Um, we do stuff... Umm.. I, uuh, well, I'm in charge of this.. And, you know.. As you can see by this stuff here. Yeah...

I looked around for a second at 20 inquisitive pairs of eyes, begging to know just what the fuck I was talking about. After an awkward 5 seconds or so looking back at them in abject confusion, I finally got my shit together and regained control of the English language, finishing off my little stammerfest.

My current boss walked in with a huge smile on his face (he was in the back). He seemed to've gotten a big kick out of my performance. All I could say was, "Did you like that? Get a nice view?" and he said, "Of what?" and I said, "Of me, showing my ass. That was awesome." He apologized, but I was too shellshocked to really care.

So after that, I was promptly told that a it was time for another meeting with some of our customers back in the states who had come to visit. Some big wigs. Four of our Japanese staff work for them, and while they are not directly employed by them, whenever the bigwigs come, the section chief tends to voice grievances that the big wigs really have no power to change, because administratively the Japanese workers are under the control of our organization. It's painful to watch, and the section chief insists on making it a complain session every time, with the same answers. The section chief will go on a 10 minute diatribe about something, which will end with the big wigs saying, "We don't control that. The organization here does." It took every ounce of restraint in my soul not to jump in and make it stop. So I drew pictures and kinda paid attention.

Part of my job is to edit the information given to the big wigs by the Japanese staff, which is why I was there. The meeting was held in Japanese with an interpreter sitting there, because I don't like doing simultaneous interpretation. I was sitting there, again, half listening and half doodling on a piece of paper. The Japanese section chief was going on about his many grievances which the folks from the states have no power over, when I looked up and thought to myself, "Did he just say what I think he said?"

It's great, hearing something that you wish you didn't hear in Japanese, then hearing it said in English. It's like getting manslapped and during the shock-phase where you're attempting to comprehend what just happened, your adversary kicks you in the throat. Sometimes you're not quite sure what they said, so you ask them to say it again. Since I wasn't directly part of the conversation I didn't have that option. Here's what I thought he said, in Japanese:

As you can see, our production is considerably lower than last year. This is for a few reasons, partly because the American staff is undermanned. The other reason is because Paully over there has been putting your products on a much lower priority than his other work, so we are suffering.

That was the manslap. That's when I stopped drawing a picture of a stick figure getting killed by a falcon. That's when I looked up and said to myself, "...he just say that?" That's when I felt a wakizashi sliding between my shoulder blades.

As I felt the blood rushing to my stomach, I heard the interpreter say the following:

As you can see, our production is considerably lower than last year. This is for a few reasons, partly because the American staff is undermanned. The other reason is because Paully over there has been putting your products on a much lower priority than his other work, so we are suffering.

I didn't really know what to say, because it's not true. Yes, I have had a lot on my plate, but I've been getting their shit done as fast as I've been doing anything else. Another good reason production isn't as high this year is because, well, the fiscal year began last month. So yeah. There probably isn't going to be as much done in the past month as there was in the past year. And in the 1 month represented in their little statistics? Around 1/12th of last year's total production. Hm..

So thanks buddy. I thought we were cool. I thought we were homies, because you come into my office and yap at me whenever you wanna talk about WWII airplanes or whatever weird shit you have on your mind. I pretend not to notice the awkwardness when I tell you I need to get back to work, which you ignore, and entertain your conversations about any and all aircraft since 1941. When you go on about things which I have no control over, I make sympathetic faces and curse the man. Roger that.

But I have news for you. Tomorrow I'm going to purchase a car. A pimp car. It looks like this.



You, sir, will never ride in my car*. Oh, and just so you know? Consider yourself photoshopped.

But that's as far as my revenge will go. I suppose I'll sit there, in the name of harmony, and continue to listen to your ridiculous senile babblings. You are a nice man, I think, but in the dozen or so years of working with roundeye you never learned our customs or etiquette. And why should you? We are your guests. We are simple barbarians after all, unable to comprehend your nepotistic subtleties and roundabout buddy fucking. I won't even tell our boss about what you said at the meeting that he luckily missed, because he will go completely apeshit and hire a 19 year old Filipina drinky-girl to fill the current opening just to spite you.

...and that, my friends, is what we call Cultural Sensitivity.

* yeah im seriously getting that car

We Don't Serve Your Kind Here........

aka Don't Take Us To Nice Places

I've never written a food post, cuz I'm not real picky about what I eat. This weekend was good tho.

This weekend was my friend Yumi's birthday party, which she held at a really awesome prime rib joint called Lawry's.

Say Happy Birthday to the Yuminator!! And Thai and Kaz.



Apparently there's a Lawry's steakhouse in a few major cities around the globe. She sent us all emails asking if it was OK to have it there, and what do I care? It's a steakhouse.

Anyway, the joint was pretty cool. They have a few types of prime ribs, the difference of which is the size. The difference between mid-range and second-to-biggest was 500yen, so i figured what the hell? Kinda like when you get the ginormous size cup at the movie theatre because hey, it's 25 cents more, so fuggit. When you're ready to order, they wheel in this giant silver thing, which sorta resembles R2D2's obese silver cousin. It's a sort of grill/serving thing on wheels, and they cut the prime rib from a giant, 6000lb Diplodocus rib simmering within. Here's what the steel thing looks like:



Imagine my joy when the following was brought forth.



The meal was around 7000yen or so, so like $60ish. The prime rib was fab, as was the creamed corn and mashper-taters. Most of us also had a few drinks during dinner, so all in all it was a mellow evening. They also have an original spinning salad, where they spin a salad around in a bowl and put stuff in it. And it's good. Here's the waitresses doing it.



I got a kick out of their outfits, and quipped that they doubled as nurses for when one of us would be requiring the heimlich. I would say that they put up with us with grace, but the group I was with was really well behaved.

They brought out the desert menu, which also offered a host of surprises, including grappa. I knew what grappa was and had tasted it before, and the ladyfriend was curious as to what it was, so I ordered up a shot for 1000yen and had everyone take a taste. Most people couldn't get past the the scent, but just about everyone stomached a little sip of it. There was about a half a tiny glass left when we were about to leave, so a member of our party decided to slam it, which made him throw up in the bathroom before he left. Good thing he paid for that expensive meal, eh?

Here's me and the Mizz Aki, discussing something intently, as Craig prepares to devour his catch.



I wouldn't recommend getting grappa unless it's something that you, the hard core alcoholic requiring some some after-dinner rocket fuel, are jones-ing. The only thing I can compare it to is the booze we drank in Sasebo with the dead scorpions in the bottom, or the booze in North Korea with the two dead snakes floating around in it.

The moral of the story is, "that's why we don't take us nice places". Or rather, that's why we shouldn't order drinks from a power-alcoholic's menu.

Here's the crew:

...and then God farted, and it was good...

So this weekend I went to Hakone. First thing's first -- it's pronounced like Ha-Koe-Nay, not Hah-Cone. It's not an icecream holder. Or something Brando calls a halloween costume. It's a lovely place near Mt Fuji, and, as per SOP, the ever fickle Mt Fuji was hidiing behind clouds. Aaah, Mizz Fuji, why must you toy with me so? I was able to get this little picture while she was peeking out to see if I was looking.



Gotcha suckah!!!

Me and the she-partner hopped in my ride and drove down there first thing in the morning on Saturday. The weather was clear at first but, as always, it got progressively shittier as the day went on. It's also getting pretty cold here, but we managed. We started off by driving to this gondola-deal, or as they call it, a "rope way", which took us to the top of a fancy hill.



It was about a 7 minute ride to the top, which was way colder than it was at the bottom. Still, it yielded a bounty of snazzy pics, which you will be able to enjoy now.

Here's the lake.



As you can see, the Japanese have out done themselves maintaining the majesty of the area, by placing a golf course in between the top of the mountain and the lake.

Here it is, a tad closer.



What are those? Boats? What sort of boats? Probably some sort of traditional boat. Well, kinda traditional I guess...



Yaar, matey, that be Mt Fuji over thaarrrrrr...

They actually have a huge union-jack paint scheme on the other side. I was pretty amazed that it was able to sail around with its sails furled. I wonder what sort of demon magic they used to keep it moving? Probably something like in that Juan Depp movie.

After looking around the rope-way area for a bit, we went over to check out some volcanic plumes. I love geology, and initially chose it as my major in college until I realized that it involved math, which made it a big fat no-go. But I'm still pretty interested in it, and always have been, as shown by the silver medal I won at the Science Olympiad in Geology in high school.

Yes, I was even cooler back then.

Anyway, one thing that I haven't done since I've been driving in Japan, including my time spent in Okinawa, is ram another car. I'd always wanted to see what would happen if I did -- you know, to better understand the traffic laws and such -- so on the way to the volcanic plumes I took the opportunity to rear-end the car in front of me.

Here's what happens when a 93 Carina (my car) plows into a mini-SUV with 4 unsuspecting Japanese people in it:

His car:



And my car:



I'm sure you probably asking yourself, "Hey what gives? His plate has a Japanese letter next to the blacked out number, and yours has a Y next to yours." That's why we call em Yankee plates, folks. I'm glad the cops know that a roundeye is driving whenever I cruise by.

Anyway, it was no small thing. I was hoping to give him all my cash, high-5 and pat asses, and drive on, but no, you have to involve the police. The cop came out to confirm that I did indeed rear end him, and insurance companies were contacted, and an hour-and-a-half dance ensued. Luckily we made it to the plumes before it got dark, which was at about 4:45pm up there. The cop was cooler than I expected -- in the past, I've found them to be prickish -- and we all had a chuckle when I announced that "our cars did battle, and mine clearly lost." har har har, yuck it up, I'm a fucking idiot.

Anyway, on to the plumes. Any one who's ever been by one of these geologic wonders knows that it smells like absolute shit. Or rather, like a fart. Like a really bad fart from someone who ate an inappropriate amount of hard boiled eggs. In a word (or 3), like my office. You start off at the bottom, and walk up to where the big vents are, by this little hut on the mountain:



Next to the hut, the fumes are almost overwhelming. When a breeze hits it right and it hits you in the face, it's like god is holding you down and farting in your mouth. A big, wet, palpable fart. Another tradition they have up there is that they boil eggs in the volcanic water which turns the shells black, so everyone is standing around eating hard boiled eggs and throwing the egg detritus on the ground and on these tables. I wonder who had that bright idea? "Hey, Satoshi, it doesn't smell bad enough up here. Let's boil eggs so everyone can eat em and throw pieces of egg everywhere, which will rot. Maybe we can cover up the smell of rotten eggs that volcanic sulfer brings with, well, real rotten eggs." Anyway, I took a little video on my camera of the plumes for you all to enjoy.



Here's a picture of me next to the cool sign.



And let's not forget my faithful navigator, who refused to let me drive after bulldozing some unsuspecting folks on a narrow road:



So that was my weekend adventure. I hope I don't lose my liscence, because you might remembed that the last time I was in Kyoto I thought it would give everyone a good laugh if I hit a pole with a rental van. These are the only two times I've struck something with a vehicle. Except in Afghanistan, but that's ok, because everyone hits stuff there. It doesn't count. Plus I wrote a fancy blog about it back then, so I've made sure to let everyone know when I smack something with a vehicle.

I hope you enjoy my stupid antics as much as I enjoy doing them.

Let’s go the Zoo, Fakkahs!

Hey, check out my new hat!



And no, those aren’t Yankee Mikes in the background, they’re freakin Oliphants. Asiatic. Got it?

That’s right, me and the missez went to Ueno Zoo this past Sunday.

Everyone knows that I love animals. I grew up watching animal shows and when we all went to the park to start youth soccer, I was more interested in playing with ants. The first channels I have to know whenever I go somewhere are Animal Planet and The Discovery Channel, and if Shark Week or Big Cat Diaries or anything having to do with birds is on, good luck getting me to do anything else. I’m fixated on the tube like a retarded kid to a bus window. In Afghanistan we got the National Geographic channel, and I had all the commercials memorized and cheerfully sang along to them. I dig it, folks, that’s what I’m tryin’ to say.

This presents a quandary. How can a guy who likes animals possibly go to the zoo and have a good time?

Good question. Zoos are a little bit depressing. I’m used to seeing animals (albeit on the TV) running around in their natural habitats, running down prey, pwning their rivals’ babies, and crapping all over the place. Instead, there are these animals just sitting around doing nothing, peering from their enclosures while the equivalent of big macs with super-sized fries walk around and leer at them, just begging to be killed and eaten. Here’s a good video of a lion that wants to murder everything within view, but can’t. Poor fellah.



Still, I know that zookeepers love animals even more than me and devote their lives to making their lives comfortable. Being an animal (and in a lot of places, a human) really sucks, because everything around you is trying to take your genes out of the race and acquire the nutrients that are your muscle tissue. There is one animal, though, that I have a bit of a problem with. The animal that the Japanese (and Chinese I guess) love ever so much is the Giant Panda. I can’t really abide by the panda, because they refuse to mate and propagate their species. What happens to animals like that? They fall by the evolutionary wayside. But for some reason pandas are special, because they’re cute and cuddly. I disagree, as seen in this video, where a panda is intent on fucking some guy’s shit up.



Oh, so cuddly! Animals that are the same size or bigger than humans are typically about 100 times stronger than us, and when they get mad, they have a tendency to try and rip our heads off. Take chimps. Chimps are completely and utterly insane and fucked up, and when they have an inkling, they will tear your shit to pieces. So anyway, back to pandas.

Pandas refuse to procreate, which is pretty lame in my book. “Oh, I’m just a panda, I’m content on sitting on my ass and eating an inappropriate amount of bamboo and shitting over 200 times each each day while the WWF pimps me as their symbol. Save me lolz!!!” They have cute names like Ling-Ling and Sing-Sing and Gao-Gao. More like Gay-Gay. Weak sauce.

So here’s a little tribute I made to pandas all over the world.



This took more time than I intended, but I didn’t want to quit in the middle and waste what you clearly see is valuable time in my life. Furthermore, they're apparently doing better in the wild these days, not doubt due to the fact that it was punishable by death to kill them until recently.

Just down the road from the stupid pandas are some real bears. Bears that don’t fuck around and pimpslap your skull clean off just because you looked at them sideways.



Here's an example of what a polarbear will go through to try and annihilate your shiz-nit. I think I've posted it before.



Click here for the full video, and to see how horribly annoying that girl is.

No one wants to help the poor polar bears though, because they eat seals, and seals are cute.



Don’t get me wrong now – I’m not advocating seal clubbing.



That’s just kinda fucked up.

But sometimes things that are cute have a buttload of nutritional value, especially for our manly aforementioned bears.

Another thing I love is when animals do something really fucked up, folks will sagely proclaim, “Clearly they’re demonstrating decidedly human behavior.” Like when chimpanzees go on hunting parties and ambush some poor chimp, chewing off its face, hands, feet, and genitalia, or when a group of bottlenose dolphins gang rapes a spinner dolphin. Uuh, I think they were up to that shit way before humans were, and I don’t remember humans chewing off anyone’s face. We use tools to do that shit, because we can. Animals aren’t as smart as us, and if they had the brains to use a knife to massacre their rivals, you can bet your ass they would. Furthermore, animals can’t use language like us. I always got a chuckle in Anthro classes when students would sooo want to believe that, and even after giving a definition of language in human terms and being shown evidence that animals can’t use it like us, they didn’t believe it. They were convinced that animals could either talk the same way we could and we just couldn’t understand its subtleties, or they were talking on a different plane. Animals have complex communication methods, yes. But not like ours. They don’t use symbolic representation to mean other things. They don’t talk about things that will happen in the future in other locations. And when chimps were taught sign language, they only used it to get bananas. Scientists thought they could teach chimps or gorillas sign language and bring them into the field as interpreters ,like in Congo when that one ape is all like AMY SCARED! AMY SHIT PANTS! AMY PLAY WITH FECES AND THROW AT SCIENTISTS! AMY NEED GORILLASEX! Anyway it didn’t work and it won’t work, because apes aren't built like that. Some animals are pretty smart though. Like this fellah here. He's wearing a blanket. Oh my god, he must be as smart as us!!!



But for all our flaws and our “human tendencies” to run around butchering each other, he can't put 2 and 2 together and brain his buddy with a log because he's pissed off about something. He can't coordinate with his crew to pretend to be injured or sick and when the zookeepers come in, to tear the poor guy's throat out and wave it around triumphantly for the crowd. He’s on display being woo’d at by a bunch of screaming Japanese school children, not the other way around.

Stuck in my Eurotrash Prison

Update...

I haven't written in a while, and I feel compelled to write about some bullshit. This post may have a few completely unrelated topics, so hold your comments until the end.

Topic One: Eurotrash rikey Tokyo


This one is from when I was in Don Quixote last night. Yeah, sounds like some strange shower scene in 15th century Spain, but there's store in Japan called Don Quixote which sells stuff that you might find in a dollar store, only for more than a dollar. Basically a general store consisting of cheap plastic goods made in China for a reasonable price. I was downstairs waiting for my friend to come down to the front, and this dude walks by with what I can only describe as a Billy Idol sneer wearing what I can only describe as something picked up out of Tyler Durden's laundry hamper. You know, camel hair jacket, weird flowered button up shirt unbuttoned down to the middle.
*
He had this Japanese girl with him who was dressed like a straight up prostitute, and he was mean-mugging everyone as he walked out. He was probably 5'7 and weighed 130lbs at the most, but he sure did look mad. I was standing there minding my own business with a bag of cream puffs in one hand (a present for bringing my friend some supplements) and a bag containing bottled water in the other, with my normal bored-waiting-for-someone look on my face. He seemed to take particular interest in me, and locked eyes with me as he walked out and turned the corner. I wonder what he was thinking? "I know you weren't checkin out my hot ass girlfriend. I will cut you." Well, hipster, everyone was checking out your girlfriend because she looked like some sort of Intergalactic Spacewhore. No one does fucked up apparel ensembles quite like the Japanese, who have a tendency to over-do just about everything. It's in their character. This girl was no different. I looked away after a second, because I'm not really sure what this guy was all about. Was he the confrontational type? Was he going to walk over and ask me what my problem was? Was he going to threaten me? I could have found all that out, but instead I just looked away. It's just easier that way. I hope though, Mr Eurotrash, that you pull that shit with a few friends of mine, who have no sense and will gladly put your face in the concrete. Guys like Mr Euro are either a) pussies who bluff or b) on borrowed time. Running around Tokyo mean-mugging everyone might last for a while, because Japanese people aren't weird about mean-mugging like we are, but this guy reminds me of the typical assface from abroad who's forgotten his Ps and Qs. He's been running around Tokyo acting a fool and acting tough for so long, he's forgotten himself cuz no one's slapped him in the mouth. Me? I'm docile. I don't want any problems. I just want to buy some water and bring some cream puffs home, where I can consume my plunder with no bumps or bruises. But there are a limited amount of guys like me running around, and I hope he gets smart soon. Did part of me want to stare him down and see what would happen? Did I want to do something that would make him approach me in a threatening way so I could somehow justify whatever absurd over-reaction I'd likely produce in the middle of Don Quixote, just for the amusement of myself and my friend who was upstairs with his girlfriend? Of course. I'm all about the "story". But you just gotta let some things go. Does it bother me that some douchebag with no style and a skanked out girl might feel emboldened by my apathy? Not in the least. If anything, I encourage it.

Topic Two: There are only two types of people who wear sunglasses at night.

Blind people and assholes. My friend Tim said that the other week at a club we were in, and I got a big kick out of it. Kind've goes along with topic one in a way, because the aforementioned Eurotrash are major culprits. A lot of Japanese dudes do it too. Not only does it not look cool, but it inhibits a person's sight. I could understand if they were a clubbin' albino and the lights bothered their corneas or whatever, but they're not. They're just assholes.

So I guess that means albinos can wear sunglasses at night too, God bless 'em.

Topic Three: I purchased Season 1 of Prison Break and watched the entire thing with the ladyfriend



I won't say it was "great". I'll say it was "pretty good". Yeah, it hooked me, but there were a few things that got on my nerves, the biggest of which were how they covered up weird plot holes and explained the unexplainable.

"Genius"

OK, so the main character's a genius, which explains how he can pull crazy shit out of his ass and foresee everything. I'm sorry, but I'd like something a little more complicated than "well he's a genius" to explain whenever he does something totally badass. I guess the human elements (pedophiles, psychopaths, mafiosos, crooked cops, etc) that are mucking up his plan make it interesting, but I like my protagonists to have flaws. And not flaws that enhance him somehow or endear him to the audience, like a weakness for saving puppies and giving ice cream to Ethiopians. No. I want something weird and debilitating, cuz everyone has a few of those flaws. Everyone I know that is brilliant in some way has a side of their personality that is completely fucked up and disfunctional, and this guy shouldnt be any different. Another thing that kinda goes along with that is the fact that we don't really know anything that he did before going to prison, so the producers can conveniently throw it in there to explain whatever he happens to be doing. "Oh, you see we didn't tell you this, but he married a stripper from Prague who's his outside contact and can deliver weird shit to him on the inside during conjugal visits." Wow, this guy thinks of everything! I wonder what else he thought of in preparation for his incarceration that we're going to find out to explain his next zany antics!!

"The Government"

Ok, I'm sure the government has some powerful influence and is capable of a lot of shadiness in real life, but I have my limits. And I'm not saying this out of some weird loyalty to the US of A. I'm talking about these weird, sancrosanct GMen running around invincibly with carte blanche to do whatever they want with the gadgets to be anywhere and find anyone. Also, for those of you who watched it, did you notice that the one Secret Service guy threatened to kill his partner no less than twice? "If you keep talking like that, I'm gonna have to put a bullet in your head". And he threatened to throw him down a well. I'm not even a cold blooded GMan killer and I wouldn't put up with that bullshit. If the chubby GMan were a cold blooded killer, and I assume he is because he blasted that one woman in the woods and didn't seem to have too much problem wasting folks left and right, he wouldn't puss out if his partner started talking shit. I've met my share of Type-A whackjobs that would likely fill these jobs, and they don't get to be weirdo type-A whackjobs by being pussies and letting people walk on them. And they certainly don't have normal homelives. This whole "Oh, I'm just a normal, every day guy with a picture perfect family who happens to be a fucking hitman" thing in Hollywood is getting a little bit tired. It makes normal people think, in some weird fantasy of theirs, that they can be a super-secret covert spy. Then they run around and talk about the "intel and spec ops" community like they could be a part of it, but they just choose not to be cuz Jennifer Garner can pull off the soccermom/superspy bit seamlessly. Normal, well adjusted people don't run around killing people with no remorse. They're called sociopaths. And they probably don't make good parents.

All in all, it was "Good". Do I want to see the next season? Yes I do. Unless they spend an entire season hatching a plan that eventually fails but miraculously coincides with his brother's stay of execution, cuz then they could pretty much do the show indefinitely. I kind've thought it was going to be a little bit better, but it wasn't a bad way to spend a weekend.

So what do you guys think? Wanna beat up some sunglasses-wearing-Eurotrash and plan a daring escape from prison? I'm down.

* yeah i know it's sting