Wow, I haven't been here in about three months. This is not a good thing as this is THE place where I keep up my writing skills, meager as they are...

Anyway, I've come to realize that I must have an eating disorder with regard to timing. Last night at dinner, I was eating some stir-fried that Musubichan cooked up. It was good and I was hungry, so I was eating rather vigorously. I am pretty dexterous with chopsticks and can convey food to my mouth rather quickly, but it seems I have a timing issue these days. At one point, I failed to pull out the chopsticks from my mouth quick enough and ended up biting into its tip, cracking not only my favorite pair of chopsticks, but also a small portion of my front tooth (right incisor).

How stupid of me. I should relax while I eat and concentrate on taking the chopsticks out of my mouth before I start chewing. But concentrating on the mechanics of eating would distract me from the pleasure of eating, and that would make meals uninteresting. Of course, the upside would be that I might eat less and lose weight, and save myself the agony of going to the dentist to repair my teeth, let alone losing my favorite set of chopsticks.

Hope everyone in Xangaland is well and healthy this summer.

I am still adjusting to tweeting on Twitter. Most seem to write about their everyday life--I going to lunch, I worked out today, I'm meeting a friend for drinks tonight. I started to do something similar, but I am unsure if other people want to know or even care about the minutiae of my everyday life. So instead I've been tweeting things that don't necessarily deal with specific activities of my everyday life, but express more about what I'm thinking or feeling. 

In the past few days, this is what I've written (some editing was involved):

• Anyone know what is "pi day"? Is it about "pies" or the ratio between a circle's circumference and its diameter?
• Onigiriman is really digging the original UK version of Life on Mars, although the slang is sometimes a pain in the jacksie.
• Onigiriman needs a bolt of energy to get his butt moving forward, but a ponderous, cloudy DC Sunday is not helping.
• Onigiriman wants to know: What is OpenDNS? Can someone explain this to me?

Can anyone answe some of these questions? I'm not getting much of a response from these tweets, but then what can you say in 140 characters or less?

It is customary for a president to be seated for a year before he gives a State of the Union Address, so Obama's speech last night was not really a State of the Union. Even though the talking heads on TV treated it as such--my poison is MSNBC--it wasn't. It was more like the Hopeful State of the Union, the way Obama envisions how his stimulus package will work out when implemented. There were a few promising moments, but he grabbed my attention when he got to education. This is the first time I can remember any president speak so publicly about the necessity of HIGHER education--education beyond high school--and how it will hold a place of prominence in his policy.

It is our responsibility as lawmakers and educators to make this system work. But it is the responsibility of every citizen to participate in it. And so tonight, I ask every American to commit to at least one year or more of higher education or career training. This can be community college or a four-year school; vocational training or an apprenticeship.

But whatever the training may be, every American will need to get more than a high school diploma. And dropping out of high school is no longer an option. It's not just quitting on yourself, it's quitting on your country — and this country needs and values the talents of every American. That is why we will provide the support necessary for you to complete college and meet a new goal: By 2020, America will once again have the highest proportion of college graduates in the world.

I'm a college professor, and I'm not embarrassed to admit that I got misty eyed when I heard this.

When speaking Japanese, non-native speakers need to remember to be polite.

Most languages have at last two levels of speech. In general, they are formal and informal. In the US, this is especially true in business. You call people Mister, unless told otherwise. You speak and act politely, unless you become very familiar with your superior. Do you slap you boss's back and tell him "Good job, dude"?

In Japanese, the line is even more pronounced. Unfortunately for most Japanese learners, a Japanese speaker will not correct a non-native speaker when they speak informally. Many Americans will come back from Japan thinking their Japanese is all that. I certainly have many students like that as well. And for the most part, their confidence is well founded. Their Japanese is relatively fluent and unobstructed by the fear of using the wrong word.

However, if they are too informal with me, I will always correct them. I don't mean to be a hard-ass, but someone needs to correct them because if and when they return to Japan for work or graduate study, they cannot talk informally when talking to a business colleague or professor. They have to learn to turn the formality switch on and off in any given situation. And the level familiarity rarely has anything to do with it. I worked at a Research Center for two years in Japan and became very familiar with my bucho (division chief). We often drank together, and he is the one who dubbed me the "American who speaks English". But one night while drinking, I spoke to him a bit too familiarly. Now, in Japan, drinking often excuses an error in judgment, and most will laugh it off the next day. But my error in being too familiar with my bucho put me in his doghouse for two weeks. He literally did not speak to me during that time, relaying messages to me through others.

The bottom line is--been there, done that. So I tell my students to speak to me formally whenever they decide to speak to me in Japanese. If they think I am a hardcase, then so be it. I take it upon myself to be their practice partner, their opportunity to learn how to turn that formality switch on and off.

Yesterday was the only day I go to school this week and next, and guess what? I get a package. There's no one on campus, no one in the department, except me.

"It's either work or an important Christmas card," I tell Mr. Fedex.

"It's from a CB," the delivery dude said and looked at me in anticipation.

Aaah, CB. A former student who graduated a year ago. She's was as cute as a button, and as sharp as a tack. One of the best and most insightful student I had in my Lit in Translation course. She often came to office hours to say "hi" and chat a bit, and we got to know each other pretty well considering that she never studied anything else related to Japan. She told me that she wanted to invite me to a "distinguished student dinner" last year, but refrained as it conflicted with my late class. I ended up going anyway when another student asked me. I never pass up a free dinner.

Anyway, the last thing I remember of CB was at the end of Finals period last year. She came by the office to say "good-bye" and that she enjoyed the classes from her "favorite teacher." We hugged and she left for bigger and better things on the West Coast.

"Ah, my girlfriend in California," I smiled at the delivery dude.

He grinned as I signed for the package, and he descended down the hall seemingly pleased at the thought he was delivering joy instead of work over the holiday season.

I knew better, of course. As any experienced professor could have easily deduced, inside the package was a request for a letter of recommendation. *sigh*

Merry Christmas Eve everyone!