So I headed up to Nagoya for the weekend for a belated birthday blowout with a buddy a mine - Kev, who's just entered his Jesus year. If he ascends bodily to heaven, we'll both know being raised Catholic paid off. I waited all year for my ascension, but it didn't come. There's only so much blasphemy I can do, you know.
Regardless, I headed up, and fellow expat world traveler Ry headed down from Tokyo. We both got in on Friday, the day before the 'official' kickoff, and warmed up our livers and conditioned our brain cells with some light drinking and cigar smoking - just to stay in form, of course.
As the conversations tend to do amongst superior minds like ours, it quickly turned to world events, US politics, Iraq and the merits of national health systems. [Sadly, I'm serious. A little education is a dangerous thing.]
The only conclusions we managed to come to, however, were that Kev doesn't feel he should have to pay taxes to cover health costs for donut eating fatties, I'm a godless pinko commie-bastard, and Ry has what can only be described as an unhealthy man-love for Bill Clinton.
Ry stands here, mouth agape, clearly taken aback at the size of Kev's guns, circumferences achieved without even flexing.
So after having begun our 13 hour drinkasmokathon on Sat afternoon at a den of iniquity - the type in which photography is not allowed [use your imaginations people] - we began our pub crawl in earnest.
See here, for example, Kev + Beer = Happiness. The equation is simple really.
And you can see the distinction in the next pic, in a nice little Irish pub - perfect for an Irish lad born in England - where Kev
without beer clearly looks pensive and distraught.
Here you see Kev's "Whatthefuckmate?" face as he expresses his displeasure at my picking up a box of Phillies Sweets - 6 for 800yen! - as he continues his elitist practice of smoking only Cuban cohibas while pontificating on endlessly about cigar wraps and leaves and rolling and whatnot. Yeah, maybe yours are better Kev, but mine taste like candy, so there ya go...
Little known fact that what is commonly thought of as an obscene hand gesture actually means, amongst most civilized tribes of the lower Amazon "Hey bro, I love you too."
True story, swear to god.
Any bar that let's you order in your own pizza, well that's just good folks.
After pizza we headed off to the next bar, with our full complement of annoying gaijin we for the night.
Joined by Australian triathlete extraordinaire [and loud ass snorer - but that was later] Dan, and John... as we left the land of deep couches and delivered pizza, heading off to see the next pub, to insure that safety, rights and standards were being met throughout all of Nagoya...
Here is the first, of many, "gun shows" by Kevin throughout the evening.
Yes Kevin, we know, you're very manly. Well done.
In the "damn small world" category, out on the crawl Kev met a lad who grew up not 2 miles from where he grew up. They drank and reminisced of those wacky Catholic/Protestant rivalries. Also known as, I was delighted to learn, the heathens VS the kneelers.
And then, in the finest Japanese tradition, it was on to karaoke, where the voices of four powerful, yet intoxicated men, shook the very foundations of music itself.
Thanks to Kev, the selections were sure to include prodigious amounts of country and western, Johnny Cash, Elvis, and Tom Jones.
I've yet to figure out how a man born in Britain may actually be the biggest redneck I've ever met. I'm from North Carolina for god's sake. That's just embarrassing.
Here you can see both the sadness and disdain in Kevin's eyes as he's forced to toast with my girly bottle of Malibu Rum. I care not!
This may be the greatest karaoke picture of all time. Made even more so that they weren't paying attention to the camera and were just totally rocking out.
I must confess that I didn't quite understand their enthusiasm for the song - "It's Raining Men [Hallelujah]!"
They were
really into it though.
This next pic was snapped after I had just committed what turned out to be both a strategic and tactical karaoke error. See, I was not aware that choosing to hammer out a Green Day song would necessarily
CAUSE Kev to think that moshing inside a karaoke room was a good idea. And as boys will be boys, moshing turns to 'rasslin both quick, fast and in a hurry.
One broken glass and cigar burn later, time was called on the bout on the account of too much masculinity.
Good thing we hadn't been drinking. That might've impaired our judgement.
And it should be noted, contrary to how it looks, Dan was not trying to have his way sexually with Kev in this picture.
That was later. [Hi Dan!]
Come the end of karaoke [and moshing] we were all feeling the manly hetero-bonding love...
...though what possessed these three to take this big gay group hug walk down the streets of Nagoya is still a mystery.
Kev quickly reasserted his masculinity a short time later, at our final bar of the night, by becoming the man-meat in a bar wench sandwich.
As Dan continued his mastery in the fine art of chair dancing.
Last call at the last bar. Kev treats us to what will be, sadly, his final gun show of the night [morning?] as all look on in amazement and wonder.
It's good to know, that whether you be in America or Japan, after 13 hours of carousing about town and entirely too much alcohol, there will always be a Denny's Restaurant [I kid you not] to go into and get some greasy food to soak up all that nonsense in your system. Sadly, no hash browns, but beggars can't be choosers.
Here we are the next day, outside of Kev's host family's house, after 6 hours of sleep and gorging ourselves on more pizza [the diet of salt, cheese and fat really is required after a night of alcohol.]
Kev is regaling us with tales of courage in this pic as he points to the very location that he once had his way with a squirrel. He explained it as something done in the finest of English traditions, and that back home it's considered the highest form of love you can achieve, outside of a public school or unless you're a Catholic altar boy.
Strange lad that Kevin, but I like him.
Hope you had a happy birthday, man.
A few un-blogged [it's a word] pics from the wkend are here, for those inclined to such things -
