Yep -- esp for the time, that's pretty much spot-on, re: what locals think of revenue-generating-intrusives in their backyard for generations. I remember what I felt growing up, about tourists coming here and treating me to my face in my own hometown, like they did with abandon on mainland -- and the many townies here in '70s who'd clock out Friday evening and immediately head to the usual hot spots in the resorts to find a line-crossing tourist to spend the night in jail for (back when you could do so and only get that, hasn't been that way since late '80s). So shipping out to Germany Desert Storm time... assumed that's what our hosts felt about us -- and let me tell you, there were many German nationals who like my townies, wanted us to fulfill our stereotypes, for some wall-to-wall entertainment (late-'80s / early '90s at least). We were required to learn at least bare-arse minimum German, to even be released to work in 3rd Infantry Division posts, since we had a lot of GSes who were nationals, esp in the technical MOSes -- so you fail the indoc language course, you stayed in the in-processing company another 2 wks -- and be on the bricks in front your CO and Top, to explain your dumbarse But even learning to pronounce German without the lazy Americanisation we were are already infamous for since WWII... produced the same kind of light-up in the eyes of those nationals. Recall it well... must've felt like me hearing a tourist pronounce our Hawaiian street names competently -- rare. Both German and Japanese nationals (which I've some exp living on the economy / familiar with culture) seem quite willing to help you out if you put forth the effort (and as in both countries today, novelty fading a bit w\ easier access to learning online). Both cultures are quite used to an amt of effort to learn compulsory things I still feel Americans weren't raised with in large part -- so when you go there, matching their stride as you posted about, does elicit connection One diff betw. German and JDM locals you're stationed with... is the Japanese have much more strict cultural mores, any JDM local will know by heart -- and it's grating to have to deal with educating a foreigner from square one, just to interact with daily. So most Japanese / Uchinanchu locals will have already practiced lines in the sand they draw, a 'foreigner mode' they pull up, when you walk in the door. They don't respect you, not in the metrics of their own culture -- but their willingness to find a way to interact the money out your pocket, is their show of respect to you, since you'll probably (esp in Naha) be gone in a few years anyway. Ime, they treated me this way because I don't know how to read a newspaper -- despite being Japanese in both lineage and conversational language. If you have a Japanese face and are in Japan, why don't you know how to do this? is their kneejerk reaction -- despite being infamous for being hypocritical when applied to them, here as tourists (as an ex-tour guide, can speak with some authority) This happened in Germany too... but European culture is much, much closer to ours than Japan's... so the rift -- and line they draw, is much more forgiving (aside from being punctual) than in JDM, ime. Their prerogative, it's their country
Couple of smol coincidences from the walk this morning... -- just as I got to the start point, a cloud that was not there driving at sea level, had formed, blocking the sun. It covered it all the way thru the worst part of the walk (what I call Clencher Hill, a 25 - 30% incline 250m+, right at the start), then when got to the flat up top and rest, dissolved and let the sun through, just as I were dipping down into a loop that hid most of it behind houses. -- whilst sun beat down on the downhill at the far end of the giant loop I walk... when turning back north down a beautiful dog path, sun back away again -- allowing about half the walk to be in overcast briefly. Again, super-grateful as whilst the area is a dip so catches cool air falling downhill... when in direct sunlight, the asphalt paving heats, and drives away the cool air. -- post-walk, had been craving my egg whites -- something about the path today and slight break from direct sun & humidity, got my muscles craving it more than usual. Got to TGT... and something happened by accident that were wonderful involving getting egg whites. Super, super-grateful -- and obvi body's responding in kind, to me obeying constructive cravings, post-exercise... Could just as easily craved greasy bacon cheeseburgers or fries, or any of the garbage food I used to crave... but this time after hammering my lower body these past few weeks, didn't want any of that ant food -- 'gimme eggs', it said quite clearly. Apparently intense but measured exercise (esp in large muscles of the lower body) helps rid bad cravings + amplifies the body's hankering for actual building material
Du nn o if this qualifies as a coincidence... but then again, my call Doing the rather simple change of walking backwards down steep inclines I'd normally consider trudging up as the exercise, has given not only the sore joint (knee) a break... but sitting here typing this, the hip and ankle joints as well. Will have to research why... but walking backwards (as if going down a ladder, just on a steep incline vs. on rungs) in a specific way, is making ankle / knee / hip joints feel 'super-lubed'. Light, too. Why the hell isn't this more of a thing, shared outside a comm'y of just bodyworkers and rehab specialists and athletic trainers...? Could've used this during my 2-mi run days, 3- 6y ago So does e-contraction cue the body's peripheral sensory networks, to trigger a cascade of glandular processes, because the body conflates e-contraction with muscle failure? To survive, you'd have to have a body that stimulates muscle fibre growth to get stronger, when it's reached its limits re: c-contraction. But I'd no idea I could trigger this, just focusing on specifically e-contracting desired muscle groups. Apparently you can do this to any skeletal muscle in the body -- just make it tense whilst lengthening -- slowly and moderately. Caveat: doing this too hard will easily elicit TrP growth in atrophied or dehydrated muscles... so use with caution, and don't let your ego grab the wheel for regimen. But the right amt of e-contraction's apparently the solution for a bevy of joint-related woes
Have been thinking about this quite a bit of late -- how the future looks, as imagined in different eras, by their iconography. Have mentioned in past posts here, that I love the look of 1960s cars -- specifically early-to-mid-'60s. Not only that... but the fonts of the era tends to stick in my mind for some reason -- much like it does with WWII-era documents, films, and written characters on an endless series of things dating from the war. Not the Fifties, tho -- actually like the look of more grounded prewar designs, for cars and fonts at least. Know it were due to the war ending and the optimism of the 'Great (White) Society'... but the wings and fins and giant overhangs of the Atomic Age just doesn't do anything for me. Whilst '60s cars aren't Ford RS200s either... their flair is much more subdued and (almost) purposeful in comparison. And no need to say anything about Malaise Era '70s 4000-lb schooners with 200 gross hp and 'Corinthian leather', excess and flash over substance, in metal. With that in my head all morning, like Cobb's top in 'Inception'... here comes -- of course -- a YT video with a perfect example of mid-1960s design from high technology of the era, mostly mainframes: Do like how small the print is on 1960s things, like most focuses of attention: taillights, warning phrases, names on products on their shells. They're stylised, but a notch below the concurrent Space-Age and esp Psychedelic designs of the latter Mid- to Late-'60s. 2001ASO just looks like I remember a lot of things from just after the Malaise Era had begun in earnest, the public sick of 7 mpg musclecars and beginning to embrace the reality of 20-mpg Pintos and 30-mpg CVCC Civics. Being the shut-in I was, after friends didn't share my obsession w\ venturing on canehaul roads far north of town by bicycle... buried my nose in old hand-me-down boxes of comic books from cousins and uncles -- full of this very style of typography, not just in the panels, but in the ads and other print. Guess I associate it strongly with other beautiful and now rote-past things about my hometown in '70s and '80s, gone never to be seen again. When a sano cream-coloured '65 Impala SS on the old skinny biases rolls past, that unmistakable burble from OEM exhaust... I see all of those things of the era in little vignettes, cast visibly but invisibly, across field of vision. 'Sano', is a good word to describe and distinguish it, from the hallucinogenic, putty-knife-smear of Psych pop-art. Watching that sequence... since I know the pacing and scenes and emotions by heart at this age... it's the little things that grab me: 'SEQ ACT' '3 SEC INT' 'CAUTION EXPLOSIVE BOLTS' 'LOGIC MEMORY CENTER' 'MULTI APERTURE CORE STORAGE—FOR MAGNETIC LOGIC APPLICATIONS ONLY' Just the use of '—' vs. '-' between words for emphasis, is something I used to see in literature for old IBM (HAL? ) 4381 and DEC PDP-11 mainframes I used to babysit in mil (64MB of memory!), which had text conventions from this era. Truly rings with the vintage... now replaced by post-truth techbro flash, in iridescent-silkscreened word-salad. Almost a bit of therapy, watching a movie about a homicidal computer and a dimension-bending monolith, being anchored by these functional yet subdued fonts, for space duty. Studies and research papers and military testing since may've discovered bigger and more readable fonts would actually work better for people subjected to the often-deadly bevy of potential for mistakes in hard vacuum... but for that time and ignorance about deaths and maimings yet to come, man did it look good for the greatest scifi film ever made. --- Does reveal something else coincidental about how people saw their world in 1969, and my own views -- back then, didn't really need to post stuff 200-point, if you were paying attention at multiple points before standing next to the warning, in the first place. Know why boys used to have pocket knives in '70, but no one dare equip their kid with one today? Because we don't learn thru getting hurt anymore -- why one has to pay f***ing attention to what they're doing, and why they need to respect rules at all. It's the eff-ups that make these things necessary -- which only aid those already paying attention. But outside the gauntlet of strict vetting actual astronauts and other high-stress / high-performance technicians must pass (re: ordinary vehicle owners)... they also make those who couldn't be bothered to pay attention, crutch on an expectation they don't need to do their part, because the sign'll bail them out. Doesn't make them correct their shortcomings, just makes them even more complacent. Enough of a risk on-road -- so not looking forward to the same civilians in space, that barely make a green swiping right in their X5 4.5e whilst I get the red. Sitting next to these garbage people, even just as passengers torture enough, esp of late --- * tho am amused at Zoomers newly-entranced by Malaise throwbacks -- not at their appreciation for them, but fascinated a generation almost totally divorced from a world where they were common as socks-in-sandals, is 'rediscovering' their simple-to-work-on quirks, in a world where 32mpg and 8 airbags is taken for granted
