J-actor mini-bio: Matsumoto Jun

Name: Matusmoto Jun Nicknames: MatsuJun, Junji Birthday: 8/30/83 Height: 5'6" (173cm) Weight: 127 lbs (58kg)

Where do I know him from? Gokusen, Kimi wa Petto, Hana Yori Dango, Bambino

Tell me some more! MatsuJun is also a member of the singing group Arashi. They debuted in 1999 and are still going strong.

What is your opinion of him? I've seen a couple of his shows with some variety in characters. He plays a bad boy very well. I'm hoping to catch Bambino at some point to see how he handles that role. On the singing side, he doesn't have the best voice in Arashi but he definitely has the charisma to make up for it.

Holiday Shopping

The holiday season is quickly approaching. Black Friday, the semi-official kickoff to the Christmas buying season, is only 2 1/2 weeks away. Personally, I try to do all my shopping online. I hate stores and crowds and the whole shopping experience. I feel online shopping is the best thing ever invented. And online shopping coupons make it even better. Kohl's is one of my favorite stores. I buy a lot of my daughter's clothes there so, most likely, there will be a lot of Christmas presents bought there. I know my mother likes shopping there too. Maybe I'll get her a gift card.

EBGames is another big store for our family. Since my husband plays a ton of video games, that's probably where I will end up buying his Christmas present. Though his always have to wait until after the holiday season because he buys so many games on his own. I never know what to get him! Boys always have to make shopping so difficult.

Game review: Hawaiian Explorer: Pearl Harbor

While the website was down late last week, I gave Hawaiian Explorer: Pearl Harbor a try. Yet another hidden object game, I was expecting something along the lines of Hidden Expedition: Titanic, which was an extremely enjoyable game. However, Hawaiian Explorer was nothing but a disappointment. The typical list of objects to find is often times confusing. When you find something from your list, you need to click on a specific spot on the object or you will lose time. This, of course, makes you think that isn't the object you are looking for when, in fact, it is and you just didn't click on the special spot. If you run out of time, you have to start the level over again with a slightly different list.

In between levels, there is a map piece puzzle. Basically, there is a ripped up map and you have to piece it back together. If you fail to do accomplish this within the time limit, you get tossed back to the previous hidden object level. It is frustrating to say the least.

Hawaiian Explorer: Pearl Harbor is probably the worst hidden object game I have ever played. While some of the graphics are pretty, the gameplay is atrocious.

Music review: Mini Moni - Rock n Roll Kenchoushozaichi

Artist: Mini Moni Members: Mika Todd (family name last), Kago Ai, Nozomi Tsuji, Takahashi Ai Album: Minimoni Songs 2 Release date: 2/11/04 (single was released 4/9/03) Video link: on Veoh

Lyrics: (Sorry, no translation) "Baby ROKKUNROORU kenchoushozaichi MINIMONI. oboechaina SHIRII~ZU! saa minasan harikitte ikimasu yo~!"

hokkaidou wa sapporo otsugi wa ( sapporo RAAMEN ) aomori akita ni iwate no morioka ( wankosoba wankosoba ) fukushima yamagata miyagi wa sendai ( sasakama sasakama )

ibaraki no mito ni tochigi wa utsunomiya ( shimotsukare shimotsukare) saitama saitama yamanashi wa koufu ( houtou houtou ) gunma no maebashi kanagawa no yokohama ( shuumai shuumai )

chiba ni toukyou nagano ni shizuoka niigata touyama ishikawa no kanazawa aichi wa nagoya gifu to fukui

"tokoro de anta kenchoushozaichi tte nanden non?" "AHO ya na anta,, kenchou no shozaichi ya ga na" "he~"

kenchoushozaichi...

mie wa tsu ni shiga wa ootsu ( funazushi funazushi ) wakayama kyoto ni nara ni oosaka ( takoyaki takoyaki ) hyougo wa kobe de okayama hiroshima ( nama GAKI nama GAKI )

shimane no matsue ni tottori yamaguchi ( fugusashi fugusashi ) kagawa no takamatsu ehime no matsuyama ( iyokan iyokan ) kagoshima kouchi ni fukuoka ooita ( shiroshita karei )

saga ni nagasaki kumamoto miyazaki soshite kagoshima okinawa no naha ROKKUNROORU kenchoushozaichi About the song: Ah. Mini Moni! Mini Moni was a subgroup of Morning Musume. The original idea for the group was that all the members had to be under 4'11" tall. (Hence the mini part.) However, Takahashi Ai was slightly taller than that when she joined the group after Yaguchi Mari's departure. Mini Moni was mostly aimed at younger children in the beginning, though the group took on a more mature sound after Mari left.

While I don't have a translation for this song, I can tell you that it is about the capitals of the Japanese prefectures. Mostly it's about the food each area is famous for. The video plays along showing the girls in a classroom setting studying for an exam.

You'll notice in the video that poor Mika is singled out as different from the rest of the group. She is the only American-born member of the group. As such, she is always dressed differently from the other girls and, for some strange reason, she is always given random English phrases to say. I always felt bad for her since the Japanese girls get to wear cute little outfits and Mika is always in the ugliest costumes.

Anyway, the song is cute and educational. What more could you ask for?

America's Most Smartest Model - episode 5

Now we're starting to get down to the models who are actually pretty intelligent. Those that aren't are standing out like a sore thumb. I really can't wait until all we are left with are the smart models. I'm sure the challenges will get more difficult and I want to see how they measure up. The Edge Challenge this week was dissecting fetal pigs. I know a lot of people did this in high school. (Though I only did frogs, we never did the pigs.) The models were left with one anatomy book to study, which VJ ran off with. Everyone else was left with their encyclopedias and a bit of tutoring from animal-sciences-major Angela. Amazingly, a lot of the models did really well on this. Yes, there was a lot of complaining about having to do it in the first place but once they got working, they were really able to identify most of the organs. I was definitely surprised.

Of course, there had to be some drama about it, right? Both Lisa and the high school teacher, Mr. Morrison, thought that she had a female pig as neither of them could find any testicles. After the challenge was over and Lisa was given an A, Angela decided to take a quick look at the pig to see if it really was female. Well, Angela found testicles and she was quite prepared to leave it at that. Andre, who got a C on his dissection, had a problem with the mistake and called the teacher back in to point out the mistake. Due to the discovery, Lisa's grade was lowered to a C. I'm not really sure why the teacher didn't look for the ovaries to double-check that it was a female pig but since it was his mistake, I don't think her grade should have been lowered.

Next up was a commercial challenge. The models had to pimp a body wash product while taking a very cold shower. Daniel won the Edge Challenge so he got to shower with warm water and he got the script beforehand. Everyone else only had 20 minutes to learn the script before jumping in. Andre took the initiative and practiced talking in a cold shower. It didn't appear that anyone else was trying to make the commercial shoot a little bit easier on themselves.

When the models got to the set, they were told that they had to pick a competitor to choose their best video from the shoot. As everyone was waiting for the shoot to start, Daniel was practicing his lines with Lisa. VJ was standing nearby listening in an attempt to learn the lines before he got the script. Yay! More controversy! All of the models felt that VJ was cheating. When they brought it up to Mary Alice after the shoot, she commended VJ for "paying attention to his surroundings." As such, he won the challenge and the immunity.

Lisa and American!Rachel were up on the block this time around. Lisa flubbed the dissection whereas Rachel completely screwed up her commercial. For the first time ever, the two models were given a "Smart Off," which was basically a pop quiz. Ben asked them some questions and whoever answered the most correctly got to stay. In another surprising twist, it was Rachel that answered the most questions correctly. Maybe she isn't as stupid as she pretends to be. (Though I'm not holding my breath on that one.) Sadly, it was Lisa that had to leave last night. I will miss her.

Next week? Geometry!

Game Review: Restaurant Empire

I turned on GameTap the other day, which is rather rare for me, and decided to give one of the simulation games a try. Restaurant Empire seemed to be the best choice at the time. You have just graduated culinary school and are about to take over your uncle's restaurant. From the furniture and design of the restaurant to customizing the food you serve your customers, the future of the family business is in your hands. There are some good and bad things about this game. I like that you get a lot of control with the culinary recipes. You can change up the minor ingredients to change how the food tastes but that also takes the chance that your customers will hate it. On the other hand, you don't seem to get a lot of control on the floor of the restaurant. I frequently had customers complaining that their food was taking too long. Meanwhile I had a ton of servers but I couldn't hire any more cooks. I'm assuming my guy can only cook so fast. There should be a better way to deal with customer complaints. I know I can't make all of them happy but the complaints that I can fix seem to be extremely difficult to fix on the first level.

I'll probably keep playing it for awhile to see if it gets any better. I passed the first few levels though I imagine the challenges will get harder in the later levels. Hopefully the game will help a bit more with the waitstaff and customer complaints.

Back Online

Some of you may have noticed that the website was down all day yesterday. My husband upgraded our server and there were extreme difficulties in getting our old blog software running again. As such, we have switched from the Serendipity blog software to WordPress. This means that I will be spending the next couple of days reworking the entire site. Thank you for your patience!

National Memory Screening Day

November 13, 1007 is National Memory Screening Day. My step-grandmother has Alzheimer's so she's recently had to be put into a full-time home for Alzheimer patients. The whole ordeal has caused a lot of problems for my aunt and my mother. (Mostly because my grandfather and his wife live in California while we all live in Pennsylvania.) That is why it is very important to get your memory tested. You can find a screening site in your area for you and your loved ones. It can be difficult to recognize the beginning signs of dementia and Alzheimer's. A good idea would be to read the Alzheimer's Foundation of America website for tips on the signs of the disease as well as tips on how to age well.

While it is important to find a cure for Alzheimer's, it is even more important to find proper care for those that suffer from the disease. Often times, patients require around-the-clock supervision so they don't wander away or injure themselves. Making a donation to the Alzheimer's Foundation of America is a good start to making sure that caregivers can give their patients the attention they need. It must be scary to not remember who you are or where you are. Let's all work together to take care of those that need our help.

NaBloPoMo For Me?

I'm sure a lot of you have heard of NaNoWriMo or the National Novel Writing Month. The goal is to write a 50,000 word novel in the 30 days of November. Since November tends to be a really busy month for me, I'm not able to even come close to accomplishing the task. However, I have come upon something that I can do in November. NaBloPoMo is the National Blog Posting Month. The goal is to write at least one blog post per month for November. Including Saturdays and Sundays. So I have taken the challenge. I hope that I can do this. One post per day isn't so bad, right?