Withoutsails Blog

Ahoy!

Man time goes by fast! I have been really amazed at how fast this year is going. It seems like yesterday I was on an airplane flying back to Japan for the New Years festivities and now the year is more than half over… So many resolutions, so little time!

Japan is in the midst of the rainy season but today was uncomfortably hot, sunny, and humid… with emphasis on the humid part. I’m looking forward to the fall already! I believe that we have a typhoon coming in this weekend as well so I’ll probably need to find some tame indoor activity to tide me over. Oh, and for those of you on the other side of the international date line, typhoons are the same thing as hurricanes.

Translation work continues to plug ever onward. I spent time in central Japan today at a well-known automobile manufacturer (think everything that is not Ford/GMC… lol). It’s kind of fun to be riding the wave of the cutting edge of technology.  I highly recommend it to all. At any rate, we are growing slowly, but steadily and will undergo our first move of offices (albeit upstairs) next in early August. I’m filled with mixed emotions about it of course.

As a business administrator, making a company profitable and keeping it there is a difficult task. Finding the right people is probably the deciding factor in the entire equation and for all those who are considering starting something up, make sure that you have the right people. It is a sad but true fact that people are generally lazy and prone to cut corners whenever they think they can get away with it. Finding people who are truly dedicated to excellence, both on a personal and company level, are few and far between. Most people just want to sit back and never take responsibility, simply letting others make the decisions for their lives. I affectionately refer to these people as “slugs” because they really serve no real purpose and recoil at the smallest bit of salt (difficulty). But I digress…

Japan is good. The diet is good. Volleyball is good. I’m excited about a trip to the US in mid-September (first vacation of the year).

Cheers!
Captain Adam

Yesterday I had my first scrimmage with the volleyball team I am playing with. It was a lot of fun and the other team was really good so that made for a good set. We played about 5 sets and were able to win twice. I played in a couple of the sets, but still am having some problems adjusting to the way they play over here. I’ve only been to 2 practices so that’s not surprising.

We had a “nomi-kai” after the game with the other team and it was a lot of fun. It’s always good to meet new people and make new friends. Next Saturday we are having another scrimmage and the same team is going to be there as well.

Other than that, things are pretty tame here in the land of the rising sun. Everyone is talking about the US presidential elections. With the primaries wrapping up, the candidates should step their campaigning up a notch. That’s all fine with me, as long as they don’t drive around with megaphones attached to their vans, blasting their slogans and rhetoric (that’s how it works in Japan).

Cheers,
Captain Adam

So, in Japan, May 5 is a holiday known as “Children’s Day”. Traditionally, there were 2 children days, one on March 3 for the girls and one on May 5 for the boys. Thus, the armor on good ‘ol Sanders. It’s amazing what you can do with some cardboard and a little bit of spray paint!

Well this week has been nice. Monday and Tuesday were holidays which means that we had a nice long 4-day weekend. Well, not really… I worked all day on Sunday and the morning hours of Monday so it really wasn’t much better than a regular weekend. I do dread the office the day after this type of holiday though. I just know that there is a ton of work to do to get “caught up” (though I don’t remember falling behind).

So, with that looming on the horizon, here I am at 12:28 AM writing a blog entry. I can’t sleep… someone send me some NyQuil!

I do have a funny picture of Colonel Sanders all decked out in traditional Japanese armor, so look forward to that.

Captain Adam

Well the exercise is going well. I’m swimming every day, surprisingly well. I do about 2000 meters per day in about 40 minutes which is pretty good I think. I did a 100m sprint the other day and finished in 1:05 which made me happy. Not quite as fast as I was in high school, but what can you do.

The scale says I dropped another .3 kg which is nice. Still got 8 more to loose before I reach my intermediate goal, but things are going well.

Happy birthday to Justin! Deb, I need birthday ideas for you.

Cheers,
Captain Adam

Last weekend I attended the IJET-19 translation conference held in sunny Okinawa, Japan.

It was an amazing site and there were translators there from all over the world. With all those overstressed translators, you can imagine just how freely the alcohol flowed (don’t worry, I practiced self-control)!

At any rate, I’m looking forward to making another trip to Okinawa when I can take some time to relax and just vacation.

Cheers,
Captain Adam