Once My Looks Go, I've Got Nothing

Welcome back! When last we left off, Sheila and I had returned from the Keyaki Beer Festival and the frivolity thereof. With our first weekend concluded, we looked forward to Monday morning and the week ahead. But before I can get too much into that, I need to get something out of the way. We Need to Talk About Chu-Hi So, chu-hi. Or chūhai, or chuuhai, or however you want to write it. You may recall a passing reference to it in Part 1 of this very blog series, but I'd like to take a moment to describe what exactly it is. Chu-hi is big in Japan . It's a beverage of the adult variety, a refreshing concoction that comes in one of numerous light fruity flavors. Our favorites were lemon and grapefruit. Lest you be fooled by this seemingly innocuous description, chu-hi is potent . Deceptively so, in that it doesn't really even taste like it contains alcohol, but is actually packing a quite respectable 6% or so. And if that wasn't enough, there is a variety we ni

        A longtime friend of mine informed me last year that he would be getting married in Japan in May, 2015, which was at the time unfathomably far in the future. At first, attending didn't seem like a reasonable option: there was no way I could afford plane tickets, hotel rooms, etc. without racking up some unwanted debt, and I didn't even have a passport, having done all of my traveling to that point within the continental United States. Eventually, however, I decided to just go for it and make the trip happen, a decision which had nothing whatsoever to do with my girlfriend's desire to see Japan, no matter what she or I may tell you. So how did it go? I'm glad you asked! Otherwise I'd just stop writing here, and it would be a pretty crappy post. Bon Voyage      First off, let it be known that ANA Airlines is fantastic. Mind you, this is coming from someone who had never been on an international flight before, but still...keeping me from going out of m