today, christmas shopping. tomorrow, doom.

Tomorrow is the Japanese Language Proficiency Test. I'm taking Level 2, the 2nd hardest level, again this year. I know my Japanese has improved in the past year, I just don't think it's improved enough (no one's fault but my own, bah). I expect failure or a verrrry close pass (giri giri, we would say), so one hand will have fingers-crossed while the other fills in bubbles.

I did a little Christmas shopping today, but it was no big deal because there's no Thanksgiving here and therefore there's no concentrated Black Friday madness. Instead, there's just a gradual increase in shopper-density all the way up through Christmas and New Years...and then WHA-BAM!! It's January 2nd, the first shopping day of the new year, and one of the two MAJOR sale periods in Japan has begun. Sales are pretty rare other than the "first sale of the year" (初売り: hatsu-uri) and a big summer-long sale, so people go semi-annually nutso. You should see what you can get in the "lucky mystery bags" (福袋: fuku-bukuro) they offer only at these times...e.g., $300 worth of winter outerwear for $100. Yes, I am a little excited to come back to Japan after vacation and shop at any of the three stores I usually shop at here.

Ooh, I also played an awesome round of the arcade shooter Silent Hill today. I shoot things good. I shoot things dead. I get really fucking AMPED doing it.

Zombie-hunting aside, today is also the last day of NaBloPoMo! It's been a really amazing run. I know the posts haven't always been riveting, but I'm just surprised I could come up with something, anything to say each day. I wanna try to keep this up, but I'll be honest -- it'll be nice to have the pressure off. There were definitely nights where, after realizing I hadn't posted by 11:45 and then panicking, I would ask myself, why do I even CARE? Sometimes it seemed like such a fucking drag, but in the end it felt really good to git'er done. I hope y'all have enjoyed this little blogging streak of mine.

Good luck to the other test-takers; just don't forget that THEY ARE ALWAYS TRYING TO TRICK YOU (the bastards)!