I’m good with my didgeridoo. I’m even half-decent with my harmonica, but I can’t certainly can’t jam as hard as Moto on the piano!!!

Recently I took a trip out to Banff. This is the majestic view… from a gas station.

Just what is a ‘Pocket Gopher’? Is that like the sex toy ‘Pocket Rocket’, or was this the first variant of putting a gerbil in your rear-end?

I think this solves the age-old question “Do Bears Shit In The Woods?” No, but they apparently shit in small glass cases.

So this may just be the most graphic-intensive update I’ve done so far, and for those of you still using dial-up or running old Windows 95 or even 98 computers, I am sorry but you will just have to endure.

Yesterday was St. Patricks day. That means that everyone who is Irish gains an ounce of respect, even for one night, and everyone who isn’t Irish, pretends to be, just out of pity’s sake. St. Patrick himself was a man who apparently drove out all of the snakes from Ireland which is why you won’t see snakes… so I’m told. I’ve never been to Ireland and don’t really have any reason to visit after what Mr. McKeague told me about his travels in Belfast. Yea, I don’t really want to be ducking pipe-bombs hidden in teddy bears from the I.R.A. Thanks, but no thanks.

What was the plan for the night? Well, we will go out, pick up a couple of the Japanese students from the univeristy and then hit up Lydia’s bar on Broadway. It wasn’t that bad of a time either! Green beer and cheer were flowing like water throughout the entire night and in every bar or establishment that would permit the two!

During our first beer of the evening (Strongbow for me). Apparently I looked like a green smurf.. Thanks Paulie.

And then the two decided to give their best drunk-face. I don’t think that’s a drunk-face, missy!

Not even four beers in and he’s already pouring beer on his shirt.

While Ben swears by Guinness (which in my humble opinion tastes like a sweaty insole), I preferred Rickarts White with a slice of orange for taste.

My thoughts on Guinness.

Of course, Ben always showing off his womanly figure

Paulie and his lady-friend (I forget her name too). This as much as she would do for a strand of beads… everyone else flashed me! Of course, everyone else that flashed me were men so I guess it doesn’t count.

The group of party-goers. Plus or minus a few.

This is why you should never allow Pozzy to be surrounded by drunk men. And just what the hell is that in Paul’s mouth???

One very serious Irishman…

Ben, attempting to be debonaire…

That’s one big man…

Christine made an appearance, and as we found out, it was a little cold in the room.

Hell, even KEN came out for the festivities.

How did he manage to spill beer on the BACK of his shirt???

Simon in the background. He reminds me of Keifer Sutherland for some reason.

And another good drunk face for the two of them!

Out of no-where, this guy comes up when we get to the hotel and rips my bag out of my hand, but he isn’t running… he’s slowly walking away. The guy just took the bag and brought it along to the front desk.

Inside is the giant waste of space, but an impressive giant waste of space. It’s an amazing hotel and very very nice. As I mention inside, it is reminiscent of the inside of a cruise ship!

After getting a good look of Space Mountain, we get onto the Disney Shuttle Bus which is entirely themed as Disney right down to the handle-bars. If you listen closely, you can hear Mickey Mouse speaking Japanese… it’s amazing, he’s so multilingual!!!

I was getting a little bored of the enduring some of the other strange foods and edible tidbits from around the country, so I figured I’d start attempting a new breed of food-stuffs… JAPANESE FOODSTUFFS! OK, so I’ve already put some on my website, so what? It’s time for something new, and something that I haven’t featured on here before!

Up first? Some form of Pocky in the form of a ‘mousse’ rather than the typical chocolate covering that goes along so often with most Pocky. Just what is Pocky? Think of this… long thin cookie sticks that are covered most of the way with a layer of sweet chocolate of various flavors.

The two flavors I have today? One is some sort of strawberry of as it says of the package “Mousse-Berry”.

While at first glance, it looks like a twig covered in some sort of fungus, the smell isn’t too bad. The taste is a little different though, certainly not what I thought of when I heard ‘berry’. The taste of it is similar to strawberry cookies you can buy at the store. How good is it? I’d eat it, not sure if I would buy it, but I would certainly munch on them!

Whats up next? “Goka” Pocky. What is Goka? Y’know what? I don’t know either! Let me look it up on Google…

(5 minutes later)

OK, so I found out what Goka is. Apparently Goka Pocky is a mixture of five different flavors that have been combined and then put onto the cookie sticks. The flavors are Ume (Japanese mountain plum), Chestnuts, Peaches, Apricods and Date’s. Yuck. Yes, Yuck is what I say. How does it taste? Hrm… it DOES taste like all of those things conbined. Yuck.

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Well after that last assault on my taste-buds, I figured it’s time to settle in with something that’s a little more safe. What can be safer than Hi-Chew!?!?

Hi-Chew are little chewy gummy things that come in various different flavors and they all are VERY VERY good. The grape tastes like grape! The apple actually tastes like green apple and the Japanese lemon/orange thingy actually tastes like Japanese lemon/orange (sorry, I don’t know what the name of that thing is). Hurray! It also comes in bigger packs as well, but they cost quite a bit out here in Canada. If you can ever run across it, buy it!

Here’s another version of Hi-Chew from Okinawa. It also happens to be that same orange-lemon-lime thing that I was telling you about. Would someone care to correct me and let me know what the name of that fruit is!??! PLEASE!??!!?

Other flavors here are Huscup (bottom left purple – also from Hokkaido), Passion fruit (left center), Yogurt (right center), cherry, grape, apple and Dekopon (top left – from Ehime of Shikoku Island) – a type of Orange. Thanks to Motoaki for translating!!!