Greetings from J-List April 15, 2000

Greetings from Japan, home of the original canned coffee (UCC Coffee, first canned in 1969).

Recently, the famous landmark Studio Alta, a department store in the heart of Shinjuku and the most famous "building TV" in Japan, was sold. Mitsukoshi Department Stores, who had operated the property in the red for years, got $200 million for it, which is lot for a single building, but not all that much when you consider that, during the bubble period, the value of all the land in Tokyo exceeded the value of the entire United States. I still remember with fondness then first time I trekked into Shinjuku

This year is my wife's turn to be one of the official mother representatives at our kids' preschool. Each year, two mothers from each class are, ah, pressed into service to help out with the various events (the two parent/child sports events, the annual year-end show, and so on). Being busy with J-List, my wife didn't want to take volunteer, but it's one of those Japanese "in-group" thinks -- membership in a certain social group brings with it certain responsibilities which must be met to avoid disturbing the balance of the entire group. The driving force behind this is "hito no me" (lit. "the eyes of others"): sure, she would never be forced into volunteering for the extra responsibility, but the fear of the constant gaze of the other mothers made her give in. The concept of "hito no me" and being concerned with how you appear in the eyes of others is one of the major engines driving Japanese social interaction.

We've got a bang-up update for you this weekend. New items include:

• Great new magazines, including the new Urecco and Gal's Dee issues (both lovely)
  
• Some nice one-shot items on the photobooks page, including old issues of Nowon
  
• Speed's excellent "Legend of Speed" photobook (with special "memorial card" so you can be a card-carrying Speed fan)
  
• More copies of hot photobooks that had sold out, including Sendo Emi's "Tomadoi, Yatsu Shinoby's Kyu Kyu Pin!" and Hitomi Ryo's excellent "Virginity"
  
• For the many Miura Aika fans out there, we've got more copies of Last Song and her popular MPEG King issue
  
• For our Japanese snack fans, we've added the entire line of Bulgaria Yogart soft-chews (in plain, strawberry, blueberry and "raichi" (that exotic fruit from Thailand -- er, what is this called in English?)
  
• On the anime & toys page, a truly unique set of Star Wars items: small soft vinyl figures in the anime "super deformed" style, which speak different lines from the movie when you place them on your hand
  
• Finally, we've got DVDs and more DVDs, including a wonderful "Cosplay Museum for the 21st century and a the complete "history DVD" of Hidaka Saya, as well as two wonderful idol items: the lovely Mitsuya Yoko's "Mai-go" DVD and "Super Nice Body's" featuring three of Japan's most famous idols
  

I've got another wedding to go to on Sunday, for a former student of mine. And another speech to give in Japanese! Well, wish me luck -- see you on the web.

Greetings from J-List April 13, 2000

Hello again from Japan, that wacky place where "yes, that's so" always means "no."

Well, the Season of the Sakura has come to Japan -- all throughout the country, millions of cherry blossoms are exploding in wonderful shades of pink and white. What better excuse to take a few hours off work, break out the portable gas range and have chicken fajitas and yakiniku (Korean barbecue) under the falling sakura petals? This custom is called hanami in Japan, and we're big fans of it here at J-List. See our "sakura special report" at http://www.myjapan.net/peter/sakura2000.html . You can see all of us -- even Kaori drinking beer! -- as well as Jose, the newest addition to the J-List team.

One of the problems with living in a foreign country where English isn't spoken is maintaining one's native language. I don't actually forget English, of course, but there are the occasional difficult word that, when I go to access in my brain, I find isn't available. I mean, there isn't much use for words like gynalogical or irreplaceable when you live in Japan and talk with Japanese who have learned ESL (that's English as a second language, in English teacher-speak).

Tonight's update is a very good one indeed. We've got:

• New magazines, and more magazines, including the excellent new Birei, Men's Master (great for Minori Aoi fans) and more
  
• All-new photobooks, including the mysterious Nishio Etsuko's very artful and erotic photobook
  More copies of some of our most popular items, including Kanazawa Bunko's 4th Photobook, Wakana Sena's "Dahlia, Ozawa Madoka's Fairy Sketch, and Horiuchi Nana's popular book
  
• Because we sold out in less than a day, we've got more stock of the love Crystal Card AV collectible cards
  
• For our yaoi fans, two very nice yaoi anthology manga
  
• Many great new special-order videos, including items by Aoi Minori's Loving Raw, Honjoh Sayuri's excellent Mejiri, Fujitani Shiori's comeback video, and a super compilation video featuring performances by *8* lovely gals, including the incredibly rare Ariga Miho (see special order videos page 1)
  
• On our anime & toys page, we've got T-Dog 2000, a wonderful robotic toy dog that moves around your room, avoiding obstacles and walls, as well as fresh stock of the hard-to-find Princess Mononoke & Moro figure
  
• Fresh JPOP CDs!
  

We're also happy to announce that we've gotten our first stock of the excellent and much-requested Star Wars Episode 1 on Laserdisc. The LD release of the film is an extremely high-quality one, in CLV with wonderful high-quality video and full THX sound. The movie is the wide edition, in English, with Japanese subtitles, and they're sealed in plastic bags for collectors. The run will likely be short for this product, so let us know quickly if you want us to get you one. (They're going for around $150 on eBay as I write this.) Each one comes with a special pack of Japanese postcards, too.

Greetings from J-List April 11, 2000

Greetings from Japan, where velcro goes by the name of "magic tape."

For some reason, there are several English phrases that have burned themselves into the consciousness of the Japanese. When Dr. Clarke left Sapporo, where he helped establish what would become Sapporo University, he said left the words "Boys, be ambitious, which has endured ever since (making him far more famous than he deserved to be). When idol singer Yamaguchi Momoe retired from singing, she sang a tear-filled song that contained the English words Thank you for your kindness, thank you for your tenderness." All Japanese seem to know these little snippets.

Well, Japan's child seat law kicked in April (one thing about Japan, everything starts in April). Long have foreigners living in Japan railed against Japan for not enacting such a law. It's a good thing, to be sure, but they've gotten a little overzealous -- rather than, say, California's limit of "4 years, or 40 pounds, all children under the age of six are required to ride in carseats at all times. It's a bit of an inconvenience for my son, who turned five and hasn't used his carseat in a year. But it's progress, anyway.

We're a day later than usual with today's update, so we're adding some extra good items, including:

• Great new regular magazines, including the new Bejean, the Penthouse Japan Special that was waylaid by database elves during our last update, and a new item -- Sperma Pherome Musume (love those titles) -- see magazine page 1 for the new items
  
• On magazine page 2, a special treat -- a slew of great one shot" older magazines, some featuring some very rare and hard-to-find AV actresses
  
• On our high-end S&M photobook page, we've added several wonderful new "gouka-bon" photobooks, including the new Slave Mania and two different all-color photobooks for fans of beautiful "over 30" ladies
  
• For our DVD fans, we've got four great new DVDs in the "Gallery" series posted, by Yoshino Sally, Shiraishi Kotoko, Komuro Yuri and the lovely Mita Yuho (which, we've all decided, is supposed to mean "I saw a UFO" in Japanese)
  
• The new DVD & Video CD Soft Catalog, with nearly 2 hours of footage on two MPEG discs
  On the Video pages, the excellent Love Zamen 2 video from Deep's is posted (if you don't know what it is, don't see special order video page 1)
  
• Finally, for fans of the CG idol Terai Yuki, some special puzzle items (and yes, they are covered by the "buy any 2 items, get 20% off" anime & puzzle sale we're having now).
  

We're glad to see the positive reaction to the excellent costumes we added to the site last weekend. Carrying Japanese sailor uniforms, race queen/campaign girl outfits and other items has been a long dream for all of us, and we're glad we were able to find such cool products to make available. We know that many of the items aren't cheap -- we chose Costume World Japan because of a good range of costume sizes coupled with durability, and because they wanted to see their products sell to cosplay fans outside of Japan -- but we're sure the high quality will win you over.

Greetings from J-List April 7, 2000

Greetings from Japan, where people really do boy while they talk on the telephone (I catch myself doing it once a day).

The Japanese language has a great many kotowaza or old proverbs, recounting the wisdom of past generations. There are kotowaza dictionaries and "one a day" calendars that offer a different old proverb daily, and studying these is fun for me, because Japanese are surprised when you know something this archaic. One of my favorite kotowaza is "ningen banji saiou-ga-uma" which means "All things are like Saiou's horse." This refers to an old story about a man named Saiou whose horse broke his leg -- making everyone say how unfortunate he was. Because he had no horse, though, he didn't have to go off to battle to be killed, so this was a good thing. The moral of the story is, when something good or bad happens, no one can say for sure if it is truly a good or bad thing in the end.

I've been enjoying my AirPort, the wireless networking system from Apple and Lucent Technologies. I'd long wanted to network the J-List office is about 500 meters and our house (the liquor store), but until now, the technology hasn't been available. Now I can do email and surf on my Powerbook from my living room, while enjoying my current favorite beer, Asahi Super Malt, with those delicious "persimmon seed" spicy rice crackers. Technology is so wonderful -- where will we all be in five years?

Tonight's update is a very special one, because we're able to announce our latest great addition to J-List -- unique Japanese anime & sexy costumes! The newly rechristened T-Shirts & Costumes page now features high-quality costumes, including the often-requested high school "sailor suit" uniforms, a super-sexy Race Queen vinyl uniform (modeled after Suzuki Fumika's own!), a classic Chun Li "China dress, a stern nurse, and one of the coolest, a slim and sexy Avex girl" costume. These are high-quality machine-sewn items made by Costume World Japan, a fine maker of excellent costumes, that will bring you years of enjoyment and fun. Since Japanese sizes can be quite different from those outside of Japan, we've posted the recommended measurements (bust, waist

(Yes, that is Kaori, by the way, modeling these lovely costumes for us and on the new costumes page. Isn't she lovely?)

We've got lots of other cool items, including:

• A hot new photobook by the lovely Kanazawa Bunko, on the photobooks page
  
• A great treat -- fresh stock of the incredibly popular Crystal Card nude AV cards (1999 vol. 2)
  
• Lower prices on Video CDs, gouka-bon books, and all of our Pokemon & Digimon cards and stickers
  
• Fresh stock of many popular items, including the Princess Mononoke soft vinyl figures, the popular Mini-Suka Police keychains, and more!
  

Announcing the April Anime Toys & Puzzle Sale! To help keep our stock room from being overrun, we're announcing a big sale! Buy two or more puzzle or anime toy items (including anime figures, models, phone straps, dolls, clocks, and so on) on the Anime & Toys or the Cards & Puzzles pages, and get 20% off the total for those items! It's a great excuse to pick up that cool Gatchaman or Captain Harlock puzzle, that very special Hello Kitty clock, or that wonderful "Dancing Baby" phone strap for the "Ally" fan in your office... The sale will run until the end of April

Greetings from J-List April 5, 2000

Happy Wednesday from Japan, where foreigners are somehow compelled to refer to the country of George Washington as "the States" and by no other name.

Japanese society and relationships can be a pretty ordered business sometimes, determined by "in groups" and the concept of "uchi" (inside my group) and "soto" (outside the group). In Japan, for example, most people have a group of friends throughout elementary and junior high school, but separate when it comes time to go to high school -- high school isn't part of the compulsory education in Japan, and people usually go to a school that fits their scholastic level or goals rather the one nearest their house. One result of this is that an adult will often have one group of "junior high school friends" and another group of "high school friends, without any crossing over between the two groups. When one group of friends goes, say, for karaoke, they are relaxed and casual, and this is reflected in their language -- the most informal language is used among friends. However, if an unrelated group were to be mixed -- say, a high school friend were to mix in with the group of junior high school friends -- the result can be barriers of politeness that are damned hard for a Westerner to grasp. One thing you learn early on when living in Japan is, don't mix your groups: if you've got friends from two different areas of your life, don't invite them to a social event without knowing the potential risks.

For tonight's update, we've got some really great stuff:

• For magazine fans, we've got a bunch of new magazines posted, including the new issues of Video Boy, Best Video, Nippon Mini-Suka Club, and more
  
• Also on magazine page 1, a treat -- not one, but two great issues of Penthouse Japan, the wonderful Japanese-format erotic magazine featuring all Japanese models
  
• Photobooks, including Ouchi Arisa and Iikubo May, on photobooks page 1
  
• For manga fans, a fresh posting of all-new erotic wide" manga, with some nice new postings
  
• For the Yamato fan in you, we've got two new Yamato die-cast ships, which may be the last -- if rumors we've heard of Mimko going out of business are true
  
• Also on the Anime & Toys page, more of the popular Sentimental Grafitti figures available for order, as well as high-quality metal & plastic Gundam toys
  
• A long-awaited update to the Special Order video pages, where you can pre-order excellent videos by Kanazawa Bunko, Yoshikawa Minami, and many more
  
• For fans of Soft on Demand's truly unique "Indies" style of erotic entertainment, we've got great new titles, including Nagase Lum's hot Cosplay Doll, a new "shiofuki" video, and the classic 1996 Masterpiece of SOD, featuring the nude olympics, performances by several artists who have retired, and one of our favorites -- the "arial sex" (a couple having sex while suspended in mid-hair by cranes, and filmed by a helocopter)
  
• Finally, on our fun Japanese snacks page, we've added fresh stock of the super tart "hard gummi" candy, Lemon Shigekix, as well as a great new flavor -- Super Cola!
  

Well, Chiharu and Kazuki are back from their stay in the States. (See? I did it again.) As is our custom when someone returns home, our Japanese house has been transformed into a shrine celebrating American gastric values -- everything from Pop Tarts to Lucky Charms to tortillas those delicious onion bagels. Well, time to go home and have some Hamburger Helper!

Greetings from J-List April 3, 2000

Hello from Japan, now with 50% more volcanic eruptions than before!

The big news in Japan right now is the sudden hospitalization of Prime Minister Obuchi, who suffered a stroke and has slipped into a coma Monday. Mr. Obuchi has had a rough couple of years as he tried to move the country through rough economic and political waters. Hailing from Gunma Prefecture, not too far from where we are, he's been a good example of Japanese-style leadership -- rather a strong leader, he's been a consensus-builder, something more important to Japan than Clinton-esque Presidential political figures. It's a rough time to lose the head of government, especially with the ongoing eruption of Mt. Usu in Hokkaido.

For Americans, the parliamentary form of government used by Japan (which is modeled after the UK, I believe) can be downright confusing -- kind of like a soccer fan trying to understand the rules of American football. When I was on the plane to come to Japan back in 1992, the Prime Minister had just dissolved the Diet for some reason or another. I was concerned -- if Clinton suddenly dissolved the Congress, there'd be civil war, tanks in the streets of Washington, machine-gun fire. Over the years, I've learned more about the Japanese political process, and even helped out on one political campaign (having a white boy among your staff really turns voters' heads). Despite its differences from the American system, I do like the "grass roots" feel of democracy

For tonight's update, we've got:

• First, a slew of new in-stock videos, on the in-stock videos page, including Deep Kiss, Miura Aika, Kano Mizuho, and the cat-like Hirosue Nao
  
• For fans of the excellent Soft on Demand videos, we've got three new "zamen" (sperm-centric/bukkake) video offerings (see in-stock and special order video pages)
  
• Several all-new gouka-bon books on the S&M/Fetish photobook page
  
• New DVDs from the excellent new "Gallery" collection, including titles by Wakana Sena, Misaki Mao and Hitomi Ryo -- with multi-angle viewing and a 'secret key' hidden features on the disc
  
• Lower prices on tons of manga, magazines and videos
  
• Finally, for the fun-loving, funny Japanese hachimaki headbands, with slogans like "Looking for a girlfriend" "I'm 'H'" and more! (see them on the Japanese T-shirt page)
  

Incidentally, the reference to "not by the hair of my chinny chin-chin" generated a lot of mail, so I thought I'd explain it: in Japanese, chin chin is a child's word for penis, similar to "chinpoko." Therefore the meaning is quite different from the original ^_^

Greetings from J-List April 1, 2000

Greetings from Japan, where red is the opposite of white.

I had great fun at my friend's wedding in Iwate Prefecture. It wasn't the snowy wasteland I was expecting, although it was cold. Fortunately for me, Hanamaki is a famous onsen (hot springs) town, so I got to enjoy the best onsen in Japan (according to the hotel employee). Getting naked in front of other men has never been so good... (See pictures of the happy couple at http://www.myjapan.net/peter/wedding3.html.)

The Tohoku area (the northern part of the main Japanese island of Honshu) is a great area, and I did some hitchhiking when in my days as a single gaijin. What it lacks in castles and battlegrounds and shrines it makes up in charm. Known for enka, the eerily beautiful music of rural Japan, it's interesting because all the place names are very un-Japanese, being derived from original Ainu names. One place I enjoyed going to in the past was Aizu-Wakamatsu, the scene of one of the last battles of the conflict between the feudal samurai and the pro-reform Restorationists, who were trying to modernize Japan. Rather than submit to becoming "modernized, the last remaining group of samurai chose to commit seppuku. It's a grim but fascinating place to visit.

For tonight's update, we have some great new items:

• Famed photographer Akira Gomi's Last Loose Socks" -- a great multimedia documentary of the lives and loves of Japan's high school girls (on the photobook and CD ROM pages), for Mac and Windows
  
• For photobook fans, we've got a bunch of popular photobooks, including Sendo Emi's "Tomadoi", the Nama-Ashi, and an item that is destined to sell out quickly, three copies of Fubuki Akira's "Impressive"
  
• A lovely new photobook by the sweet and charming Uehara Rinka, Minet
  
• More copies of the popular CG artbooks, Find Love 2 and Renkin Jutsu no Musume, on the anime page
  
• For Pokemon fans, we're closing out our inventory of delicious Pokemon cookies and choco snacks, as well as those cool Hello Kitty phone strap & heart-shaped carmel treat sets
  
• Finally, for our loyal hentai manga fans, we're happy to announce that Paradise Lost, the excellent series of Evangelion hentai dojinshi anthologies, is *back in print* and available on our site now!
  

We're moving right along with the two upcoming Milky House hentai games, Legend of Fairies and Fairy Nights, and expect them to ship by May 1. You can pre-order them from J-List and get the games sent to you as soon as they're released, and get free shipping to boot. See them on Hentai Games page 2, or the CD ROM page.

Greetings from J-List March 31, 2000

Hello again from Japan, where the Three Little Pigs' chant "not by the hair of my chinny-chin-chin" has a different meaning entirely.

The end of March is upon us, and with it, the break-up of the four-girl band Speed. They've been an incredible force in the pop world in the last three years, and Japan is currently awash with little "mini-Speeds, second-rate pop singing/dancing groups that aspire to take Speed's vacant #1 slot in the music world. It won't really be vacant, of course, since Takako, Hiroko, Eriko and Hitoe all plan to pursue solo careers. (If you like Hiro, see her cute by ditzy shampoo commercial on http://www.cm-watch.com).

My son Kazuki is tickled that last year's five-team show, Go Go Five, is living on as part of the footage of Power Rangers Lightspeed Rescue. While many elements of the American version are the same -- the irrefutable coolness to a four-year-old boy of a train that flies and transforms into a robot -- I of course noted the differences so I could report them to all of you. For one thing, the original Go Go Five is a family -- four brothers and their little sister, Matsuri-chan, and contain themes like families always stick up for each other" or "even if brothers have a falling out, they're family, so they always make up in the end." The American show choose totally unrelated characters to interact with each other, and of course the need to reflect all the mosaic groups that make up the U.S. -- token black, token Asian, token female who's smarter than all the men and knows UNIX -- is reflected in the end product. Kazuki and I both agree that Red's "Ladder Punch" (extending ladders that "punch" out of the fire engine mech) are totally stupid

In tonight's update, we've got some nice new items:

• A nice magazine & dual-Video CD item, with a focus on the lovely Miura Aika (although the clips on the VCDs seem to be mostly Indies)
  Great photobooks, including new items (Yamauchi Mihoko's Brilliant and Asakura Megumi's "M") as well as back-in-stock items that had sold out before
  
• On the gouka-bon book, some extremely wonderful high-end S&M and fetish books (most of which are single issues and will sell out quickly, so hurry if you're interested in these)
  
• New manga on the hentai manga page, along with more copies of some old favorites (December's Girl and others)
  
• Twenty or so new dojinshi on the dojinshi page, including some of the very lovely Nozui Magic volumes
  
• New puzzles -- a great tribute to the Toei Godzilla movies, and a large-size brilliant Red Fuji with Flying Cranes, on the puzzle page
  
• One of the baddest mechs ever to come out of Gainax -- Gunbuster, on the Anime & Toys page
  
• The lovely swimsuit idol Ms. Shaku Yumiko, in her very popular idol video, on the idol video page
  
• New stock of Himo-Q, one of my favorite Japanese snacks (think long gummi string)
  
• Close-out prices on all our Pokemon stickers -- see the cool metallic and embossed stickers on the cards & puzzles page.
  

I've got an adventure tomorrow -- I'm off to a tiny town in rural Iwate Prefecture, near the top of Japan, for a wedding. Northern Japan is still a frozen wasteland in March, or at least it seems that way to my San Diegan-mind set. Until I get back, see you on the web!

Greetings from J-List March 28, 2000

Hello again from Japan, home of the American Dog (someone must have thought a Corn Dog would sell better with this name).

Grand Master Takatoriki has won the latest sumo tournament, taking the sumo world utterly by surprise. A less well-known rikishi, he's been wrestling for 18 years, and has never won a tournament in his life. In a TV interview, he broke the normal rules sumo wrestlers have against showing emotion openly by crying tears of joy over winning. In other sumo news, Wakanohana, one of the most famous of all the current crop of wrestlers, announced his retirement due to poor emotional and physical health. Wakanohana and his younger brother, Takanohana, are well known and popular in the sumo world. Both achieved the rank of Grand Master (Yokozuna)

My wife and son are in the U.S., enjoying a much-deserved dose of American culture -- everything they can't get here in rural Japan, from Starbucks to Taco Bell to good old American shopping malls. We all like living in Japan of course, but there's nothing like going to California and speeding down the wide, straight freeways, eating Hawaiian-style shave ice on the beach in Mission Bay... Since we both can't leave J-List along, we take turns, taking one kid at a time to make sure they get enough exposure to their "other" country, America. With my wife gone, I'm free to putter around (only married men know the fun of "puttering around")

Tonight's update features some good new items, including:

• A fistful of new magazines, including several excellent rare and "one shot" items, on all magazine pages (but most of the new single-issues are on page 2)
  
• The new "Aishite ageru" (I'll Love You), a nice "wet"-themed magazine from Million Publishing
  
• Several lovely new photobooks, including some excellent leg, skirt and high-heel shoe fetish items
  
• And on the gouka-bon page, several nice new S&M-themed all-color photobooks
  
• For dojinshi fan types, more copies of the popular "Effecter" and "Limit Break" dojinshi
  
• New hentai "wide" manga on the manga pages, and lower prices for all our stock of the excellent Colorful Moon & Electric Fighting Daughters manga series
  
• New adult videos in-stock, including some rare one-shot videos (see pages 1 and 4 for the new items)
  
• For our idol video fans, we've got a rare Kahala Tomomi gravure video, and a lovely new Race Queen offering from Pony Canyon (on the idol page)
  
• New JPOP "maxi-singles" (long-playing singles with several tracks), including new CDs by Suzuki Ami, Hide, and more
  
• Finally, for that young Pokemon fan with a birthday coming up, some new Pikachu children's puzzles (on the cards & puzzles page)
  

Hope you're having a good start of your week -- see you on the web!

Greetings from J-List March 25, 2000

Hello again from Japan, where our new favorite beverage is Calpis & Aloe (really! it's good!).

We took the kids to see Toy Story II on Sunday -- it was great fun. Japanese movies for kids come in subtitled and dubbed versions, for the obvious reason that kids can't read Japanese subtitles yet. My kids, who are bilingual, we wondering why there were only adults in the theater. Movie theaters are one area that's quite unique in Japan. After paying $18 per adult (or $10 per child) to enter the theater, you're shown some converted TV commercials (including the inevitable tobacco CM), before the movie starts. Many movie older theaters have their last showing at 6:00 pm, since Japanese apparently don't go to movies late at night that often. The new theater in Isesaki (which is owned by Sony) is very modern: the last showing is 10 pm.

Speaking of movies, Miyazaki Hayao's masterpiece Princess Mononoke is "coming home" to Japan -- shown in English with Japanese subtitles. Always happy to have one of their own recognized so highly outside of Japan, the trailer for the film was filled with footage of Miyazaki-sensei being cheered by fans in New York City. I'm looking forward to see Disney's adaptation of one of Miyazaki's best films -- especially to Scully as Moro the Wolf. (Incidentally, we do have some really nice Mononoke puzzles, please check them out!)

Tonight's update is a nice one, with lots of cool new items, including:

• The latest Urecco, which features Ayukawa Ami's "Fresh Nude" and Sakura Nana's "Special Shoot"
  
• A host of new photobook items, including Sendo Emi's lovely high school graduation photobook, excellent new photobooks for leg/skirt fetish fans, and more
  
• Fresh stock of two of J-List's best-selling items, Kusanagi Jun's "Last Nude Memorial" and Miura Aika's super 1999 photobook
  
• For fans of our $5 magazine sale, many excellent "back from the dead" issues of Urecco that were formerly sold out (see magazine page 3)
  
• Other excellent back--in-stock magazine and photobook items, including more copies of Photo Album 2, Cho Mach, Wonderful and Okay!!
  
• For fans of Japan's anime voice actresses or seiyu, we've added Voice Animage to our "reserve subscriptions" page -- get it every month!
  
• On the high-end bondage photobooks page, more copies of Sokubaku Press and more
  
• More of our cool Urecco back issues, for only $5 (see Magazine page 3)
  
• More copies of the popular funny Japanese shirt, Seiryoku Zetsurin ("matchless sexual power")
  
• For our loyal JPOP fans, a dozen new JPOP CD singles for you
  
• Finally, a great new update to our Japanese snacks page, including some uniquely Japanese items, including Milky Candy, Coffee Culture Candy, the classical Japanese delicious "Kuro-Ame, and Kaori's childhood favorite, Strawberry Milk Candy -- give them a try!
  

Remember, J-List offers convenient 6- or 12-month subscriptions to some of our best-selling magazines, including Urecco, Bejean, Gal's Dee, Gokuh, Video Boy, Best Video, and Dela Beppin. Why not get a subscription and have the latest issues sent to you before they're posted to the site, and get free issues, to boot?

Greetings from J-List March 24, 2000

Greetings from Japan, on this lovely Friday.

The latest hair fashion in Japan is a soft blonde that's very pleasing to the eye, far better than the outrageous yellows that Japanese girls have chosen in the past. Walking around Shibuya or Shinjuku, I see many girls who have colored their hair this soft, realistic blonde "chapatsu" color, and I like it. It looks perhaps best on Mochida Kaori, the lead singer of Every Little Thing (not to be confused with Mochida Kaoru, the AV actress with the 100+ cm bust. See a picture of Kaori-chan and her hair style at http://www4.big.or.jp/~tatooine/Pictures/ELT/eltphoto/kaori239.jpg.

Kaori's father is having a good week. Like many middle-aged Japanese men, golf is his primary love in life, and he made a hole-in-one while playing golf last weekend. Because he pays into a "hole-in-one fund" for golf enthusiasts, this entitles him to a whopping $5000. He's supposed to spend the money on a "congratulations party, but Kaori said he's going to find a way around that by using some judicious loopholes. In a land where it's difficult to show passion for your hobbies, golf is the king. (Kaori recently dropped her Strawberry iMac, breaking it internally, and she's setting her sights on some of her father's money to fix her lovely computer.)

This weekend's update is a nice one, with quite a few new items going onto the site, including:

Many new magazines, including one shots" and previous sold magazines -- see them on magazine page 2 and 3

• For fans of older Japanese adult magazines, we've got some sets of Orange Tsushin, in packs of 5 magazines, featuring many older and out of print actresses, like Misato Mari, Yuki Hitomi, and Matsuzaka Kimiko -- see page 2 for these
  
• For fans of J-List's unique erotic manga, we've got several new items on the hentai manga page
  
• For anyone who loves the unique themes in yaoi comics, we've posted new issues to that page, too
  
• We've got more photobooks, including new issues of Ozawa Madoka's Fairy on the Rough SKetch and Horiuchi Nana's Tickle
  o For gouka-bon fans, we've got a a bunch of new S&M, bondage and other unique books, including books featuring older women and various fetish offerings
  
• For Pokemon fans, we've got the new Gummi Pikachu series in -- see the Japanese snacks page
  
• Because we love cool Japanese puzzles, damn it, we've added more really cool items -- including idol puzzles of Hirosue Ryoko and new anime puzzles of Matsumoto Leiji's excellent Queen Emeraldas and Rayearth.
  

Remember that J-List features a large selection of great Japanese DVD AV titles without country lockout codes, so you can view them in any country, on any DVD player. Playing times are long and super features like multi-angle are supported on many discs. Also, several of our DVDs come subtitled in English, Chinese and even Korean. Check out the DVD page now.

Greetings from J-List March 22, 2000

Hello again from Japan, where our new favorite beverage is Calpis & Aloe (really! it's good!).

We took the kids to see Toy Story II on Sunday -- it was great fun. Japanese movies for kids come in subtitled and dubbed versions, for the obvious reason that kids can't read Japanese subtitles yet. My kids, who are bilingual, we wondering why there were only adults in the theater. Movie theaters are one area that's quite unique in Japan. After paying $18 per adult (or $10 per child) to enter the theater, you're shown some converted TV commercials (including the inevitable tobacco CM), before the movie starts. Many movie older theaters have their last showing at 6:00 pm, since Japanese apparently don't go to movies late at night that often. The new theater in Isesaki (which is owned by Sony) is very modern: the last showing is 10 pm.

Speaking of movies, Miyazaki Hayao's masterpiece Princess Mononoke is "coming home" to Japan -- shown in English with Japanese subtitles. Always happy to have one of their own recognized so highly outside of Japan, the trailer for the film was filled with footage of Miyazaki-sensei being cheered by fans in New York City. I'm looking forward to see Disney's adaptation of one of Miyazaki's best films. (Incidentally, we do have some really nice Mononoke puzzles, please check them out!)

Tonight's update is a nice one, with lots of cool new items, including:

• The latest Urecco, which features Ayukawa Ami's "Fresh Nude" and Sakura Nana's "Special Shoot"
  
• A host of new photobook items, including Sendo Emi's lovely high school graduation photobook, excellent new photobooks for leg/skirt fetish fans, and more
  
• Fresh stock of two of J-List's best-selling items, Kusanagi Jun's "Last Nude Memorial" and Miura Aika's super 1999 photobook
  
• Other excellent back--in-stock magazine and photobook items, including more copies of Photo Album 2, Cho Mach, Wonderful and Okay!!
  
• For fans of Japan's anime voice actresses or seiyu, we've added Voice Animage to our "reserve subscriptions" page -- get it every month!
  

On the high-end bondage photobooks page, more copies of Sokubaku Press and more

Finally, a great new update to our Japanese snacks page, including some uniquely Japanese items, including Milky Candy, Coffee Culture Candy, the classical Japanese delicious "Kuro-Ame, and Kaori's childhood favorite, Strawberry Milk Candy

Remember, J-List offers convenient 6- or 12-month subscriptions to some of our best-selling magazines, including Urecco, Bejean, Gal's Dee, Gokuh, Video Boy, Best Video, and Dela Beppin. Why not get a subscription and have the latest issues sent to you before they're posted to the site, and get free issues, to boot?

Greetings from J-List March 20, 2000

Greetings from Japan, where a hamburger with a bun is a hamburger, but hamburger meat alone is a "hamburg." Consequently, a hot dog with bun is a "frankfurter" but a dog by itself (say, on a stick) is just a "frankfurt."

Japanese make some strange adaptations to English words. Just as Spanish and French can sound exotic to Americans, the Japanese love to pepper their daily lives with words from English. One word they like is "my" -- it's used in words like "my-car" (mai-kaa) (a privately owned car), my-home (mai-ho-mu) (a word that denotes owning your own house). Banks will advertise special rates for a "my-car loan." Someone who does things his own way, at his own pace, is called "going my way" (goingu mai uee) while a person who is vague and unspecific is an "about" person (abauto na hito). New words are coined to reflect changing times, too -- such as "barrier free, a word that describes living without barriers such as steep stairs that make it hard for elderly people to get along. Just in time" is another phrase that was born in Japan.

Today is the first day of Spring, and a holiday here in Japan. Winter didn't go without a fight, though -- today was one of the windiest I can remember. Japan is

We've got a great lineup of items for you tonight, including:

• First, fresh stock of the excellent Taiwanese lovely Vivian Hsu nude photobooks, Venus and Angel, on the photobooks pages
  
• Also on the photobook pages, great new photobooks including "The Nama-ashi" (bare-let fetish) and Costume & Lingerie (for the ultimate underwear-fan)
  
• Even more stock of formerly sold-out photobooks, including a few copies of Impressive by Fubuki Akira, and Ozawa Madoka's lovely Fairy on the Rough Sketch
  
• For fans the lovely idol group Morning Musume, we've got their newest #1 music video, Koi no Dance Site, as well as the wonderful high-quality Morning Musume collectible trading cards (see the idol or card pages)
  
• Also for idol fans, we've got three lovely new idol videos -- Kojima Kanako, Anzai Hiroko and the delicious Sunouchi Mihoko
  
• For our adult video customers, there are two excellent new videos on page 1 of the video catalog, including "The Girl Sentenced to have Semen on her Face"
  
• The hot new Gal's Dee, featuring the dynamite Kusanagi Jun (95 cm bust, G cup), is on Magazine page 1
  
• Lower prices on tons of manga, dojinshi and magazines (well, maybe not tons, but at least 100 kg of them)
  

Remember that J-List regularly puts lower priced and close out magazines, photobooks and other items on higher-numbered pages (magazine page 3, photobook page 2, etc.), so please check regularly for some great bargains. As part of tonight's update, we've gone through and lowered the prices of two dozen magazines, manga and dojinshi, too, so please check out the nice items.

That's all for tonight. See you on the web!

Greetings from J-List March 15, 2000

Hello from Japan, where even the feminine products have printed Hello Kitty on them.

One thing I'm often impressed with since coming to Japan is the "steadiness" I often see here. When I married my wife and moved to Isesaki, I noticed a man in a nearby field, spending his Sunday afternoon with his RC helicopter (one of the expensive ones), flying it around the field and landing it. Well, it's been six years since that day, and that man is still in that field every Sunday afternoon, playing with his RC helicopter. Over the past six years I've gone through many changes and evolutions, but I have to respect that man for his steadfast adherence to his hobby.

Likewise, this steadiness can be seen in Japanese TV, with anime staples that have been on the air for decades and thousands and thousands of episodes -- mainly Doraemon (the "robot of cat type" who comes from the future to be with his friend, Nobita-kun) and Sazae-san (which follows the happening of the Isono family every week, brought to you by the Toshiba Corporation). The longest running movie series in history is also from Japan -- "Otoko wa Turaiyo" ("It's Tough Being a Man") followed the traveling salesman Tora-san around Japan year after year, for a total of 48 installments (it's in the Guiness Book).

But as with all observations about Japan, there are the exceptions. In America, consumers expect trusted brands, and most of the products you see -- from Milky Way and M&Ms to Coca Cola and Rice Krispies -- have been around for dozens of years. In Japan, however, companies are under pressure to come up with new products -- Morinaga's Choco Flake may have been "the delicious chocolate snack enjoyed by consumers since 1963" but when retailers want something new to attract consumers, it "out with the old, in with the new."
Tonight's update is a nice one, with lots of nice new additions, including:

• An excellent selection of key holder/phone straps, including a keychain of "Street Licca" (the kogal version of Licca-chan), Godzilla 2000 and the Dancing Baby from Ally McBiel (on the anime & toys page)
  
• Haru, a wonderful hardcover photobook of the lovely and delicious Yoshikawa Minami, the "second Aonuma Chiasa"
  
• Great new magazines, including new issues of Panstopia and two different issues of D Cup Japan
  
• Excellent new idol videos, including Final Beauty videos of Yamada Mariya and Yoshida Satomi, and a new Race Queen video offering
  
• For fans of the excellent videos from Soft on Demand, we've got new "costume play sex" that have been very well received -- as with all SOD videos, they really push the envelope and show lots of detail
  

J-List customers tell us that word of mouth is the #1 one way they hear of us. If you know someone who's interested in Japan, please tell them about J-List. Thanks!

Greetings from J-List March 14, 2000

Greetings from Japan, the country with the highest per-capita number of vending machines in the world.

Well, March 14 and White Day are upon us. White Day is the counterpoint to Valentine's Day here in Japan, when men give return presents (usually white chocolate) to women who gave them chocolate on Valentine's Day. It's not a day that many take seriously of course (except convenience stores, who deck their shelves out with White Day decorations), but Japan is a country that runs on giri -- obligation -- and if you have an obligation to a coworker or acquaintance who gave you something on Valentine's Day, it's just good manners to get them something in return.

While on one of my late-night sessions of videotaped American television, I happened across the famed Chinpokomon episode of South Park, which pokes more than a little fun at the worldwide Pokemon craze. Watching the layers of ridiculous black jokes while the Asahi Super Dry and dried, shredded squid began to take effect made me reflect on the last decade and how much Japan has been a part of it. It was almost an out of body experience -- seeing the "anime" Colonel Sanders commercials for the first time brought on a similar eerie feeling. Incidentally, chinpoko is a kid's word for "penis" in case you wanted to know.

Tonight's update features many great new items, including:

Several new items from the excellent Gremlins toy series by JUN Planning, including the deluxe Gizmo and Mohawk (on the anime & toys page)

Also on the toy & anime page, a highly detailed figure of Edward Scissorhands from the cult movie classic

A half dozen great new adult wide manga, on the hentai manga page

For the motorcycle lover in you, we've added the excellent Outrider, the quintessential magazine for motorcyclists who love touring, as a revolving subscription item

New magazines, including more copies of the popular Okay!! and Ike Ike Magazine

Fresh stock of our great Japanese photobooks, including more copies of the popular Horiuchi Nana's "Tickle"

JAST USA is looking for translators for fun and interesting Japanese to English translations projects. If you can translate Japanese and are interested in working with us, please email me for more information.

Greetings from J-List March 11, 2000

Hello from Japan, where tuna is called "sea chicken."

Trains are a bigger part in the daily lives of Japanese than most Americans, and part of riding trains is checking out the interesting print advertising inside them. Every once in a while, a company will reserve every solitary advertising spot in a train, to attain total saturation of its message. Once Apple did this, and I was surprised to find myself riding a train car filled with "Think Different" ads. Most recently, NTT's Tu-ka portable phone service rented all the advertising spots on a train in central Tokyo to plug their "EZ-Web" service -- one of the many competing new proprietary "Internet by cell-phone" services that keep springing up in Japan. Each poster featured the recent #1 singer and "CM Queen" (as well as the face of Lycos in Japan) Hamasaki Ayumi -- Japan's "new" Amuro Namie.

In addition to heavy competition in the cellular phone industry here, competition is increasing among Japan's 3000 large and small Internet Service Providers, as each tries to add new features to attract people to the Internet. @Nifty pushes their service and lack of down-time, as well as features like fortune-telling right on their site, while NEC's Big Globe supports homepages viewable by portable phones. Sony's ISP, So-Net, allows you to interface the web with a virtual 3D "Postpet" front-end, while AOL Japan struggles to gain market share (with only 43 access points in all of Japan, it's no wonder they haven't done better).

We've got some really nice new items for you this evening, including:

First, we've got several excellent old and rare AV videos, including long out-of-print items by many nice AV stars (see in-stock video page 1)

Also in the "rare, and bound to sell out very quickly" category, we've got a few copies of the long-lost "Love 4" idol series, which brings lovely nude idol footage of four gals per tape -- including many rare faces like Fubuki Akira, Tohno Natsuko, Aonuma Chiasa, Yoshino Sally, and more (see the Idol & Soft Porn page)

Also on the Idol & Soft Porn page, we've got more Matsuda Senna videos in stock, and a lovely video by the most famous and beautiful Race Queen of them all, Fumika Suzuki

On the dojinshi scene, three great new additions, including a super Shadow Defense dojinshi with Chinli and Sakura, and a great erotic Nadia book (!)

For fans of J-List's unique anime & toys page, we've gotten in some cool Licca-chan items, including the highly cool "Street Licca" (a "cogal" version of Japan's #1 doll, complete with loose socks), and Color Change Kira-chan (a lovely, petite doll that changes her hair color) -- there are also Japanese clothes for fashion dolls

Mecha-Ike Older Sister, a nice new "liquid" magazine

More copies of several excellent photobooks that had sold out, including the lovely Saira, Hitomi Ryo's Virginity, Miura Aika's Last SOng, and this month's excellent Mini-Suka Deluxe

Remember that J-List has a special "Three Pack" of English-language hentai games. You can get any three games, including the excellent new release, Viper VM1, for just $105 shipped (extra shipping applies outside of the U.S./Canada) -- this is a savings of up to $30, as good as "buy 2, get 1 free." Take advantage of our offer now.

Greetings from J-List March 8, 2000

Greetings from J-List, your friend in Japan.

Three people are dead after two trains collided head-on on the Hibiya Line in Meguro, Tokyo, in a terrible train accident. By chance I was in Tokyo today, so I got a quick call on my "keitai" (portable) by my wife to see if I was alright. Japan's train safety has been called into practice in recent months, after several instances of concrete falling from Shinkansen tunnels.

In Tokyo, I stopped by Akihabara (the holy Mecca of electronics) to check out what all the fuss over the Playstation 2 is about. While I have to admit that the extra polygons supported by the game's graphics chips made for some of the smoothest 3D I've ever seen in a game console. I found the frame rates of some games to be rather low and limited. Given that high cost of the specialized chips means Sony is supposed to lose money on the console for two years or more, weak sales after the initial rush could turn PS2 into Vietnam for the company. As for the boy who had his Playstion stolen, all is well, and he's got a new unit, thanks to his grandmother -- see the story on ABC News at http://abcnews.go.com/wire/World/reuters20000306_220.html

We've got some great new items on the plate for you this evening, including:

• Great new magazines, including the new issues of the very popular Gal's Shower, Nippon Mini-Suka Club and Okay!
  
• A half-dozen or so new erotic manga, on the hentai manga page, including a great new busty manga by Ichiro and Sanwa Comics
  
• For members of the Second Otaku Generation, we've got more of the excellent die-cast metal Yamato ship models, including the Andromedia and Desslar's flagship, along with a new Yamato and Captain Harlock's Arcadia, on the anime & toys page
  
• New photobooks, including a great new idol photobook (covering Japan's lovely idols)
  Many great additional copies of items that had sold out before, such as Hitomi Ryo's "Virginity" and the excellent Nowon (on the photobooks pages)
  
• New gouka-bon photobooks, including books for fans of older and married women ("hitozuma")
  
• Three great new tapes in the very erotic Deep Kiss series, which films Japanese women kissing other women then gets their reactions
  
• Finally, that rare gift you've been looking for, a great puzzle map of Japan!
  

If you want to amaze and impress the Japanese people in your life, J-List has zany, esoteric T-shirts with Japanese slogans like "Dare to be stupid" "Looking for a Japanese Girlfriend" and an excerpt from the Japanese constitution. See them all, along with our "Japanese English" shirts, on the wacky shirts page.

Greetings from J-List March 6, 2000

Hello again from J-List!

Well, Playstation 2 is on sale, after many months of anticipation, and it's an incredible explosion of consumer joy. Millions of PS2's are pouring out of the channel as shops everywhere. In Urawa, near Tokyo, however, there was disappointment. A boy who saved all his New Year's gift money to buy a PS2 had it snatched from his hand by two men on a motorcycle as he walked home. The police were looking into the crime.

Japanese people are always very happy when one of their own becomes famous outside Japan. Having baseball players like Nomo or soccer players like Shoji Joe in Spain recognized as being "good enough" to make it internationally tickles them to no end -- it was even great to find vain singer Matsuda Seiko's 3-second appearance in Armageddon was a thrill. So they are very happy to see Kudoh Yuki appear in Snow Falling on Cedars, a major Hollywood movie and a big step for Asian actresses everywhere (or so they say). I've been a big fan of Yuki-chan's ever since her days pitching ECC English Conversation schools on TV, and it's great to see her go where so few Japanese have been able to go before. I saw an interview with her the other evening, in which she talked about her great rivalry with Tamilyn Tomita and the difficulties she faced trying to make it in Hollywood. (See the movie's official homepage at http://www.universalpictures.com/snowfallingoncedars/cast.html).

Tonight's update is another nice one. Newly added items include:

• New magazines, including the first-ever issue of Cho! Very Good! (featuring the bad girls of Shibuya)
  
• Several copies of the excellent and much-requested Lucky Crepu, which features some of Japan's most lovely girls
  
• For fans of the rare, a number of trading cards of idols like Amuro Namie, Speed and Max before they were famous
  
• For our loyal and much-appreciated JPOP fans, a great update to our JPOP page, featuring a dozen or so new JPOP music singles (including Globe, Oguro Maki and Chinen Rina) -- and remember, our buy-4-get-1-free JPOP sale is going until further notice
  
• A wonderful new DVD, featuring sexy race queen Kihara Rei (and it's subtitled in English, Chinese and Korean!)
  
• From Kaori, a great update of in-stock adult videos, including Akimoto Yuna's "Let's Cosplay, Shirakawa Narumi Pretty Wife" and several fun train videos
  
• A unique and cool item, little "kisekae" (dressable) dolls of Oja-Majo Doremi, a popular girl witch show that my daughter loves
  
• For fans of J-List's unique collection of Japanese snacks, we've got Baked Chocolate Pretz, a wonderful tasty pretzel with chocolate baked into it (see the snacks page)
  

Well, that's all for now. We hope you have a good Monday!

Greetings from J-List March 4, 2000

Greetings from Japan. It's a lazy Saturday afternoon as Tomo and I put the finishing touches on the weekend update today.

As the Japanese recession continues, I've noticed a definite trend in Japanese companies trying to turn their businesses around by emulating successful U.S. companies. Just as U.S. companies scrambled to copy the best of Japan's business practices in the 80's and early 90's (the Saturn company is a great example of this), Japanese companies are trying things the other way around. Seibu Department Stores have formed a cross-pollination alliance with Nordstorm, as they try to teach the "Nordy" method of customer service to their employees, while all manner of companies scramble to adapt e-business models to the Japanese markets.

One area of the Japanese economy that's doing well is beer, which is booming along nicely. Kirin has even knocked rival Asahi out of the lead, garnering 40.2 percent of the market to Asahi's 40.0 percent. In addition to the major brands like Kirin Lager and Asahi Super Dry, the Japanese beer market thrives on seasonal "limited run" beers like Sapporo's Winter Tale, Kirin's Spring has Come beer, and short-lived brands like Asahi First Lady (beer for ladies) and Super Malt (beer made from hops, and not partially from rice, as all other Japanese beers are). If you're interested in seeing some beer commercials, check out CM-Watch at http://www.cm-watch.com (newly updated).

Tonight's update is a nice one, with many great new items for you, including:

• Great new issues of Japan's most popular magazines, including the new Gokuh and Bejean -- the latter of which has a great appearance by the lovely Kanazawa Bunko
  
• New photobooks, including a great new leg fetish photobook, and more copies of the long-lost Kuroda Mirei first (bust 95 cm) photobook
  
• On the S&M photobook page, we've got new gouba-bon format books, including more copies of Traditional Bondage in Japan and the Deluxe Female Urine Book
  
• Some great single-issue copies of PC Angel, on the hentai manga page
  
• For fans of the excellent DVD & Video CD Soft Catalog, a sampler 2-Video CD & magazine set, the new issue is posted on the CD ROMs page
  
• On the in-stock videos page (page 1), a great new 60-minute cos-play (costume playing) video by the lovely Chinatsu Yui
  
• Finally, a great update to our puzzle page, with new puzzles by lovely illustrator Haruyo Morita, as well as great new anime puzzles for fans of The Princess Mononoke, Captain Harlock and Card Captor Sakura
  

Remember that anytime you order more than 10 units of any of J-List's gum or snack items, as well as our collectible card items, you get a 15% discount. We've got lots of great items in stock, so check out the snack & card/puzzle pages now!

Greetings from J-List March 2, 2000

Hello again from Japan, where fatherhood means never taking a bath alone...

I love to watch Japanese TV and see what the next "boom" might be. A company called Megahouse is banking that their tiny camera, a 1/4 size replica of the classic Leica camera, this camera takes real pictures on special quarter-size film. The company is hoping the tiny cameras catch on with high school girls and people in their 20's.

Another potential boom are new digital cameras with an adapter so you can send the pictures to your friends directly through your portable phone. After you snap a picture, you can "write" digitally on it with a special friend before you send it. It's made by NTT Docomo.

Tonight's update is another great one. First of all, by request, we've added funny Japanese English T-shirts to our wacky T-shirts page. Now, in addition to bizarre phrases in English, you can buy authentic Japanese-English T-shirts modeled after real shirts that we found here in Japan. Our shirts are 100% cotton Hanes Comfort-T, and feel really great. Check out the new funny English shirts on the T-shirt page now.

Other newly-added items include:

• Great new magazines, including the new Gal's Dee and Milky Dolls
  
• One of my favorite magazines, Ike Ike Magazine, featuring a wonderful spread of the very erotic Ms. Wakana Sena
  
• New items on our popular gouka-bon S&M photobook page, with a great all-Stewardess costplay book, and another one for fans of school uniforms
  
• For Video CD fans, four new VCD items added to the Video CD page
  
• New in-stock videos, posted by Kaori
  
• Amazingly, we've found a few copies of the out-of-print hardcover photobook Pistil, by the lovely Fubuki Akira
  

I'm flying out the door, heading for Tokyo on business. I'll stay at my favorite capsule hotel in the heart of Shibuya for 3800 yen, and enjoy the deep bath and sauna as well. I enjoy my little trips to Tokyo, but it's deathly cold tonight -- wish me luck!