I live far enough in the future, a little less in the future than say, New Zealand, but I know that it's not quite New Years day in the Eastern Standard timezone yet--- Here in the future mind you, in Rand McNally, where people wear hats on their feet and hamburgers eat people, today is supposed to be spent eating osechi, (mochi--- a sort of sweet sticky confectionery made of rice that happens to kill off a lot of old people in Japan this time of year, soba, miso etc etc), and visiting shrines---

I think I have some mochi covered ice cream, so there's one down--- The shrine at Narita is quite popular this time of year, but the shrine down the street (around the way shrine---), is that even blasphemous, I don't know? That one will have to do.

They say that what you dream of on New Years eve foretells your new year, I dreamed I had given myself a bad haircut (quite a likelihood actually), and was wearing some nice new clothes... I'll pass on the former, but I'll be happy to live out the second half of that dream with good nature and aplomb. In actuality, the osechi we are eating happens to be home made chicken soup that I "slaved" over last night... It's not miso or soba, but meh.

Coincidentally, it's the year of the dog, apparently it's also the 55th anniversary of snoopy. It's a pretty sweet deal for the Peanuts franchise, but I always sort of think of Peanuts as representing elemental human charactaristics like sadness, love, friendship, rather than whoring rapacious greed--- still, this diamond encrusted snoopy is fetching in a 'could feed millions' sort of way.

A platinum Snoopy figurine encrusted with black, white and pink diamonds is displayed at a Tokyo department store December 15, 2005. The 50 mm-tall Snoopy, with a production limit of 10, carries a price tag of 5.5 million yen. (REUTERS)

I'm not against wealth but, if you have the money, why spend it on a diamond encrusted dog, or a $400 dollar BAPE hoodie that looks like a box of crayons vomited on it--- do something useful, like buy a slave or go classic and simply use the money to make more money. That Snoopy thing is just an eyesore. Doye.