My apologies once again for the dearth of posting as of late. My boss is on a business trip this week, and while I thought that would mean a breezy time at work, in fact it has been quite the opposite. Not only have I been swamped with several big translations all due tomorrow, but my office is also being host to a new intern from Thailand this week and I have been assisting with her training.

In addition, I recently downloaded obtained by legal means (*cough*) the full three seasons of The Family Guy and have been amidst the throes of an unrelenting addiction. I haven’t laughed this hard in ages! However, the culmination of these and additional factors have left me unable to fulfill my duties as the operator of this infantile and wholly inane weblog, and thus I hereby regretfully submit my resignation.

Just kidding.

Actually, starting this Friday, the Japanese holiday season known as Golden Week will be upon us, and I will be taking advantage of the much-needed five days off from work to get the heck out of town and live a little. Thus, I will be heading down to Osaka for the duration of the holiday and likely will not have an opportunity to update this site due to a combination of the following factors: inebriation, exhaustion (sexual or otherwise), lethargy and the fact that I probably won’t have regular access to a computer.

Therefore, I’ve decided to try to set things up so that a new random photo will be posted each day for the duration of my time away, starting Friday night at midnight (Japan time). Hopefully it will work as planned. Of course, one could just go take a peek in the galleries and look ahead at the photos that are going to be posted, but I certainly hope that people will refrain from doing so because that’s just no fun at all. No one likes a spoilsport.

While in Osaka, I’ll be spending my time with some family friends who live in the region, the youngest of whom is this precious angel:

The last time I paid the family a visit was Golden Week 2002, so I’m definitely looking forward to catching up. I’m hoping that my Japanese has improved sufficiently since then that communication will run far more smoothly than previous visits. One can only rely on body language so long.

Well, it’s late and I just got back from the kangeikai for the new intern so I really should take a shower to remove the stench of cigarettes and booze from my body and then head to bed. I’ll be back again with the usual tripe next week. Until then, I hope you’ll enjoy the mediocre photos!