OMG! I’m writing another blog? I AM writing another blog. AHH!

Big whoop, right? Or should it be a small whoop? Is writing a blog every week worthy of a large-sized whoop? I’m not even sure. I mean, technically how big is a “big whoop” anyways? I need some context here. Now I’m worried about my whoop; HOW BIG AND/OR SMALL SHOULD IT BE? Oh, god – WHAT HAVE I DONE! Now I got WHOOP ANXIETY. This is horrible. OK, how about this: me writing another blog is a whoop of an undetermined size? If you want the whoop to be big, awesome! Small? Go for it! Medium? Uh, I guess. Medium-small? Dude. Small-medium? Uh-oh. Medium-small-sorta-big? …You suck.

Speaking of whoops of varying sizes, the past 6 months of my life here in Japan has had its ups and downs. I’ve had a lot of cool moments, fo sho. But I’ve also had a bunch of crappy ones, too. Both kinda balance each other out. Y’know – gotta have some shitty moments to appreciate the special ones. And vice versa. It’s kinda like a bag of skittles; you gotta have a bunch of lame-ass flavors like lemon and orange to appreciate the real winners: grape and cherry. Hmm… Unless you buy the berry-only bag. CRAP. I just ruined my own analogy. Can I get a do-over? I can feel my whoop shrinking by the second. AHHHH!!

What I meant to say is this:

Whoop, there it is!

Just kidding. I have no idea where the whoop is. Nor do I know its size. I’m the worst whooper to have ever whooped, here or there. So, instead, I’m going to list my top 3 COOLEST and CRAPPIEST moments from my past 6 months here. Let’s get into it!

Top 3 Coolest Moments

Postal Presents: I’ve talked about how I love my local post office workers before, so I won’t I say it again. But I love them. I won’t say that they’re the best either. But, seriously, they’re the BEST. And I won’t say that I’m totally handsome either. Because I’m not handsome, I’m a HIDEOUS. C-c-c-c-c-ombo BREAKER!

I do love my local post office workers, though. And they really are the best. Because they deal with my crap EVERY DAY. And they (seemingly) don’t mind. So I reward them the only way I can: bringing them 25+ mailers every day. OK, that’s a CRAPPY reward. I suck! Just kidding. I bring them treats every now and then, starting with the first worker that helped when I started my business.

If you’ve been reading my blog since the beginning, then you’ve probably heard this story before (sucks to be you!). So I’ll give you the tl;dr: I noticed the worker always wears a Stitch pen on her uniform, so I brought her a Stitch Ufufy keychain as a present. Undetermined-sized whoop, right? That’s what I thought. I figured she’d say, “ありがとうございます,” take it home, and proceed to throw it in the trash. Oh, no! The COMPLETE opposite. Since I gave her that keychain MONTHS ago, she’s made it a PERMANENT part of her uniform. That just BLOWS my mind. My seemingly insignificant little gesture of thanks is now a LASTING memory for her. Amazing.

Takeaway: Always try to thank people who help you out, big or small. Because it may seem like nothing to you, but it can potentially have a HUGE impact on their daily life.

Power of Persistence 

I wrote about this one a few weeks ago, so you probably already read it. Wait – who am I kidding? You don’t read my blogs. Do you even know who I am? What’s my favorite color? How did you know it was CORGIS? Are you a mind-reader? Crazy. Sorry to doubt you. But for the folk here who are new, here again is the tl;dr: an AWESOME cast member at Tokyo DisneySea helped me find a rando drink a customer of mine requested for his partner.

I chose this as one of my coolest moments not because the women helped me. A lot of people help me here. I chose it because she went OUT OF HER WAY to help me. And as you may know by the moment above, when people go above and beyond for me, I’m CONTRACTUALLY OBLIGATED BY LIFE to thank them. So I did just that. Only, I thought to do this after I literally EXITED the park. Doh! I almost continued on my way, too. But then I thought to myself, “I have an opportunity to not only positively impact someones life, but also create a cool moment worthy of a blog I don’t even know I’m going to write yet.” So I went back into the park, found her, and thank her. Numerous times. I think I counted somewhere between 3 and 357. I forget. I’m bad at math. She was counting with me, but she eventually lost track. We both laughed. Then I started again. She laughed and thought I’d stop. I didn’t. She started to slowly back away. I started to thank her faster. She pressed a button and Tweedle Dee and Tweddle Dum magically appeared and proceeded to pick me up and carry me away, still counting, of course. None of this happened. Excepting the thanking part. Totally true. And totally worth it.

Think about it from her perspective: She helped a stupid foreigner. A whoop of unknown size, right? She prolly does that every day. And she probably never sees those people ever again. But instead of just taking her help for granted, I made an effort to go back and celebrate her generosity. That’s gotta feel pretty good, right? I’ll answer my own rhetorical question: IT FEELS GREAT. I know this because every thank you letter I get from a customer is a humble bomb of joy. Hell, just today, a customer wrote me this:

Has anyone told you how awesome you are?

The answer: Um, duh! All the NEVER. But I was flattered to hear that. And I’m sure the cast member was also flattered I told her she was awesome.

Takeaway: If you exit a theme park before thanking a worker, you turn your ass RIGHT BACK around and make their day! You’ll both get rewarded with JOY.

Fashion Show 

I also wrote about this experience. But this was back in October. In human years, that was 4 months ago. In Michael years, that was 12 years ago. Basic gist: I got chosen to take part in the HALLOWEEN FASHION SHOW at Tokyo DisneySea. This was an especially COOL moment because I was told it’s SUPER rare for a foreigner to get chosen. This meant I got to be the apprentice to the minion of Scar, a woman so goddamn beautiful I almost FEINTED when she touched me. Not really. But almost really. That alone made it worth it. Also worth it? Telling everyone I was from San Francisco and hearing a collective, “Ohhhhhh!” from the audience like they were auditioning to play the Toy Story Alien in the next movie. Such a fun moment and one I won’t forget for a long time. Or tomorrow; my memory is ASS. Wait, what I was writing about again? Corgis? Yeah, prolly corgis.

Takeaway: Don’t be shy to make a fool of yourself in front of an audience of people you can’t understand, because it could lead you to holding the hand of an attractive woman who probably wishes she wore gloves.

Top 3 Crappy Moments

Homeless 

When I first moved here, I stayed in an AirBnb. In fact, it was the same Airbnb I stayed at when I FIRST visited Japan back in 2015. Whoa – full circle. But I only booked it for about 2 weeks. Because I figured, oh, I’d fine an apartment by then. Spoiler alert: I didn’t. In fact, it took me like 2-3 weeks AFTER my Airbnb ended to find an apartment. In the meantime, what did I do? Um, duh – corgis. That, and cry. Lots of crying. Because I was literally homeless. Pretty crazy! But I kid – it wasn’t too bad because I had my office to store my stuff. So, while I was searching, I was sleeping/shower in a manga cafe. Not the BEST experience, but without a doubt a MEMORABLE experience. Plus, I got FREE royal milk tea every night. Awww yeahhh.

Takeaway: Be patient when you’re starting something new. Because the end result may be worth it. And if it’s not, hey, free royal milk tea!

No Hot Water 

This was one fairly recent; my hot water heater had ONE job: heat the water. Apparently that was TOO MUCH WORK for my heater, so it just up and quit, leaving with me with no way of showering without TURING INTO AN ICE SCULPTURE. The worst of the whole scenario was the time; it happened on a weekend, so the repair folks couldn’t come until the following Monday. That meant I went 2-3 days without showering. Yeck! Luckily, I got it fixed, so I don’t smell like ass anymore! Scratch that – I only smell like MILD ass now.

Takeaway: It’s OK not to shower. In a world where noses and the concept of smell doesn’t exist.

Broken Phone

This one illustrates how much of a GOOF I am: I cracked the screen of my phone. Within like a month or so coming here. I think I may have set a clumsy record. Yay me! It’s funny, too – back home in San Francisco, I used to always look at people with cracked screens and think to myself, “HOW DO YOU EVEN DO THAT?” Now I now: You bend over to put on your shoes (with your phone not-so-securely resting in your jacket pocket) next to concrete. Ah! Makes so much sense now. Shame I had to CRACK THE SCREEN OF MY PHONE to realize this fact, but if the clue “A way to show people you’re a totally goddamn goof” ever appears on Jeopardy, you know I’m gonna ANSWER: “What is crack your phone and not replace it?”

But, honestly, I kinda see my CRACKED PHONE as a metaphor for my time here. Right now, I’m totally broken. I’ve started afresh. I’m building my business from scratch. I have next-to-no social life. I’m barely scraping by. My LIFE is like my PHONE SCREEN right now: COMPLETELY BROKEN. But I (hope) things will start to come together. And, once they do, I can BUY A NEW PHONE (and maybe a case?) to signify that I’ve made it here. Yeah… Let’s just hope that day comes. Until then, my phone is a reminder I gotta EARN the right NOT to look like a goof.

Takeaway: Get a goddamn phone case. Jesus.

That’s it for this week! If you enjoyed reading, I love you. If you didn’t enjoy reading, just think about my cracked phone. WHAT A GOOF!