Glow Gala

Coming soon...

Burger Buns

Here is Le Merde's newest Burger Buns figure, released at Thrash Out this week. All clear with colorful guts inside. So cool, and so crazy! These sold out fast.

Jindaiji, Daruma, Soba Cake

Spent a part of the afternoon at Jindaiji as it was nice and sunny today. Took a walk, saw a lot of daruma, had some soba (buckwheat) cake, relaxed.

Mononoke Dance

New Alarm Clock

I had been looking for a bedside clock/radio/CD player for a while now with no luck. I just happened upon this Marantz today and decided to go for it. It features all of the above with bass and treble settings, two remote controls, 8 color display backlights, etc. And there's an additional speaker on the back for really nice sound. I just hope it lasts a more than a few years. I hate throwing electronics away.

Mark, Carlos, and Booska

Met up with Mark Nagata and Carlos Enriquez Gonzales last night. They were here for last weekend's Wonder Festival. Mark brought a sample of his upcoming Booska figure, which was designed by Martin Ontiveros and sculpted by Kiyoka. It's made in China but the quality is quite impressive and the paint work is pretty nice. Carlos brought one of his colorful fiberglass creations as well.

Wonder Festival Winter 2008

For those not familiar, Wonder Festival is a toy, character, modeling, and hobby show that happens twice a year at Tokyo Big Site in Odaiba. This is one of the bigger events in Japan, taking up 3 or 4 halls of the convention center. One of the unique things about Wonder Festival is that fans are able to produce, make, and release their own versions of their favorite characters, and get a one day license to officially sell them at the show. Of the hundreds of otaku booths at the event, there are usually a couple of interesting releases. This time, Gargamel released a Tomy licensed Microman Acroyear soft vinyl figure, and Charactics had Henshin Cyborg and King Walder mini figures. I think these were my favorites from today's show. I was also able to score a jumbo unpainted M1 Booska at the M1 ring toss. Soon after that, I wandered into the used and vintage toy area and found this vintage Popy Makoto Chan figure for super cheap. Pretty stoked about today.

Sunday Driver

The view from the Tokyo highways is quite different from what you see from the train windows. Here are a few pictures of today's drive to Wonder Festival at Big Site in Odaiba. It was quite smooth, no traffic at all, but very windy. Wonder Festival pictures coming next.

Electric Killers

Neon yellow and pink Killers. I really like how these turned out. But I could only make one of each.

Skate and Destroy

Went skating with Yutaka and Naoya tonight. This is the first time I've skated hard since my knee was injured last year in California. It felt pretty good and we all had a lot of fun. It was cold though, close to freezing.