Picture of the day

This picture is from flickr.

Full marathon challenge.

This year, I will challenge my first full marathon. This year is a one in a million chance to complete it for me. Since I was very busy last year and did not run well, I have to spend one entire year for this challenge. Here is the plan I will run each month. Fortunately, I will be able to complete 60 miles in April, and I will try hard to complete the following plan.

April 60 miles
May 60 miles
June 70 miles
July 80 miles
August 100 miles plus a half marathon (slow)
September 150 miles
October 100 miles
November 80 miles
December 60 miles plus a full marathon (race)

Favorite minor webpage. Time Machiner

Time machiner is an unique service in which you can send e-mail to the future. This service got a simple but excellent idea. The e-mail you wrote on the time machiner will be sent on the day you set, and you can set the date up to 2030. You can write e-mail to yourself in 2030!

time machiner
http://www.timemachiner.com/

Millions of excuses.

There are millions of excuses why you don't run today. You are always busy at your work and everything. You always face family emergencies, or your health emergencies. Your condition is not always as good as when you are very young. There are millions of excuses why you just stay home today. Instead, there is only one reason why you do run today. You run because you decided to run.
Otherwise, you will never have any chance to run in this crazy world.

For me, running everyday is the training to survive my life. There are millions of incidents that will make me unhappy, however there are only few chances that can make me happy. I have to be very patient to tolerate unhappiness and be very careful not to miss the chance to success.

Laurence Lessing supports Obama

I really respect Lawrence Lessing. He is the opinion leader who influences me very much. In this video, Lawrence is supporting Obama for Pennsylvania democratic primary on April 22nd. This primary is very important for Obama, because if he wins, he will be the democratic nominee of the presidential candidate.


video is from Lessing blog.

Vitasoy update

A friend of mine read the entry about my search for vitasoy original, and kindly bought a half dozen of the vitasoy original for me today. I am very happy to have vitasoy again. Thank you very much Kayo, you are so generous!

Vegan -7 months-

I have been a vegan for 7 months now. The strong happiness I felt at the beginning has already gone. Indeed, I lost desire to eat meat completely. Being a vegan is now so natural for me, and I do not want to eat American fast food again (No more MacDonald's in my life).

However, as I became a natural vegan, the true problem of being a vegan has emerged its face. Social life. Most of friends of mine are not vegan. When I am invited to a party, dinner or any social situation, I usually have really few things I can actually eat. Then I face a really difficult question. What should I do? Not eating food served for me or not ordering food at restaurant are extremely rude, and I do not want to do so. However, I do not want to eat non-vegan food neither.

I have no answer yet for this difficult question. I usually eat non-vegan food except for meats when people serve it to me (For my sense, denying to eat meal that someone cooked for me is too rude). I order fish at restaurant because only eating salad will bemuse other people. I do not want to loose social connections to people I care, therefore, I will have to find a good solution for this problem.

Tax cut

I cut my thumb today (just a scratch). I was enclosing tax documents into a brand new envelope, and accidentally cut the thumb by a sharp edge of the envelope. Cutting the finger by a paper was painful, but I called it "tax cut".

This year, my tax filing was very easy because the tax treatment between the U.S. and Japan is no more applied to me. I pay a lot more tax than that of last year, but the filing process itself was much easier (Last year's filing was a real nightmare). It will be complicated again in next year, because my grant kicks in this year (Boy, I do not want to think about it until next March.....).

Vitasoy emergency.

I wrote that I love Vitasoy soy milk original very much. However, recently, the vitasoy original is sold out in all shops I visited in San Francisco! Some shops are no more selling the original (but many other derivatives that I do not like). This is an emergency situation for me, because my current body is on this drink. If anyone see the vitasoy original in the city, please let me know.

Language is your brain's OS. -Part 2

I wrote that a language is brain's OS. I still believe this is true. In my middle 20s, I tried to shut down my first language, Japanese, and rely only on second language, English. Here I write what was physically happen to me at the time.

The primary principle I learned is that you will be greatly depressed when you shut down your mother tongue. I experienced many different symptoms of the depression when I shut down Japanese; eating disorder, anxiety, loss of willingness and sleeping disorder.

The brain uses the language for its functional processes. Even when you are not talking with others, your brain uses the language. When you think of an idea, any idea (choose food to eat, stand up from a chair or pick up an apple on a tabe), the idea is quickly embodied by the language in your brain. This step is important for decision of successional actions. Since most of us do these steps without recognition, it is difficult to imagine how hard it is when your brain stalks in the middle of these processes. I recognized these processes because I change the language after being an adult, and my brain became very dull and less functioning when it stalked during the processes.

These unconscious conversations in your brain are also very important to keep your brain healthy. If the brain cannot undertake the inside conversations, it will burn out. It will burn out the brain region which is very close to the region regulating your essential body functions, such as sleeping, eating or heart pumping functions. I think this is why I experienced the symptoms of depression. I could not eat well, waked up middle of the night (you need your language to even dream during night), I slept during middle of the day and felt so unhappy.

I am very proud that I survive these difficult days. My English still has a lot of problems but I feel much comfortable with it now. I feel I became stronger by changing the language, however, I will not recommend anyone to do this. I now realized that it was a really dangerous and life threating challenge, and the outcome could be much worse than that of now.