For quite some time I’ve been thinking I ought to focus this blog on something, and Dharma’s recent comment on the Boards just gave me the push to get off my pasty white butt and do it.

So, this blog will no longer be about the random crap it has long been about. For those who want to see pics of Japan, my family, and my dog, or ruminations about this and that, I’ve started a new blog here. (By the way, there’s nothing there yet, but I will make update announcements here for that tiny number of you who are interested.)

Instead, I’m going to focus on the theme of utopia. As you probably know, utopian themes are the focus of my literature studies these days, and I’m planning to start a PhD in a couple months with the same focus. So I’m sure to come across a lot of stuff connected to that, stuff that may not fit into my papers, but that I can share with you. Or even if it does fit into my papers, I can still share it with you.

Utopia, of course, is an important part of SF–today, it’s pretty rare for non-SF utopias to be written, though that certainly wasn’t always true. And to make a utopia, you pretty much have to go through a revolution, even if the result of many revolutions is dystopia. So I figure it fits well here at the Revolution SF community.

Right, more later.

Golden Week has actually been over for a few days, but this is the first Monday since it ended, so I’m really feeling it now.

We had a guest for about 2 weeks: Lucie, a ceramics artist from Ottawa, who had studied in Arita ("Birthplace of Japanese Porcelain") for awhile and had met Junko there. This was her first return to Japan in about 12 years. It was a lot of fun having her–she left on Saturday to spend some time with a friend in Kyoto.

With the guest and working on my paper for the lit conference, I haven’t had much time to just relax. But my presentation was on Saturday, and it was well-attended and well-received, with some really good questions asked that will help me in revising for publication.

Also, there was an announcement at the conference that my proposal for a presentation at the national Japan American Literature Society conference has been officially accepted. Whoo!

The conference went well over all. Since my current job ends in less than a year, I was in full-on schmooze mode, handing out my namecard and mentioning, "Yeah, this job I have now is great, but this is my final year, so if you hear of any openings, email me, OK?" Starting this week, I’ll be emailing everyone who gave me their cards, plus checking the job postings and updating my CV in English and Japanese. I’m not worried, but I don’t want to be like my previous officemate, who let it go, thought that a vague answer was a promise of employment, and didn’t have a backup when that fell through. I intend to have a job firmly nailed down, with a backup, before the beginning of next semester in October.