Google Earth now has layers for Japan Tourism and Kyoto Tourism, linked to pictures and English text provided by JNTO. Good stuff, although of course the national-level layer is pretty sparse. Fortunately, we’re going to Kyoto.

Korean girls should never rap in Japanese.

Okay, neither should Japanese girls (or, well, anyone, in any language), but somehow it’s particularly bad when the gratuitous rap break in the middle of a bouncy pop song is delivered phonetically.

Also, why such harsh autotune in a video that’s full of cuddly cuteness?

And is it just me, or does Hyuna look like a tiger cub in a room full of kittens, particularly in the dance scenes?

And why, since it sounds like very-nearly-17 SoHyun is the only one who actually speaks Japanese, does she get so few lines?

Sorry, girls, but the awful rap and autotune will keep me from buying your albums, because I don’t know if I’ll be able to listen to them without pain; I’ll stick to watching the video with my hand over the mute button (not a euphemism). Hyuna’s solo effort Bubble Pop, on the other hand, is pure eye/ear candy.

In OS X Lion, it is no longer possible to manually create 802.1x profiles. You must use the iPhone configuration tool to generate a .mobileconfig file for users to download and double-click.

…but I can now state from experience that a mosquito bite on the eyelid is quite annoying.

Also, unrelated, never run an application that’s located on an NFS file server at the other end of an OpenVPN tunnel. That hurts, too.

My deepest fear is that someday these Amazon recommendations will turn out to be right.

For some time now, I’ve been wondering if the opening action scene in episode 1 was taken from somewhere in the novels. Yesterday morning, I found its origin in chapter 3 of book 9.

The day before Lawry arrives on Earth, Aoi finds the key to a post-office box that was used to contact her back in the bad old days when she was a secret agent. She goes to the post office intending to just drop it off, but before she has a chance to say anything, the employee has gone off to retrieve her box. Inside, she finds a variety of messages related to her former career, none of which matter to her at all, and one foreign letter, in English (yes, this is how it’s printed in the book…):

Hello momiji.
Do you remember me?
I am "Burning rose".
Woman into whom life changes thanks to you.
…wish to express our gratitude to you by us.…
I want to meet one of these days if it is good.
Let's meet by you in the Yogi park on February xx day if this letter is read.

It returns if not coming…………

The date? Tomorrow. In flashbacks, Aoi remembers a certain night mission, from a time before she met Kio. It’s basically the same battle at sea against smugglers, up to the point where she’s disposed of the crew and is alone in the cargo hold. In the anime, she heads up to the bridge and confronts the last survivor, and the scene ends when he blows up the ship to kill them both.

In this version, while down in the hold, she’s attacked by a powerful pyrokinetic, Burning Rose, a former CIA agent turned mercenary. There’s no contraband in the crates; the whole thing was a setup to take her out, and Rose has the upper hand. It’s a deathmatch, both of them armored from head to toe and heavily armed, and in the end, Aoi seems to be the only survivor, pulled out of the sea by her support ship. Yeah, the ship still blew up, but it was more of a side-effect of their fight than a deliberate act.

Aoi remembers the soulless fighting machine she was back then, and wonders if she’s still strong enough to take on an enemy from her past. She hides her concern from her assistoroids, afraid more of what Rose’s powers could do to them than for herself, and cheerfully gives them permission to spend the day with Lawry. She carefully checks out the rendezvous point in advance, then prepares her weapons and heads out.

It’s a very public place, and she’s not sure what the trap will be, but when she gets there, all she finds is a lovely young American woman sitting on a bench, casually reading a book for newlyweds. Scanning the area for threats and not finding them, Aoi calls out, “Where are you, Burning Rose?”. The young woman on the bench stands up in surprise and asks, “Are you Calamity Momiji?”. (yup, the kanji 悪縁紅葉 (“Evil-Destiny Momiji”) is given the furigana reading カラミティ・モミジ)

Rose is honestly thrilled to see Aoi, and embraces her so quickly that she forgets about her weapons. Rose is so happy that she’s practically babbling as she talks about trying to find a good way to reach Aoi to thank her. Why? Because after her half-dead body washed up onto a nearby island and she was nursed back to health by the Intern who found her, she discovered that her powers were gone.

She could be a normal woman, escaping the lonely and dangerous life of an esper. She feels like she’s been born again, and hopes that Aoi’s new life is going well, too. And then she runs off to greet her husband (a certain Intern), leaving a bemused Aoi waving as the happy newlyweds walk away.

Looks like Pixy’s empire has temporarily vanished from the net; I can’t get response from either of the mee.nu/mu.nu nameservers. One of them is pingable, but not answering DNS. I’d send email, but, well, y’know.

[Update: all better now]

[Update: Momiji’s opening action scene from episode 1 was also adapted from book 9, but more loosely. More on that after I finish it.]

This book takes place at two different points in the timeline, identified as “winter break” and “after spring break”. Book 8 ended with Valentine’s Day, so the first part is flashback. The framing story is Ichika sitting at home on New Years Eve, playing mahjongg with Ichika, Ichika, and Ichika. I get the impression that the other three are from parallel universes.

Chapter 1 is an end-of-year party at Kio’s house, featuring the first real appearance by his parents. (Dad had previously shown up just long enough to offer Eris a beer in book 1).

• Mom isn't quite as bad as Sara when it comes to assistoroids.
• They return the ridiculous rent Kuune paid for use of their house as the embassy. Kio hadn't known about it, and was shocked at the amount.
• Mom gives it back to Eris in the form of a bank account in the name Eris Kakazu. Kio and Dad exchange uneasy glances, recognizing Mom's not-so-subtle matchmaking.
• Uncle Yuuichi and Itokazu-sensei are dating (thanks to the events of book 6), but currently keeping it a secret.
• Sara's been busy making formal new-year outfits for all of the assistoroids. She enlisted Ichika's aid, but this apparently happened before the other three Ichikas showed up.
• Timing issue: before they show up, Kio and Eris talk about having already met her parents. Also, when Aoi shows up, her thoughts seem to match up with that, and later Kio reflects on having been to space three times (first time to save the ship, second time to get his genemods reversed, third time for book 7). The problem is, book 6 ended on Christmas Day, and then I'm pretty sure book 7 was nearly a month later, based on the amount of time the various world navies had to get used to the sight of the assistoroid patrols at the space elevator. Oops?

Chapter 1.5 is a collection of secret documents and conversations covering the government reactions to events from the initial reception of messages from the Catians through the end of the year. Lots of stilted official-style writing and vocabulary, so I’m sure I missed some things in here.

Chapter 2 is the last remaining major item that was used in the anime, Lawry’s visit to Earth. This is something I want to read carefully. As adapted for the anime, it fleshed out the Catians and Eris nicely. Also, while it seems to be a standalone piece, there may be a significant bit of foreshadowing for the conflict in book 10.