[..i really think so.] could it be all the asian food i eat? could it be all the time i lived in hawaii? that’s definitely when it started. or is it all the japanese tv i’m watching??

Ninja Warrior!! my new favorite show! it’s on G4, a channel created for geeky guys, with shows like “hurl” which is a show about vomiting (seriously), and soon i’m sure to be the home of “Ow, my balls!”

in the meantime, there’s at least an hour of Ninja Warrior on every day! it defies explanation really, but basically its the world’s most insane obstacle course, which may not seem that interesting but it is totally compelling! they start off with 100 contestants and usually only 5 or 6 make it past the first stage, which is a hundred yard timed course of crazy jumps and climbs and ropes and bars and climbs all over a pit of muddy water. on a good day, half of those people make it past stage 2 which is shorter, and also timed but you have much less time to do much more challenging tasks like climbing a ladder when all you have is one rung which you have to hold on to and throw your whole body up to hook the rung on the next notch where a step should be, then at the end you have to lift three walls and crawl under them, each one being heavier than the last one and starting at 100lbs. then there’s stage 3 which sometimes nobody gets through, even though they have unlimited time. it’s all upper body strength stuff like hanging by your fingertips on a ledge that’s only a couple inches wide and having to move down it then reach up to a higher level and back down to a lower level, it’s called the cliff hanger,then there’s the body prop and the pipe slider, and on and on. and if anybody survives all that, for the fourth and final stage they have to scale the center of a huge tower in 15 seconds then climb a ridiculously long rope in the remaining 15 seconds. they’ve been having this competition for 10 years and only 2 people have ever completed the whole damn thing! yet they keep coming back again and again and again to try again and again. and they keep making the course harder!! you can click here to go to G4 and play the video to see an american dude try to complete the whole thing.

then there’s the Unbeatable Banzuke and i don’t know what banzuke means but this much smaller obstacle course is definitely, usually unbeatable. there are different versions, sometimes it’s for unicycles, sometimes stilts, sometimes they have to walk on their hands over stairs covered with gravel or on moving conveyor belts, etc. it’s insane! usually they have 2 or 3 events per show and usually nobody completes the course. ir’s craaaazy, and i loooove it!

and now there’s a new show in america called, “I survived a Japanese game show,” we watched the first episode last week and it was hilarious!! those wacky japanese really know their game shows!

all i know is its keeping me entertained in the entertainmentlessness of the long hot miserable summer!