Same lounge, same machine

NARITA AIRPORT. Back in my home away from home, the United Red Carpet lounge. It's very interesting how we develop incredibly specific information about spaces in the course of our travels: Anyone who wants to hook up a keychain drive in the Red Carpet Lounge should know that the PC on the far right side is the one that you want.

After we got settled into the lounge, I spent a little time playing tourist, and bought a kimono for Elizabeth (I'd told her I might get her a Korean dress, and I figure this is close enough; I just hope it fits her), and some CDs of the music I'd heard on the way over here. They CDs were more expensive than their American counterparts (today's exchange rate is about 115 yen to the dollar, which is not good-- all this concern about war is hitting the markets hard), and I just heard that there's a place in San Francisco's Japantown that sells the same things.

But now I've renewed my connection with Japanese consumer electronics culture, however tenuously. Maybe the next time I come over here I can work out a long layover, go to the Akihabara, and emerge 18 hours later, encrusted in the latest gear.

Besides, if a silicon exoskeleton is good enough for mollusks, it should be good enough for me.