Isn’t this absolutely incredible? I found this in NewScientist, and it is a short article about how spider-trees like the one in the picture above actually prevents malaria. That tree looks unreal.

I remember when I was about 10 or so, I used to love these two songs by Hélène Rollès. I had completely forgotten about these songs, until we had a conversation last night about the very first songs you used to like in your childhood. I did a pretty random youtube search, I couldn’t even remember her name, but I actually found the songs. I remember forcing my mother to buy me one of her CD’s. God, they are so sappy, but still … it was kind of nice to hear them again!

I have been woken up 3 days in a row with earthquakes as a make-shift alarm clock. It is funny how you almost get used to the unusual. In other news, Nakano-ku is beautiful this time of year! Even though I live here, I rarely walk around Nakano. I guess since Shinjuku is so close, I always tend to go to Shinjuku instead of walking around my neighborhood.

I love all of the cute small streets filled with stores and whatnot.

Beautiful sunset! I want to buy sakura like that myself and decorate the rooms, but I am not sure if they still sell them. Everything in Japan is so incredibly seasonal, they will have something for sale for two weeks, and then the “season” is over, and it will not be for sale until next year.

And then I bought these, aren’t they pretty?

Coffee shop table lined up with stuff for the perfect afternoon coffee.

Apart from the coffee. I miss good coffee like crazy. The coffee from most chains in Japan taste like overheated milk and sour espresso. They also do not even make the coffee themselves, they just put the cup under the machine and push a button. This happens in both ChocoCro and Dotour. Starbucks actually make the coffee, but they still overheat the milk. Mah, I shouldn’t complain at all, it was a beautiful day and I am just spoiled when I demand better coffee.

I had this for dinner a few night ago. It was really good. The small fish are filled with roe, and on the package it says they are from Norway. I was wondering if anyone in Norway has ever eaten a fish like this? I have never seen them for sale when I was living in Norway, so I was wondering if it was one of those fish that is only exported to Japan, and not consumed in Norway at all? They are between 10 – 13 cm long, and you just grill them in the oven, and you eat the entire thing, including the head.

Quite a while back I drew these flower patterns, and I made them into a PS brush set, so I thought I would upload for others to download. (I have quite a few brush sets and PS actions, so if people are interested in them I will upload more.) Among other things, I made these postcards quite a while back: Flowered.

I decided to make an account on deviantart just to save a little bit of bandwidth and space here on the blog. I am not a big fan of deviantart (even thought I used to have an account back there from 2001! I will not upload art to this deviantart account, but I thought I would use it to upload resources.) To download the brushes, you can click the picture above.

The rules for using these brushes are simple:
– The brushes are free for non-commercial use.
– A link back to sushibird.com if you use these brushes is much appreciated.
– You may not redistribute these brushes elsewhere.
– Feel free to post a link to your work if you have used these brushes.

Hope you like them!

I am not sure if it is me or the camera or whatnot, but it has gotten ridiculously harder to take a decent picture of myself as the years have passed. I used to take a lot of selfs when I was a bit younger, but something looks a bit off lately… I can not tell if it is the facial structure itself that has changed (at such a slow pace that I have failed to notice), or if it is simply lack of practice or interest. Taking decent pictures of myself when I was younger did wonders to my self-confidence, but I just can not seem to get much out of it anymore.

In other news, it is the time of year where everyone is rethinking their future, what to do with their lives, and I am no exception. Listening to Serge Gainsbourg and drinking cheap red wine, I think I have finally figured out what I want. Maybe it is true as they say – there are only two problems in life, not knowing how to get what you want, or not knowing what you want. The latter has by far always been my biggest obstacle.

I am not a big fan of monotheistic religion and its worship, so walking into different Shinto and Buddhist shrines and temples always feels very different to me than walking on other holy ground like churches and mosques. Instead of feeling pressured down, I feel like I am walking into some kind of wonderland. It is quiet, but the good kind of quiet, and going up and tossing in 5 yen to Kamisama in the box and praying or wishing for something to come true reminds me of my childhood when we used to toss a coin into the wishing well.

Isn’t this just gorgeous? Hanami-season is my absolute favorite time of year, and I just snapped these when I was in a hurry to get to school the other day. I will be back with more pictures of the cherry blossoms really soon, but wow, it just makes me so happy to walk down the street and see this. Everything feels lighter and warmer and I am just really happy.

Before school started up, I took a small walk around my neighbourhood, and I found a cute little bike.

And in the middle of the street there was a little shrine.

These boards come up every now and again, and I am not sure what they are for, but I think it is for some kind of election?

Another little shrine in the middle of the street.

And more fancy names of buildings. Yesterday I saw a building called レベール – Rebeeru. Level? Rebel? I am not really sure.

I actually used my macro lens (105mm Nikkor 2.8) for the first time in ages. My new camera doesn’t have autofocus for the old lenses without VR, so it is manual focus all the way. I used to think it was fun with manual focus, but nowdays I guess I have turned more into a point-and-shoot-girl.