Japan's Dating Services Extremely Short of Eligible Men?! - Prearranged Marriages Making a Comeback in Japan!?

Yesterday I had a meeting with a couple of the top executives from Recruit corporation of Japan. One of the guys is the president of a Recruit subsidiary company. He introduced me to a young guy who he said is one of their top salesmen.

(Gratuitous use of cheesecake photo) Whatever she's selling, I'm buying!

Recruit is one of the biggest and most famous companies in Japan and specializes in Human Resources and job searches. If you go to any train, or subway station, in Japan you'll see tons of free magazines and papers. It's a pretty sure bet that most of those are Recruit owned publications.


For the fiscal year ending in March 2011, Recruit had over $97 million (USD) in annual sales (which is a 30% drop from the year earlier) so "one of their top salesmen" is making tons of money for them and is no joke. The guy is now being groomed for a top management position. So he was brought to our meeting to see how to steal our information.


He was telling me that, in one of their profitable businesses, dating services and online dating, there is a huge shortage of available men! I was dumbfounded.

Girls like this are having trouble getting guys to their parties???

He said that, "...at most events there will be about 300 people. Seventy percent are women. Sometimes the breakdown of percentages is so bad that I had to go and participate as one of the eligible men..." WTF!!!????


Actually, it is okay that he participated as an eligible bachelor because he's not married (hell, I'd be stoked if a top salesman at Recruit married my daughter! The guy makes huge bucks!) but it really surprises me that they can't get enough men to join these dating parties! He also told me that they've been trying all sorts of promotions to get more men and that it was one of the biggest challenges to that businesses' future success.


A room full of beautiful and available Japanese girls and they can't get enough men to come to the party? You kiddin' me? I thought he must have been joking or that was a temporary problem but it isn't it seems.

Yes. Marriage should be a deeply religious experience... Holy!

Seriously, guys, Japanese women are having a problem finding enough eligible and suitable men to get hitched to. Unreal! This country has so many beautiful and sexy women that it's hard to comprehend but true! 

Need proof? Well, I have it for you. It seems that the old Japanese tradition of pre-arranged marriages has made a comeback and that's okay with me. Why? Well, my third marriage was arranged! Really! I was so drunk all the time back then that don't know how my marriage got arranged but my wife just told me where to be at what time. And when I got there, it was all set up.

The Telegraph UK has a report about the comeback of these marriages in Arranged Marriages Make a Comeback in Japan:

Until 1945 they were almost universal. They started to decline during the post war American occupation, but as late as 1960 it is estimated that 70 per cent of weddings were arranged. 

Westernisation and the increasing independence of women led to a marked decline. By 1990 the proportion of arranged marriages is thought to have fallen to around 30 per cent of the total.

But things changed in the after a swathe of the country was devastated by the tsunami and earthquake.

"People felt so lonely in the big cities," said Sasaki Akiko, a tour guide. "After the earthquake, there was no public transportation and people had to walk up to 10 hours to get home." It was a time for reflection. "Many felt that if they died nobody would care, so they thought they should marry." With arranged marriages back up to 40 per cent, business has been brisk for photo studios, who prepare the portfolios which are shown to potential suitors.

Women pose in a kimono and also in informal attire; men wear a suit and tie as well as dressing down for the other picture. Anxious parents then circulate the portfolio, which also sets out the youngsters' interests and prospects, to work colleagues, friends and neighbors. Once a meeting is arranged the couple are normally accompanied by their mothers who act as chaperones.

Polite small talk is the order of the day. Afterwards it is a case of comparing notes to see if there are grounds for pursuing matters further.

At this point a professional go-between could get involved although they are scarcer now than a few decades ago.

Arranged marriages may appear anathema to westerners but, according to Ms Akiko, the divorce rate is lower than that for more modern partnerships.

"With an arranged marriage, you go into it with both eyes open, with love you always have one eye closed."

Seriously. Only in Japan, eh? This isn't the first time that I've heard that the divorce rate for prearranged marriages is lower than regular marriages, but wow!


My two older daughters aren't married... Maybe if they don't get married by 35, daddy (that's me) will have to arrange marriage for them...


I wonder if that Recruit salesman will still be available in a few years? He would be a great candidate... After all, it would be nice to have someone in the family who is making some money... Daddy (that's me) certainly isn't!

Facebook Loss of Privacy Really Out of Hand! Woman finds her husband has another wife on Facebook!

"Facebook says, 'Privacy is theft,' because they're selling your lack of privacy to the advertisers who might show up one day." - Jaron Lanier

Well, the articles that will make one really want to start thinking about deleting their Facebook account are coming hard and fast. This time, a married woman finds out her husband has another wife through Facebook!

The same thing happened in the sixties! Just that word got out a different way.

What did I tell you about idiots putting too much information up on the internet and Facebook? Like that lady who killed the endangered species polar bear then placed the phot up on the Internet for everyone to see? Talk about dumb! This guy might even be worse!


Washington radio station WLFI reports:

Facebook 'friend' offer exposes man's other wife

TACOMA, Wash. (AP) — Facebook's automatic efforts to connect user through "friends" they may know recently led two Washington women to find out they were married to the same man, at the same time.

That led to the man, corrections officer Alan L. O'Neill, being slapped with bigamy charges.

According to charging documents filed Thursday, O'Neill married a woman in 2001, moved out in 2009, changed his name and remarried without divorcing her. The first wife first noticed O'Neill had moved on to another woman when Facebook suggested the friendship connection to wife No. 2 under the "People You May Know" feature.

"Wife No. 1 went to wife No. 2's page and saw a picture of her and her husband with a wedding cake," said Pierce County Prosecutor Mark Lindquist told The Associated Press.

If that were my spouse? Why, yes! I would politely inquire what this was all about!

Wife No. 1 then called the defendant's mother.

"An hour later the defendant arrived at (Wife No. 1's) apartment, and she asked him several times if they were divorced," court records show. "The defendant said, 'No, we are still married.'"

Neither O'Neill nor his first wife had filed for divorce, according to charging documents. The name change came in December, and later that month he married his second wife.

O'Neill allegedly told Wife No. 1 not to tell anybody about his dual marriages, that he would fix it, the documents state. But wife No. 1 alerted authorities.

"Facebook is now some place where people discover things about each other that end up reporting that to law enforcement," Lindquist said.

O'Neill, 41, was previously known at Alan Fulk. He has worked as a Pierce County corrections officer for five years, sheriff's spokesman Ed Troyer said. He was placed on administrative leave after prosecutors charged him Thursday. He could face up to a year in jail if convicted.

His name is Alan Fulk? Well, I guess he Fulked up! Yuk! Yuk! Yuk!

Junior high school grade jokes aside, I think one year in jail is far too severe. This guy obviously has some sort of mental problem as one has to wonder, "Why in the world would he want two wives? Isn't one enough trouble as it is?" As Jerry Lee Lewis would counter: "Well, since I wasn't really married to my first wife then I didn't need a divorce!" Or some sort of twisted logic like that...

Seriously, I predict that something is going to come along that is like Facebook excepting it is more protective of your privacy (a friend recommended "Anonymousbook") and also really confines who your "friends" can be. 

Facebook spreads a much too broad of a net. There's got to be something very wrong with a site that gives away all your private information to 5,000 people, or more so easily.

Think I could start a "FREE ALAN FULK" scam charity like Kony 2012 and pay myself massive bonuses too?

What Did I Tell You? Ayumi Hamasaki Gets a Divorce

I predicted it. It barely lasted a year. In fact, they didn't even really live together. Ayumi Hamasaki and the Big Lebowski have filed for divorce. Actually, it might seem crass that I laugh about a divorce (forgive me) but this is a celebrity divorce and, frankly speaking, it never really struck me as a sincere marriage anyway.


But, then again, who am I to judge? I am divorced twice! That shows what a total hypocritical loser I am.

Anime News Network has the story:


Singer Ayumi Hamasaki announced on her official fan club site "Team Ayu" on Tuesday that she is getting divorced from Manuel Schwarz, an Austrian actor. She is filing for the divorce in America on Monday (which would be Tuesday in Japan). The two had gotten married in a Las Vegas chapel on New Year's Day last year.

Hamasaki performed theme songs for Inuyasha, Connected, and SHINOBI - Heart Under Blade, and she voice-acted as Yuri Sakazaki in Art of Fighting (Battle Spirits Ryuko no Ken).

Well, I predicted it because, well, it was predictable.


Hopefully these two people will find their soul mates someday.

Vacation is a State of Mind - How to Get The Truly Wonderful Things in Life

"Vacation used to be a luxury, but in today's world it is a necessity." - Unknown 

Japan sure has a lot of holidays. I like that about Japan. I mean, who doesn't like holidays? "Holiday" means that it is time to spend away from work and with family. 


Too bad not enough people take advantage of that.


It's a Saturday and the start of a three-day weekend here in Japan. I hope that I can take this holiday and use it to rest more and spend more time with my son and other children.... 


I shouldn't say "hope. I should say, "I will." I must have the state of mind that "I do" and not "I hope." 


"I hope" is a pretty terrible business plan. 

Barbecuing trout that we caught fishing near Atsugi

This post is for you good folks with children. Everyone who has children thinks, "Our children grow up so fast." But I think, more often than not, that's where the thinking stops. We should add to that thinking, "How can I add to what little time I have left with these kids?" We must always remember to stop and smell the roses along the way.


My son is now 8-years-old. Why, just the other day, it seems, he was a baby.


Heck, it seems just like yesterday, he was born. I can remember it well. He was born at about 2:30 in the morning at a hospital in Tokyo. My wife's parents were both there. My son being born was a big deal for them as he is the first and only boy in the entire family. Everyone else has had girls. Being "number one son" is a very important and traditional role in Asian societies.


I remember after he was just born, for about the first two years of his life, I would take him in the stroller for walks everyday that wasn't too cold or raining and go to the park and back. It was about a one hour walk, round trip. Starting when he was 6 months old, until he was six-years-old, I would go to bed with him at night, every night, and we would read books together. I like to think that's why he is such an advanced reader. He had read the children's classic "Charlotte's Web" by the time he was 4 years old. I did that religiously until he entered into first grade.


Within three months of first grade, he was jumped up to second grade and his school work load increased and, with that, time with dad decreased. That was almost two years ago. Now, he is in 3rd grade at school. 


Everyone has memories like this about their kids too. 

My son and second daughter, Sheena

Now I look at him and I just sigh. He will soon be nine. He has his own iPad, computer, friends at school... He goes to Karate class, takes music and piano lessons and spends time with friends. Heck, he has an hour or more of homework every night and piano practice too! Sure, he still likes to spend time with mom and dad, but I know from experience that, from 4th grade, kids really start to spread their wings and will, little by little, stop spending so much time with mom and dad. 


Time goes by so fast.


One thing that I saw in his room last night that made me chuckle and remember my own experiences as a child and times with my own father, rest in peace, was a book that he had checked out from the school library. It was entitled "How to Beat Your Dad at Chess." I picked the book up and laughed. Surely, beating your dad at chess is a mountain to climb when you are a boy. Once you do it, you will see other mountains to climb. But this book shows that still dad is #1... But not for long. 

I write this blog post now because I want to stress to you fathers out there and remind you that, even though Christmas just ended and the New Year's Holidays are over, that doesn't mean that we should go back to "business as usual." Yes, of course we must work and feed our families, but isn't it also a good time to access what we have and to try to appreciate it more?

Isn't it a good time to slow down and to try to enjoy what we have while we have it?

Yesterday, I met a friend at the grocery store whom I hadn't seen for quite a while. We exchanged pleasantries and he asked about my work and I asked about his. The part of the conversation that really stuck in my mind was his final comment,

"At least we both have jobs. I know a lot of people who are out of work." Come to think of it, I reckon that I do too. We are lucky, we have jobs and we have families.

I know, though, far too many fathers who are chasing the all mighty dollar and exchanging their time with their families for money. I don't mean some of their time, I mean all of their time. I know fathers who are away from their families for months, even years. I think they have lost sight of the purpose of work. 

In Japan, we have what is called "Tanshin Funin." Father's are transferred away from their families and miss out on seeing their children grow up. I even know one family where the father lived away for over ten years! Does it surprise dear reader that, ultimately, those parents divorced?

I'd never do that. While I might transfer for a few months or maybe six, I quit I'd quit my job instead of living away from my family on a semi-permanent basis. Why? Heck, the kids are only children once. What is the price of missing out on seeing them and growing with them?

Of course, the example above is an extreme case, but how many of us dads leave for work from early in the morning and do not come home until after the kids are asleep and we do that six days a week? On Sundays, we are so dead tired that we sleep all day? How is that enjoying life and spending time with the kids? 

What do we work for? We work to feed and house our families so that they can be happy. How can a family truly be happy without the father around to enjoy all the fruits life gives us daily?

I have often written about how I write down my goals for life and for that day in my notebook. I do it religiously everyday. I have written before about that One Step to Becoming a Better Parent and More Successful in Life:

I write down my goals every day religiously in the morning when I wake up and, not only does doing so help me to achieve them, it also helps me to relax and stay much more focused through the day. Who doesn't want to stay more focused in this day and age when our "in-box" includes, for most people, several e-mail accounts that are constantly filling up as the day goes by and consistently altering our priorities? Add on an Internet world filled with Social Media like Facebook and Linkedin accounts to attend? Twitter is no longer for just sending messages to your friends, but it too, has been co-opted into the business world and your boss orders you to use them, or blogs and SNS, to get the company message out...

How in the world can anyone today get ahead of the pile in the "in-box"? Any person in their right mind would be stressed.

.....let me point out that writing down your goals and purposes is like having a sort of road map to where you want to go. When you write them down, they enter your subconsciousness and they cause your inner brain to focus upon the Law of Attraction. If you do not write down where you want to go — if you do not have a map — then how will you know where you are going?

I recently have started writing down two more things in my daily notes. I wouldn't call them "goals" necessarily, but in the effort to create the "Law of Attraction," I write them down to try to make sure they come true. Those two goals are:

1) Thank you god for all the wonderful things I have and all the truly wonderful things I am about to receive.

2) All my loved ones are healthy and prosper.

From today, I think I am again going to add something more:

3) I spend one hour today with my son playing a game or reading a book together.

Dads (and working moms) remember that family fun and spirit of Christmas you had the other day? Remember the warmth and feeling of "family" when you share time together? Isn't there a song that says, "I wish everyday could be like Christmas?" Of course, we have jobs to do and bills to pay, but remember over this weekend and at every chance you get with your kids to make those moments special. 

Like I said, I know everyone is busy, so lastly, here's a quick tip to help you:

Trying to spend more time with your kids is tough, but here's a simple way to do that better. Here is a good way to better the time that you do spend together and it's so simple, if even for only a few moments a day: 


Whenever your child talks to you give them your total attention; put down that newspaper or cellphone; Close the computer laptop. Look them straight in the eye and show complete interest in what they say when they are talking. Give your child your total self and complete undivided attention. Give them your all. Listen - really listen - to what your child has to say.

Show your child that you love them and respect them. As I wrote in Most Men Die With Regrets:

Share time now with your children because now isn't coming back ever again. Give your child a hug and spend time with them while you can.

The future is coming sooner than you can imagine. Don't kid yourself. No matter how much time you spend with your children, one day, you'll wish you had spent more. Do it now. 

Today is the start of a wonderful weekend. Start making great memories and spending more time with your children today.


NOTE: Lastly to help you more appreciate what we have, please enjoy this wonderful short video sent to me by my dear friend Paul Kitabayashi. It brought a tear to my eye.

Have a wonderful weekend!

Killing Butterflies (and Suffocating the One You Love)

To my lovely dear daughter, Sheena....


I'd like to talk to you all about why people take things of beauty and destroy them by putting them in cages.


When I was a 7 or 8 year old boy, a second-grader, and living in the country in Minnesota, my school class gave us the assignment to capture butterflies and bring them to school for some sort of Science class experiment. 


One of the neighborhood girls, and a classmate of mine, Paula Nelson, and I went out to capture butterflies together. Paula was a nice girl but I didn't have a crush on her like I did with some of the other girls in class.


While chasing butterflies together, we spied a large yellow beauty fluttering about the roof of my house. The butterfly lit upon the rain drainage pipes. I gathered a ladder and started to climb up in order to capture the butterfly with my net.

As I climbed, Paula started chanting, "Mike! You can do it! You can do it!" I began to swell with pride and because of this cheering began to to develop a real liking for Paula... 


Everyone wants to feel important and Paula did that for me at the time. I will never forget how I felt at that moment. Someone was truly cheering for me! I was so happy! Even though I was but a small boy, I will never forget Paula for making me feel so good about myself. I have thought about her many times over the years. I hope she found a true soul-mate and is truly happy! Thank you Paula!


In a way, capturing a butterfly and making it "mine" is also a way for children to increase their personal worth and add to their lives "treasures."


But I digress...


I neared the butterfly slowly and took up my net. Paula continued chanting. I swatted my net down upon the beautiful butterfly and... It escaped and fluttered away.


I felt defeated for a moment and felt that I had let Paula down.


A few days later, back at school, I viewed all the captured butterflies the other children brought into the classroom laying dead, side by side, in a row. Some kids had very many of them. I had failed to catch even one. As I viewed the butterflies, it dawned on me that dead butterflies were not beautiful but were actually trash.


All those wings of grace and color and dreams lying there were like a pile of old and dirty crayons: cold, lifeless and used up. Of no use to anyone or anything.  


Simply garbage.

The butterflies flying in the blue skies are actually a miracle of grace and give us, children and adults, dreams... Dreams of flying over the mountains and clouds. Dreams of being who we've always wanted to be! 


The butterflies laying still and lifeless in a cage give us death and dispair. 


For the first time in my life, I was glad that I didn't catch any of those poor butterflies. I wished I had had a time machine and could help all those dead butterflies go back in time where I could have prevented their capture and set them free.


I will never forget that experience.


When my lovely second daughter, Sheena, was a small girl of seven and a second-grader, she and her friends had some nets and were out catching butterflies in the neighborhood near Yokohama. To my great surprise they caught a very many of them and put them in a plastic, see-through clear box that had holes in the top. Even though the box was designed for insects, the holes were so small the butterflies suffocated and died....


The children had so merry a time a capturing these creatures... They were so happy that they brought the butterflies to me for my approval. But I didn't approve. The memories of my time as a child and seeing all those dead butterflies came racing back to me.


I foolishly got angry at the small children.


"These poor butterflies are beautiful and a gift from God when they are flying free. But now that you've captured them, they have died a terrible death in a box. Dead and lifeless they are not beautiful to anyone anymore. They are merely trash to be thrown away. Please, dear children, don't take these beautiful creatures and capture them. They are only beautful if they are flying free."


I learned that lesson as a small child. I was hoping that these small children would learn it too...


I was reminded again of that lesson again last night.


A beautiful girl, with dreams and visions all her own, marries... Then the husband takes her away and puts her in a cage where she suffocates.


In the cage she suffers, cannot breathe, begins to lose herself and is, of course, extremely unhappy.

The husband thinks he loves her and so he captures her and puts her away... He puts her into a cage where she languishes and eventually will become resentful and will whither and die...

Is that what the husband really wants? Does he think that this situation is really what's best for his happiness too?

When you stop to think about it, if he truly loved her, he'd make her happy and set her free. Everyone desperately desires freedom.

Why do so many men never grow out of their childhood phase?

True love between two people will come from a sympathy for each other and putting the other's feelings first... How could putting one in a cage possibly do anything but create a feeling of resentment and start tearing down the dream that was the intention at the start?

When my daughter was a small girl, she refused to come and sit with her grandfather. "Why won't she sit on my lap?" The grandfather complained to me!

I told him, "Because, when she wants to get up and go play, you won't allow her too. You hold her down so she can't leave. Let her come and go freely as she pleases and wishes to do and then, and only then, will she sit willingly on your lap." 

He followed my advice and she willingly began sitting on his lap again.

Men! Do not destroy that what you love! Do not strangle that which you want to grow. Do not destroy, hold, capture and cage!

Women! Life is short! The cage once closed is rarely opened again. If it does crack open, for even a bit, dash and make yourselves free while you can! For the chance to do so disappears as your youth and energy dissipates! Do not allow yourselves to be captured and caged! If you are caged, then set yourselves free! 

Men and women! Be free. You can be free and still share the love! Share the love every moment of everyday even when you are apart! Always understand and feel sympathy for each other. Life is short, we all have much suffering to go through. Let us not be the cause of more suffering for each other.

Life is bad enough without have those who supposedly love us being the source of our misery. Life is bad enough without those, who supposedly love us and want to care for us, putting us in a cage. 


Share. Respect. Set free! In this way, and this way only, can you build the one and only true love.


For Sheena, Julie, Wendy and Asami....

Admit the Worst Thing You've Ever Done and Be Happy

Most people have done some pretty bad things in their lives. Most people wouldn't admit the bad things they've done. I think that most people wouldn't believe the terrible and sick and pathetic things others have done in their lives before - all the while not wanting to admit their own evil deeds... 


But those admissions make great reading. 


Unless, of course, you are like someones prudish grandmother. In that case, tales of hair raising schemes and being chased by the police will just cause shock and disgust. Stories like that, when told to prudish "church-lady-types," are kind of like when W.C. Fields asked the old bitties who complained about his behavior, 


"Do any of you ladies have any empty gin bottles?" 


To which the insulted women replied, "Do we look like we drink gin?"


And W.C. Fields retorted, "OK, then. Do you have any empty vinegar bottles?"

W. C. Fields: "Don't say you can't swear off drinking. 

I've done it a thousand times."

I've done some pretty bad things in my life that I am ashamed of telling anyone. But today, for some reason, I've decided to admit some stuff because I feel that things aren't going as well as they should so maybe I need to get this stuff off of my shoulders. Think of this article as a sort of catharsis for Mike Rogers today.


I've done at least several very stupid things so far in my life that I have only admitted to just a few people because they are embarrassing. They are so embarrassing and so dumb that I've been reluctant to admit them before. 


Not that I didn't want to. I do want to admit my wrongs.  Why? Because I don't think you can be truly happy unless you admit your wrongs and your shortcomings and then move forward. Don't Catholics and Christians think this way, too? Aren't we supposed to ask for forgiveness?


Aren't we supposed to love ourselves first?


Not admitting bad things you have done is having skeletons in the closet. Maybe I am anal retentive, but I don't want any skeletons.


That's why I write a blog. I've been writing a blog, or writing for another blog, for nearly 8 years now. That's a pretty long time as far as blogger lifetimes go, I reckon.


I like writing these blogs and these blogs posts because they allow me to spill my guts and cleanse my soul. It's sort of like confession sometimes and I get to admit some of the bad things I've done to people before in an attempt to clear my conscious and, perhaps, start from a clean slate.


I've posted to this blog and others about stupid things I did and some of the bad things that happened to me. You know, they say "What goes around comes around!" So, I figure that if I tell the truth and admit my wrongs and shortcomings then good things will come back to me. It's worth the risk, no?


So, don't think I'm being magnanimous in admitting my wrongs. It's actually selfish. If I admit my wrongs, then maybe so many bad things won't happen to me or my family and friends. 


Or are these thoughts that I have the thoughts of someone suffering from delusions of grandeur?


All of us have things we'd like to hide. Especially if we are looking for a job.


Have you ever had the police pointing guns at your head and yelling for you to get down on the ground? I have. More than once. The first time I was only 17-years-old. Have you ever been arrested? I have. More than once. But I have never been convicted of a crime and have no criminal record (so don't tell me that there's no God!) I was never a criminal, per se, never stole anything or shoplifted or robbed or beat anyone or anything like what goes on today.... I was a prankster... My calling card was hijinks and playing tricks on people.


Have you ever drank so much that you couldn't walk? I have. Far too many times to count. I used to like drinking myself nearly blind. If you don't believe me, ask my friends. I'd get so drunk I couldn't hardly stand up (and being so drunk once that I actually forgot my own then 5-year-old like a piece of discarded luggage when I got off the train and walked away).


How about getting divorced twice and married three times? Yeah. Been there, done that. 


In Japan, a very conservative and proper society, people who have these experiences will usually never admit them publicly. I used to host a very popular FM radio show and admitted these things freely. That garnered me lots of fans. I even admitted to going into drug rehabilitation on the radio before and that in a country that will lock you up for possessing even a minuscule amount of marijuana. That was a shocker. The program's ratings skyrocketed.


The ratings skyrocketed because I believe that people were ready to hear from someone who wasn't perfect and had all the same flaws they did (I don't have perfect pearly white teeth, slicked back hair and a pink cadillac either).


My 5 weeks in drug rehab happened in the late nineties. Thanks to that experience, and my wife saving my life, I've been off drugs with no desire to do that ever again... Though I will admit that, looking back, drug rehab was a lot of fun and I met some of the wildest people there. 


Please refer to Drug Rehab for George from Lew Rockwell:

Like the time I put myself into drug rehabilitation for speed addiction. The little voice was right about interning myself — I just about had no choice. But darned if that little guy didn't change his mind and start telling me to plan an escape within the first few days of being there; Which is it? Get high or stay straight, make up your mind, will you?

Everyone else who found themselves trapped in drug rehab seemed to be hearing voices too. One day a guy, I'll call him "George," (not his real name) came up to me while I was secretly planning on tunneling out of the hospital complex using a tea-spoon I had stolen from the cafeteria to dig through concrete floor — à la that World War II movie The Great Escape (The little voice was also playing the theme song from that movie in my head for special effect). George sat down next to me, looked around to see if anyone was spying on us and then he whispered, "Are you a foreigner?" Sheesh! Duh! This is Japan. Do I look like a foreigner? I answered, "Yes." He said, "I thought so." He looked around again and then he went on to explain to me how he spoke to God and that a scar — shaped like a star — on middle of his forehead proved that he was the Chosen One. Well, he did have weird star shaped scar on his head and it's not often that I get to meet the second coming of Christ so I listened in. He explained that they had him interned because he knew too much — and had too much power. I would find out later that they interned him because his mom put him in there. It seems that he would wake up in the mornings and pour Vodka straight onto his cornflakes and eat that for breakfast and then not go to school — Funny that. I guess he'd been doing this since he was in 5^th grade. When I met him in the hospital he was 18 or so.

Later on George explained to me that, even though they had never met, the heavy metal rock band Mettalica had written a song about him. I think the song title was Master of Puppets (makes sense). The song was something about George being the second — or would it be the third — I didn't bother to ask — coming of Christ. I told George that if he really were The Chosen One, then he could just wiggle his nose like Samantha in Bewitched (Even though I liked I Dream of Jeannie better) and get us out of there. But he couldn't do it. Damn! And I had my hopes up there for a minute, too. You know, usually I'm a pretty good judge of character, but George had me fooled. What a big liar. Oh well, back to the spoon escape plan, I thought.

Now, a lot of you folks reading this might think, "Why did Mike sit there and listen to this nutcase?" And I might have to agree. But let me defend myself by saying that I was in a hospital full of screw-balls, so George's conversation was just as interesting — if not more than — anyone else's. I had nowhere to go, so I'd listen intently on what George would have to say and usually wound up thinking the same thing over and over, "How in the world did I wind up in this hospital full of these crazy people? Get me out of here!"

That was over 14 years ago. I don't do drugs anymore. There's no way in the world I'm ever going back to play my part as Jack Nicholson in One Flew Over The Cuckoo's Nest again. By the way, at least the hospital in the Nicholson movie had background music playing all the time. Mine didn't, yet we still had two or three people dancing all day in the hallway all the time.

The other reason I don't do drugs anymore is that drugs make you forget what you were doing. It was quite a shock one-day when my then 12-year-old daughter walked up to me holding my speed pipe and said "Daddy? What's this?" "It's my, er, asthma medicine, Stay away from it." 

I know she didn't believe me.

But even though rehab-hospital was a living hell, I'm glad I went to that hospital. You know why? Well, at the time I hated it. But now, looking back, it was a great (and funny memory) — but never again. 

The other thing about it that I am thankful for is that I was put through a rigorous method to break my addiction at the most famous rehab hospital in all of Asia — Matsumoto Clinic. And I did it. The doctor told me leaving Matsumoto and never returning was as tough as getting into the world famous Tokyo University and graduating. He said that the chance of retuning to drug rehab was about 96% for first-timers. If they re-enter after the first time, the chances for a full recovery are 1 in 10,000. Three times in and out of drug rehab means that the patient will usually spend the rest of their lives going in and out of the hospital (usually in secret). So now you know where guys like Rush Limbaugh most probably go when they claim to be "on vacation."


....I never went back, even once.

I hope that the above passage doesn't shock dear reader too much. There's lots more about that place that I will write about someday. Also, someday I will work up the courage to write about events leading up to drug rehab that will really blow your mind...

Like the time I rode my motorcycle ala Hell's Angels through the double front glass doors at a big building in the middle of the night and revved the engine in the lobby as I sat upon the bike waking up the entire neighborhood.

But not today. I'm saving that one up for a movie script.

1/2 of my reason for living... I see that I need to 

take a photo with all 4 of my kids and us together too!

I'm not perfect, and neither are you. None of us are. That's why we need to ask for forgiveness from our god and from our loved ones. We've all done stupid things and made mistakes. We've all done things we regret and hurt people we loved... Every time I do this, I feel better about myself and more positive about me and my life.

Admitting these things, like an alcoholic admitting that they have a drinking problem, is the first step towards a cure. And that first step is the first step towards true happiness.

Pray or meditate for a moment on a past wrong. Give a friend or a loved one a hug or a phone call and say, "Remember the time?...." and ask forgiveness. 

Today is a wonderful day. Like a butterfly emerging from a cocoon, you can spread your wings and shed some weight from your shoulders but just being honest and open and saying "sorry" (if even just to yourself).    

It's an easy way to spread love, share the light and to sooth the mortal soul.