What you'll find on Storybook Days

The Home page displays all my musings on life in Japan and a few other things (baseball and children's books are distinct possibilities). For highlights only: "A Day in the Life (edited)." "Tabemono (Food)" is exactly that. "Big in Japan" is my completely biased and oversimplified list of what is popular in Japan, and "Kimono Count" is a day-by-day record of the people I see in traditional dress. "Editor's Delight" catalogs the unintentionally amusing and apparently quite complicated world of Japanese-English translation. "Uncle Tucker" tracks our sightings of a certain cat following us around Japan.

Uncle Tucker

Not long after we arrived in Tokyo, we realized we were being followed.  Apparently "Uncle Tucker" (as we've named him) has been assigned to follow us around Japan and report back on our every move.  We first saw him at a neko café.


Then at the Asakusa (pronounced Asaksa) market in Tokyo.  You can see he is in disguise, but we were not fooled.  Not for a minute:


Then in Kyoto at the Nishiki Market.  Also in disguise (same tie, but clearly he's dyed his fur and is hawking seafood):


Perhaps most disturbing, he popped up in a souvenir shop in Hakone while we were sightseeing.  Sure, he looks all happy and friendly here (and back to his usual black, white and gray, but don't be fooled.  He's menacing:


What's worse is that now he thinks it's okay to bring his friends along.  We are now victims of full-on intimidation, and it is becoming hard to sleep at night:




I find this last guy particularly unsettling.  An undercover agent disguised as a cat disguised as a guinea pig.









We tried to get away with a trip to Nikko for the weekend.  Just as we thought we were finally free of Uncle Tucker's watchful eye, we encountered another agent.  He was not happy with our attempts to evade surveillance:


UPDATE:  Last weekend (7/14/12) we returned to Café Jalala, the nekko café where we first saw Uncle Tucker.  Guess what?  HE WAS GONE.  Vanished.  Further proof that he is out and about and keeping tabs on us.  Damn cat.
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