i can't stop now

This is the view of Route 25 as taken by my cell phone from a pedestrian bridge somewhere in-between Daikokucho and Imamiya. The direction I am facing in the photograph is, sadly, the only worthwhile direction to go from where I live; to the south is Shin-Imamiya, often considered one of the few dangerous places in Japan (and most definitely one of the more depressing.) To the east and west appears to lie absolutely nothing. I have walked for a while in both directions and there was nothing to be found for my troubles except run down apartment buildings and storefronts that hadn't been touched in years.

To the north, though... a mile or so north of that photo's vantage point is Namba, where Osaka seems to come alive. I plan on doing a huge pictorial tour of Namba at some point, as it is, perhaps, one of the craziest places in Japan (let alone Osaka!), but that will have to wait until another time.

( The search for familiarity, in photographic form. )

Speaking of which, today I caught a glimpse of myself in the mirror at 7-11 and was actually really surprised by what I saw. I've mentioned a few times on here that I've been losing weight for last year or so, but despite the fact that, mentally, I know I look different, I'm so used to seeing myself that I only rarely actually realize it. I'm not putting a value on it, because I don't think the aesthetic results of weight loss are actually that important (in fact, people who put too much emphasis on that make me viciously angry), but it is fairly interesting to me to just see how different one person can look over the course of a year.

If anyone cares, here is a picture of me from about a year ago. I wanted to take a good picture for comparison purposes, but my apartment is too small and crowded to find a good place for my camera that wasn't awkward, but here's a very badly taken picture of me standing on my bed making a stupid face. Apparently I am going to eternally rock the hairbands, though.

I am so bored. What should I eat for dinner? Slop from Yoshinoya, or slop from Matsuya? It's all the same to me. x.x