Hey, folks, I hope you don’t mind if I take a break from my wackadilly Japanese adventures to bring you a little rambling about the Christmas season. Longtime fans will recall there was no Christmas rambling last year, as I was still embroiled in recounting my Vancouver adventures. My stars, that seems so long ago now. One year ago, I was still in shock at the biggest trip I had ever taken in my life, which was a measly hour-and-a-half flight to the coast. Now, I live and work in a foreign country, and I take it all as the norm. Sadly, there are some things I have to learn to live without. For example, there are no Cool Ranch Doritos in Japan. So, as I write this, I’m munching on my sister’s Christmas gift…a bag of Cool Ranch Doritos. I guess the one thing that you can appreciate about being in a foreign country is that you become cheap to shop for.