Karaoke, with hats!

One of the most economically entertaining places I have ever been in my life is a “super arcade” near my friend Nick’s apartment. The place is called “JJ club”, but a more accurate translation would be “Chuck-E Cheese For Grownups” (*) Not only are these people nice enough to let you register your name as anything you want (say, “Barento Pimpo” for example), you can also play a ton of crazy video games, use batting cages, kick soccer balls at targets, check your email, read comics (in Japanese, sadly), FISH indoors and even sing karaoke. Best of all, EVERYTHING there is included for your hourly fee (I think its about 400 yen for each hour, or you can go all night for 1500 yen ($15). All the games are on free mode, and even the beer is only 300 yen. So, basically, it’s a wicked awesome fun time for less than the cost of one movie in the theatre.

Anyway, I went there with Nick, Atsushi, Takuya, Adam, and two girls who jokingly told me not to blog about them. Even though they told me they were joking and would be happy to be on here, they will remain nameless out of spite. (But not faceless. Bwa ha ha ha…)


(Mystery Friend “B”, with Nick and Atsushi.

Thus armed with all the tools we needed to achieve budget nirvana, we played video games and sang karaoke all night. There were some memorable moments, including the “Michael Jackson Meledy”, Queen, and any number of show tunes.

(If you’re familiar with Home Star Runner… Strong Bad would say “AndrewLloydWebber’ed!!!!”)




Basically, this night was only remarkable for one single fact (apart from the fun we had, of course)… we decided that everyone ought to wear hats.

But not just any hats…


Dirty Sanchez and Mystery Friend “K”

HA!

As I always say, you can’t go out Sombrero-ing without a fake moustache.

We stumbled out into the broad sunlight (not sunrise, not even close… it was MORNING and no doubt about it – 7:30 am or so) and headed back to crash at the Eda apartments these nice folk all live in.

I slept with the sombrero on my head to keep the sunlight out. In a stunning bit of wisdom that I can't undersell, Nick's first words upon seeing me lying on his floor in the late afternoon.


Any time you wake up with a sombrero beside you, you’ve partied too hard.




Wise words.


(*) For all two of my Japanese fans and for Geoff’s mom, “Chuck-E Cheese’s” is a chain of children’s play places that specialize in birthday parties. They have lots of arcade games, play places and skee-ball, etc. Basically, it’s a place where parents can feed their kids lots of pizza and let them run amok for a few hours with video games.