ABIKO 2011: BEND OVER, YOU WON'T FEEL A THING

Oh. There seems to be something happening on November 13th in Abiko. The blank signboards are up outside key means of public communication and Our Man's letter box has been stuffed with pictures of smart-casual folk in hard hats staring into the middle distance. Either the Abercrombe and Fitch catalogue has gone amateur hour or there's a city council election afoot.

Of course there's only one issue this election: which candidate can dig up the most soil. See, Abiko is a hotspot for radiation. Possibly because of the rain storm that swept through these parts back in March when the meltdown that wasn't a meltdown but actually was a meltdown happened, or didn't happen, depending on who you read or what you can remember about 3/11; or because they keep burning radioactive stuff and creating radioactive ash at the incinerators down the road in Kashiwa; or because everywhere is irradiated, which means nowhere is, relatively speaking, right?

Right.

So anyway, candidate A promises to remove more soil than candidate B from Abiko's schoolyards, parks and other public land. Thank goodness radiation only affects public property with easily accessible topsoil. Our Man wonders where they plan to put all this soil? They wouldn't just dig it up and bury it on site in schools in a big hole would they? Because that would be counterproductive and downright silly. So they won't do that.

Anyway. Our Man will try* to keep up to date on all the local races so you don't have to.

By the way, the novel. #halflifebook remember? is coming along. On the second draft now. Hoping it can make a public appearance in December. Working on it.

*"try" in the sense of "if a leaflet lands through his letter box and the picture of the candidate looks like a potato or some such equally comical non-candidate-like thing, he might, MIGHT, consider taking a pic of it and posting it here."