RKS Japanese Literature: The Last Stages of Ritual Suicide (seppuku) of Lieutenant Takeyama Shinji (Yukio Mishima)

“Was this seppuku? He was thinking. It was a sensation of utter chaos, as if the sky had fallen on his head and the world was reeling drunkenly. His will power and courage, which had seemed so robust before he made the incision, had now dwindled to something like a singe hair-like thread of steel and he was assailed by the uneasy feeling that he must advance along this thread, clinging to it with desperation. His clenched fist had gone moist. Looking down, he saw that both his hand and cloth about the blade were drenched in blood. His loincloth, too, was dyed a deep red. It struck him as incredible that, amid this terrible agony, things which could still be seen and things that existed still existed.”

Yukio Mishima, “Patriotism”.

“Lost in Puppydom: Rory Dylan Stephen’s Puppydom”: THE ABDUCTION OF RORY DYLAN STEPHEN: WITH TOP DOGS TO NUDE JERSEY WALMART PARKING LOTS

THE ABDUCTION OF RORY DYLAN STEPHEN: WITH TOP DOGS TO NUDE JERSEY WALMART PARKING LOTS

The Singapore Times Exclusive: In a Toronto Opium Den on my Way to North Bergen, Nude Jersey

Madame Fong was a 335-pound trans he him her or they..not sure. From the back door it was down to a basement opium den. Rock n roll stars, winery owners, real estate magnates, a few Catholic priests, some folks with checkered scarves perhaps Palestinian CISIS plants from the University of Toronto and hockey players prostate with pipes up their snouts lamenting a failure to make the NHL playoffs. I was tied up next to a famous Toronto Maple Leafs hockey player who I had seen advertising milk on the telly and a soccer player who had hawked peanut butter and jelly sandwiches. I do love peanut butter but it sticks to my mouth. Bob had said if only milk wouldn’t give you worms it would go down well with peanut butter.

I had to pee real bad and almost being potty trained to the max I gave a heads up gotta pee bark but unlike Bob and Fay no one picked up on the hint so I peed on the floor.

Speaking of Bob and Fay…isn’t time they picked me up, poor puppy that I am? And take me home?  

Later on a bowl of rice and chopped chicken with a bowl of jasmine tea was placed before me which I lustily consumed and immediately feel asleep. Bastards had drugged me.

I woke up to a voice questioning a nearby person why the truck was headed to the United States. “We are The Top Dogs Touring Company” the voice said, “We are heading to the North Bergen, New Jersey Walmart Supercentre for our first show on our Top Dogs New Jersey Tour. We have 12 shows in New Jersey and one in French River Delaware.”

What is going on here? Where in the hell is North Bergen and what is Nude Jersey?

RKS Literature: The Almost Pleasure of Being Down and Out (George Orwell)

“And there is another feeling that is a great consolation in poverty. I believe everyone who has been hard up has experienced it. It is a feeling of relief, almost of pleasure, as knowing yourself at last genuinely down and out. You have talked so often of going to the dogs-and well here are the dogs, and you have reached them, and you can stand it. It takes off a lot of anxiety.”

George Orwell, “Down and Out in Paris and London”, 1933.

RKS Japanese Literature: A Soldiery Lecture by Lieutenant Takeyama Shinji to His Wife Reiko (Yukio Mishima)

“They refrained from taking a honeymoon trip, these being times of national emergency. The couple spent their wedding night at this house. Before going to bed Shinji knelt formally on the matted floor with his sword laid at his knees and bestowed on his wife a soldierly lecture. A woman who had become the wife of a soldier should know and resolutely accept that her husband’s death could come at any moment. It could be tomorrow. It could be the day after. But no matter when it came-he asked-was she steadfast in her resolve to accept it? Reiko rose to her feet, pulled out a drawer of the cabinet and took out what was the most prized of her new possessions, the dagger her mother had given her. Returning to her place, she laid the dagger without a word on the mat before her just as the husband had laid his sword. A silent understanding was achieved at once, and the lieutenant never again sought to test his wife’s resolve.”

Yukio Mishima, “Patriotism”.

RKS Japanese Literature: Used Bathwater from the Prison (Nagai Kafū)

“And on sultry summer evenings, peering through sparse reed blinds, I have had a clear view of the secrets of these people’s households. How well I recall passing by here on afternoons where the prisoner’s used bathwater would gush down the drainage ditches below the tenement’s windows, raising clouds of foul-smelling steam. It must be the same even now. Most shocking of all were the local housewives with scabrous babies on their backs, seizing the opportunity to make use of the hot water on cold, clear days, to wash things in the ditches as they chattered away with mouthfuls of crooked teeth, or in the summertime scattering the stinking water on the road.”

Nagai Kafū, “Behind the Prison”.

RKS Japanese Literature: The Pure Art of Conversation Lost on People Like This (Nagai Kafū)

“Now the argument centres on him until the evening dishes line up beneath the dusky lamp-boiled beans, pickled vegetables, a stew of fish bones and scallions, and a rice tub smeared with dirty fingerprints. Gathered around their flimsy table, the family talk about uncle so-and-so, who showed up wanting to know the cost of Mother’s medicine in the spring. They talk about how the wife’s father lost his job. They talk about their everyday expenses. The family’s mouths were formed for only two purposes: to eat food and complain endlessly about the hardships of life. Whether they are impoverished or not it amounts to the same thing. The pure art of conversation for its own sake is lost on people like this. They have no need for language for anything other than seeking advice, complaining, harping on the same old stories and quarrelling.”

Nagai Kafū, “Behind the Prison”.

RKS PORTUGUESE WINE: Ravasqueira Encantado Red

A blend of Syrah, Touriga Franca and Alicante Bouschet.

Grown in clay-limestone soils with rocky influence of granite and schist.

The vinification of the Syrah and Touriga Franca was in open stainless steel lagares and the Alicante Bouschet in stainless steel fermenting tanks.

The blend was aged 8 months in new French oak barrels.

The winemakers were David Baverstock and Vaco Rosa Santos.

Aroma: Intense black cherry and blackberry with the new French oak giving the wine vanilla and toast.

Palate: Massive black fruit with and concentrated and long finish with a nip of white pepper. Rich, full bodied with a sweet middle palate.

Personality: Full bodied blessed with black fruit.

Food Match: Chicken Cacciatore.

Cellarbility: Consume by 2027-year end.

Price: $18 CDN.

RKS PORTUGUESE WINE RATING: 91/100. Wine Align 88.

Tasted 1May2026.

(Ravasqueira 2024 Encantado, VR Alentejano, Ravasqueira Vinhos, Arraiolos, Portugal. 750 mL, 14%).

RKS Literature: In Poverty You Discover Boredom (George Orwell)

“You discover the boredom which is inseparable from poverty; the times when you have nothing to do and, being underfed, can interest yourself in nothing. For half a day at a time you lie on your bed, feeling like a jeune squelette in Beaudelaire’s poem. Only food could rouse you. You discover that a man who has gone a week on bread and margarine is not a man any longer, only a belly with a few accessory organs.”

George Orwell, “Down and Out in Paris and London”, 1933.

RKS Japanese Literature: Making the Yellow Man Believe in the White Man’s Yellow Peril (Nagai Kafū)

“Here, then, is proof that cruelty to animals is an issue only to a few Christians, not a pressing problem for the whole of Japanese society. Is this a matter for grief or celebration? Witnessing these scenes only deepens my sense that the Japanese are a warlike people who are sure to defeat the Russians once again in the future. Oh patriots set your minds at ease. As long as you can make a yellow man like me believe in the white man’s Yellow Peril, you should feel free to go on cursing your wives, oppressing your children and giving three cheers for the empire with glasses held high.”

Nagai Kafū, “Behind the Prison”.

RKS Literature: In Poverty You Discover Hunger (George Orwell)

You discover what it is like to be hungry. With bread and margarine in your belly, you go out and look into the shop windows. Everywhere there is food insulting you in huge, wasteful piles; whole dead pigs, baskets of hot loaves, great yellow blocks of butter, strings of sausages, mountains of potatoes, vast Gruyère cheeses like grindstones. A snivelling self pity comes over you at the sight of so much food. You plan to grab a loaf and run, swallowing it before they catch you; and you refrain, from pure funk.”

George Orwell, “Down and Out in Paris and London”, 1933.