Well, as 2006 draws to a close, I find myself spending it pretty much the same way I’ve done so for years now. Earlier today we went to Seibu’s depachika and loaded up on food. We’ve eaten a good part of it, waiting until around 23:00 or so for the soba. I’m flipping through all the TV specials, including of course the venerable KOHAKU on NHK, mixed in with some K-1 for good measure — poor Akebono continues his losing streak, and in record time! I am quite sad that Takashi Okamura of the comedy duo 99 won’t be doing his annual New Year’s show — I did get a kick out of his appearance on KOHAKU though — it just doesn’t feel the same. A bit after midnight we’ll walk over to Gokokuji, a rather large temple not too far from where we live, for hatsumode (first prayer of the New Year). I always look forward to the food stalls set up in front of the temple — gotta get me some buttered potatoes! Strangely enough, despite the couple of beers I drank earlier — some delicious amber Kohaku Yebisu, which I highly recommend — I’ve taken the time to install a program, Tracks, to help me get started on the whole GTD craze. I’ve also been cleaning up the computer a bit, leaving me with a beautiful clean desktop (although I tend to be pretty good with that at all times), and changing the desktop after about a year with no change to what you see above (photo taken during Tokyo Design Week at the Design Tide main exhibition space). Tomorrow, it’s 2007, and I look forward to a first bowl of ramen wearing my brand spankin’ new sneakers! Happy New Year, everyone!

Earlier today I scored this pair of Adidas Gazelle TKY sneakers at the Seibu department store in Ikebukuro (in the Adidas corner). Only 6600 yen! What a great pair of sneaks to start the new year with!

The Japanese film site Midnight Eye updates with a Katsuhiro Otomo interview, concerning his new film, BUGMASTER.

So what are the search terms that are bringing readers to the site these days? “jean snow” and “jeansnow” are still tops, so either it’s people who can’t remember the site’s address (hint: starts with “jeansnow,” ends with “.net”), or I’ve got a little cult of personality going. Bape is still going strong — the Bape London shop is still tops — but gaining ground is Hysteric Glamour (and coincidently, my latest post at Gridskipper relates to the brand). The Willcom R9 phone got a lot of interest, as did the Yutori Kimono shoes from Puma. Seems like there’s also interest in Naoki Honjo — maybe I should write more on him. “tokyo blog” seems natural enough, and of course “japanese jeans” (Jeans Now!)

Another nice thing with the Mint program is that you can get stats on searches done on the site, to see what people are looking for once they already are here. Tops is “pecha kucha,” which is probably due to Momus‘ recent rant (and supposed satire) that caused some fuss. Next up are “record store” and “kono takashi,” and I see even “marxy” gets some attention.

There’s still a backlog of photos I took during Tokyo Design Week that MoCo Loco hasn’t gotten around to posting yet, but they will come, starting with these latest two (from 100% Design Tokyo): Ismi Design Office (pictured above) and i-Design.

And in other MoCo Loco-related news, it’s no secret that the MoCo Tokyo site I was editing has been on hiatus for a while now (the site is going to evolve into something else, which you’ll see sometime next year), but plans are for me to start contributing regularly to the main site in 2007.

• United Cinemas Toyosu
• Everything You Ever Wanted to Know About Hysteric Glamour but Were Afraid to Ask

You can read all of my Gridskipper posts here (or even subscribe to a feed).

Anime News Network is reporting that even though you can’t register with a non-Japanese credit card on the iTunes Music Store Japan, you can buy tracks no matter where you are with an iTunes Japan Music card, which can be purchased on Amazon Japan and Jbox.

Want to see more from the recently opened BAPE KIDS shop in Harajuku? The Wonderwall site has updated with a few new galleries, including this one for the store.

What does a Jean Snow Christmas in Tokyo look like? Well, this year, things kicked off a bit early on Saturday night, when my good friend Denis — a childhood friend, and interactive designer, from my hometown who recently moved to Tokyo — dropped by Cafe Pause for a drink. For dinner, I wanted to bring him to Rakeru, the chain that specializes in om-rice (omelette/rice), and when we got there we saw they had a Christmas plate. Sure, corn soup, an omelette, and some chicken with mustard and white sauce may not sound very Christmas-y, but hey, it’s all in the mind! We then went to Mashman’s Cafe, also in Ikebukuro, and a sort of hippie/art/rock cafe/bar (if that makes any sense), where after a few drinks the owner/manager gave us a copy of a Mashman’s Cafe CD as a present.

So then we get to Christmas day. Since it’s not a holiday in Japan, Yuko was working, and so I figured I’d try to find some sort of reasonable Christmas lunch to grab with Denis, hopefully involving turkey. When I couldn’t find anything, I spotted the ad in METROPOLIS for the chain of Belgian pubs in Tokyo that was touting a few special Christmas beers on the menu. What better than Christmas beer, right! So we picked Frigo in Shinjuku, because the name is also French slang for fridge, and that made us chuckle. The beers were terrific — if pricey — with mine being the fine Cuvée de Noël St. Feuillien pictured above. I had to get back to Ikebukuro to meet Yuko, since we had planned on getting food from Seibu’s depachika, something we do every year. But she was detained at work, and since Denis wanted to get some more Belgian beer, I brought him to the world beer section at Tobu’s depachika, where we hit gold. I forget the name of it, but on the label there was a picture of little baby Jesus, in the stable, riding a hot-rod, giving a thumbs up! Since Yuko was going to be late, we got a big bottle, and then just walked outside to the Metropolitan Plaza area, found some nice steps to sit on, and proceeded to down our brew. We of course kept it wrapped in the Tobu wrapping paper, hobo-style! Merry Christmas!

Are you a girl — and a foreigner — who regularly checks out Otome Road in Ikebukuro? Would you like to talk about it on TV? If so, get in touch with me.

The big foreign books winter sale at LOGOS Gallery starts this Friday (December 29), and will run until January 15. This is always a great opportunity to get some nice art and design-related books at heavily discounted prices. I stopped by the LOGOS store today while in Shibuya, and ended up picking up a copy of Jeremy Leslie’s ISSUES: NEW MAGAZINE DESIGN, which I’d been wanting to pick up for a while now. I’m a big fan of his blog as well.

This month’s edition of my “On Design” column is in today’s THE JAPAN TIMES, and you can read it online here. In it, I cover Plusminuszero’s Air Purifier, Thanko’s Easy Desk Aluminum, Yomiko Advertising’s Waste Me Not (Mottainai) Calendar, and METAPHYS‘ Celtis game.

No root beer is involved, but if you really liked the flyer for the TFP “Juliana” party, know that it was done by graphic duo A&W. The TFP blog has a few pics of their studio, and pictured above is their design for the new flyer, with the next party happening January 28, again at Soft.

PingMag interviews fashion designer Toko Kumagai, of the brand NAM.

It feels like it’s been ages since I’ve done some good old fashion mystery announcements, so here then is the first official mention of M31. What is M31? It’s what 2007 is going to be all about for me, and I’m pretty damn excited about it. It’s basically a way for me to finally organize and put together everything that I’ve been heading towards in the past couple of years. Expect more details in the coming week. Here’s to a great and fruitful 2007!