RAmen in Nagoya Japan with Pay Katsuyuki

Pay Katsuyuki took me to Koonan Ramen in Nagoya where they have his art on display. Pay makes ramen at a different Koonan location. It really is the best ramen I have ever had. Everything there was great, gyooza, eggplant, even meatballs.
I would like to have a swimming pool full of it, or at least a bathtub or small jacuzzi.
Pay is a great artist and I did a whole post about him earlier in this blog

I hope you will take a look at it and see his beautiful art work.

Hello Kitty meet the artists Party at Royal-T

Yesterday was the meet the artists party, and I went and saw my friends artist Mari Inukai, and Amanda Visell

I also got good news from the curator that my painting sold yesterday. YAY. やった！

I was very happy

The part was packed with Kitty lovers and art friends. They were silk screening t-shirts with Buff Monster designs there, and also had yummy kitty cakes and brownies.

I got a goody bag with all kinds of kitty goods in it, and a $25 target store card, pez, a wallet, coloring book, crayons, pens, pins, a stamp, book, so much stuff.


They also published this book of all the art in the show.





It's my first time having my art in a book so I was very happy. The picture at the very top shows my painting in the book.


I made a video about it for my new Japanese channel, but it's only in Japanese.

Pigs make me sneeze and cough

I guess I have the swine flu, but there's no way to know for sure. It could be a bad cold. I did't really have a fever, but it has been a week now and I am still feeling too weak and coughy to go outside much.
I went to the LA county fair a few weeks ago. There was a small piglet named Evelyn who looked very cute and snuggly. When nobody was watching I climbed into her pen and snuggled her a little bit. Maybe that is where I got the virus.

I hope the soup fairy comes soon. My friend Natasha, told me there is an American Obake called the soup fairy. When you are sick, you put an empty bottle of Nyquil cough syrup under your pillow. At night the soup fairy comes and takes the bottle and leaves a pot of chicken soup. I slept on my empty nyquil bottle for three nights, but no soup yet. My cheek is getting sore. I knocked on Natash's door and she told me she made a mistake. It's not Nyquil, it's Robitussin MD brand cough syrup. Now I have to start all over.

I made a video about the flu but it's for my new Japanese channel, so it's only in Japanese.



I feel too lazy to do much, so I mostly am playing tetris. I have painted a little bit too. I'm working on the book that I am making. It's the same book that features the two bears in my earlier post. I have a habit of making one painting, and then deciding I need to make a change and doing another version. It makes my progress go slow. I can't tell you much about the book now, but hopefully soon I will. I think it will take me a few more months to finish it.




I made this one first, but then I got worried that it was too cramped and hard to read.



Then I made this one, but I still don't know which I will use.

Now that this cat is done, I have to do the hardest page so far. It's hard because I don't know what to draw yet. I only know the words.

Paranormal Activity in Death Valley

For Halloween, I went to the Death Valley desert of California. It's about 250 miles east of Los Angeles. I stayed high in the mountains so it wasn't so hot, but in the valley it can be 120 degrees. It's to hot for most animals to live a happy life, so I only saw two little rodents while I was there. I tried to make friends with them, but they were too fast.

The bee hives in this picture are actually giant kilns made over 100 years ago. They used to burn pine wood inside these kilns and make charcoal. That's what the sign said, but I still think it is a giant hive, with a giant super bee who lives inside. People are probably trying to keep it secret because they want to keep the honey for themselves.

The nearest town to death valley is called Trona. It's a sulfer mining town, and Americans say it smells bad, but to me it smells like Japanese hot springs. It's a pretty quiet and lonesome town, I wonder what it would be like to grow up there.

I was a gold miner for Halloween and I stayed by myself in an abandoned Death Valley gold mine. I was hoping to meet the ghost of an old gold miner.
Here is a video about it.

YOUTUBE SOCKS....AND THE YOUTUBE ROUND TABLE

Today I was invited to the Santa Monica google office to a Youtube round table discussion about the future of youtube and how youtube partners are using youtube. Most of the other participants were very well known youtubers that i recognized like Shane Dawson, David Choi (davidchoimusic) , Tay Zonday, Corey from SMPfilms, Alphacat and Liam Kyle Sullivan (Kelly). I felt a little bit out of place among all of these youtube celebrities. I don't really know how I got invited to this event, but it was very fun, and I also got free fruit roll ups.

When I arrived, they asked me whether I would like youtube socks or wrist bands. I wanted both because I thought it would be funny to walk around with youtube wrist bands on, but I went with the socks. They are practical and also very fashionable. I like to know that youtube is keeping my feets warm.

Sharks, Seals and Pelicans.

Last week, my friend took me on a trip to Avila Beach near San Luis Obispo. It's in Central California, about 4 hours from Los Angeles and San Francisco.
There were nice waves there so I thought about surfing, but then I saw this sign. A local man told me a sad story of how a woman was swimming with some seals in the ocean and a great white shark bit her in the leg, and cut her artery.


Later, I saw this seal lying in the rocks. I decided to go closer and try to make friends with him. But when I got next to him, I realized that he wasn't alive anymore. He was just the body of the seal, but the seal inside him had moved on. Maybe he had been bitten by a shark. I gave him the name of Toby.




Toby wasn't a very exciting friend to talk to since he wasn't alive anymore. So I went to the pier and met this Pelican. Her name is Lucia Pelican. She told me that she likes to sit on the pier and wait for fisherman to clean out their fish and throw the guts away. She said it's much easier than having to catch a fish on her own. Also, she can get some reading done while she is waiting for the fish guts. It's a good deal for her. She mostly reads mysteries.

How to be a better bear

The past month, I have been working on drawing a story. This is part of the 4th page of the story. A honey bear is being attacked by a honey bee. It's a sad story for the bear, and for the bee too, because I think honey bees die after stinging. Maybe it would be best if people were like honey bees. We would have the power to hurt people, but we would die immediately afterwards.

Here are two versions of the bear and bee.


This is the first version I drew. The envelope is covering up the words to the story because it's a secret. I drew this bear two days ago and painted him, but I thought he might not be the right kind of bear for my story. I thought he looked a little bit like a wookie.



Yesterday I drew this bear. He is a little softer. At first, I thought he was definitely a better bear, but then my friend, the great artist called Gooch came over. He said that the original bear at the top was better because it really looked like a bear who was getting stung by a bee and going crazy. He said the bear's weird and awkward pose was also good. The second one, Gooch said, looked like a representation of how we are taught to think of bears and was less interesting.

Now I am confused. Maybe you can help me, by telling me which bear you would most like to see in a storybook.

Wayward Goose Pilots overshoot destination

Today I came across an interesting article on the web.
The following is copied from the Goose Times




WAYWARD GEESE BACK TRACK ON THEIR STORY
Eric Gosling
Special to the Times


Two Canada geese, part of a large flock heading towards Baja California for the winter, overflew their destination by nearly 150 miles last Wednesday October 21st. The flock arrived at Magadalena Plain Salt Marsh at 1:45 pm on Wednesday but two geese failed to land. Jay Edgar Goose, and Patrick L Gooseman continued flying South west after the rest of the flock landed. Other geese reportedly tried to get their attention with rapid wing flapping and loud honking, but neither Mr. Goose nor Mr. Gooseman responded. An immature albatross reportedly spotted the geese 152 miles west of Magadalena Marsh, over open water.
When questioned by flock leader Captain Lucinda Goose, the wayward geese claimed to have been in a heated argument over migratory patterns. This was met with much skepticism, and today the two geese changed their story, claiming that they became distracted while playing an intense round of charades.

Goose specialists suggest that it is unlikely the geese were arguing or playing charades, and MIgratory fatigue may have been a factor. Migratory flocks have recently come under fire from the International Avian MIgratory Commission over flights that can sometimes keep geese airborne for over 24 hours.

Giant Robot Museum Show with James Jean and David Choe

James Jean
Dave Choe

Saturday October 24th was the opening reception for the Giant Robot Beinnale 2 art exhibit at the Japanese American National Museum in LA. The show runs through January 24th, so make sure to check it out if you are in LA.

They featured work from my friend and neighbor James Jean, and his good friend David Choe, who is also a very nice man. They also have work from my friends Kozyndan as well as Souther Salazar, Jeff Soto and many others.

I went with my friend the Gooch, but we could only stay for a little bit because we had tickets to see Mr. Daniel Johnston play a concert in Hollywood.

When we got to the Museum, we were very surprised to find James and Dave up on stage playing music. James was playing keyboards and Dave Choe was playing drums, with Goh Nakamura on guitar. If you have seen my videos of James you know that he is a very talented trumpeter, but he also plays piano and he is an accomplished hand whistler.

Here is a video of James and I last Christmas.

HELLO KITTY THREE APPLES PARTY AT ROYAL-T

Starting October 22nd through November 15th Royal-T in Los Angeles and Sanrio are celebrating Hello Kitty's 35th birthday.

Hundreds of people showed up at the opening to see Hello Kitty. Japan La curated an art show with 60 artists doing their version of Hello Kitty. Participating artists include Gary Baseman, Ron English, Buff Monster, Yoskay Yamamoto, Edwin Ushiro, Natalia FAbia, Buff Monster, and me. Yes, Sanrio and Japan La were kind to ask me to do my Hello Kitty painting, which you can see below. It's up in the gallery and on sale. I hope Hello Kitty likes it.

So many people came to her birthday party. I think there were at least 500 people, which is a lot for a fictional cat's birthday party. When I was 7 years old, I threw a birthday party for my cat Shintaro but only my grandma came, and she had to leave early to get acupuncture. I miss you, Shintaro.

Poor Little Fire Hydrant

I was on Olympic Blvd in Los Angeles today. Traffic was bad because somebody had decided to drive into a fire hydrant and knock it over to create a beautiful, giant fountain.

I think it was a kind of performance art.

Everybody was stopping to look at it. The street was flooded. I pulled over to go for a swim, but the water was very cold. I didn't have my wetsuit with me.

If it is still flooded this evening, I might go fishing. Fish bite best at dusk. I am hoping to catch a mackerel.

2 New Color variations of t-shirts

I just printed two new colors of "Mistaken Bear" and "The Decision".

Like all my t-shirts, I hand screen print these myself. They will be available at the Royal-T in Culver City (I think they are $25) and you can also get them direct from me. Just send an email to kentanakala ( at) gmail (dot) com and request your size.

I have them in Boys XL through Mens XL. For girls I recommend a boys xl or mens small.

These other prints are also available.

Cooking with Human 餃子パーテイー Potsticker Party

My Chinese friend had a potsticker party for her birthday. We made potstickers from scratch.

They are fun and easy to make.

HEre is what you will need to make them.

-One small piglet (or just a part of one).

- ginger, garlic, corn starch, green onion, soy sauce, sesame oil,

All you have to do is mix it all up and put it in dumpling wrappers. If you are a serious dumpling master, you can make the wrappers from scratch, but we bought them at market.

If you are using a whole piglet, make sure that it is fully not alive before mixing with other ingredients. Otherwise you can end up with a big mess.

You can see a recipe in English here.

The scariest part is when you finally fry them up. You put them in hot oil for a few minutes. When they get a deep, dark tan, you have to add water to the hot oil and it pops and sizzles and flies in the air. It's important to wear a shirt and pants for this part, I wore a Smurfs halloween mask also to protect my face and sideburns.

They came out all crispy and yummy and we were all very proud. There were a few left over dumpling wrappers. I want to use them to make a dessert potsticker. Maybe chocolate with cream cheese and a straw berry. I guess you could put anything inside of a dumpling wrapper.

Captain Chesley (sully) Sullenberger Flies Again

Mr. Captain Chesley Sullenberger has been in the news again lately. He is the pilot who safely landed his jet into the Hudson River after some birdies flew into both engines.

This month, he returned to the sky and is again flying around up there. He also has a book out called Highest Duty: My Search for What Really Matters.

For my gallery show at Billy Shire Fine Arts this April, I painted this picture above in memory of the geese who died from the engines of Mr. Sullenberger's aeroplane. I would like to send this painting to Mr. Sullenberger but I don't know how to get it to him. If you are his friend, please let me know.

Whiskey Minute

I met my friend SKU at a whiskey tasting event in Los Angeles. He is a whiskey and food lover. He has a popular blog about food in LA and whiskey and he also has a youtube channel where he teaches some basic lessons about whiskey...with videos like "What is Whiskey?"...."What is Scotch?" "What is Bourbon(shown above)" and "Why is daddy lying face down in the street again?" (The last video is not real.)

He was nice enough to have me on his video to do a tasting of Japanese whisky .

I like whiskey but I'm not as much of a fan as Sku-san.

I did visit the Yamazaki whiskey distillery in the Osaka area though.

There is all kind of whiskey you can find. Some tastes sweet like caramel, and some tastes like you are drinking the smoke from a camp fire. Whiskey is tasty, but drinking too much can make my brains angry at me. I'm sorry, brains.

Drawing Drawings and Painting Paintings

I have been working on illustrating a new book. It's kind a children's book for grown ups but I can't tell you what it's about yet. My goal is to finish the book and have my next art show feature the drawings and the book for sale.

For page one, I drew 7 cute animals. Right now I am working on page 2 and I am drawing 7 scary animals. Today I have been drawing sharks. It's not so easy to draw an animal exactly how you want him. Sometimes I have to draw the same animal, over and over again all day or all week, 100 times, till I finally get him to look right. I spent a week just to get a nice cute elephant done. I think I drew 117 of them. Now my room is covered in elephants.

I'm having a harder time with the scary animals. I'm not sure which animals to include. This is what I have so far as possible scary animals.

Shark

Alligator

Snake

Scorpion

Tarantula

Sting RAy

Jelly Fish

Pit Bull Doggy

Lion or mountain lion

Crow

Vulture

If you have any comments about these animals, or any ideas of other scary animals, please let me know.

The drawing above is one I drew yesterday while I was doing sketches of alligators. I couldn't get it quite right, so I decided to color one in just to see if that would make it look better. This alligator doesn't look how I want it to look in the picture book, but that doesn't make him a bad alligator. He just wants to be loved, so he has crawled out of his swamp onto land to see if someone will love him. Will you love this alligator? Serious replies only please.

Wet, Naked and in a barrel

Do you know Japanese Onsen? It's a hot springs and they are all over Japan. Hot springs is one of my favorite things to do. It warms you up in the fall and winter, and it refreshes you in the humid Japanese summer.

I guess people in most Western countries (except for Russia) are not used to the tradition of group baths. The baths in Japan are separated by sex, and everyone goes in naked. In the old days, it was not so common for Japanese apartments to have a bath in them, so people would go to the public baths. You might go with your grandpa and scrub his back for him.

I miss hot springs and baths when I am in Los Angeles. They do have Korean Spas in the Koreatown area in LA, but it is not quite the same.

In Japan, hotsprings are a popular tourist destination, and if your town discovers a hot springs, suddenly it will have many visitors and tax dollars. Sometimes cities and hotels get in trouble for faking a hot springs. I like hot springs, but I am just a happy if it is just regular water, as long as the baths are handsome.

Giant Prehistoric Shark Will Eat You Alive

Yesterday, I visited the City of San Diego where I met this Giant Shark Hanging up from the ceiling of the museum of Natural History in Balboa Park. His name is Jacob the Megaladon and he lived millions of years ago. He is the Great,Great,Great,Great,Great,Great, Great,Great,Great, Great,Great,Great, Great,Great,GreatGreat,Great,Great, Great,Great,Great, Great,Great,Great, Great,Great,Great, Great,Great,Great, Great,Great,Great, Great,Great,Great, Great,Great,Great, Great,Great,Great, Great,Great,Great, Great,Great,Great, Great,Great,Great, Great,Great,Great, Great,Great,Great, Great,Great,Great, Great,Great,Great, Great,Great,Great, Great,Great,Great, Great,Great,Great, Great,Great,Great, Great,Great,Great, Great,Great,Great, Great,Great,Great, Great,Great,Great, Great,Great,Great, Great,Great,Great, Great,Great,Great, Great,Great,Great, Great,Great,Great,

Grandfather of today's Great White Shark.

He can be 40-70 feet long.

The next morning I surfed at Trails in San Onofre, where great white sharks are seen sometimes. I kept thinking of Jacob swimming below me. His mouth is so wide that he can swallow up a Ken Tanaka without chewing. If that happened I would just live inside of his throat and eat fresh sashimi everyday. I would use his tongue as a blanket.

I like to think about going back in time. When a time machine is invented, I will go back to the dinosaur time and meet all the dinosaurs and name them. I will pet the plant eaters up close, and I will pet the meat eaters from far away using a long stick with something soft on the end like a sock or a pussy willow.

The ocean from millions of years ago has lots of waves that are only surfed by dolphins and other mystery extinct surf animals. When I go back in time I will be tempted to surf or swim in the ocean. But Megalodon and all kind of mystery Tanaka eaters that science has never met might be swimming out there. If you woke up in the dinosaur time, and you found a cave to live in, and the ocean was right near by...would you swim in it?

Please let me know. And if you are from the future and have any advice for me on my time machine trip to dinosaur time, please comment to me.

The Swimming Pool

Title: Jumper

Medium: Watercolor

Size: 5 x 13

Price: $38

This is a water color and ink picture that I made a long time ago, but I only just wrote the words on it today. I had it hanging above my computer for months while I was trying to figure out what she was saying. Then I finally heard her. I guess I hadn't been listening hard enough.

The same thing happened before with this dog.

I hung him up above my bed for 6 months before I heard him. I finally noticed him.

He was purchased by art collector Susan Hancock at my show at Billy Shire Fine Arts. I miss him very much. Although he is a two dimensional dog, we got to be very close. Sometimes I would pet him, and his oil pastel fur would come of on my fingers. I miss those days.

Will Giant Mouse be my friend?

Last night I walked into the driveway of my apartment in Los Angeles to see this giant mouse sitting on a brick fence. He was the size of a cat and he was just sitting there looking at me. His tail was thick and long. He didn't move at all. I thought maybe he had come to tell me something very important. I wasn't sure what to do. I had never seen such a giant mouse. Was he a kind of monster mouse? What had he been eating?

I had a mix of feelings. He was quite handsome and I wanted to pet him, but I was also very afraid that he might have come to take over the human world and turn it into a kind of monster mouse paradise.

I called the police and firetrucks but none of them came. I thought maybe I was just imagining the monster mouse, or hallucinating. Maybe someone had put a kind of special drug in the Sea Chicken Onigiri that I had eaten for dinner.

I videotaped him to make sure it was reality. When I woke up this morning, I checked the video to see if I had just had a dream.

HE IS REAL.

HE IS MONSTER MOUSE.

I WILL NAME HIM JACOB.