Water Color is fun.


I painted two paintings with by friend BPPB's water color set.

BPPB and I collaborated on the octopus one. She drew the octopus shape and I filled it in and did words and background. The octupus' name is Jamie Octopus. I guess Octopus is a common last name for Octopus. She only has six legs because she is a shark attack survivor. On march 12th 2007 she was attacked by a white tip reef shark near Cairns, Australia.


I did the other painting by myself. This is one of those paintings where I did not know what I was going to draw, but just played with the brush, and this guy came out. I will name him Jacob Blueyman.
He is a very nice man. He was arrested while looking for his mommy in front of his own home. Do you think he's guilty?

These are both for sale for $32 The size is 6.5" x 7.5"

You can buy them by paypal...just send email to me Kentanakala (then type the atmark) then type gmail then dot com. like this ______@gmail.com

Ken Tanaka On Glee


I have been getting many e-mails about this Ken Tanaka sign on the new Fox TV show Glee. Many people wanted to know if they were talking about me, but I'm pretty sure it's not me, because I don't know how to use a shredder. Also, I feel bad for so many innocent documents that are sent into a shredder.
I looked up the show and I learned that there is a character named Coach Ken Tanaka. Many people also wrote to me to ask if they have named this character after me. I don't know, but Ken Tanaka is a pretty common name. There are other Ken Tanaka's that people confuse me with.

1. Photographer Ken (kenneth) Tanaka
http://www.pbase.com/tanakak/

This Ken Tanaka is a professional photographer who takes very handsome photos, sometimes of Cats. He also reviews cameras on a blog called
http://theonlinephotographer.typepad.com/the_online_photographer/blog_index.html

People sometimes think I am this Ken Tanaka and send me questions about my photographs. When I had my art show at Billy Shire Fine ARts, a Los Angeles Photography Festival curator called and asked if they could put my art show in the Photo Festival.

2. Ken Tanaka the Actor
There is an actor in Japan named Ken Tanaka who was in the 1984 version of Godzilla.
People also ask me about this, but I have never met Godzilla. I met Mothra before though. I met him at a Doutour coffe shop in Yamaguchi. A few years later I saw him again at a Hiroshima Carp baseball game. He was sitting in the bleachers. I said hi to him and he said hi back, but I could tell he didn't remember me.

3. Ken Tanaka the mystery character

An author named Dale Furutani writes mysteries about a character named Ken Tanaka. This isn't me either. I'm not a detective although I can sometimes solve mysteries. Once I couldn't find my cat. Then I went outside and found him sleeping in front of the door. I solved that one, but I have never tried to solve a murder. I am willing to try.

Do you know another ken Tanaka

Ethiopian Food and Zine Comic book writer Carrie McNinch


This Saturday I went to the Buff Monster gallery show opening at Corey Helford. Afterwords, some friends took me to eat Ethiopian food at a restaurant in Fairfax called Mercado. One of the friends in this picture is Carrie McNinch who writes the comic zine "You can't get there from here" (see below).

Ethiopian food is good for these three reasons.
1. Yummy
2. You get to eat with your hands.
3. The food has nice names like Firfir and Fitfit and Chicken Tibs. These are all good names for babies too.

We got a vegetable plate with many bean curries. It is all served on a sour spongy crepe called Injera. You also get a basket of injera and you can use it like Indian Nan to scoop up the curries.
They also roast their own coffee in front of you.
If I am ever a coffee bean, I hope I will end up there.

This is Carrie's comic. My friend Dr. Mao introduced me to her comics which you can get here.
http://microcosmpublishing.com/catalog/artist/carrie_mcninch/
I like to read home made comics and this is my favorite one so far.


Her comics are good for these reasons.
1. Funny
2. Sad
3. True

Carrie likes coffee and she even goes to Rome just to drink her favorite cappucino. If you read about it in volume 3, above, you will want to go to rome.

Her zine is about her real life, her friends, her cats, and she writes very honestly about things she struggles with. She also has a neat t-shirt she made with her cat on it which she sells.
I think it is important to have a t-shirt with a cat on it.

Happy Birthday Neptune-Kun


My friend David Neptune-Kun had his birthday while I was in Japan. I met Neptune-Kun at my gallery show at Billy Shire Fine Arts. His story is kind of like mine. He was born and raised in Chiba, near Tokyo. His parents are American, but have been living in Chiba since the 70's or so. David moved to America when he was 15 or so to finish high school and go to college. We became good friends very quickly because we have many things in common.

He is also my surf pal. Last night we went night surfing at the Venice Pier at midnight. The moon was full or close so we could see the waves. In June, we went to El Salvador to surf with my brother David, as you can see in one of my earlier blogs below.

I made him this late birthday card yesterday night.

It is fun to paint when you don't have any idea what you are drawing. To just rub the brush on paper and see what it looks like. You can't make a mistake, because you aren't trying to draw anything.

I made some brush strokes that I thought looked like a funny animal's mane....so then I drew the rest of the animal, but he was too big to fit on the paper. I am hoping that David will get another piece of paper and draw the other half of the animal. Or maybe you will print the drawing out and draw your version of the other half, and give it to me for my birthday or Christmas, or White Day (Do you know White Day?).



I think this animal is called a Mobo-beast. I wonder if he has a tail. He is a good Mobo-beast and always works hard. He is a family man. He is nice to everybody he meets. Even the small plants and flowers he eats forgive him, because he is so nice to them.

Once you draw something, does it become real in some other place? I will try to go there and meet him. I'd better bring some candy or fruit or something for him. Maybe I will buy some peaches.