The Monday Read: Arcs

Found a great new board game

I ordered a copy of Arcs a while back after seeing some enthusiastic YouTube videos about it.

It arrived last week, and I finally managed to play half a game with my granddaughter.

Wonderfully nuanced. I got the gameplay completely wrong in this first game, instinctively trying to dominate the territory which has nothing to do with getting victory points in this game.

My granddaughter wiped the floor with me, so I’m looking forward to a rematch this week.

If you’re into board games and have 1-3 people who are willing to play with you, this might be worth checking out.

Daylight Saving Time

Aweber (our mailing list host) is a US company, so if you were wondering why the weekly email was late this week it’s because the clocks went back. So we’ll be going out at 11am on Mondays until the end of March, when we’ll go back to our summer schedule of going out at 10am JST.

RetireJapan TV

RJTV returns tonight (Monday Nov 11th) for Season 3! Join us as we take a look at what we missed over the last couple of months and look ahead to 2025.

RetireJapan on tour

I’ll be giving a presentation in Nara on December 1st. Details below.

YouTube

Thank you for your support of the RetireJapan YouTube channel. We published a new video on Wednesday, and also on Friday (what is going on?).

The second will mainly be of interest to teachers, public servants, and kyosai members.

The Forum

Speaking of which, the Forum is doing well (38,363 posts so far). The forum rules are here. In essence, they are:

1. Be nice
2. Ask any question you like
3. Only answer questions when you have relevant knowledge or experience

Here are the latest active threads:

This week’s books

Finished Transition, by Iain M. Banks. Wonderful, if a little confusing. Still don’t really understand the underlying mechanic of the book, but great ending.

Started reading Perdido Street Station, by China Mieville. Heard great things, seems good so far. Just found out it is book one in a trilogy though. Eeek.

TV show of the week

Saw La Cage on Georges St-Pierre’s Facebook feed, and was really pleasantly surprised. A short 5-episode French drama about MMA with great characters, decent acting, some cool cameos (GSP! Firas Zahabi!). Big recommend, especially if you are into MMA or martial arts.

This week’s links

1. The numbers are completely shocking: Japan births fall under 330,000 in Jan-June, down 6.3% from 2023
2. My biggest concern regarding the new US government: Donald Trump can’t stop global climate action. If we stick together, it’s the US that will lose out
3. Selfish superpower has a nice ring to it: “A long four years begins” Japan braces for Trump again
4. Martin’s thoughts: Full send – what the US election means for risk assets
5. Really informative interview (YouTube): Union secretary breaks down Japan’s labor laws

(more links next time! It’s been a busy week)

What do you think? Anything interesting in there?

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