Me and My Bobby McGee

Sitting in the Elite Inn Yushima at the foot of the Yushima shrine in Tokyo. I'm near Ueno Park and up the street from noodle houses where men sit slurping big bowls of noodles. They all wear the same blue suit, chain smoke and read comic books....But as my back aches from two weeks on this hard, trying-t0-be-Western-bed, my mind drifts back to a giant, white marshmallow and an Irishman wearing a white, button-down shirt...At the nearby shrine, people write their hopes, their wishes on wooden plates and then pin them on the shrine. Incense fills the air. Monks bow on their knees, and I think about how wishes, especially of the romantic variety, must transcend language...

...28 days until I seem him again, and counting....