Gross domestic products

By the way, I am With Camera again :)

After weeks of concocting unsuccessful homemade fruit fly traps, from pinapple juice to vinegar to old-azzed banana (all tried, tested, and true on the internet), I accidentally leave out a 1/4 glass of watered down orange juice in the morning and return home to find its thirsty victim. This, after developing my fly-clapping skills to a point where even Mr. Miyagi would be humbled in my presence. Just today I snatched a fly out of the air with one hand-IN THE DARK!

I think my co-worker's a dork and I have proof to back up my claim. He doesn't share my view about the annoying hot weather because he loves hot weather, he says.
He's happy-go-lucky.
Upon entering the room after a class, he sighs and proclaims, "It's been a long day." Sympathizing sarcastically, I say "Lucky you," to which he replies, "Why is that?"
The poor guy's conversation starters are limited to a) "All done for today?"; b) "Got any fun plans for the weekend?"; and c) "Get to anything fun on the weekend?" When I do get riled up enough to rant about a topic, he has nothing to share. Or it's something that a happy-go-lucky guy would say.
And obviously not his fault, but this guy is blind. Like, legitimately visually-impaired. Anything he reads is held up to his nose. His eyes aren't quite aligned. And whenever I pass him on the street, he doesn't even know it's me.

Now let's talk swine flu. Firstly, I seem to spend half my time in classes trying to get my students to admit to their Japanese logic holes. I know it's a selfish foreigner thing to do and fortunately for them, their English is never at a level high enough where I can declare myself "victorious" for being such an asshole. Most of the time we just go in circles. However, many students have told me this past week that Japanese people have been totally overreacting to the current swine flu outbreak. Masks are sold out in every store, though I see only a small increase in people wearing them in Tokyo. I asked a student, who recently bought a supply of masks, when she would "start" wearing one and she told me, "maybe next week." I was trying to get her to admit to the fact that by the time that she thinks she should start wearing the mask, it would probably already be too late. There will never be a time when the government will say "Okay. Start wearing your masks.....NOW!" It's either now or never. And if you really cared, you'd be wearing it all day. But of course, she didn't get it.

I see people wearing or putting on their mask whenever they please. I saw a woman put on a mask on the train, when she had already been maskless for 10 minutes. Sometimes I see people with their mask under their chin or with their nose exposed. Why are they wearing them at all if this is what they do?