TOKYOMANGO

RuPaul's new music vid has NND-syle mash-up porn (NSFW, maybe)

In his new music video for the song Jealous of my Boogie, famed drag queen RuPaul takes inspiration from the otaku community's obsession with American porn star Billy Herrington. The video sharing site Nico Nico Douga has tons of mash-ups of Herrington's old porn flicks; RuPaul tapped into this and made his own. I'm sure it will be huge in Japan.

By the way, someone just told me that RuPaul's new America's-Next-Top-Model-for-drag-queens reality show is really good. The first season just ended, so I'm going to splurge on reruns.

Robo-Q, the smallest walking bipedal robots in the world

Takara Tomy released the Robo-Q, which they claim is the smallest walking bipedal robot in the world, in February. They're just 3.4 cm tall, and they're super cute. Also, from the promotional videos and pics it looks like they're geared towards couples and kids, not hard core robokit fans. He can do things like walk around your desktop without crashing into things, or play soccer with his mini-robot friends. Do any of you remember playing with the tiny toy cars called Choro-Q? My brother used to collect them. Anyway, this is the sister brand of that.

Cell phone strap replicates sensation of opening a can of beer

The latest in Bandai Gadget's "do it forever" series is the top of a coke or beer can. Basically, researchers spent hours and hours perfecting the sensation of cracking open a can, and then made it into a cell phone strap. It goes on sale in June for about $8.

Pop-the-edamame cell phone strap
Bubble wrap mania

Robot signals beginning of future-themed weekend in Roppongi

Tonight in Roppongi happened already, but if you happened to have been there you would have seen the debut of this 7-meter tall aluminum fire-breathing robot called Giant Torayan. It's actually the creation of artist Kenji Yanobe, and it's part of an awesome art project that will transform the entire neighborhood into an alien robot-themed wonderland. (Image by AP)

Aiiku hospital no longer offers perinatal care

I just found out that the hospital I was born at, Tokyo's Aiiku Hospital, just delisted itself from the official registry of perinatal clinics because they don't have enough doctors. Sad! The hospital, whose name Aiiku is a combination of the kanji for "love" and "grow," is the first of what could be many to delist because it couldn't solve the problem of understaffed, overworked doctors. (If you're listed, it apparently means you have special equipment for dealing with complicated pregnancies.) The hospital was founded in 1938; it's where Princess Kiko gave birth to her baby prince in 2006.

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