Eely-Feely

I didn't know until today, but this is the day (midsummer day of the ox) for eating eel to boost your summer heat tolerance. Apparently this belief is an artefact of an advertising campaign of the Edo period. (Hey, I wonder what advertising jingles that I imprinted in my childhood will still be part of the culture in 2270? C&H pure cane sugar, from Hawaii, wonder-bread helps build strong healthy tumors 12 ways, it's the real thing, where's the beef, uh-oh, spaghettio!? I remember those as well as I remember Aesop or Mother Goose. But will I transmit them to coming generations? Maybe I already am!)
Anyway, I was hungry for eel (unagi) this week, and went out in the pouring rain of this incessant Blade-Runner-esque rainy season to try to buy, an unagi bento. I found one at 7-11, but the price was an unreasonable ¥1300, 2 or 3 times a normal lunch box. I switched to getting an unagi onigiri (eel rice ball) instead, for a still-expensive ¥220, double the price of your typical nori-wrapped onigiri. There seems to be an acute shortage of eel this year, as today's DY reports. While searching for other eel news headlines, I found that the JT has some eel-related vocabulary in their eel restaurant reviews that you could try out when you visit your local eelateria. If you don't even like seafood and were hoping this was about EELS, why don't you go there, instead?