[steven]

Nyororin, great info! I never knew that senmai was called "seimai"... I know people around here say "senmai" for sure... and I always just connected it with the word 洗たく... I guess　洗 can be read sei, too then?

I asked my girlfriend about the seimaiki... and her parents do have one, which I kinda expected, them farming rice and all. I might get one, but we have a lot of other stuff to get (as appliances tend to all die at once, and that process seems to have begun recently).

As far as "last year's rice" goes, I think a lot of what you get in stores is "last years rice". You can get newer rice, but I'm sure the price goes up with that.

About soy sauce, I remember studying about that in a Japanese History class in college... the old kind of soy sauce, that is. I wonder if anyone makes that around here-- I'll have to ask around to see if I can't try some (although I'm slightly afraid of super salty things, and I think that may be what I'm in for).

What MMM said may have been a figurative thing, but I've seen people take that sentiment very seriously and almost hold a grudge against people who pour soy sauce on rice.

I'm just very curious as to how these types of things originate. Sometimes by asking around and talking about this stuff with different people, you can gain a lot of insight on different cultures. Just for the record I love these kinds of conversations and mean no ill-will to anyone.