Rumor has it this is the year.

Each October Haruki Murakami’s name gets trotted out for the Nobel Prize for Literature and each year it goes to someone else. This year, a fabled bookie, known for his literary prize predicting infallibility, says that tomorrow is the day.

We’ll see.

Regardless, I send Mr. Murakami my love and adoration. It was January of 2005 that I picked him up for the first time. I read a review of Kafka on the Shore that hyped its bildungsroman arc: young man goes on bizarro adventure, meets strange characters, danger and self-discovery ensue.

Only, wait. What…? How the…?

Murakami is a poultice for my aching brain. He presents solutions for the equations of being non-linearly and with such elegance that my overly-analytic, rigidly-doubtful mind is by turns baffled, paralyzed, and then put to sleep.

Mr. Murakami, you are a Vulcan Death Grip for my banality. Thank you. You are jazz incarnate.

I hope tomorrow brings you the acclaim you deserve. Just keep doing what you’re doing.