Here's a confession for you – a self-insight I discovered just the other night: I would rather watch animal shows than soccer. "But Dad, don't you see?" My younger son's voice squeaks. His eyes spring out from his head as if on stalks. "It's time for the World Cup! THE WORLD CUP!" He then trembles as if he has voiced something holy – a kind of reverence he usually reserves only for all-you-can-eat dessert bars.

If the old saw is correct and, "You are what you eat," then Takeru Kobayashi is a hot dog. In more ways than one. First, he is the brightest star in one of the world's fastest growing "sports" – competitive eating. And what he is most renowned for is his dominance of the "sports' " marquee event, Nathan's annual Fourth of July hot dog chow down in New York, an event he has won for six years running and where he once devoured 53 plus dogs in 12 minutes.

This Japan Times column from 2014 is about “stage fright,” not capybara. Yet, keep reading. I tie things together in the end. As for stage fright, I have suffered my share, especially when addressing groups in Japanese. At those times, I long to drop my text and dash for the door. And I am not alone. Many of my countrymen get the willies when speaking before groups, thus the stage fright nickname: the American disease. In my first few years in Japan, I was invited to speak often. Westerners...