To give their staff a mid-August break, most magazines came out with special two-week issues. A few, waxing nostalgic, are describing this year as "the last summer of the Heisei Era."

This doesn't portend anything ominous, of course; it just means that because the present Emperor will abdicate at the end of April 2019, next year's summer will have a new nengō (era name).

Shukan Post (Aug. 17-24) wonders if making the date for the future Emperor's birthday (Feb. 23) a national holiday will create problems, since in the past that date has been picked to hold university entrance examinations. Over the short term, businesses are likely to benefit in a variety of ways: Retailers will almost certainly hold everything-must-go, end-of-old-era sales, to be immediately followed by see-it-all-on-your-new-8K-TV, start-of-new-era sales." And some travelers are expected to take advantage of the celebrations to leave the country, extending their Golden Week holidays to 10 days, from April 26 to May 5, or even longer.