I gots car

I gots car. So yesterday we started the paperwork to make Nick’s car my car, but it didn’t work as quickly as we would have hoped. “Today the person you need to see is in Irabu” (the other island you need a ferry to get to). So today we finished that up.

Then we met with a friend of Taira-san’s at the iinkai (the building where I work, it’s short for some kind of government building, I think) and I got insurance as well. So I can drive my car. Sometime next week I’ll have to get together with Jonathan and change the scooter over too. The car paperwork cost me 35y because my name was too long and she had to use a different piece of paper. Silliness. The insurance wasn't that bad either. Only 33,900 for the year. And it covers accidents with other cars, poles, cats, dogs, and even if my friends get hurt in my car. Not too shabby. Although I didn’t pay the extra to allow people who are younger than me to drive my car. Sorry, Nat, when you come to visit, you’ll have to walk everywhere until I get off. But when Chris and Marnie come, Marnie can drive Chris around. :D

Last night we also met Kirsty (from Scotland, then Massachuttes, then England) (“KARS-tee”), who is really nice. We took her out to Sangoya, the place I went the first night, and then we found a place to play darts at some random bar. It was fun. Her apartment is pretty nice, too. Again, you can tell who is taking over for girls and who is taking over for boys.

Today we did stuff with cars and housing. Apparently all of my paperwork will happen tomorrow morning at 10 at Nick’s apartment for the housing stuff. Which means we won’t be going anywhere in the morning and I can sleep in. Yay!

After dealing with insurance guy, I was on my way to walk home, but decided to try to find the grocery store. Which I only knew where it was in reference to coming from my house, but I was coming from the iinkai, and I Didn’t Get Lost. It was an amazing moment. To celebrate I treated myself to some too expensive fresh pineapple. Which is lovely.

Oh, and because there have been things that I’ve been wanting to talk about, and haven’t gotten around to them in other posts, in no order or introduction:

The portion sizes are HUGE here. Enough food to feed an army at every meal. They are so big that they actually have doggie bags!

There’s a billiards place (where we took Amy her first night) that is 800y per hour. The table is huge, the room is huge, and there aren’t any poles to hit, unlike most of the pool halls I’ve been to back in the states. It’s really nice.

I’ve been reading a book since I got here, one that I packed in my luggage to have here in case the box of books didn't’ get here in time. It’s called the Warrior Heir by Chima. It sucks. I really hate her writing. The story’s okay, I guess, but I really won’t recommend it to anyone. The really bad part is that she teaches at university, and so she’s teaching new writers to write like her. And it’s just really really bad. I mean if you can see the “twist” from more than 200 pages in advance (young adult, only 500 pages in the book), then you know it’s not done with finesse. Sigh. But I need to finish it, because, like I said, the story is decent. But I really don’t feel like paying money for the sequel.

As many of you know, I really am not good friends with the dark. And Justin’s apartment is so very . . . foreign (lots of stuff just on the walls and piled up and just lots of stuff) that with the fan on (so that I can sleep) stuff moves and it makes me think that there are terrier sized rats in the walls. It wasn’t bad until about 2 nights ago. I think my apartment will be better, because it is my apartment, you know? My own stuff. But I slept with a light on the other night.

That’s the news for now. More as the story develops.