I'm just bouncing

Because I'm assuming that if something went wrong with him getting on the plane, I would have been called by now. So.



Tonight was fun. After the beach I talked to Leo for a bit as he was driving to the airport. Then I went to Xia's Last Pizza. Afterwards I was all like "I want ice cream" which is normal for whenever I'm up late. And Jeff was like, "Okay" when he got a call from Hide, a diving friend of his to meet up with him at Pisala, and I'm like "oo cheesecake" and he's like "do you wanna come" and I'm like "I was wondering if it'd be rude to invite myself." So we go to Pisala, get our drink and cheesecake paid for. And then get invited by the owner of the bar to have a drink of caffeine free mint tea. It was a good evening.

Sun, Sun, we finally have sun!

My steam ran out today. I have 2 lessons done, 1 lesson half planned. 10 sets of alphabet cards (40 kids=1 set/4 people groups). And I just pooped today. Didn't feel like sitting down and actually doing much of anything. So I talked with people. It was good.

Then I went to my physical therapist and was told some new exercises and to not come back for 2 weeks (which is good, because Leo won't have to sit through that :) ).

Then, for the second day in a row I went to Soraneko for lunch. And yes, that's 空猫, sky cat. It's a bakery almost out at Sunayama (Natalie, that's the beach we walked to). It was TASTY! And because I literally came two days in a row, they gave me some service. And here, service = free stuff. I got almost half a loaf of some REALLY GOOD 900yen a loaf fruit and nut bread. OMG. I'm going back there. Just not as often as I'd like because they charge more for their stuff. It's good, better quality, but you pay for it.

Then I came home, had a quick shower, and went back to the doctor to actually see the doctor, who took one look at my foot, told me I'm fine and sent me on my way. Waste of time, but at least they didn't charge me extra for it.

And then I came home to be upset in Curi's general direction that I couldn't go to the beach because I had the stupid doctor's appointment. (I wasn't upset at her, I was just complaining at her, you know?) And then I realized that it was only about 3:20 and why the hey should I not go to the beach. So I did.

It was a bit cold towards the end of my hour and a half sun bathing. And I didn't go in the water, seeing how the only people in the water were wearing wet suits and I figured it was for a good reason. But I had a good time. We'll see how red or brown I get because of it tomorrow. I did put on sunscreen. You know me.

Thud!

I was going to go to the beach today. I was going to go the doctor and pick up some pills then go to the beach for the afternoon.

Instead I pass out (quite literally) for 2 hours. And then I get up, put in my mouth guard and pass out for 2 more.

I have dreams of fallen angels and horses and being kidnapped by a crazy lady and held with 20 other people in a hole in the wall sometimes with light, sometimes not, until we escape. Pretty good, except for the one where there was someone standing just outside the window, talking about me like an experiment. I'd like to remind you I live on the second story.

At least my headache has faded into the background.

I submitted for a publication.

So, the YAK is our monthly Okinawa JET newspaper. I've wanted to submit some things in the past, but have never felt up to it. Deadlines would either creep up on me or I just wouldn't feel inspired to write anything. But then I get this.

Ahoy there, bored ALT's!

This is just a quick reminder from the YAK teamu that the deadline's
coming up! Yup, this Friday, the 28th of March is the deadline for
submissions to the next YAK.

Remember that the theme of this issue is "Random Creativity", so
pretty much anything goes! Poems, photos, random writing, photocopies
of your butt...*

In particular, we'd like to draw attention to the 50 Word Challenge.
Now that you've got some free time, a take a look at the last issue
of the YAK, grab the 50 words you need and write us something random!
There is a prize going, so there's really no excuse not to enter, now
is there?

That's it from us! We're looking forward to seeing what you can come up with!

Your ever-faithful servants,
Jax and Jen

*Small-print: We reserve the right to not print submissions and instead
post them on the internet and/or use them as blackmail material.

Okay, so I come up with this:

Boredom Suggestions--in Haiku

by me


Are you bored at school?
Updating Wikitravel
is time consuming.

Freerice dot com tests
tons of vocabulary
while giving free food.

thehungersite takes
just a few moments daily.
You will help so much.


ihascheezburger
is funny in English but
not in Japanese

People name babies
at notwithoutmyhandbag,
but the names are odd.

lolcatbible is
a new and amusing way
to read the Bible.


myoats are neat art.
You can make them online but
mine don't look so good.

Do you remember?
My Little Ponies were cute.
jwebgen breeds them.

earthshots are pictures.
Beautiful pictures of Earth.
You can submit too.

Join zombieworkout.
Because you never know when
the zombies will come.

hellproject dot com
has an eikaiwa section.
Some girls are so dumb.

Facebook wastes much time
But is it blocked at your school?
I have no help then.

Thinking good ideas
For the YAK takes time but cringe.
You must show others.

Now I know I'm not a very good poet, but I liked that I could write so much keeping with the theme, mostly around internet sites that can take up some time. I'll let you know if I get published.

Sharing the Girl Scout Cookie Addictions

Stolen from atlanta

apparently about 36,000 boxes of Thin Mints, Tagalongs and Samoas were stacked at the Georgia World Congress Center, until the tornado hit downtown. Now the Girl Scouts need to sell them, and want your help!

sooo... they're having a Girl Scout cookie drive-thru – buy cookies without having to get out of your car! Cookies will be sold Monday, March 24-Friday, March 28, 11a.m.-7p.m. at the Atlanta Volunteer Service Center located at 1577 Northeast Expressway, Atlanta, GA 30329. Cash and credit/debit cards are accepted.

more info here

How sick is that. And yes, I so want.

Today I . . .

Got more cards made at work. Yesterday (and it doesn't feel like today was Tuesday, any more than yesterday felt like Monday, but that might just be due to anticipation about Leo, or my two days off in the middle of last week), Amy gave me copies of some alphabet cards and today I copied off 10 sets of them and wanted to back them with color paper, to make it so you can't see through them. 10 sets mean that I can play actual card games with my Heiichi kids (which is always my basis. That's the school where I have the closest to 40 kids in a class, 10 sets of both upper and lowercase means that I have 4 men groups and enough cards for them to play anything from Memory to Old Maid to Go Fish), and color paper so that you can't see through the cards. So I ask Noriko-san if I can have some colored paper, and she finds some, but it's too thin, you can see right through the card and the paper, so I ask for permission to go to the store and buy some colored paper. I could have just stolen it from one of my schools (I say steal and I really mean use the supplies that are there for all of the teachers to use, me included), but I wanted to have these cards ready for the first class, I want to really drill the alphabet before I leave, even if I'll only have about 6 classes with each class, so I figure I'm gonna fork over the cash and buy some of the most hideous, cheapest construction paper I can find. And she says, sure, go, but if you go to these particular stores (and lists off three) we (the BOE) have an agreement with them and you can get your supplies for free. And I go, what? And Amy, who was sitting right across the way and just the week before had spend a good bit of money on supplies went, what? So yeah. I got pretty colored paper for free. And I spent the rest of the work day gluing and cutting. Tomorrow there'll be more cutting and then some laminating. I've already got the cards for animals and sports and now letters. I'm thinking of adding countries. After that, I haven't quite decided what to teach, but I want to have it all planned by the end of next week. Cards made, flashcards printed. That way the rest of the school year should be cake. I might do weather with the kids who haven't gotten it yet (everyone but Sunagawa), as I already have the cards and lesson, but then I'll have to do something else with Sunagawa.

When I got home I was good and dieted. Because yesterday I totally didn't. It's sad that every moment since I got home, I've been thinking about what I want to and still have the calories to eat.

I also inhaled a whole bunch of toxic chemicals, but my bathroom can be eaten in now, it's so sparkly.

Then I did some laundry, dishes, and watched ep 210 of Torchwood.

I also packed up as many books and clothes as I could, within the weight limit, so I can send one of my big suitcases home with Leo and not pay for it to be sent. As is, I've found I've brought too many clothes, or rather, I didn't realize I wouldn't use all of the clothes I've brought. I should have, but I hate doing laundry so I thought it was a good idea at the time. I'm getting better about doing said laundry, and it's getting warmer so there's really no reason for me to keep most of my heavier clothing here, on top of clothing that I just don't wear here, but probably would at a job back home (the more formal-ish wear. You all know that I wear a teeshirt and jeans or sports pants at work). And I added all of the books I could and still make it under 50 pounds. I just barely could cut it. It's currently at 48.something.

Then I got invited to lunch, too bad it was about 7:30pm. Amy said she just noticed that her earlier email didn't go through. Ah well. And I grumbled with Maru-ne for a bit about astrology. Good times.

After which I went bowling. First game 112 ^_^ second game 82 :( third game 135 O.o <.< >.> XD

So yeah. Good day. Ish. But mostly.

Also, I found out, for those of you who care, that http://www.southparkstudios.com/ has all of South Park uploaded. And you can go there and watch whatever episode you want. Legally. Cuz it has commercials. Which means that someone gets paid. And guess what. It works outside the continental United States.

Yesterday was Xia's goodbye party. I feel so bad, because people gave him goodbye gifts and I didn't even think about getting him anything because I subconsciously thought that we were giving him the party. I didn't even think about it at all. I also ate like a pig. Weee. So today is diet again. I think my current thinking will be between 74 and 75 kilos makes for a mostly happy Kim. My face is not too thin, my belly is not tooooooo fat. We're still doing the upper body workout to work on the belly without working on the overall amount of fat in my system (it's my body type, I can't do anything about that, so I'm working around it).

Speaking of, I got up this morning to go out and hunt a heavier weight for said workout. My 2lb water bottle is just not cutting it any more on some of my exercises, so I have purchased a 2kg PURPLE weight. Going from 2lbs to 4.4lbs. Hopefully it'll be good.

And, seeing how it's a kinda cold overcast day, I've opted to not go to the beach in favor of staying at home all day and dye my hair (it has been 2 months). And yay for no ammonia or peroxide. Boo for it taking forever. 30 minutes down, 6.5 hours to go . . .

Post-apocalyptic workouts

As several of you know, I've been participating in the Post-apocalyptic Workout. The slackmistress has put out a call for Top Ten things that need to be learned to survive the zombie apocalypse, and seeing how I actually put some thought into my response to her, I'd thought I'd repost them here. This is taking into mind that she's already done Basic First Aid (which I have a shakey, but precursory knowledge), CPR (I gots, want to do a course again for a freshup), and can run for 40 minutes consecutively (good for her, when my ankle heals, maybe I'll try to borrow Janine's Couch to 5K and see if I can in fact start running).

My reply to her:

Hmmm, on my first look through the list I only get nine as the most important for beginnings of survival. Other things are also necessary, of course, but this is my list. I call my method Get Me Away from That method of surviving the apocalypse.

*gather/purify water--because all else will pale in comparison to finding good, untainted water. Knowing how to purify water you find will be imperative. You can go a few days without sufficient food while you run away or go on gathering raids. You cannot live without a steady intake of clean water.

*get faster (outrun zombies)--if you can get away from them, they can't get you ;)

*marathon walking--most zombies (at least the slow ones that make "sense" to me) can't run for long periods of time. A good run to get away followed by an extended ability to walk should be sufficient.

*bike safety & maintenance--a good, no gas way to get away.

*boating--this also goes with the Getting Away. It'll be good to have several options open--on foot, on wheels, on water.

*swimming/holding breath--and this goes with the boating, for safety, of course.

*gun safety & maintenance
*load & fire handgun--these two go together. Because, while in a perfect scenario you'll always be able to get away, but sometimes, you'll probably need to make a hole where you'll be able to get away. Getting a start on the basics as soon as possible is probably a good idea. I wouldn't touch anything larger than a handgun for a while. Master this first, then move up to shotguns and rifles.

*diplomacy--because I've seen that movie. Have you seen that movie? Where everyone dies because they couldn't work out their differences and talk it out? I'm sure there are some books or something about talking to people. This would probably be something you could work on in the background of other training.

And one more . . . I'll go with
*first aid. Specifically basic veterinary first aid. Knowing that your priorities revolve around getting you and your beloved companion out of harm's way, and that you've already tackled basic first aid for humans, I think the veterinary aspect should be next on your list. As well as slowly moving on to advanced first aid to humans, but that would make 11 :P
I noticed that a Damien posted a reply to her as well, and the writing style was very familiar :P And that some things on my list were not on his and vice versa. I thought I'd comment on why.

* starting/building a fire sans matches--because in the beginning, most of your food will probably come out of a can. That doesn't need fire and fire is a very tentative weapon at best, as it is easy to loose control of fire. And it's a way for them to find you.
* gather/purify water--score.
* cooking over campfire--again with the lack of needing hot food.
* orienteering -- yeah, I was thinking that, but it'd fall a little lower on my list
* climate training (Desert/Cold) -- again, I though other things would come first
* storing food -- as you pointed out, in the beginning at least there should be a ready supply of things
* advanced first aid -- score.
* starvation training -- this one is funny to me. I wonder how well people would do if they didn't train in this. Would they just lay down dead? Or would they deal with the gnawing pit in their stomach and do what needs doing?
* load & fire handgun--score.
* swimming/holding breath -- score.

Just some of my thoughts. Feel free to comment back.

My workout ground to a halt for about a month there as I wallowed over my lack of being able to walk (it's still not very happy). I cannot yet actively walk as a form of exercise, so I can't build up my endurance that way. I have begun my upper body workouts again. I can do over 120 crunches. (I've moved up from sets of 15 to sets of 20, I think I might move again to sets of 25 and see how many I can do). Basically I take my 2lb water bottle and do a set of Until I can't anymore, then I do the other arm. Rinse. Repeat. However, medical (ish) question. Is doing a ton of crunches every day a really bad thing? I know that muscles need the recovery time, but then you hear about people doing an insane amount of crunches a day. I was wondering what the medical, muscle erosion side of this was. I'm in a very improve myself move and kind of want to run with it. I probably wouldn't do them every day once I can start my walks again, but until then . . .

Also: There's a listing of Atlanta area hospitals with attached birth rates and c-section %ages. Seemed neat.

Random Free day (yay!)

I started my day with some politics, thanks to damien :


It's really a very good speech, a good way to look at the whole race issue. Very smart campaigning. And yeah, he's not my choice, but that's mostly about where he stands on the issues, as is, nobody left in the race is really my choice, but we'll see how it goes when it gets down to the actual election.

And then I got a call from No. 1 travel who booked our flights to and from Thailand to hear that Tiffany has just completely opted out of the trip and even though it was her idea to go to Thailand in the first place, she's not going and it's just me and curi. Oh. Darn. It went down a little badly, and I hope we can be friends after it, but me traveling around a foreign country with just curi, who has very similar interests when it comes to traveling, will not be anywhere near a bad thing.

So, from about 10 this morning til now, I've been communicating with curi and we've gotten all but 1 of our hotels confirmed, or flights to and from Koh Samui confirmed, and transport to and from the airport. Booya. We rocks.

In case anyone was wondering, this is The Plan.

April 23rd, I fly out of Miyako(I wrote everything on this site by the way, I plan to update it further) to Tokyo. I overnight there with curi.
April 24th, We fly to Bangkok. We'll arrive just before midnight, so no tourism.
April 25th, we'll train (or something) to Ayuthaya and overnight there.
April 26th, we'll train it over to Khao Yai National Park.
April 27th, staying at Khao Yai. Probably do a nature tour or something.
April 28th, bus back to Bangkok and see the city.
April 29th, more Bangkok
April 30th fly to Koh Samui.
May 1st, more Koh Samui. They have a big Buddha.
May 2nd, fly back to Bangkok so that we can wake up at the unforgiving hour of 4am on
May 3rd, fly back to Tokyo at 6am. Train to Niigata.
May 4th, relaxing in Niigata.
May 5th, fly back to Miyako
May 6th, *die*
May 7th, go back to work.


Also in there I found time to talk to both rosie and my family. And go to eat some tasty tasty, iron rich gyuudon. Because my anemia has been rearing it's ugly head recently, and it's only 580 for a massive bowl during the lunch special at Goya, right next door. I had a good day off, and I'm going to go make it even better by having a nice warm bath here in a minute :)

=happiness

Check out this message:

元気ですか？明日の砂川小は授業はないそうです。委員会での勤務
になりますが、家で休んでてもいいですよないしょ、ね

That's from my supervisor, to me.

It says (or at least I hope it says, because I'm going to act accordingly):

Are you well? Tomorrow, I heard that Sunagawa Elementary school doesn't have classes. Normally this would mean you'd go to the iinkai, but stay home :3 Okay?

Suck that I don't get to see those kids for the last time this year (I missed the other last class I would have had with them because of sinus infection), groovy that I can passively not see the 6th graders who fought in my classroom ever again. And dood. This means I get tomorrow and Thursday off. Alarm = off. I = jubilant. Noriko = love.

72, 115, 88 (I think, I forget exactly) = 275

Bowling league is made of win. I sucked, that's nothing new, but I had fun and improved a bit. I can now make impossible splits with ease. No, I can't knock down the impossible splits, but with the first throw I can make them. Now only to consistently move myself a little to the right so that I make consistent strikes instead, without making my ball go too far to the right. *sigh* It's a lot harder than I thought. And my left buttock is killing me. Apparently I really need more than one day before bowling again to rest. But I am super stoked. My team mates, Nema-san and Ishigaki-san were awesome. They and our team neighbor, Kamegawa-san talked me through a lot, and then about half way through stopped giving me advice because I (for the most part) was doing what they said. Now, like I said, constancy. And relaxing. And not looking at the pins but at the triangles. And keeping my body straight. And letting go of the ball sooner than I want to. And not moving my hand to the left or right but keeping it straight. And . . .

Ato jyuppun

So yesterday I was told by the water lady that you are not a person if you don:t say things like greetings and thank you for help. It was surreal, but I guess that kind of thing really matters here.

Today, I:m at Shimoji and I;m just over it. I:m sooooo tired of teaching and I can:t bring myself to care about it anymore. Oh, don:t get me wrong. I:m sure I:ll be fine after our 3 week break and I get my new classes with new and or old teachers. The 6th graders will be gone, and I:ll have fresh meat--newly turned first graders. I:ll be fine. It just doesn:t make these last few classes any easier.

Also, somebody cleaned out the putrescent pond out front that literally spawned the term *pond scum.* You can see right to the bottom. The koi are hiding. Now that they don:t have all that green muck to hid them from their predators.

Last summer I bought a book as part of the 4 for 3 summer reading things from Borders. Nightlife. Interesting take on Auphes (Elves, you can see it can:t you?). I:d never heard of the author or the book, but I got it for free so I was happy. And I enjoyed it thoroughly. In my last order to Amazon I found the sequel. Moonshine. And I:m equally happy with that. So far. Yay.

Two more minutes . . . I start my bowling league tonight. Here:s to doing better than I did in the tourny on Sunday (64, 84, 93). I hope to not embarrass myself too much. I:d done my upper body workout that day before I was told there was a tourny. I:m not going to do that today. Maybe it:ll help.

Reading, reading, reading

I've just spent the last little while updating my [online book recording site] with all of the new books I've gotten in as well as the audiobooks. I've been tagging them all appropriately, like for pre-japan reading vs audiobook vs hardback vs author and whatnot. I feel good about having so many books. I love having lots of choices to read.

Storm warnings

Yesterday, a tornado hit downtown Atlanta.

NWUS52 KFFC 151738
LSRFFC

PRELIMINARY LOCAL STORM REPORT...CORRECTED
NATIONAL WEATHER SERVICE PEACHTREE CITY GA
137 PM EDT SAT MAR 15 2008

..TIME...   ...EVENT...      ...CITY LOCATION...     ...LAT.LON...
..DATE...   ....MAG....      ..COUNTY LOCATION..ST.. ...SOURCE....
            ..REMARKS..

0938 PM     TORNADO          1 NW ATLANTA            33.77N 84.43W
03/14/2008  F2               FULTON             GA   EMERGENCY MNGR

            NWS DAMAGE SURVEY CONCLUDED AN EF2 TORNADO 6 MILES LONG
            AND 200 YARDS WIDE TUCHED DOWN AT SIMPSON AND BURBANK
            ROAD AT 938 PM. IT MOVED ACROSS DOWNTOWN ATLANTA AND CAME
            UP AT THE CORNER OF BRAEBURN AND JOSEPHINE ROAD IN
            WESTERN DEKALB COUNTY.

This was followed up with more heavy storms and hail.  I don't 
think anyone I know was hurt or injured.  It seems very surreal.  
Like, just because it's a city, it's magically protected, you know?  Anyway.

You can see some ajc pictures here, here, and a video here.
You can see some local picutres here and here.

Earthquakes

There was an earthquake today, but I didn't feel it. It was mostly west of here and while some people felt it, I didn't.



Earthquake Information (Information about Seismic Intensity at each site)
Issued at 17:10 JST 15 Mar 2008

Occurred at (JST)	Latitude (degree)	Longitude (degree)	Depth	Magnitude	Region Name
17:06 JST 15 Mar 2008	24.6N	124.3E	60km	4.8	NEAR ISHIGAKIJIMA ISLAND

Seismic Intensity at each station
(* mark: Local Governments' or NIED's station)

Prefecture	JMA Seismic Intensity	Station Name
OKINAWA	2	ISHIGAKISHITONOSHIRO
		ISHIGAKISHIARAKAWA
		ISHIGAKISHISHIN-EICHO*
		ISHIGAKISHIIBARUMA*
		ISHIGAKISHIMISAKICHO*
		TAKETOMICHOFUNAUKI
	1	TARAMASONSHIOKAWA
		TARAMASONNAKASUJI*
		TAKETOMICHOOHARA
		TAKETOMICHOKUROSHIMA
		TAKETOMICHOUEHARA*

No Tsunami threat by this earthquake.

I taught six classes today. *dies* That is all.

Dreamed of you and ancient Unnamable gods

Disturbing dreams last night. I wonder about my medication interacting with each other, it:s been going on a few nights now.

I taught kindergarten for the first time today, and the last time of the year. I:ll have a fresh new yoichen class starting next month, but for now, that:s all I get, and I don:t think I did a very good job. I made it really simple, and we played a game, but I don:t think I can do the same kinds of lessons that I do with everyone else, which means I:ll have to plan. And that:s fine, I:ll just have to figure out what I want them to learn and maybe we:ll be okay. I welcome help here. We:re looking for things that don:t require a lot of time on my part, and are easy for the kids to do or play in English.

Also, from David, a game controler that uses your thoughts to move objects. Want.

And last, I saw an animal today. Take a red panda, make it smaller, lengthen it, more ermine, and that:s what I saw. You might say a ferret that:s red with a very poofy tail. I have no idea what it was, but it was the closest thing to a squirrel that I:ve seen since coming here, and it made me happy before it hopped down into the sewers.

I've been slacking.

Yesterday, my shiny PS3 of happiness came in. I get to go to the electronic stores today to see if I can't find a router so that I can play it and be online with my computer at the same time. Apparently, I can log into the Playstation store under Leo's login, and download all of the games we paid for back home. Yay. This means I'll have my Super Street Puzzle Fighter 2 Turbo, HD remastered. Weeeeee.

Other than that, I've been eating Shadow Puppets while doing a Yoshitaka Amano puzzle I got from curi which was kicking my behind.



Picture stolen from the interwebs at large, but that's the picture I'm working on. At 50 by 75 cm. It's huge and has large spaces that have very little differenciation in color or texture. It got (a little) easier once I realized that I was doing it backwards. I'd started with the gold bits, and got horrendously frustrated, so I put them asside and have been working on the colored bits instead. It's still really hard and time consuming. Which is good, and bad, all at the same time. I like a puzzle to be difficult, but easily doable, if that makes sense. I don't mind pouring over a table full of puzzle pieces, but I'd like to be capable of finding the piece I'm looking for, you know? For the gold bits, when I get to them, I'm seriously going to have to try every single piece in every single spot.

Being sick, I missed a huge sports tournament for elementary school over the weekend, which I probably wouldn't have gone to anyway, but makes me sad that I *couldn't* go, you know?

And, even though I was sick, I've started to work out again. Nothing too envigorating, because I couldn't. Just some upper body with weights and crunches. This morning 4-1 of Heiichi told me that she noticed that I'd been losing weight and asked me how many kilos I'd lost. I had to tell her 4. Which made me feel very good. Yeah, it's not a lot for dieting basically since January, but I haven't gained more and have been able to maintain a (somewhat) steady loosing streak. And really, it's the not putting it back that's my problem. But we'll see how it goes. I'm expecting to gain weight while Leo is here, seeing how we'll probably be sampleing the cuisine fairly often. So geting down ahead of time is important.

I also finished the present that I'm sending to curi, so I'll have to pack it all up and get my keester over to the post office today. On top of buying a router. Although, depending on how long that takes, I might mail her stuff tomorrow. I decided what I'm going to do for veronica, I just didn't bring the right materials to do it today.

And, let's share:

I'm not going to explain this one, the link does it fine. http://io9.com/364715/put-a-nuclear-reactor-in-your-basement Yep, you read that right.

Since the ferry

Sorry. I've found that, while I've been posting on my other journal fairly regularly over the past few days, I haven't here because mostly I've not had anything to say. Let us recap.

I felt pretty puny coming home from Sarahama. I stopped by the store on the way home and bought a thermometer and took my temperature when I got home. It was 99.86. I felt bad, and that was high enough for me to reason that it was okay if I called in sick. Kind of a nip it in the bud kind of thing. I figured, I could go into work, but if I did, it would be pushing myself, and I'd just get sicker. So I didn't go to school on Wednesday. On Thursday, my fever went up, over 100, not much, but still. So I called in again, and said I'd go to the doctor. Which I did, he said I had a sinus infection, game me antibiotics, and sent me home. Friday was suppose to be my first day at Kagamihara, but because they were just having a picnic, I called in again. It stinks that I didn't get to meet the kids--I wouldn't have wanted to meet them feeling bad anyway.

So, over the past few days I've completed a 1000 piece puzzle about cats (it was HARD), a 500 piece puzzle, Disney, Mickey and Minnie in kimono, and have started on a second 1000 piece one that has lots of gold in it, I mean half of the puzzle is gold and nothin else. This should be interesting. Oh, and Curi, I found some of your hair in the puzzle box. It made me smile.

While doing these puzzles, I've finished Anansi Boys, Listened to the entirety of First Meetings in the Ender Universe, by Osron Scott Card, and finished up Diggers by Terry Pratchett. I couldn't imagine reading this series in book for, the guy who reads it is awesome. "And lo, it was said, 'we must leave this place.' and the reply was 'um.'" Read in a "I'm reading the scripture" kind of voice. It's awesome.

I've also watched the first few episodes of D. Gray Man, an anime that Veronica gave to me. It's good, but I've read the first book of the manga (I own the first book of the manga, back home), and I like it better, but it gives me something to watch. Most of my shows are not producing new episodes right now, so I'm a little in flounder.

I went to my ankle appointment on Friday afternoon, as I wasn't running a fever at the time (I've been going up and down). He worked with my stiff ankle and said it was likely that my next trip to the physical therapist would be my last. I'm skeptical, because I still can't stand on it for long periods of time and I don't have near my full range of motion yet, but we'll just see how it goes. I want to get back to walking. I want to be able to walk for 15km and not die. I think, because I haven't been walking in 6 weeks, I'll have to start at 5k and see how I do. That should be an hour, but with my ankle, I CANNOT walk at my normal speed. Which hurts. If you know me, you know how much it hurts me to slow down.

And, my friend Kirsten has declared today Official Lazy Pajama Day (she used different terminology, but this is more polite), and I was all set up to agree with her, to not get out of my pjs and not leave my house at all, when my next door neighbor, Justin, called (at 9am, mind) to say could I pretty please come rescue him because his bike blew it's second tire today. So I got dressed, got his car (which is more of a van and much bigger than mine), and got lost trying to find him. Eventually I did, and we're planning to go to breakfast as soon as he gets cleaned up.

This morning I rode the ferry.

Let me tell you, it:s such a good pick me up, to go to a new school and have all of the kids talking behind your back and have them say things like *bijin* and *kawaii* and knowing what it means. These kids can call me pretty and cute all they want. :D

Too bad I:m teaching 5 classes a day, and next week I get my very first kindergarten class. WEEEEEE! I:m going to mention it to Taira-san, saying I don:t mind now, because it:s the end of the year and I want to see everybody (as it is, I:m not seeing the 2nd graders), but in the new year, I really don:t want to teach 5 classes once a week.

And that thing that was living in my throat, making my nose run, that I thought might just be the China Haze (apparently, around this time of year we have the perfect wind to bring polution from hong kong, Hey Matt! I:m smelling your air!!), I:m not too sure that:s what that is anymore. Mostly because my throats on fire and I may or may not be running a fever. I don:t feel bad enough to go home yet, but I might call in tomorrow. It:s been getting progressivly worse, and I don:t want a repeat of last month. A day of rest might do me good.

And in reading. I have FINISHED SALEM*S LOT!!! Yay! It took two days of cleaning, laundry, dishes, and getting a good chunk of a puzzle done to kill the stupid book. But it:s over. The vampires can rest in peices. I:ve moved on to Anansi Boys. Because I love it. And because while I was trying to decide wither to listen to Anansi Boys or Ender:s Shadow, I did a coin toss. Only when I tossed the coin I said *heads, Neil, tails, Anansi* and Anansi won (is anyone surprised?), when I was suppose to say Orson, but whichever. Spider showed up on the ferry this morning. I decided that because the sea was a bit rough, reading on the ferry should probably never happen, so I:m so glad books on tape exist.

Current existance.

Torchwood lives in my dreams. Not surprising because I watched a few episodes almost right before bed. I need to not do that with the creepy shows. But I couldn:t read in bed last night. Because my current book is creepy too. This is a problem.

And even though I spent an hour or so working out to Salem:s Lot, I:m still not done with it yet. Some where in the middle of the 13th chapter, out of 15. Grrrrr, I wants to finish it so badly. Poor Father Callahan. I think it would have hurt more if I hadn:t known what was going to happen to him much, much later. Or maybe it hurts worse because of the knowledge. Tonight I:m planning on cleaning and laundrying to it.

I was awake for only 10 hours yesterday. I hate those days. It:s what I get for staying out so late the night before.

I start my newest school tomorrow. I have no idea what to expect.

So I spent today cleaning

What have you been up to? Now, most of my loved ones know that I'm not one for keeping things perfectly tidy. To the point where people have not been welcome at my home for about 2 months. Last night, for unknown reasons, as I hadn't specifically invited anyone over, I decided to rectify that. So this morning, I got up, and while talking to people, specifically Jeanelle, Ryam, and Natalie, I cleaned my house. Stephen King also helped (they're about to face the big bad). My apartment went from this to this. Go me.

Kickin' It Old Skool

This was one of the performances at Natalie's Berry College's opening of their new Sports Center.



Just thought you'd like some Old Skool for your morning. Back to cleaning!