Kim's Happy World Full of Rainbows and Sunshine

Trying to remember to breathe

2009-07-09T11:55:00.002+09:00

The past two months have been hard. 4 summer classes are so not a good idea. But I can do it. I know I can do it. Just 2 more weeks, 2 paper/projects more and one more final. I'm almost done with the paper due tomorrow.

I'll get through this, it's just a matter of how sane I'll be at the end of it.

I had such wonderful plans today

2008-08-22T06:21:00.002+09:00

I was going to get up. I set my alarm for 12, I was going to get up, mess around a bit, and then go running. No plan with the running, just run. Probably north, towards Marietta square. I seem to remember sidewalks going that way. So I set my alarm and was ready to go. But my bowels had ideas of their own.

I haven't put food into my system since about 11 last night. I haven't put water into my system since 7 am. When my alarm went off at 12, I went to the bathroom, stayed in the bathroom, and then decided that my bowels didn't really want me moving too much, so I went and laid back down. I've been laying here since, with periodic trips Back to the bathroom. It's after 4 now. I've been in bed 14 hours and still, I'm scared to eat, I'm scared to drink. And I feel cold. It's not cold here, but I feel cold.

I hate being sick.

So, here. Have a happy write up of the rest of our Taiwan Adventour.

Monday August 4th.

Relocated to Taichung. Had ISSUES finding the hotel, thanks to the Great Idea that Lonely Planet seems to have by giving us maps in our guide book in English (or Pinying), but not in the native writing system. But we got there, and it reeked of the 70s, but they were very friendly and took care of us, and had a laundry service, which was a godsend.

After settling in for a bit, we got ourselves up and buses back to the station, so that we could bus to the 1st Big Buddha. This one was all gold (although he needed a bit of work) and was the biggest laughing-style buddha in Taiwan. He was 22 meters high and completely tucked in around this neighborhood. Just right there amidst other random buildings. Other people have made comments that this takes away from the Buddha pilgrimage experience. I disagree. To me, that seemed like Taiwan written all over it. I mean, the temples themselves here are just tucked into the middle of the strip mall style sidewalks. Shoes, Clothing, Bags, Temple, Tea Shop, Stamp Shop--that's the norm. So having a giant Buddha tucked between old apartment buildings, normal.

We walked most of the way back to the hotel, caught a cab, rested, and then went out to dinner at this awesome noddle house, but still couldn't really read the menu, so we had noodles with beef again. But Oh! the beef was divine.

Tuesday August 5th.

We decided to forgo the bus that morning and took a taxi to the train station (by about this time in the trip actually remembering what "train station" was in horribly wrong Chinese), got a train to Chung Hua (about 15 minutes), and then a bus to the big buddha there. This one had a whole park around it, lovely place for walking, biking, doing taichi (we saw people doing it), fountains, and then on the top(ish) of the mountain, was the Buddha. He was pretty cool. And we could go inside and see all of the different stages of Buddha's life, in kinda creepy statues. That was pretty neat.

Then it was back down the mountain, back to the train station-ish, a brief stop in McDonald's for lunch, then across the street to catch a bus to take us to Lukang, where we couldn't find a single taxi until we were almost to the temple. The map we had was WRONG (like the roads didn't actually DO that dood), it started to pour down rain, and it was just not really cool until we found the temple, built in the 1600s which almost made it worth the trip. Although I think I disagree that it's "totally worth the side trip." Things like, "there are no taxis in this town" would have been good to know ahead of time. Stupid book.

But the day was saved when Chris was reading the signs and found a bus that would take us directly back to Taichung for about the same price as the buses and train back to Taichung through Chung Hua. Go Chris. And we found more bubble tea, which always makes it better.

For dinner we tried to go to the Japanese restaurant, but failed as the menu started around $30 (USD) so we went across the street to a place that a lot of locals seemed to like, nearly cried over the incomprehensible menu for about 15 minutes, then went up to the counter, and (thank god) found a woman who spoke english who could understand that all we wanted was something with rice, and veg, no meat. They asked if we were vegetarian, and I said no, but I didn't have the mental capacity to explain that we were just sick of only ordering beef. What they came out with was wonderful and perfect, and I'm pretty sure it wasn't actually on the menu. It was awesome.

Wednesday August 6th

Taxi to station, train to Taipei. We had the trains down. We knew the procedure and had it all fixed.

We got out, went back to the cheap hotel we got the first night in Taipei (they were actually There this time), got our same room where the a/c seemed to have broken in the last week, but whatever. We had icecream and pita from this wonderful pita place in the train station, and all was right with the world.

Thursday, August 7th

Every day we woke up in Taipei we had pitas for breakfast. I'm not gonna keep saying it.

We took the subway and a bus up to see the National Palace museum, and thank God that we missed the English tour. When they say that they have a TON of artifacts stolen from China, and that what they're displaying is only a small portion of the real collection, I live in FEAR of the storage costs. We ran into the English tour. Around about 2pm, the English tour started at 10am. I feel so sorry for those people. By the third floor, Curi and I were just glancing at things and only really looking at the stuff that caught our eyes, there was just that much of it.

Dinner that night was some lovely pastries from a Japanese bakery, which we had to get totally lost in the underbelly of the Taipei Main Station to find, but we did.

Friday, August 8th

This day we looked at each other and said no. We were suppose to go out to the tea gardens and drink tea in this awesome senery and lovely atmosphere, and just no. We couldn't do it. We found a movie theature (which was a bit of an adventour in and of itself, but really just asking about 6 people where the dang thing was) and watched Brendon Fraiser in the Mummy 3. Which was an awesome Mummy movie, you just have to have your expectations in the right place. They actually said it themselves in the very beginning, they'd contracted for 3, so this was it. Don't expect much. And with expectations low, it was pretty good.

This was also the day that I bought my jade buddha bead. it's got a small hole in the top of it, so it can be set in a necklace pretty easily. I would have been kicking myself if I hadn't bought one, so I'm glad.

Saturday, August 9th.

Breakfast again, then bus to the airport. The flight was pretty nice, we got into Tokyo on time, even after being delayed a bit, and found long term storage for our heavy heavy bags, which was just AWESOME. Much less encombered we FINALLY met up with Marnie, got dinner, and crashed.

Sunday - Wednesday, August 10th through 13th.

I don't really remember these days very well. I know we went to Harujuku to a specialty lunch shop (which was AWESOME), and I bought a new bag (which I love), I know we went to Shinjuku to be blessed by Marnie's favorite monk (that felt awesome, TONS of good juju), we went to Asakusa and got my DS, games, and some cds, we had to go back to Asakusa because of issues, but that was okay. And other than that, I can't really remember right now what we did. I *think* that was it, but if the other two remember something I didn't, let me know.

I know we cut off our phones like around 5 on Tuesday, and we hadn't heard from Jyn by that time, so I assumed that she was stuck studying, we didn't get a chance to meet up with her, which kinda sucked. Didn't get a chance to meet up with Tiffany either.

Then, on Wednesday, we got up early, got ourselves to Tokyo to go back to Narita, to collect both of our bags, check in, get really upset at the lady at the counter because the system had our seats wrong, but we ended up together, with barely enough down time to go to the gate, and buy supplies for the flight before boarding. Then the 12 hour flight. Fun times. We watched Iron Man, read a bunch, I watched Spiderwyck, played video games, had one of the rudest stewardesses ever, and stayed up the entire time.

We deplaned, had fun with the Atlanta security of stupidity, were met by our loving families (with signs and balloons :D ), found ALL of our luggage 8D, and were taken home to showers before going out to see Dark Knight (NOBODY SPOILED ME!!! WOOOOOO!!!! I MADE IT!!!!!), which was . . . I need to see it again when I haven't been up for 26 hours to decide. By the end of it I was awake for 29 hours straight, and then crashed. I think that was my record. Ever.

So, there you go. I'll get pictures up. Sometime. I'd prefer not to do uploading on wireless, and that's all I got on the laptop right now.

Cheers.

Oh, but have some stats.

Since leaving the United States, I was gone for one year, two weeks, and six days. During that time I read, in completion, 112 books, 9 of which were in the last two and a half weeks since I'd left Miyako. Go me. I hit over one hundred.

Adventour in Taiwan!!!!

2008-08-03T20:11:00.002+09:00

I has a bit of internet right now, so thought I'd upload what I've been doing. I pretty much have access to internet (intermittently). If there's anything you think I should definitely know about, please email it to me? This username at the gmails. I'm also in the process of uploading photos. We'll see how far I get. I already filled up the gig card . . .

Kim and Curi’s Adventour in Taiwan!!!!

Monday, July 28th.

Kim and Curi’s Mini-Adventour in Japan!

That morning was kinda harrowing. I was suppose to wake up at 7:30 to get last minute things (like getting dressed) done before the power guy came to cut everything off. I woke up at 6:50 and was Up, so I packed up my bed, got everything last thing taken care of and headed to the airport.

Upon check in I was told that the plane I was waiting on was coming from Naha, stopping in Miyako, and traveling on to Tokyo. Because of the typhoon and bad winds, it might not come, it might be canceled. That was a fun way to start my morning.

Jason showed up, saying that Erika was upset that she couldn’t come because of work. And then Erika called me to say bye and that she was sorry she couldn’t come. That was awesome. I like Erika, and Jason.

They were shortly followed by Juliane, Justin, Teresa and her family (who were visiting in Miyako), Sam (big! surprise. Sam had meetings on Irabu, so she said she wouldn’t be able to come, but then the ferries were canceled because of the typhoon, so she could show up :D We had fun conversations about how the ferries weren’t running and weither my plane would be able to go or not), Kirsty (didn’t expect her), Noriko, Noriko, K*** (I can’t remember her name right now), Wakayama, David (!!!!!!!), and Jeff. It was a good send off. Noriko gave me a little parting gift that was awesome, the Japanese ladies were very interested in my pillow case (it’s all shiny satin, I’ve had it for YEARS), everyone was really nice and all. I didn’t cry, but I think that was more because it still doesn’t feel real, like I'm still planning to go back there after a little vacation or something.

Anywho. The flights before me and after me were canceled, but my flight got off with just a little delay, that they made up in the air :).

I got to Haneda airport in Tokyo, asked how was I suppose to get to Narita airport (all in Japanese! During the first of my stay here, I was always asking if they spoke English first, but now I’m confident enough to just ask in Japanese from the get go!) and was told that the next bus left in 2 minutes. So I bought my ticket (3000yen just for an hour bus ride XP) and got on, mailing Curi that I was On My Way!

When I got to Narita, Curi picked me up and we were off on our Mini Adventour! in our rented car. We picked up some conbini lunch and drove the 45 minutes to the second largest Buddha in the car. The Ushiku Daibutsu was awesome. And about twice as tall as the Statue of Liberty. You could ride up an elevator inside it and look out these neat holes in his chest. It was pretty cool.

Then we drove back to the hotel (getting horribly lost trying to find the rental car place, eating some nice noodles for dinner, and stopping by Jusco for some last minute travel items) for a nice stay in a shwank hotel that cost too much.

In the morning we were off to Taiwan!

Tuesday, July 29th

Our flight was delayed. And then further delayed. Now I’d been worrying about the typhoon being the reason we were delayed or the flight was canceled, but no, there was a thunder storm over Tokyo.

We get on. Had a nice 3 and a half hour flight with some nasty in flight fish (they ran out of beef) and landed without much incident (I finished Witch Week on the plane). We got to Taiwan. Had a little mix up at customs, but no problems, and got on a bus for Taipei. We landed about 4:30-5, but we didn’t get to the hotel until about 8. It was kinda ridiculous. And when we get there, (first we couldn’t FIND the hotel, but then we did after asking about 3 people) there was a sign on reception that said to knock VERY loudly, and if there wasn’t anyone there, to go up to the 5th floor and wait. Need I mention the lack of elevator? So we lugged all of our bags up the 5 flights, figured out how to use the phone, called the manager, and were told to wait another 20 minutes while they finish dinner (I’ve been having to REALLY pee for about 30 minutes at this point, and no, there wasn’t a bathroom in the waiting area) and that we were so late that they almost gave our room away (way to make me NOT stress out!). We finally got in, were told that where the bus dropped us off was the train station, and we went back, checked the train schedules to Taroko, and had dinner there. Nice nice pita place. Curi had falafel and I had eggplant and hummus. Made of win. We go back to the hotel, have an interesting shower experience, and go to bed.

Wednesday, July 30th

We both wake up Uber early and decide to just leave.

We catch the 7:25 train to Hualin and meet some nice people who help us with our oversized luggage. This is the first time that our beloved Lonely Planet led us astray. We get off at the station before Hualin, because that’s where the book says we can get a bus ride into Taroko. The book lied. But we met a really nice park ranger that offered to take us up into Taroko and we thought, great. This is also the first time we figured out exactly how HUGE this Gorge is. Taroko (the city) is at the beginning of Taroko National Park. Our hotel was in Tian Siang. This is about an hour bus ride from Taroko. Who knew.

We wait around the park station for about 2 hours, taking in the scenic beauty and some really tasty lunch before hopping on the city bus to Tian Siang.

At Tian Siang we walk up the hill, with all of our stuff, to our hotel, and no body was there. Nobody, no sign, no nothing. And we don’t have cellphones or anything. So we wait.

We are met by a nice dog and 2 cats who really just want the love, but no people. The dog was just all kinds of awesome. At first she was really nervous of us. In that kinda aggressive nervous way. Like she was all wary of us, and when one of the cats came out and wanted to say hi to us, she tried to herd the black kitty away from us, trying to tell her that we’re strangers and not to be trusted. But the cat was stubborn and came over anyway. And after a while of us sitting down and writing postcards without being any kind of problem, the dog came over as well. First she nuzzeled and licked my knee. Then, after I broke down and started loving on the kitties, getting down on their level, she came up to me and was all ten kinds of lovey, but would only come over when I was kneeling, she didn’t like it when I stood up.

The owner came back after about an hour, and she spoke nicely broken Japanese. We got checked in, and then wandered over to the temple right next to Tian Siang. Hsing-te Temple. Large Buddha, temple, tower, really nice. Apparently they had a bunch of natural disasters not too long ago and needed lots of money and volunteers for the reconstruction of the temple (and the monks are all female). We met a nice young monk in the gift shop who talked to us a bit and told us some information. (I finally found a necklace of my personal Buddha!)

After walking around the temple for a while we came back to the hotel to just chill for a bit before dinner. Apparently the only restaurant in Tian Siang that caters to non-Taiwanese is the restaurant in the resort (RESORT!) and it was kinda pricey, but good. We met a German guy named Robert (does NOT sound American) and dined with him, and talked a bunch. Good times.

After dinner we met this nice Taiwanese guy (who’s dad apparently lives in Canada, and that’s why his English was so good) who’s family had worked on the construction of many of the roads in Taiwan and he took us around an exhibit in the hotel that showed pictures of Then and Now about the war and the roads and the Gorge. He also gave us some travel advice for when we go to visit China. Really neat.

We came back to a mostly cold shower, and then chilled out and read until we went to bed, a bit early.

Thursday, July 31st

12 hours later, we woke up :P We had a bit of a light meal for breakfast and walked to the information center. We were told that there aren’t buses that just go from one stop in the gorge to the others, that if we wanted to see more of the gorge we should have rented a car, rented a taxi (from Hualin), or gotten on a tour bus (from Hualin), and we were just kinda stuck. So we walked from Tian Siang to the next stop over, Lyu Shui, which was nice to walk so slowly and get pictures.

In Lyu Shui we found a restaurant that was closed, and a visitor’s center that wasn’t and showed us how Taiwan was made and rocks and stuff. There was also a video that they played just for us (because there weren’t a whole lot of visitors today, I guess). We were also told that all but one of the trails were closed, and one of the volunteers was going on it and did we want to join her. We said we did and she showed us the Lyushui trail (2km) which was pretty awesome. And then we walked back to Lyu Shui and she helped us hitchhike back up to Tian Siang. Yes, I have officially hitchhiked in a foreign country.

We had a fantabulous lunch of ice cream and instant noodles and are now chilling in the hotel again, our legs aching. Yay!

Friday, August 1st

We woke early enough to catch the 9:05 bus to Hualin, which took about 2 hours to get there. We got off at Hualin station, and were told to jump back on the same bus to go to the train station (I bet the driver thought we were crazy—speaking of the driver, he was just kinda awesome, cursing at everyone else on the road, but beeping his horn and waving to his friends). We had about a 2 hour wait for our train, and we spent it just sitting there, eating a whole bunch of conbini food, in preparation for our VERY long train ride to Tainan.

I’d like to take this moment to point out that I love the fact that I know a bit of Japanese. And that day was the day that it really hit home how great it was. See Japan kinda ganked the Chinese writing system a few hundred years ago, and while things have changed a bit, some of the words are still written the same, and in Japanese there are usually 2 or more readings for any particular character, and one of those readings is usually from Chinese. So as we were passing Taipei on our 7 and a half hour train ride, we knew where we were because we were passing tai = 台 (the kanji that is Taiwan’s tai) and pei = 北　(north) Or the big city of North Taiwan. Cuz I can read that. Go me. I can also read 台中 (Taichung, Japanese = Taiwan’s tai + chuu, middle), 台南 (tai + south), among most of the other station names, or at the very least, as soon as I saw them, I could usually figure out where we were on the map. It was the awesome.

Like I said, 7 and a half hours later, we get to Tainan, a nice lady with a colorful backpack helps us know where our hotel is and that it’s waaaaaay to far to want to walk, so we catch a cab, which was fun, cuz he didn’t know exactly where our hotel was either. But it’s okay, because we found 2! nice couples who showed us to our hotel :D

We check in, kinda cringe at the bill, but love the fact that it’s a “hostel” with an actual “hotel” feel. And we get breakfast vouchers, so it’s not so bad. We go out in search of dinner, and don’t find anything for a ways, as everything seems to close about 9pm. We found 1 ramen place still open, and negotiate in Japanese for him to just pick whatever kind of ramen he wants to cook for us (seeing how we can’t really read the menu), but for Curi to not have any actual pork meat in hers.

Saturday, August 2nd – Death and Cake Day

We started out the day with some Death. Well, actually we started out the day with our complementary breakfast, but then we went to Dongyue Temple (Top 10 in Taiwan, #10) which was a whole bunch of Death, which was just kinda awesome. Then we walked towards the Alter of Heaven, good for dispelling bad luck, and on to the Official God of War Temple (Sacrificial Rites Temple) which is dedicated to a Han dynasty general deified as the war god (woo!). Next door was the Matsu Temple (Top 10 #3), which use to be a palace, and we even saw the ceiling beams where the king’s wives hung themselves (followed along with the Death theme very nicely). We walked back to our hotel much earlier than I though we would and on our way found a nice lady who talked at us in Chinese, but helped us to FINALLY find us some bubble tea!!!! We then went to the super across the street from the hotel and got some meat buns and cake and enjoyed some of the nice A/C for the rest of the night.

Sunday, August 3rd

We would have gone on a bus to see another Top Ten temple (#9), but decided that we were really tired and wanted to take it really easy today. So we did. It’s been awesome. So far we went walking around a little bit, got our tickets for tomorrow, and mostly read and played video games. Like I said, pretty awesome. Tomorrow we take our train to Taichung and to the BIG Buddhas.

Look at me, I still has the internets!

2008-07-27T09:56:00.001+09:00

But for how longs? O.o

This is what my neighborhood looks like right now. I haven't opened the windows yet to see how bad the winds are, but it's not currently raining, and with 22mph winds, I'm thinking not only snorkeling, but also beach is out. Which sucks. I wanted to go on my last day.

However, I'd be much more happy if I can go to Taiwan without problems. The prediction map looks good for me. This is what I want it to do. Go further and faster west so that it'll hit China by the 29th and not be over Taiwan AT ALL. It's already changed a lot since yesterday, doing exactly what I want it to. Let's all keep on pushing it a bit more?

Read at least the beginning? It's long, so key words in bold.

2008-07-26T17:41:00.001+09:00

Okay, I need your help again. I'm flying to Taiwan from Tokyo on July 29th. I need the typhoon to not still be over Taiwan at that point. Here's the typhoon right now. The first number, that's what day they predict that the center of the storm will be somewhere in that big circle. I need it to go FASTER. I need it to go WEST. This time not pushing it out of the way, but pushing it faster west so that it passes over Taiwan quicker and will be on it's way to China by Tuesday. So, please think about the typhoon going faster west. Further West. This will also be a good thing because the less time it hangs out over the ocean, the less chance it has to get stronger, the weaker it is, the less damage it'll do.

Now for an update. Yesterday was awesome. I got just about everything I need to do done and all that's left is my bed appointment at 11am tomorrow. And then packing up the last few things. And then going. Woo.

I also went for my run yesterday. Now, this was suppose to be my w1d3 run after my 30 minute run. The wind was KILLER. Like, on the way over the bridge it was fine, strong, but nice. On the way back it was pushing me sooooo hard. The final hill, it literally felt like I was trying to run through water. I gave up, about 2 minutes from the end of my 30 minutes and started to speedwalk, and I went FASTER. It was rediculous.

So then, I do my 5 minute recovery walk and start on w1d3. Now I've had two minds about this week. I've found the 1 minute interval too easy. But I leave for Tokyo then Taiwan on Monday, and I didn't want to push myself so hard that I got to a point that I'd be pushing myself during my trip. I don't expect to be able to run every other day, and I expect that my progress, due to inactivity, will slow down considerably. I don't want to be pushing myself hard before I leave only to find that the level I make it to while I'm on my trip kills me because I'm running after sightseeing all day. If that makes sense.

But yesterday, I was just sick of it. I accidentally over ran the 60 seconds for the 2nd time that day, and I just said to myself, fine. How far can you do? So after 4 of the minute intervals, I did a 2 minute interval (and felt a bit winded, but good), walked for 90 secons, did a 3 minute interval (felt a bit more like I did at the very beginning of the program, rather winded and happy that I could walk again), walked for 90 seconds, and then did a 3rd longer interval, but lost track of the time, and was comfortable to run until the end of the 20 minutes, so around 4 minutes. I followed the day with a cool down walk. It was good. I think, I don't know. I think I'll just have to try and see what feels comfortable for me during my trip. I think that if I need to I'll stick with week 2 after my 30 minute run, but I'll forgive myself if all I do is the 30 minute run and a 30 minute walk, if that's how tired I feel. Or less, if I find that I don't have time after seeing everything I want to see. I can exercise any day, I can walk around Takoro Gorge probably once in my life.

Afterwards I hung out on the beach for a bit with Juliane ("YOU lee AHN eh" she's German) before driving back, catching a shower, and walking around Miyako Matsuri for a bit. All of the other girls were all dressed up in yukata, but mine's all packed away :( But it was fun, and we got some cotton candy before heading to pizza where the whole old skool crew was there, it took us about an hour to get our pizza, another 45 minutes to another hour to get our salads, but good company, and I've finally met the infamous Owen-sensei, who's on Miyako for the summer with his wife and his 1 year old.

We didn't quite leave before they started otori, but left before too long. Milton's wife, Tomoko, wrote me a beautiful good bye letter in English (which she doesn't speak very well, so it showed extra effort), I really need to keep in contact with them.

Then we headed to Anchan and Ryu's new restraunt that doesn't open until the 1st, but they had Hiroko's birthday party there. Good atmosphere, good location, good people, good fun, dangerous floor. I fell down a step I didn't see and didn't hurt my ankle! I had a choice, in that second of falling. Recover and possibly really hurt my ankle again, or just fall. So I just fell. I have a hugenormous, beautiful bruise on my right knee. About 3 inches long ;)

After, sleep and waking up too early for the final bill with the gas man. Because of my deposit, I only had to pay about 17 bucks for the last two months ;D

Then, with the typhoon in the area, things were girigiri today about weither we could go snorkeling or not. (They're pretty much muri tomorrow, but we may try to go anyway). But me, Juliane, and Jason tried anyway out at Arugusuku. It was windy. And the waves were ROUGH. But it was awesome. I swear, about half of the fish I saw, it was my first time seeing that species. Soooo good. And for a while, me and Juliane were swimming INSIDE this school of fish (about 6-7 different species) but they were swimming in front of, surrounding, behind us. Literally getting within a few inches of our bodies. It was like they were uber curious about us! not the other way around. We also saw this HUGE fish, about a foot and a half long, about a foot tall, fat, that just chilled out, looking at us. And you could tell, it was checking us out. We'd watch it, it'd watch us right back. I figure it figured we were the only things in the area that were big enough to eat it, so it was being cautious.

Then, or rather, from the beginning, Juliane's mask was just Not Working Right and she just gave up, and went back towards shore, keeping an eye on me from there. I went around a bit by myself and saw a long skinny fish, about 2 feet long, silvery, with a long snout, and an eye bigger than the old silver dollars (the Old ones, like Ryam has), with a body about only 3 inches in diameter. It was funky. I also saw a school of about a hundred zebra striped fish, but yellow, not white, and a I think you call 'em sea slugs? The pretty little brightly colored things? This one was orange. A ton of sea urchins and anemones, and a couple nemos. I gave up about an hour fifteen and went back towards shore, where it turns out Juliane and I have the same foot size, so she borrowed my fins and mask and went back out for another 40 minutes or so while I watched her from the shore.

Jason was out spearfishing this whole time, but didn't see anything big enough to catch. He said he saw a small octopus though. Groovy for him. I'm glad it was small and he didn't kill it. At least he's the kind of fisherman who takes only what he'll eat.

The waves and the current were really strong, but the viability was good and we saw a bunch of stuff. I'm gonna call it a good day.

After I dropped them off, I did a shower and an errand and went to Mitchan's for lunch. Where he gave me an awesome book on the fundementals of Buddhism (and I got his email, he wants to know what I think of it), and a present for Leo for his birthday. We had a really good conversation, going every where from linguistics to religion to experiences, to temperature, and beyond. He said that his new lesson for the day was that in degrees Fahrenheit water freezes at 32 degrees. He didn't know that previously, or the formula for converting it (degrees C x 1.8 + 32, I love the internet), and that that would have been something that he think would have been interesting to learn in school, as it has real world implications (ie: you travel to America and you need to know weither to bring sunblock or a sweater).

Then, on his suggestion, I went to San-e to get a caligraphy pen, and because I was there I poked around the clothing. I had a faint idea to buy Leo (or myself) a junbei, but I didn't see one I liked enough for the price they wanted, but I did find a sale on exercise pants, dry fit, and as the ones that I've been using for school have started to wear thin in the crotch (10 buck pants, I wore them for about 6 months, totally worth it), and they're starting to get tight around the thighs, I figured getting two more pairs of capris that fit better and a new pair of shorts would be worth it (21 bucks, 3 new dry fit pants ;) ). The thigh problem is not because I'm gaining weight, mind. It's because of the running. My thigh muscles are getting more fit, and a little bit bigger, so all of my pants have become a bit tight around the thighs. I don't mind it, I think they look better. They're no longer sticks with a bit of fat round the buttocks, but actually neatly proportioned legs, with nice calves and good thigh curvature, before getting to my now a little higher and firmer, but seemingly just as squishy badunkadunk. Yes, you may in fact see me in spandex at dragon con this year.

In a little bit the second day of Miyako Matsuri starts where they're crowing Miss Miyako and the have a giant tug-a-war, which they'll cut up and give out for good luck. I'm gonna go, but I need to finish my crunches first (I've used this as a rest time between my push ups). I'm still pushing myself too hard on my push ups, doing w3c3, but I think it's good. I'm still going up in numbers, even if I'm not going any higher than the max. And this is after snorkeling in rough waters this morning, so I still feel good about it.

I think they cut of my internet later tonight, so I probably won't be updating much in the next few weeks. But I'll have my computer with me, so maybe I'll try to write up a bit about my trip and then post it late.

Couch to 5k

2008-07-24T10:44:00.001+09:00

I'm playing around with google documents and I rewrote the couch to 5k plan because I don't like the spacing on their website. And google has a publish to blog button. So I'm trying it out. Anyway, this is the program that I just finished and am doing again :P

Week

Day 1

Day 2

Day 3

5 minute walk

20 minute intervals

60 seconds running

90 seconds walking

5 minute walk

20 minute intervals

60 seconds running

90 seconds walking

5 minute walk

20 minute intervals

60 seconds running

90 seconds walking

5 minute walk

20 minute intervals

90 seconds running

2 minutes walking

5 minute walk

20 minute intervals

90 seconds running

2 minutes walking

5 minute walk

20 minute intervals

90 seconds running

2 minutes walking

5 minute walk

2 repetitions:

90 seconds running

90 seconds walking

3 minutes running

3 minutes walking

5 minute walk

2 repetitions:

90 seconds running

90 seconds walking

3 minutes running

3 minutes walking

5 minute walk

2 repetitions:

90 seconds running

90 seconds walking

3 minutes running

3 minutes walking

5 minute walk

3 minutes running

90 seconds walking

5 minutes running

2.5 minutes walking

3 minutes running

90 seconds walking

5 minutes running

5 minute walk

3 minutes running

90 seconds walking

5 minutes running

2.5 minutes walking

3 minutes running

90 seconds walking

5 minutes running

5 minute walk

3 minutes running

90 seconds walking

5 minutes running

2.5 minutes walking

3 minutes running

90 seconds walking

5 minutes running

5 minute walk

5 minutes running

3 minutes walking

5 minutes running

3 minutes walking

5 minutes running

5 minute walk

8 minutes running

5 minutes walking

8 minutes running

5 minute walk

20 minutes running

5 minute walk

5 minutes running

3 minutes walking

8 minutes running

3 minutes walking

5 minutes running

5 minute walk

10 minutes running

3 minutes walking

10 minutes running

5 minute walk

25 minutes running

5 minute walk

25 minutes running

5 minute walk

25 minutes running

5 minute walk

25 minutes running

5 minute walk

28 minutes running

5 minute walk

28 minutes running

5 minute walk

28 minutes running

5 minute walk

30 minutes running

5 minute walk

30 minutes running

5 minute walk

30 minutes running

5 minute walk

Now that they're gone . . .

2008-07-23T18:28:00.000+09:00

So yeah, bowling last night was awesome. Or, I didn't do badly, and *I* won a game (everyone else did dismally). Then I went out drinking with Ikemura-san, and Justin, and some other bowling peeps. And I got home late, rather . . . drinked, and decided to go ahead and take that last day of nenkyuu I had today. Good plans.

I slept until about 9:30. I got up, got dressed and started to clean. And oh! the cleaning that had to be done, and I had an appointment at 5 for them to come and do the final check on the apartment. So I start cleaning, and then at 10am someone knocks on my door. It's the apartment people.

. . .

*sigh*

I freak out and tell them that they can't come in now because my appointment was at 5 and the apartment wasn't ready yet.

And that scared me enough to really dig in and start cleaning after they'd gone.

So yeah, today I cleaned, I packed, I set aside everything that's going with me, everything that's getting shipped to Narita to meet me at the airport, made lists of everything that I can't pack yet (computer, shampoo, etc). I feel all 10 kinds of accomplished. And I'm really glad I took today off, because if I hadn't there's no way in all of God's creation that I would have gotten it done, even to just the point I did, by 5. Just check out my list and how much of it is all struck through :)

They just came, and we had long and engrossing conversations about stuff I'd already cleared like 3 times, I'd already explained and had explained. *sigh* But it's over, and they gave me 4820 just for the pleasure of living with them for a year. And then the boss asked if I'd had any problems this last year, and the main problem I'd had was standing there in my kitchen with me, so I didn't say anything. Except the termites. But again, that's over.

Now tomorrow I get to go into work, give them that copy of the tickets, print out information from the hotels in Taiwan so I know where I'm going and have a phone number if I don't. Oh, the train information too. Then I get to (hopefully) cut out early to deal with signing over the name of my scooter to Jeff and Mike. And then I get to go to the post office and become a poor woman. Fun fun. And I need to go ahead and get the Narita suitcase ALL packed up and I think I'm going to go ahead and send it, if I can. Or go down, get it weighed, do everything but give them the money, and then make Jeff do it after I'm gone. And I need to find a box for my computer (that'd be so much simpler if I just felt comfortable with taking the dang thing with me to Taiwan. Maybe I just should. I mean, I'm sending my harddrive and all my electrics in my suitcase to Narita, but my computer I was planning to mail to Marnie to meet me in Tokyo, but . . . I really just don't want to deal with any of this. Oh, and I need to go to the used shop tomorrow to see what I can sell.

And, since the post office is closed (at 5, so that appointment screwed up all my plans for the rest of the day, too) I don't have anywhere to be. I don't have anything to pack. I don't have anything to clean. I need to run in a bit, but I think I'm going to wait until full on sunset to do that so I don't have to bother with sunscreen. And I'm doing my push ups as we speak (or I'm writing between sets as my arms feel like wet noodles), and I'm not sure how well it's doing. I've bumped up my max a whole bunch, and now I'm really struggling to keep up. I mean, the first set nearly killed me and now my arms are shaking through the middle of the 2nd and 3rd sets. I'm taking them REALLY slow. I might have to cut down to column two.

I did my crunches last night before bowling. That went well enough. They still start to get really hard towards the end of em, but I'm still moving up. Woo.

I did really want to get both the crunches and push ups done yesterday, so I'd be on an alternating day with my running, seeing how I'm not bowling anymore, but the drinked. Also, I was invited to a turnament on Sunday, so I don't know what's going to happen with my workout. Maybe if I get up and do them first thing on Saturday, right before the gas guy comes, but either way, I'm going to have to not do them or do them two days in a row somewhere. Which is not good. I don't want to just give up. But I won't get a chance to do them on Monday, and then I'm traveling, so who knows when I'm going to be doing them over the next 3 weeks . . .

That last set of push ups *really* hurt. It was HARD. I barely, barely did the min max. I really hope that I don't crap out on day 2. If I push myself, I *should* be able to do them. I *should be able to finish this week and move on. Again, it goes with the being able to continue while on vacation . . . Oh, I need to print out the program tomorrow as well . . .

Oh, and color me distracted. I had another fangirl moment (similar to my Warren Ellis Moment). Yeah, you know how I was pimping The Guild? If you haven't gone and watched it, you should. It's funny, and doesn't take a whole bunch of time. And it stars Felicia Day. Who commented on my blog. Yep, she somehow bewitched the interwebs and found out that I'd made the link to her website. (Thanks, by the way, for the original heads up.) And she came back to my blog, and commented. It's just a little thing. Just a few moments of her time. But dood, that's cool. That she would take her time and do that. I mean, yeah, it's self advertising, but it made me feel all appreciated and stuff. And now I think I am gonna actually buy The Guild on DVD when it comes out, because it is funny, and I think I'd like to support her endeavors. Because she's a cool person. Because she took time out of her day and commented on my blog.

Again with the whole argument that we're all people living in the same world and why shouldn't we talk to each other.

Still busy

2008-07-21T17:32:00.002+09:00

I've gotten some cleaning done, and I'm up on my exercise, but I don't think I'll be packing anymore today. It means that a BUNCH of packing will have to get done tomorrow. But I seem to work better (read: more directly with less distractions) under pressure, so it should be okay. They're coming to do the final apartment check on Wednesday, so I still have 2 days.

I did my week 4 test for both push ups and crunches. I got 27 pushups, which is a vast improvement and means I went up one rank again. However, 27 puts me in column 3 for a week 4 and 5 progression, and that's a kinda scary jump for me, seeing how so far I've gone from w1&2c1 to w1&2c3. We'll just have to see how many I can do on Wednesday. I also did a marvelous 75 crunches. I'm really proud of my progress this last week, as I actually improved, as well as went up one rank, so I'm on w6c3. I'm taking that as a sign I'm back on track and moving up normally. I guess I need to start thinking about what I'm going to do when I can actually do 100 crunches in a row. I want to continue having them in my workout, but I don't know how many I want to push myself to do in one workout session. As it is now, I'm already doing about 200 crunches total every other day, maybe I should work up to being able to do 200 in a row? Sets are wonderful, but surely doing that much at one time without a break is more work on your muscles, ya?

Oh, by the way, with very little pomp and circumstance, I finished couch to 5k. I did my week 9 day 3 on Saturday. I did it down by the port, nice, flat, cushy. I kept a good pace the whole time, didn't feel extremely winded at the end of it. It went really nicely--more of a normal running day than a completion to a program (I started on May 23rd, so it took me 1 month and 4 weeks, I usually didn't take 2 days off a week, just ran every other day).

I still can't run for 5k yet, I did the program on time, not distance, so what I started today was My Plan. I've been walking 30 minutes after my run for the past 3 weeks or so (starting at 10 minute walks, and moving up 5 minutes each week, until I got to 30 minutes), and today, seeing how I'd finished week 9, I started week 1 day 1 after a 5 minute walk at the end of my 30 minute run. It went well. I felt awesome during the first few intervals, and didn't even really get uber tired at the end. I found and kept my running pace quickly, and was amazed at how fast that minute went by, remembering just 2 months ago how long that 60 seconds seemed, how it never seemed to end. I'm really positive that I can work it that I'll be able to run one hour in about 2-3 months (I'm moving back to the US from Japan about halfway to April, but in the meantime, I've got one more week here and then I'm traveling in Taiwan and mainland Japan for about 3 weeks. While I'd like to be optimistic that I'll be able to run regularly while traveling, I'd rather be realistic, and plan to run when I can, but not push myself when I've been sightseeing all day in the outdoor heat). On today's run, which I did on the Kurima Bridge, I saw 1 sea turtle, 3 really long thin fish (light gray, about 1.5-2 feet long), and a really long large brown thing that I thought may be another turtle or possibly a dolphin, but turned out to be most of a tree trunk. I then lounged about the beach, swimming occasionally (this is permitted as visiting the beach, while not specifically on my to do list, is one of the things that I'd really like to do as much as I can this week. As well as finishing my largest heaviest book, which also got a bit done on the beach. Oh, I can update my Shelfari!

Other than that, I had fun at Teresa's birthday on Saturday night, got a bunch done that day, I think. Mostly concerning the computer. Then yesterday was Sanitsuhama, which was the lowest tide of the year and the bay by Shimoji was all not a bay (it was kinda smelly, seeing how that dirt never sees the air) and they had tug of wars and races and horses and a volley ball tournament that Jeff, Jon, Jason, Greg, Hajime, and Nema had a team for (they one two and then lost to the team that eventually won), and Teresa, Ryu, Acchan, Nishi, and some guy I don't know had a team and they won right up until the final, when they lost to the team that obviously won. Then dinner at Sunnyside with Jeff and Nana, and then bowling practice with Justin and Ryuta (I didn't suck, but I didn't do as well as hoped, but I was really tired from being in the sun all day).

And now tonight Scott and Makiko are having a naming party for their newest son Alex who was born about a month ago. So yeah, I'm gonna chill and read and then go to that.

In other news, while I'm thinking about it, and have the windows open. The Guild is a really funny WoW Players' Real Life skit on youtube, but also with a dvd coming out in August. I think it's hilarious. And it stars Felicia Day from the recent Dr. Horrible's Sing-a-long Blog. She also writes and produces much of it (I think). Good times.

Oh, and I also went back and updated the necessary info on my travel itinerary. It's all fixed and up there now.

All the lonely people . . .

2008-07-18T16:21:00.002+09:00

7/28 -- 10:05am -- JTA 072 Miyako to Haneda
7/28 -- Narita -- Hotel Marroad Chain
7/29 -- 13:45 -- JL645 Narita to Taipei
7/29 -- Taipei -- Happy Family Hostel
7/30 -- Takoro -- Catholic Hostel
7/31 -- Takoro
8/01 -- Tainan -- Confucius Inn
8/02 -- Tainan
8/03 -- Tainan
8/04 -- Taichung -- Athens Taichung Hotel
8/05 -- Taichung, Changhua, Longshan Temple
8/06 -- Taipei -- Happy Family Hostel
8/07 -- Taipei
8/08 -- Taipei
8/09 -- 14:30 -- JL648 Taipei to Narita
8/09 -- Tokyo -- the Weekly Something or Another
8/10 -- Tokyo
8/11 -- Tokyo
8/12 -- Tokyo
8/13 -- 3:10pm -- Delta 56 Narita to Atlanta

Things are going pretty well according to plan. I got up and went to Shimoji this morning at around 9:30. I was glad I took the extra 5 minutes in the car to tailor my good bye speech to Shimoji, because yes, they had me do one. And the did a question and answer session, Nariko-sensei retranslating for me after I gave my answer in my beautiful broken Japanese. I almost cried, but didn't. Got a few pictures of them.

Then I went to the airport and asked about checked luggage and airport shipping. 2 Checked bags are okay, she didn't have a clue what airport shipping was. So off I went to the Post Office!

At the Post Office I asked about airport shipping and was told that I could, but then told that I couldn't, but that Kuroneko Yamato could and where the store for that was. I drove there and was told that they'd ship my luggage, up to 25kg, and hold it at the airport for 2 weeks. I think that's the route I'm gonna be going. And that I'm going to put my electronics in that suitcase, so I don't have to rush ship a box home last minute of things I need up until that last minute. I like that plan.

Then I went to the doctor and told him I was going on a long trip and needed 2 months worth of meds, which he gave me.

Then I went to Geo and tried to rent the music that I've been listening to in my car for the past year. I was mostly successful and now have to return all of the CDs tomorrow.

Then I went to the fruit and veggie market over by the Shimoji Max Value and got 6 passion fruits for 200yen, and 4 red dragon fruits for 200yen. Along with the yogurt I picked up at San-e, that was a wonderful lunch.

From then on, I've been at home, doing things with my external hard drive, doing laundry, cleaning, and making piles. I've run out of steam a bit, and will probably resume my labors after a shower or something. Maybe some reading. And I need to email people again about the crabs. I only *think* I know where I'm going.

Oh, and I need to workout today . . .

Sports Updates and whatnot

2008-07-17T15:17:00.000+09:00

Bowling didn:t go too terribly on Tuesday, if you don:t count that second game.

My last day on the league is next week, so hopefully I:ll get a practice game in the middle of the week, and actually sleep the night before. At least I don:t have to ride the ferry anymore.

Push ups are still hard, but that total number continues to climb, even though yesterday:s max was lower than previously that week. I put that up for being just tired with everything needing to get done. Crunches are going much better this week than last week. Now that I:m actually paying attention to the time between the sets. Hopefully my max test will continue to go up. Yesterday I did 8 more as my max than my previous exhaustion test. I feel much better this week than last week.

Today, I:m going to work until 4 and then leave right after work to go running. I:m going to do it early, because as soon as I go home my motivation runs away and I need to run today. And I need to get some things knocked off my list. So I need to run right after work. しゃやないな. Right now it:s 84 @ 79%. I *shouldn:t* die.

Today my goals are:

*Things To Go--put in piles
*All disks to Hard Drive (at least get started on this)
Clean out car (because today was my last day teaching, I can at least get all of the school supplies out and clear out my book bag and get that ready to go to Taiwan)
*Exercise-- Running-- Thursday
*Mail invoice to Jake (If I can)
*Mail invoice to Jeff (toothpaste x3, sunscreen x1, and scooter)

If I get all of that done, or at least started, I:ll be pleased with myself. If I do more than that, mostly concerning the state of the kitchen and the pile of stuff in the entrance way, mores the better.

Aaaaand, Yes yes yes! Keep it up! Keep thinking WEST! Just like that!

You probably won:t be hearing from me much in the next week or so

2008-07-17T14:56:00.002+09:00

Here:s why:

This week:
@ home:
Practice pack
Things To Go--put in piles
Things To Go--Pack and send off
~~Selling stuff email~~
Make suitcase box(es)
Call Tokyo Hotel (Marnie?)
Decide electric box
All disks to Hard Drive
Pention paperwork --~~Power of atterny~~, final paperwork
Clean
Hair dye?
Showerhead
~~Set up email posts~~
Clean out car
Exercise--Pushups Crunches--~~Wednesday~~, Friday, Sunday, Running-- Thursday, Saturday
~~Break into Change Jar~~
~~deposit said change into account~~ (got about 25 bucks, not counting 6 500yen coins that the ATM wouldn't take.)
Type up itinerary and post it for all the paranoid people
Mail invoice to Jake

Out and about:

@Post office
~~Electric--last bill date, cut off date, cancel autopay~~ 28th @ 8am
~~Gas--last bill date, cut off date, cancel autopay~~ 26th @10 am, 28th off
~~Cable--last bill date, cut off date, cancel autopay~~ 26th, paid
Ask about Airport Shipping

Go to doctor-get meds
~~Get Boxes~~
Reference letters, ~~Yamaguchi, Noriko~~ ~~asked~~, recieved
Ask Airport about 2 checked bags
~~Hair cut~~
GEO music
Used Shop--clothes

Next week:
Nenkyuu
Trash, Moday (Tuesday), Wednesday (Thursday), Thursday (Friday)
Ship Stuff--futsu (BY FRIDAY), electric (Friday), computer (Friday)
Exercise--Pushups Crunches--Wednesday, Friday, Sunday, Running-- Monday, Wednesday, Friday, Sunday
Suitcase?
write Japanese thank you letters

In Tokyo:
Clean out Bank Account
Cut off Keitai
Suitcase?
turn in gaijin card at customs office

You might get a few things here and there. But probably not too much.

I need you.

2008-07-15T23:06:00.000+09:00

I need your thoughts. Your prayers if that's what you do. Or your good juju. Or your good thoughts or intentions or just positive thinking.

I need the typhoon to go WEST.

I need the typhoon to NOT hit Miyako.

I need the typhoon to hit Taiwan and continue straight on to China.

This weekend is Miyako Matsuri. There are 3 festivals going on this weekend. Events all over the island. It's my last big cultural weekend here, and ALL of the events are outside. All of the events will get canceled if the typhoon hits us.

Right now were in danger for the center of the storm this Friday, but there's a good chance it will also miss us.

The events this weekend are the reason I'm not going to Ishigaki to see my friends there one last time. But if the typhoon hits, I wouldn't be able to fly anyway. If the typhoon hits that weekend will be full of the suck.

Please. Typhoon. West.

Scattered things I'd like to share today, things of little concequence.

2008-07-13T18:58:00.000+09:00

The muppets are coming to Atlanta. They're coming to the Atlanta History Center, October 25,2008-January 18, 2009. They're at the Center for Puppetry Arts from last September to next September. Including Kermit and Ms. Piggy. Found via

Next, push ups and crunches. Today was HARD. It might have been due to the Virtual 5k I ran this morning (details over at ), or it might be due to week 2 just being hard (remember I've moved up two ranks, but I've had to redo week 1 and now 2). Or it might have been due to this past week just being bad with personal stuff going on and me skipping a few workouts. Or actually paying attention to the "rest 60 seconds" between the crunches, and that REALLY hurt.

Version: modified push ups
Progress: w4(2)d2c3
Today's Max: 19 (+4)
Today's Totals: 70

I'm really upset with myself for with the crunches. Due to . . . lots of things . . . I didn't really pay attention to the "rest" numbers last week, and while I should have been getting shorter and shorter between the sets, I didn't really bother. And that, along with skipping a day, I think really impacted what I was able to do for my test at the end. I moved up only 1 crunch with my end of week test, so I'm redoing week 6, column 1. That's pathetic. Not nearly as pathetic as how hard (and I mean HARD) it was to complete today's numbers. After the first set, only waiting the 60 seconds, it started to REALLY HURT after about 25. I finished them, but only after stopping for a few breaths every now and again.

Version: normal crunches
Progress: w4(6)d1c1
Today's Max: 45 (+3)
Today's Totals: 184

It's going to be REALLY annoying this week, being on different days for the different programs. I think, because there's a test for both programs at the end of this week, I'm just going to do day 3 for push ups twice to get me back on the same day. No harm done there, I think.

However, this week's mantra is "I will not fall off the horse, I will not fall off the horse." Last week I was dangerously close to doing so. But last week was a bad week. This week will not be.

And finally, I again updated my flickr site. This includes the race photos, but also goes back to some beautiful scenery shots and some pics of my students.

This was written last Friday

2008-07-13T14:49:00.001+09:00

They keep on finding me so I shouldn:t leave yet

So, today is my last day at Shimoji, and I didn:t know it. Apparently that last day, the 18th, is a ceremony day, so that there are no classes that day. Would have been nice to know that sooner, I was originally planning lessons right up until the end.

So I find this out last night. Now get how I found out. Akemi-sensei, my coordintor at Heiichi calls the BOE to get my number. I get in contact with her, and she asks me if I can stop by that last day during their cerimony. I say I have class in the morning and can:t. She says, no, you don:t. And I:m all like, wha? So I get here today and ask if there:s classes next friday, and they:re all like, no. So I scratch today:s lesson and teach my final lesson. In doing so I tell them that this is my last class with them, I:m going back home after. And the teachers are all like, wha? You:re going home? I didn:t know! And I:m all like, how did it not come up!?!?! But apparently it didn:t. So yeah. They:ve been coming up to me all day with letters and books and pictures and all kinds of nice things. I might cry if this continues.

Usually, I:m allowed to bug out of Shimoji after lunch, around 2, but because it:s my last day, I:m hanging around a little longer. In order to not be suspicious (the only computer I can use here is in the teacher room), I:m emailing this to myself to post later, that:s why the date is wrong. I:ll probably go before too long, but. Also, they asked me to come next Friday, even if it:s just for half an hour or so. I:m going to try to hit as many schools as ask me to come that final day. Right now I:ve got 2.

I:ve said this in talking to some of you, and maybe here, but I:m going to say it again. I think the biggest regret I have for leaving is that I:m just now getting the hang of this whole teaching thing. I mean, I:m really starting to connect with my students. I:m really starting to REALLY *get* what they are and aren:t capable of. I mean, they are just now, JUST NOW beginning to READ!!!! WORDS!!!!! That:s just so amazing to me and makes me so happy and it makes me sad that if I:d stayed, I bet I could have had some of them reading books by Christmas. Not big books, not important books, but BOOKS!! And I:m really worried that Jake:s not going to continue their phonics studies. I:m worried that theyr:re not going to remember the sounds coming back from natsu yasumi and I:m really worried that Jake won:t pump it back into their heads. But it:s no longer my job, so I shouldn:t worry about it right? Besides, that alone isn:t a good enough reason to stay compared to all of my reasons I have for leaving. So it:s good that I:m coming home.

In related to getting out of Japan news, this article is just scary, outrageous, and just plain worrisome. It's about how foreigners in Japan don't have the same rights as citizens and basic human rights can be taken away. Fun times.

Virtual 5k--race breakdown

2008-07-13T13:37:00.002+09:00

Okay, so today I got up at 8:30. On a Sunday. Look at my dedication. A little water and a little breakfast (I go for some fiber bars, I've found my stomach can't handle much more that early in the morning) and I go out of the house by 9 and was at the beginning site of my 5k race at around 9:30. A few minutes of stretching, then promptly at 9:35 I began.

Now, I'm not a couch to 5k grad. I'm still in the middle of week 8, and while that is impressive, my 28 minutes of running doesn't even begin to cover 5k just yet. So I began the race with a 5 minute warm up. I figure, I'm going to be walking during parts of the course anyway, why not have some of the walking occur while I'm fresh and can actually walk my normal quick pace?

After 5 minutes, I begin running. I run until I hit the first incline. Now again, I'm going to be walking some of the course anyway, there's no way I could run for the full time, so why not make it work for me. I walked up the hill. I walked up the hill probably faster than I would have gone if I'd run it, and it took less out of me. At the crest of the hill I began running again, and nearly sprinted down it, I was feeling so good.

I think I might have pushed myself a bit too hard because I felt winded before I got to the next uphill, and had to slow down considerably. Again, I walked up the hill and ran back down it. The same for the third and final hill. By the last hill however, the heat was starting to get to me. And the lack of hydration was starting to make itself known. I usually go running in the afternoon or evening, after drinking at least 2 liters during the course of the day. The glass of water this morning soon after I woke up had made my stomach a little shaky, so I didn't drink more than that, and I could tell the difference.

I got down to the bottom of the third hill, expecting to run as far as I could back to the finish line, and was sourly disappointed when I didn't make it a third of the way from the base of the last hill back down to the end of the bridge. I was starting to get a stitch in my stomach (right side, usually if I get a stitch from eating then running I get it on my left, so I don't know why I got this one), and the lack of water was really starting to get to me. I slowed to a walk, but it was a brisk walk, faster than I really would have liked. And as soon as I got some wind back, I began running again. Although again, I couldn't make it the full way across the bridge and slowed again for a few minutes of walking before finally running to the end of the bridge. When I hit the turn towards the finish, I again walked, then ran, then walked. I glanced at my watch and was bitterly disappointed that it had reached the 3 (I have an analog) as this meant that I'd just gone over my 45 minute best time that I'd done with my w8d2 on Friday. I figured though, since I was already over my goal and the end was near, why not just sprint to the finish? So I did. Finishing at 10:15:15. For a final time of 46:15. This upset me, but I figured it was due to the heat and the hydration problems.

Then somewhere during stretching, I thought again. Wait, I didn't start at 9:30, I started at 9:35. That means that my time was 41:15. Holy cow in the pasture of the Lord. I cut 3 minutes and 45 seconds off my time since Friday. I bet this was due to my walk uphills and the not finding my good slow steady pace when I started running again, tiring me out quicker, and forcing me to walk more.

All said and done, I'm very proud of that time. It shows me I really need to work on my endurance, I would love to be able to actually run a full 5k, hills or no hills, but I figure that's an excellent start.

Here, have some race photos!

Before. That bridge in the background is my route.

The start and finish. The change in the pavement marks the line.

The race route.

The beginning of the bridge.

From the top of the first hill.

From the bottom of the first hill, looking at the second.

After the turn around, looking up at the last hill.

View from the top of the big hill

View from the top of the first hill, going back to the main island.

After. Tired, but alive :)

The Victory Ice Cream. From this little place in the middle of Miyako called Utopia that grows it's own fruits and mixes them into soft serve. I got the papaya.

I don't plan to end every race with ice cream (it's kind of anti-productive), but I'm leaving Miyako in 15 days, and when will I be able to eat this lovely ice cream again? So I think it's worth it, this once.

So, final time: 41:15

w8d1, and last days

2008-07-10T16:37:00.001+09:00

I post about my exercise here a lot. I'm sure you've noticed. You've probably also noticed that I don't post a whole lot else up here. That's probably because I don't really consider my life that interesting and while yeah, I'm living in Japan, not a whole lot happens here day to day. Maybe it would be different if I made more friends. I don't know. Anyway.

The reason I write about my exercise is not to shove it down your throats, all though that might be a side effect. If you want to do the same programs I'm doing, fine, please do. Misery loves company, after all.

I hate exercising. I really really really hate getting off my butt and moving. I like the results of exercise, and while I'm doing it, it's not so bad, but I really hate getting up and starting. Same with cleaning. If I wasn't sitting here dripping with sweat right now, I'd be cleaning. But that would just end in tears--big large painful tears as a result of the sweat pouring into my eyes--so I'm not going to do that just yet.

I keep on posting my exercise here because more often than not its the most interesting part of my day. And if I don't continue to post, then I'll probably loose motivation. It's a tool I'm using. I'm sorry if it's annoying.

Yesterday was my last day at Sunagawa Sho. They were awesome. Like had me stand up after we finished eating in the cafeteria, presented me with a speech, two framed pictures of the staff and kids, and a bouquet of flowers. It was awesome, I was so touched. And then we talked from about 3pm to almost 4:30. And they saw me to the door and said that they'll miss me and got my email address and actual address and everything. It was wonderful.

Now, back to exercising. I really hate exercising at night. Or rather, I hate exercising after dinner, because it never turns out right. So I went out yesterday and got to Maehama at around 5pm. 85 degrees, 84% humidity. It was HARD. Sweat literally poured from every pour in my body. By the end of the 28 minutes I really could have been going faster walking, I know this because I actually sped up a bit for my cool down. It hurt, but I did the full 28 minutes. I've discovered I really don't like the adding 2-3 minutes at the end. I really much preferred moving up by intervals.

By the time I got home, it was about 7 and I hadn't even eaten yet. I finally get food around 8 and just give up on doing my pushup/crunches. I was just too tired. I was in bed by 9. This was probably due to the fact that I didn't sleep much Tuesday night. I was in bed, I was tired, sleep just didn't happen. This is what caffeine does to me. It's no help at all. I should do my push ups and my crunch exhaustion test in a bit, but again with the so much sweat, I don't think I can right now.

My fan broke yesterday, to add insult to injury. I took it to the store I bought it, and after much confusion, its going to be sent off to the factory where they'll fix it. Yay. Hopefully it'll be back soon.

Speaking of how nice my last day at Sunagawa was, today was my last day at Kagamihara. It's over. That's a good thing. And that's all I'm going to say about that.

And why not.

2008-07-08T22:50:00.000+09:00

I give you the original Godzilla movie's Japanese trailer.

It's just kinda awesome like that. And because yesterday was Eiji Tsuburaya (who was the head of special effects for the team that created Godzilla)'s birthday. Found out via .

[edit] And while I'm on the theme. Have a cgi gojira from io9.com. Looks pretty awesome, that.

Bowling and Warren Ellis

2008-07-08T22:15:00.000+09:00

Bowling went better than expected. Didn't do under 100. Didn't do that wonderful either. My average fell a bit, but not like a stone off the edge of the Grand Canyon.

And then I got home and Warren Ellis replied to a comment I left on his LJ. Even though he was giving me a negative answer, I'm happy because he acknowledged my existence. I'm so easily pleased by people whose brains I love.

Being productive and getting paid!

2008-07-08T16:20:00.002+09:00

Today I took the 2:30 ferry home so that I could stop by the iinkai and get my check. I got the paid. Now, I'd been counting this plane fair home money as spent, so I just received the entirety of my budget for Taiwan (weee!). I'm also really glad that we'll be spending those days in Tokyo, as it means I won't have to walk around with the entirety of this year's savings on my person while trekking around Taiwan. I love that I have a postal bank account.

I then proceed to continue to be productive and stopped by AU to ask them about turning off my phone and whatnot. They said all groovy and I can deal with all of that in Tokyo, so I'll have my keitai and contact while traveling. :)

There's bowling tonight, which is bad, because my arms and back are already tired because of workout yesterday. And then there's bowling on Friday, which is bad, because the Iinkai Going Away Fest is also on Friday, and I'll have to skip bowling. Suck.

But at least I get to see people.

I also stopped by the car rental place and paid them for my last month (or about 20 days) of renting my beautiful car, and get this. They said instead of dropping it off at the car rental place, I can totally leave the keys in the car AT THE AIRPORT. I won't need to get a ride. I won't need to get a taxi. I'm on my own time that morning. Granted, I still have to get up at way too early in the morning to catch my 10am flight, but still. Yay!

By the way, this is post 112 of this year. I did only 112 posts in 2007. I think I like writing to you people, or something :P

w7d3, w3d3

2008-07-07T21:38:00.001+09:00

I'm getting worried. I'm getting worried that the runs are becoming common place. I mean, it's become no big deal to run 25 minutes, yeah, it sometimes hurts, but it's not a big deal. I think maybe because it's not increasing as much as it did in the earlier weeks. I'm worried that I'm loosing my enthusiasm for it. I still like it (like being a relative term), I still like doing it, I'm just not as excited about it as I was in the beginning. Ah well.

Today I tried a different running technique than usual. I tried to lengthen my strides, while keeping my slow pace about the same. I ran about 3.1k, almost 2 miles in the 25 minutes. I liked the feeling of it, but it made me think about what I was doing more (which is not necessarily a bad thing)--it made me use my feet more than I had been. I like it, I think I'll keep doing it.

And then I came home and did my push ups and crunches. Which I also skipped yesterday (I'm sure my aim is going to be horrible tomorrow at bowling because of this). I was thinking about why I'd been so lackadaisical about it yesterday. I think it's just the winding down of my time here. I mean, today I shipped my PS3 home, it's really getting close. So I'm much less enthused about my life right now. But about 5 minutes from the end of my run I looked at myself (internally, of course) and said, self, your belly is fat. You can't wear a bikini. Why should you stop doing the push ups and crunches just because you're depressed. That's a stupid reason. And I told myself I was right.

Version: modified push ups
Progress: w3(1)d3c3
Today's Max: 17 (+2)
Today's Totals: 65

Version: normal crunches
Progress: w3(6)d3c1
Today's Max: 42 (+0)
Today's Totals: 174

I'm still amazed at those totals. I'm so proud that I did 17 push ups in a row. Still not getting any higher on my max for crunches, but I am doing them after running and walking for an hour, so I get home and am drowning about 3 glasses of water before I start because I'm dying of thirst and I'm sure it doesn't help to have all that sloshing around :P

Oh, and by the way:

This is me not getting off my couch yet. So you get some things.

2008-07-07T17:35:00.001+09:00

found via

Send your name to the moon. The link to the actual site is at the bottom of the article. Personally though, I kinda agree with his opinion about the whole thing, I mean, with the aliens and everything. But I'm still gonna do it. (Ah, weak! The certificate is only a print out! Man! X< )

Next up, a really trippy video that's featured on youtube right now. It's John Lennon giving an interview to some kid who snuck into his hotel room. Complete with trippy animations.

I rock the ABCs

2008-07-04T13:18:00.000+09:00

Today:s lesson was basically unplanned and went spectacularly.

I:d noticed that some of my kids on my every Friday classes still have problems knowing the names of the letters (expecially 3rd grade, but I taught them like 4 times last year? So I:m not surprised) so instead of going ahead with my planned lesson of Jobs, we branched off and went a little crazy.

First, we went over the alphabet song. Then we did the letter:s reading, one person per one letter. This has become my usual warmup.

Then I gave them cards and we played karuta. I called out the name of a letter and the first kid to smack their hand on it got to claim the letter as a point. Both lower and upper case on the tables so 2 people could get a point each round (I made enough cards over Spring Break for groups of 4 people each). I amused myself during this by first spelling my name, then going a letter at random. You:d be amazed how many kids hear *g* when I said *z.* Everyone down through 3rd grade did fabulously. 3rd was hard, because they were really talkative today, and because they don:t quite know the names of the letters yet, but we stumbled through it. I only got frustrated when we got to a letter that they didn:t know, and then just held up cards at random. The problem being that when they:d hold up the cards, they sometimes knew the letters in their hands, so they should know that that A is not a Q. But whatever. I still had the alphabet spelled out on the board so if there was a really big problem letter, I:d point to the board and sing, and then they:d get it. The 6th graders did it so fast we had time for an extra activity.

Then I asked them to as a group place the alphabet in order, upper case on top, lower case on the bottom.

When they were done and I checked it I told them they could play Memory. The 6th graders actually had time to mess their alphabets up and then switch card tables and fix it before moving on. But they were the only ones who were that fast.

Everyone seemed very enthused and it went really really well. I:m thinking next week I:m going to do colors. Because they already know most of them. And they should be able to spell most of them on their own. I:m also going to make them have to be able to tell me their names. Most of them can write their names, most can:t tell me how to spell them.

And yes Mom, your suggestions did help me come to this lesson. Thanks.

100 books in a year, and school

2008-07-03T16:40:00.000+09:00

It has been 11 months and 5 days since I last set foot in America. And since that time, as of today at 4:00pm, I have read 100 books. I'm pretty sure I'm never going to have that much "me" time ever again, but gods was it fun. That last one hurt, though. I didn't like Wicked as much as I hoped I would. I think my problem was the characters. There were very few that I liked, so very few that I actually cared about what was happening. Ah well. I don't know what I'm going to try to read next. Something heavy, so I don't have to carry it to Taiwan with me.

Today I was suppose to have 4 classes, normal affair. But since the pool opened up, the classes have been using their free periods to do swimming class, and some teachers just don't think about when they are scheduled for English, so I missed my last class with 2-1 today. I'm not too fussed, I mean, I have 25 handouts for them that won't get used, and I stopped what I was in the middle of working of to get the classroom ready and wait for them to show up, but you know, whatever. Then I had my 3rd years, who also had a wonderful bit of schedule mismatching due to pool, but at least that all worked out. I really want to grumble about how I don't mind being left alone with good classes and mind a lot about talkative or bad classes, but it was the last time I'll see those kids too, so meh.

Funny thing, if the 2nd graders hadn't messed up the schedule, I wouldn't have been able to get through Wicked today, and I'm REALLY glad that that's over. I feel like I've been reading it forever. Only a week and a half, but to me, that's forever.

Yesterday was just painful.

2008-07-03T14:00:00.000+09:00

Okay, so on top of getting to my last day at Miyahara and nobody but me realizing it, having them change my schedule, and then try to change it again literally so that I was teaching first period RIGHT after the bell to start first period had rung (I told them no, I couldn:t do it, because I was working on the things I needed for the class and they weren:t done yet because they hadn:t told me that I would be teaching first period seeing how I never teach first period), having my 3rd and 4th grades thankfully thrown together (we played fruits basket, because with the two grades we had enough people, 8, including me), having to make an improptu goodbye speech (whenever you say the word speech in japanese, my japanese proficiency goes down about 6 levels), and then finally leaving, I decided not to work out right away and was incredibly foolish and took myself to the bakery where I always overeat. I also took myself to the store and got some yogurt to go with the passion fruits that the school gave to me (they have a tree out back, the fruits were divine). So, 6:30 came around, and I really should have been getting out to go run, and I was still FULL. And I:d eaten about an hour before. I mess around for a few more minutes, and then a few more, and then I stupidly go out and run.

I got 4 cramps. Each one in the same place. Each one went away after stopping and stretching and perhaps some walking. But still, it makes for a very annoying run. I did about 2 minutes longer than the scheduled 25 minutes when I got the 4th one and just gave up. Then I walked for my 30 minutes (although it might or might not have been longer, I really don:t know, I wasn:t paying much attention) and remarked on how about half way through the walk, when I was really booking it, you know? I could totally break out into a 90 second run right now and be totally FINE. I:m looking forward to completeing this program the once and doing it again for the second 30 minutes.

Also, I finished The Green Mile and started on Pillars of the Earth by Ken Follett. Because I:ve never read it, and it called to me. It:s kinda annoying though. For one, it:s long, but for two, the reader doesn:t do any kind of voices. It:s litterally like he:s just reading it to an audience. Hard to follow which people are saying what sometimes.

Then I get home, drown about 2 glasses of water, and then realize I still have my push ups and crunches to do. Stupid. So I do them and I feel like @$$ as I do, I only did the min at the end, but I did them. And then, because it:s getting really late and I TOTALLY NEED a shower by this point, I plug in my numbers. I did 181 crunches and 41 push ups yesterday. Holy cow in dairyland. I mean, it hurt to do them, but they weren:t impossible. And even as tired and beat as I was, I did that freaking many?!?!?! Wooot!

In other news I haven:t had a good nights sleep since Sunday morning (life keeps getting in the way), so I:m REALLY exhausted. I haven:t been talking to people this week, and that:s why.

Exercise, cancer, and crabs.

2008-06-30T21:11:00.001+09:00

This morning I got up a bit early and did my push up test (to give my arms as long as possible between the test and bowling tomorrow night as I could and still progress in the program quicker :P ), and I am proud to say that I was able to do 12 push ups before my arms said "no." Coming from 2 on my first day, that's just awesome. So, I'm not yet strong enough to move on to week 3 (ah well), but I did move up a rank and two columns. On Wednesday I'll be starting on my w3, but on a progression of w1c3.

Then tonight I went running and ran for 25 minutes. Let me let that sink into you for a bit.

. . .

You get that? I ran for 25 minutes, but here's the absolute sick part. I could have kept going. For once I finally got it into my head that yeah, I really really REALLY need slow down and go so slow it feels like I'm barely moving, and I hit that pace, that pace that felt like I could just go on forever. It was awesome. My 30 minute walk at the end didn't seem like a recovery walk nearly as much as an I can still go, look at me go walk. And, I was able to walk at my actual normal pace (which is really fast). Boo ya.

That said, I did get an ache in my left knee today, not a sharp pain, or a cramp, just an ache. Not even enough to make me stop. And I got a few blisters on my toes. I usually wear size 8 1/2 shoes, but the summers here are so brutal that last summer I noticed that my feet swelled pretty badly, so I bought some size 9 shoes in anticipation. My feet don't quite fit in the 9s, and I was wondering if that had to do with some of the weird little, I don't even know how to put it, I feel like my pace is off, like where I put my feet, so today I switched back to the 8 1/2s. I'm not going to make that mistake again. From now until I go home, it's 9s for me.

I also went at 7pm, and watched a beautiful sunset that I got a few pictures of. I'm actually looking forward to next week, it's nothing but 25 minute runs. From here on out for the next 2 weeks, it's nothing but straight running, just adding 3 minute on the end each week until I hit 30.

Tonight, I also did my exhaustion test for crunches. I was able to pull 46 out of nowhere. I thought I was done at around 30, but got disgusted with myself and actually went up to 46. My initial test was 21. That's more than double in 2 weeks. I'm stoked. Now, I'm not doubling the program's numbers or anything, just going by actual numbers. So with that total, I'm actually going from a progression of w4, skipping w5 and going straight to w6, column one. Boo. Ya. Ka.

In other news, they may have found a cure for cancer. I really really really hope it works.

And, June 21st is kani no hi (crab day), because when you go through the japanese alphabet, ka is the 6th character, so June, and ni is the 21st. So, kani no hi. I thought it was awesome when I heard that. From a teacher no less. And I understood what she was talking about before the other teachers. Because that's the way my brain works. Rock.

I've been playing with Google Docs

2008-06-29T12:21:00.001+09:00

So, one of my fellow pushupers has made a simple google spreadsheet that shows her push up and crunches progression totals. It's really nice and simple. But I like seeing all of the numbers, so.

My push up chart.
My crunches chart.

Look at me, being all data entry and whatnot. Now, if only I could figure out how do to the same formula over and over on the same column but on a different rows without spelling it out every row . . . I suck at spreadsheets.

Oh, I've also put up my bowling scores.

Working with online spreadsheets is hard. Sometimes the values don't update right . . .

Excersice and bbq

2008-06-28T15:13:00.000+09:00

Today's w6d2 was not very interesting. I'm so over the intervals. Especially the long ones. I use an analog watch, I like it, when I was first starting it was nice to be able to physically see how long until I could quite, but as soon as we got to intervals over 5 minutes it just got annoying. Mostly because I don't want to have to look at how far I have left to go, and it's hard to see on an analog, at a glance while your arm is bouncing up and down, exactly what minute you're at. And then fit in a 3 minute walk in the middle so that the next 10 minutes ends at somehour:08? Annoying. But, that's over. At least until I start doing it from the beginning, either working on time, or distance, or both.

I also think I figured out why I insist on going out around noon. I think I'm subconsciously trying to prove to myself that I can. I mean today was 88 degrees, 75% humidity, 20mph wind. That's just kinda nasty. I mean, the heat index is 102. And I was asking myself why I didn't get out of the house when I woke up at 9 this morning and go then. Why I sat around and messed on the computer and just procrastinated until it was bloody hot. I asked myself this about 8 minutes into my final interval. And I think I came back with "to prove to myself that I can." Which is stupid, and now that I know the reason, maybe I'll be better about it. I'm also hosting a dinner party tonight, so that's why I couldn't just wait until it got cool again. Ce la vie.

In other news, I saw a sea turtle again today. Again, I ran down by the port, so I didn't have a good angle, but it was a sea turtle. Woo.

Version: modified push ups
Progress: w2d3c1
Progression: 5, 5, 4, 4, max 6
Today's Max: 10 (+4)
Today's Totals: 28

Version: normal crunches
Progress: w2(4)d3c2
Progression: 25, 19, 19, 17 (+2, oops), max 24
Today's Max: 35 (+11)
Today's Totals: 117

I REALLY like those numbers ^_^

Now I got to get the rest of the house ready for a bbq that I wish more people were coming to, and I think it's going to rain, so it might not matter if I get my place clean because we'll probably have to do it next door, but if I don't clean, it'll be as dry as New Mexico.

While procrastinating I found some nice memories on youtube involving the muppets, kermit, rainbows, and cookies.

Virtual 5k

2008-06-28T15:12:00.002+09:00

Okay, so my virtual friend has proposed that we (the couch to 5kers) do a Virtual 5k. Kind of like a coming out (like the olden parties when you were introduced to society), but without all of the people watching us do it. I figured I should be in my 8th week of the program by then (knock on wood) so I'll be running for 28 minutes anyway, why not race for it? I know my time will be atrocious compared to the people already completed with the program, but eh. I'll do it for me.

However, I do not have to be the only one doing this Virtual 5k. You can do it too! Here, have some details from 's original post.

When: July 12-13
What: 5k and 2 Mile virtual race
Who: walkers, beginner runners, c25k grads

Register Now

Why participate in the C25K Virtual Race Weekend?
This is the perfect opportunity for you to get your feet wet with racing without the added pressure of a huge crowd or an unfamiliar route. If you've raced before, this can be your chance for a new PR or to practice for your next race.

How does it work?
You simply choose the best time and place for you, measure out the distance, and run! Keep track of your time and then post a new entry in this community with your time, race report, and pictures if you have them by noon on Monday, July 14th. We'll post the official results Monday night.

Who should participate?
Everyone!! To accommodate those still in the program as well as the graduates, we have 2 distances and 3 divisions. You can run either a 5K or a 2 Mile race and we'll recognize the top 3 runners in the following divisions: current c25k runners, c25k graduates, walkers.

I'm in! Now What?
First, make sure you register so we know what division and distance you are running in (you can run both distances if you want, but must register separately for each).

Second, tell us a little about you and your running, and help us promote the race. Post an entry in your own journal telling us about your running (how did you start, why do you do it, etc) and what your goals are for the Virtual Race Weekend. Post a link to your post in the comments so we can check it out.

She just said it so well, I didn't feel like paraphrasing.

So. Me and my running. I think I'm gonna take a cue from this fellow runner for my questions.

1. When did you start running?

My first run was on May 23rd, 2008. Before that I'd always said that I had such bad knees and ankles that running would be a stupid fantasy. Even in elementary school, when they made us run, I didn't run properly. I'm sure being overweight and out of shape didn't help, but I hated running with a firey passion of doom. So yeah, May 23rd, 2008, and not a single day before. Ever.

2. Did you follow a plan (C25K etc.) to get you started running? If so, what plan did you use? If not, how did you go about getting started?

I'm currently plugging away on the couch to 5k program, and ~~hating~~ loving every minute of it. No, I kid. I don't really like the running in and of itself. I love the before and after feeling. More on this in a minute.

3. Why did you start running?

. . . Because if the zombies come, I would die. And yes, you have permission to take that with a grain of salt. Through a friend I found The Post Apocalyptic Workout. And yeah, it's about what would you do if the zombies would come, and yes, if they came, I would probably die, but it's also about all of the other terrible possibilities in the world that if something disastrous happened, I'd want to be physically and mentally fit enough to handle it. And if, in the process of preparing myself for the hopefully non-immanent zombie invasion, I slim down, get stronger, condition myself to run for an hour, and learn good things to know anyway, like basic first aid? All's the better.

4. Now that you are running regularly, what do you find to be the biggest benefits?

Before and after--definitely not the during. As I said before, I don't really like running (although the more I do it, the more I forget how much I don't like it), but I like the anticipation of accomplishing a goal, I like how I feel when I've finished my run for the day (accomplished, endorphins, whatever), I love being able to say "I ran twenty minutes today." I love that I can do things now without getting winded (like walking up stairs, or running down the street to catch up with my friend). I love being outside and seeing wildlife on my runs.

5. What are your future plans for running? Short-term and Long-range.

After finishing c2k5 the first time, I plan to do it again. I'm currently adding 25 minute walks to the end of each of my runs, and when I finish I want to go through the program again. I think what I'm going to do is to double the length of my second program, week 1 run week 1 faster, going for speed, followed by 30 minutes of walking. Week 1 run 30 minutes followed by week 1 of c25k normal. I think. I'm not sure about the logistics just yet.

Longterm, I'm planning to run the Peachtree Road Race next year. My parents reserve me a number every year, in hopes that one day I'd get up early on July 4th and run 10k (HA!), but this next year, I'm seriously gonna do it. When I get back state side, I plan to sign up for a 5k.

6. What are your personal goals for the Virtual 5K?

Less than 50 minutes. I can currently walk 5 minutes, run 20 minutes, and get back to my car in about 25 minutes. By week 8 I should have cut that time down considerably, but that's my current goal.

7. Do you have a music “theme song” that you will use for this race?

As I've said before, I don't listen to music during my runs. I'll probably be done with my current book, Stephen King's The Green Mile and haven't decided what I'm going to listen to next. Probably something funny, maybe some Terry Pratchett.

If you're interested, this is my 5k race plan. I had to do it in miles, so it's a very little off, I'll make up for it on race day.

Flickr update

2008-06-27T15:48:00.001+09:00

More pictures are up on the photostream. You can go look at them. There's stuff there from Irabu and around the island, and my apartment and whatnot. Cool stuff. Some beautiful scenery.

Some things about our friend Stephen

2008-06-26T21:57:00.001+09:00

As most of you probably know, I'm a big enthusiast for Stephen King's Dark Tower series. So this is a list. A list of things to do, if you will. The following is the list, from Wiki, of all of the Stephen King books that have something to do with the Tower. I've marked off the ones that I've already read. Put a star next to the ones I have my grubby little hands on.


    * The Gunslinger (Revised Edition)
          o Bag of Bones
          o The Stand
          o The Eyes of the Dragon
    * The Drawing of the Three
          o The Eyes of the Dragon
          o The Shining (film)
          o The Stand
    * The Waste Lands
          o Rose Madder
          o The Stand
          o Cell
          o It
          o Insomnia
    * Wizard and Glass
          o The Mist (from Skeleton Crew)
          o The Stand
          o The Eyes of the Dragon
* Wolves of the Calla
          o 'Salem's Lot 
          o Black House
                + The Talisman
          o The Stand
          o Low Men in Yellow Coats (from Hearts in Atlantis)
    * Song of Susannah
          o The Eyes of the Dragon
          o Black House
                + The Talisman
          o The Little Sisters of Eluria (from Everything's Eventual: 14 Dark Tales)
          o Desperation
                + The Regulators
          o Low Men in Yellow Coats (from Hearts in Atlantis)
          o From a Buick 8
          o It
          o Insomnia
          o The Shining*
    * The Dark Tower
          o Insomnia
          o 'Salem's Lot
          o Everything's Eventual (from Everything's Eventual: 14 Dark Tales)
          o Low Men in Yellow Coats (from Hearts in Atlantis)
          o From a Buick 8
          o It

Now I don't know about you, but that seems like a doable list. There are some others that I'm pretty sure I have the paperbacks back at my house (bag of bones and it, I think), but I don't think I'll be reading those in paperback form. I'm really digging the reading of scary books while I'm running in the nice bright sunshine, so I think I'll continue with that, thanks. I think it's just nice to have everything in one place.

Transformers Knitting

2008-06-26T21:22:00.003+09:00

Now I want to learn how to knit. Because I could knit things with Transformer's logos on them.

Here's the link to the original design and pattern.

But because there's some debate on row 25 (and I don't know enough about knitting, read "anything," to know which one's right), I'm gonna repost the pattern here, just so I have it for later works.

CO 43
1-4. MB (make border of your choice)
5. MB4 , K35, MB4
6. MB4, P10, K1, P3, K7, P3, K1, P10, MB4
7. MB4, K10, P2, K2, P7, K2, P2, K10, MB4
8. MB4, P10, K3, P2, K5, P2, K3, P10, MB4
9. MB4, K7, P1, K2, P4, K1, P5, K1, P4, K2, P1, K7, MB4
10. MB4, P6, K2, P2, K4, P2, K3, P2, K4, P2, K2, P6, MB4
11. MB4, K5, P3, K2, P4, K2, P3, K2, P4, K2, P3, K5, MB4
12. MB4, P4, K4, P2, K4, P7, K4, P2, K4, P4, MB4
13. MB4, K3, P5, K2, P4, K7, P4, K2, P5, K3, MB4
14. MB4, P3, K5, P2, K15, P2, K5, P3, MB4
15. MB4, K3, P5, K2, P15, K2, P5, K3, MB4
16. MB4, P3, K5, P2, K15, P2, K5, P3, MB4
17. MB4, K3, P5, K2, P4, K7, P4, K2, P5, K3, MB4
18. MB4, P3, K5, P2, K4, P7, K4, P2, K5, P3, MB4
19. MB4, K3, P5, K2, P4, K2, P3, K2, P4, K2, P5, K3, MB4
20. MB4, P3, K5, P2, K4, P2, K3, P2, K4, P2, K5, P3, MB4
21. MB4, K3, P5, K2, P4, K2, P3, K2, P4, K2, P5, K3, MB4
22. MB4, P3, K5, P2, K4, P2, K3, P2, K4, P2, K5, P3, MB4
23. MB4, K3, P5, K3, P3, K2, P3, K2, P3, K3, P5, K3, MB4
24. MB4, P3, K5, P4, K2, P2, K3, P2, K2, P4, K5, P3, MB4

25. MB4, K3, P5, K5, P1, K2, P3, K2, P1, K5, P5, K3, MB4 (this one is from here.
or  MB4, K3, P5, K5, P1, K2, P3, K2, P3, K2, P1, K5, P5, K3, MB4
or  MB4, K3, P5, K5, P1, K2, P3, K3, P1, K5, P4, K3, MB4
or  MB4, K3, P3, K5, P1, K2, P3, K2, P1, K5, P5, K3, MB4

26. MB4, P3, K4, P9, K3, P9, K4, P3, MB4
27. MB4, K3, P3, K10, P3, K10, P3, K3, MB4
28. MB4, P3, K2, P3, K5, P3, K3, P3, K5, P3, K2, P3, MB4
29. MB4, K3, P1, K4, P5, K3, P3, K3, P5, K4, P1, K3, MB4
30. MB4, P6, K7, P3, K3, P3, K7, P6, MB4
31. MB4, K6, P7, K2, P5, K2, P7, K6, MB4
32. MB4, P5, K8, P2, K5, P2, K8, P5, MB4
33. MB4, K5, P8, K2, P5, K2, P8, K5, MB4
34. MB4, P4, K9, P1, K3, P1, K3, P1, K9, P4, MB4
35. MB4, K4, P9, K1, P2, K3, P2, K1, P9, K4, MB4
36. MB4, P3, K10, P1, K1, P5, K1, P1, K10, P3, MB4
37. MB4, K3, P10, K3, P3, K3, P10, K3, MB4
38. MB4, P2, K10, P3, K5, P3, K10, P2, MB4
39. MB4, K2, P9, K3, P7, K3, P9, K2, MB4
40. MB4, P1, K9, P3, K9, P3, K9, P1, MB4
41. MB4, K1, P8, K3, P5, K1, P5, K3, P8, K1, MB4
42. MB4, P1, K6, P3, K4, P7, K4, P3, K6, P1, MB4
43. MB4, K1, P5, K3, P4, K9, P4, K3, P5, K1, MB4
44. MB4, P1, K4, P3, K5, P9, K5, P3, K4, P1, MB4
45. MB4, K7, P8, K5, P8, K7, MB4
46. MB4, P7, K21, P7, MB4
47. MB4, K7, P21, K7, MB4
48. MB4, P9, K17, P9, MB4
49. MB4, K35, MB4
50. MB4, P35, MB4
51-54. MB (make border of your choice)
Bind Off

Yesterday and today, followed by w6d1, w2d2X2

2008-06-26T14:12:00.000+09:00

Yesterday was pretty uneventful. I stayed in most of the day. Cleaned up a bit, talked to people, tried to eat Wicked but the story's not as much to my liking as I'd hoped, so it's slow going. I did decide about half way through the day that I desperately needed waffles, and seeing how I had a waffle iron and waffle mix, needed to get me some eggs and milk. While I was checking out, the lady in front of me stole one of my bags (probably an accident), and so I got to wait while they tried to find everything again, although I'd gotten the last of that size of inarizushi, so there was no inarizushi for me and a reimbursal of 200yen. And that was the highlight of my day yesterday. Today's highlight is probably going to be going out for lunch, whenever I get around to eating. I was woken up at 8:30 by Curi and after having to think couldn't get back to sleep. I'm too dripping to go outside just now. Must shower.

When I started this program the thought of week 5 was so incomprehensible that week 6 just seemed like a figment of people's imaginations--not something that I could actually get to and accomplish myself. But, here we are.

I had today off, and after talking to my family down in Florida for the funeral, I went out. I was a bit stupid in this, as it was 87 degrees with 75% humidity, but I thought because the humidity was lower, and the wind was going about 15mph, and that it's suppose to storm later, that it would be better to just go on and go.

It was hot, but after running the 20 minutes on Tuesday, I felt good. In fact, running for that 5 minutes and stopping was harder than just keeping going--I finally understand what y'all were talking about. It's a WHOLE lot easier to run when you're not checking your watch to keep track of the seconds, to just zone out on your music or whatever you do (I'm currently getting through Stephen King's The Green Mile, I hadn't read it, nor seen the movie so I thought it was about time) and not concern yourself with time. But the intervals were okay today. The first 5 I told myself to slow down, and then gave up and ran a little faster, and that was okay. So was the 8 minutes. The last 5 hurt, but I think it was more from the heat and having to run into the wind than anything else. The clouds were such a tease. I could see them coming, and if I'd waited another 30 minutes before starting, I bet I would have gotten some of them.

After my run, I ended with my 25 minute walk, or that was the plan, but I messed up my timing (walking down by the port, on piers and whatnot), that I was about 10 minutes from my car with 5 minutes to go. And then I saw a sea turtle off the pier, and walked in place for about 3 minutes waiting to see if it'd come up again, but it didn't. So I was tired getting back. All in all though, I feel really good about today. Although, I think I'll feel even better day after tomorrow, when all of the intervals are behind me.

After getting back and hydrating a bit, I did my push ups and crunches.

Version: modified push ups
Progress: w2d2c1
Progression: 6, 5, 3, 3, max 6
Today's Max: 7 (+1)
Today's Totals: 24

Version: normal crunches
Progress: w4d2c2
Progression: 22, 17, 17, 15, max 20
Today's Max: 26 (+6)
Today's Totals: 97

Look at me, I are strong. My left arm is doing a bit of a wobbly thing during my push ups. I think it's just letting me know that it's really that much weaker than my right (I'm insanely right handed). In light of this (and it was my left arm's fault that I couldn't go past my max of 7 today), I've been thinking about The Test.

Let's put The Test into perspective (seeing how we're all going through this program for the first time). I'm doing column 1, right? Now on w2d3 the largest number of push ups I'm scheduled to do in a row is at least 6. But then on week 3 (after doing The Test, and let's assume I'll be able to do 16-20 and still be in column 1) I'm expected to start doing 15 in a row. That's a big jump. But not only that, for this test, I should be able to do 16-20 push ups. Now, I'm not freaking about this, I think it's totally doable (and if it's not, I don't have a problem repeating the first two weeks of the program, I mean I started with 0 and can do 7 push ups in a row, the program works, I'm sold), but I'd rather set myself up for success than failure.

With this in mind, my plan is to take The Test AS a work out day. Even on the 100 push ups site it says:

At the end of Week 2 it will be time to check your strength and perform another exhaustion test. In simple terms, perform as many good-form push ups as you can manage before you physically can't do another rep. The number of push ups you complete will determine which level of the program you'll start in Week 3. Perform this test within a couple of days of completing Week 2. Good luck!

Obviously we won't be able to do our true max after completing a work out day, and we'll be exhausted if we try to do the test right before starting the new week (the whole point of the test is to exhaust yourself, right?), so my plan is to do w2d3 the day after tomorrow, Saturday, and then my next workout day, which with my schedule will be Monday, to do The Test, as my workout.

Maybe I've been thinking about this too much, but that's what I've come up with. Do y'all have any thoughts on it?

w5d3, bowling, and w2d1

2008-06-24T23:41:00.002+09:00

. . . and we're back.

Life got in the way this weekend.

I did w5d2 on Saturday before the giant concert, but because of giant concert being in the same area where I usually run, I did a different route. And ended up going up hill for most of it. I slowed waaaaaaaay down, but with how hard the first 8 minutes had been, let alone the second, I honestly didn't know if I was ready for week 5's 20 minutes or not. So I had a plan today. See how I was doing at 8 minutes, if I needed to, I'd do day 2 again, if I felt good, I'd keep going for the 20. I was suppose to do this run yesterday. But it was my birthday and I had plans that basically took up the entire day. So.

At 5 minutes I felt good. At 10 minutes I felt good. At 15 minutes I was dying, but that was more to do with doing my run out at the bridge and that being the first up hill more than the actual length of the run. I got to the end of the bridge and turned around at around 19 minutes. At 20 minutes I couldn't actually tell that it was 20 (I use an analog watch, which I prefer, but these longer runs are more difficult, as it's hard to see the exact minute), so I actually ran for 21 straight minutes. Let me say that again. I actually ran for 21 straight minutes. Woo. No, WOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!

After running I took some time at the beach--I'm reading Wicked now, just started today. I found a coconut, just sitting there in the surf. It was kinda neat. Then I went home, showered and bowled.

This week was MUCH better than last week. How much better, you ask? I did my high game this week.

This week's scores: 124, 136, 163=423 This weeks avg. = 141
Last week's running avg: 117.25 Last week's session avg: 117.7
Running total: 1360 Running average (11 games): 123.6 Session average (4 sessions @ 123.5, 100.2, 129.6, and this week's 141): 123.6

Then I got home and talked to my parents for a bit. Cried for a bit. It was a good talk.

After I did my 100_pushups and 100_crunches.

I was suppose to do this day after taking Veronica and Kat to the airport on Sunday. But with my grandmother dying, I really didn't feel like it. Yesterday either, but that was my birthday, so it was just a whole lot of other didn't feel like it. But today we got back on the horse. And it felt good.

Version: modified push ups
Progress: w2d1c1
Progression: 4, 4, 3, 3, max 5
Today's Max: 9 (+4)
Today's Totals: 23

I'm really happy with that end number, especially since I went to the bowling league tonight. I didn't think I'd be able to do that many after throwing a ball around for an hour and a half. Although, I'm really glad that I did the push ups after bowling, not before.

Version: normal crunches
Progress: w2(4)d1c2
Progression: 22, 16, 16, 14, max 22
Today's Max: 22 (+0)
Today's Totals: 90

I'm kinda dissapointed that I couldn't do more than the max today. But then, I did run 20 minutes in couch_to_5k, participate in the local bowling league, and then did 100_pushups before doing the crunches, so I guess it's to be expected. At least I did them at all.

Here's to getting right back on the horse.

Miyako Island Rock Festival and my Birthday Weekend.

2008-06-24T12:05:00.003+09:00

I woke up to dreams about the Super Mario Brothers traveling in a fantasy realm. Thing is, I could totally turn it into a story about two brothers who don't get along but care for each other, falling through the realms. Would be kinda neat.

Okay, let's start this. My weekend.

Friday, I got off at the usual time, went home, finished picking up, did 100_pushups and 100_crunches, and the picked up Veronica and Kat (from Ishigaki) at the airport. We were starving so we went to have pizza and then walk down Nishizato where there was apparently a street festival in honor of the Miyako Island Rock Fest the next day. Had some shaved ice. It was good. Oh, and they brought me birthday presents. I got Hello Kitty Shisa, a pair of beautiful wood chopsticks, a nice wooden almost puzzle box, and a box of flower flavored inside jokes from Kat, and handdrawn pictures of my Bleach boys from Veronica. I is very happy camper.

Saturday, I get up at 8 because I was just lying there anyway. I go on my run (w5d2), which I should have gone and tried to park down at the port where I usually run, but I didn't, because I got it into my head that it would be closed off and I'd have to turn around anyway (not actually true) so I parked at the big port and ran down the road towards the other port and past it, and by the end of it almost back to my house (mostly uphill, it sucked) before turning around and running back. Fun fun. Then I grabbed Veronica and Kat, we went to Mitchan's to eat lunch (heavenly!) and then head off to the fest.

I honestly couldn't believe that they wouldn't let us take water into the event, seeing how it was so damn hot, but they didn't, so I had to catch a cab back to my apartment, drop off my camera and water jugs, and then catch a cab back. In hindsight, I should have driven them down there, seen what we could or couldn't take in, and driven back and then just caught the one cab myself. But ah well.

We get in just as the first band was playing. I don't remember who they were, some girl fronter with boys, oh, Hearts Grow. In the course of the day we listen to ストレイテナー (ok), TOKYO SKUNX (really fun, bought their album), Rickie-G (good music), 湘南乃風 (good music), ELLEGARDEN (very mainstream, but good to listen to), PUFFY (as in Puffyamiyumi no Puffy. And I totally didn't realize it until Veronica and Kat were talking about it as they were going on. Holy cow. They didn't play anything I knew, except for Green Day, but it was a pretty good performance), FUNKY MONKEY BABYS (GREAT show, music was okay, couldn't decide on their style), and MONGOL800 (who were last, and we didn't really dig, so we left).

During the course of the very hot day, we bought several 300yen CUPS of water (about 16 oz.), several shaved ices, food, and towards the end of the day, when it wasn't nearly as hot, some awamori. Then we went back home, and I showed them the wonderfullyness that is David Tennant as Doctor Who. They didn't know. Now they do.

Sunday was their last day in Miyako, and seeing how it was Kat's first, we tried to go to Sunnyside for lunch, but failed because she was closed, so we hit Family Mart. We drove out to the cape where the water was the clearist I've ever seen it. Like, down by the far end, where the really big waves hit, we could see the rocks underneath the waves. I mean, it was just perfect.

Then we do a driveby of the Ueno German Cultural Village, get a bit lost getting to Utopia (but agreed it was totally worth it), then drove out to the Kurima bridge and Maehama for a minute. Maehama was closed. But get this, it's a public beach, it can't close. Yeah, they'd blocked off the parking lot for the Festival workers. So that they could have a "private day on the beach." After a few minutes of actually getting the story out of the guys, we turn around and go park down at the port--the Other End of Maehama. If we had wanted to, we could totally have walked all the way to the best part of Maehama. It was totally pointless. But we only stay a minute before heading to the bowling alley and playing a few games before leaving to drive them to the airport at 5:30 to catch their 6:15 flight. Or that was the plan.

Shortly after the first game, my dad calls. Like Calls My Cell Phone, something that's just not done. Yeah, my grandmother had passed away in her sleep that morning (like just a few minutes ago), and I cried for a bit, but rallied, because it was a good day, and they were here and all, and we finished the game. For your information, 125, 122=247, avg. 123.5. Running total is 937. Running avg is (8 games) 117.25. Running session avg is (3 sessions) 117.7. And that was with a 10 lb ball. Usually I roll with a 9 pounder, but it wasn't there, so I had to take what I could fit my fingers into. I was Tired after just the 2 games, but it was pretty good. I think I might try to use that ball from now on, but I'm kinda scared to. I don't think I have the endurance to do it for 3 games yet. It was heavy.

I take them back home, mope for a bit, talk to my dad for a bit, and then go out for Janine's birthday.

We started at the bowling alley izukaya that I hate. Mostly cuz they're slow. And that was fun. I was actually told I looked "knackered" by Kirsty, and she said it was a good reason to look knackered. We sat down at 8, left for our karaoke apt at 11:30, added another hour to our 2 hour booking. Then, because Justin (from mainland Okinawa, not nextdoor neighbor), Suzy and Jon (from Ishigaki) and Jan and I weren't quite karaoke'd out, we hit a smaller room for another hour. I got home at 4am. Then I talked to Leo, until I could honestly say that I was passing out on the couch, and then I crashed.

But for some silly reason I woke up at 10. My super called and said she'd been thinking and yes, I should be able to take this week off, not just because I wanted to go home (because I didn't, 2 days travel time each way, along with I'm coming home in 50 days, it's just not worth it), but because I didn't want to go home I'm more lonely and sad so I shouldn't have to deal with children. Yay. I sent out an email to everyone telling them that my day would consist of lunch at Sunnyside at 12:30, beach, and then dinner at Pisala at 7:30. I said I didn't want anything, just company.

Jason, Kirsty, and Amy joined me at Sunnyside for lunch. I had the ebi curry and the chocolate cake with the molten happiness inside (she even gave me a happy birthday decoration :) ) and we stayed there talking for 2 hours. It was awesome. Also, Jason went home to Hawaii recently, and I asked him to bring me back something free (because everyone says bring me back something, but it's just a pain to find things that people will like and whatnot, so I said, something free, something small, but if you forget, no worries) and he brought me back a postcard of O'Ahu. It's really pretty, and I loved it.

I then proceeded to go down to Maehama, where no one I knew was there, but I had a lovely time reading, sun bathing, and occasionally dipping into the perfect water. I mean, just cool enough to be soothing, just warm enough to not be a shock. Perfect.

Just as I had finished my hour and a half at the beach, I get a phone call from Curi who just called to talk, and we talked for 30 minutes, while I pulled my car off to the side of the road in the shade of some satokibi. It was awesomes.

Then shower and Doctor Who (OMGWFTBBQ this week's episode *splodes!*) and went to Pisala. Jeff, Jonathan, Jason and Erika, and Justin showed up. Nana was working (of course) and I had the amazing tuna and mozzarella pasta, and then Nana surprised me with cheesecake and candles, and a free drink (I had a maitai~ish, it was loverly). Then we went to "31" and I had a strawberry cheesecake cone. I finally got home around 10, so again about 2 and a half hours of just good company and good food. Towards the end Erika gave me a small cell dangly with okinawan glass and a hibiscus flow. It's really pretty, and was really sweet.

I had a near perfect birthday. Considering you all weren't here. A ton of people mailed me or called me to wish me happy birthday, the only one that got a hold of me was Rosie (sorry I wasn't here or asleep when the rest of you called) and we talked for a bit. My head is still sploding about her and Jason, but whatever. It's good.

Today, I'm taking it easy. I was thinking about running and whatnot today, but it's already 89 degrees, heat index 109, so I'm not doing that until much later. I have bowling tonight, which I'm going to go to, as it makes me happy (and that's what this week is going to be about, making Kim happy--I got it off, due to death). But because of bowling, I might do my crunches earlier and then my pushups after. (Because making Kim stronger and more able to out run the zombies also makes her happy). And I don't want to get too behind on my programs (because finishing the programs and obtaining the goals will also make her happy). I'm even in the process of cleaning. Not because cleaning makes me happy, but living in a clean house does. And I might pack up a box of extra clothing to send home. Because that would make me feel more accomplished. And applications for working need to happen this week, but probably not today.

2008-06-22T18:15:00.001+09:00

My Grandmotts is no longer with us. But I'm okay. Mostly.

Yesterday's w5d1

2008-06-20T16:03:00.001+09:00

I drove down to Maehama beach after school today. School was awesome today, by the way. It was my last day with my 3rd and 4th grades, and they were all broken up about it when I told them, no not just for the semester, forever. But that's okay, the classes themselves went well. And during afternoon break most of them came into my room and played with me. I got some pictures, it was pretty cool.

Then I drove down to the Beach side of the island, parked at the port and started my 5th week of couch to 5k. This is not necessarily true, mind. I haven't taken a weekend off since week 2, so I've been running off and on every other day. It cuts out a day every other week. Anyway.

I started on the 5 minute warm up walking towards the bridge from the port. The first interval going fine, like I could have continued for a few more minutes fine. Not pushing myself. Woo. And when the second interval hit, of course it hit on the uphill of the bridge, but whatever, I was only dying by the time it ended. The third interval was also on the next uphill, but I turned around at the end of the bridge about a minute to the end of the 5 minute run. Then I had to walk alllllll the way back to my car. I'd planned this to take about 25 minutes, it took about 27, so good. The total is about 5.5k.

On the way back, one of the fishermen pointed over the bridge and said look. It was a sea turtle. Yay! That was my second one on the bridge. I always keep my eye out, but things don't often show themselves. I also was welcomed back by a fisherman I pasted towards the beginning of the bridge. That was pretty neat.

After my run, I went to the beach for some tanning and reading. I ran into the tail end of volleyballers, including Janine and Teresa, but they left soon. I went for a small swim on the deserted beach, small because it was deserted, and then laid down on my towel and read for a bit. All in all, a nice day. Although I think I burned my back a little bit. There's something to be said for being so hot that you just can't get that layer of sweat off of you long enough to lotion up.

While I was lying there reading, I saw a small blue crab skitter amongst the surf. I also could Hear the tide coming it. It was pretty neat.

Push Ups and Crunches w1d3

2008-06-20T15:42:00.001+09:00

Current Stats

Version: modified push ups
Progress: w1d3c1
Progression: 5, 4, 4, 3, max 5
Today's Max: 6 (+1)
Today's Totals: 22

I couldn't go past 6 today. I really had my eyes set on 7, but just couldn't. I had this problem last time too. My left arm starts shaking something terrible at around 5. I'm pretty sure that's my body telling me that it can't go any further. I'm going to continue on to week 2 though, as the min max isn't above 6 until week 3, and that's after another test, so we'll see where we rate.

Also, I've found that The Number One Don't Be Sore The Next Day Stretch is to grasp my hands behind my back and lift them up behind me. Or, position them on top of something, and lean my body down (as that gets more of a stretch then just me lifting). Other stretches are necessary too, but that one is the one that helps the most. I know because I forgot to do it the first day and was uber sore, but remembered on d2 and was FINE. Thought I'd share.

Current Stats

Progress: w3d3c2
Progression: 25, 19, 19, 17, max 22
Today's Max: 25 (+3)
Today's Totals: 105

I think I'm just tired today. Last time was so good, but today was a lot harder. Maybe just because it's Friday, or because it's so hot I'm swelling (like my hands and feet and whatnot). Either way, I did more than the max, so I feel good. And dood, I just did 105 crunches. Woot.

This is my Birthday weekend. Because my birthday is also the Battle of Okinawa's Anniversary, we get Monday off. I asked and there's not any festivals or anything, just people going to family graves and whatnot. I don't know what I'm specifically doing for my birthday, no one's really asked, so no plans have been made. I am going to the Miyako Island Rock Festival. And Veronica and Kat are flying over from Ishigaki, which is pretty awesome. But the actual birthday celebrations? I just don't know. At least I don't have to work on the day of.

I also have several things to share with you. The first being a petition. See, I like being an American. I think discrimination is bad. I think this even if I don't agree with whatever it is that they're doing, so long as nobody is getting hurt in this process. So, I support marriage (for as far as I support "marriage" at all, personally I think that that should be completely separated from the state, but I digress) being available and open to whoever wants to do it. Therefore I signed the Million for Marriage Petition. You don't have to, but if you like the whole religious freedom and lack of discrimination, you should think about signing as well.

Also, an interesting petition on oil drilling more is not gonna lower gas prices and just make the rich richer. Is Not Solution. Again, you don't have to sign. Just thought you'd like it brought to your attention.

Push ups and Crunches w1d2

2008-06-18T20:19:00.001+09:00

I think I'm doing these wrong. What I do is just like that vid I posted (also on the profile), but I don't go down all the way--I can't. There gets to be a point, about halfway down, that if I go down any further, that I fall down. My arms just can't support my weight at that point. I'm debating doing week one over again, at least until I can go down further, but I don't know, yet.

Also, I learned that so long as I'm in Japan (countdown, t minus 55 days), and participating in the local bowling league, I shouldn't do my push up workout Monday or Tuesday, because my control goes soooo far away. It's kinda sad. I know I'm the worst person in the league, but I don't want to let my teammates down and just be HORRIBLE (like I was last night). So for now it looks like I'm on a Wednesday, Friday, Sunday rotation (no matter when I run for couch25k . . .)

Even so, today was a lot better than Monday. I stretched before and after and don't feel half as sore. And I was able to do above the max at the end :) I also started out the workout with carrying this week's 20 liter jug of drinkable water up the stairs to my apartment (always a fun trip) and followed the push ups with crunches.

Current Stats

Version: modified push ups
Progress: w1d2c1
Progression: 4, 3, 2, 2, max 4
Today's Max: 6 (+2!)
Today's Totals: 17

Oh, wow. I really like that total. That makes me feel so good.

So, in response to some of the How To questions, I did an internet search and found this how to video.

According to this, I've (of course) been doing them wrong. But that's okay. Today went really well, I think. The "proper" crunches were both harder to do, and easier all at the same time. I was able to do a few more, but they hurt more, if that makes sense.

Current Stats

Version: normal crunch
Progress: w3d2c2
Progression: 22, 17, 17, 15, max 20
Today's Max: 30 (+10!!!!!!!)
Today's Totals: 101

Oh, wow. I really like that total. That makes me feel so good.

w4d3 and Push Up Vid

2008-06-17T23:07:00.001+09:00

Wooo! I feel really good about today. Especially since this is the day (Tuesdays) that I normally have to get up earlier, catch a ferry to go to work, and then, while I have a ride to work from the port, I do not have a ride back to the port from work, so I get to walk with my backpack full of all of my teaching supplies for 15-20 minutes. And then I ran today. And I killed it dead.

84 degrees, 79% humidity. 6:30pm.

Today's run actually felt good. The first 5 minute interval kinda hurt, but the second one felt fine, oddly enough. I mean, really really fine. I mean like I could have (really, with a good oomph) pushed myself to do another minute. Instead I didn't and did my now regular 20 minute walk, but still. I feel really good about how this week turned out and am really looking forward to next week (something I haven't said in the past 2 weeks or so). Even the 20 minute run at the end of next week day 3 doesn't look all that scary, when you put it into perspective. I mean, last week it looked like Jason from Friday the 13th, no matter how far or how fast you run, it'll catch up with you and kill you. Now it just looks like that troll from the first Lord of the Rings movie. A mythological enemy (not quite real), a pain in the keaster to kill, and it might throw me 20 feet into a wall, but killable with effort and a little luck. I like those odds a whole lot better. :)

Also, I found a video that's really informative on how to do a "proper push up" and guess what, I was doing it wrong. Ah, well, from tomorrow on . . .

Bowling, first night, new team

2008-06-17T22:37:00.000+09:00

Today was the first night of the new league. I didn't impress my teammates very much, I don't think.

This might have been due to running at 6, showering by 7:20 and showing up for bowling at 7:40. Or might have been due to my push up workout yesterday that I'm still sore from (yep, definitely need to stretch both before and after push ups. And maybe not ever do them the night of or the night before bowling, which'll restrict me to a Wed, Fri, Sun schedule, no matter when I run, but I hope not. We'll just have to see.)

Tonights scores were: 90, 89, 123=302 avg.=100.2 (broke 100! woo! but still, not so good a night.)
Last week: 130, 150, 109 = 389. avg=129.6(repeating)
So running total is 691. Running avg of games = 115.2. Running avg of sessions = 114.9

My teammates were nice though. I like Ikemura-san, but I don't know quite what to make of Masayu-san yet. He's a bit nondescript.

Okay, I've been slacking here, and I'm not quite sure why

2008-06-16T20:26:00.006+09:00

But this is gonna be a large one to catch up. Mostly it's gonna be copy and pasted from my private blog (the one where I'm not nearly as polite :P ) because for some stupid reason I've been able to keep up there and this one has fallen behind, so.

w3d1
Jun. 7th, 2008
Hmmm, why is it that every time (although it's only been the second, but you know what I mean) I get used to one week's training, the next week comes along to kick my butt? Today's run went okay until the end. The last minute or so of the final 3 minute run was not pleasant, but it happened. I'm sure I'll just be getting use to it when day 3 comes around and I'll have to move on :P

[79 degrees, 89% humidity.]

I found a place down by the port where they're building (the longest bridge of it's kind in japan, 20k) the bridge to Irabu that has tons of sqwishy squishy turf for the nice walking and running. I found it last week Tuesday as I did my walk/run from the port, but reached it as soon as I hit my turn around point, and then revisited it on Thursday, actually driving down there and parking, but I did my run so late that I couldn't hardly see anything. Today I went around 6 and could actually see various paths go off into and around the area that were also made of that wonderful squishy material. I think on Monday's run I'm gonna go down and explore a little more.

I also got on Google maps and actually measured what I did today. With my 7 (not 5) minute warm up walk, and my 13 minute cool down walk (not on the plan) I did 3.3k or 2 miles. Realizing this makes me really glad I'm doing the extra walking, as (well, today it is, but on Monday I'll go farther) it doesn't take that much out of me, and it adds my distance. Remember the goal is to be able to run a 5k, but I'm doing the program based on minutes, not distance, so at the end I probably will be able to run 30 minutes, but not necessarily be able to run 5k. The ultimate goal (down the line a ways) would be to run 5k in 30 minutes, but I would like to be able to run 30 minutes and walk the rest of the 5k within the 9 week program. Which (in theory) means I'll be able to cover 5k, 30 minutes of that running, the week before I leave Miyako. I like that goal. Knock on wood to not having a hold up (getting sick, injured, too busy, etc).

And then there are day:s like thisJun. 11th, 2008

"Oh, the 6th graders have stuff to do this afternoon, so they can't do your English Class."

"Okay, no problem. Since I don't have any classes after lunch, can I go to the iinkai?"

"Sure, no problem."

Turns out they were on a 3 day field trip to Okinawa. Naw, I don't think I can get mad at them for missing my class for that :P

w3d3Jun. 11th, 2008

Heat 86. Humidity 79%

That hurt. I did it, but it hurt. With how much that hurt, I'm not sure I'm actually ready for w4 yet. There were, however, several possible reasons for so much hurt.

1. I went running at 2pm. I got out of work early so decided to go to the Cape (link for pictures), since the school I taught at today was halfway to the other side of the island (where the Cape is), and gas prices are astronomical (1.70per liter!) and I hadn't been running out there yet. And it's got the squishy turf. So groovy.

2. It was so hot I could have taken a bath and been less wet. Half the time I felt like I was swimming, not running.

3. Also, there is NO SHADE by the Cape, and wonderful scrubby tree-type things that block the beautiful wind for most of the length of the trail.

4. And there were hills. Not big ones, mind, but Miyakojima is a Really Flat Island. So even the little ups and downs were more than I was use to. I really felt like I was dying on the ups, but the downs and flat bits I was fine with.

So, it makes me wonder if I need to do a day or two of week 3 over, until I can really kill it dead, or whither I should just try to move on and see if that really kills me dead. Decisions, decisions . . . Also, I'm thinking that this really solidified the fact that I can no longer go running before about 6:30 unless it's overcast. It's just not worth it. At the end I was starting to get a heat headache.

I suppose I should also mention that day 2 also kicked my butt a bit, and because I felt so tired I did a 15 minute walk at the end (if that motivation makes sense to you, it makes perfect sense to me . . .). I tried to do the same today, but I think the heat just got to me, and I was only able to do 10 minutes after the sets.

w4d1 and packages Jun. 13th, 2008

I've been doing this for 3 full weeks? It doesn't seem like long, and at the same time seems like forever.

Today's run was again done stupid early, 3pm, but we had a thunder storm with several buckets of rain go over from about 1:30-2:30, so it'd cooled down and was mostly cloudy out when I started. Then the sun came out and it was kinda nasty for a bit, but I had a nice cooling breeze to compensate.

I forgot to check the exacts when I got home, but around 5 it was 81 degrees with 74% humidity.

Anyway, to the actual run. Can I mention how much I hate week 4's intervals? Not that they were all that hard (no, I lie, the 5 minute run was all that hard), it's just I can't run to music (I'm currently working towards the end of Eragon by Chrisopher Paolini having just finished Orson Scott Card's Ender series, starting with Ender's Shadow through Shadow of the Giant before going back to the beginning with Ender's Game and finishing with Children of the Mind. The Card audio presentations are WONDERFUL, by the way, with several different actors actually PERFORMING the books, not just reading. Though I'd recommend starting with book 1, Ender's Game, if you're going to start at all :P I've read them all before, so going out of order was just interesting.), so I'm not listening to the podcasts, and it's hard to remember where you are and when to switch over to walking or running. I miss the set run for x, walk for y, rinse, repeats. But I'm just griping.

I did have to stop about 3 times, for 5-10 seconds, to stretch out my shins. Only once during a run though. Stupid cramps. Need to hydrate more.

I feel like I've found my "running stride." You know, the pace that my body wants to run at? Unfortunately, I'm not yet to the point where I can keep it up for more than about 2 minutes, so I have to remember at the onset of a running interval that I really do need to go That Slow, so I don't burn myself out. I keep forgetting and pushing too fast.

Also, I finished the run with a nice 20 minute walk. I'm thinking that when I finish c25k, I'm going to try to do it again, to work myself up to 10k. Basically start with the 30 minute run, and then follow with w?d?. I wonder if anyone else had done this. I figure if I work myself up to a 30 minute slow walk at the end of my runs, a week or two of running 30 walking 30 at the end of c25k will be good enough to embark on the next set. I'm not really concerned with speed and racing so much as being able to accomplish that level of activity for that amount of time.

Also, after work today I went to the post office to post another box home. 30 bucks for about 11 books and a few knickknacks. This hurts. But again, I'm happy that Mom was able to take so many books home with her when they came to visit. Saves me so much. I also asked about shipping my suitcases home, seeing how all of the airlines have initiated the Only One Checked Bag policy. Basically, I can ship my small suitcase back (inside a box with nothing in the suitcase), but my big suitcase is too big to ship so I'll be taking that with me (in all of it's huge glory) to Taiwan and checking that and only that, or I'll have to find another carrier. If I take my big suitcase with me, it'll mean I'll have to ship my new bookbag home, as that's too big to check. Which stinks. I really didn't want to bring a bag that I couldn't just sling on my back if I chose. We'll have to see what I can come up with.

Can we talk for a minute? Jun. 13th, 2008

Can we talk about how much I HATE cleaning? I mean, yeah, it's good to be clean. It's good to be free of clutter. But if being free of clutter was what I was good at, I'd have a place to put the clutter, wouldn't I?

It's Still Not Clean. Landlord and people are coming tomorrow at 10:30 (I hope I got that time right) and it's still not clean. May I remind you that Saturday is usually the day that I like to sleep for 12 hours or so. Not gonna happen. Neither is cleaning more tonight. I only have a few more piles of clutter that are going to be dumped unceremoniously onto bookshelves. If I get up at 8 I'll have time to do that, and vacuum, and clean the last bit out of the sink (stuff that was just put there today and yesterday), and put away the clothes, and pack my overnight stuff into a bag (it's in a pile, just waiting for the toiletries), although I'm still praying to several gods that I won't, in fact, have to vacate my house.

I like having a clean house. I don't like all of the Random Little Things that Need To Be Kept and don't really have Away Places. Hopefully, though, since this is the first time it's been Clean since Leo left (yeah, he visited in April, what about it?) hopefully I'll do a better job of Keeping It Clean, which is a WHOLE lot easier than Cleaning Up.

And yes, I have been working on cleaning since last weekend. Why do you ask?

not getting kicked out! Jun. 14th, 2008

After all that, they come over and look for about 10 minutes (at 1:30, by the way. They must REALLY have been on Island Time) and then decide that they'll come back on Monday (when I'm not here o~O) and replace the bad boards. They're not gonna use bug killer, so the problem is still gonna be there, but you know what? It's not my house. I'm not gonna worry about it. I'm just gonna take ALL of my valuables to work with me on Monday. That's all.

Unfortunately, I used most of my motivation now and don't really wanna go out and do anything. I should want to go to the beach . . . I might go in a bit . . .

w4d2 and a New Program Jun. 15th, 2008

Now, THAT's more like it.

Today was Much Better. I ran down at the Kurima Bridge again, back where I was first running, before I discovered the squishy turf by the Hirara Port. I did down there, on actual pavement, because the bridge actually has 2 hills (one to let boats under it, one to make level with the higher elevation of Kurima Island), and I figured I needed the hilly practice for when I come back home to Georgia (USA) in (OMGOMGOMG) two months. Also, I wanted to hit the beach afterwards :P

84 degrees, 79% humidity, KILLER WIND, 18mph.

The wind was blowing HARD today, and at the start, against me. It made the first crossing of the bridge difficult, but not as difficult as those hills. Of Course I hit all 3 of the uphills at the beginning of a running interval. But it was okay. No, really, it was Okay. I just had to slow down even more than my normal slow pace (so much that I was only going a little faster than walking), but I was able to run up the hills in about 3 minutes each, and run down them is less than 2 :) And I didn't feel like dying. It was awesome. The 5 minutes still hurt me a bit, but today was easier than day 1, and I'm more confidant than I was last week. I again ended the day with a 20 minute walk, which I had to double back on the bridge a bit to complete, but that's good. I just means I have to park my car farther away next time, maybe down at the Maehama Port, nearer to the beach :P

I think, just for hill training, I need to make sure I get at least one day a "week" down there. Oh, darn. An excuse to go to the beach (this time links to my flickr set).

And, if you care, I've finished Eragon (which I liked much better than the movie, and still, it wasn't that great of a book. I blame the writing experience and finesse, or lack thereof. But it was good enough that I read the rest of the trilogy) and started on Arthur C. Clarke's 2001: A Space Odyssey. The introduction by Clarke alone was hilarious enough to make me enthused about listening to the book. Here, just for you, Wacko.

Writing a novel is like swimming through the sea. Writing a film script is like thrashing through treacle.

--Arthur C. Clark

Yeah, I'm gonna like this one. That and the fact that I've never actually sat through the movie. Maybe I'll be more inclined after reading it. There's a lot of nothing happening if I remember correctly . . . from those several attempts on TBS . . .

Also, yzztik (over on livejournal) pointed out another program called 100 Push Ups. I really like this idea (another slowly working your way up to a goal program), so I've created a community for it, again, on livejournal. "100_pushups". Feel free to check it out and join if you want.

Initial Test Jun. 15th, 2008

Okay, so there I was, ready to test myself, see how far I'd come in my fitness over the course of the year. Some bowling, some running, some crunches, sounds good, right? So I try the Initial Test, to see where I should start. I first try the actual push up. Toes on the floor, straight back, and I fall. Nope, that's not going to happen. So okay, maybe I too will try yzztik's idea of doing easy push ups (knees on the ground, "girl push ups" for all of us kids raised in the 80s and early 90s) and just do the program twice, once on my knees, once on my toes. Sounds good to me.

Okay, so I get myself ready for the girl push ups too see how many I can do, and I do two. Right up until I realize that I'm not actually going down as far as you're suppose to, so that my shoulders are equal with my elbows. So on my third push up, I go down, and I fall down. My arms couldn't take it. So yeah. I'll be starting in Column One--0-5 push ups, under 40 years of age. Woo hoo!

I'm looking forward to my first day tomorrow.

Oh! Watch my little Community Grow! June 16, 2008

I now have 10 members over at "100_pushups" and am watched by 12 people (2 people are just lurking). I feel so proud!

Also, yzztik is adapting the program from push ups to crunches and created a community for it. Guess the name. Go on guess. "100_crunches". Yep, you guessed right.

I'm gonna do both. Because I can, and before I hurt myself (stupid staircase) and lost my motivation, I was doing about 100 crunches. In 25 or so sets. So I know it can be done, easily. What they:re doing is just doubling the numbers in the program. I think I might have to triple them, but we:ll see how it goes with my initial test. I:ll do that today as soon as I get home, and then push ups, then my first crunch day. It would be nice to have a good layer of solid muscle underneath my layer of fat, don:t you think? I mean, cuz the layer of fat isn:t going anywhere. That:s just how my body type is, if I want the good girly bits, I get the belly and kester fat. I:m (kinda) okay with this. Also, if I loose too much more weight, my face starts to get toooooooo thin, and I really don:t like that. So, layer of belly fat it is. But underneath that, having a solid layer of muscle would be very nice, I think.

Also, might I add how amazing exercising is when you have a group of people doing it with you? I mean, even if I don:t know these people. I don:t even really know what they look like. But we:re doing it TOGETHER. Giving support and whatnot. I REALLY like that.

100 Push Ups w1d1c1 and 100 Crunches w1(3)d1c2 Jun. 16th, 2008

Today I did Week 1, Day 1, Column 1 of 100_pushups

Hooray for just getting started! There's something about that first day, isn't there? When you first start and then do what you wanted to? So, yep. I started! Yay!

Day 1 was hard. This might be because I wasn't really able to do more than 2 push ups during the initial test, and then I had to do those 2 repeatedly, even if they were all girl type push ups, but my buttocks is apparently rather large and heavy. Or at least that's how it feels to me when I try to push myself back up! But it wasn't too bad, and I don't think I blew out anything, although my left arm (the one that hasn't been getting weight training every week by bowling in a league) kinda hurts. And my pecs definitely Feel The Burn (tm).

Between each level I waited from the standard 60 seconds to about 70 seconds, which might be why I only was able to do the at least 3 as my max. So, in total, I did 11 (girl) push ups today. Wooo!

On Wednesday I plan to wait for a full 2 minutes or more between level 4 and 5 and see if that makes a difference.

Afterwards, I went ahead with my first day of 100_crunches.

LaFou I'm afraid I've been thinking . . .

So, the goal for the 100 Push Ups Program that we're basing this thing off of is to do 100 consecutive push ups, right? Well, I know I can do 100 crunches. Before I hurt myself (again, and again, I say, "stupid staircase") I was doing about 120 in a sitting. I just wasn't doing them consecutively. I was doing them in about 25 repped sets. So, I figure if the goal is to do 100 crunches consecutively, then I don't really see a problem with doing the program as is, seeing how during my initial test, I could only do about 20 crunches consecutively before my stomach and back started burning so much I couldn't continue and needed a rest. So, based on that number for my initial test, I'm at Rank 3.

When looking actually at the week one chart, there isn't a place for "if you did 20 push ups during the initial test," and there isn't one for week 2 either. But starting with week 3, there is. Column 1 is for 16-20, Column 2 is for 21-25. So I did that. I decided, because I was right on the cusp anyway to go ahead and start my 100 Crunches Program on Week 3, Day 1, Column 2. And it went fantabulously.

I waited the standard 60 seconds between each level, until the last one, in which I waited until it really stopped hurting, about 2 minutes. During level 5 I was able to push myself and do 23 crunches. For a daily total of 86 crunches. Woot! I feel pretty good about it.

Also, they finished messing up--I mean, fixing my apartment. Things are not yet back in their assigned places, but I'm just glad that the termites are all dead and gone.

I'll try to keep better track of this thing :P

Important things

2008-06-12T19:36:00.002+09:00

Have I actually out and out said here that I'm coming home on August 13th?

Also, I took a break in cleaning today and watched The Karate Kid. I'm noticing a whole lot more of Japanese/Okinawan Culture, and a whole lot less of "he's trying to be a Japanese-like silly man." What, I was how old when I first watched it? And yay for being more culturally aware. You know his head band? White with the blue dots. I Have One. I picked it up as a prize at a party. Go me. I use it for sweat while I'm cleaning :P A very traditional use.

Also, when he was speaking Japanese to the official, he was calling the official names.

I HAVE to finish cleaning by tomorrow. The people come to inspect the termites on Saturday morning.

Bowling league

2008-06-11T13:03:00.000+09:00

I think I should mention that last nights bowling league was awesome. It was the last night of the session, so there were prizes (I won 10 bucks for getting a perfect something score (like 510 with my handicap) and a case of green tea cuz my team won the league), I actually got to bowl with people I knew (it was Wherever You Want, so me, Mike, Stu, and Justin) and then we went out and then went to the afterparty. It was bunches of fun.

I:m doing the next league too, even though I:ll only be here for 7 weeks of it (dear god, is that how soon I leave?). Should be fun. We figure out who our teammates are at the next gameday, Tuesday.

Because I:m planning on continuing to play when I get home, I thought I should start marking down each weeks scores, not just the good ones, so I can figure out my average before I leave.

So, last night: 130, 150, 109 = 389. avg=129.6(repeating) Good night.

Good day

2008-06-09T11:22:00.001+09:00

First off, Saturday was UBER fun. I got up, caught the ferry over to Irabu, met up with my Sarahama kids, got pictures of the fishermen throwing fish at the people (video too :)), and watched them do some sumo. Then I met up with our supervisor, Yamaguchi Akemi and she introduced me to her husband (who was having a party at 10am on his friend's boat with fresh sashimi (like they killed it that morning) and otori), and then took me on a drive around Irabu. She told me so much about the area, where she grew up, where the whales can be seen, where the mermaid use to live (aparently, nengyou hime fell in love with a man, and married him, but she missed the ocean, so she prayed to the Ocean God to take her back home, and he sent a tsunami to bring her back (I'm pretty sure this meant that all of the people on Irabu at the time were killed, but eh), and I got tons of beautiful pictures and for the most part had a great time hanging out.

Then I caught the ferry back, had lunch at Nishino's with Jeff and Nana, and then went running around 6. It was a really good day.

Yesterday I avoided cleaning like a pro, but still managed to pick up the place, go figure.

Well, that was interesting . . .

2008-06-06T16:38:00.001+09:00

I went to the Japanese OBGYN today. It was . . . an experience . . . But at least he took one look at me, told me yep, you were right, and gave me meds for it and told me to go back in 2 weeks. Fun fun.

I was really impressed with the clinic itself. It was so VERY girly, for the doctor being male and all, but I guess that most of the people who go there are having babies and they're very girly people, or whatever. Also, they had this microscope that hooked up to a TV and he showed me the cell sample he took. I love looking at microscopes so it was REALLY neat.

Also, the apartment people got back to me about my termites. Apparently they not only want to meet with me in the middle of school hours, they also want to bomb the house and kick me out for 3 days next week. Depending on how this goes, I might ask for next Friday off and run away to Ishigaki instead . . .

And it totally did (is) rain today, so I'm really glad I did my run yesterday :D And I'm gonna get up early tomorrow and try to watch the Dragon Boat Races. Should be fun, but I won't be home in the morning to talk to people :(

w2d3 or Wasn't I suppose to take today off?

2008-06-05T21:06:00.001+09:00

I got horrendously anxious today. This might have had something to do with a 2 hour doctor's visit (only about 3 minutes with the doctor himself saying my ankle is now fine and I've officially graduated rehab, yay!) and a slight headache, not to mention the massive amount of cleaning that really should be done in and around my apartment and just as I was grudgingly getting around to starting to clean I looked at myself and said, "Self, you really don't want to do this." And I said, "I know, what I really want to do is run today. It's suppose to rain tomorrow, and the week will just be nicer if I run today, Saturday, then Monday and Wednesday, based on this week's work schedule. And I'm getting towards the end of my book on tape (mp3) and I want to hear the ending." To which I replied, "Okay, Self, so why don't you go run?" "Because I really SHOULD clean, and I'm suppose to be taking 2 day's break because of that twinge in my knee Tuesday night at bowling." At this I gave myself a stern look and said, "Self, don't be silly. You feel fine. You can always just stop if something hurts. You really didn't want to clean anyway. It's going to rain tomorrow. And the schedule will be so much nicer if you run today, then Saturday and Monday and Wednesday. Get off of your @$$ and go running. Perhaps on that nice cushy turf by the port." And I looked at myself, and I looked at my kitchen, and I got my running shoes out and went running.

It felt awesome. My muscles are a bit sore, but seeing how it was a tendon twinging before, I think this is okay and I'll do some more stretching today and tomorrow before running on Saturday and Monday and Wednesday :P Seeing how I've been a champion couch in the past, I think this attitude is remarkable and quite . . . nice, actually. I hope your weeks are going as nicely.

We're not gonna talk about the apartment . . .

2008-05-30T17:42:00.001+09:00

It's always fun to get to school and then have a teacher say that your schedule is completely different today and a Bad Man is coming into your classroom. We had an emergency someone's in the school drill yesterday. The office guy dressed up in sunglasses and a face mask and terrorized the 4th graders. Then they called the police and a nice police officer came and talked to the kids about the kind of things he uses and has. He handcuffed on of the little snots--dears, I mean, of course. It was neat to see the differences. My favorite part was "maybe you've seen this think on american tv or movies" and he pulled out his badge.

In other news, I have purchased my ticket from Miyako to Tokyo, and will hopefully this weekend be purchasing the ticket from Tokyo to Home. I leave this island July 28th.

And, I've finished week 1 of couch to 5k. I did an extra day, so that I did 4 of the week 1 runs, because day 2 was so bad. I pushed myself too far and ended up having to walk most of it. Stepid heat. But I feel good about week 2.

Stress

2008-05-23T15:12:00.002+09:00

I've been stressing out. Stressing about the volleyball tournament. Stressing about my successor. Stressing about the termites in the floor. Stressing about the landlord calling and wanting to come over with my house in the state I've let it become. Stressing about paperwork. Stressing about work. Stressing about my belly. Too much stress. It hurts.

So, today after I got off work I drove over to the Kurima Bridge and I did week 1 day 1 of the couch to 5k program. I've been thinking about doing this for a while. I mean, dang, if Janine can go from hating running to triathlete, I should be able to run for a freaking 30 minutes, right? Yesterday at my rehab I asked my rehab-guy and he said that because it no longer really hurts, I should be okay with slowing working my way up to running. I just need to listen to my body, really closely, and so long as it doesn't hurt, it should be fine. All good.

So for the first day you're suppose to walk for 5 minutes and then alternate 60 seconds of running and 90 seconds of running for 10 minutes and end with 5 minutes of walking, 20 minutes total. My body didn't want to do 60. So I let it do 30 seconds of running, for 15 minutes and a 10 minute walk at the end. We seemed to be fine with that. What with the 1-2 hour walks we're use to, our endurance is higher than our aerobic ability. So I can work with shorter for longer in the beginning. On day 2 we'll try for 60 again and see how we like it. What's really funny to me is that my body didn't want to run for 60 seconds, but it would have been fine doing the intervals for probably another 10-15 minutes. I wonder if that would be okay . . . Maybe I should try to get to where I can do 60 and then see how long I can hold that interval for . . .

VOLLEYBALL!!!!! Bring the rain!

2008-05-17T18:11:00.002+09:00

One of the reasons I've been so tired the past two weeks, getting back from a foreign country aside, is that we (the ALTs) were participating in the Teacher Volleyball Tournament, which actually happened today. The last two weeks we had 4 practices, and bowling, and getting ready for new JET, and we'll not even talk about the state of my house, although I did get a little time to clean up a bit yesterday.

So, MY position in the 9 man set up is middle right. I work really well between Jeff (front), Mike (rear), and Jon (center). I actually do really well for having not played volleyball since bloody high school. I actually hit some hard balls and saved points and did really well for me. I've learned a lot in the last two weeks and actually DUG my first ball today. Didn't do anything with it, it went out, but I freaking Hit It. Boo. Ya. Ka.

First up, there was a teeshirt design contest. And Mike did a beautiful job of designing the teeshirts, which showed when we won. Booya.

We played the Chugakko devision, seeing how most of the ALTs are middle school teachers, it made sense. We won our first round. We won our second round. We lost the semi-finals. So, depending on the other semi-final loser's points we took either 3rd or 4th place. Amy and I tried to head over the sho tournament, but it was over by the time we got there. :(

And my Lonely Planet Taiwan came in today. Planing shall commence. Woo.

Today was Really Fun. So fun, that I think I want to continue doing this when I get back. I think I actually wanna play volleyball. I think I'll be much less afraid of the court if I actually had some pads. Now I just have to work on jumping . . .

I AM PUBLISHED!!!!!!!

2008-05-13T21:57:00.001+09:00

Okay, I hope this link works.

The YAK is the Okinawa JET newspaper. I'm on page 8 in the May 2008 issue. You should go, download it, and read my printed work. Tell me if the link is bad.

Oh, and this is post #200. Woot.

Brief update while I'm working on the Major Thai update

2008-05-11T12:55:00.001+09:00

Firefox is getting cracky, and so in Flickr Uploader, so I think I need a reboot or something (the last batch that I tagged and noted and tried to upload just DIDN'T) so I'm gonna go through all of the little things I've been saving so that I can give my computer a break.

Look what happened while I was in Thailand:

and

Yeah, kinda glad I missed that one, although the glasses I had in the drying rack above the sink aren't anymore, it could have been worse and I'm glad and thankful it wasn't.

Selfari updated. 78 books read this year since coming to Japan. 4 in Thailand.

There's a typhoon in the area, so the wind right now is just killer.

SO

2008-05-09T18:57:00.000+09:00

While yesterday's surprised sucked (hello, you're teaching 5 classes!), today's just rocked (hello, you have no classes and we're all going on a field trip! did you bring sunblock?). Yeah. Awesome.

We went to a museum where I impressed the kids with my wondorous ability to read the English titles to the Canadian Native American artwork, as well as translate the plaques (did you know we only have 23 species of birds here in Miyako year round, but over 200 come through on a migratory or seasonal basis?). Then we went to a park and the teachers fed me FANTABULOUS box lunch. After which we went back to the school and all of the kids were released (this was about 1:30) while the teachers congregated in the tatami and ate leftovers. When that was done, I left early because there was really no point in sticking around, dropped by the iinkai, doctors and then home. Yay!

Gone to Thailand, be back soon

2008-04-23T14:21:00.003+09:00

In case you wanted to keep tabs on me (or the international news), this is my schedule:

Flights:
4/23--JTA 022 19:40 Miyako-Haneda
4/24--NWA 0027 18:45 Narita-Suvarnabhumi (Bangkok)
4/30--Thai Airways International TG287 15:55 Suvarnabhumi-Koh Samui
5/02--Thai Airways International TG288 17:45 Koh Samui-Suvarnabhumi
5/03--NWA 0028 6:00 Suvarnabhumi-Narita
5/05--ANA 465 12:15 Niigata-Okinawa
5/05--ANA 1729 18:25 Okinawa-Miyako

Hotels and locals:

Wed 23--Tokyo http://www.hostelworld.com/hosteldetails.php/KhaosanTokyoSmile-Tokyo-16535
Thur 24--Bangkok http://www.queensgardenresort.net/
Fri 25--Ayuthaya http://www.baansuanguesthouse.com/
Sat 26--Khao Yai http://www.greenleaftour.com/index.html
Sun 27--Khao Yai http://www.greenleaftour.com/index.html
Mon 28--Bangkokhttp://www.newjoeguesthouse.com/
Tues 29--Bangkok http://www.newjoeguesthouse.com/
Wed 30--Koh Samui http://www.embassysamui.com/
Thur 1--Koh Samui http://www.embassysamui.com/
Fri 2--Bangkok http://www.queensgardenresort.net/
Sat 3-Mon 5--Niigata

I AM CARLESS--and I just got paid for the priveledge

2008-04-22T17:26:00.004+09:00

Okay, so my car was old. 16 years old. It could legally drive itself in the US. And it leaked so that it rained on both the inside and outside. And the transmition was DYING. Like there was that time that it just didn't start when Gabe and Hillary were here. And that time where it just would NOT go up Jason's driveway. And the several times when it would just NOT go backwards. Like back up the slight incline in the Strongman parking lot. Like into my garage last night.

Yes, it was time to let it go.

Lets also mention that in Japan they have this thing called Shaken, that is basically an insanely expensive emissions inspection, every other year. And after a car turns 12, it happens every year. Mine was due on April 30th.

So yeah. I'm off today because I have the hacking crud, but seeing how I'm leaving the island for mainland tomorrow, and the mainland for Thailand the day after, and I won't bet back until next month, I needed to deal with car TODAY.

So, over the weekend I ask Sam to do it with me. She says fine, but today she's got a horrible sore throat, so she can't.

Okaaaaaay, so I ask Jeff, because he's had like 2 accidents that required a new vehicle, and he can't help either.

Okaaaaaay, so I go to the iinkai, even though I'm sick, so it's bad of me to show up, and I ask them what do I need to do. My new supervisor called my old supervisor and asks her what the heck I should do. Noriko comes up and calls my insurance agent, and when he finally gets there over an hour later, HE finally helps me more than anyone.

He fills out the paperwork I need to cancel my insurance. He then reimburses me for about 8500yen. Booya. I'd written that money as gone.

He then calls a recycle place, gets directions, shows me on the map where I need to go, asks them if I need any other paperwork (which I thankfully didn't), and sends me on my way. He even warns me that they'll be paying me for the car. Boo. Ya. Ka.

So I go. I find it (it's on the gusukubesen, on the right, across from Toast, just after the giant old looking Japanese gate. The first kanji of the name is 土 over 口, I have no idea how to say it, the driveway is at the same place as the giant gate thing). I get out and they tell me I have everything and then they give me 3000yen. Rock. I totally made money on this car.

And then, just to show you how people are on this island, the lady asks me how I was planning to get home. And I tell her I was going to catch a cab. And she Drives Me Home.

. . .

I love this island. And I need to remember that Miyagi Airi is a 5th grader at Kagamihara Sho, cuz she's her granddaughter and one of my students :P

So now, I am carless. My garage feels empty. I have to ride my scooter to work tomorrow and guess what it's doing Right Now. If you thought "raining" you'd be correct. Of. Course. But that's okay. I'm leasing a new (to me) car for 35,000yen a month starting when I get back. And that's a total deal. And I don't have to drive Nick's Car around any more. I loved that car, because I totally believe that that car ran on the power of love alone, but I don't have to worry whether my car will start or not, will back up or not, will just refuse to downshift at a red light or not, will rain on me or not . . .

To do and done

2008-04-22T14:24:00.000+09:00

So far I've:

Packed for Thailand, fitting everything into my bookbag and purse. All of it. Including a dufflebag in the bottom of the book bag, so that when I get to places, I can add things.

Uploaded all of the pictures I have from when Leo was in Miyako and Strongman. This includes several videos. I love Flickr.

So far I need to:

Go to the Iinkai and ask them to help me throw away my car. And not take any meds before doing so so that they see that yes, I am in fact sick, but there's stuff that I need to do, so even though I took today off school, I need to throw my car away. But I shouldn't do this too soon, I think, cuz I don't want it to look bad.

I need to clean out my car, this will only take a few minutes, I'll do it just after posting.

Get ready for school tomorrow. Seeing how my school bag is my book bag that is currently so perfectly full of everything I need while in Thailand, I don't want to take it all out and repack, so I'll have to come up with something else for tomorrow. Probably my beach bag.

I need to go to bowling tonight. This sucks because I haven't practiced since last week, and I still feel pretty cruddy. But it must happen. So. Depending on how things turn out with the car, I might go early and just have a full practice game. Hopefully my arm won't get tired. But seeing how I'm almost ready to move up to a bigger ball, I don't think it'll be a problem.

Strongman

2008-04-20T08:59:00.001+09:00

I'm out at http://www.miyako-net.ne.jp/~strong-e/ I'll be announcing parts of the bike and the run. Peace!

Do you remember?

2008-04-18T14:47:00.003+09:00

When I said that the iinkai said if my schools told me to go to the iinkai after teaching classes for the day that I could just go home?

So, when the school that I teach at every Friday said that there was a change in the schedule and that since I didn't have classes after lunch, I could just go to the iinkai every week, and asked me if that was a problem, what do you think I said? Yep. I is so happy right now.

Catch up

2008-04-16T14:03:00.003+09:00

Monday -- Monday was my first day back teaching. It was okay. After my classes were over, I spend several of my cell phone's minutes calling around to different rental car places, getting told that it was muri at some and getting told unbelievable prices at others. I finally found one that was the cheapest in Miyako (seems like anyway) and I tried to call back and see where they were located. And I couldn:t understand a word he was saying, or rather, I didn:t have any clue where the places were. So. I ask him to hold on for a second, rush over to the jimusho and ask the office ladies to ask where the place is. They do, and one of the is nice enough to, a little early, drive me over there to talk to them face to face. We laugh about how broken my Japanese is, and how I:m apparently fun to talk to because of it. And we get the car thing sorted. I:m expected to pick up my rental car on the 6th at about noon. Yay. Now to just get rid of my old one.

Right after that I had to rush over to the hospital for my physical therapy. Which went well and he says that my next time should be my last time and gave me some more exercises to do. Weeee.

When I finally got home I felt so accomplished that I was practically dead to the world and ended up doing nothing, including my workout (as in, no, I just didn:t) and went to bed early. Good thing.

Tuesday was my Sarahama day. That:s the get up a hour early to get to the port to catch the ferry day. Y. A. Y. Because I didn:t do my workout the night before, I get myself all together and get out the door early enough to walk to the port. 50lb pack and all. I make good time and get there early enough. Then there:s the quick hop across the pond and a bus ride up to my school. When I get there it seems the new coordinator completely didn:t see the note that said that the iinkai only allows their teachers to teach 4 classes a day, and they schduled me for 5. Which I don:t mind doing occasionally. Just not every week. Not at all. My ear was blowing out by the end of the first period (I wonder if this is a sign of high blood pressure), and I told them flat out, I don:t mind doing it today, but the iinkai has a rule that I can:t do it everyday. And thank god, the 4-1 teacher from Heiichi moved to Sarahama and she totally backed me up. So the poor new coordinator is panicing, trying to see how he can fix the schedule, but I should only teach 4 classes. Yay.

After my last class, I get directions and I walk back down to the port (because I really don:t like making a teacher leave to do it, and my ankle needs to start getting the exercise), I left ubber early, because it was my first time walking alone, and I made it in litterally 15 minutes, just like they said. I think from now on, I:ll ask to leave at about 3:35, just to make sure I don:t miss the ferry, and then actually be walking out the door by 3:40. Technically anyway they shouldn:t have any problem with me leaving early, seeing how I don:t have to show up til 8:15 and I always get there around 8 because of said same ferry.

Then, after the ferry ride, I walk back up The Hill to my apartment. For a total of 3.5k. Woohoo. Next week, I:m gonna try walking to the school too instead of taking the bus. Now that I have a map, I should be able to do it. Even though The Hill on Irabu is much steeper and taller than The Hill on Miyako. It:ll be good exersice, and it:s getting hot, so I:m stinky anyway. We all are.

Later, last night, I went to my weekly bowling. It SUCKED. And I didn:t know how to tell them it was because of my personal and professional life. I just couldn:t get my focus. Ah well. I need to practice this weekend. Even if I have to go by myself. I:m gonna have to.

Today, I:m at my smallest school, Miyahara. With my 3 3rd graders, 5 4th graders, and 4 6th graders. And no, that:s right, I didn:t miss the 5th grade. It just doesn:t exist at this school. With this introductory activity it actually went pretty well. Because they:re so small (the classes) I:m considering breaking from my normal routine and really focusing on writing and reading with them. But I:ll probably just do what I:ve been doing and adapt the curriculum for a smaller class size. Changing up the games as needed. Although, with this small of a class, I really like playing go fish. I hope they don:t get sick of it. Cuz dood, it:s small enough that we CAN.

Also, this marks the 3rd day that I:ve both brought my lunch to school and have not eaten it. Because at each school they always give the teachers too much food and I was told flat out that if I don:t eat, the extra will just sit there. So I might as well. And at that argument I cannot argue. So I:ll be eating my boxed lunch for dinner again tonight. Oh, darn. It means I still have to cook. Because the day that I bank on being told it:s okay is the day that they won:t offer. So I still have to bring my bento.

Today after school, I:m gonna try to see if I can:t get my scooter fixed. I think it:s just out of gas, but I haven:t actually looked into the gas tank so I don:t know. If that:s not it, I:m gonna walk it to the shop down the street from my house. Hopefully they can fix it there. Although I:m really just hoping that I just need gas. I spent a lot of money in the last two weeks. And I:m going to Thailand next Thursday. And then maybe nap. Because I was up early because of stupid Ferry, and I was up late because of bowling and cooking. And I HAVE to do my upper body workout today. At some point . . .

Okay, let's do this thang

2008-04-14T10:49:00.002+09:00

So, Leo came about 2 weeks ago and I dropped of the face of the planet. Happily. We went places, ate food, saw people, and generally enjoyed each other's company. It was good.

He was a little dissapointed that he didn't get to see more people while he was here. Although if you talk to him "a little dissapointed" is putting it mildly. Mostly he was upset by the people who didn't show up. The three or so times I sent out mass emails. Two of those times litterally one person showed up. I'm getting use to this, as that's been the norm for the last few times I've tried to hook up with people, so maybe I've gotten numb to it, but he thought it wasn't very good hospitality. Maybe it's different from where all of them are from. Maybe what you concider hospitality is different in the South (we'll, we all know it is, but still, I guess I never knew HOW different the standards are). For those who did show up, when they did, he really enjoyed their company.

He left on Saturday morning. That Saturday doesn't exist to me. I basically stayed in bed, read a book (City of Ashes, book 2 of Mortal Instruments) cover to cover, played some FFCC, and did NOTHING all day. It was a bad day. Although I did pull myself off my butt enough to do an abbriviated upper body work out. At least I did something at all.

Sunday was better. I actually got out of bed, did some dishes, laundry, and picked up a bunch until I lost my steam and watched tv, read some more, and played video games for the rest of the day. Not actually putting together my lesson for today until about 8pm. Remember, I spent that week I had going to the iinkai making cards and flashcards for my new lessons. But I never really got around to doing an introductory lesson. I had cards for the Goods (morning, afternoon, etc), but I didn't really have a lesson planned out. And I get to putting my bag together at like 8pm last night and remember that I need to teach them how to write their names. So I make a hiragana to English chart with the alphabet upper and lower on the top. I've done my lesson twice now, 5-1 and 5-2 and it didn't go too terribly. Although I've forgotten to introduce myself both times. It's worked out okay. Most of them already know me.

Also on Sunday I walked. I went for my 5k walk. My ankle was heating up by the first k, but didn't "hurt" so I kept going. Worst thing I got was a blister on the ball of my foot. My ankle seems fine today too, so I think I'm gonna stick at this length before slowly adding kilometer by kilometer. I hope I'll be okay in Thailand. I mean, I know I'll be okay, I just hope my ankle doesn't die before we see everything we want to. So far it just got hot and stayed hot. I assume this means it was swelling, but didn't actually hurt so I feel positive. Next phys ther is today after work.

Today has been a bit crazy. Because I'm only teaching a total of 8 days this month, I decided to not buy lunch at 4200yen for 8 days of food, so I have to make and bring my own lunches. And you all know how much I hate that. So yeah, hectic cooking this morning. Packing up. Forgetting my indoor shoes (stupid leo for moving them!). Finding out that my schedule has completely changed so that I only have 20 minutes until my first class and most of that was taken up by a morning meeting, where I was introduced to my new coordinator, who's name I just didn:t catch, then had to sit there not understanding anything like normal, and out of nowhere she askes me to do a self introduction (TERROR). But I made them all laugh by saying, in Japanese "To half of you, nice to meet you." And I kept it really short and sweet and the meeting almost didn't give me time to get my copying done and my first class started about 10 minutes late and only half of it was my fault and it's just been crazy. But all good.

So yeah. I've got another 10 minutes or so until my next class. Then lunch (oh, did I mention I completely forgot to eat breakfast this morning?), then my last class. Yeah, for this month (at least) Heiichi is on the Shimoji schedule of 1st, 2nd, 4th, 5th for classes. Sigh, I like this schedule and I don't all at the same time. I'm gonna be guruguru pa over here. Don't mind me.

Leo got here

2008-04-02T00:34:00.000+09:00

I'm gonna be away from the computer.

I'm just bouncing

2008-03-29T00:53:00.001+09:00

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!

2008-03-28T18:43:00.002+09:00

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!

2008-03-27T17:24:00.001+09:00

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.

2008-03-26T15:28:00.003+09:00

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

2008-03-26T08:46:00.001+09:00

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 . . .

2008-03-25T22:54:00.000+09:00

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.

2008-03-22T13:23:00.001+09:00

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

2008-03-20T12:10:00.002+09:00

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!)

2008-03-19T15:12:00.002+09:00

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

2008-03-18T22:45:00.000+09:00

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

2008-03-18T21:53:00.001+09:00

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

2008-03-18T17:29:00.002+09:00

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

2008-03-16T10:52:00.001+09:00

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

2008-03-16T08:25:00.005+09:00

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

2008-03-15T17:39:00.001+09:00

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.

2008-03-12T17:10:00.002+09:00

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

Dreamed of you and ancient Unnamable gods

2008-03-11T13:39:00.002+09:00

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.

2008-03-10T13:24:00.002+09:00

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

2008-03-08T08:46:00.003+09:00

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.

2008-03-04T13:24:00.003+09:00

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.

2008-03-03T09:24:00.000+09:00

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

2008-03-01T19:06:00.003+09:00

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

2008-03-01T12:59:00.003+09:00

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!

Oh Noes!

2008-02-29T17:02:00.002+09:00

My hot physical therapist is moving back to Tokyo! He was only here for two weeks! My daydreams of bringing back a hot japanese boyfriend go with him! I guess I'll just have to be happy with the boyfriend I have who loves me enough to fly half way around the world just to see me for two weeks. *Sigh*

My ligaments = torn. And yes, that was plural. He says that I've torn two ligaments in my ankle, one on top and one of the side. Because they are still fubared, I cannot do exercise, I have to wear my ankle brace thingy, and I'm not suppose to point my toes (stupid me loving to sleep on my stomach). And I still have physical therapy until "it doesn't hurt anymore."

In other news, Taira Noriko, my supervisor = teh awesome. She went with me on Wednesday to visit Kagamihara, remember? And today she went with me to Sarahama, on a ferry, even though she hates ferries, even though she gets sea sick. She was okay (ish) on the ferry, but actually threw up when we got back to the port in Hirara. She rocks. She is so awesome.

And my new school looks very neat. Although they want me to teach a song to the kids about spring/America on my first day. DOES ANYONE KNOW AN EASY FOR NONNATIVE ENGLISH SPEAKERS SONG ABOUT SPRING OR AMERICA?!?!?!? Need ASAP.

Also, Sarahama gave me papayas. Not the fruit, the vegetable (who knew it existed?) and gave me gross instructions (gross meaning vague) on how to cook it. I'm trying to get people to cook it and try it with me. I don't want to venture it on my own.

On the way back we ran into Kei (who is always at work) who is quitting her job in about a month and just going to bum for a little while (go her) in order to focus on learning English and getting her diving license before trying to get a job (I think) in Hawaii. At the very least she's planning to go to Hawaii in July. Good for her.

I think my plan is to massively clean my house tomorrow and hopefully get as far as I can listening to Stephen King's Salem's Lot. It's freaking me out (pervading my dreams and whatnot) and I need to finish it. And I can't listen to it unless I'm doing something with my body (walking, which is muri right now, cleaning, cutting out lamination, crocheting (which I don't have my needle here), exercising, SOMETHING). So yeah, cleaning needs to happen anyway. I has goal. Maybe I can actually clean enough to feel somewhat comfortable with hosting another dinner party. I've been missing them lately.

Earthquake!

2008-02-28T17:40:00.002+09:00

Another small one. This marks the second that I've felt since coming to Japan.

Earthquake Information (Information about Seismic Intensity at each site)
Issued at 17:40 JST 28 Feb 2008

Occurred at (JST) Latitude
(degree) Longitude
(degree) Depth Magnitude Region Name
17:35 JST 28 Feb 2008 24.9N 125.9E 60km 4.2 NEAR MIYAKOJIMA ISLAND

Seismic Intensity at each station
(* mark: Local Governments' or NIED's station)
Prefecture JMA Seismic Intensity Station Name
OKINAWA 1 MIYAKOJIMASHIGUSUKUBEFUKUKITA
MIYAKOJIMASHIGUSUKUBEFUKUSEI*

No Tsunami threat by this earthquake.

From Fist Fights to New Schools

2008-02-27T15:41:00.004+09:00

I feel a lot better about this day ending than I did in the beginning.

Okay, so I had no lesson planned again for today (subject matter, yes, details, no) so OF COURSE today is another one of those days that my schedule gets flipped and I have no 5th period because I have 1st period. Surprise! But that's fine.

So I get the 6th grade started, they have a rousing game of 4 Corners (their request, I've gotten to the point in the year that after we go over the vocab I ask what game they want to play. They really like that one. This is why with the not planning, they request anyway. No worries. I usually try to make some back ups in case they don't feel like playing anything in particular, but yeah) and then I tell them to get their chairs so that we can play Fruits Basket (thank you, Veronica, for giving me the idea and walking me through the rules. Thank you Seijo's 6th grade for being my guinea pigs and requesting that we play it. They're the ones who really taught me how to play). And they do, and two boys come back and I have NO IDEA what the problem was but one kid decided the only way to fix it was to beat up the other kid. And the teacher just sat there. So I didn't.

Yeah, always fun holding off a kid who's trying to beat the snot out of another kid (the other kid, while not smart in staying in the room, at least didn't want to fight. He'd defend himself, sure (defense being offense) but he didn't actively try to beat the angry kid up). Fun times. Nobody got too hurt. Then the rest of us played Fruits Basket while the principal and angry kid sat in the corner and just let him calm down. He was with his class at lunch. I Don't Understand the Japanese Punishment System. You smoke, you're expelled. Even if it's off school property, after school hours. You try to beat the snot out of a classmate and a teacher has to hold you off of him, you're welcome back into the class after you calm down. The principal apologized to me. The kid didn't. I don't really care about the principal apologizing, I mean it was nice, but it's not like it was his fault. His wasn't the apology that I want.

So yeah, that was my first period. From there we played more Fruits Basket, and with the 3rd grade, Old Maid (because I didn't have enough cards to do it with any of the larger classes), was all in all a good lessons day.

Then, after a not very impressive lunch, I left early to go to the iinkai to meet up with Noriko-san and we went to Kagamihara, one of the 2 new schools I'll be going to starting next Friday. They were so nice. And I mostly understood the conversation! I couldn't answer questions very well, but I understood the main ideas of what they were talking about. Rock! Japanese = improved!

Next week they're having a giant picnic on my first day, so I get to make an introduction, and then we all go and have a picnic. Weeee! So yeah, today ended on a much better note than it started. And I even got off about 30 minutes early so now I have no excuse not to try to organize my paperwork that is in my "office" a bit. Office, of course, meaning in heaps on my living room floor, but who's counting. I think I'll do it to Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, circa 1990. Man, I love those turtles.

2008-02-26T16:26:00.002+09:00

Nothing like old school rock to start your day.

Let me tell you about today's lunch, shall I?

Sweet potato pie. White soup with veggies. Bread with chocolate sauce. An apple slice. The kids made fun at me for eating my "desert" (the apple) before the sweet potato pie. I told them it was as if half of the meal was a desert and I liked the sweet potato pie best so that was my desert. They looked at me funny and then quizzed me on anime I knew. They were impressed with my Dragon Ball Z knowledge. Although I can never say the name right. So, pop quiz! Who won? Cell or Goku? And I said Gohan. Cuz he did, Goku was ded at the time, and I win.

Also, Jeanelle, the Stephanie Plum novel is awesome. Just the right amount of fluff surrounded by so much 90s it hurts my head. Thank you for the recommendation.

The diet continues, but less strictly, so I don't know how well it'll go. My goal is to eat around 400 calories for dinner (I figure around 700 are in that "well balanced meal" called school lunch and I eat around 100 for breakfast). This is hard. I'm currently eating pineapple for dinner along with some sushi (4 pieces). It looks so small, and I get hungry :*(

2008-02-25T21:30:00.002+09:00

Got home and took a 2 hour nap today. Now I'm going to bed at the Normal Time. A little early, in fact. What's up with that?

New schools and book reviews

2008-02-25T15:32:00.003+09:00

So, after lunch on Thursday I'm going to meet up with Taira-san and together we will go visit Sarahama and Kagamihara, my two new schools. I'm just planning to do a variant of my Family/Introduction lesson, although I still need to know which grades I'll be teaching. That should be found out on Thursday, so all good. We'll play a few games, mess around, and hopefully it won't be the horrible horrible dooms.

Also, in being slack, and not having an extra lesson out (I teach 2 weeks, same vocab), I need a third part to both my weather lesson and adjectives lesson. Weather is 3rd and 4th, do you think if I give them 2 weeks they'll be able to put together a report using the computers? I was going to let 5th and 6th do collages from magazines describing adjectives, but that sounds lame to me, if anyone has a way to make it not lame, that would be awesome. By tomorrow would rock even more. What with the I teach this on Wednesday and I need to prepare.

And books, I keep forgetting how good of a writer Ursula Le Guin is, and how much I hate reading her. The Tomb of Atuan (2 of the Earthsea Cycle) is much easter to read than the first book of the series was, or maybe I just feel more invested with the characters. Not as much has happened, literally almost the entire book takes place in one temple compound (labyrinth underneath ^_^V ), but I'm enjoying it a LOT more. I mean, I'm actually getting through it. It took me about 3 weeks to read the first one, and about 3 days to work on this one. I have about 10 or 20 pages left and plan on killing it tonight. Although again with how much I hate reading Ursula Le Guin (she has the same problem that Tolkien does, too much detail, muggs down the reading, makes it slow to a crawl) I'll probably read some other book on my shelf before I continue the series. I still hope to finish the book (its a collection, 4 in one) before I leave japan, and I'm feeling much more optimistic now that I'm actually enjoying the second book much better than the first.

And, my new Amazon order is ready to ship. In just a moment I'm gonna go pay for it and get it on it's merry way. Sqwee!

And, yeah, this video pretty much is what Lucifer would do. I love my little angel kitty so much.

I finally did it

2008-02-25T13:39:00.001+09:00

Today I wore jeans to school. At Heiichi Sho. The one (big) school that I hadn:t previously asked for permission to wear jeans at work. And I was all set up to deliever my priorly memorized speach of how I:m sorry I didn:t realize when most of my others schools let me. And one of the 5th grade teachers was also wearing jeans and nobody said anything. Man. If I had known I*d have been wearing jeans for the past few months! Ah well.

Today I:m leaving work early to head over to the iinkai and hopefully get some information about the two new schools I:m picking up Next Week. I think I:ve mentioned before how not happy I am with this situation, but lets reiterate. 1) I see my old kids even less. 2) I:m starting 3 weeks before the end of the school year, I only have 2 lessons with each class. 3) I*m Starting at the End of the School Year. 4) I have NO idea what they:ve already learned this year and what I will be reviewing or teaching them. 5) I have never met their old teacher. 6) I only have a VAGUE idea of where these schools even are. I know one is on Irabu Island (ferry for me!) and one is off of the gusukubesen. Somewhere. Me = not happy. But ah, well.

Oh, if you go here and clicky the button, then you give food to the hungry. At the top of the page there are tabs for other causes like breast cancer and whatnot. It:s free, and just takes a few seconds.

And lets not forget that if you are bored and wish to improve your vocab skillz, you can go here and play the game for free. And give rice to the hungry. Yay.

Because I wanted to

2008-02-24T16:31:00.002+09:00

Productivty.

2008-02-24T15:46:00.004+09:00

Continuing in the spirit of Go Out and See People, I was suppose to go to Irabu this morning and support the people who walked/ran it. I didn't because the weather was ick and the people I was suppose to go with didn't want to. So, instead, slept in. And when I finally pulled myself out of rather disturbing dreams that didn't GO anywhere (I've been having several of those lately, I think it's just because I'm waiting for my life to continue again) I got up and realized that I couldn't wear pants, due to the fact that I had no clean pants, and seeing how I teach children tomorrow, being pantsless is a bad thing so I did laundry. After a bit (talking to Natalie), I went to breakfast with Kirsty, Amy, and later Sam (who only had coffee). Afterwhich we made marvelous plans to get our hair cut, but when we got there they didn't have room for us until 3 and Amy's friend from Singapore is flying in at 4 so she said she'd just do it later, and Kirsty felt like catching a nap. So I made the appointment and just got home. My hair is . . . the exact same, just about an inch shorter.

I've determined that I really don't care what my hair looks like (color aside). I always put it up. So, so long as it is easy to put up, and long enough to play with on the rare occasions that I feel like playing with it, groovy. This means, I prefer no bangs (for easy of putting up) and no layers (same reason). I prefer it to be longer than the top of my shoulders. And that's basically it when I come to preferences. So, there is no reason that I shouldn't try to grow it 10 inches past my shoulders. Doing so will enable me to donate it to Locks of Love, and still be long enough when I cut it. It's currently 23cm past my shoulders, so I only need another inch or so to make it past the test. Now, my hair grows slow, but I should be able to accomplish this before I come back state side.

Oh, in other news, I finally put away my christmas tree today. I'm not too sure about the rest of Cleaning the Apartment, but at least that giant step has been accomplished :P

When things work out

2008-02-23T20:38:00.000+09:00

So I went to pizza last night thinking "man, I want to SEE PEOPLE this weekend" thinking that I'll be the only person to actually show up again, read my book and go home. Imagine my surprise when I get there and Janine, Stu, Jason, Scott, Kirsty, and Sam have all beaten me there and Amy shows up shortly after. Then we went out :)

Then I get home, talk to Leo for a bit, reply to some posts and emails and crashed around 2 only to be woken up at 8:45 by Jonathan asking if we wanted to go out for breakfast. Which of course I did. After breakfast I drove to the airport, sorted out my tickets for golden week (Thailand and Niigata), then went to the All Shogakko Ekiden (all elementary school relay race) and cheered on my kids whom I love and cannot remember their names.

Then I went towards several places, because I wanted lunch, but I really wanted crepes and ended up going home with nothing only to munch on crap all afternoon before going out with Mike, Stu, and Jason for bowling. I averaged 100, which was my "At least" goal, so yay. I'm going to try to join the league when it comes around in a few weeks (it's 15 buck a week, but I'll get out of the house, see people, and practice my japanese and bowling tech. sounds worth it to me). I just need to get more consistent with my not throwing it in the gutter after a strike or a spare. Or period, but that's how these things go. I bowled very weakly today, mostly because of fubared ankle, some because I was trying to actually perfect my technique, when my technique of the past has been "Ball, please knock over pins." I worked on lining myself up better, not twisting, staying upright. Little things that matter.

Then I went out to tacos for dinner, and didn't find the tacos I was looking for, but found tacos, which was good. (The tortillas aren't tortillas, but it's almost real tacos). Then, walking out of tacos I was thinking, man, I really want something sweet, and look, basken robbins is Right Across the Street. And guess what Basken Robbins has right now. Crepes. Remember that thing I wanted for lunch? I win.

Oh, and I finally uploaded pics from my trip to Ishigaki. Enjoy.

Books, books, books

2008-02-22T19:00:00.000+09:00

From the time I got here in August of 2007 through New Year's, I read 28 books. You can see them here.

From New Year's to today I have read 24 books. You can see them here.

The number on the side is a little higher than the actual number because this list counts books that I have been reading as well, and I didn't finished Diggers in 2007, but it's on that list. I'm also not through with Salem's Lot, Tombs of Atuan, or the Book Thief, but they're on the 2008 list. The Book Thief still depresses me, so I'm going to just Put it Down. I want to read it. I want to finish it. But I cannot read it at home. It's too depressing. So, I'll be double bringing it to work with me for a while yet, I think. And Salem's Lot creeps me out at home, so the same. I listen to it when I can occupy my hands (or body, I listened to it when I was still walking, remember, before The Fall) like making cards for the new unit. It's great while laminating and cutting. Stupid creepy vampires. Personally I like the drop dead gorgeous kind (no pun intended).

I've rated every book I've read (56) except for Thailand because I want to wait until I go to Thailand to see how good it was. Makes sense, don't it?

Mystery Everybody Off Day

2008-02-22T18:06:00.001+09:00

We were let out of school early today. I have no Idea why. I was just told that we wouldn't be having lunch and that everyone was going home, including the iinkai, so to just go home myself. And I was just tickled pink. So yeah, after 4th period, I left.

I went home and talked to Leo for a bit, which was awesome. Found out that
[info]flameswithin
wanted to be my friend (woot and welcome!). Figured out which day I needed to buy my plane ticket to get me from here to Tokyo so that I can go to Thailand (already bought that half of the ticket) and when I need to come back if I'm gonna see Curi after it (yay seeing Niigata again!). And got myself ready to go. After followed The Errands.

1) Eat. This was more difficult that I'd previously thought. Apparently, when my english coordiantor said that "everybody" was off after lunch, she meant "EVERYBODY." All of my usual "OMG I'm out early enough to eat lunch!" places were CLOSED. So skip this step and move to step two.

2) Reserve plane tickets. Got the one to Tokyo reserved no problems. Getting back is more difficult because the only place that JAL flies to from Niigata is Osaka, and Osaka doesn't fly to Miyako, but does to Naha. At so early in the morning I'd need to layover over night. Same with Tokyo. So I can train from Niigata to Tokyo and fly Tokyo to Naha to Miyako. XP Or, I can do what Curi suggested when I talked to her and fly ANA, which I dont' want to do (fequent flyer miles and all, but if it gets me home nicer).

3) Eat. Wafute was open and had a wonderful lunch special with Tempora, maguro sushi don, zaru soba, and their nice little almost asian salad. Tastey.

4) Go to doctor. Doctor was out of the office until 3.

5) Buy a light bulb. I leave the light in the bathroom on at night so that I can see as I stumble my way towards it in the middle of the night. It goes out quicker that way. But I don't bash my toes.

6) Go to doctor. He says that the swelling is normal and should be expected through weeks 5 and 6 after My Fall. When I pointed out that I can't point my toe, he sent me to physical therapy.

Note: I'm in love with my physical therapist.

Deep abiding emotional connections to Leo aside. Yoshioka is cute. Yoshioka speaks a bit of English. Almost the first thing Yoshioka did to me was sit in between my thighs and give me one of the best leg massages I'd ever had. It. Was. The. Awesome.

He says that because I fubared my ligament, yeah, more time, still no exercise. There's swelling deep in my muscle so that's why my ligament is so tight. When the swelling goes down, I should be able to point my toe again. (Good news, as that's "suppose" to happen in the next 2 weeks or so.) And I have to give myself muscle massages along my calf and thigh on the outside. And I'm to see him again next week. Yay.

So yeah, that was what I did with my mystery "EVERYBODY'S off early" afternoon. I got home about the same time I would have if I'd had a normal day. And since, I've been trying to finish Deep Secrets by Diana Wynne Jones (It's really good, but the endings been going on for a while now. About the Multiverse). Yep. I've really got nothing to look forward to this weekend but laundry and trying to get the place a little cleaner. My computer's been lagging this afternoon for some reason, it's typing slower than I am, and I did a disk permissions repair. I think I want to go out tonight, but by the time everyone else is going to want to, I'm going to be extremely tired and that's no fun. *sigh* I'll try to figure out something.

Oh, and I dreamed an awesome story last night, but when I remembered that I'd dreamed an awesome story, on my way home today, I couldn't remember what it was about. No, no wait. 2 sisters were secretly ruling the world from a resteraunt. When you went inside, it was like a maze and you found yourself before you got out. They served duck. Story idea copywrite Kimberly Bundschu Yay! *sqee!* Thank you all for the use of your extra brain space.

Rain

2008-02-20T20:11:00.003+09:00

And you thought a few drops of rain make drivers stupid back home.

I saw my first automobile accident in Miyako today.

It started raining shortly before lunch. It was a heavy rain to make up for the past day and a half of ACTUAL SKY that we've had. I was slightly depressed at the rain, and it slightly depressed back at me.

I left work at the usual time, went the usual way, and was startled when I saw the flashing red lights. (They don't have blue here, I don't think) Half of the road was blocked with a head on collision. It looked very crumply, but I didn't see if anyone was hurt. I was just wondering how it happened. It was on a rather straight part of the gusukubesen, and yeah, the road was wet, but how do you slide into the other side of on coming traffic on a straight bit of the road? *Sigh* ah, well. I'm sure there was some reason for it. And it made me slow down a bit on the rest of my ride home.

Broke down (again) and bought KFC for dinner. They have a tasty chicken pot pie.

In other news, the last episode of Terminator, while not as disappointing as the last episode of Smallville, still was on my disappointed in you list. The second to last episode of Avatar was not on that list. I'm saving the last one, don't know how long I'll hold out.

Aaaaand I just received my latest box from my parent. I have sweet tarts. I is so happeh.

Past moments

2008-02-20T13:48:00.002+09:00

I concidered not posting this. I posted it on my private journal, and feel better, so I think I:ll post it here, just to let you know what I:ve been feeling lately. So you know why I:ve been so cranky on the phone and whatnot.

I have figured out the reason I'm depressed. Being stuck at home for 2 weeks without really seeing anybody who speaks english aside, I'm depressed because I am here. I have signed the paper and made the decision that I do not want to stay here another year, and now I have to stay here another 5 months. That is depressing. I still say that the timing of the JET program is it's biggest weakness.

To make myself not depressed, I have no idea what I'm going to do. I don't really feel like hanging out with the people here. I don't really feel like traveling (don't have the money to do it anyway). I can't change my decision and course of life (I signed a contract, I WILL finish it). I don't feel like writing. I don't feel like drawing. I don't feel like watching tv. I guess I'll continue to eat books, but I have a finite supply of them.

What was that? YOU want to help me not be depressed? But what can you possibly do on the other side of the world, you ask? You can write me about your boring little lives. Tell me the stupid details. Even if you just post them in your own journals. Tell me about your dogs and cats and the stupid little things that I'd be able to see if I was there. Tell me what you watched on tv, what you ate for dinner, what that horrible woman at the office did this week. Please. Help me feel connected. You wouldn't BELIEVE how often I check my email to see if somebody else has replied.

That was a few days ago.

Today I donated 1500 grains of rice to end world hunger. You can too. Builds your vocabulary up while you play.

Doing better, overall. Classes really help with that. The whole not sitting on your butt in the house, you know? And I really liked my classes today. Even if we didn:t do anything special. 3-4 did weather (we played bongo and four corners, same old same old), 5-6 did adjectives (big, little, fast, ect.). 5 went rather well, for them being the hellions I hate, and 6th was early, but went really well. I miss managed time (because they came 1st period, not 5th, and I usually don:t have a class 1st period) so I thought we were done 5 minutes early, and had just finished my 5 minutes left game, so I didn:t know what to do, so I had them turn to their neighbor and janken them and the looser had to describe themselves. *I am heavy* *I am short* *I am fast* ect. I thought it was an excellent use of 5 minutes.

Also, I caught up on Smallville with Justin (we try to watch it together) and while 2 weeks: ago episode was rockin:, this weeks episode was teh lame and makes me sad. I mean, if I wanted to watch The Cell again, I could just watch The Cell again, you know? I:d like to try to get a group of people together to watch Equilibrium and Terminator 3, because not enough people on this island have seen them. T3 (dood, they drive a truck THROUGH a city block) is good for the action, but Equilibrium is just a good movie all around, commenting on the human condition with the obliguatory action sequences. I have a copy of both movies and just have to get off my keester and talk to everybody to see who:d be interested and when said interested parties could attend. If there:s enough people I:d like to go to the german cultural village movie theature, if not, I:m gonna need at least a week to clean my apartment. Being sick is not very good for the cleaning motivation.

Now, I should be going and printing out cards and laminating for next week:s lesson. But the printers are telling me things in Japanese that I don:t understand and I don:t feel like dealing with it. Instead I think I:m going to read and try to make an itenerary for the Thailand trip. That sounds like plan to me.

(PS; I hate how I:m tired. Dead, there are bags under my eyes, I could take a nap right now tired. But as soon as I get home, I:m not tired any more. Usually, shortly after lunch I become not tired any more. And when I try to go to sleep at night, I lay there for about an hour or more, just looking at the ceiling. I:m wondering what:s up with my body clock. This might be why I try to get 9 hours in bed (I think it amounts to somewhere between 6-8, really) and on the weekends I:m dead to the world for 10-12. While I was sick I was getting 10-14 daily. And I didn:t get that horrible *I:ve slept too much* feeling. You know you:re sick when.)

Buying Alcohol in Georgia and Food Banks.

2008-02-19T16:40:00.003+09:00

There is an online petition to repeal the Georgia's blue laws and allow the sale of alcohol on Sunday. You can go here to see and sign the petition.

Personally, you all know how much I'm gung ho for separation of church and state and I think that this will benefit our great state bunches. If you are unsure, read the petition. It states very reasonable reasons for such a bill. Personally, I think it's an issue about letting adults behave like adults and be responsible for their own actions. If people want to drink on Sunday, they're going to, laws for selling alcohol or not. They're just going to stock up ahead of time. Think of Super Bowl Sunday.

Also, if you make a donation to the Atlanta Community Food Bank between February 15th and March 31st will be matched as part of a challenge grant. Rock on.

Aaaaaand done!

2008-02-16T00:20:00.001+09:00

Truly 50. Or 50 and two halves. Good enough. I'm going to bed.

50 Theme Photo Challenge

2008-02-15T19:26:00.002+09:00

So, I'm a member of the Oki JET Photo Club and I signed up for this challenge. There's this list (to be added below) and I have to try to find pictures that fit 50 of the 100 things. And maybe I'm going about it backwards, because I'm just taking a ton of pictures of anything that interests me and then going back and seeing what fits the themes, but I'm no good at trying to keep 100 ideas in my head and I figure that if I'm too busy thinking about Young, then I might miss the perfect opportunity for Test. So, I snap tons of pictures and then think about it later. For the most part, as soon as I went back over the list, I thought of specific pictures to attach and then had to go back and Find the specific pictures. Or I had pictures that I took with Something in mind, and then just had to figure out which theme best described that feeling (like my One pic, I had Lonely in mind). So, you can go to my flickr page and I've created a new set for the Challenge. I reserve the right to pick whatever pictures I want for the themes (and nanny nanny boo boo) as well as change the pics if I find one more appropriete for any particular theme, as it is a personal challenge.

~~1.Introduction~~
~~2.See~~
3.Citrus
4.Young
~~5.Old~~
6.Voodoo
7.Words
8.Advertisement
9.Fantasy
10.Blink
11.Holiday
12.Shape
13.Fun
~~14.Teeth~~
15.Chaos
16.Identity
17.Freedom
18.Play
19.Okinawa
20.Fame
21.Grime
22.Drink
~~23.Rush Hour~~
24.Time
25.Music
26.Patriotism
27.Road
28.Chocolate
29.Wet
30.Smoke
31.Growth
32.Summer
~~33.Winter~~
~~34.Panorama~~
35.Five
36.Sign
37.Empty
38.Structure
39.Curve
40.Small
41.Big
42.Love
43.Light
44.Dark
45.Innocence
46.Drive
47.Memory
48.Insanity
49.Misfortune
50.Smile
51.Silence
52.Fortitude
53.Foreign
54.Sorrow
55.Happiness
~~56.Night~~
57.Expectations
58.Stars
59.Eye
60.Abandoned
61.Dreams
62.Rated
63.Illusion
~~64.Creation~~
65.Sport
66.Waiting
67.Magic
68.Trap
69.Hero
70.Obsession
~~71.Mirror~~
72.Test
73.Heal
74.Spiral
75.Food
~~76.Puzzle~~
~~77.Urban~~
78.Rural
79.Walk
80.4:29PM
81.Comfort
82.Oddity
83.Dangerous
84.Milk
85.Stop
86.Water
~~87.Angles~~
88.Candy
89.Abstract
90.Natural
91.Journey
92.Speed
~~93.Crowd~~
94.Luscious
95.Plastic
96.Retro
~~97.One~~
98.Addict
~~99.Gross~~
~~100.End~~