Wrap Up

Today is my last day here and I'll be heading back to Susono on the shinkansen this evening.

It's been a nice change of scenery, which included lakeside walks and bird sightings.

High Speed

Between us, Brian and I have five computers - one new laptop each, one old laptop each, and a desktop tower hooked up to our TV so that we can run DVDs etc.

Both apartments (and all computers) have fully wireless high-speed connectivity, and are frequently running 24/7. Sometimes I wonder what we did before we became so "one" with our computers and technolife. I suppose I used to read a little more, study Japanese a little more, and get out a little more.

Now I find myself working out of town for a few days, and staying in a small town business hotel with (gasp!) no high-speed access. I luckily have a wireless dial-up card for my laptop - but whatever will I do without my constant fill of high-speed access??

Probably, I will read a little more, study Japanese a little more, and get out a little more! Rather like a vacation:-)

The Long Ride Home

We decided to have an evening off on Friday - no riding, no socializing, no working, no meeting external obligations.

What this resulted in was two very energized people on Saturday! We did a really good, long ride; granted, with gears we probably could have ridden further, but in one gear, we did great! Seriously - when I think back to just a few months ago - Brian was still recovering from his varicose vein surgery, and even a short ride was taxing...now, we just ride and ride and ride until we are begging for gears and our legs can't get us up one more hill...

While investigating one promising trail (uphill!), we saw a snake, a yamakagashi. Here's a photo:


Sorry it's blurry - the low lighting in the forest, combined with the snake being fidgety made a good shot impossible!

It was a really big snake actually; this shot should show some of the length:


This kind of snake is reputed to be dangerously poisonous, but with their fangs situated so far back in their mouths, they are not really a threat (click here to see a photo of Brian holding one last year).

After our "epic ride", Brian managed to conquer a few projects he'd had piling up - like taking the rack off his Pajero. I, meanwhile, spent more time learning about Photoshop Elements 4.0. This is the result of our effort!

Quiet Night In

Who would ever look forward to staying home on a warm summer Friday night? But I've been longing for this evening since about 8 a.m. this morning!

We've been in high demand this week with some kind of party or event every night. My only date tonight, however, is with Thai curry, a nice glass of red wine and an Ian Rankin novel. Ahhhh....

I am cooking the curry now, while Brian glazes lustfully at the Walt Works site, looking for pictures of his "next bike".

All constraints of time have been released, all sense of urgency gone. Time can now be enjoyed the way it was meant to be enjoyed.

The Longest Day of the Year

It is now clearly the midst of summer and the heat and humidity have arrived in style. The weather had been fairly (unseasonably) comfortable until this week, but tsuyu (rainy season) is in full swing now and the traditional summer humidity is here. Yesterday was also June 21st, the summer solstice and the longest day of the year. Days are going to slowly become shorter again, and we plan to make the most of the daylight and summer warmth while we have it. Sweaty bike rides and early mornings will be the theme for this summer!

Riding When You Can

We are several days into the official rainy season. It is the "official" rainy season because it has been announced, and only another announcement from the weather forecasters will signal the end of the official rainy season.

As you can see from the many previous posts that talk about the rain, we have to ride in every narrow window of opportunity that we have. Luckily, the long summer days make this easy - the sky is light by 4:30 am and doesn't get dark again until 7:30 or so. If it isn't pouring rain, we get out. Yesterday, after work and before a little welcome party for a new arrival, we did a ride usually reserved for the weekend - 10km uphill! Such a hard ride meant that we had to stumble to the izakaya on tired legs but it made the beer taste oh-so-sweet!

Eight-Legged Visitor

One of the more interesting things about summer around here is the abundance of interesting insects and other creatures. We usually have frogs sitting on our balcony, stag beatles walking past our front door, and, occasionally, a spider or two trying to get inside.

Early on Saturday morning when Brian was doing something on the back balcony, he caught sight of this not-so-little guy:



Luckily, Brian made sure the eight-legged visitor stayed outside!

A Really Good Ride

We had a great ride yesterday - not much distance, but a lot of altitude. We climbed up about 10 steep kilometers, cutting through some very scenic areas. Brian and I were on our singlespeeds, and Dan (our friend and co-worker) was on his new (geared) Giant. We then did some rolling hills, before coming to one of the trails down. We had decided we wouldn't take this particular route as it was bound to be very muddy and very slippery in some parts. However, once we got to that trail head, instead of passing it by, we changed our minds because, despite all the mud, it is still the most fun and challenging way down. This was new for Dan, but he didn't hesitate to hit the slippery slopes!

When we got back to our apartment, we were covered with mud and our bikes were barely recognizable - what can be better than that?

Lilies and King Kong

Between bouts of rain and bike rides, I managed to get one sharp photo (as opposed to the slightly soft or totally blurry photos) of some lilies (or day lilies?) growing in my neighbor's garden.



In Japanese, this flower is called yuri no hana(lily flower).

Now - I'd really hoped to be able to show you a picture of the wild monkey we spotted on one of our very early morning rides this week. Except, of course, we had left home without the camera (note to self: in future, take own advice). It was still exciting, though, to see such a big, untamed animal sharing our trails!

Lazy Blogger

We've been slacking off - it's no secret. Everyone knows that "good" blogging means blogging daily. "OK" blogging might be every other day. We, on the other hand, have only been blogging a couple of times a week.

The good news is, though we have been saying less, we've actually been DOING more:-)

But I would like to say that we will make a more concerted effort to be good bloggers and post more frequently.

Holidays and Hangovers

Well, weekends aren't exactly holidays, but I liked the alliteration:-)And we were rather hungover yesterday after "a few" beers on Friday night.

Being in a weakened state, we pretty much took it easy all day. I watched a couple of episodes of Cracker - that British TV show that was on the air a few years ago - and Brian worked on computer projects before we ordered a pizza for dinner.

Today the rain kept us homebound - a workout at my local gym (not the one that I was thrown out of!), and playing on the computer.

All in all, not a bad weekend.

Gotta Love Fridays

We made it through another week. Tonight we'll go out for a few drinks with colleagues at a local izakaya. After that, the weekend is a blank slate, just waiting for our creative pens to write the story...

OUT: a review

I mentioned about a month or two ago that I was reading a novel called Out, by Natsuo Kirino.

I finished it long ago, but it lingers in me. Out has assumed a presence, become an entity, to me. There are few other novels that have succeeded in this(The Fountainhead is one, Pride and Prejudice another).

Out has been described by my Japanese friends as "gruesome", "terrible"; and it is both gruesome and terrible. It is a look at life among the working class, debt-ridden, relationship-dead-ended women in a particularly scripted society - and it is about taking one's self back.

A very good read and highly recommended.

Wild Weekend

Well, ok, not so wild really. But very active and fun.

We put the Rigs (our Single Speed mountain bikes) into my Civic on Saturday morning, and drove for about 15 or 20 minutes, to a trail head in Nagaizumi. Though it's just down the road from us, we hadn't known about the trail. Which is also why we didn't know it wasn't ridable! So we hiked instead, and had a great morning (though in the future we will always carry hiking shoes in the car, as hiking in our biking shoes created some legendary blisters!).

Sweeet trail - don't you just lust to get your tires on that dirt?


Today (Sunday), we again drove the bikes in the Civic - this time up to Hakone. We saw a farmer/hunter, with boar pelts drying in front of his house. The owner was a pleasant enough man, and invited us up to see a full-grown wild boar caged behind his house.



We did a bit of riding, too - enough to be tired, but didn't manage to get too far as the hills were 15% grade, and sometimes a little less. Coming down was fun, though!

We stopped for a beer at the Gotemba Kogen Beer Hall, then got home, where Brian collapsed, shirtless, in the sun:

Body Art - or, Tattoos

My first tattoo, for which I will always have a special fondness:


Though bernicky wasn't too far off, kurisu comes through in this guessing game. Living here for so many years, I suppose he had the advantage:-) In Japan, even now, tattoos carry a stigma - they are associated with the yakuza (Japanese Mafia), and the low-life of society. When (as likely happened) someone who'd seen me in the bath/locker room of the prestigious new gym that they were paying for, they were offended/disgusted by my tattoos and complained. It seems that, in the very, very fine print, in kanji, on the back page of pamphlet number four, there was listed a "No Tattoos" rule. And so I was unceremoniously cast out.

On the upside, no one complained about my navel ring!

And kurisu wins...a free tattoo of his choice at Tattouage Artistic in Montreal, the very place that did this fine work a decade and a half ago!