July 8th through 12th A Pleasant Rest in 2016

Friday the 8th passed without any significant developments. The biggest news came out of Kitchen Inoue:
One of the great barriers that I find for weight loss is the reality that eating out is highly caloric and eating in is highly time consuming. It’s very difficult to cook healthy food that tastes good in a timely manner. Well, when I was at Kitchen Inoue, I asked them if, maybe, they would be able to do something like give me smaller portions or just do a healthier version of what they already do. Instead, they’re now going to make me personalized, diet, food. And it’s going to change every night. Just . . . I love Japan. Granted, this is a small mom-and-pop place, and I’m going to be going there every night . . . probably forever, but still. Just . . . I love Japan. And I love Japanese people. Of course, this sort of thing may be able to happen in the US. I never tried. I never lived in a town where that sort of thing would happen.
Saturday morning, I got up nice and early. Well, actually, I woke up at 8ish, which is later than I’ve generally been waking up lately on Saturdays. Then, it was time for Pathfinder. The session went remarkably well. Then, after that, I went off to guitar. The lesson didn’t go very well, but, I’d not practiced at all that week, so it was unsurprising. Then . . . what did I do then? I don’t quite remember. I believe that I went home or something of the sort? Well, that’s fine. The most interesting event was dinner with Masami.
Masami was the strange man that I met several months ago at Waiwai. His sister is the owner’s wife and/or owner and/or co-owner (I’m not sure how this works). We met up for dinner, and I walked there in spite of the rain (drinking). It was so much fun! Turns out that it was the day after his birthday. Also there was a big event at the time. Well, there were two. However, one involved Masami’s mom! It was so nice to meet her! It turns out that she’s from Morioka! I couldn’t believe it! She’s the second person I’ve randomly met from there. Morioka is, by the way, the nearby (ish) town that I’d go to for fun when I was living in Akita. It’s across the border in Iwate. The other random Morioka lady was the Japanese teacher that my half Japanese/half Chinese student (Kelly?) studied with in Chengdu. Dammit. Her name wasn’t Kelly, I’m just still fixated on Kelly Kitagawa from high school. Wish I could remember . . . it’s kind of sad. I’ve forgotten almost every student that I had in China, even the ones that I liked. Well, at least Matt is still awesome.
Anyway, the dinner was fun, and, after that we went to a Snack Bar (Moomin). I was surprised that he brought is daughters! I thought that they’d stay with their cousins at Waiwai or something. Well, it didn’t go that way. I also found out that it was Masami’s birthday. I wanted to pay for the bar for him, but, the girls got sleepy really quickly and he had to take them home early so he insisted on paying (he also insisted on paying for dinner). He’s a great guy. I need to do something fun for him.
When he left, I wanted to go with him, but he encouraged me to stay. Well, I mean, I didn’t want to go with him, but I was going to and I felt that it was right to do so. In the end, I was invited over to another table full of fun old guys and we had a great time.
The main waitress at Moomin is one of my favorites. She’s older than I am, and, shockingly, she looks it. But she’s a consummate professional in leading on old men. I really admire her ability. She tends to be a bit more clever with me than with them because there’s an unspoken understanding that I’m not interested. She’s a great hostess. I like her.
I stumbled home and went to sleep.
I woke up on Sunday remarkably fine. However, the weather was as unpropitious as it could be. Thank goodness for Excedrin. Well, maybe the weather wasn’t that bad. It got that bad, but I don’t remember much of the morning. Specifically, I don’t remember much before I decided to go to Rara for lunch.
I went there, and it was delicious. I had a great talk with the owner. It is always fun to go. Of course, one of the troubles with getting to know everybody at the restaurants you like is that it’s impossible to sit down and just have a read.
After that, I decided that I may as well go to to Baskin Robbins, thinking that I could have a quiet read over ice cream. However, there had been some swim event in Sendai and the Eshin swimmers were there in force, along with their families. It was super cute. So I got waylaid by adorable children and then sat down and had a bit of a read when they were done. It also started pouring while I was in there, and I didn’t have my umbrella. Naturally.
I had vowed to clean a bit on Sunday, but I didn’t. I didn’t really do anything on Sunday, but it felt good. I did relax, and I was also vaguely able to. It’s nice to de-stress a bit. I wish I’d done something, or eaten less, but . . . I felt good. Which was nice. Still wish I’d done stuff, but . . . eh.
Monday the 11th was Eshin. I got to the BOE during exercises, which was later than I’d hoped, but should have been early enough. However, they sent the wrong schedule. I had Friday’s (I think), not Monday’s. By the time we got Monday’s (8:30) class had started. At 8:30. So I had to rush over. In my genius that morning, I’d forgotten to bring my normal footwear, and thus, I was stuck in ill fitting school slippers all day.
The fifth and sixth grade classes were fine, though obviously not as fun as the little ones. At lunch, I paraded around the school and was seriously terrified that I’d be ripped to pieces by the little 1st graders who were yanking on me in every direction screaming. Cannot express how cute it was.
On a random note, I think that I chipped my right fang tooth recently, but how I did it baffles me.
Also, I feel that there was some sweet, wonderful, meaningful thing that I am forgetting to say that happened to me, probably involving a kid.
Eikaiwa went well enough on Monday. There was a Chinese lady there who spoke perfect Japanese. Maybe I can do a little Chinese with her sometime. That’d be fun. Um . . . not much to report. Dinner at Kitchen Inoue was AMAZING. Some kind of cold noodles, salad, small bit of Japanese hamburger steak, and a bit of fajita tasting stir fry with a yummy soup. I also did laundry and about an hour of cleaning. However, I had a bit of an interesting episode last night.
Today (the 12th) at Miyanojo, nothing of interest has happened. I ought to be walking, but I’m not wearing my super skivies, and, frankly, I’ll chafe up again if I try to walk in this humidity. It’s just insanity here. It doesn’t help that it rains for about twenty minutes, then the sun beats down, then it rains again. Shower, rinse, repeat, and all that. I had part of a class with Ebihara (most of it, thankfully) and then a full class with Inori. Lunch with 1-1 wasn’t as fun as normal. I don’t know if it’s summer or stress or tests or what. Probably all of that. I’m fighting the urge to play Civ at work (and I’ve given in twice when the VP was out of the office) but I have nothing to do and I’m trying to not use all o my data, not that it’s working.
Tomorrow is, as far as I know, Riusui, unless they bumped Eshin to Wednesday ‘cause Wednesday I’ve got training for English camp. I seem to remember that the Eshin schedule was Wednesday, but, thus far, nobody’s told me that that is the case. We’ll see.
The big accomplishment today was answering TONS of back e-mails. Some going back 2 years. I’m now down to my last 9. For whatever reason, I’ve felt like answering e-mails.
I’m going to end this entry here. There’s a lot I want to say, and I was full of feels yesterday, but I’ve gone stir crazy, I’m over caffeinated, and I simply can’t focus.
Hopefully the next entry will cover more of this stuff.