Thinking Outside the Box

Most excellent greetings my friends and anonymous readers. The weather has been all over the map lately, but we were blessed with absolutely fabulous weather on Sunday. Project Luck had planned a huge beach party for Sunday and we were worried the weather forecast (cloudy skies and rain) would come true. Maki's friend Kayo was to pick me up WAY early at 7am, at which point I was still sleeping. I was able to get dressed, pack my junk and run the 8 blocks to the pickup spot in just over ten minutes! Not bad for someone who'd only gotten around 3 hours of actual sleep I think. To top it off we ended up being somewhere around 25 minutes early to where we needed to be. Talk about irony! Anyway, the setup they had at Takasu beach was really great. There was a full square of open tents, and they even had a food and beer tent set up! We spent the whole day doing various activities. The first thing I tried was making some bead accessories. My bracelet was a mess, but one of the girls l...

I don't know what the title has to do with my entry, but it is a line from a song in the movie The Lost Boys , which has popped up in conversation several times this week. So, it seemed appropriate. Let's see, where to start. Ah ok how about on Friday? Sitting in my classroom with my two students around 3:30 in the afternoon. Hear a few sirens and whatnot, but figure no big deal right? Head downstairs to the lobby after class to see quite the commotion going on down the street. Apparently the ramen shop three buildings down had itself a wee meltdown. Back home that wouldn't be a big deal, but in Japan it can be a rather alarming thing, since there is basically no such thing as space in between the buildings. It'd take little more than a soft breeze to take the fire over to the next building and before you know it the whole block is gone. Fortunately only the one building was damaged. Saturday was supposed to be a lazy day at home. Sleep in, no plans, sit around and wa...

Hey they can't all be witty... Another party-packed weekend. I seem to be collecting those too recently. Three parties in two days if you want an accurate count. Saturday I woke up WAY earlier than planned (ie: 6:45 AM!). Not having anything planned until about 13 hours later you can imagine my frustration at not being able to go back to sleep after that. The day was rather rainy and dreary but I slogged through the drizzle to achieve my entire list of "to-do". There is something to be said about persistence I guess. Hey I even managed to clean up my apartment a bit. Not that that's really anything to brag about but I digress. I headed down to the pub for the Canada Day party I'd set up with a few other displaced Canucks. Naturally I was the first one there even though I was late. Seems stomach flu, girlfriend implosions and laziness disuaded my three countrymen and -women from attending. That left me to entertain the 12+ Japanese folks that showed up. So, we hun...

I feel fine now, but wow was my weekend tiring! I got up early to hit the closest mall so I could pick up a small birthday cake for my friend Mari. Early for me on a weekend being before 10am. I wasn't able to buy one the weekend before (which was her actual birthday) because I didn't have any money. Don't act shocked, it's a constant of my life over here. Anyway, she dropped by around 11:30 laden with groceries!! She'd said she going to make sushi but she also made niku-jyaga, which a kind of stew with beef, noodles, potatoes, carrots and onions. It's pretty tasty. Of course most of you have probably eaten sushi before, and some of you may even have made it, but I never have. It was a lot of fun and really isn't that hard to do. Once you have the rice cooked (don't forget to add sushi vinegar!) and everything you just lay it out on the nori (seaweed sheet) and roll things up. Like this: After you roll it up, gently of course, just plop it down on the ...

Ever sit around wondering just exactly what you accomplish in a day? Happens to me all the time. My job isn't exactly a difficult one to do, but I enjoy it for the most part. It does leave me with a fair amount of free time though, which can be a blessing or a curse depending on the day. Lately I've been trying to focus a little more on some of the various projects I've started, or want to start. I'm one of those people with too many hobbies, way too many ideas and not enough knowledge, motivation or assistance to get anywhere near all of it accomplished in my lifetime. That doesn't necessarily stop me from working on stuff, it just slows me down a lot . Anyway, what's my point here you say? Well, I've had this story idea for quite a long time. I have lots of story ideas...but they're just that unless you do something with them right? Well, yesterday I was struck by some inspiration. Two of my concepts that had been kind of wallowing in the ethe...

It sure feels like it this week. Mondays are pretty quiet at work, as I'm usually the only person on staff. That means I open and close the school, chat with any visitors or parents that come by (as best I can) and essentially am bored stupid when I'm not actually teaching a class. One of my co-workers stopped by today though, so at least I had someone to go for lunch with. :) On the weekend I had a few people over for dinner, which is always interesting in my tiny little apartment. I made pasta and salad, my friends provided desert and drinks. Everyone seemed to have a good time and enjoyed my cooking, so I guess you can say it was a successful evening. We drank our way through my last birthday present too: a bottle of (what I'm assured was very good quality) Japanese sake. It was pretty good chilled, but probably not for the faint of heart or easily hung-over. Some of you may choose to stick with beer. Sunday was pretty warm outside, if cloudy. I didn't really have an...

I'm about 16 or 17 hours ahead of my "home" time zone, which means that evening games of hockey are mid-morning in my schedule. Problem is, I usually have to leave for work before the friggin' games are over. It's rather annoying listening to a tied game (via internet radio) and having to leave with ten minutes left in the third period. When you get back home it's over and all you can do it check the final score. Admittedly listening on the radio isn't nearly as interesting as watching the games, but hey, you gotta take what you can get. I was happy to come back today to find that Edmonton's own cardiac kids were able to pull out an OT win and send things back for a game six. Way to go boys! Yes, I consider myself a Calgary fan first having lived there for almost a decade...but I grew up in a small town smack in between Calgary and Edmonton. People say you can't cheer for both, but to that I say...well, I can't type that because I'm tryin...