homesick home

Give us this day our daily CARB FEST.

2012-01-29T01:27:00.000-08:00

This time, I added garlic powder and dried basil. I prefer to cook with fresh versions of both, but figured dried forms would give me more even distribution, and I wasn't disappointed.

I also chopped up some pricey dried tomatoes that I got at the Nissin supermarket. I need to find a cheaper source of them, because this recipe was a winner.

I did not intend this to become a BAKING BREAD blog, but bear with me, this is the most exciting thing I've done in a long time. Sad, but true!

Perspective

2012-01-28T20:14:00.000-08:00

Okay, I just deleted the embarrassing post about being upset that someone didn't accept my Facebook friend request.

For one thing, I pasted part of it from an email and I couldn't fix the format, even messing with the html (What's up, Google Chrome? Blogger never used to do that!).

For another thing, I don't want to remember how upset I got, over something so stupid.

There are greater things to be upset about.

For one thing, Little Son is down with the flu, and I have a bad cold and I am in denial about the possibility that it could be the flu, too.

For another thing, last night I was taking the turtle's tank outside to change the water last night, and I accidentally dropped the whole tankful of stinky water in the entranceway, all over our shoes. The plastic tank and turtle are fine, but repeated attempts to get rid of the turtle-stank are so far unsuccessful.

And now I am spending a delightful day coughing, and washing shoes.

Adventures in Gluten

2012-01-26T05:56:00.000-08:00

Here's a photo of my latest bread attempt, taken at my desk at work -- baked last night for a co-worker's birthday today.

I added half a box of chocolate cake mix to the dough, to make chocolate-ly bread. It seemed like a good idea but it didn't quite taste as good as I expected. Next time I might throw in some nuts and/or chocolate chips.

And yes, there will be a "next time," because I still have the other half of the box of cake mix left.

This was only the third loaf of bread I have ever baked, and I am already radically experimenting! Where will this go next?

(Here is the bread left to an actual piece of lava carried down from the summit of Mt. Fuji. Can you spot the difference?)

A Hill of Beans

2012-01-25T06:32:00.000-08:00

This is the tofu shop at the corner of the main intersection of the shopping street in Higashi-Azabu.

It was, according to what I've heard, one of the first buildings put up after the firebombings of World War II destroyed the neighborhood. The father of the current tofu man (Ogawa-san) bought it in 1952. Ogawa-san is in his 70's now, and his mother is still alive, and lives here, too -- she's around 95.

I last bought tofu there on Saturday. There was nothing out of the ordinary. I made small talk about the cold weather with Ogawa-san.

Today, I found out that the Ogawa-san's 68-year old wife died suddenly in her sleep on.....Friday. And the next day, he woke up and made tofu as usual, and made small talk with his customer.

This is so sad. She was too young.

And she was so NICE.

She was a small, cheerful woman, who came to Tokyo as a bride from Niigata. When was the last time I saw her? I've been buying tofu there since 1998. I ate it almost every day when I was pregnant with Little Son -- it was one of my healthier cravings.

Today, only one vegetable shop in the shopping street was open, because the rest of the people had gone to the wake, which was tonight.

"Don't worry," the vegetable lady assured me, "When you bought tofu on Saturday, the dead body wasn't in the house. They took it away on Friday."

It had never occurred to me, to worry about that.

Is it bad luck to buy tofu in a building with a dead body in it or something?

I do wonder how long Ogawa-san will keep making tofu now. Without his wife, he's going to have to care for his 95-year old mother by himself, and running the business might be too much.

Life goes on, but something like this gives me pause, and makes me stop and reflect and mourn for a while, about life and what it amounts to.

Hey, white stuff fell from the sky.

2012-01-24T06:08:00.001-08:00

I need to compose a haiku or something here. But I'm drawing a blank. Sorry!

Roe, Roe and Bread

2012-01-22T04:25:00.000-08:00

ROE I.

Today is the 39th anniversary of Roe vs. Wade, and I was going to do the NARAL "Blog for Choice" thing, but for some reason, I can't get the "Blog for Choice" banner/button thing to work on my blog, and I don't feel like wasting any more time messing with it.

NARAL wants people to answer the question: What will you do to help elect pro-choice candidates in 2012?

The answer, of course, is nothing, because I live outside the U.S. and vote by absentee ballot which probably doesn't even get counted. I am not wealthy enough to contribute anything that would make a difference to any politician, nor am I physically present to host fundraisers or pass out leaflets. I don't even have a car, upon which to affix a bumper sticker.

What I am doing: I am going about my life, being pro-choice, and explaining why to anyone who will listen.

I have never had an abortion, but I know I would, in certain situations. It frankly terrifies me, that all of the Republican presidential candidates want to criminalize a procedure that I believe I would have.

I have friends who are pro-life, and have said to me, "You don't KNOW for sure what you would do -- no one really knows, until they're in the situation. You wouldn't go through with it!" They seem quite sure that I would change my mind at the last minute.

So I say to them, "If you don't know for sure what you would do, and no one really knows, until they're in the situation, how can you be so sure what YOU would do?"

To which they say, "I know in my heart I would NEVER..." and I say, "Well, I know in my heart I WOULD."

And there it is. The personal becoming the political.

ROE II.

The tarako, or cod roe, pictured in the post below this is actually quite delicious.

My mother-in-law makes a huge pot of it every year, but I've never seen her make it because it's always ready when we get there,

This year, she made extra, and told me and Hub to eat a lot of it before Jan. 1.

So we did -- we each had a huge serving of it for lunch one day.

We forgot that my mother-in-law, like so many Kyoto people, doesn't quite mean what she says. There's the old joke that when someone from Kyoto says, "Come on it, stay a while," what they really mean is, "Go away!"

She was appalled that we ate so much of her tarako, and fretted that there wasn't enough for the morning feast on New Year's Day.

I noticed that on Jan. 1, everyone else had some cod roe in a dish at their place -- except me. There wasn't enough to go around, and I guess she figured I'd already had my share? But Hub had eaten just as much as I had, and she had still given him some.

I didn't say anything. I know life isn't fair, and it's even less fair in a household where time is standing still sometime in the early Showa era.

BREAD

Tonight, I decided to finally use what I learned at the breadmaking class, and took the plunge.

The result was nicely crunchy on the outside but a bit gummy on the inside. I will have to tweak the recipe in further attempts, but at least it was edible:

Random Edibles

2012-01-17T05:52:00.000-08:00

I just posted on Facebook the photo of the loaf of bread I posted here a while back -- it was the product of a breadmaking class that Daughter and I took at a local bakery.

(I am horrible at responding to questions in blog comments, even though I read them all -- for the person who asked, it's plain white bread with a little malt, and the cross hatches were done with a knife before baking, for texture.)

This weekend, we're going to try this recipe.

I'll let you all know what happens.

In the meantime, please enjoy this photo of my mother-in-law's boiled cod roe:

Or is it the Loch Ness monster? I think it's looking at me. [shudder]

Is a boring post better than no post at all?

2012-01-16T02:16:00.001-08:00

Okay, I just took the plunge and did the Facebook timeline thing.

I am also going to "like" all of the authors whose books I enjoy on my Kindle this year -- that is one of my boring New Year's resolutions.

And I might start posting photos -- both over there at FB, and over here on the blog -- of what I make for dinner, too.

Do we have excitement?

YES.WE.DO!

Is this weird, or is it just me?

2012-01-15T01:51:00.000-08:00

I got an email from mother of one of Little Son's classmates, inviting him to go to see a movie with some of his friends. A couple of the mothers would be going, too, the email said, though the invitation was clearly just for Little Son, not for both of us. (I showed it to Hub later, to make sure I wasn't missing any nuances.)

Little Son went to the movie, and had a great time.

I asked him which kids went, and he told me -- and said that all their mothers went, too, and went shopping or something together while their kids were in the movie.

ALL their mothers? Not just a few, I asked?

"Yeah," he said, "I was the only kid there without a mother."

This did not seem to bother him.

And I am happy they included him, and he had a great time with his friends. That part is most important.

But I am rationalizing about why they didn't include me.

Hub said I shouldn't think too deeply about it, and he's probably right about that.

Blog? Or Run? No time for both.

2012-01-11T05:54:00.001-08:00

Run.

Sorry!

A new name for this blog?

2012-01-09T01:40:00.000-08:00

Hey, I finally got an iphone!

And I am delighted to report that my surname autocorrects to "Tearoom ire."

Wouldn't that be a great blog name?

I am still figuring out how to turn my new device on and off with my big fat clumsy fingers, and memorizing the finer points of checking my email.

But I understand there are these things out there called "aps." See, look at me, using that Apple jargon like a pro!

Now that I have my own iphone, I can stop tuning out whenever people start talking about the great new aps they've found. Until now, sorry, I just wasn't interested, because I had no reason to be. I would hum a merry little tune in my head and go over my grocery list, until they changed the subject to something more relevant to my life.

But now I can ask my blog readers, do you have any aps you can recommend?

If so, do tell!

Social Media, Shmedia Weedia

2012-01-07T05:07:00.000-08:00

A commenter on my last post asked if I am friends with her on Facebook. But you know what? I had no idea -- Facebook, despite being the least public, most password-protected social media outlet I use, is probably the one I keep track of least, and where I censor what I say most (after bosses at my past employer sent me friend requests).

You will find me there saying the kinds of things I can say in front of my extended family and my bosses.

I accept all friend requests, as I aim to be an INclusive, not EXclusive, Facebooker -- if any blog readers send me a friend request, please send a message saying that you know me from my blog, to save the time of my asking you where I know you from, okay?

And if I don't accept your request, it means there was some inexplicable technical glitch, so please send it again.

Also --- I am still on Twitter, and one of my new year's resolutions is to tweet more.

I tweet under my real name, and it's my professional Twitter account, so I say stuff about markets and the world economy, etc. However, my usual snark does creep in there.

The blog, as long as I keep it up, will remain the key venue at which I bitch/rejoice about life's little agonies/pleasures.

No more RAW delicacies -- I promise!

Now, please enjoy some bread, that I baked myself at a bread-making class:

Too Raw

2012-01-05T04:57:00.000-08:00

One thing I love about Hub is his dry wit and sarcasm, but last night, it reached an inflection point of sorts: I couldn't tell if he was kidding or not.

He was either pretending to be insulted that I disrespected his father's new year's delicacy on Facebook (and in the post below on this blog, though he rarely looks here), or else he was truly insulted.

I honestly couldn't tell.

Nor did I care, which I suppose might be worse?

Sea cucumbers -- also called sea slugs -- are namako in Japanese. Hub's dad gets them every year, so it's a big tradition in their house.

You know how some things are an acquired taste, and you dislike them at first but grow to enjoy them over time? For me, namako was an acquired aversion. Yes, I actually used to eat it every year, mostly to make his dad happy. I wasn't fond of it, but it didn't bother me. Some years I even gave up chewing and let the pieces just slide down my throat.

One year, it occurred to me Hub's dad didn't care a rat's ass (a sea cucumber's anus?) whether I ate them or not. I just said, no thanks -- I think it was the year I was pregnant with Little Son and avoiding raw stuff -- and that was that.

Over time, I came to loathe them, and now just the idea of them makes me want to gag.

Sorry, Hub.

[Insert your own crude joke about swallowing here, as final kicker, okay? Better yet, leave it in the comments!]

Would you eat this?

2012-01-04T02:37:00.000-08:00

I just posted this on Facebook and figured I should duplicate it here, for the benefit of readers who don't go there:

RAW SEA CUCUMBER: Why? So that nothing else you're served in the new year will make you retch as much. Whose bright idea was it to try to eat these things? And who thought of eating them RAW? Does this look like a dish of anuses, or what?

Challenging Passage

2012-01-03T04:09:00.000-08:00

Hey, I'm back from Kyoto! Oh, wait -- I didn't mention that we were going to Kyoto to stay with the in-laws, because it didn't seem like a great idea to tell the whole Internet, "HEY, WE'RE NOT GOING TO BE HOME FOR A FEW DAYS, SO COME AND ROB US!"

Not that we have anything worth stealing, and what are the odds of weirdos and creeps reading this blog?

Heh, I know the answer to THAT, because my merry Christmas troll reminded me that there are still plenty of odd people out there -- and speaking of that I wonder if my troll was the same person who trolled here, and then apologized in the comments for the trolling? They do sound similar, with the emphasis on hating gaijin in Japan and calling them fat -- but realistically, there are probably lots of people who hate gaijin in Japan and think we're all fat, so who knows.

Anyway, the title of this post refers not to any challenges in my current boring life, but is instead meant to be the caption for the photo I finally took of the stairs in my in-laws' very old Kyoto house, which Hub's grandfather built a century ago (give or take a few decades -- no one seems to remember exactly when).

I have enormous feet, which makes these stairs exceptionally challenging.

If these stairs were any steeper, they would be a ladder:

Somehow, that's a fitting photo for my first post of the year: Onward and upward.

Happy new year of the dragon to everyone, and I will post some more photos of Kyoto in the days to come.

Loose Ends

2011-12-26T05:04:00.000-08:00

Sorry, my intended Christmas Eve post was side-tracked by the troll -- who has now gone back and deleted his comments, perhaps realizing that IP addresses can be tracked and he said some pretty embarrassing things? Who knows. Anyway.....

I meant to say that on Dec. 23, I brought Little Son to a Christmas party organized by some of the mothers of kids in his class.

One mother introduced herself to me, and said that her daughter was a new student at the beginning of the school year -- they had just moved from Kumamoto. And she said Little Son was assigned to sit next to her for the first three months. So he was her very first friend, and she really appreciated that.

And this mother wondered if perhaps the teacher hadn't put his seat next to the new girl's on purpose, because she knew my son is so talkative and friendly?

This reminded me of something Hub said. When Hub was a boy, if a student was being teased, the teachers would always make Hub sit next to them, because they knew Hub would be kind to them, and protect them if needed. He was apparently the kind of kid who stood up to bullies.

The other thing I learned at the party was that all of the third-grade kids still believe -- or profess to believe -- in Santa Claus.

You know, I used to believe in Santa myself, except....he didn't bring me the iPhone I wanted.

So sorry -- bah humbug, I'm no longer a believer.

The TROLL Before Christmas!

2011-12-24T00:06:00.000-08:00

Hey, guess who's back, just in time for Christmas Eve?

MY TROLL!

He left some comments on old posts, including this one:

Ame Otoko has left a new comment on your post "No regrets!":

Fatty McGluttinz, I have 'that' photo of you seared in my brain. Well,
not all of it. Just the vageu image of swatches of fat swaddled by
something tight and completely unbefitting.

30 pounds and running won't have made you thin. It's a nice dent, and
all, but you are in no way in hell thin.

I know a similar imbecile who who goes to the park near his house and
does 'kettlebells', then FBs and tweets about it for about five times
as much time as he spent...kettlbelling. He then spends another hour
tweeing and FB'ing about how he's losing weight.

He's not. He's fat. He's nasty. You're not, and you're fat, and you're nasty.

You fats have NO clue about what actual weight loss or a healthy body
weight is. It's all this 'OMG I started excercising!' blather and
bluster.

Fatties are nasty, straight up.

I wonder, why does this person, whoever they are, feel compelled to call anonymous people on the Internet "fat?" And "nasty?"

To set the record straight, I didn't lose 30 pounds in 2011 -- only about 20, right after the earthquake/nuclear crisis, due primarily to stress. I kept the lost weight off because I started running -- not to lose weight, but to help with the stress (which it did). I run most days, and I walk to and from work.

And actually, I do feel a bit sorry for anyone who thinks it's fun to go around the Internet writing mean-spirited comments on old posts. I had a mean response to the comment all written in my head, but I just don't feel like writing it on Christmas Eve.

Peace on earth and goodwill towards men, indeed.

Troll, whoever you are, you are warped, and this fat n' nasty lady is glad you're only leaving obnoxious blog comments, instead of stabbing us fat people in the street.

Keep it up, okay?

Now, I am off to stuff my face with Christmas goodies! Mmmmm, mmmmmm, MMMMMMM!

A Room with a View / A View of a Room

2011-12-16T06:17:00.000-08:00

We interrupt this obsession on contraception for this breaking news:

Our apartment was just featured on a Tokyo decorator blog -- about halfway down the page, past the enormous rooms.

My junk never looked better.

Emergency contraception has stirred up some interesting comments!

2011-12-13T06:09:00.000-08:00

I didn't expect to get such interesting and thoughtful comments about emergency contraception.

I think I need to start calling it that -- emergency contraception -- because I found out that the term "morning after pill" means different things to different people.

In some European countries, I found out that "morning after pill" means mifepristone, or RU486, which causes the lining of the uterus to shed, complete with any teeny weeny babies that have implanted there.

Plan B -- or other brand names Next Choice, or Ella -- contains levonorgestrel, which prevents ovulation. It can also cause the uterine lining to thin, so that if ovulation does occur and an egg is fertilized, the baby can't attach to the uterus, and dies. This would appear to be why religious folks oppose it, even though it's primary use is preventing ovulation and it hasn't been proven reliable in preventing implantation.

Full disclosure: I have taken Plan B before -- quite recently, in fact. I got almost every side effect on the list, and found it rather like being kicked in the stomach. It totally wrecked a weekend for me. But I would take it again if I were in the same situation, because if I were to ever conceive again, I would definitely have an abortion, and I have no desire to go through that radical form of back-up birth control. So bring on the hormones instead, please.

I also did some Googling and found that the age of consent in the U.S. varies from 16 to 18, which was older than I thought -- but there are exceptions in some states for 13- and 14-year olds if they have sex with other youngsters.

(In Connecticut, my home state, even consensual sexual intercourse within the legal-with-other-youngsters time frame might, upon a complaint, lead the Connecticut Superior Court to a "family with service needs" finding. Interesting!)

So yeah, I have to revise my opinion, and say I support emergency contraception being sold over the counter like aspirin. I would like to get it into the hands of women (and girls) who want to take it, with the minimum amount of hassle and fuss.

To the anonymous commenter who said, "I, however, can stop you from drugging up my minor daughter without my knowledge, and if I knew a parent was giving my child any medicines or drugs without my permission, I'd stop them with the business end of my Glock."

Alas, I don't have enough emergency contraception to start my own dispensary, and I've only got enough of the stuff for myself. But I will continue to do all I can, by voting by absentee ballot in U.S. elections for laws and politicians who support providing your (and my) minor daughter with contraception/abortions, and voting against notification laws for the same.

And good luck getting your Glock through Japanese customs.

To the commenter who said,

"This will be the last time I read or comment here. I used to be very interested in the things that were written and respected and admired thoughts and opinions voiced here. Lately not so much. Views on corporal punishment, feeling that "beating" children was acceptable, the violence (videos and hitting one's student and reciprocally, one's teacher!) and now advocating for the morning after pill being used for birth control is simply much, much too far past my own personal morality. Tongue in cheek comments or not, it is not a comfortable place to relax and read anymore."

That one left me scratching my head. Was this blog EVER "a comfortable place to relax and read?"

I can remember writing posts in favor of corporal discipline and against parental notification for minors' abortions way back when I first started blogging. My stances have been nothing but consistent.

And "the morning after pill being used for birth control?"

That's EXACTLY what is is -- and some of us are mighty grateful for it.

Kendo Mama

2011-12-12T04:22:00.000-08:00

Ah, the clack of the bamboo sword!

Since I'm raising my kid in a culture where

teachers apparently get to hit their students,

at least I am giving him grounding in a martial art

so maybe he'll have a chance to hit her back.

Hard.

Two Questions

2011-12-11T06:37:00.001-08:00

I realize it's really lame of me to ask blog readers to answer questions when I have yet to answer the questions posed by readers some weeks back, after I solicited questions. Yeah, my bad. But heck, if you don't like what you read here, you should ask for your money back.

Question one:

Should Plan B be available over the counter with no age restrictions, or if you favor an age restriction, what should it be? [I think it would be reasonable to make it coincide with the legal age of consent to sexual activity, which varies by state.]

Question two, just for women who live in Japan:

Those "etiquette" noise makers in public restrooms, to cover up the sounds of bathroom noises -- do you use them? Why or why not?

Did everyone see it?

2011-12-10T05:59:00.001-08:00

Barack Obama, THIS SUCKS.

2011-12-08T04:17:00.001-08:00

Today is a dark day for reproductive rights in American: The U.S. Department of Health & Human Services decided that non-prescription use of emergency contraceptives containing the drug levonorgestre-- the so-called "morning after pill" -- won't be made available over the counter to girls younger than 17.

THERE IS NO GOOD REASON FOR THIS.

As someone who was sexually active as a teen, and the mother of teens now, I am outraged.

I will make Plan B is available to my 14-year old daughter if she needs it.

I will do my best to make it available to your daughter, too.

Especially Loathsome

2011-12-07T04:19:00.001-08:00

Something that happened at work reminded me of something today.

I don't mention work on this blog anymore, and that's a GOOD thing. I am afraid of jinxing it by saying, I am liking it. Hub says he can't remember the last time he went this long without hearing me complain about my job.

Sure, it ain't perfect -- because life isn't perfect. But the things that bother me count more as pet peeves, and no longer the seethe-worthy traumas of the past.

Today, I was bitching to someone about being excluded -- particularly, about a situation in one of my past jobs, in which I was excluded from certain meetings.

And then.....suddenly, I remembered something else.

I was in second grade.

It was Paula Lynch's birthday. I can use her real name, because there are probably thousands of people with that same name.

Paula's mom was one of those stay-at-home, alpha-mom types, who volunteered for everything at school, and did everything as properly as possible. (My mom was one of those working-outside-the-home-by-choice-not-necessity, in the '70's, when this was considered especially evil. She never volunteered for anything at school, and defiantly did nothing -- but all of that is incidental to this story.)

Paula had a birthday party after school one day.

Most kids took the school bus, but Paula lived near the school. So after school, everyone would be walking to her party.

There were two second-grade classes. Paula's mother, in her perpetual effort to do everything properly, invited all the girls in both classes. Except, for some reason, me.

Why was I left out? Looking back, I now wonder if an invitation was in fact mailed to me, and my mother had misplaced it? Or maybe it was lost in the mail? Who knows, but at the time, all that mattered was that 30 girls were going to a party, and I wasn't.

It was going to be a party where you brought one of your dolls, and made clothes for them. So all the other girls brought dolls to school that day, and talked about what they were going to make, with the sequins and the felt and the feathers that Paula's mom had all ready for them.

At the end of the day, we all lined up to go home, and I was the only girl who lined up to wait for the school bus.

I watched the crowd of girls -- every other girl, in both of the second grade classes -- walking together up the hill, away from the school, getting farther and farther away.

I could have asked Paula, "Why wasn't I invited?" But I was sure the answer would be something like, "Why ever would you expect me to invite YOU?!?" So I didn't.

I figured there must be something really wrong with me. I must be especially loathsome, to be excluded like that. It didn't occur to me then that it might have been a mistake -- I thought I was excluded because I deserved it.

Funny, how nearly 40 years later, I still remember exactly how I felt, watching those girls walk up that hill.

Does anyone else remember....

2011-12-05T13:48:00.001-08:00

...sneaking peeks at their parents' copy of "The Joy of Sex?"

Someone mentioned this book the other day, and it took me back.

My parents' copy was hidden in my father's sock drawer. Oh, WHAT? Doesn't every kid snoop in their parents' stuff? Stop looking at me like that!

One day, the book was gone. Either he suspected I was snooping and found a new hiding place -- but there were few places in our house where I wasn't snooping, so it's more likely he got rid of it.

I wondered why they even had it in the first place. Maybe someone gave it to my dad as a joke? It doesn't seem like something my uptight parents would have read. I mean, I know my parents must have (AHEM!), because they have two biological children, but actually having a book about it.....that's something else.

Anyway....I found it when I was around Daughter's age, and I remember waiting for my parents to go out, and then looking at it while they weren't home -- and listening for their car in the driveway.

I don't remember a whole lot of what I saw, but I do remember that the message I took from it was that sex (something in which I was not yet interested in trying) was supposed to be enjoyable for both partners.

So I guess I can say it had a very positive influence on me.

I ate one of these doughnuts in Seoul, but it didn't make me any happier.

2011-12-03T17:02:00.001-08:00

Heart and Seoul

2011-12-03T07:12:00.001-08:00

I just went to Korea for the very first time. It's amazing I'd never been there before because I've lived in Japan for most of my adult life and it's so close.

First of all, can I just say, Korean Airlines has the BEST food? I was licking the trays. And what kind of airline serves a hot meal on a two-hour flight, in this day and age?

Alas, I went on a business trip, for training, so I didn't have much time for sightseeing or shopping. Like a good mom, I didn't spend any extra time there.

Superficial impression -- it's like a Japan with FEELINGS.

I would walk down the street and hear people laughing, crying, yelling, singing. One middle-aged guy in a business suit got into the elevator with me, said something in Korean I didn't understand, and started singing opera music -- and then giggled, and got off at his floor.

And the food....instead of the mostly bland but very beautifully arranged Japanese stuff to which I'm accustomed, I got served mounds and mounds of spicy, garlicy stuff, and along with various tangy grilled meats. Why doesn't everyone in that country weigh 300 pounds?

It was bizarre to walk down the street and not be able to read any of the signs.

Now I'm "home," in my uptight city, and hoping I can get back to Seoul again someday.

Virtue is Gender-Neutral

2011-11-27T07:11:00.001-08:00

[Some of you might have noticed, I tried to post this on the morning of Thanksgiving, but had trouble with the formatting for some reason and had to leave for work. So I'm trying again.]

Something I read on a fundie Catholic blog just made me cringe.

No, it wasn't about why people shouldn't use contraception, or have abortions, or have sex outside of marriage, or only be allowed to marry someone of the opposite gender. That's what I expect to read on the fundie blogs I troll for fun (though I rarely comment anymore, so I guess I'm not an actual "troll").

It was this:"To a great extent the level of any civilization is the level of its womanhood. When a man loves a woman, he has to become worthy of her. The higher her virtue, the more her character, the more devoted she is to truth, justice and goodness, the more a man has to aspire to be worthy of her. The history of civilization could actually be written in terms of the level of its women."- Bishop Fulton Sheen

So what's wrong with that, you might ask? It encapsulates everything I hate about the fucking Catholic Church.

Replace "womanhood" with "humanity," and I would agree with it, 100%. See?

"To a great extent the level of any civilization is the level of its humanity. When people love each other, they have to become worthy of each other. The higher their virtue, the more their character, the more devoted they are to truth, justice and goodness, the more their partners have to aspire to be worthy of them. The history of civilization could actually be written in terms of the level of its humanity."

This reminds me of a conversation I had last Friday, out drinking in a bar in Roppongi with five middle-aged North American men. When someone noted that "A lady was present," I laughed and said, "I am no lady!"

And we discussed the definition of what a lady is. I did indeed fit the definition of some of the men. I have ovaries and boobs, it's true.

But I don't fit my own definition, which is that a lady is someone who thinks that her gender entitles her to special privileges and special protection.Demanding that woman stay up on their pedestals is the best way to ensure they don't behave in certain ways.

So some of us are fighting the good fight, and raising our daughters (and sons) to believe that virtue and character are gender-neutral.

Setting Himself Up for Disappointment

2011-11-23T05:10:00.001-08:00

Me: "What do you want for Christmas?"

Little Son: "A FLYING SQUIRREL!"

They're baaaaaaaaack.

2011-11-21T03:44:00.001-08:00

The nightmares.

They're back.

Only now, they're stupid.

Remember, how for more than three months after the earthquake, I had dreams every night -- really, EVERY NIGHT! -- about frantically searching for my kids?

Then they went away.

Life is still good. I am liking my new job -- not so new any more, but still has that happy "new job" feel to it. Hub and I laugh a lot and enjoy each other's company. The kids have been a joy lately. I've been really getting into running, and physically feeling really great.

So what's up? The dreams started last week.

This morning, I woke up with a start because I had a dream there was a tarantula on my pillow. I looked around the room for it, before I realized it had only been a dream.

The night before, I woke up seized with anxiety -- "OHMYGOD, MY TAXES AREN'T DONE!" But of course, they were done months ago, and wouldn't be due again for a while.

In another dream, I was trying to catch a dropped wine glass. I missed, it shattered, and I woke up with that awful familiar jolt.

Yeah, it's better than the recurring searching-for-my-kids tape loop, played over and over in my head for weeks. But still, this is no fun.

I can't help worry -- nothing is wrong now, but are these dreams prophetic? Is something ABOUT to be wrong?

I know that is a stupid thought, but I can't make it go away, either.

What's my excuse today?

2011-11-16T04:51:00.001-08:00

The Kindle library book is due in three days, and I have a third of it left to go.

I wish I could say something more thrilling, like "I'm not blogging today because I'm attending an all-night orgy instead," or at the very least, "I'm not blogging today because I'm watching Internet porn and masturbating instead."

Oh god, I couldn't even type that last part without blushing....

But I'm going to leave it up there and check my site meter tomorrow and see how many visitors it brings me from search engines.

Bullet Points: Instead of Blogging

2011-11-15T06:23:00.001-08:00

Running
Bath
Kindle

Yeah...that's about it.

Not Blogging

2011-11-14T05:15:00.001-08:00

Nope, not tonight.

Reading a library book on my Kindle....for free. What a concept!

I'm reading this now, and enjoying it.

(Henceforth, whenever I don't blog, I will try to take a moment to write down what I'm doing instead -- primarily for my own time-tracking benefit, and not because I am under the illusion lots of people are interested.)

Good/Bad

2011-11-13T05:10:00.001-08:00

My nine-year old still believes in Santa Claus.

I don't know whether to be charmed at his sweet innocence... or worried that my kid might be dangerously gullible.

Do the Math

2011-11-10T13:34:00.001-08:00

I will be 46 in a few weeks.

Someone new just started on my team at work. She's 23.

My mother was 23 when I was born.

So....I'm really glad I just ran that 10k race, because it's the only thing that's preventing me from feeling old this week.

Do you ever think you know a person...

2011-11-07T14:28:00.000-08:00

...and then find out you don't really know them at all, that you were completely wrong about them?

That's how I feel right now.

I've been blogging here for six years, and I feel as if some readers are finally realizing the person I truly am.

I'm trying to remember the last time I beat Daughter -- I can't, it was so long ago. She's 14, and the idea of striking her now is ridiculous, because she would hit me back. I punish her in different ways.

I last beat Little Son about a year and a half ago, for stealing the money I had left for our cleaning woman. I caught him red-handed, and delivered open-handed -- what shall I call them? Spanks? Blows? Swats? Then we talked about what he'd done, and why it was so bad, and why had he wanted the money so badly, and maybe there was a way he could chores to earn it instead of resorting to doing something that was very wrong, for so many reasons.

If there had been a hidden camera in our house, it would have shown a woman spanking/beating/hitting a child -- not for seven minutes, and not with a belt. It was over quickly, but it was definitely more than one swat/spank/blow.

People who believe all physical discipline is wrong surely would have considered it abusive. People who believe that only a single spank on the bottom is okay would have considered it abusive. I am not those people. I didn't consider it abuse, and I still don't.

I was also raised by parents who believed in it, particularly my dad. I don't model my parenting after their example, for many reasons, but I pick and choose, and incorporate what I think were the effective aspects of how they raised me. I don't copy everything my father ever did to me in every situation, but overall, I don't consider what he did to be abusive.

This whole thing made me remember a friend I had, in my early 20's. We were talking about how our parents disciplined us as kids, and when I told her my dad hit me, she was appalled, and told me I was a "survivor of abuse." I begged to differ, but she was insistent -- her definition was that all physical discipline is abuse. Her label made me uncomfortable, but it made me realize that there was no subjective definition of abuse.

I began writing this blog mostly as a way to keep in touch with friends in Japan, after we moved to San Francisco. I continued it because I enjoy it, and it's now a way for me to keep in touch with friends in San Francisco now that we've moved back to Japan.

It's also been fun to meet people on the Internet, and share their lives a little, and let them share a little of mine. It's unfortunate, then, when I reveal some of my true colors, and some of the people who don't know me in real life are disappointed.

But I am not writing here for the approval of strangers, and I can't imagine writing anything but the truth.

So consider this a disclaimer: The person you know as "L." might not live up to your image of her, in every way.

You can keep reading if you want, but if you decide you don't want to, then I have nothing to say -- except, bye.

More on BEATING MY KIDS

2011-11-05T21:54:00.000-07:00

I have posted here in the past about actually beating my kids, and this didn't seem to raise anyone hackles -- but when I said I showed a video of that judge beating his daughter to my kids, NOW lots and lots people are getting upset?

To any commenters who stop reading my blog because I beat my kids: Bye!

To the MANY commenters who say they'll stop reading my blog because I showed my kids a video of someone else beating their kid: WHY was showing them that video somehow worse than me actually beating them?

I don't get it, but...

Bye to you, too!

Before, During and After

2011-11-05T20:55:00.000-07:00

Below is me ACTUALLY FINISHING the 10K race.
I would tell you what my time was, but it was really pathetic -- and I was satisfied with it, which is even more pathetic.

I forgot to pack my breakfast so I ran on an empty stomach, which in retrospect was quite stupid.

But I still managed to finish ahead of dozens of people who were elderly, or very overweight, or complaining of being hungover, or walking -- as well as the woman dressed as a bowling pin.

Trying again.

2011-11-05T01:04:00.000-07:00

Hub asked me to take down the post below this, mostly because I mentioned him, and he hates it when I mention him on this blog.

I was about the video posted on YouTube of the judge in Texas beating his 16-year old with a belt.

Okay, it did bother me that the dad seemed kind of into it, in a creepy (perhaps even sexually suggestive) way -- and his gratuitous use of profanity also bothered even me (who uses "fuck" as an expletive and adjective all the time -- though almost never as a verb). It bothered me that the girl was at an age when I would think words/actions would be more effective discipline methods than a beating. And yeah, some of his words did make me cringe.

But I will say this: I didn't particularly flinch that he was beating her. The actual beating part? That didn't bother me, because I am not against corporal punishment.

I have never used a belt, but I have certainly beaten my kids with my hand, when they were younger. Some people might call this "spanking," but I will call a spade a spade. I use the words "spanking" and "beating" interchangeably, and to me, they are one and the same thing.

I am not revealing any new secrets here. I have blogged -- on this very blog! -- about beating my kids before.

Long-time readers will remember: I once had mothers in a public park in Los Angeles threaten to call CPS on me when I beat Big Son when he was a baby, and it happened again when I beat Little Son on a public street in San Francisco, too.

Last night, I showed the judge/daughter video to my kids (after watching it myself first) and Little Son was upset by it and cried. I didn't think he would be that upset -- maybe I shouldn't have showed it to him? I am willing to admit that maybe I shouldn't have. I acknowledge that it made him far more upset than I thought it would, which was greatly surprising to me. He is more sensitive than I realized.

Coincidentally, I had just watched the video myself when Little Son refused to turn off the TV, so I showed him the video and said, this is what happens to kids who don't listen. Awright, so maybe I wouldn't have beaten him for seven minutes with a belt, but you know what? Depending on the circumstances, I would not be above whacking a nine-year old who talks back and refuses to do something I tell him to do (and, fortunately, he usually does as he's told, because unlike the judge, I really don't enjoy doing the beating thing).

On the whole, depriving Little Son of his Nintendo DS and/or TV is a more effective threat than a beating, at his age. And yelling, of course. Don't forget yelling!

And those of you who noted the irony, of me approving of corporal punishment and yet getting upset that Little Son's teacher slapped him, I never told the end of that story, did I?

On the sidelines of kendo practice, I mentioned the incident to one of the third-grade "alpha moms," who assured me that the teacher was a great teacher, and said surely my son must have done something to deserve the slap, and I had best forget about it, and not make a big deal about it. Okay.....right. So that's what I did.

So those of you who think that all of this makes me a bad parent, and want to un-friend me on Facebook for this, go right ahead.

I noticed that a handful of you already have.

For the first time EVER...

2011-11-04T17:04:00.000-07:00

Hub has asked me to delete one of my blog posts.

Sorry!

Questions?

2011-10-30T06:43:00.000-07:00

I think I'm losing my ability to express myself on a blog.

Or maybe it's because I do lots of write-throughs of a stock market report every day and I don't even realize how much energy it's taking out of me?

Anyway, does anyone out there have any questions they'd like me to answer? I've seen other bloggers do this, to get blog fodder.

Leave them in the comments, and I'll try -- but I'm not making any promises. These days, generally speaking, all I seem to want to do is eat good food, drink beer, go running, and read my Kindle in the bath tub -- not necessarily in that order.

Engrish

2011-10-26T05:27:00.000-07:00

Sorry, I posted this photo on Facebook last night and meant to put it here, too, but spaced out and went to sleep.

This is toilet paper I bought yesterday.

I'm a bit afraid to use it.

Too Much Information, and Too Much Cranberry Juice

2011-10-22T23:04:00.000-07:00

Sorry I didn't blog all week -- I was quite under the weather.

I didn't get sick enough to miss work, just to feel rotten, and totally screw up my running and training ahead of the 10K race I signed up to run in only (gulp!) two weeks.

I didn't go to a doctor, but I am sure I had a bladder infection. I know that a few guys read this blog, so I will skip the gory details, but many of you female readers know exactly what I'm talking about here.

Female readers also know the magical way to sometimes get rid of a bladder infection without antibiotics: cranberry juice. This has always worked for me.

But I have never had it happen to me in Japan before, where I have to go to the pricey supermarket that specializes in imported goods to pay a fortune for the same gallon of Kirkland cranberry juice that I could get in the U.S. at Cosco for less than the GDP of a small country. I think I must have spent close to 10,000 yen on juice this week.

I am covering the stock market at work now. This means I am supposed to be watching the market, when it's open. I am sure my (all male) co-workers were a bit irritated, when I kept saying, "Would-you-keep-an-eye-on-the-market-for-a-minute-I-promise-I'll-be-right-back" and left my desk again and again. They also might have wondered what the strange red liquid was, that I was slurping from a thermos, and spilling on my clothing.

Score one for cranberry juice -- I am all better now.

But I didn't go running all week because it really hurt too much. In retrospect, I was probably foolish not to seek real medical attention.

Thanks to the combination of not running, and chugging sweetened juice....I gained two kilograms. Ha!

So next time, I think I'll skip the juice, and just go straight to the doctor and get the pills.

Perspective, Perspective, Perspective

2011-10-15T23:55:00.000-07:00

I'm trying to keep THE SLAP INCIDENT in perspective.

If Little Son hadn't thought to mention it to me (and he did so quite offhandedly), he might not have remembered it at all. But now, surely, he will remember it as an INCIDENT that generated much heated discussion in his household, and much difference of opinion.

Little Son himself is of the opinion that he "deserved" the slap.

"I talked back," he said.

He didn't really "not understand" the math, apparently. Otherwise, why did he then sit down in his seat, and finish the assignment? It was probably a little challenging, and he decided to see if he could get away with not doing it -- pushing limits, testing boundaries, the way he goes through life.

Plus, I am pretty sure he WHINED, in his particularly obnoxious way. And when he whines like that.....oh, do I ever feel like slapping him myself!

But you see, I don't slap him -- even though he's my kid, and it's perfectly legal, and even though I am not a "zero-tolerance" person when it comes to corporal discipline. Longtime readers, remember this old post?

I believe corporal discipline has its place -- and that its place isn't the classroom.

Hub disagrees, and thinks it's fine. If the teacher is regularly losing control and presents a clear danger, that's another story, he says, but a light slap from a strict teacher is part of the culture from which he proudly emerged, and it's the culture in which he feels strongly about socializing his kids.

I can't just sit back and do nothing here. I am going to say something to the teacher, at some point -- perhaps at our next parent conference, or maybe I can pull her aside at the next open classroom day.

I want her to know, I don't think it's okay, and it's not done in my culture -- so if she has a problem with my kid (and yes, she has problems with him, I'm sure), I want her to discipline him in ways that don't involve getting physical with him.

And I will talk about it with the other moms, too. Unfortunately, there was no soccer this week, so I didn't get to see anyone of them on the sidelines, but sooner or later, I will run across them.

Little Son has this teacher for give more months, but will get a new one from April -- this is the second school year in a row he's had the same teacher, and I don't think they ever have the same one three years in a row.

I'm not going to do anything to make this worse, and I'm going to hope it was an isolated incident.

I happened to mention it to an older man at church this morning, hanging out before mass. He was in Tokyo visiting his grandkids, and was commenting on what a wonderful, safe city it is, and how great it must be to raise kids here.

I said it's not all perfect, and I told him about the slapping incident -- and his eyes lit up.

"Oh, there are some kids at [ritzy international school] where my grandkids go, who could use a good slap like that! The nuns at my school used to do that do us, too, whenever we got out of line. In my day, they raised us RIGHT," he said, with great feeling.

He and Hub are clearly on the same wavelength there.

Corporal Punishment in Tokyo Schools?

2011-10-14T04:37:00.000-07:00

So I asked Little Son how school was today, and he cheerfully answered, told me what he had for lunch, whom he played with at recess, what which friend said to which friend, etc.

And then he said, "...and the teacher slapped me! And I cried! But then she was nice again!"

...and continued talking about his friends.

I pressed him about the key piece of information. He hadn't done his homework -- his math -- because he said he hadn't understood it.

He didn't tell us at home that he didn't understand it, and ask us to help him, which we surely would have. He simply didn't do it.

The teacher made him stay after school. He cried and said he didn't understand, and the teacher slapped him, and made him stand in the corner.

Then...he did the homework, and she let him go.

There were no witnesses to this. It is his word against the teacher's.

He begged me not to tell Hub, and not to call the teacher.

"She didn't hit me hard! It's okay, teachers do this, Mama! It's Japan, not America!" he said.

Of course I told Hub, the minute he walked in the door, and he is, at this very moment, ripping Little Son apart for not doing his homework, and for whining to the teacher about it, and being so obnoxious that she had to slap him.

Hub is telling him that he needs to write a letter of apology to the teacher.

It isn't acceptable that Little Son didn't do his homework. And if he whined about not being able to do it, and insisted he couldn't -- that isn't right, either.

But this slapping thing...I don't think I can let this go.

Hub is telling me that if I complain to the teacher, that would make me a "Monster Parent."

Hub was regularly hit by teachers, growing up. He thinks it's perfectly normal, and he is mortified at the idea that I want to call the teacher about this, and he is imploring me not to.

Little Son, too, is mortified, and is begging me not to call the teacher, and no doubt regretting he told me about it.

So I think what I'll do is.........I'll talk about this with the other friendly Japanese moms first, and see what they think.

They all grew up here, too, they all have Japanese husbands, they all know my son, and they all know this teacher.

They will have advice, and I want to hear it, before I do anything.

The MAN COLD

2011-10-13T04:37:00.000-07:00

Hub and I have a cold.

But his is much worse -- his is a MAN COLD.

I went to work today, coughing and wiping my nose.

Hub stayed home. Because, you know, his cold just might have killed him.

I came home, and I was in no mood to cook dinner for someone who had spent all day napping on the couch. Fortunately, he had already made rice and one side dish, so all I had to do was throw together an easy main dish.

He went to bed -- it's 8:30. He left all the dirty dishes in the sink.

Guess who is going to bed now, too, without washing them.

One of those days....

2011-10-12T07:50:00.000-07:00

You know, when an "I-HATE-JAPAN" moment just kind of bleeds into the whole day?

And so I have to remind myself, there are much worse places to be, and this is where I need to be right now -- and for the next few years at least, until the kids are older.

I like my friends and my new job -- and in fact I DO like lots of things about my life. The short term is bearable. Pleasant, even!

But I can't lose sight of the long term.

Win-Win-Win

2011-10-11T06:31:00.000-07:00

Why didn't I make a point of watching soccer games with Hub until now? What took me so long?

Sure, I watched the 2002 World Cup -- who didn't? But after that, Hub's game-watching was a solitary activity. This year, I decided it was time to change that.

Tonight, Hub got home and told Little Son that he couldn't watch his English videos tonight, because "Mama and Papa have a GAME to watch."

That was touching, and showed that Hub is already counting on me watching together with him. This tells me he appreciates my company -- which is the whole point.

And it's not exactly a chore. The games are pleasant and fun to watch -- particularly, as happened tonight, when Japan wins.

Added bonus: Hot. Hot! HOT! Guys! with AMAZING! Soccer! Legs!

(sigh)

That is also the point.

Heartless

2011-10-10T03:00:00.000-07:00

The spaghetti restaurant is finally gone.

I don't think I ever wrote about it, did I? When I moved back to Tokyo in the summer of 2009, it was a cafe/pastry shop, run by a sad-looking older man, who hardly ever had customers.

It was on a back street in my neighborhood, one I had to walk down several times a week to do some of my grocery shopping and pick up Little Son. It wasn't a particularly well-traveled, desirable location, and I thought, this poor pastry shop is probably doomed.

I was trying really hard to save money then, so there was no question that I was going to buy expensive cafe pastries -- not even take-out ones for the kids. And I made my own coffee, instead of drinking expensive cafe coffee. I never went in, not even once, and soon, the man was gone, and the storefront was empty.

Then the spaghetti restaurant opened, run by an even older, even sadder-looking man -- and he never had even a single customer, at least not whenever I walked past with Little Son.

To make matters worse, he would stand in the doorway, and call to me across the street, "Good evening! How about some delicious spaghetti, for you and your fine boy?"

"Sorry, not tonight," I would say with a smile, and I would vow to myself to start taking the long way home, and avoid these sad encounters.

His spaghetti may indeed have been delicious, but I would never find out. It cost 1,200 a plate -- not cheap at all, especially for something that we eat often at home. I don't care if his sauce was uniquely exquisite, made with truffles he gathered by hand himself, and sprinkled with gold dust -- that was just too much to charge, for a plate of spaghetti.

Of course, I was afraid to eat there. I was afraid of getting sucked into feeling sorry for the poor old man, and his doomed restaurant. I could see this happening.

I imagined he was a widower, and his kids were all gone -- maybe even dead. Opening a restaurant was his dream, and he had sunken all that he had left in the world into it.

I knew that if I ever went in there, and heard his story, and if it was even a fraction as sad as the one I had made up for him, then I wouldn't be able to stop myself from going back. So why even start? I forced myself to stay away. Because I'm heartless that way.

I couldn't afford to support every struggling establishment in my neighborhood. I'm embarrassed to admit how many of them I already feel obligated to support.

And now, finally, the man is gone, and there's a new Brazilian restaurant there.

I haven't seen any customers in it, either, but at least the older woman who runs it doesn't stand in the doorway and talk to me as I walk by.

So...

2011-10-06T07:01:00.000-07:00

I'm sad, but....

...I want an iPhone even MORE now.

No regrets!

2011-10-03T05:01:00.000-07:00

I was reading Cecily, one of the famous bloggers I still read, and she listed her five best decisions.

I haven't done a blog meme in ages -- I just lost interest in them -- but this one is different. The answers just popped into my head.

1) Marrying Hub! Who knows if we'll stay married, or if his next overseas transfer will be the beginning of the end? But at least I'll have 20 years of mostly pretty wonderful married life to look back on.

2) Having kids! I always say, I never wanted kids, and I never regretted changing my mind on that.

3) NOT going to law school! I realized I was thinking about doing this primarily to make my parents happy. Who knows, I might have made a decent lawyer, or I might have been able to use a law degree for some other interesting job, but I think going to journalism school instead was actually a good move for me, even if it brought me down permanently in my mother's esteem.

4) Changing jobs this summer! I didn't realize how unhappy I was at my last job until I started my new one.

5) Running again!

My five WORST decisions? Sorry, I'm not going there -- they mostly involve alcohol, sex and baaaaaaaaad haircuts.

Why does the "Occupy Wall Street" protest ANNOY me so much?

2011-10-02T14:35:00.000-07:00

For one thing, I am not entirely sure WHAT the hell they're protesting.

But most of all, I wish I could tell all the protesters to put their time and energy into doing things that actually CHANGE the world (organizing boycotts against the worst corporate offenders! working for politicians who support some of their specific causes! volunteering in their communities!) instead of just listing problems, and blocking traffic, and wasting every one's time.

Time: It's not unlimited, and you'll never get it back.

When will I ever learn, and stop letting them do this to me, again and again?

2011-09-29T09:16:00.000-07:00

The Red Sox....

Two Things

2011-09-28T05:34:00.000-07:00

i.

The first thing is a continuation of unfortunate Japanese company names in the post below.

A commenter brought up BALS Co., a company that sells furniture and interior stuff.

This month, BALS approved a tender offer to go private.

I heard about this at work, so I did a Google search to see if I could find the press release. I searched "tender bals."

....and of course Google asked me, "Did you mean: tender balls?" and showed me the search results for "tender balls."

Was I interested in testicular pain? Infected varicocoele, perhaps?

Noooooo, Goooooooogle, noooooooooo, I did NOT mean "tender balls," but....thanks for trying.

ii.

The second thing is a request.

I have a friend who is going to quit their job on Thursday morning. Please send this friend good thoughts, because it's going to be a tough conversation. As I know well, sometimes quitting a job can be just as fraught as breaking up with a longterm partner.

In fact, I told this friend, just remember the last time you broke up with someone, how did you do it? Whatever you did, just do it again.

And this friend said, the last person they were seriously involved with, when it was over, they just....didn't talk for a long time, and then they went their separate ways.

So based on that, maybe this person can just stop showing up for work? And sooner or later, their company will clue in to the fact that they're not coming back, and the paychecks will just stop one day?

That works, right?

Just checking in, to let you know I'm still here.

2011-09-27T08:08:00.000-07:00

...blog? What about a blog? Oooooooh, right -- I have one!

Yeah, sorry -- but since I got the Kindle, all I want to do is read, not write.

I just posted this on Facebook:
Need a laugh? This is the real name of a real listed company.

I giggle whenever I see that.

There's also a big used book chain in Japan called "Book Off."

Hub goes there frequently.

I remember the first time he said to me, "I'm going to Book Off!"

I was like, um...wha...?

Okay, back to the Kindle now. Book on!

And on the SUNNY side...

2011-09-25T03:14:00.000-07:00

....I just figured out how to download library books into my new Kindle! (Legally -- I still have a valid library card.)

It's like a whole new world just opened before me.

So hey, if Hub does end up going alone on his next overseas posting, at least I will have access to good books, to help fill those empty evenings.

Distant Storm Clouds

2011-09-25T01:55:00.000-07:00

I am enjoying life as it comes. Who knows how long this happy spell can last?

Hub was telling me that there's going to be an opening in Los Angeles soon, and they might ask him to go.

There is no way in hell I am going with him.

I mean, it's really, REALLY hard to imagine circumstances in which I would go. A family medical emergency, or some other dire reason for which we would want to keep the family together? Or if I am laid off from my new job -- unlikely, I think, but always possible? Maybe.

But....quitting my new job, and following him overseas again?

Not. Going. To. Happen.

I know from his past two overseas transfers.....there are going to be those people around me who say, "If you REALLY loved him, you would follow him ANYWHERE, ANYTIME."

And I will say back to them, "If he really loved ME, he wouldn't keep expecting me to do this -- uprooting our lives, according to the whim of his organization's personnel department."

I know there's no use arguing about it now -- it hasn't happened yet.

Who knows, they might keep him in Tokyo a while longer, or they might transfer him to another part of Japan for a while. That would be okay, since he could return on weekends. My fingers are crossed, for that.

I admit, though, when he said to me, "There's going to be an opening in LA very soon...." -- my first gut reaction was ANGER.

Which I swallowed, like vomit, before it could surface and ruin our nice weekend afternoon.

Sturm und drang

2011-09-21T08:37:00.000-07:00

My umbrella got fatally mangled by the wind today, and one of my work colleagues looked at it and quipped, "OPERATION TWIST!"
(Um...maybe you had to be there...?)

While I was walking to pick up Little Son at his afterschool program, the wind blew a metal gate right off its hinges, and it almost hit me.

But now, I can hear crickets chirping outside.

Typhoon over, maybe? Or more to come?

On days like today, I wish we had a car...

Discretionary Spending Update

2011-09-18T23:53:00.000-07:00

I am earning yen now.

My new salary is by no means extravagent, but my former dollar salary (with no forex protection) meant that we ate lots of expired food. For the first time in three years, I can think about spending money on myself, without being overcome by pangs of guilt.

Question -- all you serious book readers out there, please weigh in:

KINDLE? Yes or no? Why or why not?

And while I'm talking about spending my money on unnecessary goods and services, here's an update:

HIGHLIGHTS -- yes, I got them. It's only a subtle difference, but I can tell, and I'm happy.

I was going to go to a place recommended to me by a co-worker whose hair I admired, but instead I went to the cheap salon in my neighborhood, where I used to get my hair cut until I discovered an even cheaper barber shop, complete with dust and porn.

Of course, I can't admit to a former hair cutter that I am now going to a different shop, so I lied and said Hub has been trimming my hair for me. (I am a HORRIBLE liar, so this is perhaps not a great idea -- so rarely does an untruth pass my lips that my palms start sweating and my heart starts pounding, and I think that surely they can tell from my reaction that I'm lying about cheating with another hair place -- and someday, like a scene from Edgar Allan Poe's "The Tell-Tale Heart," I will just blurt out the truth, and start babbling about barber shops and porn.)

Anyway, the cheap salon did passably decent highlights. I do not look like a zebra, which is always nice.

PEDICURE -- I keep starting at my feet and smiling. I am truly a simple-minded, easy-to-please person. (Downside: I am just as easily perturbed.)

OTHER GROOMING -- I've never gotten my legs -- or any other body parts -- waxed in Tokyo. I tried getting my legs waxed a few times in SF, and I liked the results, but it seemed silly to pay a lot of money for something I could do myself with a cheap razor.

As for the other parts, why would I pay good money to groom places that don't even show? I have blogged about this before. But then I read this, and now I think I'm beginning to understand why some people pay to get their body hair removed.

I'm not sure I'm ready to join those people. And if I do, I am surely too uptight to publicly (pubicly?) blog about doing it -- however, I am NOT too uptight to publicly muse about spending good money on it. Because, you know, I'm weird that way.

Also, um...I am hoping that ladies (or lads) who do pay for waxing in Tokyo have some recommendations? If so, please let me know.

IPHONE -- I've had a Blackberry for a while. The device is my own -- Cow Bones was subsidizing some of my usage, after I conclusively demonstrated that I used it for newsgathering purposes, but I was paying for most of it myself. Of course, the camera broke right after the warranty ran out.

And now my new company has given me a brand-new one, so I am carrying around two, one of which is older and no longer in optimal condition.

So I can rationalize finally getting an iPhone, which I have coveted for years. I am waiting for the iPhone 5 to be available in Japan. Who knows, maybe I could get a great deal on an iPhone 4 then?

Any readers of this blog in Tokyo have any iPhone advice?

I'm also hiring an ENGLISH TUTOR for reading/writing tutor for Little Son -- more on that once the lessons start, but I have found someone that I hope will work out (fingers crossed).

I am succeeding in maintaining his English at a first-grade level, but if we were back in the U.S., he would be in fourth grade. So obviously, I need to bring in the hired guns.

And hey, if I am paying extra for people to sand the dead skin off my feet and put highlights in my hair (and even pondering paying for other exfoliation), then I can easily rationalize paying an experienced professional to spend an hour teaching my kid English once a week.

Oh, one more discretionary item: I just bought an expensive bag of organic, Fair Trade COFFEE from East Timor at church. Why not pay a little extra to support a good cause, as I satisfy my morning addiction?

I haven't tried it yet, though. If it tastes like dirt, I am going to go right back to my politically incorrect, non-organic coffee.

Everything has a price, right?

Lowlife and Highlights

2011-09-16T20:59:00.000-07:00

[UPDATE: Yes, of course I mean hair "DYEING" below, not "dying," but I'm going to leave it like that, because I'm morbid that way.]

Little Son had Saturday classes today, and it was also one of the "open school" days, when parents can come in and watch the classes.

Hub had some other plans in the late morning, so he went in first to watch the first class, and the idea was that I would go later and we would do the tag-team switcheroo, and I would watch the next class.

So I walked over to the school, about an hour after classes had started. By mistake I went to the wrong gate, because I'm used to going to the gym to watch Little Son's kendo practice. Maybe the fact that I did a double take and suddenly turned around to open the correct gate explains what happened next.

THE SCHOOL SECURITY GUARD STOPPED ME.

He came and stood and front of me.

"I'm here to watch my kid's class," I said, trying to get around him.

"Do you have a PTA badge?" he asked.

Of course I didn't. Hub, who was already in the school, had ours.

Granted, I'm not a super-involved parent who's at the school all the time, but I go there often enough for parents' meetings, kendo and these open school things. This guard has been there for a while -- he should have recognized me.

Did I really look like a suspicious lowlife?

Today I'm wearing comfy, loose-fitting black pants (trousers, that is, for you U.K. readers -- though I admit I'm wearing black "pants" underneath them, too), and a long-sleeved black tee-shirt. I'm wearing a necklace that I made myself out of a piece of black elastic and a small, holey chunk of lava I found on top of Mt. Fuji, and modest earrings -- granted, my left ear is double-pierced, which is hardly cutting-edge anywhere these days, but perhaps is less common among central Tokyo PTA moms?

I looked around the classroom, and the other moms all seemed to favor pastel colors. And they were all Asian, too.

I know the guard was just doing his job, and wanted to make sure I wasn't some lowlife who wandered over from Roppongi, looking for trouble.

But it really made me think about the kind of appearance I'm projecting here.

Ironically, I've been dying my hair a little darker lately, and Hub even asked me about it.

The dying part is nothing new. I've been dying my hair since I was a teenager -- at first just for fun, and then to cover the gray hairs that started sprouting when I was still in my 20's. Because I've lived in Japan most of my adult life, and have never made much money, I learned to do a decent job myself.

But I'm running out of hair dye lately. When I went back to the U.S. in March, I was far too traumatized to shop in any organized way, and I forgot to stock up. So I need to make my meager supply last longer, and one way is to use my supply of darker shades, and touch it up less often.

So part of it is simply a supply issue, but I wondered whether this also might reflect a subconscious wish for darker hair, to blend in more in this country? Of course, even though I use a darker shade, it's still a very light brown color that could properly be called blond, particularly in this country, but still.

You know what? Screw that. I will NEVER blend in here.

If I still stand out enough to be mistaken for a lowlife, I am going to go get myself some highlights, damn it.

What was it Oscar Wilde said? If you can't get rid of the skeletons in your closet, you might as well make them dance?

So if you look like a lowlife Roppongi bar queen no matter what you do, then you might as well GO FOR THE BLOND.

Nine Lives Lived

2011-09-16T06:59:00.000-07:00

Tonight I went to a wake....for a cat.

I got home from work and was getting our mail and newspaper out of our mailbox, and I met a neighbor who told me that one of Cat Lady's cats died.

I haven't blogged lately about Cat Lady, the older Japanese woman who lives downstairs, in the basement-level apartment with the garden. She's really cool. She has a ton of cats, which can be a bit....off-putting, at first. But she has lived here for most of her life, and her family originally owned the land upon which our building stands, so she knows all the neighbors.

"You need to pay your respects," the neighbor said. "Go down now, they'll let you in."

This struck me as bizarre, but I went downstairs. Cat Lady's daughter opened the door for me, and set out a pair of slippers.

"It was very sudden," she said. "The poor thing had some kind of tumor, but we didn't expect the end to come so soon."

She let me into the living room, where the cat was laid out on the coffee table in a box wrapped neatly with white towels. A bouquet of white flowers was placed near its head, and many sticks of fragrant incense smoldered.

I bowed my head and paid my respects to the cat. I was still holding my mail and newspaper, and a supermarket bag with our dinner it in, which seemed disrespectful, somehow.

I told Cat Lady and her daughter that their cat looked very peaceful, and I was sorry for their loss.

They thanked me for coming, and I came upstairs.

And I can't help but think, did that really just happen?

Happy Toes

2011-09-15T06:20:00.000-07:00

The camera in my Blackberry died, or I'd post a photo of my newly pedicured toenails.

I went to a new place today, a cheap one -- cheap for Tokyo, that is. For what it cost, I could probably get three pedicures if I were paying U.S. dollars in any U.S. city, but I happen to live here now.

And fortunately, I am earning yen, so I no longer have to drive myself insane calculating the exorbitant dollar prices of everything.

"My, what big feet you have!" the cheerful pedicure lady said to me. ("Ashi dekai ne!")

There's no tipping in this country, so obviously, she didn't care what kind of personal impression she made. However, she didn't say it in a mean way -- just as a casual observation.

She also commented on how much dead skin I had on them. I insisted I rub them with a pumice stone at least once a week in the shower, and she didn't believe me.

First, she sandblasted my feet with heavy equipment, and then she hand-sanded each one so vigorously and enthusiastically that she almost pulled me out of the chair.

"I'm going to be sore tomorrow, after this," she said, more to herself than to me.

My feet look really nice. It was worth it, after all.

It's so nice when that happens.

Do you ever..

2011-09-14T06:06:00.001-07:00

...think you hear the muffled sound of your cell phone ringing in your backpak -- and then realize no, it's just your husband snoring?

After the Storm

2011-09-10T21:49:00.000-07:00

Has it already been five years, since I wrote my "Five Long Years Ago" post here?

I guess it has.

And has it already been six months, since Mother Nature rocked my world, and prompted me to make some major changes to my life?

I am running again. I shed my old job like a scaly skin, and now work at a place I'm happy to go every day. I am making an effort to be as positive as possible to everyone around me -- especially my precious husband who might get transferred overseas any day, without me. (Golly, that makes him sound like a soldier -- his government work isn't dangerous, but he will definitely be going on his next overseas transfer alone, which will be tough on all of us again.)

Spending time with my family....making sure we eat healthy food.....doing everything I can to get enough sleep at night, so I can be as productive as possible at my job, to support my family: These are my top priorities now.

I spent the months after 9-11 in a fog of morning sickness. That's why I stopped running, and never seriously started again.

I spent the months after 3-11 in a fog of anxiety and insomnia.

Things are clearer now, clearer than they've ever been.

I'm looking inward, of course -- not outward, at the world that still doesn't make a whole lot of sense to me.

I'm doing the best I can, and it took traumatic events to force me to realize that wasn't always true.

What to do about "Things That Have No Right to Exist"

2011-09-10T04:46:00.000-07:00

I've been reading Simcha Fisher's blog, and her column in the "National Catholic Register" for....oh, I don't know, for a while now.

She's a great writer, and she's hilarious -- she's now pregnant with her ninth child, so she writes a lot about juggling a large brood. She's the kind of person I would like to have as a friend, and/or a next-door neighbor, except...

....except.....

....she's a very conservative Catholic, and I doubt she would look too kindly on the fact that I am a contraception enthusiast who's profoundly glad I didn't make the mistake of having any more children myself. All power to those who want lots of them, but some of us just don't.

I tend to think that if Simcha did live next door to me, she would be a cordial neighbor but might not let her kids play with mine. This hasn't kept me from enjoying her writing.

Until now.

As some of you might have seen on Facebook, I linked to this column of hers, in which she and her kids destroyed two complete audio sets of Philip Pullman's books.

Coincidentally, someone I know just recommended Pullman's "His Dark Materials" trilogy for my teens. This same person recommended "The Hunger Games" trilogy, which Daughter is now sloooooooooowly reading, but which I enjoyed very much and raced through.

Simcha said she never read the books herself, but objected to the fact that Pullman was "...not shy about stating that his intention was to turn readers away from a belief in God and organized religion in general. Of the Church, he says, 'I hope the wretched organisation will vanish entirely.'”

I can see why she would avoid his books. But....destroy them?

Hey, she's a blogger and an online columnist -- she might have done it, and described doing it, just to drum up some good conversation.

Anyway.....I went ahead and ordered the Pullman books for our family. I look forward to reading them myself.

Rude Awakening

2011-09-08T15:57:00.000-07:00

This morning, I woke up, yawned, stretched, and thought, "Yaaaay, it's Saturday, I can go back to sleep."

And then Hub's alarm went off, and he got up, and I realized it's only Friday -- damn!

But at least I'm not on early stocks today, so I could go back to sleep for an extra hour. And I even have a few minutes to quickly blog before I leave for work.

Funny, I had a bad dream a few nights ago, that I was back at my old company, and I was on the phone biting my tongue, listening to my old boss rant at me.

I woke up with my heart pounding -- and then I realized it was only a dream, and that I didn't work there anymore. I now work somewhere happier, where the people are stable and professional.

I am no longer having earthquake anxiety dreams, which is definitely progress. But now I have to worry about having Cow Bones anxiety dreams, too, I guess.

These, too, shall pass.

2011-09-06T07:54:00.000-07:00

I was on the early shift today, but instead of turning in early tonight, guess what I'm doing? I'm watching Japan play Uzbekistan, as part of my effort to spend more quality time with the husband.

If Japan were winning, he would be all smiley and cuddly on the couch, but right now, Japan is losing 0-1, and he is scowling, sitting by himself in the green chair with his knees drawn up against him.

There's nothing like losing sleep for quality time with a grumpy man.

Anyway, at least I'm not on the early shift tomorrow, so maybe I can get a bit more sleep -- though I tend to wake up at the same hour no matter what, even on weekends (when I force myself back to sleep).

So many people have asked me why I no longer link to my articles -- it's because I now write things like this.

Believe it or not, it's fun -- I haven't covered stocks in 11 years, and there's a lot I need to remember, and a lot I never learned in the first place. I'm only scratching the surface, but I can see it being even more interesting the deeper I get.

I am liking the new job, but it's only been a month. There's still plenty of time for things to go wrong.

Speaking of which.....back to watching the game, and hoping Japan at least ties the score.

Does anyone else out there think...

2011-09-05T07:28:00.000-07:00

....that Seiji Maehara is hot, or is it just me?

Is it a sign that I've been here too long, if politicians are starting to look good to me?

And he has just a hint of that sexy Kyoto accent.

The FAT Post

2011-09-04T07:15:00.000-07:00

Another Tokyo blog I read just brought up the FAT issue in Asia: "...weight is not a taboo subject. Girls are not brought up believing that their partners should never ever comment on their weight or that they should tell others they aren't fat even if they are."

Now, I have blogged about my almost crippling lack of self-confidence, and about how I am so thin-skinned that, as I say, all of my internal organs are visible. Tell me (or even imply) that I'm worthless or incompetent or that you just plain don't LIKE me, and I will probably go weep in the nearest restroom for a while, until I get ahold of myself, emerge and begin to plot how I can kick your ass.

But criticize my appearance, and it bounces right off me. Go figure.

When I was a little girl, I would ask my mother, "Am I pretty?" And she would always respond, "You're nothing special. You're very plain." She said she thought it was best to be honest all the time.

It's true I was no supermodel. But by the time I was a teenager, I was skinny, blond and had big boobs. Guys weren't exactly falling all over me, but I seemed to have no trouble getting dates, and I knew then that my mother was full of shit.

I wasn't drop-dead beautiful, but I had confidence that I looked all right -- and I also realized how superficial appearances are. I strove not for traditional beauty, but to be different. I dyed my hair odd colors and got even odder hair cuts, and wore lots of dark eye makeup. I wore earrings made from human teeth. I would have pierced my nose and gotten some tattoos (which weren't mainstream in the 80's) except I met Hub when I was 19 and he convinced me to take it down a notch, and it seemed easy to comply and make him happy.

Anyway....back to weight. I was on the scrawny side, but I had curves, and Japanese girls used to comment on them. This made me uncomfortable, but didn't make me feel bad about my body. Neither did three full-term pregnancies, each with a 50-pound weight gain (and eventual loss). Neither did gaining 30 pounds in the years after I stopped running.

I started running again in April, and even though my weight hasn't changed, my body has. I'm fitting into smaller clothes again.

And Japanese people are asking me, "Did you lose weight?"

Whenever anyone asks me that, I've been frowning at them as if they had just said something crazy, and saying, "No, I'm the same weight as always."

This is absolutely true. Let them ponder it. Let them think their memories are playing tricks on them.

The funniest thing is, I remember doing this to two of my friends at different times over the years, with the same bizarre result.

Both of these friends were American. One time was after the birth of my first child, the other was seven years later, after the birth of my third.

Both of these friends were skinny, and neither had any kids of her own. Both were absolutely APPALLED that I had gained 50 pounds with the pregnancy, and both were convinced that it was merely a result of a lack of self-discipline and unhealthy diet choices. This was annoying.

So what did I do? I fucked with their minds.

I laughed and told them I was craving nothing but ice cream. And then, of course, the babies were born and I began to lose the weight (breastfeeding did it for me). But whenever these friends asked me if I'd lost weight, I would say, "Nope, I'm still on my ice cream diet! I'm the same weight as always!"

Over the course of a year, before their eyes, I lost 50 pounds. But I was telling them that I was the same weight as always, and they were still saying tut-tut-tut and sadly shaking their heads, and lecturing me about nutrition.

They believed what I was saying, not what was actually in front of them. This amused me to no end.

So I will keep running, and even if I do end up losing a few pounds, I will tell everyone I'm exactly the same weight.

And I'll look at them as if they're crazy, because anyone who takes a deep interest in another person's weight has their priorities skewed, as far as I'm concerned.

Countdown

2011-09-01T05:55:00.001-07:00

Big Son is getting ready to go back to school in a few days.

He's excited and looking forward to it, as always.

And I'm getting ready to count down the days, until his Christmas break.

[sigh]

FAIL

2011-08-29T02:38:00.001-07:00

Little Son had what I thought was a playdate at a friend's house today.

The friend called our house yesterday -- the two little boys talked. No mothers involved.

I remembered at work today that Little Son has kendo on Mondays. Crap! Did he forget? I called T's house to make sure.

"No, no, Little Son is going to leave early to go to kendo," T.'s mother assured me. That was all she said.

Tonight, I got home from work, and asked him, "How was T.'s house?"

"Great! It was a party! T.'s BIRTHDAY PARTY!"

I turned pale.

"But you didn't bring a present for T...."

"No, T. didn't get to keep the presents. There was a game where everyone brought a present, and we had to pass it to the person sitting next to us. And you know what? T.'s mother said she KNEW someone would forget, so there was an EXTRA present for me to pass!"

I realized with horror that T.'s mother had described to me , on the sidelines of soccer practice, that T. would be having a birthday party sometime the last week of August, and that this present-passing game would be conducted.

That conversation took place several weeks ago, before school was out for the summer.

There was no mention of it again, there were no printed invitations, there was no phone call to remind me. It seems to have been one of those word-of-mouth things. And the words didn't make it my way again.

So I called and left a message on T.'s mother's answering machine, apologizing for Little Son's lack of present.

What else can I do?

I can beat my head against the wall, because after more than two years, I am still failing to make the connections that facilitate day-to-day life.

But at least my son isn't being excluded, for having a mom who is hopelessly out of the loop.

Kiss and Tell

2011-08-27T21:43:00.000-07:00

Yesterday was our neighborhood summer festival, the one I have written about in the past.

Overall, I love our neighborhood, I love the festivals, and I'm still happy to be part of them. But there were a few things that pissed me off about it this year, and I am going to use this blog to vent about them.

One is that no one told me when it was going to be held -- the date is usually finalized at some point in the summer. But everyone seems to have taken if for granted that I would just show up and work hard.

The festival turned out to be the day after our Fuji trip, the reservations for which were made in May (hence my being able to take time off from my new job -- I cleared this with HR before I joined, explaining we had a long-standing reservation).

There were a few people who grumbled that I wasn't out there all day, helping everyone set things up. Sure, I was exhausted and my body ached all over -- but that was because of my own selfish Fuji plans, that had nothing to do with helping the neighborhood, right?

Another thing is that a few weeks ago, one neighbor dropped off origami paper and complicated instructions for Big Son, to make origami spiders and such for the haunted house. Big Son has been famous in our neighborhood since he was quite small, for his origami skills.

But these patterns were very tricky and time-consuming. He made ONE spider, declared that it took him too long, and said he wasn't going to make any more.

Now, Big Son usually doesn't mind helping out. I think he correctly perceived the spiders/creepy-crawlers as non-essential to the haunted house, and realized it would be a pain to make lots of them, and resented that this task was foisted upon him with no right of refusal. I understood this, and I wasn't about to push him to make more.

Yes, but...as a good parent of a Japanese citizen, didn't I know that it was my DUTY to force my son to use his God-given origami talents for the greater good?

I saw some neighbors working at the haunted house looking right at me, and shaking their heads. One of them said something to me after that, about how it was TOO BAD my son hadn't made more spiders.

Yeah, TOO BAD.

And then there was the stand selling the rubber bracelets, with the proceeds to help the children of Fukushima. Help them do what? That was unclear. Anyway, since I knew the neighbors selling them, I walked over to buy a few, and do my part.

They seemed cheap -- only 30 yen. So I decided to get three.

And the neighbor selling them indignantly informed me that they were actually three HUNDRED yen each, and it was for charity, after all! As if I was trying to rip her off? Her reaction startled me.

Fine, no problem -- I handed her a thousand-yen bill, and scooped up three bracelets, and told her to keep the 100 yen change.

"NO," she insisted, practically throwing it back at me.

"But isn't it for charity?" I said, trying to throw it back at her.

She was horrified. Oh, the mortification of someone breaking the RULES of the transaction, and donating an extra COIN. What, was I maliciously forcing her accounting to be off?

I picked up my change and slunk away.

But there is one GOOD thing about having inadvertently fallen out with some of the neighbors.

I am on the bad side of the woman who ran the Halloween festival last year. This is entirely guilt by association -- she was cloyingly sweet until she turned against the entire faction of the neighborhood group with which I am most active. I don't even take it personally, because I know her problem isn't with me as an individual, and the whole thing is ridiculous.

Anyway, she ordered tee-shirts for all the festival helpers, and notably did NOT order one for me, even though I am a regular helper at all events.

Their family business is a beer and sake distributor, and she got one of the beverage companies to sponsor the tee-shirts. On the back of the black shirts, in tasteful Japanese writing was the name of the neighborhood.

The company makes a product that I won't name, but is engaged in a kiss-related marketing campaign. So on the front, surrounded by hot pink lip imprints, were the words, "I'M A KISS MACHINE."

Because I'm currently on this woman's shit list, I didn't have to wear an embarrassing tee-shirt all night.

I failed to see any downside to that.

I got my sun rise.

2011-08-26T05:26:00.001-07:00

[I keep re-publishing this post, to attempt to fix a weird spacing issue -- and I realize I ought to clarify, we did indeed make it to the summit, just not in time for the sun rise, but shortly after. And hey, isn't it cool how the sky in the photo matches my blog banner?]

We didn't quite make it to the summit in time, even after waking up just after midnight to start climbing. But we still were above the 9th station, so it was high enough.

That's a grumpy Big Son in the background.

"Grumpy" was definitely the theme of our trip (more later). But overall, it was a great thing to have done -- and we lucked out with PERFECT weather.

Now I am getting my tired old bones to bed!

Mt. Fuji Challenge

2011-08-24T04:06:00.000-07:00

Tomorrow night, we'll be staying here, just below the 8th station of Mt. Fuji.

I made the reservation in May, and cleared it with my new employer before I started the job, but I still feel guilty about taking days off already.

On the other hand, I shouldn't feel guilty at all -- I didn't really get much vacation time this year.

I very foolishly told the editor-in-chief of my old company that I could stay through the end of the July, and he surprised me by saying , "Great!"

I should never have offered. I should have insisted on taking at least a couple of weeks off between jobs instead. But who knows, I might need a job reference from him someday, so I wanted to part on the best terms possible.

So I took only a week off, and the company paid me for the two weeks' vacation I didn't use. Damn, maybe I should have used it -- I'm dead exhausted, and now I'm climbing a 13,000-foot mountain tomorrow. That was probably pretty stupid of me.

Those of you who've been reading this blog for a while know that we attempted to climb Fuji last summer, and didn't make it all the way up.

Maybe tomorrow we'll make it?

Stay tuned!

Competitive Neurosis

2011-08-23T05:21:00.000-07:00

Those of us who are parents know people like this -- hey, perhaps you even ARE people like this. Their kid doesn't consume sugar/junk food of any kind/meat/trans-fats/whatever -- which is just fine.

But they act as if these substances are the equivalent of arsenic, and people who do feed them to their kids [like, ahem, ME] should lose custody, unless we can be made to realize and repent the error of our ways. This is NOT fine, no matter how well-meaning. This is annoying.

I just got my first comment from someone I know -- a friend, in fact -- who was horrified that I'm eating -- and letting my kids eat -- lettuce and other leafy vegetables.

She said that since we know from the lessons of Chernobyl that these food absorb high levels of soil radiation, we all need to avoid ALL of them for a year....as she is doing, just in case some of them contain radiation.

"It won't be FUNNY if one of you gets CANCER!" were her exact words.

I guess I sounded like I was laughing off her concerns. I didn't actually laugh, though -- I just told her that I wasn't particularly avoiding green leafy foods.

Not that we eat kilos of spinach in our house, but sometimes I'll throw some into sauces, or chop up a cabbage. As I said in a post below, I would avoid feeding my kids anything I knew came from Fukushima prefecture, but I would eat it myself -- and in fact, I have.

We don't drink tap water, but I cook with it. Will I regret this? I don't know -- I worry more about what we were already exposed to, than about low levels of exposure from now.

On March 15, when the radiation was blowing over Tokyo, I made my kids wear face masks, but I didn't wear one myself -- and I didn't make them stay indoors, which in retrospect, I probably should have done, even if it meant Little Son missing school.

My friend and I just have different concerns. If she feels uneasy about eating greens, she is certainly right to avoid them.

But if I let myself start worrying about everything I breathe and eat and drink.....I don't think I'd be able to function in Tokyo anymore.

And this is where I happen to live.

The Wrong Funeral

2011-08-22T04:23:00.000-07:00

So after missing the right funeral last week, I got stuck going to the wrong funeral tonight.

I got an email at work today, from a neighbor, about the passing of the 59-year old son of 80-something Mr. O., the chairman of one of the neighborhood groups. Mr. O. is helpful and involved in everything, and even though I didn' t think I knew his son, I realized we would have to go to pay our respects.

So Hub and I rushed home from work, threw some takeout sushi on the table for the kids, put on our blackest black garments and trotted off to be dutifully respectful.

There were hundreds of people at the funeral home, which was a few stops away on the subway. I was following Hub, figuring he would tell me where to go and what to do.

It turned out there were five different lines, and after we handed over our envelope full of funeral cash, no one could tell us the right one to get into.

We were steered to a short one, but then someone who seemed to have some authority said to us, loudly and not too kindly, "EXCUSE ME, but there are LOTS OF PEOPLE LINING UP."

This seemed to be our humiliating signal to go and wait in the longer line, and it made me feel like crying. Did he think we were trying to get away with something, and cut in front of the other mourners on purpose?

So we went to the back of the long line, and the neighborhood tatami mat maker marched over, forcibly pulled us out, and steered us past ALL the lines, straight to the alter where you were supposed to throw a pinch of incense on the burner and say a prayer in front of bank of flowers with a photo of the deceased.

And I looked up, right into the face of the dead man, and realized that I had known him after all -- I just hadn't known his name, or that he was Mr. O's son.

There was that shock of recognition, like when I saw my dead friend's photo on the bulletin board at work. Oh, I know that person! -- followed by, Oh... wait..make that past tense: I KNEW that person.

I pictured Mr. O.'s son walking around the neighborhood, working every year at the children's matsuri.

He always said hello to me. Now he never will again.

On the way home, we ran into some neighbors who said he died very suddenly on Friday, of a blocked blood vessel in his neck.

Life isn't fair.

But I knew that.

What I don't know is why I keep expecting it to be, and why I'm surprised and upset whenever it isn't.

Good Dreams and Bad

2011-08-21T06:46:00.000-07:00

The heat wave here broke on Friday afternoon, with a violent downpour. Saturday and Sunday have been cool and drizzly.

I woke up from a dream that a San Francisco friend's daughter was visiting us, and for a moment I thought it was real, and that she was here.

Then I looked out my window and saw the tops of the tall buildings shrouded in fog, and I shivered happily, because it was such a San Francisco summer-like view.

I called the friend to say hello, which made me miss San Francisco even more. It's been two years -- will I ever stop missing it?

Tokyo's all right, though.

As long as I'm careful not to compare it to San Francisco.

I had other dreams last night, too -- nightmares, including a couple of disaster doozies in which horrible things happened to Little Son.

Perhaps not coincidentally, I had three glasses of wine with dinner on Saturday. I am beginning to notice a disturbing pattern of alcohol consumption = nightmares.

I had dinner with someone I used to work with -- perhaps associations of my old office = nightmares?

Yep, that's possible, too.

Happy, But Still Crazy

2011-08-19T05:24:00.000-07:00

Guess what FINALLY made me crack.

No, not the new job -- two full weeks, and I still like it. I'm still happy to go there every day.

And I'm not in some perfect honeymoon period, either. Plenty of small things have gone wrong, there's been frustration and sometimes I sigh, because I know it will be many months before I am comfortable doing it. But I'm used to BIG things being wrong at work, so I don't sweat the small things, you know?

So you know what finally did me in?

I was unable to enter a bar and drink with happy people.

NO, REALLY.

The whole bureau was gathering at a local bar after work today, and a former copyeditor was in town, visiting from London where he now works. I know him well -- he was a colleague at Cow Bones -- and I was looking forward to seeing him.

I should also mention, this is not a bureau of strangers. Ha, I counted, and I realized I knew THIRTEEN people there. I know two well (they read this blog -- hi!), one is a close friend of a close friend whom I've known for years, three are former Cow Bones colleagues, two more worked for my old website before Cow Bones bought it, and five more are people with whom I've never worked, but our paths have crossed in Tokyo over the years.

I would have known 14, but one friend was killed last year covering the riots in Thailand, remember that? That was just awful. There's a memorial bulletin board to him in the service room, and the first time I saw it, it was like seeing a ghost.

Anyway, my point is, there is nothing hostile about my new office, and I have known many of the people for a long time. And all of the ones I met for the first time are friendly and helpful.

I am, of course, sad that I missed my grandfather's funeral this week. I'm not feeling any sense of loss, because he was so old and had such a full life -- instead, I'm mourning the fact that I missed a family milestone. My far-flung family rarely gathers together in one place, so I missed a rare opportunity that probably won't come again for a while.

They were drinking when I called them on Tuesday, remembering my grandfather.

Maybe this lingering sadness was part of the reason, but....I just couldn't bring myself to go into the bar tonight.

I left the bureau alone, and...just couldn't do it. Maybe if I had gone over with someone, it would have been different -- but quite possibly, it would have been even worse, even more awkward, if I still didn't feel like going in and I had to explain why. It was hard to explain it even to myself.

It wasn't any fear of the people themselves. I was just repelled by the idea of happy people, drinking.

Is this normal? No, of course it isn't. Usually the idea of happy people drinking cheers me up even more than sunshine and kittens.

I walked around the block a few times, to see if the feeling would pass, and then I found my feet were pointing me in the direction of home.

I got home, and instead of giving in to the urge to cry, I went running. That felt good.

I'm not sure I was missed. Neither of the two friends who read this blog were going to be there, and I don't think I'll need to explain myself to any of the others. Hopefully, by Monday, anyone who missed me will have forgotten about it.

With any luck, I will forget about it, too.

Ha ha, if I had any fear that the happy aura from my new job was going to turn me into a happy person overall, I can lay those fears to rest.

At the end of the day, I'm still just as screwed-up and gloomy as ever.

Let Us Worry About Lettuce

2011-08-18T03:50:00.000-07:00

Last week, one of my favorite vegetable vendors presented me with a gift of four heads of lettuce.

I thanked him, and since I'm the kind of person who looks a gift horse in the mouth (gift lettuce in the leaf?), I asked him where it was from.

"It's FINE!" he responded. "The government is testing, so it's fine!"

This told me that it must be from Fukushima. Sure enough, a glance at the package label confirmed this.

"I'm eating it myself," he reassured me.

"Yes, but....you're 80," I said.

I wondered what to do with it. Should I eat it?

I solved half the dilemma by giving half of it away, to the old woman at the corner beer store. But she's a close friend of the veggie man's wife, so I couldn't unload all of it on her, or perhaps it would have gotten back to him. It's one thing to share a gift, and another thing to re-gift all of it.

I wouldn't have fed it to my kids, but my family is in Kyoto this week without me.

And then...I got busy, with the new job, and thinking about my grandfather's funeral.

I forgot where the lettuce was from. I just saw it on the shelf in my fridge, and ate it without thinking.

So I ate it, and it was probably okay. But I'll let you know in 20 years.

What would you have done?

Heart/Mind in Three Neat Pieces

2011-08-16T06:54:00.000-07:00

i.

I am supposed to be in Kyoto now. That's where Hub and the kids are, visiting his parents, as we had planned.

They went to see the Daimonji tonight.

I wish I was there.

ii.

I am supposed to be at my grandfather's funeral now. I had money put aside for it -- it was really important to me to be there.

I called my family in Connecticut this morning. After the wake, they all went to my cousin's house for a big dinner, and Lithuanian spiced wine (krupnikas). The florist who did all the flowers knew that my grandfather had loved dahlias, so he filled the room with them -- and my family filled it with Red Sox pennants, too.

I can picture them, all singing "Sweet Caroline" and toasting my grandfather, and playing cards. My family puts the "fun" in "funeral."

I wish I was there.

iii.

I like my new job. It's only the second week. I keep waiting for some ugly reality to set in, but I am going to savor this "good new job" feeling, as long as I can.

If I can't be (i) or (ii), at least I've got (iii).

But I just wish life didn't happen all at once.

What I can do, and what I can't.

2011-08-13T21:14:00.000-07:00

Those of you who follow me on Facebook and Twitter already know that my grandfather died last week.

Long-time readers know that I had money set aside, earmarked for a plane ticket to either his funeral, or his 100th birthday party in 2013. I was of course hoping for the latter, but it wasn't meant to be.

And as for the funeral....I just started my new job, which at first gave me pause. But my new company is known for being very humane, and our bureau seems to be no exception. I would have felt awkward, asking for time off already, but they likely would have given it to me.

I hadn't seen my grandfather since the summer of 2007, but he stayed relatively healthy until earlier this year. Little Son was even writing postcards to him. But this year, he took a turn for the worse, started fading, stopped recognizing people, and moved out of his active retirement home to a fullcare facility.

It happened like this: He went into the hospital this week with pneumonia, and the family opted to forgo any aggressive life-sustaining measures, and instead allow only palliative care. So...he died.

He was 98. It was neither tragic nor unexpected. Here's his obituary, -- believe it or not, that photo of him was taken just a few years ago. His hair stayed dark on top, into his 90's.

He was a very grumpy old man who loved the Red Sox more than he loved his own children (or any children. He was not fond of children). In the 1940's, he was a duckpin bowler of some renown, in Connecticut. He loved growing dahlias, and coaxed them into impressive sizes and colors. I remember him scowling most of the time, but always smiling when he showed people his garden.

Perhaps fate arranged the timing of his death this way, just as I was starting my new job, to give me a reminder of what's really important in life? A little taste of mortality, to remind me not to get too caught up in a job again, and keep my perspective on everything?

Anyway, on Friday morning, I found myself scrambling for a roundtrip plane ticket to New York at the peak of the summer vacation season -- and historically low dollar/yen rates. My plane-ticket fund was in dollars, and we have no yen savings, but many kind friends offered to lend me yen so I wouldn't have to change money at the astoundingly rotten rates.

I thought, why didn't he die just a few weeks ago, when tickets were dramatically cheaper? But I was willing to pay whatever it took to get me there.

The dollar tickets were much cheaper than the yen tickets, but still more than $1,000 more than I had planned to spend. There was an Air Canada ticket for $4,500 -- and an Air China ticket with a 15-hour layover in Beijing for just under $3,000.

But then I called my dad.

He sounded fine -- cheerful, even. When his mother died in 2007, he sounded sad, even though she was 90 and had suffered from Alzheimer's. That time, he wanted me at my grandmother's funeral.

This time, though, he said all the arrangements were made already, there was nothing I could do to help, no one was expecting me to get there, and the astronomical price of the ticket could be better spent if we used it toward a 2013 trip, when we all hope to go to New York for Big Son's high school graduation. This all made sense.

Still....I was conflicted. Is it odd to say, I had been looking forward to going to the funeral?

I wanted to see my family, my cousins, maybe even a few friends from high school. I thought about going anyway, but I decided my father was right.

So I didn't book the ticket. I am sorry I'm not going. I don't regret the decision, but I wish I could get there -- not to honor my grandfather's memory, which I can do anywhere, but FOR ME.

I wanted to go FOR ME.

The thought that I'm so far away, and no one expected me to go....I am just reinforcing those expectations, by not going.

Those of you who live overseas like me know exactly what I'm talking about here. Maybe we're no less loved, but we can't help but feel sad, when we realize that our families automatically factor in our absence from important rites of passage.

I decided to use a big chunk of my plane-ticket fund for a memorial donation for my grandfather. This would be tricky, since no one could remember him giving to any cause that wasn't affiliated with the Catholic church.

So I gave to Catholic Relief Service's East African Drought Appeal.

I am upset there are starving children in Africa, but I'm powerless to do anything about the complex political problems behind the whole horrible situation. Giving emergency aid to the refugees....just so that another generation can survive, to suffer from the next round of atrocities? It all seems so futile.

Somehow, throwing money into the black hole of Africa's suffering seems apt, to compensate for the fact that I am not going to my grandfather's funeral, despite my long-held plans and deep wish to be there.

Sometimes, all you can do is what seems like the right decision at the time, and go with it.

The Lobster Metaphor

2011-08-10T03:54:00.000-07:00

When I started my last new job -- the one working for the website, which later became a unit of the company that rhymes with Cow Bones -- I remember one of the editors joked, I was like a lobster in a pot, and that gradually, they would turn up the fire on me.

I'm thinking of that now, as I enjoy the nice warm bath, so to speak, at my new company.

The people are friendly, and I think I will like it. I don't think I will dislike it -- although I am old enough to realize, the people won't always be friendly at every single moment and I will certainly dislike bits of the job, here and there, from time to time.

It's funny -- it's as if I can see the future, based on the past.

I know I'll do some things well, and some things not so well. Some days I'll feel exceptionally competent, and other days I'll feel like crawling under my desk in a fetal position. Sooner or later, I'll do something wrong, and someone will get upset at me, and I'll feel bad -- and then I'll get over it. Some days I will drag myself into work sick and resent it, and some days I will leave a sick child at home alone and be worried him all day.

Some of the people will become my friends -- which ones? It's usually impossible to tell, based on first impressions alone. Most of them will just be my work aquaintances.

I used to have a recurring dream that I was working and could see Mt. Fuji from my desk -- and I just found out that in the winter, when it's clear, it is indeed visible from our 30th floor office.

What does it mean when a recurring dream comes true?

I don't think I want to know, since I also used to have a recurring childhood dream that I was being attacked by a giant octopus.

I wish I had dreamed about a giant lobster, so there was some way to neatly tie the image back to what I said at the beginning of this post -- but no, it was not a lobster, but an octopus.

All I can do is boil the sucker, and hope it dies.

Metaphorically, of course. Because the thing in the pot is me.

Until then...I'm enjoying the nice warm bath.

Eve of De(con)struction

2011-08-07T02:06:00.001-07:00

I start the new job tomorrow.

It's like the first day of school! What should I wear?

Instead of writing a blog post, I'm going to paste excerpts of an email conversation I had with a friend today (and she reads this blog, so apologies to her for repeating myself):

It's funny, every other new job I've had in my life, I always asked myself, "Where can this lead me? What will be my next step after this one? How will this job help me achieve my long-term goals?"

Honestly, I now no longer HAVE any long-term goals. I kept making plans, only to be frustrated when those plans changed....and changed....and changed....and changed....

And if I have to be honest, I think the disaster really made me change my whole outlook on life.

This is the very first time I've started a job thinking "I don't know what I'll be doing in five years! So I will just do the very best job, right here, right now, at THIS, and try to be be good at THIS!"

[snip]

I've never been a drifter. I've been a person with a PLAN, who just kept getting shoved off track, and ended up drifting...And tomorrow, I wash up at [the company that rhymes with "Goiters"].

My friend asked, "Wonder what's better -- to have a plan and get shoved off, or to drift?"

I honestly don't know.

And at this point in time, I prefer not to think more than ten minutes into the future.

Onward and upward [JPY included]

2011-08-05T20:00:00.000-07:00

Am I the only one who thinks Paul Krugman would be hot, if only he shaved his beard?

And is that truly the most compelling thing I can think of to say right now, after S&P downgraded the U.S.' sovereign rating?

Actually, no -- the most compelling thing I can say is that I AM SO HAPPY TO BE PAID IN YEN, as of Monday. It doesn't get much better than that, at this point in time -- except for maybe Swiss francs, or solid gold bars.

I spent some of my all-too-brief vacation fretting about social media -- Facebook, in particular. [I do prefer it backwards, though -- doesn't "Koobecaf" sound like a recipe for something exotic, like veal kabobs?]

As a result, I sent out a batch of friend requests to people I know very well, whom I was 100% certain would accept my requests, as well as lots of distant acquaintances -- some of whom I hadn't seen since high school -- whose rejection wouldn't bother me.

I sent very few to the vast middle ground of people I genuinely like and respect and with whom I would like to keep in touch -- but whose failure to accept my request would make me feel bad, and the bad feelings aren't worth it. So I think this counts as "Facebook fail."

I spent much of my vacation fretting about something else: DOLLAR/YEN RATES, because thanks to some recent dental work, we have a whopper of a yen credit-card bill coming due next week, and Hub's paycheck isn't going to cover it. That means I have to bring over some U.S. dollars, at historically crappy exchange rates.

I am profoundly grateful that this is the last time I expect to have this problem, in the foreseeable future.

Bring on the new!

Intervention, inter-schmention!

2011-08-03T22:00:00.000-07:00

Yeah, I missed it -- Japan's direct intervention in currency markets.

This means I am 0 for 3, for all recent yen intervention, since September.

I was cooking bacon and eggs for my kids, and happened to look at my dollar/yen chart on my Blackberry, and.....WHOA!

Kind of amazing.

You know what else is amazing? As soon as I say the word "pool," it starts to pour rain. I must have pissed off the weather gods.

My kids and I have started spelling it out, just in case.

And did you know, Facebook spelled backwards is Koobecaf?

2011-08-03T21:44:00.000-07:00

Okay, back to Facebook -- I didn't mean the person I know had totally blocked me. I meant this:

You can remove someone from the People You May Know list by clicking the little "x" icon next to the name. The person you "x" won't be notified and that feedback will be used to improve the quality of the future suggestions. In addition, you will not appear as a suggestion for the person that you "x" out.

That would explain why someone who was coming up all the time in my suggested friends list suddenly disappeared without a trace.

I'm sure people do this all the time -- I just happened to notice, because this time it was someone about whom I was in fact deliberating about whether to send a friend request, or not.

And I guess I know the answer to that.

Thin Skin

2011-08-03T17:38:00.000-07:00

The whole Facebook thing is making me think about just how THIN my skin is -- paper thin, so thin that all of my internal organs are clearly visible through it. (Oh, look, there's that corn I had for lunch!)

I remember when I was small, my mother would tell me, it doesn't matter if people like you -- why should you care? All that matters is that you like yourself.

But this was the same woman who, whenever she was upset at me for anything, would say, "No wonder no one likes you! No wonder you have no friends!" -- just because she knew it was the surest way to make me cry.

I learned long ago, people have no control over feelings. But we CAN control our actions, and our behavior.

I will probably always be thin-skinned. I will probably always get upset when people don't like me -- especially whenever they do something to show it.

But what I can do is, get over it, and move on.

And I can remember what I learned, being raised by my mother: Whatever doesn't kill you makes you stronger.

Facebook question

2011-08-03T07:19:00.001-07:00

If someone's photo keeps coming up over and over in "People You May Know" on Facebook because you have lots of mutual friends, and then suddenly one day you notice it's gone -- what does that mean?

This is one of the people I hesitated sending a request to -- someone I know, but not so well....yet well enough to be disappointed if they didn't accept it, so why set myself for rejection?

But now I set myself up for something worse: not knowing why all of a sudden, this person is nowhere, when I look at "See all suggestions."

No, they didn't deactivate their account -- this person still comes up, when I look at our mutual friends' lists of friends. They just ceased coming up as a suggestion anymore.

I assume that as the number of our mutual friends climbed, I started coming up as a suggestion on this person's list, too. And perhaps they thought, "Uh-oh, she's on Facebook? I better take evasive action!"

I didn't send them a request because I didn't want to be sad if they didn't accept it.

So now, instead of that, I get to wonder if they've pre-emptively blocked me.

Sigh....

YES! I DO NEED TO GO BACK TO WORK, AND HAVE BETTER THINGS TO WORRY ABOUT!!!

(On the other hand, can I tell you how GRATEFUL I am, that worrying about Facebook is my biggest downer in an otherwise wonderful week? Heh!)

I am a woman of leisure! Sort of...

2011-07-31T17:55:00.000-07:00

Between jobs -- oh what a feeling!

All of the problems of the old job: not mine anymore!

All of the problems of the new job: blissfully unknown yet. Ignorance is bliss!

One of my many projects for this week is to back up my blog archives.

Yes, can you believe it? I've been writing this for over five years, and I have never saved any of my posts anywhere else. I think that proves that I am doing this whole blogging thing very much for its therapeutic "in-the-moment" value, and not to make any kind of lasting statement.

But it has occurred to me many times that I'm glad I have a record of my life -- even just sporadic glimpses are better than nothing.

Sometimes I ask myself, how did we survive that first awful year in San Francisco? And that last awful year, living apart from Hub? And what made those two SF years in between so damn wonderful? How did I get through the transition back to Tokyo?

My blog can answer some of these questions, where my memory fails me. But if my blog where to fail....Hey, no one's perfect, not even Google engineers, right?

What's the best way to do this? How do all the other bloggers out there save their archives?

All advice welcome and appreciated.

More on volunteering

2011-07-28T06:23:00.000-07:00

My articles were written for a global business website, but if you're already in Japan (and some of you who emailed me, and at least one commenter are), here are some links to the groups:

I did one trip that was done through Peace Boat, and was impressed with their operations.

The other trip I did was through RQ Citizens Disaster Relief Network. You can contact them directly if you speak Japanese, or do one of the affiliated NTA volunteer tours.

Caritas Japan is a Catholic charity but open to everyone, and is also seeking volunteers (Japanese link). I know some people from church who volunteered through them.

I'm sure there are more -- these are just the ones I know.

Questions? Ask!

Hey, everyone -- PLEASE read!

2011-07-27T19:50:00.000-07:00

So many people have emailed me to ask if there's anyway they can volunteer in Japan, to help disaster victims.

So many, in fact, that for one of my final stories for Cow Bones, I decided to write about volunteering here:

Please read my story, or at least click on it a lot -- so that a story about people helping people can actually get high traffic, because that's the way it should be, in a perfect world!

And please look at my photos -- some of them are quite compelling, and I'm very glad I got them published.

And hey, why not come on over here, and clear debris?

Thanks!

Odds & Ends (or maybe just Odd....)

2011-07-27T06:20:00.000-07:00

So, I'm looking into this whole ear piercing thing (hole ear piercing thing?) and indeed, it seems as if our choices in Tokyo are 1) hideously expensive cosmetic surgery clinics, or 2) unlicensed tattoo parlors.

Daughter herself has ruled out option 3), the home-piercing option -- with needle, nail or mechanized thingie.

So perhaps we move on to option 4), none of the above. As in: Sorry, you had years to do this when we were in the U. S. of A., and you lost your chance -- so now you have to wait a while, until you're once again in city where hygienic, affordable options abound.

Here is my FINAL Japan column for my Cow Bones website.

The funniest part was, I was searching for an example of cliched coverage of Japan having a lower debt rating than Botswana, and I found....one of my very own stories.

I totally forgot I interviewed the president of Botswana! It was the only time I ever had a one-on-one interview with an acting head of state, and it just slipped my mind.

And here's a question I just asked on Twitter:

Andrew Ross Sorkin and I have three mutual Facebook friends -- plus, he cites me by name in a footnote on page 576 of his "Too Big To Fail" book. Is that enough to send him a friend request?

Yeah....I didn't think so, either.

Holes

2011-07-26T05:44:00.000-07:00

Anyone know where to get ears pierced in Tokyo?

Daughter finally wants to get hers done. She resisted for years, when we were in America, where we could have gone to any number of cheap, clean places.

I offered to do it with a sewing needle at home -- numbing her ear lobes with ice first, of course -- but she was repulsed by this generous offer, can you imagine?

I did the second hold in my left ear myself that way, back when I was 17 and my parents refused to allow me to get a double piercing. This is when double ear piercings were cutting edge, ha -- back in the Connecticut 'burbs in the early '80's, when the dinosaurs walked the earth.

If anyone has any advice about where I can take my daughter in Tokyo to be cosmetically mutilated, I would greatly appreciate it. Thanks.

Withdrawal Symptoms

2011-07-25T05:38:00.000-07:00

It's my last week of work. My last Monday at Cow Bones.

I felt bad today....and I know why.

It's because I had a morning doctor's appointment at which they were going to draw blood so I couldn't have anything to eat or drink, including coffee -- and the latter is vital to my well-being.

I was stomping around the house this morning, yelling at the kids and slamming doors, and wondering what the hell was wrong with me, because I don't do stuff like that. [I mean, I don't do stuff like that ANYMORE, but long-time readers of this blog know I acted like that for an entire year when I lived apart from Hub in San Francisco.]

I realized the lack of coffee must be having a profound physical effect on me.

I reflected on this, and have to admit, I don't like the fact that I turn into a raging monster unless I partake of a brew made from dried beans. It seems so primitive, to be dependent on something like that.

Maybe my Mormon friends are onto something there?

On the other hand, my stomping and slamming and yelling so terrified my family that tonight I came home to a CLEAN house (cleaned by sullen teenagers, no less), and Hub made dinner. And now everyone is being really, really NICE to me.

So maybe I need to withdraw from coffee more often.

Failing at Facebook

2011-07-24T01:28:00.000-07:00

I lack the emotional strength/confidence to be good at any social networking that involves asking people for something.

Yes, I'm talking about "send friend request" on Facebook. I have rarely done this, because isn't it just another form of setting myself up for rejection?

I managed to get a respectable number of Facebook friends only because 1) I have teenagers, and their friends tend to send me friend requests, and 2) I have a blog, and get friend requests from people who read it and identify themselves as readers of my blog.

This has allowed me to get little glimpses into the lives of my kids' friends, as well as into some of the anonymous strangers who read this blog and don't have blogs of their own. I check in every once in a while and look at people's photos and such, and it's nice.

So now that I'm leaving my current company, I have resolved to be better at keeping up with Facebook. To this end, I've been sending out sporadic batches of friend requests lately.

I have to admit, I find this process quite taxing.

For example, there's one editor at work with whom I haven't worked particularly closely, but I like and respect him a lot. I've gotten to know him a bit better since the earthquake. Ordinarily, I would have no qualms about sending him a friend request.

But a while back, Facebook came up in a conversation with him, and he told that he NEVER friends anyone from work. This seemed like a very polite way to clearly say, "Do NOT send me a friend request, Lisa!"

I thought, fair enough --some people like to limit their Facebook communities to immediate family and close friends. So I didn't take this personally.

Except......I just noticed that this editor and I have NINE mutual friends, who appear to be people from work.

So now I feel bad.

And then.....I sent a friend request to another editor, one with whom I thought I was on friendly terms over the years, with whom I have 17 mutual friends. Weeks later, he still hasn't accepted it, which also makes me feel bad.

Does he just not go on Facebook much? That must be it, don't you think?
(Yeah, sure, whatever you want to tell yourself, Lisa....)

Is anyone else this neurotic about Facebook, or is it just me?

Expiration

2011-07-23T00:12:00.001-07:00

I have a friend who's pregnant now, with not so long to go, and she said she looks at the expiration dates on food and thinks, "By the time this expires, my baby will be here."

I am TOTALLY doing the same thing now. I'm looking at the milk in my fridge, and thinking, "By the time this milk expires, I will no longer be working for the news company that rhymes with Cow Bones."

It's a weird, sad feeling. I hadn't been looking for another job, but a better opportunity arose at just the right moment -- right at my two-year point, when I was asking what next.

I have one more week to go, then a week off, and then I start at the news company that rhymes with Goiters.

I gave 30 days notice, which is a long time. I feel like I already said goodbye to everyone, and now I'm just standing in the doorway.

Which...I am.

Radioactive cows? [UPDATED}

2011-07-20T06:03:00.000-07:00

I wrote my second-to-last Japan column today, on radioactive cows.

I am really going to miss writing a weekly column.

It's weird, still going in to work every day, knowing that I'll be gone soon....

[Oh, and by the way, the supermarket chain that sold radioactive beef in Tokyo is the one we shop at...Nope, not thinking about that....]

UPDATE: Someone left this comment on it:

"With all the death, suffering, and destruction the Japanese have endured because of this incident, I'm sure that they would agree that the flippant and insensitive tone of this article is insulting and unprofessional at the least and is an embarrassment to Market Watch and the American people."

I don't respond to most comments on my stories, but I really wish I could tell that person to BITE ME. However, ignoring it is probably best.

Survivors' Guilt?

2011-07-18T04:25:00.000-07:00

I've been thinking more about what I said in the post below, and the extent to which I truly do have survivors' guilt.

I was in Tokyo, not Tohoku -- not Miyagi, Iwate or Fukushima. The earthquake and radiation crisis were scary, but my family is fine. Lots and lots of families are not fine. Many will never be fine, and some are just gone.

Last week, I bought Big Son a long-sleeved shirt at a discount store. I commented to the woman at the register how hard it was to find long sleeves this time of year, and she asked me why I was looking, and I told her that me and my son were going to volunteer in the disaster zone.

And she gave me the 500 yen shirt for 300 yen, because I was volunteering. GUILT! I ended up buying a tee-shirt and socks and two pairs of sports shorts there, just to feel less guilty. Why should I get special treatment, just for a few hours of work?

Then on the way back on Sunday evening, at a roadside service area in Miyagi, there was a garden stand and I bought some plants to put in front of our building. They were incredibly cheap, compared to Tokyo prices.

I chatted with the older man at the register (why YES, I do make a habit of taking to everyone) and I mentioned I was on a volunteer trip.

And he gave me a huge discount on the already cheap plants. GUILT! Ugh, I felt like paying full price and running away.

But you know what's worse than guilt? COMPETITIVE VOLUNTEERING.

There are volunteers who live in tents, eschew comfort and convenience and dedicate their lives to clearing tsunami debris. Some of them look askance at those of us who do these weekend trips, and stay in our comfy hotels.

Hey, if sleeping rough were the only way to volunteer, I would do it. But if I have the option of paying my own money to sleep on a soft surface at a place with a nice hot bath -- not to mention, supporting a hotel whose business is down, due to the disaster, and is happy for my patronage -- I see no shame in that.

But the rancor is real. At the end of our volunteer trip this time, I offered my used leather work gloves to the volunteer group leader, and asked if his group needed them. I figured, the mud will never wash off completely, and when I volunteer again, I could buy a new pair -- and I figured the group must go through lots and lots of work gloves. Indeed, he said that yes, he would take them.

Another Japanese volunteer watched this conversation, and afterward, approached me.

"I want to ask you to wash your dirty gloves before you give them to him. He doesn't need your garbage," she said to me in English.

I explained I was heading back to Tokyo and had nowhere to wash them, or I would have.

"I'm staying at the volunteer center," she said. "They have plenty of gloves. They're always complaining about people like you, who volunteer for a short time and bother them with such trifles."

All right, then.

I continued to talk to her, more out of curiosity than goodwill. It turned out, she was from Nara, and had a close friend from Ishinomaki whose house was damaged, and this inspired her to come up to spend some time volunteering herself. So she obviously meant well, overall, even though she had decided that I was the epitome of the inconsiderate weekend volunteer and decided to let me have it.

Several of the other Japanese weekend volunteers overheard our conversation, and said they couldn't believe how rudely she spoke to me.

But I couldn't get upset -- I figured, it wasn't about me. She didn't even know me.

It's easy to look at tsunami damage, and feel shaken to one's core, that life is unfair -- and it's easy to take this feeling out on others.

And Big Son? All he cared about was that there are lots and lots of six- and eight-legged critters crawling around in the stinky debris, and I think this traumatized him even more than any of the unbearably sad things we saw this weekend (with the possible exception of the memorial at Okawa Elementary School, where 74 of 108 students and 10 of 13 teachers and staff are dead or still missing).

Do I feel guilty that I brought him along with me?

No way!

Someday, he'll look back and appreciate it. And hopefully in the meantime, he won't have too many nightmares about all the scary bugs he saw.

Back to the ZONE

2011-07-14T07:46:00.001-07:00

Yeah, I'm going back up there Friday night, on the all-night miserable bus this time.

Gonna shovel some more mud. I'll bring Big Son with me this time.

I suppose this is all about confronting my fears and assuaging my survivor's guilt -- volunteering in Tohoku really felt good.

I'm going to do it as often as I can.

So the happy moth is flying right into the flame of what drove her insane, those first few months after the disaster.

More travels down Memory Lane

2011-07-13T01:01:00.000-07:00

Okay, you want to know the reason why I was asking about "The Witch of Blackbird Pond?"

I am from the Connecticut town in which it's set. A high school friend of mine said on Facebook, "I've found that practically nobody's heard of the Witch of Blackbird Pond outside of... um... basically the 061xx zip code."

This friend is a guy. Guys didn't read that book. Or did they? I don't think they did.

Anyway, the results of my informal poll prove conclusively to me that one of my favorite childhood books was not as obscure as my friend thinks. Maybe it was no "Little House on the Prairie," but it certainly had readers outside our zip code.

Okay, here's yet another blast from the past:

I've always wanted to write, "It's raining yen," and... I just did, in what will be one of my last Japan columns.

Does anyone else remember that song, who is not either a gay man or someone who went to a women's college in the '80's?