Monthly Archives: January 2016

Eat Food, Get Gas

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One of the things I liked about Mississippi was that it’s acceptable for a young gentleman to take his date to a gas station for a meal.

The funny part is, I never took my then girlfriend to a gas station for dinner. Instead I got her catfish in the back of a grocery store. I also tried to convince other people to go there.

As I understand it, this a common phenomenon in the South and stems partly from the fluctuation in oil and gas prices, the need for income diversity and an exploitation of the Southern love of automobiles.

Oddly, when I was in Oxford, I never went to a gas station for a meal and I consider that a terrible mistake. I was more prone to get fast food rather than go next door and get ribs and an oil check.

My favorite place, though, was Taylor Grocery, which is outside of Oxford, Ms and is accessed by a creepy tree-lined road where you keep expecting to see an in-bred kid playing a banjo and Bill McKinney telling you to “squeal like a pig”. (Although, technically, that’s the kind of thing that happens in Georgia.)

At the back of the tiny grocery store is a restaurant that serves terrific catfish and hush-puppies and, if I remember correctly, allows you to bring your own wine but not your own beer. You might have to wait in line and at some point are expected to write on the walls.

I also tried to convince Mom and Dad Two to try it, although that suggestion was met with skepticism. Mom Two is from Cape Cod and considers mushy fish to be either a form of bait or a form or garbage. Eventually they went and said they’d liked it.

Now, in Japan, the closest I get to a good meal in a gas station is a coffee shop in a gas station and the rest areas on the expressways.

It’s not quite the same, though.

 

The Parade of Fashionable Approval

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Today I got to put on a fashion show which is not something I usually do. I also got to play fashion critic which, as a dad, is part of my job description

Today was our day to, at long last, go out and go shopping. After the weight loss, I needed clothes that fit, rather than clothes that made look as if I’d grabbed large sacks and bound them them to my body with rope. Mind you, when I’m at home that look doesn’t bother me much. It also doesn’t bother me much when we’re out shopping, but it doesn’t look the best at work. She Who Must Be Obeyed was getting her Christmas present and our youngest was getting “the Christmas Presents That Suck” (clothes, socks, underwear, etc.)

However, before we left, she dressed up in a short skirt and our oldest’s knee socks which became thigh socks on our youngest. I went “that skirt’s too short” and SWMBO went “those stockings are too sexy” and I went “The stockings wouldn’t matter if the skirt was longer.” In the end, over my protests, our youngest got to keep the skirt but had to change socks.

Our oldest was staying home “to study”.

We went one station away to go to a large Uniqlo which offers clothes that meet my basic clothes requirements (especially for work clothes): 1) cheap, 2) boring, 3) no logos. If you want me to wear your logo, you can pay me to do so, not charge me more for the “privilege” of being your unpaid billboard. (Note: if anyone is interested in making me their paid billboard please contact me here.)

After shopping, we all made our own way home (ping pong was involved; long story) and I told our oldest to take a break from studying. (Ha ha ha. Not really. I actually ended her long break.)

Once everyone was home, we underwent the traditional “parade of approval” where we put on and showed off our newly acquired wares and made ready to take things back if they didn’t receive enthusiastic approval.

Oddly, all my clothes received approval. They must be more boring than I thought.

Only a Fool Like Me Goes Twice

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There is a Japanese saying I heard once along the lines of “He who climbs Mount Fuji is a wise man; He who climbs it twice is a fool.” A similar thing can be said about visiting Graceland.

I of course, have visited Graceland twice which means, well, yeah, pretty much.

The first time I went to Graceland I went because I felt it was something I ought to do. I lived in Oxford, Mississippi and had friends from Albania (Mom and Dad Two) who lived in Memphis and they agreed to drive me to Graceland, but wouldn’t go back inside. Instead Dad Two sat in the cafe across the street (which served Elvis specialties like deep-fried peanut butter and banana sandwiches) and drank coffee whilst I went inside.

I visited the car museum and the planes (both of which are worth a visit) and then crossed the street to the mansion.

A couple things struck me about the mansion. First, except for the jungle room, and some random leopard skin, it was less gaudy than I was expecting, or at least I was surprised by how it all seemed to work. Also, I remember how bored the room guides were. They weren’t tour guides, instead they were human tape players who waited in a room and recited the same speech many times a day and had grown bored and robotic about it all. When the young woman explained how Elvis saw the jungle furniture and decided to build a room around it, she could have been a text to speech computer.

The second time I went with my father and step-mother. That time the bored human tape players had been replaced with actual tape players (with headphones) and Priscilla Presley’s voice guided visitors through the mansion and the museum of Elvis guitars and jumpsuits. There were two problems with this.

First, many tourists followed the tapes so exactly that when Priscilla Presley told them to move they moved. She didn’t tell them to look though, so I got stepped on and bumped into a lot.

Second, the recordings couldn’t be hurried. You moved at Priscilla Presley’s pace and no faster. If you weren’t interested in the subtleties of the American Eagle jumpsuits from the Aloha Via Satellite from Hawaii concert, you were out of luck. You had to listen to the explanation before you got to move to the Mexican Sundial jumpsuit.

I ended up just letting the tape run and moved along at my own pace. This though, proved rather creepy, as I found myself surrounded by people who moved silently when Priscilla Presley told them to. I also got to visit a back building that had been closed the first time I visited.

I recommend everyone visit Graceland once, mostly because Memphis is worth visiting. Graceland is in a rough neighborhood, though, and don’t go in mid-August around the anniversary of Elvis death unless you have a place to stay. That’s when all the Elvis fans and Elvis impersonators do their annual hajj to Graceland. It’s kind of fun, but you’ll never get a room and you never, ever, criticize Harum Scarum.

 

 

All By My Lonesome

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Although I usually like having time to myself, today it was kind of annoying.

At the school where I work today was make-up exams. Any student who gets a 3 (21-30%) as his final score for the term must, in theory, take the make-up exam. If a student gets a 4 (31-40%) he has the option of taking the exam. A 4 is considered a passing grade, although in English classes it’s not high enough to get an automatic recommendation to the attached university (that requires a 6). If a student passes the make-up exam, he can push his grade up one mark.

The problems occur when the student has a 4 because he’s missed a third or more of the total classes. These students get to take the exam but, because they have a habit of missing things, the odds of them showing up for the make-up exam are very slim.

That’s what happened to me today. I got up at a decent hour and then made my way to the school where I printed off my exam paper and did some prep work. At exam time, I found the room early and turned on the heater (which I don’t always do during a make-up exam because that’s the kind of cruel person I am…).

The student didn’t arrive early and at exam time, I found myself standing in the classroom by myself. The problem was, I couldn’t actually leave until the exam time was over (which I learned the term before). If the student had arrived with five minutes left, I would have to give him the exam and then collect it five minutes later.

Instead, I camped out at the front and did a little writing and a little planning. I also looked up a few things on my cellphone, which I’d brought anticipating this happening. The only student who came by was a student who wanted to take a picture of the blackboard and tomorrow’s special exam schedule.

After exam time, I entered an X on the OCR form and turned it in. I then headed out to do nothing for a little while until my evening class. I’d rather have done nothing at home, so maybe this was the student’s payback for his having received a low score.

Being Present Yet Phoning it in

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Today was the first meeting I’ve ever been to where everyone seemed to phone it in, including the people in charge of the meeting.

I’ve mentioned before how the Company For Which I Work (not its real name) has for the last few years, been requiring us to attend odd little training meetings during what used to be time off. The meetings are mostly useless and seem to exist to justify the employment of one or more people above us. Usually, the only useful part is the  sharing session where we pass around lessons that have worked and therefore get a selection of proven ideas.

Today, though, we were expected to describe how last year went–fine except for problems caused by you guys–and then watched a video of a poor gentleman dying in front of a class in what appeared to be a last minute change of schedule. Although the video clip was entertaining in an “I feel you pain” kind of way, it’s the kind of thing I hate doing at meetings such as these. It’s like having a professional baseball player studying a worse player’s batting style and saying “don’t do that” and calling it training.

There was some interesting politics where a couple teachers told us they would lose their positions because the company lost the contract but the company was trying to find them other placements. Why the positions were lost had us taking bets on when the school would come back to CFWIW and beg for trained teachers. (I can’t give more details than that except to say that private schools seemed to have discovered a way to get the free teachers from the JET Programme; the schools then discover that not all foreigners are trained language teachers.)

When we got the sharing part, most of us didn’t have handouts. We just got up and talked about the lesson or activity and promised to deliver it by email if anyone was interested. I tried to get copies of mine, but had technical issues meshed with a lack of incentives to deal with the issues so I just got up and talked.

When time was up, we bolted for the train station and home. We get to do this again in April (for orientation) and then in July (for no reason whatsoever).

Watching When I Eat After Not Watching What I Ate

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One of the hard parts about going to the in-laws, especially when you’ve changed the way you eat, is they still treat you as if nothing has changed, even if they comment on the results.

The other problem is, you pick up bad habits again.

After a week at the in-laws I can say I gained just over two kilograms (about 4.4 pounds). The main culprit was beer. Even though I cut back what they usually try to to serve me, there was still more than I’m used to drinking.

There were also a lot more carbs than I’d gotten used to the previous 140 or so days. For that matter, there was a lot more food. They commented every time I ate carbs without noticing that carbs was all I’d been offered. My choices were carbs or not. One morning I didn’t even get that choice when I got handed handed a bowl of ozoni with a rice cake in it.

I kept up a token daily exercise routine, but because there were always people around, and my usual workout space was being used in its official capacity as a family shrine during the new year, it was hard to follow a regular schedule. Also, my usual sleep pattern has been disrupted which messed with my physical state as well.

That would have been fine, but the last thing that contributed to the weight gain was a combination of boredom and easily available tasty sweets with no healthier alternatives. The boredom came because we didn’t do much this time. We usually go shopping a couple times and then go skiing once, but none of us were in the mood to ski. This time, though, I was mostly just sitting around watching people watch the various new year’s marathon relays whilst Mother of She Who Must Be Obeyed handed out sweets from gift boxes. Unfortunately, this is the first year they didn’t have pile of mixed nuts available and, because we didn’t go shopping, I didn’t have a chance to grab any. This all led to bored eating which didn’t help me maintain my weight.

All this threw off my new eating habits. I now find myself, even when I’ve been working on something, trying to track down easily available sweets. This is complicated by the fact I haven’t had a chance to go shopping and pick up some healthy alternatives.

Today was better, but I found myself reaching for cookies and chocolate more than once. Luckily I only picked them up once.

A Sudden Loss of New Rhythm

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I was oddly out of rhythm today even though I hadn’t been out of my old rhythm that long.

One of the odd things about being away at the in-laws is that the first day back is a day of trying to find my old rhythm. I’ve got my real chair back, I’ve got things to do that I planned at the in-laws (especially this time as there wasn’t much to do), and I’ve got clothes to unpack and put back and a lot of dusting to do.

Today, though, I couldn’t find any rhythm at all. I started to do a few things but quickly side-tracked myself. The list of things I’d made to do suddenly seemed distant and I had to remember where I’d put it and then had to remember what a certain list item meant and why I’d put it there. What’s odd about this is we were only there five days. However, we didn’t do much, which I think put me in a lazy rhythm.

I managed to get the coming term planned and tried to figure out when I need to be a the company I work for so that I can attend the latest in a string of useless compliance tests, er, “training sessions taught by people with less experience than I”. The resentment from that didn’t help motivate me the rest of the day.

Eventually I realized that the girls–who are still on vacation–needed feeding which reminded me that I needed feeding. Unfortunately, there was nothing in the house to cook. After that issue was resolved–She Who Must Be Obeyed had plans but neglected to tell us before she went to her part time job–I went back to ignoring the list.

Now it’s late and I have dishes to do. I also need to think about getting back into my usual work sleep pattern. I can do that tomorrow, though. Or is it today? Time all runs together this time of year so I’m not actually sure.

 

For the Trains Not the People

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I can imagine a world where trains run without people and the people running the trains are happy about that.

Our trip home today confirmed one of my long time theses about life in Japan: Japan Rail understands trains but it doesn’t understand people.

The problems actually began before we even left for the trip. She Who Must Be Obeyed managed to get all the tickets for the trip except, oddly, for the first leg of the return trip. Apparently Japan Rail East and Japan Rail West, although part of the same group of companies no longer cooperate enough that it’s no longer possible to buy tickets for one on the website of the other. (This hasn’t been a problem in the past.)

Keep in mind we were traveling in the U-Turn Rush on what is arguably the busiest travel day of the year as most company workers go back to work tomorrow. You would think a little cooperation would be be in order. But JR doesn’t think that way.

Instead we had to buy tickets at the station and the machine wouldn’t take SWMBO’s 1,000 yen notes and we had to use an actual person.

The trips on the local trains were fine but when we got to the bullet train the first thing we noticed was the usual omiyage (souvenir) stands were gone. This was a surprise because one of the last things Japanese do on their way home is buy gifts for friends and for the office. Also, as was mentioned yesterday, most kids are flush with cash and looking to spend. Instead, we had to go to a convenience store and get some gifts.

The biggest surprise, to me anyway, was on the train.

As soon as we departed the station a voice from the speakers informed us that there would be no food or drinks sold on the train. This means there’d be no drink cart roaming the aisles. This was a surprise because I’ve been on trains packed so full of people it almost counted as an orgy and been ordered out of the way by the cart lady as she tried to make her rounds. Getting out of her way required a level of intimacy with nearby passengers that probably violated several Japanese laws and makes me legally betrothed to several men, women and children.

This time, though, the aisles were empty but no cart came.

Luckily, in one of our stations the main omiyage and food courts were open and we were able to grab supper. They, of course, are actually interested in making money. Apparently JR is still in a hangover from its government owned days and isn’t that interested in profit.

 

Cash is King After Christmas

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One of the reasons Christmas isn’t that big of a deal in Japan is that the real presents come in small envelopes on New Year’s Day.

I’ve mentioned before how part of the New Year’s tradition is for relatives to hand out envelopes full of cash to their nieces, nephews and random cousins. The tradition is called otoshidama and can make discipline rather problematic at the end of the year. After all, it’s hard to threaten “no Christmas presents for you this year” when your kids know their grandparents and the aunt they only see once a year are going to hook them up with loads of cash just a week later.

Although traditions vary from family to family, it’s generally understood that the older the child, the greater the cash reward. For example, our in-laws dealt out 15,000 yen ($124) to three young relatives: 7,000 went to the oldest child, 5,000 to the middle and 3,000 to the youngest. With immediate relatives the amounts get larger. Our girls both got 10,000 yen ($83ish) from their grandparents (and that’s only the money we know about).

Our youngest's early takings: 22,000 yen or about $182.

Our youngest’s early takings: 22,000 yen or about $182. More came later. 

After the otoshidama is handed out, our girls have become masters at disappearing the money so that we cannot find it. However, they understand that the bulk of the money will go into savings not stuff. Mind you “understanding” and “following through” are much different things and we usually have to “encourage” them to hand over the money. (We also know most of their hiding places…)

The cut off date for receiving otoshidama varies from family to family. Some stop giving the cash when the kids start university; others when they turn 20 (the age of adulthood); others after the kids graduate university. I’ve had at least one 24 year old student in her second year of her first job claim that she still received otoshidama from her parents and grandparents.

At this point, all the envelopes have been received and our oldest has 47,000 yen ($389) and our youngest, I suspect, has well over 35,000 yen ($290). From what I’ve heard from students at the school where I work and the other school where I work this is about average.

This, of course, means that drinks are on our girls when we head home.

Food, Alcohol and In-laws

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This post is written under the influence of alcohol, too much food and lots of in-laws. These things are all realted and I’m not sure which is more fatal.

Despite my success in losing weight, I’d always planned on New Year’s Eve and New Year’s Day being cheat days. I’d keep up with a token exercise habit but give in to a substantial amount of temptation.

I didn’t realize the temptation would be so substantial.

Yesterday’s supper was temaki sushi (aka hand roll or “roll your own” sushi). This is one of my favorite foods and although I horrify Mother of She Who Must Be Obeyed by spreading a mere shmere of rice on the seaweed paper, I still managed to consume more carbs than I’ve been doing lately.

Then there was the booze my brother-in-law bought me. I had to consume that, too, as we waited for the new year to arrive.

Today began with the traditional ozoni. This is a stew with lots of vegetables on top of toasted rice cakes. There was also a few ounces of sake. Later, a few distant in-laws stopped by and that meant I got to consume beer, mostly to keep the visitor from having to drink an entire liter of beer. This meant that by 10:30 a.m. I’d had a few ounces of sake and a lot of beer (a technical term) and was feeling kind of mellow.

The evening brought the full complement of immediate in-laws which meant we had a full family of serious eaters and drinkers. Although I usually resist such challenges, keep in mind I’d already been drinking, and decided to remind them why I used to be bigger which, well, yeah.

Supper was osechi, which I’ve written about before, and yakiniku, which we hand fried on a griddle in the middle of the table. I ate a lot of that whilst explaining that, no, really, I was actually watching what I ate and explaining how I’d lost so much weight. That explanation was followed by fried noodles and cheap cake. (Yes, I ate some because “cheesecake” and “weakness”.)

One of the three trays of osechi. This one includes chili squid, and

One of the three trays of osechi. This one includes chili squid, teriyaki chicken and caramel walnuts.

The second of the two trays

The second of the two trays. This one includes salmon, potato salad, fried pork and potato salad.

Along the way we went through two bottles of sparkling wine (one of which was blue), two bottles of beaujolais nouveau and at least one can of beer. Now I’m sipping some bourbon and trying to remain coherent. (Not that these posts have ever been coherent, but there you are.)

No, really, this sparkling wine is blue. (It's also a bit sweet, but not terribly so.)

No, really, this sparkling wine is blue. (It’s also a bit sweet, but not terribly so.)

Tomorrow will probably be shopping, which completes the final stage of consumption.