Category Archives: Life and Stuff

Every Day is Vaguely the Same

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If you ever want to verify that you need to shake things up in your life, keep a diary. If you want to make the sameness even more horrifying, try keeping a log in different colored inks.

I’ve mentioned before how I’m not a big fan of keeping a diary (with apologies to all my history professors who consider such items to be an important part of history which is why I hope historians will some day find my diary and wonder if I could actually fly) but have decided to experiment with keeping a daily log, where I record events and my thoughts on them soon after they happen. To do so, I use different colored inks for different events. Weather is usually done in Noodler’s Midway Blue and Apache Sunset and my morning routing and morning pages are done in either purple or green.

This not only gives the log some visual flair but also lets me test different inks and pens on the Muji paper.

Now, at four months of making regular entries, I’ve begun to notice flaws in the plan.

Part of the trouble is I only have a few inks. After several days, each page looks similar to the ones before and after and I even seem to dedicate the same amount of space to the same events, including meals and complaining about work. This means despite my efforts to make it interesting have instead made it kind of boring.

Also, because my work days don’t change much from week to week, it’s easy to fall into a foolish consistency in the way I describe them and complain about them. Classes are either crappy, ordinary bad, decent or better than normal. I’m wasting time, fretting over wasting time, writing about wasting time or, on occasion, actually doing something. It’s the same “Okay day” metronome click click click that made me stop keeping diaries in the first place.

Now, there are a few solutions to this:

A–Buy more ink.
B–Try different ways of keeping a log.
C–Both A and B.
D–A and B plus buy a new pen.
E–Abandon this and keep a calendar like a normal person.

As much as I should probably choose E and would like an excuse to choose D, I’m leaning toward C. I do like having a personal history on hand to occasionally peruse, but since the log is supposed to be an experiment, I’m feeling the need to shake it up a bit. No more descriptions of food, I’d rather draw what I ate. No more sloppy sketches of the weather, I’d rather make the sun into a character with regular expressions and a consistent look.

Hopefully, in four months, I won’t have chosen E, but there are days.

A Wedding with Bureaucracy but no Counselling

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Because of a wedding ceremony, my late grandmother left her church.

I’ve mentioned before how fifteen years ago She Who Must Be Obeyed and I had bureaucratic issues on the day we chose for our official wedding day. That was then followed by two more wedding ceremonies. The first ceremony, the one in the USA, had its own bureaucratic problems.

The original plan for the US wedding was reasonably simple. We’d play dress up and rather than a ceremony there’d be a reception, cake, presents, and sparkling wine of some sort. However, one relative or another insisted we be married in a church even though we were already married.

This seemed like a simple idea, and even I thought it was a good idea, but the Lutheran church involved wasn’t as impressed. They insisted we go through wedding counseling with representatives from the church. This counseling could be done in Japan with a local representative but SWMBO and I would be required to go through individual counseling not couple’s counseling. After my mom explained this my reaction was, and I believe this was a direct quote, “No fucking way.”

After washing my mouth out with soap at my mother’s insistence (as a requirement for continuing the conversation/remaining her son) I explained that all they were trying to do was convert SWMBO. I’ve been subjected to a religious “intervention” before (it’s part of the reason I’m more a supporter of religion than churches–more on that in another post.) and I wasn’t going to let that happen to SWMBO especially as we were already married.

After much negotiation on the US side of the issue, my grandmother threw her hands up and said “fuck this” (knowing her, she probably actually said that) and stopped going to that church.

Instead we went to a Methodist church where the pastor did everything she could (not a typo) to make sure we and She Who Must Be Obeyed’s family were taken care of.

No counseling was required, although there are days I think it might have been a good idea…

NOTE: Correction 5/27/2015. Originally stated we went to a Lutheran church when, in fact, it was a Methodist church.

Signs of a Struggle are Not Always What They Seem

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A friend of mine kept house so badly that people used to say that if he ever disappeared police would look at his room and declare there was evidence of struggle. That pretty much describes our apartment right now.

As the weather changes from Static to Pleasant, with periodic fits of Humid and Awesome in the same day, we are in the annual “Changing of the Clothes”. This is a process that involves opening the top cabinets of our closets and taking down several soft cases full of summer clothes. Those clothes end up in the living room whilst they are sorted into various piles: fits, doesn’t fit, could fit, give away to someone it might fit, and yes the baby clothes really need to go so give them away to someone with an actual baby because NO WE ARE NOT. (Something like that.)

Then the winter clothes are sorted into fits, full of holes, you only wore this once last winter, you didn’t wear this at all, and really, you think that still fits? Those clothes are then put in the soft cases and returned to the cabinet above the closets.

The problem is this process requires both our girls to be on hand and that’s not always possible once school starts. Also, because She Who Must Be Obeyed is now working she’s not always at home to sort the clothes. (Note: She won’t let me near them.)

There is also the problem of putting the heavy blankets away in the variety room closet which requires moving the “secondary storage” pile in front of the door and then moving a few boxes and putting the blankets away on top of the kerosene heaters and the electric carpet. Because this is currently a complicated process, we try to do it as few times as possible and won’t do it until everything is ready.

The problem right now is that with the clothes stacked up, we haven’t had time to clean and put away the electric carpet. Also, because we haven’t been able to finish the carpet, we’re also backed up on revamping the emergency supplies which means more stuff is scattered about the variety room than usual.

Yes, there are signs of a struggle, just not what you’d expect.

There’s a First Time for Everything

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It’s very rare that I find myself feeling relaxed after a school event, but today was one of those rare days. Today was sports day at our youngest’s school and it was remarkable for a series of firsts.

First, I somehow managed to get through a sporting event without getting angry. This is partly because, for the first time ever, I didn’t encounter any aggressive jerks or assholes. I’m not sure why this was, but the weather was almost perfect. It was 27 Celsius (81 Fahrenheit) and not humid at all. This made people more relaxed and calm, I suspect.

Second, for the first time ever, at any school I’ve been to in Japan, the schedule ran on time. Lunch started when it was supposed to and ended when it was supposed to In fact, things were moving so swiftly, I almost didn’t make it back from lunch in time to see our youngest take part in the Typhoon Race (which involves four people carrying a pole around a couple cones and then under and over everyone else on the team. Long story.) I’d budgeted for the usual “Well get there eventually” schedule and arrived fashionably late only to find out I was actually late.

Third, our youngest was chosen to design the flag for her class. This is also the first year the classes had flags.

The flag our youngest designed.

The flag our youngest designed.

Fourth, it was a close contest. For those who don’t know, on sports day the school is divided into the Red Team and the White Team. (Our youngest was on the white team.) Everyone competes in the events and the teams earn points based on how they place in the events. (Some events are individual, some are team events.) The prize is a trophy and bragging rights. This year the white team won by only 20 points. This, I believe, is the closest contest I remember.

The final results at the top. Red 660. White 680. (Notice our youngest's flag on the left.)

The final results at the top. Red 660. White 680. (Notice our youngest’s flag on the right, second from the top.)

Fifth, our youngest, for the first time ever, won her heat in the 80 meter dash. (Each class is divided into heats and the winners of each heat get a red ribbon and their team gets points.) Our youngest traditionally has not done well in the running. Last year she was second; this year she won, although she still has a bad habit of slowing down before the tape instead of running through it.

Our youngest crossing the tape. (After slowing down, of course.)

Our youngest (left) crossing the tape. (After slowing down, of course.) She just edged out a red team member.

After the Typhoon Race, our youngest watches the pole pass over everyone. You can see the red ribbon on her shoulder.

Our youngest in a later event. You can see the red ribbon of victory pinned to her shoulder.

Now we get five months to rest before our oldest’s school has her sports day. I usually don’t get angry during that one. (More on that in a future post.)

 

Abandoning that Paper Thing and Hoping the Batteries Last

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Well, maybe it was a waste of time after all.

I’ve written before about my odd (to most normal people) habit/hobby of constructing my own analogue calendars, entering the dates by hand and then crossing off the days as I go along. It takes a couple hours of work (plus or minus several minutes of swearing at various complications) to get it more or less how I want it.

Have fun now, because your days are probably numbered. No pun intended.

Have fun now, because your days are probably numbered. No pun intended. (No, really, they are numbered.)

Normally I carry it around and scribble To Do lists and random daily tasks and record correspondence and then use it as reference to remind me where I was and when. In the past I also kept all my calendars as a reference.  For the record, on one occasion I actually had to refer to them to establish the most likely possible day the term would end and summer would begin allowing a colleague to make travel plans. (Therefore hoarding, for want of a better word, is good. Hoarding  works.)

I also mentioned, though, that I’d also started using Google Calendar as a back up.

The trouble is, this year, I’ve been using the back up more than the analogue version. I can use it on my phone and my tablet and can use it on different browsers. It’s easy to change and I can make corrections without having to track down some correction tape. and leave evidence of my mistakes everywhere.

Lately, the analogue calendar has been carried but not consulted. Every now and then I remind myself to look through it and cross off the days, but that doesn’t inspire me to use it.

I’m now at the point where I’m ready to pull it apart and salvage what I can. (I can also just turn it backwards and upside down and use it for morning pages.) I am, however, struggling with the sunk cost fallacy. which in my case can be summed up as “I made the thing and even though I don’t use it I have to carry it so that didn’t waste my time making it even though I don’t use it because carrying it is symbolic of me having made it to use even though I don’t use it.” Something like that.

Now, if you’ll excuse me, I have to enter the destruction date in my Google Calendar. I just hope the batteries last in my phone.

 

Morning Pages for Worse and for Better

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Several months ago, as part of a plan to write more, I decided to try my hand at writing morning pages. I quickly modified them but I’m not sure if that was for the better.

For those who don’t know, “morning pages” are the brainchild of Julia Cameron from her book The Artist’s Way. To do morning pages you’re supposed to wake up, pick up a notebook and knock out three pages of writing without putting any thought, grammar or punctuation into it. (Rather like this blog, at times, now that I think about it.) The theory is that you’re essentially performing a kind of brain dump and cleansing your mind of whatever flows from your fingers and your pen. You then are supposed to throw away the completed notebook.

I tried the pages that way for a while but then eventually felt as if I was wasting time with them.  I’d zone out, nearly fall asleep, and long for coffee. Most of my early pages were along the lines of  “I need coffee I need coffee I need coffee I need coffee sweet mother of Jesus I need coffee coffee coffee coffee my kingdom for coffee my soul for coffee your soul for coffee death to all who refuse to bring me coffee no coffee no life no coffee no God decafen, decaffinated, decaf coffee is evil and freaking hard to spell.” (Something like that.) Basically, it was all the kinds of navel gazing that kept me from writing morning pages in the first place. (In fact, it’s the same thing that kept me from writing a blog for a long time and still keeps me from writing a proper diary.)

That lasted for about a tablet and a half. Since then I’ve modified my morning pages routine. I write on A4 copy paper pads I assembled myself from scrap paper and I don’t start writing until I’ve showered and had at least one sip of coffee. My goal is two A4 pages in half an hour, although I’ve been known to take longer on weekends and days I don’t have to be into work early.

I change pens every day so I have a chance to do long term tests of different pens, nibs and inks on cheap copy paper. I also write different types of pages. There are the whiny brain dumps where I complain about life in general; the pen reviews where I describe how it feels to write with the various pens; and the focused writing.

In the latter I focus on whatever particular project I happen to be working on. I sketch characters and scenes and brainstorm ideas for different plots and different characters. If anything seems particularly useful and legible, I underline it and then go back and type into a computer file. I’ve managed to get some useful stuff that way.

If I were smart, I’d brainstorm one of these blog entries and kill two birds with one stone, so to speak. But, if you’re a regular reader of this blog, you know I’m not that smart.

 

 

Rules at School and the Law at Home

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Today, She Who Must Be Obeyed invoked school rules to explain why she’d confiscated our oldest’s Android tablet. I was prepared invoke my own rule that “when it becomes a problem Daddy makes the problem go away.” Unfortunately, I was already too late to make much of an impact other than point a finger and say “yeah, and don’t you forget it” at a teenager who wasn’t actually listening.

One of the things non-Japanese find difficult is the abundance of rules, both written and unwritten, involved with having a child in a Japanese school. These rules can be annoying and seem like interference in family affairs. (Which they are, sort of. You’ll see.)

For example, although there is no official curfew, students are expected to be home at a certain time. Parents take turns going out and policing parks and other popular hangouts to remind the kids it’s time to get home. If you gave permission for a child to stay out late, that gets around and you might hear about it at the next Parent/Teacher conference.

Since this week is mid-term exams at our oldest’s school, the powers what are at the school have asked students not to waste time on electronics until after the exams.

Although this seems like a good idea, I find it has a couple problems:

First, we’d already imposed our own ban. (More on that later.)

Second, the way the school suggestion is phrased, it allows for students to debate what the meaning of “is” is and argue that since they’ve studied a while they now get tablet time. Our oldest, for example, has interpreted the ban as allowing her to use her now neglected Nintendo 3DS and its limited internet access. (Her motto seems to be “No Twitter/No Life”. to which I respond with “Yeah, and don’t you forget it.”)

Third, once the exams are over the assumption is that the ban is over once and for all forever until the final exams. This, however, is false as our local ban will not be over.

Since our local ban will not be over–long story involving broken charging cords; stolen power cords; tablets stolen from She Who Must Be Obeyed; passwords on all our electronics; and Line calls from friends at 1:45 in the morning–we will almost certainly be involved in a fight over the appropriate amount of time allocated for tablet use.

In the end, though, I will make it all go away as I can simply change all the passwords. However, if the problem persists I’ll find a way to configure our wireless hub to accept only certain MAC codes and reject others (say, hypothetically, those on a certain teenager’s tablet and/or 3DS). I prefer this way because it allows me to turn access on and off without having to memorize a new password. (Enforcing rules, after all, shouldn’t be THAT inconvenient.)

And don’t you forget it.

The International Bank of Dad’s Good Intentions

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At some point when our oldest was still in elementary school, I came up with this plan to teach her something about money. The results have been mixed.

The plan was to give her an allowance based on her age. She got 100 yen per month for each year of her life. When she was eight, she got 800 yen per month and then she got 900 yen per month when she turned nine.

There were also a couple rules. First, she had to save 10% of her allowance (after doing the math to figure out what that was) and she had to set 10% aside to donate to those in need. This rule also applied to Christmas cash, New Year’s Money and any birthday cash.

I started referring to the 10% donation as “money for sick people” and when I say that, She Who Must Be Obeyed immediately starts coughing and saying “I’m sick. I’m sick” and I have to hide the money and pretend she doesn’t know where it is.

In addition to all that, I founded the International Bank of Dad. The 10% deposit in the bank, along with any extra savings, earns 5% interest per month. This means 100 yen will have earned an extra 80 yen at the end of the year. (No you may not open an account with IBOD; but if you have any bailout money, please send it.)

When our oldest entered junior high I doubled the money (she gets her age x 100 every two weeks now) and scaled the interest back to something I could actually afford.

When our youngest turned eight we started the age X 100 yen per month plan.

The mixed results come from a couple things, first She Who Must Be Obeyed was amused by all this but not especially dedicated to it. It was, and is, as far as she’s concerned, my hobby and not her problem.

Also, although she did well at first, our oldest is now a teenager which means, by default she’s a Keynesian and her motto is “Spend Baby Spend”. Being a true Keynesian, she’s also taken to borrowing from She Who Must Be Obeyed for larger purchases. (It’s amazing what you can do with other people’s money.)  Unfortunately, SWMBO usually makes the loan without actually working out the terms and arguments ensue.

Our oldest also confiscated money intended to be split with our youngest, although she simultaneously denies this whilst claiming our youngest donated that voluntarily.

The International Bank of Dad has intervened in a few instances by paying allowance directly to She Who Must Be Obeyed or keeping a large portion of it and facing the brunt of the argument.

I suspect that eventually the International Bank of Dad will be forced to intervene more fully. Debtors prison (dishes and housecleaning) and confiscation (her tablet will be mine) will ensue.

 

Another Fine Mess was Made

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In my daily log today, the weather doodle looks like the sun is barfing up a fur ball of flames. This is absurd, of course, because it’s not yet August when the sun actually does barf up flames all over Japan.

Instead the mess was made by a pen burping.

One of the charms/curses of owning and regularly using fountain pens, especially if you use bottled ink,  is that you will, no matter how careful you are, get ink on your fingers eventually. Sometimes, even if you’ve been careful, the pen takes it upon itself to make a mess.

Today as I was adding rays to my sun doodle, my Noodler’s Konrad fountain pen suddenly decided to burp up Noodler’s Apache Sunset ink in a heavy glob that sent me looking for tissue. As I dabbed the mess, ink soaked through the tissue and got my fingers messy and smeared on the log. (I didn’t think to take pictures but, in my defense, my hands were messy.)

Today the sun barf's flame on to the clouds.

Today the sun barf’s flame on to the clouds. That ink has a great color, though.

The effects of the burp on yesterday. Still a great color.

The effects of the burp on yesterday. Looks good with the Noodler’s Midway Blue and Diamine Sherwood Green.

This is caused because the pen was getting low on ink. When pens like this get low complicated laws of physics (complete with complicated math and power point presentations) suddenly activate and remind the user, via a gusher, to refill the reservoir. The Noodler’s pens are cheap pens designed to be tinkered with by the user (before use you are expected to clean the pen, adjust the nib and, in my case, take it apart and remove a part to make it work better, but more on that in another post). Because the celluloid is thin, it make the burping worse. (None of my other piston fillers burp but they are better made.)

Making the mess worse was the flex nib. Flex nibs are designed for calligraphy (the split between the tines is longer) and they let a lot of ink flow. When one burps, you end up with globs on the paper.

I cleaned up the mess and refilled the pen, which required getting more ink on my fingers. Once again I neglected to take pictures.

Maybe next time. And I’m pretty sure there will be a next time.

Low Pressure Big Headache

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Typhoon Noul (aka Typhoon #6) is coming and it’s giving me a headache.

We’ve been having relatively cool weather recently, including a couple days that felt like Awesome rather than the usual Pleasant weather. This means the air was dry rather than increasingly muggy. It also means that payback is coming.

The last couple days have been cool but you could feel the humidity increasing. Only wind kept it from counting as Pleasant weather.

Today, though, we passed through Awesome to Pleasant to the Season in Which it Rains. Because of this, air pressure and gray skies have been playing hell with students and teachers alike. Also the wind has kicked up dust and pollen. We’ve been watching our youngest closely as the low pressure from typhoons has been known to trigger bouts of asthma. So far so good, but I was the one who got hit.

On the way back from work, about a 100 yards or so from the station I started to get my migraine spot. I swore a little and picked up my pace. Once I got home I downed a couple aspirin and a cup of coffee because, as fate would have it, She Who Must Be Obeyed had just made a fresh pot of coffee. (Technically, as SWMBO reminded me, that was for her not for me but in my defense, it was medicinal.)

Luckily, my ghetto treatment worked and the migraine was mild. I’ll go to bed early and, luckily, I get to sleep in tomorrow as the day after a migraine, even a mild one, leaves me feeling as if I have a mild hangover.

The other problem is that typhoons usually have to unusual effects. First they sweep the sky clean and leave it an impressive clear blue. Second, they drop off heat and humidity.

It’s enough to give a person a headache.