Category Archives: Personal

Cold Beer Festival

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She Who Must Be Obeyed has been in the mood for beer. She even managed to discover that the Autumn beer festival had been moved to this weekend.

We (her, actually) made plans to attend the festival. Friday night, though, was thwarted by cold rain.

Today our plan was to go to the festival in the evening or, if the weather was bad, got to a nearby izakaya for less crafty beer.

Although the weather was gorgeous (eventually) it remained cool enough that beer was suddenly off the table.

Tomorrow is supposed to be warmer and plans have been made for tomorrow. However, the plan depend on our oldest being dependably on time.

I’m not holding my breath. We may just have to go to a grocery store and buy some beer.

The Summer Time Blahs

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Suddenly, I remember what the end of summer was like back when I was in elementary school. I’m ready for it to be over.

The doctor who did my retching/endoscopy check said I didn’t have cancer, but that my stomach showed signs that I was stressed. First I was like “Really? What proves that?” Then I was like, well, yeah, I could have told you that.

I was in a bad mood all summer and I’m not sure why. Maybe my usual October malaise has become an August angst.

There’s the anniversary of dad’s death along with the recent death of people I knew when I lived in Colorado. What bothered me about the latter was I didn’t remember the person until I saw pictures of her when I knew her. Even now, I don’t remember specifics, just warm feelings and a friendly smile. I’ve even seen pictures of us camping with her family and all I can do is think “when was that”?

There are also issues with my in-laws that are going to force major decisions fairly soon.

School starts soon, though, and I’m getting back on a normal sleep schedule. Maybe that will help.

All Fine Except the Retching

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I think I scared a doctor today, which is too bad because she was kind of cute.

The annual mandatory health check up went surprisingly quickly as I was rushed from station to station with surprisingly little delay. (I suspect this is because I brought a book anticipating some waiting.)

The funniest moment was the “doctor check” with the first of the cute young female doctors. She had my x-ray from a few years before on her computer screen but didn’t comment on it. She did a quick heart check and sent me on my way so fast I wasn’t sure I’d heard her correctly. She was like “get out” and I was like “but the old guys usually keep me around a minute and tell me nothing you’re only keeping me 45 seconds”.

That was followed by blood letting and other tests until I got to the endoscopy phase. A lot had improved. They had a comfy chair for the numbing medicine phase which was much better than two years before when I had to position myself. It was all very relaxing. Then I was taken to the endoscopy room (same as two years ago) and was surprised to see the doctor was young and cute rather than the old guy from two years before.

Then the doctor started the camera phase and I started the retching phase. She rattled off a bunch of stuff and let me watch the screen and was fine until she needed to adjust things and I felt the tube move and then the next retching phase started.

When it was all over she rattled off a bunch of stuff that sounded important (main point: no cancer) but I didn’t catch all the rest. I kept assuring her she did great and it was merely my natural aversion to choking on cameras that created all the drama. Also, it was better than barium.

I got home and took a nap, then it was finally time to eat breakfast.

Ready for Needles, Tubes, and Cameras

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Heading off to bed relatively early so that I can get up in time to drink some tea and some water. Won’t get to eat anything though. I’m already in a mandatory fast.

After that, though, all I’ll be doing is filling in forms and then traveling one station away for the annual health check.

This year I’m lucky that it’s been scheduled at a clinic near my house, which means I get to have a relaxing morning before needles, tubes, and cameras get involved. (Note: Japan has clinics that do nothing but annual physicals. Period. If your arm fell off during an exam they’d note the “arm related issue” on your physical but wouldn’t recommend another clinic.)

After a couple hours of exam I’ll get to come home and take a nap whilst some medication wears off. Then I’ll finally get to eat something.

Last Week Blues

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Not much to write about.

This is the last full week of fake work before my real work starts up again. I’ll enjoy it as much as I can, but even if I didn’t have fake work, I’d be feeling blue.

The last week of summer is always kind of blah. Even though actual work hasn’t started, and our girls aren’t attending actual school, our schedules get busy. Our oldest had club the entire summer, but even our youngest starts having activities. This means we don’t even get a chance to do a last minute Tokyo Disneyland Trip (which saves us the heart attack of the entry fee, so it’s not all bad).

I’ve got to start prepping for the coming term, which always makes me feel blah.

I do have a health check coming up on Wednesday; that may make for an interesting time, in the same way a Chinese curse encourages.

 

Once More the Intervention

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Life intervened again with She Who Must Be Obeyed coming down ill this evening.

This had me cooking and has me reminding our oldest she has to do dishes. This involves periodically chasing her off our living room sofa. There is something about the living room sofa that causes the two oldest women in  the house to immediately fall asleep as soon as they sit on it.

This something is so bad that I actually have to make our oldest get up off the sofa before I can leave the room. If I don’t, she will be asleep again in a few minutes and the process will start again. Even if she’s sitting up and playing on her phone when I leave the living room the something will cause her to fall asleep sideways with her phone somehow still gripped in her fingers.

This makes my job a bit more difficult as the sound of her phone hitting the floor was the Dad Signal calling me into action.

 

Four By Too Many

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For 20 months or so I’ve been carrying the Quad Field Notes Leather Notebook Cover from Old Church Works and the entire time I’ve had it filled with four notebooks with different uses.

As much as I like it, it’s probably time for a change.

The cover has held up well, despite a couple issues, but that’s fodder for a different post.

The notebooks are a food journal, a random notes book, a 10 ideas book, and a book “Bible” for one of the projects I’ve been working on. (Sort of.)

The main issue is that, over time, I’ve not only stopped using three of the four notebooks, but I also feel I’m not getting a good sense of how durable the different notebooks are in the pocket when they are protected by a thick leather cover.

Because of that, I’ve decided that it’s time to shed at least two notebooks (the 10 ideas and the book Bible), and start pocket carrying the food journal and the random notes notebook.

I’ve done something like this in the past and found I got more use out of the random notes notebook than I am now.

However I use them, it will definitely lighten my everyday carry. But that’s also part of a future review.

 

The Busy Sabbath

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I’ve recently resolved to take Sunday off. If I do nothing work or writing or anything related, that’s okay.

I’m not feeling guilty about doing nothing, although I am a bit surprised at how easy it is to do nothing whilst seeming as if you’ve done something. (Note: play games and/or plan other things.)

This bit of blather is something to do  but I can control the length so I won’t count it as work.

The only interesting thing today is our youngest created a new version of the song Happy Birthday. It translates from Japanese to “Happy birthday is done; happy birthday is done” implying that life is back to normal.

Well, if you count doing nothing and liking it as normal.

Getting Back in the Groove

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I was less of a zombie today and even managed to force myself to force myself.

I took our youngest out for lunch and to buy birthday presents for She Who Must Be Obeyed. We were enjoying what appears to be the last of the unseasonably cool days we’ve been having. However, even though there was a light rain, the breeze was warm, not cool as it has been for a couple weeks.

I also sent a friend a copy of a partial typescript to get the benefit of his skills as an alpha reader. I did this not only because I respect his opinion (and believe he will actually give it) but also to force myself to finish typing up the rest of the text. (I wrote it all by hand at first; damn my handwriting.)

Of course, I fear that by the time I get it all typed in, my alpha reader will tell me not to bother sending him the rest.

 

Another Zombie Day

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I didn’t think we would be, but were zombies again.

I’ve written before about how the day after a trip to the in-laws turns everyone into zombies.

The girls are still in “grandparent amnesty” mode in which the intervention of grandparents staves off a plethora of punishments and it’s my job to remind them that, yes, the dishes really do have to be washed, and no, there is no one here who will save you.

This means not much was accomplished today. I did some writing and at least one daughter may have done homework but I was too much of a zombie to find out.

Tomorrow we’ll start settling back into normal life, but today was kind of a bye on normal life.