Taking today off, except for a place/habit keeper.
The only interesting thing was that I forgot to finish using the notebook I was planning on reviewing. I’ve been using it as part of a morning routine (more on that in a future post) but because it’s the weekend, I completely forgot to use up the last page.
Yeah, I could have done the review anyway, but I’m weird that way. (More on that in a future post, too.)
It’s a the last day of summer vacation before actual work starts.
Although I’ve dropped in twice at the school where I work in the last couple days, I haven’t actually met any students. All that changes tomorrow and things could get badly rather quickly.
All my classes tomorrow are junior high school classes which means they will be working on their speech contest speeches which, in theory, were supposed to be completed as summer homework.
In reality, probably less than a third will have completed their speeches; another third will have their names on their papers and maybe one or two actual lines; and the final third will have lost the papers or claim they left them at home.
My job is to guide them through a couple days of writing and checking and then, if necessary, drag them at lunch and after school to complete their speeches. (My students know this is not a bluff.)
For two weeks there will be a lot of stress and annoyance, for both me and the students. Then we’ll try to get back to regular classes. That has its own problems. (But more on that in a future post.)
I wanted what he wanted. He wanted what I wanted. Our timing was just off.
In the Michael Douglas movie Falling Down, the main character shoots up a fast food restaurant after they fail to serve him breakfast despite his being only a minute or two past official breakfast time. In my case, I arrived at a fast food restaurant while breakfast was still being served and opted for breakfast.
Granted, I was actually getting brunch (long story) and thought the changeover time was later. I could have asked, but I didn’t care enough to be bothered.
Then, a minute after I ordered, as I was waiting for my food, the staff flipped the signs to the real menu. I was annoyed, but not as annoyed as the man who couldn’t get breakfast. (I’d have swapped with him, but I think he wanted pancakes.)
After that, the only thing that bothered me was the quality of the food. I got the dregs of breakfast and what I got didn’t match the picture but I’m pretty much used to that now.
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.
As I start gearing up for the start of classes next week, I find myself doing something resembling actual work on my “house arrest” days. Today, for example, I spruced up the spreadsheet I use for recording students’ marks.
However, because it has students’ names, I can’t actually send it in as evidence that I did something resembling work.
Instead, I filled out an online form that said I did it.
I’m operating with the depressing feeling that no one is actually paying attention to what is being submitted. I think this because I’ve been waiting for someone to contact me and tell me where to actually submit stuff and that hasn’t happened all year.
We got a video sometime earlier this year explaining how to submit one part of what we’re supposed to do but 1) I have to watch the entire video to find out what to do because no one thought to create a written version and 2) no one told us how to submit the things we will actually probably use in class.
I’m now in an odd waiting game to see what, if anything, ever comes of this.
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.
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.
Spent part of the day working on a project and then working on another project.
I’m making little progress with either, but the latter (notebook reviews) got cut off today as life intervened. Nothing major, just lots of little annoyances that ate up some time.
I’m also entering one of those phases where I rethink the components of my everyday carry system (because normal people totally worry about that kind of thing) especially what notebooks I’m carrying but not actually using. (That’s part of the review I’m working on.)
There are lots of steps to the process, with several of them being “No really, I’ll use it, I promise”.
More on that in a future post, though.
An acquaintance of mine is off scuba diving somewhere this summer, but his last wish for those of us left in Japan was that we get pounded by rain whilst he was off somewhere else. (We had a dry “rainy season” following a dry “Season in which it rains”.)
Thus far, his wish has come true, but in an odd way.
We’ve had a mercifully cool summer. It’s been humid to the level of “breathing liquid” but the temperature has been in the high 70s/low 80s Fahrenheit (26-28 Celsius) which is a lot better than usual Tokyo metro area temperature of “scorched earth”.
The trade off has been lots of rain and a few migraines.
Today, for example, we kept the air conditioner off most of the day. However, about the time it got so humid we decided to turn on the air conditioner, we had an impressive cloud burst.
I hope this lasts. However, I suspect we’ll have a hot September. I have to be good and sweaty by the time I get to work, I guess.
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.