January 18, 2026

Sunday - Clear and sunny, warmish

I dragged myself out of bed around noon today. I got dressed and then made a quick trip downstairs. A little later, F came upstairs and asked if I’d like some of his chicken rice dish. He’d made it early in the day and it smelled gorgeous. I took some of his rice and it was okay. The add-ins were great, but the rice felt a bit mushy in my opinion. 

After we ate and had a nice hot drink, we decided to go out. We went for lunch to Gusto because both restaurants are close to a Yamaya. I wanted to pick up some tea and F said it was okay. We went over to the Shinsai-Machi Gusto and were seated right away. I had a burger and shared some fries with F. He had their kara-age set meal and said it was okay. 

We had a nice time there and enjoyed our meal. When we left, I used my points to reduce the price of our meal so it was a tiny bit cheaper for us. Yay.

We went over to Yamaya and I got a couple of boxes of rooibos tea. I got a caramel one and an organic one. F picked up quite a few things, mostly noodle based!

Next up we went to PAL shopping area and did the shopping. F needed stuff for the dinner he was making and I needed stuff for the next two night’s of dinners plus some breakfast and lunch foods. F came in with me and didn’t annoy me too much. He did do a bit of Walkabout but it was fine!

We came back to the house where he did get a bit annoying. He keeps unpacking the shopping bag and putting things all over the kitchen. I wish he’d just leave everything IN the shopping bag. My preference is to put the bag down near the fridge and put things straight in, but he doesn’t do that! I thought I had finished putting things away, but he’d put the meat for tomorrow’s dinner over by the sink. Why? Anyway, I put it away. 

I went upstairs and I think F came up soon after. I watched some YouTube and F told me that dinner would be ready around 7pm. He was a tad early. I decided that I wouldn’t really help him tonight. So, he put dinner on the table, Japanese style with a million plates. Oh well, I wasn’t washing dishes tonight. He also forgot to put drinks out for us, but I didn’t say anything! He had bought some tuna sashimi for tonight and had forgotten to put it out so I did remind him about that. He put it out quickly.

When the meal was over I did give him a tiny bit of help, I opened the door for him and carried a couple of things to the kitchen. Then, I left to go upstairs!Tee hee! 

F came upstairs around 9pm. I was watching some YouTube but I decided I’d watch a movie off the DVR tonight. I did invite F to watch with me but he begged off. I finally decided I’d watch Beetlejuice and it was a hoot. It’s been a while since I saw the original movie. 

During the movie, I unpicked a bit more of my blanket and wound the yarn into balls for myself. I’m not sure how much of it I’m going to take down!

After the movie, I went downstairs and then came back up to the room. F has gone to bed but I’m not sure if he’s asleep or not yet. He’s back at work tomorrow.

I’m not sure what I’m going to get up to tomorrow. I might do a bit of laundry because I need things to dry before I go out on Tuesday night! 

Come back later if you like and hear all about my day. Until tomorrow….

 

January 17, 2026

Sunday - Rainy, Windy and warmish.

I woke up this morning after 9. I went downstairs. F was back from dropping off K, but I didn’t say hi. I went back upstairs and went back to bed. I snoozed for a while and then F came in and asked if I wanted to go for yakiniku. I was okay with that so I got up and dressed. We left a few minutes later.

We drove over to Sakata and went to the Yakiniku place we like. We were seated right away and ordered a few minutes later too. We had a good meal there and left around 3pm. 

We drove back to Tsuruoka but stopped at a post office to mail my Postcrossings. F took the long way round as usual. He always does this, he turns too soon and then we can’t go where we want to go, we had to go around the block and try again. I roll my eyes at him but he was trying to help! And, of course I did get the cards in the mail box. 

Back at the house, I helped clear the table and strongly suggested that F turn on the heater and prepare for something to drink. K was coming back in half and hour and then the Day Service Manager was coming over a while later. 

I went upstairs and relaxed for a while, but came downstairs before 5 pm. We had the meeting and it was fine. She wants K to go to the Day Service more often but we don’t think that K wants that. She’s very deaf and finds it hard to make friends there. 

After the next meeting was set up and the Manager left, I went upstairs again and F decided to wait a bit and then make K some dinner.

After he did that, F asked me about our dinner. F then suggested going for Udon to the local chain restaurant. I was okay with that, I just wanted to change my shirt. Noodles and nice shirts do not go together!

We drove over to the Udon restaurant and were seated right away. We ordered our food and it came very quickly. I had a udon nabe that was very good and very filling, F had tempura and a small udon. 

After we finished eating we spent a few extra minutes in the restaurant and then left. F wanted to go to the grocery store. He’s planning to make dinner for us tomorrow night and needed ingredients. I’m a bit nervous about the whole thing! We did our shopping and then we came back to the house. I came upstairs and F followed soon after.

Tonight, F went to bed fairly early. I’m glad as he stayed up very late last night. I watched an episode of The Big Door Prize and it was good tonight. It was also a bit strange, but it often is!

I followed up with tonight’s episode of Criminal Minds. I think it was the last one of the season. It’s been an odd show if I’m honest. I’ll look forward to the next season of it.

Since midnight I’ve been watching some YouTube and doing my end of day stuff. Oh, and while I was watching Criminal Minds, I started ripping down a huge blanket I made a couple of years ago. Why? It’s too heavy and too big. And, I want to use the yarn for something else maybe! I do plan to keep part of the blanket. I’ll either use it as a lap blanket or for the back seat of the car, if F agrees. 

So, that’s my day. It was quite good. F and I got on well and we had a couple of nice meals. 

Come back later if you like and hear all about my day. Until tomorrow….

January 16, 2026

Friday - Warmish but cloudy

I woke up a little early this morning, but not as early as I did yesterday! I woke up before my alarm so I went downstairs and then came back to the room. I sorted my laundry and then I put some cream on my feet and put my socks back on. Then, bed again.

I slept fairly late but not terribly if that makes any sense. I got up, dressed and took my laundry and the kerosene tank from the heater downstairs. I started the laundry in the washing machine and then filled up my kerosene tank. Nice person that I sometimes am, I filled up K’s heater’s kerosene tank too.

I took my yogurt and the scales upstairs to prepare my breakfast but the laundry was supposed to be finished before I could eat. I went downstairs but there was still a bit of time on the machine. 

I had a quiet afternoon today. I wrote up a couple of Postcrossing cards, scanned them and stamped them. I’ll try to mail them tomorrow.

Over lunch I had a problem getting the WOWOW on Demand to work, so I ended up watching an episode of Lie To Me from Prime. I watched the news too and that was the same as usual. 

I knew that F was going to be late tonight so I was a little late going downstairs. I went, did the dishes of the day and then worked on getting ready for dinner. Tonight was Pasta Night so I heated up the water, sliced the roast duck, and put the plates in the living room to warm up. F called me around 6:30 and said he was on his way back. 

F arrived a bit after 7 pm and I got cooking in earnest. I cooked the pasta, mixed it with the sauce (garlic-mayo tonight) and got it on the table. F came downstairs and we ate. All the food basically disappeared! There was a little bit of duck leftover but that was it. 

I did the dishes and then went to talk to F. I told him about the problem that I had with WOWOW on Demand today so I tried to get him to sign into his email for later. Unfortunately, he didn’t know his password and his computer broke a few weeks ago.  It took a while but we got him into his email account. 

Upstairs, I asked F to help me sign into WOD…and it was different tonight and I could do it myself. We spent ages getting him into his email account. Oh well, at least he’s in it again. 

I watched some YouTube and then went downstairs and took a shower. Afterwards, I came upstairs and watched an episode of The Good Fight and I really enjoyed it. 

Since the show finished I’ve been watching YouTube again and doing my end of day things. I’m not sure what we’ll get up to tomorrow. We have a meeting with K’s Day Service Manager and of course K has her Day Service thing. Although there is a movie playing at the Mall that I’ve heard is good, I’m not really moved to see it, so we’ll probably stay in tomorrow night. 

That’s about it for me for today. Come back later if you like and hear all about my day. Until tomorrow…. 

January 15, 2025

Thursday - Warmish, rainy at night

I woke up this morning at 7:05am. How did I know that? That’s when F’s alarm went off. Where was F? Not in the room! I got up and went downstairs, but F came back to the room before I did. He did have the grace to apologize for not turning off his alarm!

I waited until F left before I went back to bed. I turned off my early alarms and watched a few videos before just falling asleep. I woke up fairly late, but no worries. I got dressed and then went downstairs. I did notice that F’s sister was in the house. Okay then. I used the ‘loo and then went upstairs again. I waited a while and then went downstairs and made my breakfast. I ate upstairs and then got ready to join a video meeting.

I joined a Book Club meeting and it was interesting. I hadn’t read the featured books but we talked about some of the books other people are reading and the one I’m trying again. I’ve got two on the go at the moment, one’s a modern romance (I think, I just started it) and 1984. I tried to read it a few years ago on my computer but I couldn’t get into it and I didn’t really like reading on my computer. My phone, I can get behind that! I do have a paperback version of the novel, but I always have my phone around so….

I left the meeting around 3:30. It was supposed to go until then, I needed to have my lunch and I needed the washroom.  I went downstairs and made my lunch, brought it back up to the room. Oh, yeah, when I was making my lunch, I saw K so I offered to heat up her lunch for her. She said yes and I think she ate it all. That’s good. 

It was after 4 when I came back to the room so I just watched the news, as much as I could handle of it. I ate and then worked on my favourite game site. F called me after 5:15 and said he was on the way back to the house. 

I went downstairs around 6 pm and got busy in the kitchen. Today I made hamburgers from scratch, air-fried some French Fries, steamed some veggies and served it all with a salad. Dinner was good and almost everything disappeared. After dinner, I cleared the table and washed the dishes. 

I finished around 9pm and let F know I was heading upstairs. He finished in the living room too and came up a couple of minutes later. We had a quiet time in the room. We were both watching videos on our devices! After 10pm I put on the next episode of Pluribus and it was quite good. After that, I watched an episode of The Studio which I enjoyed a bit. I know it’s a popular show, but sometimes I just don’t feel I’m in on the joke of that show. 

That’s about it for me. F was a bit late going to bed but I think he’s sleeping finally. I’m tired so I’m going to try and get to bed soon. 

Tomorrow I think I’ll try and do a load or two of laundry and then we’ll see what else I can get up to! Come back later if you like and hear all about my day. Until tomorrow….

January 14, 2026

Wednesday - Cold and windy

I woke up this morning around 5:30. I’m not sure why! F was awake too. I asked him tonight if he knew why we woke up, but he said that it might have been him that woke up first. I don’t know. I had to go downstairs and then I came back upstairs and went back to bed. 

I fell asleep again and then didn’t get up at my first alarm. I got up around 9 and went downstairs again. I got my clothes ready for going out and then went back to bed for a little bit of time. I dragged myself out of bed around 10:30 and got ready to go out. F had forgotten to take his sandwich pack so I ate it as my breakfast! I went downstairs around 11:20, used the ‘loo, and then put on my boots and went out. I got to the bus stop but had to wait quite a while. I was early and the bus was late so it took a while. I was glad I had my hat and scarf and some gloves with me. Finally, the bus came and I rode it to the end of the line.

At S-Mall I got off the bus, mailed my Postcrossings (I did some yesterday) and then tried to find lunch. Unfortunately, I wasn’t interested in the hotel’s lunch, so I went to Pizza Hut Express and had their Hut Melts, the bacon and potato one. It doesn’t have tomato in it and I asked them not to give me the tomato dipping sauce that comes with it. I had my lunch with a bottle of rooibos that I had bought at the grocery store. 

When I finished lunch, it was almost time to leave. I went to the bus station and waited for my bus. I rode the three stops to the Sanno-Machi stop and got off. I was surprised that about 3 other people got off at the same stop too! I did something a little bad today…I walked through the parking lot of the building. It saved me a lot of walking around in the cold and I got to Machi-kine much quicker. 

I paid my money and went in to see The Phoenician Scheme. I like the director, the actors were great, but the movie wasn’t good. I laughed about twice and nearly fell asleep several times! I knew that there was a good chance I wouldn’t like the film since Kermode didn’t like it, but I had hoped I would. 

After the movie if I rushed, I could get to the bus stop in time to catch the bus back. I decided not to do that. I walked to the nearby drugstore and did a little shopping and walking around in the store. I bought a few things for myself including a pair of socks and a thing to make fried eggs in the microwave!

I paid and walked back to the bus stop. I was too early again and had to wait about 15 minutes in the cold. The bus came finally and I got on. There were a few people on the bus and they were all sitting in aisle seat. I had to take the single seat by the door with my big backpack. It was a bit annoying. Oh well. After a bit, when they got out of the bus, I moved over to another seat.

I walked back to the house from the bus stop and did a little bit of shovelling. Then, I went inside. I turned on the heater in the kitchen and went upstairs. I turned on the heater upstairs and made myself a cup of coffee. I had an onigiri that I had bought as a late snack and F called me around 5:25. I ended up going downstairs a bit later and taking some plastic bottles down with me. I put them in for recycling.

I got started on dinner and it went fairly well. The kitchen was freezing though. Brr. The heater is slow to heat the room and I’d forgotten to set it before I left. 

Tonight I did toaster oven chicken with a basil flavour, tuna & macaroni salad, salad, and steamed veggies. F’s rice was horrible and had gone hard at the ends. Dinner, apart from the rice, was good.

I did the dishes and then F helped me with the garbage downstairs. I went upstairs to change and did up my garbage up in the room. 

F and I drove over to Mina and bought groceries. He wasn’t as annoying as he can be today, so that was nice! After we finished, he started to drive us back to the house, but I reminded him that we needed to buy kerosene. We went over to the gas station with a couple of wrong turns along the way. He forgot we were going to the gas station and started towards another grocery store!

He got the kerosene and we came back to the house. I took care of the groceries and F took care of the kerosene. We went upstairs and F had the heater on, but the room was cold. 

At 11pm I watched WildCards, it was a good one as they caught the guy that killed Ellis’s brother and Max’s father got out of prison. 

Since midnight I’ve been watching a bit of YouTube and getting ready to go to bed. I’m really tired tonight and need to get to bed!

I’m not sure what I’ll get up to tomorrow but I’ll let you know tomorrow night! Come back later if you like. Until tomorrow….

January 13, 2026

Tuesday - Warmish but windy

I woke up this morning really early for me. F had already left…it was before 7 am. He told me later that he’d gone to his favourite onsen. I thought that he might have gone there. 

I went back to bed and fell asleep after a few videos on my phone. Later on, I dragged myself out of bed. I dressed and sorted my laundry. I took a couple of loads downstairs and started washing it. I measured out my yogurt and then brought the scales upstairs to weigh my cereal. I ate breakfast and hung up my laundry when it was done.  

I went downstairs to make my lunch around 3. While I was in the kitchen, I set up dinner to marinate as well. I put some pork in a mix of soy sauce and garlic. 

Later on in the day I watched an episode of Matlock and then the rest of the US news. Head shake. 

F called after 5:30 to say he was on his way back to the house. I went downstairs after I changed and took the kerosene tank with me. I filled up the kerosene tank and left it on the stairs. I washed up and went into the kitchen to get a start on dinner. F arrived sometime around then and took the empty tanks out to the car. He also took the full tank upstairs, yay! 

I got busy with dinner. Tonight we had garlic-soy sauce sautéd pork, salad, rice, tuna & macaroni salad, kabocha and some gyoza too. It was pretty good and most of it disappeared!

After dinner I cleared the table, washed the dishes and listened to my podcasts. Then, I went upstairs and watched Project Runway. They do a really weird things these days, they don’t tell you who is out until the next episode. I don’t like that. They are also doing group projects which are boring! And, I know I’m not supposed to comment about people’s bodies but Heidi was wearing a jacket that was open in the front and it looked like she might fall out of it…she wasn’t wearing a regular bra at all! Weird. 

I took a shower tonight and then came back upstairs and watched FBI: Most Wanted. It was an odd one. 

So, that is about that. I’ve been working on my end of day stuff and planning on going to bed soonish. Tomorrow I am hoping to go out and have lunch and then go to the cinema to see a movie. If I oversleep I won’t be able to do that! Yikes. Cross your fingers for me that I’ll get up on time to catch the bus!

Come back later if you like and hear all about my days, until tomorrow….

 

January 12, 2026

 Monday - Cold and snowy and windy

I woke up early this morning, went downstairs and then came back to bed and went back to sleep for a bit. I dragged myself out of bed a bit later because of Lizzo. I have her as one of my alarms and the song is so cheerful that it usually wakes me up.

I dressed and was heating up my water to make tea when F came in and asked if I’d like to go to the restaurant that we were planning on going to yesterday. I said yes! He called the restaurant to pre-order our meal. Because I’m allergic to tomatoes, the chef told us if we call ahead, he can make another type of sauce on pasta for me. Yay!

We drove out to Oyama and went to the little restaurant there. They have a lunch special with pasta, all you can eat soup and salad for a reasonable price, so that’s what we had. We had creamy herb-chicken pasta with rotini. The soups available today were a Chinese-style one and Provence style Onion soup. I had that one and it was amazing!

After we finished our meal we left and drove back to Tsuruoka. F wanted to go to Komeda Coffee, so we drove over there.

At Komeda we were seated soon after we arrived. We both had coffee, I had decaf and we relaxed for a bit. I kept falling asleep which was rather annoying! When we left, I asked F if we could just go back to the house and take a nap. He said sure but then wanted to do the grocery shopping at MaxValu. Nope.

We came back to the house, F headed into the living room and I headed upstairs. I changed into my pyjamas and went to bed. I only napped for a little bit, but it was nice. 

I got up again and was at my computer when F came back and wanted to go out and go grocery shopping. I wasn’t quite ready but it was fine.

We went over to Mina and got a few things for dinner the next couple of nights. We got K a bento for tonight and some lunches and breakfasts as well. Back at the house, F became indisposed for a bit, so I heated up the bento for K and also made her some soup. I don’t know if she appreciated it or not, she seemed a bit surprised. 

A little later, F and I headed out for our dinner. We went to the Taiwanese restaurant again. We were seated right away and looked at the menus. F had a yakisoba combo that he of course didn’t like. I had the subuta or sweet and sour pork meal that I really did like! It came with rice, soup, a big piece of fried chicken, pickles and a dessert of annon-dofu with fruit. The subuta was nicely balanced and I liked it a lot. 

After our meal we came back to the house and F headed upstairs. I used the ‘loo and when I was washing my hands noticed a strange metal lid on the windowsill. I thought it might be from the kerosene tank for the hot water. I opened the window and outside the window was the kerosene tank and the lid was off! Yikes. I flipped the plastic lid over and went upstairs and told F. He went downstairs to check. He’d forgotten to put the metal lid on and then the plastic lids over it. Sigh. It’s been open for 2 nights and we’ve had a lot of snow today. I hope we didn’t get a lot of snow in the tank. 

We had a quiet night in. I watched a couple of shows off the Fire Stick tonight. I caught up on Criminal Minds and then watched another episode of Evil. I quite like that show. 

And that’s about it. F went to bed a while ago. He’s back at work tomorrow and I feel sorry for him as he’ll probably have to shovel a bit of snow tomorrow. I hope he’ll be okay. 

I’ll probably do some laundry tomorrow and I’ll be back to cooking dinner again. Come back later if you like and hear all about my day. Until tomorrow….