March 14, 2011

Monday- Cloudy and cool.

An okay day. I got up fairly early today. I wanted to see if regular news was on and of course it wasn’t. Instead I ended up watching The Informant! and then The Time Traveler’s Wife. It was such a relief to see something that wasn’t earthquake related. I’m so tired of my husband watching it all the blooming time.

We had lunch at Hyakkenbori today. We tried to go to a couple of other places, but they either weren’t open or they weren’t the way my husband had been led to believe. Lunch was good and one of my students was there in a meeting, at the table behind me! We said hello, but she was busy.

After lunch, F dropped me off while he tried to get kerosene. He was gone a long time as there wasn’t a lot to be had. In fact, he only managed to get one container full. Still, it is better than nothing.

In the evening we went out for dinner to Marumatsu. It wasn’t my first choice, but it actually wasn’t bad. It has improved a lot recently. I was surprised that the McDonalds next to it was closed. At Marumatsu we couldn’t have deep fried food or hot noodles, so I think McDonalds being closed was more to do with safety than anything else. I certainly wouldn’t like to man the deep fryer in an earthquake.

We went to my school and I set up the heater for tomorrow. I was looking forward to teaching all day tomorrow, but 2 of my 3 students have cancelled. Sigh. I’m hoping the other one comes.

We hit up the grocery store afterward and there still wasn’t much stuff there. There’s no milk or yogurt, only some eggs, not much meat and the noodles aisle is decimated. F managed to buy himself a couple of packs though. We got a couple of packets of lamb chops, so we’ll be having lamb for dinner tomorrow night. It’s already marinating away. I guess I should be happy that it’s not popular with Japanese people or we wouldn’t have any dinner!

If I sound flippant, I’m sorry. I know I have it lucky. I’m in my own apartment, I have my own bed, I know where my husband is and while I’m slightly inconvenienced by Friday’s events and their aftermath, life is good. I am grateful for what I have, I really am.

We came home after the grocery store and F watched boxing and then more earthquake stuff. While he was watching boxing, I prepped the marinade and then stuck the chops in the fridge for the night.

I couldn’t handle watching any more of the earthquake stuff. It’s all in Japanese (understandably), but every now and then F will make a comment about what’s on the TV and expects that 1) I’ll understand what he’s talking about and 2) that I’m listening to him! Argh. I don’t and I’m not. I was getting more and more depressed and upset so I finally put my head down and put on my headphones and listened to some Secret Garden. They are great for relaxing me. The music is helping a bit.

F’s now gone to bed and I’m going there soon. We had a couple of aftershocks today and I’m not sure what’s going to happen. We were supposed to go south this coming weekend for a little trip as it is a long weekend, but the area has earthquakes and there may be a gasoline shortage so I’m not sure that it is a wise decision. We haven’t cancelled yet, but I’m leaning towards it. Advice?

Night.

6 comments:

Orchid64 said...

I'm a bit torn about things like going out and about. Life has to start resuming as normal eventually. There will always be quakes in Japan and if you live life as if the next big one is just lurking around the corner, you'll be standing still. The shortages are supply line issues (except the electricity problems, which are related to the damage from the quake) and the result of people panicking and hoarding. These will clear up eventually, probably within a week, almost certainly by the end of this month.

I don't know where you're going or how far it is, but if it is in an area unaffected by quake damage and the traffic isn't too bad, I'd go and just start getting back to normal. Sitting around the house watching more bad news incessantly roll in (which the networks are dwelling on because it's what gets viewers right now) has to be worse than a small risk of being away from home and having another quake/ strong aftershock hit.

JY69 said...

Have a good trip... I would go but it depends on exactly where... possible to re-route???

Mieko said...

I'm glad that you are OK.
Here in Utsunomiya, gasoline is not enough. So no one can fill up their cars, we share gasoline,by 10 liters.
According to the news,planned black out has been doing. fortunately yesterday we didn't.
But from the day of the earthquake to next day, we had blackout.
It was very cold evening.
Thinking of the people who spend days in shleters, I'm really sad.

Take care
Miko

Theresa said...

Kanazawa trip, right? I'd say if you have no problem with gas to go ahead. I always hurried through Kanazawa Station, it has a very high glass ceiling where the buses are, not a good place to be in a quake, excellent for a bloody scene in a disaster movie, though.

Helen said...

Right Theresa, Kanazawa. I'm not sure about gas. F is terribly optimistic, but we don't have any idea how much we can get when we're there. Knowing my husband, we'd get there and we wouldn't be able to find enough gas to come back!

Helen said...

Thank you all for writing! I appreciate you visiting!