May 6, 2008 - Tuesday

Cloudy but warm.

We got back about 3 hours ago and I've spent the time catching up on my email and a little bit of time reading blogs. It's been a long day!

I stayed up late last night so that I could finish the novel I was reading. I finished it this morning before bed. It was Book of the Dead by Patricia Cornwell and was quite good. Almost up to her old standards.

This morning we got up and checked out of our hotel. We took the subway to Sapporo station, put our suitcases in a locker and then went in search of breakfast. I found a Subway (Sapporo has at least a couple of them now) and had an avocado and thick bacon sub. Yum. Fumihiko went to the shop next to it and had ramen! Go figure. I don't call him Ramen Man for nothing!

We went over to Kinokuniya, the big bookstore again. I had bought a book and a magazine earlier in the holiday, so I wanted something for the train/plane ride back. I got a non-fiction and also a fantasy novel in a series I've been reading. I've got most of that one read now! We had a lovely coffee or tea in the bookstore's cafe, then back to the station. We tried to buy decafe coffee at Starbucks, but they were out, so we popped upstairs to Tully's and got some of theirs! We didn't have it ground, we'll hand grind it for ourselves. As we were a bit bored, we decided to go to the airport.

We caught the train to the airport and were lucky enough to get seats. At the airport, Fumihiko got our tickets/boarding passes and then he went souvenir shopping. I looked after the suitcases. We switched when he was done. He put his souvenirs in his suitcase, and I put a few things in mine, then we checked our bags. Whew. Relief to get rid of them.

We each had lunch in the airport, but in different places. I had pasta, he had Japanese food, so we were both happy! When it came time to go through the security, we both passed with no problems. We sat quite near the front of the plane and didn't board until quite late. The flight was fine. We'd been told that it would be bumpy, but it really wasn't that bad.

In Sendai we collected our bags, took the shuttle back to parking, and went on our way. We looked for a restaurant for us to have dinner in, and finally I spotted one that I've heard about, but never been to before. It was Saizeraiya (spelling???) We were both pleasantly surprised. We had some decent food and then were back in the car.

It took us about 2 and a half hours to drive home. We stopped for gas before leaving Sendai and to stretch our legs in Sagae. I almost fell asleep at one point, but didn't. Yay.

We came home and both of us spent time on our computers. Fumihiko is having trouble with his. He can't get his Internet Explorer to work. I asked him what version he was using in case he needed to upgrade it, but he doesn't know. Poor thing. Should have got a Mac! I could have helped him then.

He's off to bed now. He has to work tomorrow. I'm going to go very soon too as I'm really quite tired. It's been a mostly good few days away. Not all of it was good though. But, enough of it was that I'd likely do it all over again!

Night night.