October 16, 2011

Sunday - Cloudy and then rainy in the evening

A good day. I went to bed when the sun was coming up, so I half-expected to sleep all day. However, I did not. F and I had actually made plans for today, casual ones, but it was still worth getting up for them. When I woke up a little before noon, I debated sleeping on or getting up. I chose to get up.

After a bit of computer time I took a shower and then we went out to have brunch. We went for yakiniku and had a nice meal at a local place . After that, we picked up some drinks and after a quick detour through our apartment were on our way.

We were going to see the fall colours around Mount Chokai today. At least that’s what I thought! On the way there, F started to get antsy at other drivers, even though we were in no hurry. We stopped to stretch our legs and then got back on the road.

All of a sudden we got off the main road and ended up in the back of beyond. Seriously. F was driving on “roads” that were there to allow farmers to get to their rice fields. They were made of gravel and only one lane. I was a tad worried about the whole thing. Finally F found the place he was looking for. It was a kind of salmon ladder, or place where fish are fertilised. I’m not really sure what the heck he was trying to tell me. We got out and had a quick look. There were some fairly large salmon there, but there really wasn’t much to see. I was expecting something like at Pitlochry, so I was very disappointed!

He did a little exploring and told me that there was a walking trail beside the river that we could go on. However, it was now about 4:40 and it gets dark just after 5:00 these days, so I put the kibosh on that and we left. I took a few photos of the salmon, but they are hard to see as my camera kept focussing on the water and not the fish in it.

We were on the way back to Tsuruoka, when F asked me if I’d like to go to the mall. I’m always up for that, so we stopped in. We had a drink first at Seattle’s Best and then I did a bit of window shopping. Wonder of wonders, when I suggested to F that he go to the bookstore and enjoy himself, he did! He almost never does that.

I made a quick scouting trip through the kitchenware shop, Uniqlo and then Jusco. I didn’t buy anything, it really was just to see what was there and if it might make good presents for people. There are some interesting things, not sure about sizes and such at the moment.

We met up again, and I looked at crafting books in the bookstore. I didn’t buy any, but one or two were tempting. We decided to have dinner in the mall and I asked for the Omurice place. We’d had a decent meal there before.

We went in, looked at the menu and a waiter dropped a cup or something and broke it near the kitchen. He cleaned it up…no biggie. We ordered from a waitress, waited for a while, and then got our food. Except, I’d ordered mine to come with butter rice and I got ketchup rice, so we sent it back. Other than that, it was okay. I liked it, but I would have preferred my meal a little faster!

We came back to Tsuruoka, bought a few groceries and then came home. I made F watch Let the Right One In on WOWOW tonight. I have the DVD, but it only has English and French subtitles, not Japanese ones. This way, he got to see it with subtitles that he could understand easily. He really liked the movie. I was surprised. He did very little cell phone playing or computer using during the film. Yay! I love the film. It is so dark and sad. Violent, yes, but not unexpectedly I’d say.

After the movie, he watched a few other things on TV. Nothing too annoying for a change and a little while ago he went to bed.

I’m going to try and go fairly soon, although I’ve said that before!

This week will be a bit different for us, we’re going to Niigata in a couple of days to meet up with an old friend and her family. She lives in England now and it’s the only time we can see her.

And that, finally, is all I’m going to write! Night.