Thursday - rainy and cold
A good day today. I got up this morning and after my shower I watched a little Project Runway. F was here, sitting up in the dark and cold. I have no idea why he doesn’t turn on the light or the heater…
After a nice lunch at Capri, F dropped me off at my school and I got busy. My student came on time and we had quite a good lesson. After class I cleaned up, and ran an errand! I came back to my school and read some of the newspapers that had piled up when I was away.
F came to pick me up and we tried to make a plan for the evening. I finally suggested a movie with dinner at the theatre’s restaurant. He thought it was fine. We came home to do a little bit of work for my school and then we went back to the theatre.
We had dinner and it was okay, then went to see Moneyball. I really liked it. Of course I’m a fan of both Brad Pitt and Aaron Sorkin (star and writer, respectively) so I was quite sure I’d like it.
We came home via the grocery store for a few munchies for F. We had a quiet evening in. I watched Drop Dead Diva and then a British comedy which I thought was very funny. I rounded out the evening with a couple of episodes of ER. Yay!
So… about the trip. The first day we just drove to Niigata and checked into our hotel. We did a little shopping and then had dinner in an izakaya. The whole thing was okay, except neither of us slept that well.
We got up for the hotel’s free breakfast (rice balls and potato salad if you can believe it) then checked out and after a bit more shopping for F we started on the road to Kanazawa. We were on the highway but had to get off. Apparently there was bad weather and they closed part of the highway. Where we were off the highway was bad too. We saw a bit of slush that turned into an icy snow type thing by the road. Yuck. Finally, we made it to our destination and checked into the hotel. The desk clerk ticked me off though, he asked for my passport. If he’d even glanced at my reservation form, he’d have seen that I have an address in Japan and I don’t need to show it. I didn’t have it with me anyway so I refused! Ha!
The hotel was very swank. Our room was small, but very comfortable. We set down our bags and then went out to find something for dinner. And that’s when it went wrong for a little. F of course wanted ramen for dinner and I didn’t. I would have been okay with a restaurant that served ramen as long as it had something for me. Breakfast was all carbs, lunch was (bad) soba and greasy tempura so I wanted a decent dinner. He whined and complained and basically acted like an idiot. We agreed to go and have a snack at a sandwich place, but after I ate my all vegetarian sandwich I started to feel quite sick. I felt feverish and finally told F that I’d go back to the hotel, give him my key and he could go and get what he’d like. I just wanted to go to bed. I bought a sandwich and some tea at a convenience store and then we went back to the hotel. I was in bed by 7:30 pm and I stayed there.
F came back around 9:30 after having his damned ramen and he went to bed too! I ended up waking up around midnight and having my sandwiches (which had protein—tuna, egg and maybe ham?), some tea and then went back to bed.
In the morning I felt much better. Hurray. We were both in good moods as we’d both slept well. We went for breakfast (included in our room charge) and ate very well.
We headed out for a bit of sightseeing. We had a bit of a problem with the bus we planned to take (it didn’t run during the week), but we visited a few places. We saw a Cultural Exchange Hall and saw some art, then walked over and saw the 21st Century Art Museum. That one was quite cool. There were a lot of interesting exhibits, including some that it was okay to photograph! I’ve never seen that before at a museum.
We walked over to the Kenrokuen Gardens and had a good wander around. They were lovely. It was a good time of year to go. It was so busy that you couldn’t see anything and it was still warm enough to walk around without a heavy jacket. We had our picture taken and also went into a historic house in the park. That was quite cool.
When the park closed, we left. I was going to suggest going for dinner near the park, but F paid for a taxi back to the hotel. He also suggested going to the Teppanyaki room on the 19th floor. Wow. He phoned and made a reservation for us. We were hungry as we hadn’t eaten since breakfast so went out and had a little keiten sushi first. Just a little.
Dinner was amazing. It was beautifully cooked in front of us and equally beautifully presented too. And it was so good! It was supposed to be F’s birthday dinner, but he paid for it. Expensive, but very nice.
We waddled back to our room and had a relaxing evening.
On the last day, we breakfasted and then I gave F his present. He got an Anne Murray Cd set and a double pack of movies. I gave him Fly Away Home and The Waterhorse. He likes movies about kids.
We visited a Stained Glass Museum on our way out of town. Except, it wasn’t really a museum in my opinion. It was a church! The cool thing for me was it had a trio of windows by William Morris. I’d read a book of his in University so I was quite thrilled. My theological knowledge was put to the test with some of the windows and was found sadly lacking.
After a trip to the mall for some souvenirs and lunch, we got on the road and headed for home. The rest you know!
And finally, I am going to go to bed. Night!
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