March 3, 2019

Sunday - Sunny and Warm

Hina Matsuri

We slept in a bit this morning, but F had been up early to take out the bread. Good for him!  I slept on but got up before 11. Yay me.

F gave his mother some toast for her brunch and then we went off for the day. We had lunch at Cafe Studio Cinq today. They had a tonkatsu plate which was quite nice. The best thing about the restaurant was that they had an Aibo set up in a corner!  It was so cute. I really wanted to take it with me when I left.  

After lunch, we decided to drive out to Haguro again and go to the temple that we didn’t go to yesterday because of time. Today we went and arrived a little earlier than yesterday. We paid and went in.  We looked around a little and went out into the garden for a bit. We were at Gyokusenji, which is famous for its garden and it was lovely, but still under 2 feet or so of snow! F and I had a bowl of matcha each and a wagashi(Japanese sweet) and it was lovely.  We each got special bowls to celebrate Hina Matsuri which was today. We kept an eye on the time and left just before 4 pm. As we left, some other people were asking if it was okay for them to come in, and the workers said it was okay!  We could have come in yesterday. Argh.

We drove back to Tsuruoka and picked up the kerosene tanks at F’s house. We checked on his mother too, who was fine. F set up the bread maker for later on tonight too. He was making bread for tomorrow. Yay.

We headed out but didn’t get groceries or kerosene yet. Instead, we went shoe shopping. F’s shoes are so worn out that there are literally holes in them and I just wanted to get myself a cheap comfy pair for summer if I could.  We went to three different places tonight. The problem for me is that Japanese women’s shoes seem to stop at size 24.5. I can often wear size 25 if they are wide enough.  Neither of us got anything in the first place, our usual shoe place. I tried on a couple of pairs at the second place and they might have done if I was looking for that type of shoe. F got a pair there. I did get a pair in the third place. I hope they’ll do. Of course, they aren’t women’s shoes. Argh.  

F was “helping” me by bringing me the ugliest, most mannish shoes in the store to try on. I was getting rather annoyed with him. I finally told him to think about the shoes and if his Grandfather would wear them, not to bring them to me!  He eventually came up with a pair of blueish sneakers that were okay, so I got them. I do worry that they won’t be comfortable, but I have a bit of time to test them out. Shopping for shoes in Japan is soul-crushing, I die a little with every ugly pair of shoes that I have to wear. 

We picked up the kerosene and then we got some groceries. I decided to cook dinner tomorrow night. It’s from a packet, nothing too exciting, but hopefully, it’ll be nice. 

We came back to the house with the nice bento that we got for K, only to find that she’d already eaten. We left the bento for tomorrow for her. We put our shopping away and then F and I headed out again.

We had dinner in the Chinese restaurant that is near our old apartment. We had a sweet and sour chicken dish, bifen (noodles), and a stir-fried vegetable dish. It was all quite nice. 

We came back to the house after we ate and relaxed. F took the bread out of the bread maker and I did up the garbage for tomorrow. I had a bit of help, but things went okay and I didn’t lose my temper, I’m glad to say. 

Tomorrow, F is back to work a bit early. I’m going to cook dinner and I hope to do a few other things during the day. I have to get working on the mini-con and finding out if other people would enjoy my ideas for outings and lunches, etc. 

Come back later and find out how things go. Until tomorrow….