May 23, 2020

Saturday - Rainy, sunny and warm

I set my alarm to go off at 9:30 this morning. I went to bed very late so 9:30 was pretty early for me! I went looking for F and he was downstairs making breakfast for his mother. I came back upstairs and got half-dressed. I wasn’t sure if F would want to go out or not. 

When F came upstairs, he was raring to go! I suggested going to the doctor, but he didn’t want to go. Okay then! I also called F’s attention to the weird traffic line-up that we could see from our window. (Remember this!)

I suggested that we go and get his mother some food for the day, and that’s what we did. However, when we got to the main road, the other side of the road was completely backed up. What was going on?

We got to the store, bought a bento and some other food and then started back. I reminded F that the roads were busy so he went a different way. We ended up in a traffic jam! As we inched forward, we came to a crossing. F zoomed off in another direction. We ended up on several dirt roads in between rice fields. I started singing, “Country Roads” at one point. I’m not sure how, but we did make it back to the house! It took a little longer than we expected, but we made it.  It turns out that today some local coupons for restaurants went on sale. You could pay 3000 yen and get 6000 yen in discounts. It was insanely popular. They were planning to sell them tomorrow too, but they were completely sold out. I think they were selling the coupons in the park across the main road from us!

We finally got on the road. F and I had a nice lunch in Kushibiki at the Chinese style restaurant he likes. I had a set meal with egg, pork and veggies, he had ramen and was quite pleased.

We made good time to Yamagata. We stopped at a rest stop for a few minutes and used the facilities but didn’t buy anything. We decided to stop at the Aeon Mall as I wanted to go to the Import Food store.  We went to the mall and F did a little shopping first. He wanted a new pair of jeans and while I looked at the craft corner, he went shopping. He tried them on and liked them, and also asked to have them shortened.  It was going to be an hour and a half until they were done. We decided to wait!  I bought some fabric masks that I found in the craft area.  I put one on when I went to the washroom. So much more comfortable than the non-reusable ones. 

We went to the food court area and got a drink, then did a little bit of shopping. We went to the import store and I got my rooibos tea bags (two boxes!) and some peanut butter. Yay. We went back to the store and picked up his jeans. Yay. I also got a couple of pairs of socks too. 

We got back on the road, and this time ended up at Costco. We parked on the roof and F got a great parking spot right near the elevator. Yay.

We went in and did our shopping. We had a bit of a problem finding things. I couldn’t get any liquid hand soap as I didn’t find it, and I didn’t get any tissues for my MIL. We got some Brussel Sprouts and some beets, some cheese, sausages, potatoes, just stuff. We picked up quite a few “junk food” things, but I tried to get some that were in smaller quantities so that I could do a bit of portion control. 

As usual, we had a few words with each other going through the checkout. I had asked F to get out the bags before we went through the checkout line and of course he ignored me. That meant that everything got stuffed back in the cart when she ran the items through the register. I tried to bag it when we were at the end of the counter and F started telling me off. Honestly. He made me go and stand in the middle of the store to bag things. I wasn’t best pleased. I didn’t want to yell at him because he didn’t have to bring me today after all.

We stopped and had an ice cream each. It was so good! Today it was mixed Hokkaido strawberry and milk I think. After our break and a bit of a cool down, we were much happier with each other!

We went back to the car. The parking lot was empty except for our car…and the one right next to it! The whole place was empty, but for the two cars parked right next to each other. Happily, the car next to us did move, but I thought it was funny.

We stopped at an Indian restaurant in Yamagata city for dinner. We both had Saag Chicken curry, medium hot and chai. F had his with saffron rice and I had mine with naan.  It was good. F thought his was too spicy though, but I was fine with mine!

After we left the restaurant, we started the long drive back to Tsuruoka. We made pretty good time and got back around 10 pm.  We unloaded the car and put things away. I separated the bagels and put them in the freezer. We came upstairs and have spent the time since we got back relaxing and watching YouTube videos!

Not completely sure what we’ll get up to tomorrow, but we have plans with a friend to have lunch if we can agree on a place. After that, who knows!

If you are still interested, come back later and find out what happened on Sunday. Until tomorrow….