August 11, 2024

Sunday - Hot and sunny with a few raindrops in the late afternoon.

I woke up around 8:30 the first time, went downstairs and then I came back upstairs and went back to sleep. I had the weirdest dream this morning. I dreamt that I was back in university, trying to find a place to live and for some reason former President Trump was there and was trying to sign up 2 young boys to the same school. It didn’t make any sense, as dreams rarely do!

I got up a bit later, F came up to the room while I was getting dressed and we talked about where to have lunch. He said he didn’t want any as he’d eaten with his mother. Okay then. I suggested Arpeggio but as we were going to the car, I thought about another place. We ended up going to the nearby cafe, Cafe B-Flat. It was quite busy today but we got in right away. We looked at the menu and I chose their special, but I couldn’t have that as they were out of salad! I ended up having carbonara and it was quite nice. I had Darjeeling tea with it, F had a strawberry shortcake dessert and an iced coffee. I did quite a bit of reading on my phone and even finished reading Anne of Green Gables, which was so lovely to read again. I cried at the end, when the sad thing happened. F didn’t notice!

While we were in the cafe, F booked himself a massage. I didn’t mind, yesterday he was talking about booking it at odd times like 9:00 am when I was asleep. Of course, he could go, but I wanted to have some time at S-Mall because I haven’t been there in ages. The mall doesn’t open until 10 am, so there wouldn’t be a point in me going out with him, even if I was awake!  Anyway, he could get a massage at 3:45, so we left the cafe at 3:15 and went on our way. 

F left me at the mall and I did a little shopping. I went to Daiso and tooled around and just enjoyed myself. The most interesting thing I got was  a couple of silicone rings to fry eggs in. I was thinking about using them when I make gapao rice. I don’t generally like fried eggs, so I don’t make them well! I’ll see if they help. 

After a bit of store wandering, I went to Doutor and had a decaf iced coffee and a piece of pound cake. I was relaxing and enjoying my phone when F phoned to say he was done. I told him where I was and that I’d see him soon. He showed up about 2 minutes later!

I bought a new round of drinks and F subsidized me so that was good. After our drink, I suggested that if we were going to go driving tonight, we should get F’s mother something for dinner. 

We went to the grocery store and F picked up a few things. When we left the mall, there was an incredible rainbow overhead. It was basically the full arc. It was lovely!

The picture doesn't do it justice.

We drove back to the house, F fed his mother and then we drove off to the wilds of Yamagata!  Now, I guess I take a little bit of responsibility because I didn’t check where F was driving to, but he didn’t check with me either! He also didn’t check that the place we wanted to go was open. We drove off to see the falls. We went a different route than usual, but F said it was a new route. After 30-45 minutes of driving we arrived. At the wrong place! I asked F where we were and I don’t think he knew. He said he did, but I don’t know why he didn’t take us to the highest waterfall in the prefecture. We’ve gone there a few times this time of year. I Google mapped it and it said it would take us about 35 minutes to get to the correct place. Okay then. Off we went. Now, keep in mind that 2-3 weeks ago, we had torrential rain and the area we were in had flooding and some road damage. We dodged some of the damage on the roads and finally arrived at Tsumedare Falls. And, the road to the parking area was blocked off. The road to the Falls was blocked off! Oh no!  F looked it up then and discovered that there had been some damage up near the falls and they were probably not open. Why did he wait to check? He should have checked before we drove out there!

We drove back into Sakata, making a pitstop along the way. We decided to have dinner at a keiten sushi place, one we don’t have in Tsuruoka. We had a pretty good meal and enjoyed ourselves. 

After that, we drove back to Tsuruoka and came back to the house. It was quite late when we arrived. 

In the kitchen, I washed the drink jugs and set up a new bottle of mugi-cha and one with some watermelon-lime tea that i bought today. It sounds interesting, I hope it is good! F doesn’t seem sure.

I didn’t watch any TV tonight, just a few YouTube videos. That’s about it for today.

I’m not sure what’s going to happen tomorrow, literally. Supposedly, there is a typhoon on the way and we have been getting warnings on our phones’ weather apps about it. 

Come back later if you like and hear all about my day. Until tomorrow….