June 25, 2019

Tuesday - Clear and sunny

Today did not turn out the way I thought it would, but it was fine! I woke up early again and F got up just after me to get ready for work. I dozed for a bit but ended up falling asleep again. I woke up just before 9am, which was a big surprise.  I got up, dressed and watched ER.  I did a load of laundry and got a text from F saying that his back was bad again and he was taking off Wednesday so he could go to the doctor.  I texted back that it was a good thing.

After my laundry was hung up, I did a little work on F’s jeans.  I made a second patch for the pocket and I edge-sewed one of the holes. I had to stop to have lunch though.

After lunch, I did some Postcrossing and ended up doing 3 postcards. Yay me. They are quite a varied bunch.  I also got one in the mail today which was a nice treat.

I washed dishes and then did a bit of prep for dinner, I put a marinade on the meat.  I came back upstairs and watched the news. 

F called and then arrived back at the house around 6 pm. He wanted to go and get a massage tonight and decided to book it then and there.  I asked him not to book it until after 8pm.  Of course, he booked it for 8 pm. Sigh.  That meant that I had to scramble to get dinner on the table.  I wasn’t too worried though.

I prepped the salad, microwaved the veggies, and fried the meat. F came into the kitchen to watch and I asked him to help by setting the table. Of course, he vanished immediately. I set the table, I was running back and forth trying not to let things burn. The one thing F did was put water in the water-pot so we could have miso soup. 

Dinner was ready and we all ate.  Once again, almost everything disappeared. There were leftovers today, but that was unusual. After dinner, I brought everything back to the kitchen and prepared to wash the dishes. F showed up and did that…but he drove me crazy.  He washes the pots before the plates, he washed everything so slowly that I actually suggested he leave so that he could get ready to go.  He’s tall, and the sink is low (too low even for me), so he stands with his legs in the splits to reach the sink. At one point tonight he went on his knees to wash dishes. It was so annoying. I dried things and put them away.  F got rather testy with me and told me that the reason he washes the dishes is that I don’t rinse the dishes.  Yes.  That’s it.  Except, he whined so much about me not rinsing the dishes that I started rinsing the dishes about 15 years ago.  He’s obviously never lived in a place that has water rationing, but I do rinse the dishes.  I realized that this was probably the back pain talking and that if I denied it too strongly, I’d never get any help with the dishes. However, do I really want his kind of help?

He stormed off when he was done and I went upstairs. He went off to his massage and I watched a bit of telly. I enjoyed myself. 

A little after 9 he called to see if I wanted to go out. I did, of course, I needed to mail my postcards. I said that I’d get ready and wait for him downstairs. I did that.

We went for coffee and cake first. He seemed in a bit better mood and we even chatted a little. We ended up spending much too much time in the coffee shop but finally got out. There was another spat when he yelled at me for standing in front of his car when the people parked in the car next to his were just sitting and parking there. I was supposed to get in his car quickly. Well, I was trying to talk to him, but I’m not sure if I’m allowed to do that. Even when I do, he doesn’t listen much.

We drove closer to the grocery store. I said to F that I just needed to mail my cards, so then he said he wouldn’t go in. Fine. I got out of the car to mail my cards and he came too. I walked to the mailbox, he went into the shop. I came back to the entrance but couldn’t see him. I decided to look inside. Nope. Maybe the washroom? I finally saw him in the lobby. He was obviously looking for me but didn’t see me. I don’t know why he never sees me!  We met up outside and went in again.

We grabbed a few snack-like things and then came back to the house. I took a shower, watched a little TV and F went to bed and basically ignored me in favour of his phone. Sigh. 

So that’s it. Tomorrow I have grumpy man around and I’m not looking forward to it. Hopefully, he’ll take his mother off to the doctor in the morning and the two of them will be all happy and cheerful when they get back. Snort. I hope.

Come back later if you like and see what does happen on Wednesday. Until tomorrow….

July 31, 2009 - Friday

Sunny and hot today.

A pretty good day. I got up on time, spent some time on line...make that, spent a lot of time on line, and then when it was time, went to work. I stopped off at a drugstore on the way there, got a few things for the day.

I had one class today and it went quite well. The student worked hard and I really am starting to think that there is hope for him after all. After class I gave his mother the letter that F had translated for me last night and it looks like we'll be using a new textbook soon. Woot. I think it's a good choice for him.

When I finished with class I read a bit of the newspaper, then F called me. He was at home...had been for quite a while. I thought he was going to work late, because of course he SAID he was going to work late!

We had a quick and cheerful dinner at New York, New York and then came home.. I spent the evening watching London Hospital 1906. It was terribly heartbreaking and realistic too.

I'm going to try and have an early night too. I have a long shift tomorrow, even though it's not that busy. Keep your fingers crossed for me that everything goes well. Night!

July 30, 2009 - Thursday

Cloudy but thankfully not rainy today. A little cooler, but still humid.

When I woke up this morning the first time I had a headache. I got up for a few minutes, watched some news and then went back to bed. After that, I overslept! It was quite late when I woke up again, I just kept turning off my alarms and going back to sleep. When I got up again, most of my headache was gone. Yay.

After I showered and such, I started working on dinner. I wanted to make a creamy horseradish chicken dish that I found in my cookbook today. One problem though is that I didn't have horseradish. Oh well, I substituted wasabi. I also didn't have as much chicken either, but didn't care! I browned the chicken, but it was too early to put it in the slow cooker, so I put it back in the fridge for a bit.

Just before I cooked my brunch, I heated up the chicken in the frypan, then put it in the crockpot and poured my chicken bouillion/wasabi mix over it all, closed the lid and hoped for the best.

I left for work a bit late and had to really run. I got to the school fairly quickly and got set up. I was finished a little bit before my student came. Whew.

I had 3 back to back classes today, so I was fairly busy. The first one was fine, and she left when she was supposed to, but the second classes students came late, and then their mother was late picking them up. When she arrived, I couldn't get her to leave! Finally she did and I was able to move the furniture in the classroom and take care of some personal business. All of the classes went fairly well and it was nice to see everybody .

After classes, I did paperwork and was just looking forward to ten minutes of downtime, when my hubby called. A student had cancelled her Saturday class and should he come and pick me up right now? No thank you! I wasn't finished yet. I managed to put him off by another 10 minutes and got the dishes done, and finished changing clothes.

We made a quick run through the grocery store. My recipe needed cream cheese and cream for the sauce. Of course hub had to get himself some happoshu. At home, I went into cook mode and added the cream cheese to the sauce. It was supposed to melt, but it took it's own sweet time. I added cream and then a thickener, set the table and put all the stuff out. Hubby made coffee, but only cause I asked him to do it. He did give me a big glass of ice water which was something I didn't know I wanted until he did it!

Anyway, the chicken was scrumptious. It was really tender and falling off the bone. The sauce was nice. If I do it again, I might add more wasabi. I like more of a kick to it, but it was really good. Tomorrow I'm hoping to use the sauce on my omelette! The broccoli was nice too. In fact the only bad thing about our dinner was that F was watching the news at the same time, so I had it blaring in my ear and a husband who was more interested in the news than the meal. Sigh.

After he did the dishes, he did some translating for me and my school. I had asked him to do it two weeks ago, and I was getting desperate for it. I have to ask a student's mother about changing her child's text. Anyway, it's done now, so I'm happy. I'll give it to the student or his mother tomorrow.

That was my day. My headache is still around in the corners, but it really hasn't been that painful all day. In fact, I only took pain medicine once, the rest of the time I didn't need it. Too soon to know if it's ending or I'm just getting a respite.

Night night!

July 29, 2009 - Wednesday

Rainy. Was it St. Swithin's Day recently and nobody told me? (Actually, yes it was, and it rained. I just checked my blog.)

I went to bed last night around 12:30am. That is not a typo. Very early for me. I slept well, but still woke up with a headache. Ack. I've noticed that if I take medicine it works for a short time, but the pain comes back.

In the morning I did a lot of lazing around the apartment. Lazing and sweating. Bleck. Finally I roused myself, thought about going out, but then it started to rain again. Sigh.

In the afternoon I watched some TV and also did some housework (gasp!). I vacuumed and cut up our lovely milk cartons to take in for recycling.

Hubby came home a bit late and we hemmed and hawed about where to have dinner. I had originally planned to go out and get some food and then cook that for dinner, but the weather combined with my headache made that a non-starter. Finally we decided to go to Fireball. We've been there a couple of times. It's a little pasta restaurant fairly close by, they aren't fancy inside, but the food is good. Well, it was good tonight too. I had chicken and eggplant spaghetti in a tomato cream sauce. Oh, so good. F had some kind of pasta with pork and eggplant. I think he had more of an olive oil based sauce. We got the set so we each had soup, salad, dessert and drink bar too. The food was great and we had a nice time together.

After dinner we bought a few groceries for tomorrow night. The plan at the moment is for me to cook chicken drumsticks in the afternoon and then we'll have them cold at night, with salad and cold broccoli. Hopefully it'll work out.

At home, hub watched something on TV, but at 11 we started watching Desperate Housewives. It was sooo good tonight. It was the end of season 4 so they tied up a few loose ends, but also started a big change in the show. F was terribly surprised at the end. I already knew, because I'd seen part of season 5 last year in Canada.

And that was my day. F is off in bed, and I'll likely go soon. It is raining really hard now. I tried opening the windows a few minutes ago, but it was like listening to a tap running, so I closed them again. Sigh. I hope the weather improves tomorrow.

Got to go! Night night.

July 28, 2009 - Tuesday

Sunny but a bit of rain in the morning and at night.

If I don't make a lot of sense tonight, please forgive me. The left side of my head is hurting and at times I can't even move my head. I've taken almost as much tylenol as I can and it's not even taking the edge off the pain. Yikes.

Today was a pretty good day. I got up early and watched news. NHK does this thing that I really don't like. They show little clips from international news, on the stories that they want to feature. I wonder why they don't just show more of the news like they do at noon? I really don't need someone telling me why it's so important to them. They did show most of the US news, so I felt a little lucky not to have missed it. I went back to bed afterwards, for a little while.

Today was my early work day, so I left the apartment before 1 and then had class at 2 pm. My student and I talked about housework for a bit. She had also done a book report to enter my draw for a bag. Hurray for her. I put her book report up on the closet door.

I made a drugstore run after my class, but didn't get anything worth noting. I was a bit sad, but what can you do?

My 6 o'clock class was a little late, but it was the first time I'd seen the student in about a month so it was just nice that she came at all. My student at 7 pm came and we had a nice chat. We did a bit of review and I was really impressed. She's remembered a lot from last week.

After class I finished up and then called F to come and get me. We had dinner in Jiro tonight. I had originally thought about cooking, but my headache was bad and hubby said he was tired, so we went out. It wasn't terribly expensive tonight.

We came home and then F watched some TV and I read email. I think I'm going to end this now. I might try to have an early night (it's just barely midnight) and see if more sleep will help.

Good night!

July 27, 2009 - Monday

Very rainy in the morning, early afternoon, clear at night. Very humid.

I got up this morning just a little after my hubby left. I had a cup of coffee and took a tylenol. I realized that the headache I woke up with is the same one that I've had for about 3 days now. Ack. I think the headache of Christmas past is back to haunt me. Then I went back to bed and slept for a long time.

I got up later, had a shower, and then did my laundry. I usually do it when the mound is about 6 feet high (I'm only exaggerating a little), but today I just thought, why not. I'm hoping the weather will improve later this week and I'd like to go out.

I watched some of the TV from the weekend, even though I'd already seen it, and spent a lot of time on my computer. After a while, I got ready to go out.

About 6:20 my student picked me up. As we were walking to her car, I noticed that my hubby had just come home so I said hello and goodbye.

We went to a little Thai izakaya or snack that my student likes. A few minutes after we arrived, her friend arrived and we ordered. I had lemongrass tea to drink, the others had beer. We had some interesting conversations and hopefully, my student's friend will join my school. We discovered along the way that the bar owner speaks a bit of English, and so did one of the customers. The food was really good. It got better as the night went on. We had spring rolls, salad, grilled chicken, baked noodles with shrimp and bacon and pad thai. I've never really eaten a lot of Thai food. When I went to Thailand I was on Atkins so couldn't eat noodles or rice, and my hubby really doesn't like the flowery Thai flavours. I think he'd like what we had though.

All good things had to come to an end, and around 9:45 I sent hubby a text message to see if he'd come and get me. He would. We paid up and all decreed that we'd had a great time.

I came home with hubby and had a quiet evening in. He hadn't gone for ramen like I thought he would. He had bought some yakitori for himself. Crazy man.

Around midnight, we watched a comedy show from Quebec. It was basically all mimed comedy, so it didn't matter where the comedians were from. F was laughing quite a bit at it.

And that's it really. Tomorrow I'm back to work. I have an early class and then two in the evening. I hope they'll go well. Wish me luck. Hope this stupid headache buggers off too. Night.

July 26, 2009 - Sunday

Cloudy and rainy all day.

Today was a better day. I wasn't sure how it would be at the start, but it gradually got better over the day.

When I woke up the first time, there was a takkyubin delivery for me. My friend had sent me some books and I had to pay for it. It was a bit early for me, but I did it. I went back to sleep and then a little while later got up again. F came home and we didn't talk for a while, but then we did.

We had lunch in Kintaro sushi. It was quite busy, but I kind of like it better that way. I don't have to order as much, because what I want is usually on the way down the conveyor belt. Yay. I had quite a lot of sushi, but not as much as F. He had some pineapple too. I had a piece, but it was too sweet for me. I'm honestly turning away from sweet food these days.

After lunch we drove over to Sakata to look for shoes. We went to a shoe store near the train station. I've been there before, but never with F. We each ended up getting a pair of shoes. I got a pair of men's shoes, but they look more like unisex ones. I have such wide feet that I have trouble finding women's shoes here. With our trip coming up, I wanted to get a pair of comfortable walking shoes. I'll have to break them in soon, but they felt quite good. F got a pair of loafers made from lambskin. They feel amazing. I hope he takes care of them as they were blooming expensive. He has this habit of buying cheap and awful shoes and wearing them in the worst places you can imagine. I told him he has to take care of these ones.

After spending all that money, F wanted to buy one more thing. A new bicycle lamp. His has broken. He finally got his tire fixed, and now he needed his light fixed. He must be planning to go somewhere by bike soon! We went to Musashi, the hardware store and while we were there, I saw some fake Crocs. I've always wondered how they were for comfort, so I tried a pair on. They fitted. Whoop. I bought them, and some things for my school.

F didn't find his bicycle lamp, so we went on a search for them. We stopped at Jusco in Sakata, but he didn't find one he liked. We did have a milkshake at the Mr. Donuts there. That was a nice break. Finally at the mall in Mikawa, he found a light he could live with. I also bought some nice bread from their bakery.

We came home and after I checked my email, went to join F on the bed. After a little chit-chat, I fell asleep. I woke up a couple of hours later and was shocked to see it was almost 9 pm. Yikes.

We went out to Grado and had a nice dinner. F wanted to ride our bikes over (so he could have a drink) but it was raining. He said it was 3 drops per 3 seconds, but I pointed out that it meant in 100 seconds there'd be 100 drops, so we'd probably get quite wet. We drove! At the restaurant we had grilled chicken with cheese and pork shabu-shabu. It was quite nice and I enjoyed it. We picked up a few groceries afterwards, so it really was a good thing we didn't ride our bikes.

At home again, we finally watched 27 Dresses with Katherine Heigl and James Marsden. It was cute. I think I enjoyed it more than hubby, after all, I have more experience with Western style weddings, but he did like it. I have a thing about movies where people spontaneously start singing. I think they're fun...I do it fairly often. I also got a kick out of all the brides saying their bridesmaid dresses could be re-worn. Yeah, right! I've only been a bridesmaid once, and I had to wear a green satin monstrosity. I wanted to wear a dress from a regular store, but the bride (my sister) didn't think they were dressy enough.

Anyway, that was my day. It was much nicer than yesterday. Last night I went to bed around 2 as I had a screaming headache that my painkillers weren't helping. I have a headache tonight too, but I'm still up. Oops. I'll take something for it in a minute.

Tomorrow I'm having a night out with a student and a friend of hers and I may run out to do a bit of shopping in the afternoon. I'm not sure about that though. Got to go! Night.

July 25, 2009

Saturday

Cloudy and rainy.

My classes went well today. I had two of them and they were 4 hours apart. I spent my free time reading a book that I bookmooched, Around the World in 80 Dates. It's a lot of fun.

I'm not talking much about the rest of the day because it was terrible.

That's it for me. Night.

July 24, 2009 - Friday

Cloudy and later, hot and sunny.

Today was a nice day. I got up, found there was no news on, then went back to get 20 minutes more sleep. When I woke up, a couple of hours had passed. Sigh. I took a shower and got on with my day.

I watched Re: Genesis today and it looked like it was the last episode of the series. I'm quite sad about that. It was an interesting show and it was Canadian, so I'll miss it.

I went to work today and on the way stopped at the bank, then the craft shop and the drugstore. I got more tea tree oil and some iron supplements.

When I got to the school it wasn't as hot as yesterday, so I still turned on the air conditioner, but not as strongly as yesterday. When my student arrived it was nice and cool in there. We had an okay lesson. He wasn't able to come last week so it was a little difficult for him. He really needs to work harder on his English!

F picked me up after work and we went to the drugstore for a few necessities. After that, we came home where he was nice enough to cook us some dinner. I didn't do very much tonight, I just sliced the chicken and poured the oolong tea. Afterwards, I did the dishes.

We watched National Treasure: Book of Secrets and then London Hospital 1906. It's very interesting, and a bit gruesome. I'm still watching it.

Oh, I also got a phone call today from Gabrielle, my friend from L'Eikaiwa. She worked in Tsuruoka after I transfered up to Otaru. She married a local guy too (what is it about Tsuruoka men anyway?) and just had a daughter. She's here with her husband & baby visiting her in-laws.

Anyway, that's about it for me for today. It was a pretty decent day. Tomorrow, I have two classes, about 4 hours apart. I'm not sure what I'm going to do with the extra time. On Monday I got tons of work done, maybe tomorrow too? Or not!

Gotta go. Night

July 23, 2009 - Thursday

Hot and sunny.

An okay day. I got up a little late but it wasn't a big deal, until I remembered that today someone was coming to see if we had any trouble with the walls or doors in the apartment. Yikes. I got up and got dressed, made the bed, really fast. Just in case. I sat around the apartment and waited. And waited. Finally I decided that I wanted to take my shower, so put the security bar on the door and did. Of course, I thought I heard someone while I was in my shower, rushed out, and no one was at the door. Whew. Still, job one was done. The guy did show up about 20 minutes later, but F had forgotten to fill out the paper, so the inspection guy left without coming in. Yay. He was nice even if neither of us had a clue what the other person was saying!

I had a good afternoon today. I read some of the newspaper, then I watched a bit of telly. Saw a horrible Robin Williams movie. Thank goodness I didn't pay to see it. Around 3:30 I started making my lunch and then cleaning up to go. I left around 5 pm.

I heard my cellphone ringing in my backpack so thought that my student wouldn't be coming, but I was already halfway to the school, so decided to keep going. Besides, a little extra time in the school wouldn't hurt. I got there and it was so very hot. It was over 30 degrees. Bleck. I turned on the AC and the fan and it soon became manageable. Although I did try to call my student back, she didn't answer. She didn't come to class either. Oh dear.

My other two classes did happen and went quite well. I had fun with the two children students. After class their mother and I chatted with them for a bit. My last class of the day went really well I thought. I had put the new vocab on cards. Usually I use them for review with the student, but today I used them to introduce the vocab to the student. I asked her to put the words into 3 piles - 1) words she knows, 2) words she thinks she knows 3) words she doesn't know. It worked really well. She does quilting so I thought she'd appreciate the tactility of the cards. She did. And after we'd gone through all of the vocab, she took the lead and separated everything into nouns, verbs and adjectives all by herself. Hurray.

After class, I finished up and called F. He was sleeping at home. Sigh. Poor guy is just not doing well right now. He came and picked me up. We went to Cocos for dinner. We both wanted something light for dinner, so he had French toast and I had a taco salad. It was nice.

We came home via the grocery store and got a few things. I've asked F to make cold soba for dinner tomorrow. I was going to make cold pasta, but I have no idea how to make the sauce for it! We got a bit of cold chicken too, so there'll be some protein for me.

At home, F went to bed very soon after we came home. I have been on my computer most of the night. Just reading email and that sort of thing.

And that was my day.Tomorrow I have one evening class but I want to do a little shopping before it. Wish me luck with that! Got to go. Night night.

July 22, 2009 - Wednesday

Warm and sunny. Not too hot.

Today was a good day. I was quite glad about that. This morning I got up a little after 9 to check for news, but there wasn't any. F was home and we had some coffee and some bread that we'd gotten last night. He had to run to the photographer's, city hall and his mother's place for a bit, so I stayed home and had a relaxing morning.

When he came back we went out for lunch. Today we went to the Daiichi Hotel and both had their "meat" lunch. It was local pork in a mustard sauce. It was very nice. After that, we went up to the post office where I sent off a bookmooch and then went to buy/order travellers cheques. I was really surprised because they had Canadian cheques in the branch. They did last year too though, come to think of it. They tried to give me 100's at first, but sometimes they aren't too popular, so I asked for 50's instead. I got some, and so did F. The girl took a long time selling them to us, but as far as I know, she did everything right, so we didn't mind too much. I know they aren't used much in Japan, so I imagine she didn't have much practice selling them. Of course, I did it all the time at Le Bank!

F brought me back home after this. He had more errands to run. He went to the main police station to make arrangements to get his International License again, then he went for a massage. He was having a bad back day again.

He came back around 4:30 and we vegged for a while. Then I checked the ANA site and realized that we could book some of our in-Japan tickets. F took care of those. We have one left to get, my return flight from Tokyo. Apparently ANA doesn't offer return tickets when the return flight is more than 14 days after the first one!

After a bit, we decided to go to the mall for the new frozen caffe latte, and then to dinner. It was nice. F liked the coffee and on the way out of the mall I showed him some possible socks for Zachary. Then we drifted into the shoe store nearby and both realized that we need new shoes. We thought about coming back on the weekend.

We went to the Grand El Sun for dinner tonight. We had one of their special set menus which I thought was quite expensive. We had appetizers, salad, pizza and pasta followed by coffee. It was very tasty. The downside of dinner there was it was very noisy tonight. They had at least 3 parties in the dining room. After our meal, when we paid, I realized that the price was per set, not per person as I'd assumed! Not as expensive as all that then.

On the way home hubby said he'd like to watch a movie before Desperate Housewives. That was fine with me, so at home he picked out a few but kept coming back to James and the Giant Peach. I like it, but I wasn't really in the mood for a family movie. I'd have prefered a rom-com, but he wasn't in the mood. So, James and the Giant Peach it was. I was sitting on the couch, working on my crochet when I heard that awful sound. Yep, he'd fallen asleep and was snoring. Grr! At 11 I stopped the movie, watched DH (so good tonight....lots of goings on...finally dealt with that horrible child living with Tom and Lynette, Susan's baby was named, and someone's been kidnapped!) F decided to go to bed before it started. I watched my show, then finished up J&tGP (I don't have to type it all out again do I?). I really DO like J&tGP, it's very imaginative. Course, I love Roald Dahl too!

I set up the coffee pot for tomorrow morning, then did the garbage stuff. I even threw out a pair of leaky rubber boots that have been sitting in my genkan for far too long. It felt good to put them in the bag.

So, today was quite a productive day. We got a lot of things scratched off our "to-do" lists. Tomorrow I should be a bit busy in the evening at the school. I'm scheduled for 3 classes in a row, I just hope that they all come.

A good day. Night!

Oh, but, I haven't even mentioned the eclipse today! It was a non-event up here. It was cloudy, but it didn't get dark at all at the time. We watched it on the TV this morning, rather than go outside and risk retinal damage.

Now then, good night!

July 21, 2009 - Tuesday

Cloudy then very rainy all day.

I woke up early and then got up. I watched a bit of news on the TV, but nothing special. I went back to bed and slept a little bit longer.

I showered and then watched a bit of the weekend's telly. I saw a CSI and then realized I had a movie on the same tape and just enough time to watch it before work. So, I put on The Jane Austen Book Club. I had read the book a few years ago and didn't really like it as I thought they didn't discuss the books enough. However, I do have to say that the movie was better! They talked about the books a lot. Yay. It finished up nicely before I was ready to leave for work.

I biked over to the school. There was an occasional raindrop on the way, but I made it safely. At the school I got things ready for my first student. I had set up for two students back to back, so I put away the unnecessary things. My first student came and we had a great lesson. After her class, I did paperwork, took a short nap, did my book-keeping for last month and planned two lessons for another class. Yay me. My second student of the day came too and we had a good class. We talked about the event at her store, and then went into the lesson. We finished early, so I gave her the task of making sentences about herself using the new vocabulary from the unit. It really worked. She "owned" the words that way and hopefully they'll stick with her a little longer.

After class I finished my daily paperwork, washed dishes, prepped a couple of classes for Thursday and then thought about what to do. I was still quite angry with my husband, but it was raining out. I normally would just go home if the weather was nice, but it wasn't. I decided to call him. I think the weather helped me make the right decision!

He came and picked me up and we had a fast and cheerful dinner in New York, New York. I had chicken. Man, I eat a lot of chicken!

We came home via the grocery store and at home watched Monk. Hubby doesn't mind that show too much. Then he wanted to watch some stuff about fishing which was followed by synchronized swimming. Whatever. It wasn't annoying or brutal, so no problems.

I've had a lot of email to deal with tonight so it took a while to get blog time. Whew. Hopefully I'll be done soon.

F told me on the way home tonight that he's taken tomorrow off. He has to make arrangement to get his International Drivers License and we should go and order/buy Canadian travellers cheques. Of course we have to go to the main post office for that one. I also have a bookmooch that I'm sending so I need to wrap it up. Hopefully we'll be able to get through the day without wanting to strangle each other! Wish us luck with that.

Anyway, that's it for me for tonight. Back at you tomorrow night.

July 20, 2009 - Monday

Sunny, but cooler.

A pretty horrible day. I slept in really late as I didn't go to bed until very early this morning. When I got up, F was in a foul mood to boot. I took a shower and then came back to discover he was watching crap fighting on TV. Since I thought he wanted to go out for lunch right away I was quite surprised and shared my disdain for his TV choice.

We had lunch in Grado, then came back to the apartment. He shut himself in the bedroom and even when I asked him to come out to watch a movie, didn't. Funny, I thought he wanted to watch the movie too, so I decided not to watch it when he wasn't there. He came out of the bedroom and was surprised that I wasn't watching it.

He left for a while, close to two hours. Didn't tell me where he was going either. When he came back he went back into the bedroom. I'd had enough so I demanded to know where he went. He told me later he'd gone to watch TV in his car. What a jerk. Later he went out again and came back with food--for himself. He put the headphones on (thankfully) and watched more fighting crap.

I grabbed my book and went out for dinner. It was okay, but I can't help feeling this is all rather stupid. After all, it's not like he even had any plans for today. I've told him time and time again that if he makes plans I will get up. He never does. He doesn't do plans. He just likes to whinge about me ruining his weekends.

I came home and we basically ignored each other until he went to bed.

I had a day. I read a lot of my Stephanie Plum, did some crochet, listened to lots of CBC podcasts and had a huge fight with my husband. That wasn't a good thing. However, it feels like it's the norm these days.

Night.

July 19, 2009 - Sunday

Rainy and horrible weather all day.

One of my earliest memories this morning was having a shower in bed. I'd left the window open last night and this morning it was pouring. A little rain came in the window, so I got up and closed it a bit.

When I got up I found that my husband was up and working. He'd done quite a bit of cleaning around the apartment. Unfortunately, he didn't clean up the messes that he makes on a daily basis first, but he did more than I did today! I suggested going to the laundromat and washing our bedding and the blankets and quilt covers that we aren't using in this season. So, we did that. We had lunch first though at a restaurant near the laundromat.

Now, doing laundry (or anything) with my husband is an adventure. Today he bought a card to use in the washing machines. He tried to use it in one machine and couldn't get it to work. So, I went and got change and used the coins which worked. We were using two machines. He finally got his to work. After everything was washed, we put one load in a dryer. I saw there was another dryer a few feet away that was available, so I was going to suggest that we take it, but another lady beat us to it. Meanwhile, F was still playing around with his laundry card. He put it in the machine and started punching numbers. I suggested starting with 30 minutes on the timer. Meanwhile, as I was saying that, the timer numbers started going higher. My dear hubby was trying to cancel the extra time, by maxing it out. When he'd gotten the timer up to 72 minutes he ran out of money on the card! I hadn't planned to stay that long there....oh dear. I set my timer on my cell phone for 36 minutes, we decided we'd check it out then and if everything was dry, swap loads. Not much else we could do. I was having a good time. I brought Lean Mean Thirteen by Janet Evanovich with me, so I was laughing my head off at Stephanie Plum's misadventures. The 36 minute load of laundry was dry, so we swapped it out for the other one, and did some folding. When our dryer time was nearly up, the place was getting crowded. I think a lot of women washed their clothes at home and brought them to the laundromat to dry. Our bell beeped and we checked our laundry. Some of it needed a little longer, to the dismay of the waiting hordes!

After we folded and bagged our laundry, we came home and made the bed. Then, we didn't have a lot to do. Hubby suggested karaoke. I'm always happy to oblige!

We were in the convenience store getting munchies when I said that I was hungry. Hubby realized he was too, so we went for dinner. We found a new place and it was quite good. The bad thing for me was the soup was cream of corn-bleck, but other than that it was quite good. Then, we went to karaoke.

We got free time and stayed there for a long time. It was after 10 when we left. F told me that we'd sung more than 40 songs! It was fun. I did a few for the first time, and even did an Adam Lambert/Michael Jackson song, Black or White.

We came home afterwards, and vegged for a while. We took a nap together and I woke up and got on my computer. Hubby is still napping, but now he's on the couch. He mumbled something at me a few minutes ago, but I have no idea what he was talking about!

Tomorrow, I'm not sure what's on the agenda. We may see an old friend who's in town with her husband and baby or we may do something crazy. Guess you'll just have to tune in tomorrow and find out! Night night.

July 18, 2009 - Saturday

Rainy all day, clearing at night. Hot and humid.

Today didn't start that well. When I went to bed, F got up. I couldn't sleep for a bit, but found myself awake again at 7:30 am. I rolled over and slept on. I got up, showered and got ready for work. We had breakfast at Gusto and then I was dropped off at my school.

Work was fine today. I had 3 classes that surprisingly all went well. In the first one, I showed the mother a letter about getting new textbooks and she was all set to pay me today! I haven't ordered them yet, but it's nice to know she's okay with it. In my 2nd class, the student was hungry so I fed her some cookies. We had quite a good class, one that was a little challenging for her. My last class was fun too. We talked about our homes and what our kitchens were like. In the middle today, I read 2 newspapers, did paperwork, prepped for Tuesday and later today and even took a nap at my desk.

After work F picked me up and we went to the mall. We had a quick and okay dinner at one of the mall places and then tore upstairs to the theater. He bought tickets while I got into line for the popcorn. We made it! The movie was long, but it was good. It was sad that a lot of the details were cut from the movie, but overall, I really enjoyed it. There was a lot of teenage angst in the film too, which was quite good, and a nice relief from all the seriousness of the plot. Oh, and in case it was too difficult to figure out the movie, it was Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince.

When the movie let out, we came back to Tsuruoka and went to Cocos. We both had curry tonight. I don't usually have curry as it's served with rice but I decided what the heck. It was good, but a bit hot for me. I don't like too spicy food.

We came home and I watched House and then a British comedy show on WOWOW. It's very funny, but sometimes a bit shocking.

And that was my day. It's very hot and humid in my little corner of the living room so I think I'll move out of here and go to bed. My side of the bed is just under the window so I usually get a little breeze. Yay. Can't wait!

Night.

July 17, 2009 - Friday

Hot, cloudy and so humid.

I had a reasonably good day today. I got up, but couldn't watch news. Why do they seem to think people would rather watch sports than news?

I relaxed for a while, then in the afternoon I headed out. First I went to a bank to update my passbook, then to my hairdresser. I was lucky and she was able to take me right away.

After she was finished I went to S-mall and had a sandwich and a frozen cafe latte. It's a new drink that Doutors has for summer. It was good. Then, I did a spot of shopping and came home.

F followed me about 20 minutes later. I was suddenly overcome with sleepiness, so I went to bed for about an hour and just slept. When I got up, F went to bed and basically stayed there. He did take a bath, but after that, back to bed. I made dinner while he was in the bath and he didn't have any. I put the extra in the fridge. I might take it for lunch tomorrow.

I had a quiet evening. At 11 I watched Veronica Mars, then around 1 am Lost. I'll probably try to get to bed early as I have a busy day. It usually doesn't happen though.

Anyway, that's it for me. I have no idea what this weekend is going to be like. I want to go and see Harry Potter, but don't know if hubby will be up for it. I'll let you know. Later.

July 16, 2009 - Thursday

Hot and humid, a bit cloudy.

Today started oddly. I'm not talking about the cuddlefest I got this morning from my hubby, but after that. I fell back asleep and had the strangest dream. I dreamt that I went into Michelle Obama's hotel room and rummaged around in her private letters and such. I left the room in a hurry because I thought she was coming back to the room. I ran back to my room and got into bed to pretend that I hadn't been anywhere, but she came into my room and started telling me off. She had found me because I had left one of my personal papers in her letters. I woke up around that point, but I'm not really sure what it all means! I had read a newspaper article on her a few days ago so maybe it was in my subconscious, but how weird! And please, if there are any CIA people reading out there....It was just a dream!

I got up and watched the news today. There was great rejoicing in the land! I did computer stuff, took my shower and then did laundry. Hurray. It didn't avalanche onto me last night.

When the time came I made my brunch and then headed off to work. I got to the school, turned on the AC and then headed out to the drugstore. I didn't buy too much today, just a drink and a few munchies, but it was nice to bike around for a bit.

My class went well. The student had made a trip to Tokyo this week so she told me all about it and then we got into our lesson. We do a lot of writing in this class. In our last textbook I wanted her to do more, but she wouldn't, now she writes dialogues and seems to enjoy it very much.

F had had to go out of town today so I didn't know when he'd be back. I decided that I'd take my time closing up today. I also needed to prep my first class on Saturday. I relaxed for a bit, did paperwork and just tried to enjoy myself. Around 9 I got an email and texted him back that I would be done in a bit. He showed up in about 15 minutes. I wasn't done yet so I wasn't best pleased, but I suppose he was trying to be nice.

We had dinner in Grado. It was very nice. I had meat and hubby had fish. The dinner was delicious. I like the restaurant. It isn't perfect, but it is fairly low cost.

We bought a few groceries, and then came home. We had a quiet evening and F went to bed quite early. He's tired all the time these days. He says that he can't feel the heat. I think his body can, even if his brain doesn't really register how hot it is. Anyway, these days he's so very tired. I feel a bit sorry for him really.

That's it for me. My bruise is now surfacing on my leg. It's rather large and quite a lovely shade of purplish-blue. I'd take a picture of it, but I'd have to shave my leg first and I just can't be bothered!

Night everyone!

July 15, 2009 - Wednesday

Cloudy, with a bit of rain in the middle of the day.

Today was quite a good day. I roused myself enough to say goodbye to F as he left for work. I had slept very well last night. Yay.

I got up and discovered there wasn't any news on, so got on with my day. I showered and then did a quick bunch of things on the computer. Lunch followed, and then I left for work.

Thankfully there were no accidents on the way today. It was quite windy, but not rainy. I was so glad of that. I got to the school and did a quick set up, and cool down of the room and me!

My lesson went quite well and the student and I had a good chat. This student works really hard on her English and almost always brings a few prepared questions for me. I generally start laughing as soon as I see her take out her notebook. Today was asking me about the weather. She wondered how I liked the hot and humid weather. I'm an Albertan, so hot and humid is alien to me, even after all these years. We had a fun discussion about the weather.

After class, I did the paperwork, cleared up and set up for Thursday's class, then I read the newspaper and decided to head out. On the way home I stopped at the drugstore and also the ATMs near the grocery store to update my passbooks.

I came home and worked on my computer stuff for a bit, then Fumihiko came home too.

We hadn't planned to make anything for dinner, so decided to go out. We went to Edoichi. For the first time in a long time, I didn't make a total pig of myself and still felt quite human when I left. Often times I overeat there and am uncomfortable for the rest of the day.

We bought a few groceries at the store and then came home. At 11:10 we watched Desperate Housewives. That was fun. I spent most of the hour rolling my ball of cotton into a feeds from the middle ball. Much easier to work with. Then, I did a bit of crochet and actually started the new ball of yarn. So, I'm about halfway done now. Yay. I like the way it looks. The colour changes very nicely and looks like it's striped.

Anyway, that's about it for me. Tomorrow, I have one class in the evening, so I can have a quiet day at home. I'm thinking that laundry will be done. Or had better be done if I don't want the huge mound by my bed to avalanche and smother me while I'm sleeping!

Got to go, night.

July 14, 2009 - Tuesday

Cloudy in the morning, heavy rain in the afternoon.

I only have a little bit of time before American Idol starts, so I wanted to get a head start on my blog entry.

I had a quiet morning today. The news was on, and I enjoyed it. In the early afternoon I made cucumber yogurt salad, and put it in the fridge for dinner. Yum.

I started out for work just at 4 pm. Of course, it started to rain torrentially as I left the apartment, so I put on my raincape. When I got out to the main road and had to go over a small bridge I had a problem. I'm not sure what happened, but I ended up falling off my bike. I think the gear slipped at the same time as I turned the wheel. Anyway, I wasn't badly hurt, but I have a very bruised and scraped knee. Oww. I swore a lot and got back on my bike and went to work.

My class went well and and the student did very well. He's a great kid. Sadly, his mother will be busy for the next few weeks and he won't come to school for a bit.

I called F and asked him to come and get me. He picked me up and brought me and my bike home. I told him about my accident, but so far he hasn't even seen my knee.

I checked email and then made dinner. I really didn't do that much. We bought chicken fingers at the store yesterday, so I heated them, set the table, got out the salad and dressings, and my yogurt salad. It was simple but nice. F. did the dishes afterward.

We've spent the evening watching Spiderman 3. Personally I'd rather have watched something else, but Harry is so tragic in this that I don't really mind too much.

Well, that's it for me. I'm going to do the Idol thing in a few minutes and I'll be a crocheting fool all the while. Talk to you tomorrow. Night!

PS...I forgot to say, Happy Bastille Day!

July 13, 2009 - Monday

Torrential rain and gale-force winds in the morning, clearing in the afternoon.

I got up at a goodly time today, but being Monday there was no news on. I stayed up too. I watched some of the things I'd taped yesterday off WOWOW. The first thing I watched was 28 Weeks Later. I'm glad I didn't stay up and watch it last night. I'm just not into horror movies. I only wanted to see this one because I'd seen the first one.

I had planned to go out, but the weather in the morning was terrible. Then, in the afternoon I got caught up in something else, so I didn't go out. Oh well. That also means I didn't spend any money and that's a good thing isn't it?

I spent the afternoon writing 2 letters for my students' parents. Two of the children are finishing their textbooks and I wanted to ask the parents for permission to order new texts for their children. Hubby will translate them for me.

After F came home tonight we went out for dinner. We ended up at New York, New York where we had decent burgers. We came home via the grocery store where I bought some cucumbers. Yes, I think it is time to make cucumber salad again, although it isn't very hot right now.

We came home and F got stuck in on the translating, with me telling him that he had to stop when American Idol came on. He did, but then decided that it was time to fix himself something to eat and drink. The man is so noisy! He did catch me glaring at him a few times and had the good grace to quieten down. During AI I did a bit more on my crochet. I'm getting near the end of the 3rd ball of cotton. That should mean I'm almost half done! Woot. I'll have to try and wind some more into a ball tomorrow.

And that's about it. I had a mostly quiet day today. Tomorrow I have only one class, as one student cancelled. The good thing is I'll be able to come home early. That will be a nice treat. Gotta go. Night!