I read today about the death of Dimebag Darrell during a show in Columbus, Ohio. You might be wondering, why do I care about that? Especially if his name is “Dimebag Darrell”. This guy was the guitarist in a band that I listen to occasionally, Pantera. With songs like “Good Friends And A Bottle Of Pills”, and “Fucking Hostile” they are my band of choice for headbanging.

There is a vague connection between Dimebag Darrell and myself. Back in my college days at Fresno State we piled into my friend Chuck’s pickup and made the two hour drive to Bakersfield to see Pantera and Skid Row at the Bakersfield Fairgrounds. There was a large group of us, and even a brave girl, Theresa, came along dressed like girls usually dressed at a concert like that in Bakersfield. Yeah, like that.

We went right down to the mosh pit for Pantera and were very close to the front of the stage. The show started and at some point somebody threw one of their shoes onto the stage, landing right in front of the guitarist. He looked down at the show, and then looked into the crowd, and right then I knew what was going to happen. He stepped back and kicked that shoe as hard as he could right at us. I ducked and the shoe smacked the poor guy behind me in the face. I looked back up at him but he was already moving on to the next song.

Today after getting home early I took a three hour nap, and then had a nice simple dinner of salad, salami and cheese. After dinner I went over to the bookstore and talked with my friend that works over there. She told me that she had been transferred to the Tokyo store, so next month she’ll be leaving. Bummer!

She was transferred, but I’ve heard from various people that’s really how you get fired. Imagine working a low paying job in San Diego, kind of like what I did at Barnes & Noble for a while. Then, the manager comes to you and says, “Guess what, you’ve been transferred to the Barnes & Noble in Eureka.”

I don’t imagine that many people would head north to Eureka – most would quit. That’s a nice non-confrontational way to get rid of somebody here in Japan. I hear in the big companies that they transfer you to overseas positions, which can be really disagreeable, and tough on families. I don’t know if I would prefer getting transferred hundreds of miles away or outright fired.

Tomorrow is the school’s year end party. I’m predicting total havoc since we will be front-loading before the party, doing all you can drink beer, wine and sake at the party, and then collecting the survivors for darts at Donkey after the party. Is there anything I can do now to prepare my body for the abuse tomorrow?

Mr. Hayashi offered to buy the gang lunch today since he did some translation work the other day. His pockets were jingling, and it was to our benefit. We went next door to the cafe and had a set lunch there. They have a great price – it only set him back about 500 yen a head.

We talked about the upcoming party next week. Lots of people aren’t going, but I think I convinced Mr. Komuri to go with me. In keeping with tradition, we’ll be meeting somewhere first to do some “front-loading”, and then head over. They always have long speeches at the beginning of these, so if we arrive with a good buzz we won’t mind as much sitting there staring at the beer. It’s a fine line to walk, but we’re professionals, here.

After lunch I went home to do chores and organize my place. I’ve sent off the last of my Xmas packages, so I had lots of boxes, wrapping paper, bubble wrap, and other debris laying around the living room. Now things are back in order. I did a little laundry, and started burning data to DVD with my new burner. It’s a relief to have backups now.

At around six I went over to Azusa’s place to do some English conversation lessons, and as usual her mother fixed me a big cup of coffee for the long walk home in the cold. As a bonus she put out a bunch of sandwiches – six of them – for me to eat. I only ate one, but the hospitality seems to go up a notch each time. Next week is our last lesson before Christmas, so I need to think of something fun to do.

When I got home I cooked up some rice and shrimp with Korean sauce and green onions. It turned out delicious.

Lately I’ve been feeling a little out of whack. Usually I walk around with a smile on my face, but recently I have to remember to smile. Last year for two days I was in a blue funk and found myself locked in my house feeling like crap for no apparent reason. I’m wondering if this is another episode coming up. This week was supposed to be all fun and games after the completion of my test, but my attitude hasn’t really matched it. I guess I just need to catch up on my sleep and be a little more social. Friday’s big party should be a good way to do that.

After work today Mr. Kimura and I took a trip to Den Den Town in Osaka. It’s kind of the center off all things geeky – the high tech area of Osaka. Walking through there was kind of like how I expected Japan to be before I got here – lots of computers, software, video games, porn shops, toy stores, all concentrated into a huge area of Osaka.

We took the JR Loop Line to the southernmost part, Shinimamiya station. From there we walked north for about ten minutes to get to the southern gate of Den Den Town. The name Den Den Town comes from the Japanese word from electronics/electricity – Denki. This place earned it’s name.

I was glad that I had Mr. Kimura around to steer me in the right direction. He pointed to shops where he had found good deals in the past, and sometimes led me away from stores that were overpriced. He and I compared prices on DVD Burners, and after comparing amongst seven or eight stores, we decided on this one. We picked it up for about 15500 yen, roughly $160. That’s $50 less than the lowest price I could find on the internet.

Another cool place I found was a toy store, just a tiny place that was lined with glass cases filled with famous Japanese toys. I recognized lots of toys from my childhood – some from back when I first moved to Glen Ellen. They had every Transformer robot since the beginning of the series. I asked the guy if I could take some pictures but he said “no way”. It was like a shrine to toys, and Mr. Kimura and I were both walking through “oohhing” and “aaahhhing”.

We gathered up our stuff and headed out, catching the train back to Umeda. On the ride back I was telling Mr. Kimura that I’m just not geeky enough to take advantage of all Japan has to offer. Maybe it’s a good thing that I’m not dropping money on lots of toys from my childhood, but sometimes I think of all the people I know back home who are crazy about comics and toys from Japan. If that’s you, come out and visit me and do some shopping.

Mr. Kimura caught the next train back home, but since I was in Osaka already, I sent a message to Kuniko and then dropped by her place. She had dinner on the stove, and it looked great! It was called Jaganiku (I think), literally “meat and potatoes”. They tasted excellent and with a little rice and a bowl of miso soup it was a real feast. Kuniko said that it was completely different from how it is supposed to taste, but since I’ve never tried the original, it tasted great to me.

At around 8:30 I went out to Shin-Osaka and caught a train home. I’m now able to sleep on the train and not miss my stop. It’s like slipping into a trance – you’re not really asleep, but it feels good to rest your eyes and also to think about the plan of attack for the days ahead. I was zoning out all the way to Akashi, and then again on the train ride to Nishi Futami.

I hooked up the DVD Burner when I got home and it powered up just fine. Tomorrow I’ll try to burn a couple DVDs and see what happens.

I left my flashcards at home and went in today to work to sit around and read a book for pleasure. I’ve got easy days ahead this week, so I’m taking advantage to relax a bit from the studying. People were a little shocked to see me doing something other than studying, which may be a good thing.

Mr. Hayashi got me out of there by 11:30, and I was home preparing packages to send out this week. I made two trips to Ito Yokado to get tape and wrapping paper, and now I’m finally finished packing everything up. I hope it survives the trip!

Tomorrow I’m heading into Osaka with Mr. Kimura after school – I’m shopping for some hardware for my computer – a new DVD burner. I’ve been fearing for the data on my computer, and some judicious backing up would be a really good idea. If I get a chance I’ll try to visit Kuniko on the way home, if I can make up a good excuse to part ways with Mr. Kimura on the return trip.

Despite having almost half a day off I’m inexplicably tired, so I’m going to go to bed early tonight. Maybe I’m catching a bug, I don’t know.

I’ll spare you the boring post for Saturday – just cramming vocabulary into my head and reviewing piles and piles of flashcards. Kuniko came through on her way to party in Takasago, and a few hours later came back with some rum raisin ice cream for us to share and a bottle of Bailey’s Irish Cream. Now my cold weather bar is complete!

We had the ice cream with some Bailey’s and then we hit the rack.

I was up early the next morning for a quick breakfast with Kuniko and then I left her to meet Yuri at Sannomiya station in Kobe. From there we went on to Konan University, the site of the Japanese Language Proficiency Test. It was easy to find – there was a steady stream of foreigners heading that way.

They were very serious about the exam, with yellow cards, red cards, long explanations of the instructions, and of course everything was in Japanese. It was split into three parts – kanji and vocabulary, listening, and reading comprehension and grammar. I think that I did adequately on everything but the listening – that one was flat out tough. I need to find a way to practice listening more.

The results come back in the middle of February, and some people I was talking with theorized that they don’t want to ruin your holidays with a failing grade. I’ll just have to wait and see!

Yuri was taking the first level test – the highest one that they have. She has some Japanese heritage though, and she speaks great Japanese. I waited up for her to finish her somewhat longer exam, and then we went back to Sannomiya to meet up with Kuniko and Tamura sensei, who were shopping and having fun.

We met up and got dinner at Pastel, a pretty good Italian place. The food tasted great and wasn’t too expensive. We all got out of there for about $40. After that we walked over to the movie theater, but before we went up there was a boy band playing in front of the shopping center. They were lip-synching to their CD and they had people circulating in the crowd passing out flyers.

Upstairs we say “The Incredibles”, which for some reason is called “Mr. Incredible” here in Japan. My quick review is that it was right up my alley – great movie with so many salutes to my favorite movies – James Bond, Indiana Jones, Star Wars. I highly recommend it.

Now I’m back home and getting ready for bed. I’m giving myself five days off from hardcore Japanese study. I’m going to continue to memorize kanji (I’m up to four a day now) but other than that, relax and recharge.

We’ve got the big heaters installed in the staffroom at school now. That means that it’s nice and warm when I get there in the morning. The down side is that in the afternoon when things warm up outside, they’re still cranking the heat up in the staffroom. It’s not uncomfortably hot, just warm enough to make you sleepy. Combine that with lots of studying for an exam, and you have one tired foreigner.

The good news is that I didn’t fall asleep and I kept studying. I went home early, about 4:30, and then did some studying at home as well. I’m starting to approach the burnout level, so I’ll need to be careful and to take a nice long break after the exam.

I cooked a big dinner of rice, beef, and red peppers, and was sitting around digesting it when the phone rang. It was one of the guys heading to the yakitori, and he invited me along. I decided it was a good chance for a study break, so I went over and hung out for a little while.

He ordered up some raw octopus and wasabi over raw potatoes (takosabi), and I changed my drink to shou-chu on the rocks. I listened carefully to the Japanese being spoken and was able to catch a little more than what I’m used to. Still not enough to get by – I’ve got a long way to go.

Everybody wished me luck on my exam, and the guy who invited me picked up my tab. It just goes to show you that when you’re sitting at home with a stomach full of food getting ready to hit the sack, that in no way precludes the chance to eat raw octopus and drink strange liquors surrounded by people speaking a strange language. Another huge reason why I love living here.

I moved the link to my archives from the right hand side of your screen to just below the big picture on your left. I don’t know why you’d want to read any of my posts twice, but there you go.

I had three easy classes in the morning, and now I’m just coasting into the weekend. I had the whole afternoon off to study, and tomorrow I have just a few easy classes to do. Next week after my exam, the students will have exams, so I’ll have lots of free time to relax. I’m not really stressed out about my Japanese exam, but maybe I should be. The practice exams that I’ve been doing lately always seem to point to some little point that I didn’t quite understand. Also, it’s a timed exam, so I may be racing against the clock.

I got an interesting phone call from Hasegawa Sensei, the head of the Hyogo Board of Education. He was inquiring if I’d be available for another top secret project in December, and I said that I would be. He asked me to keep it to myself, but I’m sure all the teachers were wondering who was calling me. I’m definitely on the short list of hired help for the Board of Education. How can I turn that into a job prospect down the road… hmm…

In one of my classes today Mr. Hayashi had set the students to work on autopilot and prepare for their exam next week. He and I were talking about various things in English, and Mr. Hayashi was offering his opinions on how to attract women. He told me that personality doesn’t work – you need something more, like money. I couldn’t help but laugh and I asked him if that was his experience talking. He’s definitely from the camp that says that the more money you have, the better women you will attract. I offered the opinion that women that are with you for money will leave you easily for someone with more money, but he didn’t seem convinced. I have a lot of strong feelings on this particular subject but I didn’t push them on him.

I heard from the master of the yakitori this evening. We’ve been trying to organize a time when he and some of the gang can come over to my place for a fiesta. We’re aiming for the middle of December, but since the master works every night but Tuesday, it limits our options. I hope it works out – it would be fun to have a bunch of crazy people over to drink. What should I feed ’em?

I’m resisting the temptation to go out tomorrow night – instead I think I’ll stay in and study. There’ll be plenty of time for fun after the big test. I’m off to bed a little early tonight. Tomorrow should be a piece of cake!

More interview tests today. I baffled the students with such questions as “How are you?”, and “Do you enjoy studying English?”. To be fair, they are all so nervous that it’s tough for them to catch the question. Still, most of them did great and it went very well. Tomorrow is my last set of interviews, and then I’ll be coasting into exam week, when I will have a ton of free time.

Some of my students received the results from their STEP tests and they passed! It is really a good feeling to hear from them after you’ve been coaching them for so long.

My students can be pretty far out there – and then some of them are completely normal. You just never know for sure until you talk to them. I was explaining to one of my students that his favorite band – “Rip Slyme” was named after tearing snot. He was astonished, and a little disappointed I think. Another student today asked me how long my nose is (in centimeters). One of my ESS students gave me some omiyage from her trip to USJ a couple of weeks ago. She also wrote a nice note in English explaining the present. She’s one of my favorite students – she always tries hard.

I’m becoming more and more at home in a classroom full of students running around. In the few minutes before class officially begins it can be a bit chaotic in the classroom. Today some boys were playing a quick game of baseball – they kicked their slippers off their feet to pitch, and the boy would swing with his arm at the flying slipper to try to get a hit. Girls are screaming and chasing each other around, and the whole scene is how you imagine a food fight would be without the food. I just step out of the way of the flying slippers, or talk with some students in English.

There’s some serious behind the scenes drama going on between the English teachers right now. It’s a long story, and it goes back all the way to World War II, believe it or not.

At the end of the war, American occupying forces initiated a change (one of many) in the Japanese education system from the learning of German to the learning of English. Traditional English instruction in Japan consists of a lecture and lots of grammar rules – not conversation. For many years, up until the mid 1980’s, people just didn’t learn how to have a conversation in English. This led to lots of teachers knowing a whole lot about English, except how to speak it.

Now in present day Japan, there has been a movement over the last 15 years to teach conversation. This has put a lot of teachers on uncomfortable footing. Some teachers are afraid to get up in front of a class and speak English, because of the fear of making mistakes. They don’t mind doing it alone, but in front of other teachers, or an ALT like me, they don’t want to appear clueless.

Mr. Hayashi is great at speaking English, and he’s part of a minority of teachers that can not only teach it but speak it, as well. He makes other teachers nervous. At some schools, none of the teachers want to speak English, and so I’ve heard of situations where ALT’s have to learn Japanese to communicate with others. There is a seniority structure in these situations, and people get used to being the top dog in their pool of teachers. The wild card here is that every year, random teachers are transferred to other schools.

Ms. Mori is one teacher that was the boss at her previous school, and is used to having her way. Last year she transferred to our school and is very vocal about how English should be taught. She’s not very confident about speaking English, and she’ll only talk to me under strictly controlled conditions or if we’re alone.

She and Mr. Hayashi are clashing in a very Japanese way – subtly making power plays and allegations – recruiting friends and identifying enemies. Mr. Hayashi gives me the play-by-play daily, and sometimes tries to bait me into participating. So far I’m not having any of it, but it’s interesting to watch.

I don’t know how it will turn out, but a battle is brewing, and sooner or later somebody will come out on top. Very dramatic, and just one of the subplots going on in my workplace.

The last few days the history teacher has started to arrive at the same station at the same time so he can walk to school with me. Now we can squeeze in an extra 10-15 minutes of quality time in a day. Yaay! He’s like my English language stalker now.

My classes today were filled with the second half of the presentations that we started a couple of weeks ago. They weren’t quiet as lively (or as violent) as the previous set, but they all did a great job. I need to dream up a project for them to work on during the next term. Any ideas?

I had the chance to spend a couple of hours at school studying, and I worked through a couple of practice exams. I did pretty well – 85% on one, 75% on the other. On Sunday I will have the real thing, so I’m hoping I’m ready for it.

Have I told you how respect seems to work in Japan? Of course, this is just my experience and what I’ve gathered from talking to people both foreign and Japanese in my daily life, but the idea of respect is much different than what I’m familiar with in Western culture.

The way I see it, I’ll give somebody respect when they earn it in my eyes. When I’ve seen something they’ve done or seen evidence of it, I’ll respect them more. In Japan it’s a little different.

As in the west, if you do something well, and you do it with humility, you earn respect from other people. In addition, you can get respect just by being older than someone. Curiously, these two types of respect are weighted nearly the same.

Age is regarded as wisdom in Japanese culture, and the language is designed to be used differently depending on the status of who you are talking to. Status is closely tied to age. The corporate ladder is very closely associated with age. People in Japan have historically worked for the same company their entire lives, although from what I gather this is changing somewhat. As you progress through the years your salary increases based on your years of service rather than on merit.

Being older is useful in that people will treat you with kindness and deference, regard your opinions higher, and generally put you in a positive light. If you are senior to someone else, you will get respect from that person. Even if you are jerk.

An observation I’ve made is that some people take advantage of this “get respect free card” and use it to their advantage. They enjoy the priviledge of respect, without feeling that they have to earn it. This can lead to some uncomfortable situations, but I’m sure that the Japanese have ways of dealing with this that I’m not yet aware of.

Age and status play an important role in everyday communication. For example, when I say good morning to someone at my level or above, I say “Ohayo gozaimasu!”. When it is someone below you in status – say, a student – you can say just “Ohayo!”. It’s much more casual. A student knows they are below your level, so they don’t consider demeaning or wrong. If you say that to someone above your level, you are being rude.

There is a P.E. teacher that comes in every day and says “Ohayo gozaimasu” to everyone, but when he gets to me he says “Ohayo”. Somehow, I’m lower in status in his eyes, and it’s just something I have to live with. Even my teacher on Monday evenings, Tsuji-san, is very aware of status and respect. She checked my age and when she found out I was a bit older, then she knew that I could use a more casual tone with her.

Anyway, lately I’ve been studying the different layers of language to deal with people on the levels above you and below you. The vocabulary of Japanese changes significantly when you are using “respectful language”, and it makes things very difficult to figure out – especially on the fly. Luckily I’m a foreigner and when I make a mistake I have a good excuse.

I had a goofy combination of interview test classes, and one strange one with Mr. Hayashi.

The interview tests went just fine. At the end we played a game where I call at a word, and then two students at the front of the board try to be the first to circle the correct one from four choices. At first I had boys versus girls, but the girls were always too shy and wouldn’t try too hard. Now I play it with mixed teams, and so the boys play against each other and so do the girls. They really get into it, sometimes pushing the other kid out of the way to draw a circle.

Sometimes I wonder when an activity goes too far. Will the teacher tell me to stop it? A couple of weeks ago a kid got punched in the back during a skit (on purpose, but still…) and today was pretty rough. We’ll just have to see how far it will go.

Mr. Hayashi’s class was weird – the students were full of energy, and they asked lots of questions. Mr. Hayashi had the great idea to give them the answers to all the questions beforehand. Then they were encouraged as they got everything right. Call it an “alternative teaching method”.

One of the fill in the blanks was “I want to ( ) your sister.” I was waiting for the crude jokes to start, but not one was mentioned – it turns out that I was the only one thinking rude things. Figures. Turns out the correct answer was “I want to make friends with your sister.”

I made a semi-homemade pizza for dinner, and spent most of the evening catching up the website. Kuniko called and I got a chance to chat with her. Now I’m off to bed. Tomorrow is another busy day at school with more skits. I hope nobody gets injured.

Kuniko and I got up early, had a quick breakfast, and then caught the crowded train to Kyoto station. It’s only two stops away on the super rapid express, but a lot of people had the same idea so we were squeezed into the train. This doesn’t happen as much as you would think, but when it does you always wonder how it can be legal. What if there was an accident? How am I supposed to extract myself in a hurry?

At the station they had a pretty big Christmas tree up, and a succession of jazz musicians playing live music to entertain the people sitting around.

Our first stop was Tofukuji, a big temple just to the south of the station. We arrived in another packed train, and followed the stream of people into the temple ground. It was crazy how many people there were, and we all had to cram through a wooden bridge to reach the main entrance.

This year was supposed to be poor for viewing the trees, because we had so many typhoons this season – there weren’t many leaves left on the trees to turn color. It was better than I expected – I went nuts taking pictures, as Kuniko will surely attest to.

We didn’t actually go inside the temple because the line was monstrous, and instead we walked around to some other small temples and enjoyed some quiet time away from the crowds.

Our next stop was back at Kyoto station where we caught some Chinese food for lunch, and then it was a bus trip to Ginkakuji, the silver pavilion. I’ve been to Kinkakuji before – the gold pavilion, and it’s quite impressive because the outside is covered with gold. The silver pavilion, despite it’s name, has no silver, but is no less beautiful.

The history of the silver pavilion is interesting because the silver covering the walls was pillaged in the 1700’s by Spanish dentists in a bid to improve dental conditions in pre-Colonial Japan.

Not really. I just made that up. I’m not sure why there is no silver on the pavilion. But the grounds were great, and we walked all over the place taking more pictures. There was a peaceful waterfall, and everywhere the ground was sprinkled with Japanese maple leaves ranging in color from yellow to red.

After Ginkakuji we walked along a road that ran alongside a small steam for a mile or so. At the end of that road was another area full of shrines and temples.

By the end of the day we were both tired out. We had dinner at a ramen place in Shin-Osaka station, and I headed home around 8 p.m. I’m glad I was able to take that trip – last year I didn’t get to see much of the color change.

Today was a nice relaxing day – just cleaning up around the house and catching up on a few things I’ve been meaning to do. I spoke with my grandfather, who recently turned 94, and he was as feisty as ever. I went over to Ito Yokado and got a grilled chicken breast and made a sandwich here at home.

Around four o’clock I took the train into Akashi and did a little Christmas shopping. It’s strange to shop for Christmas presents here – everyone has lots of Christmas decorations, but buying a lot of presents isn’t really common here. I guess it’s just a celebration of the time of year.

Anyway, I had a blast shopping, and with armloads of extra baggage I hopped the next train to Osaka.

Kuniko was there cooking dinner for us when I arrived, and I got a real treat – homemade oden. Oden is great cold weather food – it’s a tasty broth with lots of different kinds of vegetables and then some fish cake-type things that are floating around. It really is good, although the concept is a bit hard to explain. You eat it with a bit of hot mustard, and Kuniko had bought a couple of beers to go with it.

I got caught up on Japanese TV, and then it was off to bed. Tomorrow is the big trip to Kyoto to see the changing leaves.

Mr. Hayashi was at a judo match today, so I took over one of his classes alone. I had some worksheets for them to work on, and I also gave them a short quiz. I was surprised that after I passed out the quiz, a lot of the students tried to cheat by looking at their books. I walked around and made faces at the ones I caught, and some of their textbooks were confiscated temporarily. They were just trying to see how much they could get away with, and I’ll report back to Mr. Hayashi later on. He’s probably not too concerned.

The history teacher came by to talk with me and we had two long conversations about the role of the state vs. the federal government in education (his topic) and also about his lack of success with girls (my topic). I’ve been hard on the history teacher in these pages and I will probably continue to be hard on him – he takes tons of my time and then when he feels guilty about it he buys me dinner to buy another few months of conversations. Other teachers have told me that they stay away when the history teacher is around, otherwise they’d like to talk to me. Students also are scared off when he is around.

It struck me today while I was walking down the hallways that in any given week I spend more time talking to the history teacher than I do Kuniko. There’s something wrong with that.

What do I do about it? Nothing, for now. What would you do? I’m sure a bright idea will come to me someday. For now, I will endure. I just think that not only is he taking up a ton of my time, but he is hogging up a resource (me) that is intended for the whole school.

The mystery of the New Belgium box is solved. My dad e-mailed me and said that he had met a representative from New Belgium, one Dave Macon, who was nice enough to send the package to me. Thanks Dave! I’m going to wear the T-shirt today and maybe the hat tomorrow in Kyoto.

I went to the yakitori with Yasu tonight, and we had a big dinner and lots of beer. There were a lot of regulars there, and so I got to chat with everyone. The guy that works at the liquor store across town came by. He speaks great English – so he was happy to get the chance to talk. He was wondering why I don’t walk by his store anymore, and so I explained about the new train station.

Yasu and I trucked out of there, and we staggered down the road towards the apartments. Yasu told me about a new word he learned in English – “reeling”. He said that we were “reeling” along the sidewalk. Good usage Yasu!

Tomorrow I’m headed into Osaka, and Sunday Kuniko and I are going to take the short trip to Kyoto to do some sightseeing. Should be fun!

Today after school, two members of the ESS club and I made hand-turkeys to celebrate Thanksgiving. We spent a lot of time talking about turkeys. Turkeys don’t run around Japan, so the closest connection I could make was that you could buy turkey legs at Universal Studios in front of the Jurassic Park ride.

I got a much-needed haircut on the way home, and then went to Uozumi to pick up a package that the post had tried to deliver yesterday. It turned out that they didn’t have it, so I went home and an hour later they delivered it. I had no idea what it could be – I’m not expecting anything and it’s a little early for Christmas.

The package had a New Belgium Brewing Company sticker on the side, and the first thing I thought was “They ship beer to Japan?” Inside the box was a Fat Tire T-shirt and baseball cap. Excellent – they both fit perfectly.

There was nothing in the box or on it to tell who sent it – it was sent straight from the brewery. If you sent the goodies – thank you very much! Let me know who you are so I can thank you!