Last night I saw a clip of the intro to “The Fall Guy” – an old TV show featuring Lee Majors as a stuntman/bounty hunter that runs around punching people and chasing women. Wow – that brought back memories.

It had me grabbing old Bionic Man and Bionic Woman episodes to watch this weekend. I don’t know how much cheese I can handle at once, but I downloaded two of my favorite episodes when I was a kid – featuring “The Probe” and “Fembots”. Maybe tonight or tomorrow I’ll watch them.

After work tonight I’m going to join some of the American inspectors for drinks at the local tachinomi. It shouldn’t get out of hand, however, and I’m planning on being back at a decent hour. Maybe I can stop for a drink at Red Spanky if the timing is right. And that is probably the extent of my wild single life until Kuniko gets back tomorrow…

Yesterday I talked a little bit with the new cleaning lady that works on my floor in the office.

She’s a little intense.

She comes in pretty early but apparently not early enough to clean my room before I get there. This fact seems to bother her a little. Also, she is a little curious about me, and among the foreigners that work on that floor I am the only one who speaks Japanese. So yesterday she wanted to talk.

The weird thing was that while we were chatting she had a dust rag in her hand, and she was cleaning random objects within her reach. She didn’t really have a target for her cleaning, just whatever happened to be nearby, and she didn’t look at whatever she was cleaning – she just looked at me while we talked. When she left she cleaned switches, walls, and anything else in her path as she opened and closed the door. It was as if she needed to show that she was in fact working – not chatting with someone – just in case her boss showed up. Strange.

While walking to work yesterday morning I had a nice encounter with a person walking the other way. The woman smiled at me, said “Good morning” in English, and then commented that the weather certainly was hot these days, also in English. But actually I wasn’t surprised at this sudden outburst of English, because I have been working on this person for weeks.

For as long as I have been in Japan I have made it a point to be friendly and smile at people as I go to and from work. Call it my last stubborn effort to not fit in with all the serious looks everyone else wears. Smiles at strangers are reserved for the crazy people. But ever since I walked to Takasago Minami high school back “in the beginning” I have enjoyed the reaction a simple smile will get. At first it is ignored, but if I’m lucky it will be returned within a few days. After a week or so somebody might throw in a “Good morning” in Japanese, and if I’m really lucky in a month or two we might exchange some English.

What I’ve found is that most people want to be friendly, it is just considered bad form to do so out of hand. You have to follow formal steps to get to the smiling stage, and to cut right to it is not Japanese. Luckily, as a foreigner I get a free pass.

So I have various “projects” on my route to work. Some are in the early stages, some are more talkative, and yesterday was a very fulfilling episode for me. Now if she takes away from this that foreigners aren’t scary, that it is OK to smile at people when walking by – well, that’s just icing on the cake.

Anyway, this is my continuing project to loosen up Japan. Just 124 million people left to convert.

It was a weird weather weekend, but luckily we were able to plan things well and get what we needed done on the right days. Saturday it was sprinkling rain in the morning – and we headed into Kobe to do some shopping. We got the things we needed, and then headed into Sannomiya to dig around for information as well as score some Thai food at Baan Thai. Actually, it was the first time we’ve been there since getting back from Bangkok, and it was very good. There was interesting crowd of people – an old guy with a horrible wig ordering enough food for an army, and then leaving most of it there when he left, an a group of American and British ex-pats that bitterly discussed inter-cultural relations.

As it happened Sunday was hot and sunny, so we stayed home and did load after load of laundry. Everybody else in the neighborhood was doing the same – which shows you how long it has been since we’ve had decent weather. For dinner I grilled up some mushrooms, zucchini and eggplant, and Kuniko did some school work before we finally hit the hay. A very relaxing day.

This week I should be able to wrap up the itinerary that I’ve been working on for our trip. Also at the end of the week Kuniko has an overnight study camp to attend with her students, so I’ll need to figure out how to stay out of trouble on Thursday and Friday night… hmmm….

After extensive searching on the internet I finally found a source of American micro-brewed beers in Japan. A small shop in Yokohama that specializes in Belgian beers also has a pretty good selection of American ones. I paid big money, but I was able to get some bottles of Sierra Nevada Pale Ale and this year’s seasonal Summer beer, some Rogue Porter, some ales from San Diego’s Green Flash brewery, a couple of bottles of Dogfish Head IPA, and even some Bear Republic beers, which is the closest thing to a hometown brewery that I’ve got.

I was very happy to find them – this weekend and next week I’ll do my research and start preparing my next order. Beer is one of the things I don’t mind paying a lot of money for. There are a lot of fake beers in Japan for people that want to save a little yen, but drinking a beer on a hot summer day is like a reward – why reward yourself with some weird fake beer?

Anyway, the research project begins tonight – should be fun to check them out.

Last night after work I joined a couple of students for dinner and drinks in Tarumi. We went to a small Italian restaurant near the station that nobody had been to before – one of the students had walked by it many times, so decided to reserve some seats there. At first when we arrived the place was empty, but it started to fill up after about 8 pm.

I really liked the atmosphere at first, but unfortunately there were little problems that started popping up. For example, during the evening the workers were always dropping things. I probably didn’t even notice the first couple of times, but probably over the whole evening they dropped 8-10 dishes. After the first five dishes dropped I started to wait for the next ones, and each time they dropped I had to laugh to myself. For my own amusement I imagined that for tonight the workers were undercover policemen or something. Who drops that many dishes? Or who hires people that drop that many dishes?

Seemingly oblivious to this my dinner companions talked about various topics and we mainly stuck to English. They really got into speaking English together, and that was good news. Two of them were a little nervous, however, so it did get quiet sometimes. Which made the noise of crashing entrees even more dramatic.

Near the middle of our meal one guy started trying to repair some broken equipment, and he kept banging on some piece of metal behind the bar. Over and over he banged on it, so loud that we couldn’t hear each other talking. This lasted for a solid five minutes. He was completely unconcerned with our comfort and satisfaction, and probably will be wondering later why his restaurant is not so busy.

Anyway, the food was pretty good, and the dinner companions even better, so we managed to have a good time of it anyway. I’m hoping that we’ll have a chance to go somewhere else in the future – maybe somewhere quieter.

The weather continues to stay in relatively high temperatures, but the humidity is what is killing us. Just sucking the energy out of you when you are outside, and the only recovery is an air conditioned room somewhere. Luckily I have one at work, all to myself, and I can set it to whatever I like. At home we’re all outfitted with AC, but unfortunately we have to pay the bill for using them.

During my breaks at work I continue to play the travel agent, and I’m almost finished making an itinerary. Just a couple of days in Switzerland and I’m done.

Next month I have three days off midweek, as Kawasaki has a holiday. The purpose of the holiday is to save power during the summer, and all major factories in the area will have a holiday sometime in July. Somehow they do it on a rotation, so everybody doesn’t stop at the same time. It is good news for me – wherever I go likely there will be very few people – the trick is to figure out where to go. Lots of my students are taking trips – Disneyland, Okinawa, Korea, etc. Normally they would only get to go to these places on the weekends or during public holidays, and that means crowds. Kuniko has to work normally during these periods, so it is just me… hmm…. what to do?

On Friday night I met up with Antoine in Sannomiya. Actually, Kuniko was around Sannomiya that night as well, and we were able to drink together both before and after the main event, so that was kind of a bonus. Antoine and I hit some of our favorite spots – we started at the Belgian beer place, then had some Indian food at a lonely restaurant on a busy street, and next moved on to Achaho and finally the New York. All over the world, inside of Kobe.

At the end of the night we met up with Kuniko’s party nearby, and we met some of her coworkers. I met Kawano sensei for the first time, but the other members were regulars, and they seemed to be having a great time. We sat around drinking for a while before realizing that we were in danger of missing the last train, so we high tailed it out of there and got home after one a.m.

That made it tougher to get out of bed and head to Takinochaya (Waterfall Tea House) station in Tarumi. It was my first time at the station, and it was a very small one perched on the hill high above Tarumi. The view was beautiful, and even though it was pouring rain you could imagine what it must be like on a sunny day.

The reason we were here was to visit one of my students, Mr. Nakamura. He had invited us to his place for lunch, and so we met him and his daughter at the station, and together we walked to his place about 10 minutes from the station.

He lives with his wife and two kids in a small company sponsored apartment complex, and so we entered and set up shop in their living/dining room. His wife served plenty of food – some seafood au gratin, potato salad and fresh vegetables, and a Bulgarian stew that was really tasty. She turned out to be quite the world traveler when she was young, and her English was quite good still. The conversation was very nice, and we played with their kids and talked after eating. It was a very pleasant afternoon.

We headed home afterwards, and spent the rest of the weekend pretty much just at home. We did some shopping, got haircuts, and did other chores, but mainly it was recharge at home and stay out of the heat and humidity. A good weekend to recharge the batteries.

This morning I woke up a little early and caught the last half of the soccer game between Japan and Denmark. Japan won, and that means that most of my classes today will involve a lot of soccer talk. Should be interesting – I need to brush up on my soccer vocabulary.

Tonight I’m meeting up with Antoine in Sannomiya to catch up and talk about the upcoming birth of his son. It’ll be interesting to hear how things are going. We’ll also try to plan a couples night at his place in the near future.

That’s about it – the temperature is warming up and the humidity is back. I guess it’ll be like this for the next few months, so planning the trip to Europe is becoming more and more attractive.

Last night after work I met up with a couple of students and we went off to Suma for dinner. They had an idea to drop into the hot dog shop near the station, run by a guy originally from Denmark.

The hot dogs were good (although I chose the salami sandwich) and everything tasted better washed down with a Carlsberg beer. The owner was very busy preparing for tonight’s World Cup game with Japan meeting Denmark. His plan was to take all his equipment to Tokyo and try to sell hot dogs to fans gathering to watch the game at 3 a.m. local time. Good luck with that. He said that he is getting some media coverage, however, so maybe that will help sell some more dogs.

The hot dog place was an eating place and not a drinking place, so afterwards we walked down the street to a yakitori and sat around drinking beer and talking about all kinds of goofy topics. The students are both really friendly and it was fun to catch up with them, since I don’t see them usually.

Today the weather forecast is hot and dry, which I guess is an improvement from the hot and wet weather we’ve been having for the last couple of weeks. I wish I didn’t have to work – I could hang the laundry out today.

Last night I went out to a tachinomi with a couple of the train inspectors after work. These guys are professionals – they go out for drinks almost every day after work. I’ve gone out with them before, and it is usually pretty smoky as two of them smoke heavily, so I don’t usually join the group. This time was no exception as went this time to Sannomiya to a tachinomi that one of the guys knew. I took a spot near the outside of the restaurant so there was plenty of fresh air, and it was much easier to breathe.

I stuck around for a couple of beers and then bowed out. I think my timing was good – these guys were looking like they were going for the long haul, and I wanted to head back and catch dinner at home.

Kuniko had a party last night and got home pretty late, and around the same time a huge storm rolled through, so all in all I was glad to get home and stay dry instead of running around Sannomiya with the train inspectors dodging rain drops and smoke clouds.

Today after work I have a previously arranged drinking party with two of my ex-students in Hyogo. That should be fun – it has been a long time since we had a chance to talk.

Last night a big thunderstorm rolled in around 3 a.m. waking us both up – it was a pretty strong one and it lasted for about an hour. We managed to fall back asleep and get back up at our normal 5 a.m. time, however.

Today Kuniko is off to a party after work, which means I’m on my own with a fridge full of Mexican food leftovers. Yum.

Saturday night Kuniko and I hosted a taco party at our house for the Yamaji’s and Fukumi’s. Mrs. Yamaji and her two kids Yuuki and Ana came over, along with both of the Fukumi’s, so it was a pretty lively crowd.

We showed them how to make their own tacos (which kind of turned out to be burritos – but who cares?) and everyone seemed to enjoy them. We experimented with different hot sauces, and Yuuki even tried out the Yucateca habanero sauce. Ouch!

As usual everyone drank plenty, cocktails were made, Negra Modela bottles were passed around, and we cheered on the Japanese soccer team in their losing effort after dinner. We stayed up pretty late talking and drinking, and it was a really good time.

Each family brought some goodies along as a present – there was a ton of stuff. Fukumi-san brought fresh bread from a local bakery, a delicious bottle of Sauvignon Blanc, Corona beer, a soy-mango liqueur, prosciutto, sausages, and more snacks. Yamaji-san brought a bottle of whiskey, some beer, 31 flavors ice cream, some sodas, and a whole bag full of snacks to munch on. It was like each person could have thrown a party on their own.

So it was another successful neighborhood party and we are looking forward to the next one. Yuuki told us he will be working part time at McDonald’s pretty soon, so we’ll have to drop in one night late just to talk to him. It’s good to have connections…