The typhoon has passed & I'm alive. A bit wet, chilled, & un-rested, but that's the majority of the damage. No blown-off roofs or flipped cars here, thank the gods. Other areas were not as lucky...

Video!

 

That I'm ok. There are some nasty storms being generated by the current typhoon, but so far the most we've gotten here is rain. There is heavy flooding to the south of me, though, and the storm is moving this way. I'll keep you all updated, but for now I'm fine. Just damp ^_^

Take care!
 

Just a quick post before I go off to bed.

Perhaps you may or may not remember my blog back in January about how United broke my legs? Well, it seems that's not all they break:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5YGc4zOqozo

This amuses me to no end ^_______^

Later!

Well, today was an office day, so that means I had a little blogging time. It also means that there just wasn't much going on today beyond a tasty lunch with the rest of the ALTs who also just happened to have an office day today. It seems the majority of schools either a) had a special "Open School", or observed-by-parents day, on Sunday & therefore got today off, or b) are on school excursions, aka field trips to various places, including here at the BoE. Yup, we had a gaggle of cute Elementary kids, possibly 3rd graders, come in here in their little yellow hats with their little yellow pencil boards, ready to take notes. And they were from one of my former schools, so that was adorable.

Today is kinda unpleasantly warm, since it's too early to turn on the AC in the office, yet the wind is just not blowing. So the humidity lingers & everything gets stuffy. And having an office day means I can't wear a t-shirt like I would at my schools, so I'm dressed all business-like & sweating, yuck. Attractive!

So, in the life of me, things are cool. My workload has simultaniously decreased & increased, with fewer lessons to plan, yet more lessons to teach. Uhm, yah. There are now some days where I'll teach 5 classes of active Elementary students in a row. Add to that lunch with the kids, recess with the kids & cleaning time with the kids, & somedays I feel I have kids of my own. Yet on the flip side, I have had more office days so far this semester than I ever have. I've averaged about 1 day per week in the office, which seems really counter-productive to me. But I'm not sure what to do about it.

Oh, for those of you interested, I'm on Twitter now... I'm not quite sure why, as I can't post from my cell phone like I had originally hoped, so my updates there are about as random as my updates here, lol! I'll stick with it & see if I like it.

I've also had a lot of my friends here demand I get on facebook, but really, I dunno. Yet another social network for me to ignore, hehe. I might, but then again, I'm fickle & might not. Rambling girl is rambly.
 

Yes, I know, I haven't blogged in a long while, but my update will be so epic that you will forgive me. Trust me, I do not lie.

Oh, where to start? How about Golden Week?

For this year's GW, me & some friends convened in Tokyo for shopping, a Dolpa & general sightseeing fun. I tried to win some dolls for an online friend & failed, but still had a great, crowded, fairly expensive time while there. Baskin & Robbins had there 31% off sale all through the holiday, so we took advantage, but not before we paid a visit to Nekobukuro. Yup, I said 'neko', as in 'cat'. It's this little place on the top of a building in Ikebukuro that is full of rehomed cats. You pay 600 yen to go in, feed your favorite cat a treat & pet & play with them as long as you want. I took so many pictures! I miss my cats so much. What's funny is, most the cats there were really tired of the strangers coming in & petting them, lol! So they'd generally run away or climb out of your reach... well, except me being gargantuan meant I could still reach them, hehe.

The day before I left for GW was a festival in Kameoka, the Mitsuhide Matsuri. It's a celebration of the long-dead lord of Kameoka and of the castle he lived in... before it kinda burned down & fell to ruin. So people parade through the streets in traditional costumes of different warrior & samurai, including my wacky shakuhachi teacher, who did not tell me he'd be in it! I also got to perform taiko with the rest of our troup on stage. I have some pics but they are actual prints, so I gotta scan them or something...

Anyway, back to Tokyo. Dolpa was fun & I got to see all kinds of beautiful dolls, as is usual at a Dolpa. I tried to take more pictures this time, but usually I'm too busy ogling to remember the camera. I didn't win anything, which is also the usual. Someday I shall win a bingo pull... & get some crappy postcards or something XP Also, we tried to go to the SOOM doll store in Harajuku but it was closed. Apparently Wednesday is it's off day. So we went shopping at Closet Child & then traveled to the Harajuku Dolls Exhibition, rather by accident. 
 

The weekend after GW, my friend sends me a message saying, "Hey, my high-school is doing a scrapbook & I need to take pictures of karaoke & do some purikura. Care to help?" I said, "But of course." Wackiness ensues!

Ok, these pics will have to wait, as I've momentarily misplaced them -_-;;

This past weekend we Kameoka folks had planned an American-style BBQ as a combination birthday party/international communication event/get a certain someone a boyfriend party (she knows who she is). We had everything all planned out; the location, the menu, the ingredients, who was cooking/bringing what, the time to start setting up, etc. etc. The weather decided to disagree with us a little bit, so we brought tarps. Liz showed off her mad climbing skillz to tether it to the awning we were under. I built a grill with Japanese instructions... that were illustrated. I'm not that cool. Phil went for lighter fluid & came back with something that looked like hair gel. It worked, though & we got 2 grills going & cooking ensued. I manned one of them for a while then passed it off after I couldn't see anymore due to the smoke constantly getting in my eyes. Laurel made cookies, I made baked beans & deviled eggs, Kim-chi brought tasty cake & good times where had by all.

About 2 1/2 hours after the cooking had finished (well, we were starting it up again for a few more burgers), 3 cops arrived. There was some obvious confusion. Then 2 more cops arrived. Huh? Then sirens were heard approaching while Margaret explained & named herself as the party planner. Then 3-4 more cops arrived & craziness ensued. It was then we were told that, while parties were allowed in the park, fires were a no-no, as was apparently explained in a sign... On the far opposite end of the park... In Japanese... That not even the natives living in Kameoka knew was there. We had all seen many gatherings & parties there in the past, so we thought it was ok. But no. So we were asked to gather our things & vacate the park, although the city parks official that the cops called in said we could come back again, just without the fire. And we had to write down our names, addresses, phone numbers & occupations, to show we had received a 'warning'. I simply put 'Instructor', as I didn't want my schools involved in this silliness.

Then the main cop guy asked to speak to all the city hall people present, which I understood meant me & the other ALTs. However the rest of the speech was unitelligable, fast, old-man Japanese, which Margaret had to translate later. Basically he said that, since we were City Hall employees we should have known better & known the rules of the park. I think the fact tht we all gave him blank stares after he said that should show our level of Japanese comprehension is not high enough, lol! And you know, just being city employees makes us magically aware of all the rules of the city, of course.

So the cleanup commenced & went fairly rapidly & efficiently. I, Margaret & Laurel turned into cheerleaders to help get the tarp down; IOW, Laurel climbed all over us cuz she's little. Then we had our own Gaijin Parade (seriously, cuz there were around 15-20 of us, Nihonjin included) back to the apartments where we all laughed, ate, drank & told Margaret not to blame herself. She did anyway.

Enjoy the video! Linked, as the embedder is failing me:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yYFMED0Y2wE

And then on Sundaychocolate_chip and I went to the Rumiko Takahashi exhibit in Kyoto which, despite the crowds & vomit, was really enjoyable. Kids. Anyway, we wandered a bit afterwards & discovered that, in the Porta below Kyoto Station there was a special event/concert going on with various acts throughout the day. We got to watch a rather talented accapella group sing hits from the 50's, 60's & 70's. & one that was popular in the 90's, I think...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qyhAAgr7Yp0

Didn't I tell you you would forgive my long hiatus? I promise I'll eventually post about my February event in Tokyo, but my computer doesn't want to cooperate with my video editing at the moment, so you'll just have to wait.

 

So the time of office transfers has come & gone; where once a year, everyone who works for the Board of Education and/or City Hall holds theire breath to find out if & when they will be transferred & where they'll be transferred to. As it turns out, my section has lost one of my favorites, Higuchi-san, to the 3rd floor Commerce & Tourism Department (I think that's what the kanji said). He's been there since before I arrived & is a pretty cool, funny guy. His son attends one of my (former) elementary schools (more on that later) & we talk about him sometimes. He's not afraid of trying to communicate in English & will always chat about random things going on, like the World Baseball Classic or his love of rock music (he used to play guitar in a high school band & has been called the "Japanese Elvis" by his coworkers ^_^). I'll miss him, since I'm sure I won't get to see him very much anymore. His replacement is a cool guy, though &I'm sure he'll do fine.

I've also lost one of my kocho-senseis, or principals, to retirement. I didn't ask if it was voluntary or mandatory ^^;; She has always been the one to pick me up for this particular elementary school & her English is quite good. I wonder who they will get to replace her. She always stood out in my mind, as there aren't nearly as many women in that position as there are men. I hope she chose to retire & will enjoy the time off ^_^

I'm not sure about the rest of my schools, as I've not actually been to any of them & won't for another week. I'm sure I'll have quite a few new teachers to get used to. In the meantime I've been in the office, finishing my taxes, catching up on blogs & vlogs & trying to find more work to do. Oh, & swapping info with my fellow ALTs about the schools we've had to exchange.

Yup. Our schools have been switched. That's what I meant when I said "former" earlier.

I've lost 4 of my elementaries & gained 3 new ones. While I have fewer schools, I'm still kinda sad about it, as some of the ones I lost were my favorites. What also gets me is that the schools now seem unbalanced between the ALTs. It used to be 9-9-10, but now it's 8-8-12! Granted, the ALT with 12 schools has several of the smaller schools, it still seems like she'll be working her hiney off. I also don't like the fact that my schools have been switched as I'm going into my 3rd & last year in the program. These schools I'm just now getting will only have me for a year & a half, then a whole new teacher will come in. It takes time to gain the trust of the students, & while I will be seeing them once a month at least, that's still only 18 visits. Plus I didn't really get to say goodbye to my other schools, & I worry the students might resent me & grow to resent English teachers in general. I know, I usually read too much into a situation & worry too much, but still.

That said, let's get on with the leftover massive update! How about a blast of winter from northern Japan, Hokkaido ^_^ To make it easy on you, I put all my best photos & vids into 2 small vlogs.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9sN7_Sh6isU

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sYcsI8DxSnw

Links because the embedder never works right for me. I'll try to embed them later... if I remember...

But I'm getting married!! I know, I'm sorry, I kept it a secret from everyone, but I didn't want to tell anyone until I was really, truly, 100% ready. And now I am! Gaaah, I said yes!!!

Ok, the lowdown; he's one of my teacher's, so we had to keep really quiet about it. We've actually been seeing each other for the better part of 3 month, but since it's kinda taboo around here to date your coworkers, we decided we wouldn't mention it to anyone. It's been really hard to keep it quiet & I'm so glad I can tell you now! But seriously, I have been swept off my feet in the worst way ^o^ Now don't worry about me; I'll most likely be staying here to live with him & his family, since he still lives with them. But that's quite normal here in Japan, and his house is HUGE. His family's actually quite old, going way back, and have a lot of old money, you might say. Plus I won't have to work if I don't want to, yay! He's also kinda rich himself, so I'll be able to travel back & forth easily to visit you all! I know, how can he be rich if he's just a school teacher, right? Well, he wasn't always a school teacher, but was once quite the performer! Look, I'll prove it; check out thislink




















I told you that you wouldn't believe it!!!

Just doing a little (read: 'a lot of') picture-posting, at last. And because I haven't had much time to type anything up, lol! First off, a few shots of friends & family over the holidays!

In my next post, some California craziness! Gotta break these up or I just might explode some poor persons computer!

Ja ne!
 

I have this bad tendency to blog in pieces over a period of time, then post it all at once. Sorry. But here you go!

(2 weeks ago)

After the holidays & all that, I'm doing pretty good. Spent the last 2 weeks in Tulsa, trying my best to catch up with family & friends & still running out of time to see everyone. It's been great though, even if my sleep schedule has been wacky, partly due to jetlag & partly due to my mother's late-nite shifts. But I have eaten so much good food (Mario's Pizzaria OMG :D~~~ ) & seen a lot of movies that won't be released in Japan for a while. I also got a lot of DVDs as Xmas presents, which is great ^_^ Really all the gifts I got from everyone have been excellent; the only complaint I have is I might not be able to take everything back to Japan with me! I'll work it out somehow.

Weather-wise, it has been typically Oklahoma, with some days in the low 30's & others in the low 70's. But it has been soooo dry! I forgot how dry OK winters could be, after living in Japan's year-round humidity. Fortunately I tend to drown myself in fluids, so it's not as bad as it could have been.

Right now I'm sitting in the airport waiting for my flight to California to visit miffiekeika & fivechildren for a few days of fun (& a visit to the US Volks store, of course!). Then I'll come back to Tulsa for one last day of whatever before flying out to Japan... and then immediately going to work the nest day. I'm not happy about that, but I'm already missing a few days of work for this extended vacation, so I didn't push the matter. At least my supervisor gave me the choice of doing Jr. High or Elementary. I chose Jr. High, cuz teaching elementary while jetlagged would probably kill me >_<

A lot of people have been asking me about my plans after JET. To be honest, I'm not 100% sure what they'll be, but I know they'll involve theatre, because I sorely miss it. I don't think I'll go into teaching, at least not yet, but I do want to get back into costume construction at least. I have a sewing machine in Japan that I hardly use, because by the time I get home I generally don't feel like sewing. Even little repairs & such (sorry, Laurel, I suck ^^; ) seem to be too much for me to deal with at times. I love the work I'm doing with JET but it can be really draining, and sometimes it doesn't leave me much creative energy for other things. It could also be the weather, cuz when I'm cold all I wanna do is warm up, lol!

(yesterday)

Well, now I'm in the Ontario airport waiting for my flight back to Tulsa. My trip here has been a blast! Tuesday night miffykeika & I just hung out, ate In & Out burgers & watched Yes Man, which was actually funny. Then Wednesday we drove over to fivechildren's, then all together went to Hollywood where they got to see me in full-on tourist mode ^___^ But before that, we stopped at Royal/T, this cute maid cafe/art gallery/shop where we had tasty food, delicious tea, and OMG I SAW JAMIE LEE CURTIS!! I wanted so bad to get her picture, but she was just there to have lunch & I didn't wanna bug her T_T But she was there & I was star-struck. She probably noticed ^^;

Thursday it was just fivechildren & I at Disneyland, whee! It was a lot of fun; great weather, not very crowded & still mostly decorated for xmas. The Haunted Mansion was closed, but Pirates of the Caribbean wasn't & it was AWESOME. Thunder Mountain just about gave me whiplash & Splash mountain soaked me down my left side, but it was worth it.

Friday fivechildren & I explored Ports O Call & the Queen Mary & were supposed to meet up with miffykeika later, but she had some family stuff come up & couldn't join. The Queen Mary was very cool; we took the Ghosts & Legends tour, which was a little cheezy but fun all the same. Afterwards we just kinda drove around & saw the sights from the hills, then relaxed at her house, watching good old American reality tv (omg Wife Swap).

Saturday it was time to pack up & head to the airport, but not before stopping ot the Volks USA store! I now have a US membership to go along with my Japanese membership ^__^ And I got to break in the new photo spot they had just created. Everyone there is really nice & they let me see Pearl & Garnet up close.

Ok, boarding now; see ya later!

(today)

And now I'm getting the last little bits of everything ready to fly out in about *checks clock* 6 hours. I'll be back soon!
 

And I'm just now posting it. Happy Birthday, lil sis!


>>Why yes, I am alive, thanks for asking ^_^

Ok, first, apologies for not writing anything for so long. I kinda got out of the writing spirit. I blame NaNoWriMo, which took my writing spirit, wrenched it outof me & dashed it upon the rocks of the Cliffs of Insanity. Or something like that. Yes, I attempted NaNoWriMo for the first time ever, & while I may not have made it to 50,000 words, I did make it to almost 8000, which is probably more than I've ever written about one topic ever before in my life. So I pat myself on the back... just a little.

What's been going on this past month or so, you ask? Well, let me tell you, a lot. I cannot believe it's already December. Work continues to be work; fun, frustrating, exciting & crazy at times. Just today I had 2 classes of ichinensei, first years at one of my Jr. Highs that were basically polar opposites of each other. The first class was so quiet when responding to questions, I couldn't even hear them over the stove! (yes, we have giant kerosene stoves in the classrooms for winter now. They scare me.) They finally started making noise, but seriously, I could whisper louder than the entire class (Ok, so it was a stage whisper, but I was trying to make a point). The second class was super-genki, or energetic, & couldn't wait to answer my questions & really had fun with it. What's even stranger is they both have the same JTE as their English teacher. I don't get it!

What else.. I got to go bowling with some of my coworkers from the BoE & the new ALTs. It was a total blast, even if my score really (really) sucked. However, it was also a little... discriminatory? Not that my coworkers see it that way, but...  let me explain. Me & the 2 ALTs were the only women there & it is considered polite to give women a handicap of 30 points. This happened last year &, with Nina's help, I was able to get it taken off. But this year they wouldn't. Why? Because it would be impolite, is what they told me. Even after I explained that I didn't need it, I had bowled in a league as a kid (yup, I even have trophies), they wouldn't remove it. So it had nothing to do with skill. It was just because I'm a woman. I tried to ignore it, but it still kind of irritated me, even though I know they don't see it as discriminatory. However, I did get to give the new kids (well, they're not so new anymore, I suppose) some pointers to improve their game, which actually worked! Go me!

Went to see Obama! No, not that Obama, but close ^_~ There's a small town in northernish Kansai called Obama that went Obama-crazy with the presidential race. When Obama won, they went even crazier, with tshirts, manju (a type of Japanese sweet) and all other kinds of paraphernalia. So me & some friends decided a tour was in order. The weather was cold, drizzly & crappy, the town nearly empty, but we discovered that Obama's also know for their gorgeous hand-crafted chopsticks, among other things. There's also this awesome temple, full of Kitsune, or fox, statues & wicked-cool horses & lanterns. Yes, there are pictures, let me show you them!

What's most hilarious about our trip is, come dinner time, we had the most impossible time finding a place to eat. Seriously, we wandered for almost 2 hours trying to find a restaurant. We were hoping for something local but could only find a few VERY expensive club-type places & a Mos Burger. Guess where we went? However, I had the most awesome Mos Burger ever, even if it wasn't technically a burger at all. It was a croquette filled with taco, or octopus, sandwiched between 2 rice patties fashioned as buns. It was ridiculously good! And very, very hot, because rice holds on to heat for a loooong time.

Of course, after we leave the Mos Burger, we discover the street that has all the restaurants! We had just taken a wrong turn, is all. So to top off our Mos, we went to this adorable parfait place & had adorable parfaits. See?

( Cute & edible! )

I also had my first taiko performance! Yes, that I actually played in. I looked like crap & messed up a little bit on a song I shouldn't have, but it was still fun. We performed with some other groups in honor of a little temple that was having a culture exposition of sorts. There were displays of traditional crafts, like bonsai, weaving, dollcraft & calligraphy, and performances of taiko, shakuhachi & other stuff. There was also nummy foods like yakitori, yakisoba & other yaki things (yaki means grilled). There was also this yummmmmmmy treat I got called a Neko no shippo, or Cat's Tail, which is a really simple treat of filo dough filled with something sweet (or not) & coated in a sugar butter mix, then griddled in an oblong press-type-thing. The end result is this breadstick that looks like a cat's tail, is light, fluffle, crunchy & sweet. Yes, I want more.

There was also beer. At 9am. Oh, Japan.

The weather has been kinda crazy with the fluctuating temperatures. For example; today it is absolutely gorgeous & rather warm, considering it's winter (kinda), but just 2 days ago it was freezing. Literally, there was frost on everything. And this morning we had the most incredible fog ever. I know Kameoka's famous for it, but this was, like, I-can't-see-my-hand-in-front-of-my-face thick. It's been several hourse & still hasn't completely burned off. But it's so nice right now I want to take off my sweater! (I'm in layers, lol)

Ok, back to the massive update. I also got to see my first (very short) kyougen performance! Kyougen is an old form of Japanese comedic theatre, using vocal stylings very much like Noh, but without masks. This was at my largest elementary school & the whole school got to attend. It was pretty fun, even if I couldn't understand half of it due to the very old-style language they used. That makes 2 types of traditional Japanese theatre I've experienced so far!

Oh, wait, actually it's 3! This last Sunday I attended a performance of traditional Japanese dance, thanks to one of my kyouto-sensei, or Vice Principals. He just handed these tickets to me a while back, explaining (thru my JTE, as he can't English) that he couldn't go & he knew I was interested in Japanese culture. Yay! I should make sure I get him some nice omiyage from my trip home to thank him. I ended up going alone due to last minute conflicts with others, but it was totally worth it!

That Sunday was actually pretty busy for me, thanks to the JLPT. Yup, I took it. Ugh. For those of you who don't know (or remember), that's the Japanese Language Proficiency Test, given only once a year to those taking the lower levels (4 & 3) & twice a year to the upper levels (2 & 1). I was so nervous, but really, I think I did ok. Not great, no, but ok. I might actually pass! However, some parts I totally guessed on, & I kinda suck at grammer & particles & Kanji recognition... yah, like I said, I might pass. T_T

Oh, also, the weekend before that I hung out with some friends in Maizuru to witness an awesome taiko festival. It was HUGE. These groups from all over the area got together for it & it was held in this big auditorium. First off we had what must have been every single kindergartner in the entire city performing in one big mass of cute. Seriously, my head exploded from the adorableness XD There  were also notable performances by a group of (hot) young men, an entire family of women, a too-cool group of punks, dancing drummers... the list goes on. Here, have some pics as proof!

 

 My own practicing of taiko & shakuhachi goes well, if not perfectly. I am still struggling with the shaku, even if my strange teacher says I'm doing great. In taiko I've been moved to the oodaiko, or 'big drum', for a few pieces as my teacher said I look kakkoii, or cool when I play it, lol! We're learning a new piece that involves even more lunging & crouching, which my legs did not appreciate, thanks to the cold. It also has a peculiar rhythm & I had a hard time grasping it. It's only about 11 measures repeated over & over ad infinitum, but it's feels like it's missing a beat somewhere. I'll get it eventually, it'll just take lots of practice. And crouching, yay.

As for me health-wise, I'm doing ok. Caught a sudden cold, but thanks to the magic of NyQuil, it's quickly dissipating. Not gonna have a repeat of last year, thank you very much! I feel like I've put on weight, even though I don't really look it. I do know my LDL cholesterol has gone up since moving here. Yah, Japanese food is not always as healthy as one might think. And I can't afford to have fruit & veggies all the time cuz they're rather expensive here. And I eat a lot of rice, which may or may not have anything to do with it. I'm ok, it's just entering that borderline area where I gotta watch it, you know?

And now, I've come to the end of the update & it's time for me to run & buy lunch! As an omake, or extras, here's some gorgeous autumn foliage pics I took on the Romantic Train & Tenshi no Sato last weekend ^_^

>>BTW, guys, 1 week & I'll be home for the holidays! There's been a slight itenerary change, according to a phone call from United, but they said they'd send the details via email. That still hasn't happened, but all I know is I will be at TIA around 9-10 PM on the 21st ^__^

Ja ne!
Paulette
 

Which is sit down & type something here. I know, I suck at the updates. But I rock with the Skyping! Yes, I have Skype & I even know how to use it! You should all get Skype, as it means talking to everyone for FREE (as long as you have a mic for your computer & whatnot). You can even webcam chat with very few glitches, which I love. I've been able to actually talk with my mom for the past few weeks & it's been great.

Lessee, what's been goin on with me lately? Well, the obvious, work. Which has been both up & down, but mostly up. And busy, with lots of interview tests lately. I always feel weird grading the students, because I fear I grade too harshly. But I love giving comments or helping them with spelling or grammatical errors & such. Now if I could just get through the rest of the tower of summer homework all my teachers gave me to mark, I'd be happy.

These papers really are cute, though. The majority of them are "What I Did For Summer Vacation"-type diaries, where they are recquired to write about 2 days in English. Bet there's also a space where they can draw pictures describing the activities of that day & let me tell you, some of these kids are super-talented artists. I may sneak a few pictures of them just for the memories ^_^

Taiko lessons are a blast. We've been learning a new piece, called 'Ni no Kuni', which the group takes it's name from. This one is a real workout for the legs. I shall have massive muscles in my knees from all the lunging!

Shakuhachi lessons, on the other hand, are progressing so slowly it's about to make me crazy. If I could just be consistent in my embouchure, I might be able to produce a sound more than 1/3 of the time. Plus if I could understand more than half of what my sensei was saying, then perhaps he wouldn't feel the need to repeat himself so often.

What else? The Kameoka Matsuri is starting up this week & the town is getting spiffy. All kinds of garden-grooming & lantern-hanging is going on all over the place. It'll culminate in a big parade on Saturday of all the local portable shrines. They'll be pulled along by children & adults of all ages & full of more people playing chimes, drums & flutes. Some of them are pretty elaborate, able to spin in one place to better display the ancient tapestries. I don't know if I'll see much of it this year, as it just happens to coincide with the arrival of my friendrkold   from the states & she, neverything & I are heading into Kyoto the night before for general comradery & karaoke-ing, then to Sato on Saturday for the release of the October clothing lineup. I hope this sudden rain stops by then!

Then on Sunday we'll shall be heading back down to Osaka for another Comic City. Not Super Comic City Kansai *explosion*, thankfully, as that on was frikkin' ridiculously crowded. But I'm hoping for some lovely stationary & maybe some art supplies, as I've kinda been wanting to draw & I need some better pencils.

On a sad note, my favorite thing in the world, my turquoise bracelet, broke last night. It had been cracked for years, but after dealing with rowdy elementary kids (one high-fived the same wrist into oblivion Monday) & a painful shakuhachi prctice, it just split in 2 while I was watching a show at home. I cried like a baby. It's hanging from an improvised necklace until I can find a place to get it fixed. I've worn it for over 15 years without ever taking it off & it feels weird to not have it near me in some way. Those of you who know the story of my bracelet understand. Those who don't, I may tell it someday, but for now  LJ is being a little glitchy, so I'll stop. I am working on some more videos, but I've been slow about it since my computer crashed. I'm kinda scared to do too much. But it seems to be doing ok, so hopefully I'll get things edited together soon.

Ja ne!
Paulette