Monthly Archives: August 2012

RNJ at Home

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Had a day off today as we had planned to invite RNJ to watch the last pre-season game between Raiders and Seahawks, next week the season starts. RNJ arrived around 10 am and Chie started to cook a few of all the dishes she had planned.

Unfortunately we lost the game, but it was after all a pre-season game so it was not that important. Even though we lost we had great fun. And the dishes was delicious. The part lasted 9 hours, and by the end we had a full moon over Tokyo.



By at pm all guests were on their way home, and we had already cleaned up the apartment – we are getting better and better at hosting RNJ parties at home 🙂

Coco gets a Visit

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This weekend we visited Coco in Tokorozawa. It has been a while since our last visit and it was difficult to see who was most happy about the visit, Coco or Chie and I. We arrived on Saturday and had a lot of time to play with Coco and relax before we went to Musashi for dinner.



The temperature in Tokorozawa seemed to be a few degrees lower than in Tokyo, which was quite nice. I managed to sleep through the whole night without using the AC, just kept the balcony door and window open.

As always when we are in Tokorozawa Chie cooks tons and tons of delicious dishes – brunch and dinner. And after eating a lot for brunch I usually get tired and take nap. This time was no exception.

During summertime in Japan it is quite hot for a small dog like Coco to be outside. So our usual walks tend to be a bit shorter and during the cooler times of the day, either in the morning or in the evening. Cooler means 23-25 degrees, which is what we have during the night right now.

When we took our walk on Sunday morning we passed a park where, it must have been, billions of cicadas cried “meeeee, meeeeee, meeeeee.” A bit egoistic they are, if you ask me. Coco didn’t seem to think that. In fact he was totally unconcerned about all these egoistic insects invading the trees, and just walked on as if nothing was going on – he’s a cool dog 🙂



On Sunday night we said bye to Coco and returned to Tokyo. The ride was as eventful as usual (which means nothing happened). Once back at home we usually just have time to drop dead in the bed.

Ocean 6

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This weekend we visited Ocean 6 again. We did much of the same thing we did the last time, which was doing as little as possible 🙂 The weather was cloudy but that was actually quite nice as the temperature quite comfortable, and I did not burn up this time even though I slept in the hammock.



To tell the truth, I was actually not that lazy. I helped out cutting some bamboo and mowing the lawn, at least part of it. In fact I cut bamboo until my skin broke on one of the fingers. I nice little flesh wound the size of a one yen coin. I also helped out painting in one of the 6 apartments. I have a painting specialty compared with many Japanese people, I can paint high up on walls without ladders 😉

When I was not working hard I joined Chie at the pool side relaxing, reading and sleeping. We sent most of the weekend like this, just taking a break from relaxing to have lunch and dinner. The meals were always prepared by the hosts while Chie and I always took care of the dishes afterwards.



In summary, a very relaxing weekend.



Visiting Tohoku

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At 1 am on Saturday morning we departed Sachi-san’s house in our car. It was Chie, me, Sachi-san and Sakai Junko-san (Lifestyle, CBS News).

It was our first time to meet Sakai-san and halfway through our visit we got to know that she was a top selling author. One of her most famous books is called “The Grumbling of Losers” – a book about single, childless, thirty-something women and who are defined as losers vs. married women with children who are defined as winners.

This visit was not about distributing anything but all about Sachi-san talking with people to understand what they need from now on. As usual they are all so friendly and invite us into their homes when we visit and offer us home cooked food, almost always that they have caught in the ocean.

Since we did not distribute anything we had more time than usual and it was more relaxing than usual. We even had time to join Sasaki-san when he used his boat to pick up some families from an island where they had done volunteer work. It was hot and humid and it was really nice to take a swim while waiting for the families to come down to the boat.



Saturday night we had dinner at the Meguro ryokan in Kobuchihama. It was fish and fresh sea urchin that was still wiggling its “nails”. Halfway through the dinner we were joined by friends from Kobuchihama. Koichi-san offered us to go fishing with him… at 2 am :-O Too early and too little sleep two days in a row and driving home later on the same day was not going to fly. But we decided to meet him in the harbour at 8 am in the morning to pick up some fish, and the next time we will stay 3 days so we can join him to fish.



The coolest part was that when we had got the fish from him he was backing the boat out by remote control. He was not in the cockpit but out on the board or whatever it is called in seaman language. Ooh, he also showed us the biggest flat fishes I have ever seen in my life.



Around noon on Sunday we went to Ishinomaki to have to spend some money in Tohoku and to have lunch. We stopped at a kind of market place where all bought some sea weed and other local produce from the ocean. I did not, but I caught a cool super hero with my camera before he took off 🙂