Mind and Body at odds

So, right now my mind and my body are hating each other a bit, because my mind is like, "You need to go to sleep before 2 a.m.! You need to wake up before 10 and go to the gym and be healthy!" And my body's all like, "Yo, nah, whatevs, I'm not gonna shut down for another 3 hours or so, so I might as well drink this cheese (nope, nope, supposed to be eat but too lazy to delete) and eat this acerole drink (and yeah, that was on purpose actually, because i can't really say i'm going to drink this cheese AND this drink; i at least need to be consistent in mixing up verbs) and check out Tegan and Sara interviews." The last part is actually more of my brain being like, "Well, if you're gonna stay awake, then food has to stop, but T&S can continue." It's a compromise. Also, I recently discovered that to be like t&s stylistically, all I have to do with wear red vans and a striped black&white shirt. So someone get on that for combo christmas/birthday gift.

That's all. I guess I'm back at the stage where all I do is talk about t&s.

I'm piteously slow at updating; of this I am aware.

During a leisurely stroll through my neighborhood tonight, I found not one, but two condom vending machines (though this was not the strangest vending machine I discovered on my walk--that prize goes to the battery vending machine). People kept telling me when I first moved here that the city was really safe, but that's not exactly what I had imagined. I'm not entirely surprised; on my walk, I basically passed one vending machine per minute; I'm actually surprised I didn't pass more unusual ones. I do have to admit that many of the drink dispensers have some fascinating choices--hot red bean soup and coffee jelly drinks being some examples. And while I haven't tried either of those things, I admit I am very pleased to have the option of having them.

Corn Choco!

More dericious than it sounds.

So I have to post this little anecdote because it is redonkulous. Yesterday, biking on my way to the gym, I saw one of the humongi crows of Japan poking around someone's garbage net (as it was burnable garbage--i.e. food waste--day). Last year, one of the Nav staff told me the story of crows scattering her garbage, and how the garbage knocked on her door and gave her a scolding because of it. I decided to save someone the trouble, so I scared the crow off by riding close to it, but not before it took off with what looked like a large meatball. I turned the corner and had gone about 2 meters when I saw something drop from the sky before smacking me in the knee. I could tell from the weight and the leftover bits on my leg that it was a large pit of some kind of fruit. While riding, I looked over my shoulder to see the crow staring at me, and I have to admit, I was pretty impressed with the bird. I nodded to him as if to say, "Touche."

[Edit: Hera informed me of my mistake by saying, "Did you mean to say that the garbage knocked on her door?" And as wonderfully magical as that sounds, no; I didn't. Twas in fact the garbage man (which, if you think about it, really just sounds like pile of garbage that has taken the form of man and become animated. Like Frosty the Snowman...Maybe...Dusty the Garbageman.]

I had a philly steak yesterday. It was dericious.

Also, I was going to write a blog entry, but now I think I will ride my bike to the 100 yen Lawson and buy some juice and breakfast for tomorrow. Sorry for the tease!

Things that happened that were minutely funny

At dinner with my coworkers, talking about our coworker to be:

Me: He might be one of those guys who goes to Akihabara (the place where nerds go--known also as Electric Town); I don't know.

Shota: Ok. I will take him fishing. And hunting.

Mika: In Akihabara?

Also, earlier in the evening--while anxiously awaiting pizza curry buffet-- I had taken off my new shoes in the teacher's room, and I was wondering if they would smell funny because they are those plasticky type shoes, so I held them up and smelled them. My other foreign coworker was in the room too, so I was struck with an idea, that went something like this:

Me: Wow! My shoes smell like pizza.

Him: What? Really?

Me: Yeah, check it out!

And though I've heard of this joke probably a million times, I've never had anyone fall for it (and I won't count the time Rory told me to 'go see how cute Tuna is sleeping in the bathtub!'), so I was pretty pleased with myself. Yes, yes; I'm 12.

Ok, that's all!

Beautiful beautiful chill!

Finally finally finally, my memories of hot hot summer are fading like a bad tan (poor simile, because as we all know, there's no such thing as a bad tan! Unless it comes with skin cancer...).

Now, to add to the magical Kit Kat kreations, I will present Hera's find: the milk tea Kit Kat! I had one tonight while, coincidentally, drinking milk tea. It was not the overwhelming combination that you might expect; it was really a pleasant mixture of liquid and candy. Also, you might notice that I am holding a kit kat while wearing a kimono. Also, you might have observed (if you have seen any pics of me in my apartment or have talked to me via skype) that I wear this kimono quite often. That's mainly because I just leave it on the chair as a covering (because I inherited the chair from the previous teacher, and who knows whose hiney it's touched), and it inevitably ends up on my shoulders.

Since I've been sick this week, I have picked up some new Japanese words from my clever children--actually, the words they used are combinations of words I knew, so I am translating them from previous knowledge. The first, and more pleasant one, is 'hanamizu'--which I have translated to mean 'nose water' (or, depending on your inflection, 'flower water')--and you have to admit, that sounds almost pleasant compared with the English "snot". The second, and 'how-say' (as one of my high-level Chinese students says) less...refined version is 'hanakuso'--which, from my understanding, is translated as basically 'nose shit'. Think about that next time you reach for a tissue.

Okay, I need sleep, because I am sickly and weak and I have to wake up at the buttcrack of dawn tomorrow (8:45 a.m.).

Re: Disappointment

"your blog disappoints me.
this is either because you are too busy doing important shtuff or you are lame like me and do nothing all the time
i miss you, gillnels!"

-Es Dolce

It's only been a week since my last update, but apparently that just isn't enough for some people, AKA

<---This one.

The problem is, I can never think about anything exciting when I'm on the computer. Usually I just think something like, "Mmm, this sashimi is delicious, but it is filling." I also think about how I should get off the computer and clean my apartment, but we all have our pipe dreams. Which reminds me of another dream I have, one of the few things I desperately desire here (I know, the heat passes and I am already on to the next thing that I need so very much); a desire which partially came to fruition this weekend (or as I like to say after a couple rounds of sushi, 'fruitation').

This dream is so much simpler than my last wish, but unlike my other dream (the end of heat, which I knew would eventually come), this one shows no promise of coming true. You see, in Japan, they have lots of adorable little shoes, and often on sale for cheap (you should see some of the affordable, stylish boots they have! Just adorable!)--however, because my feet are apparently humongous at a size 25.5 (or, okay; 26 cm), I can't find anything that even pretends to fit my feet--and I can't even glance at the shoes without my feet cramping. And so I search shoe store after shoe store hoping to find some miraculous pair that will ensconce my weary feet; and low and behold, this weekend I kind of had that happen! I found a pair of rainboots (sure, not my ideal footwear) for 1300 yen (about $13.30 or so for you 'mericans), and I snatched those puppies up so fast that you couldn't even sneeze out a 'kutsu' before I bought them (kutsu=shoes). Actually, that's a lie; I had the shoe lady show me 3 different sizes before I settled on a pair--but that's only because one of the pairs was put in the wrong size box.

Anyways, I'm started to bore myself with this post, so here's one more post of La Dolce Orso for the road from that time we went to the gay bar in Denmark (which, by the way, I'm still bitter about, Erin. Because you know that it is my dream to find a Danish man to marry and have blue eyed, brown haired children with, and you insisted on going to the one place in CPH that my dream was guaranteed not to happen in)(but you know I still less than 3 you --I put it that way because actually doing the symbol is not possible, as the blog recognizes it as a broken html code).