The Japanese Phrase of the Day

What do you want to be when you grow up?

2012-02-05T17:50:00.000+09:00

Shourai no yume ha nani?

I have the job I wanted when I was 14. But I kind of have other jobs that I wanted as a kid too. Except for one.

When I was 12, I wanted to be a writer. I blog, so that's writing. I also write and edit stuff for work. I am the person they come to when they need to write a letter in English that says "you are being an @$$" without actually saying "you are being an @$$."

When I was 13, I wanted to be an actress. I present sometimes, for research and also at training seminars. The training seminars in particular involve pretending to be more confident and knowledgable than I actually am. If that's not acting, I don't know what is...The drawback to this one is that I usually have to write my own material.

When I was 15, I wanted to be a diplomat. I am currently the designated international relations person for my department. When a group of Indonesian students wants to do a tour of the department, I am the one who makes sure everyone is ready for them. When a Nepalese woman wants to come work with us as a research fellowship type deal, I figure out which paperwork she needs to send where.

The job I don't have that I used to want? When I was six, I wanted to be a flight attendant. I am so glad I am nowhere near having that job. Those people earn every cent they get.

Well prepared

2012-01-15T18:12:00.000+09:00

Junbi ga ii

What do people who celebrate Christmas with a live tree do with the tree? Do they chop it up and leave it out for the trash? Use it for firewood?

In Japan, there is a designated method of disposal for New Year decorations. They are burnt in a traditional bonfire. The ceremony is called "dondoyaki" or "dondonyaki" in Pumpkin Prefecture (other names in other areas include but are not limited to "tondoyaki" "dontoyaki" and "sagicho" but they all involve burning New Year decorations) and it usually takes place on January 15th or thereabouts (adjusted these days so that it falls on a weekend and everyone can take part).

The week before, local kids will come knocking at your door to collect your New Year decorations and two-eyed daruma dolls. Their loot will be placed in a great tower, with straw mats and firewood added for form and flammability.

Our local dondoyaki took place in the park the Pumpkin Prince and Princess frequent. The fire department stands by, just in case.

This is my neighbor. She came prepared with dried squid skewered on twigs. When the bonfire settles, she'll roast the squid to eat. Others came with mochi (rice cakes) on sticks, and sweet potatoes in tin foil.

Here they are, getting ready to light the fire. Not all the darumas have actually earned their second eye. Many (o.k., nearly all) were bought and given two eyes just for today.

Ready, set!

Just gonna stand there and watch me burn....

It only took a minute or so for the blaze to reach full force. To be honest, until this moment, I thought the Fire Department was kind of overkill. Now, I am glad they were there.

After the blaze settled down, everyone who came prepared roasted their squid and mochi. Eating food cooked by the dondoyaki flames is supposed to bless the person with good health throughout the year.

I am glad you are around.

2012-01-09T22:38:00.000+09:00

Anata ga ite yokatta

I think I caught a watered down version of the flu. I was achy, I had a fever, I felt like I'd been run over by a car. But it only lasted a day and a half. I think it was the flu, but I'm not sure. I didn't get that test where they stick a piece of paper up a nostril and see if it changes color. I didn't even go to a clinic or hospital. I got vaccinated last fall, so it was probably watered down by that, if it was the flu. Which I think it was. But I am not an internist, nor do I play one on TV.

But that's not the point. The point is that I felt awful for a day and a half, and I was completely useless. And during that day and a half, the Pumpkin Daddy bought me ice cream and udon, and kept the kids fed and played with them and did the laundry and vacuuming. And when I felt better and told him thank you for everything, he totally blew me off. And he's tall. And looks good in random articles from Eddie Bauer.

And he always does the laundry. And the vacuuming.

And I am so lucky to have him. All the time. But more than usual this weekend.

New Year decorations

2012-01-04T23:07:00.000+09:00

oshougatsu kazari

We had a Christmas tree (since we don't have a fireplace, we needed to make a place for Santa to put the presents) but we put it away. The only holiday decorations in the house right now are these.

The small ones on either side are what the Pumpkin Daddy brought home from his holiday party at work. The large one in the middle is an arrangement my mother made from orchids she got from her neighbor and some things in the garden. The pine (matsu) are symbols of longevity. The clustered red berries are called manryo and which mean "ten thousand ryo," ryo being a large unit of currency in pre-Meiji restoration Japan, and the red berries surrounded by leaves are senryo, or "thousand ryo." The obvious reference to prosperity in their names makes them popular as New Year's decorations.

My mother insisted on bringing them on the 30th of December, as opposed to the 29th or the 31st, because

1) The 29th has a 9, or "ku" in it. "Ku" means suffering, making the 29th unlucky.

2) Bringing them on the 31st would mean they would only be there for a single day before New Year's Day, making them unlucky.

Japanese superstitions are based on puns. We're punny like that.

Sorry, couldn't resist.

New Year's Resolutions

2012-01-03T10:54:00.000+09:00

Shin-nen no houfu

1. Clean desk at work

My 8th grade English teacher used to have this sign that said "a clean desk is a sign of a sick mind." Which may be true, but a cluttered desk devoid of flat surfaces is not very productive. Which leads us to...

2. Write something on it.

Obviously, I don't mean write something like "I heart Alex O'Loughlin." I would like to write something technical that would help others with their work, and I can put on my CV, because...

3. Reassess career plan.

I am on the career track I wanted for myself right after graduation, before I understood the Dark Side of this job. Right now, staying with the Dark Side is the lesser evil available to me. I'd like to see if there is something less sinister I can realistically attain. If not, I'll stick to the Dark Side as long as they will have me. It's not like we're sucking the blood out of babies (though we hang with people that do...kidding, but not 100%...)

4. Continue to get up early every morning.

About a year ago, my BFF mentioned she got up at 5:30 every morning to run. So I tried it. While I am not a runner, getting up early gives me time to do a short Pilates workout, or do little things around the house, or, (gasp!) research work stuff. It takes effort, though. I have to fight and conquer the desire to stay in bed (otherwise I just play alarm clock tag for an hour), remember to have all my clothes laid out the night before (otherwise I just stand in the closet in a kind of daze for an hour), and stay away from the computer (I get sucked in by e-mail and Facebook checking) to get anything out of it. But worth the effort.

5. Limit late night lapses into junk food to once a week.

This is a carry over from last year. It has become a habit, probably like the way others smoke.

I can think of so many other things, but these five are probably what is realistic for the time being.

Top 5 news of 2011

2011-12-31T17:17:00.000+09:00

Nisen ichi nen no go dai nyuusu

1. 3/11 Quake, and The Pumpkin Clan battles...um...gasoline and toilet paper shortages and guilt trips about having power and running water the entire time? Pumpkin Daddy leaves Pumpkin Palace for a week to do volunteer work.

The Americans have 9/11, now we have 3/11, I guess. In retrospect we were hardly affected, but at the time I was pretty depressed.

I don't know if I mentioned this, but the Pumpkin Daddy went to one of the severely tsunami-hit areas to do volunteer work for a week, helping to clear out wreckage, shoveling sand out of gutters, that kind of thing. We missed him, but we managed without him, amazingly enough.

2. Department head retires at Pumpkin Mommy's work. My direct supervisor becomes new department head at work, and I get his old job.

I think a lot of people would have been happy with the promotion. Not me. But the alternative would have been leaving the current work environment and going job hunting. I am quite familiar with the positions available to me locally (they all kind of suck in varying aspects and degrees of intensity), and I don't consider moving an option right now, so here I am.

3. I go through, and lapse out of, a fitness phase.

It was a couple weeks long. Maybe I'll go back next year.

4. Tropical vacation in February.

Around the New Year holidays, here in Japan, the A-listers go to Hawaii and the B-listers go to Guam. If the Pumpkin Mommy, Daddy, Prince and Princess go to Guam in February, what does that make us?

5. Disneyland vacation on Halloween.

We are shallow. We are commercial. It was fun. It made us poor.

Even not considering what others had to go through this year, our year was a happy one. Here's to hoping our and your coming year will be as good or better.

Behind the scenes

2011-12-19T22:54:00.000+09:00

Butai ura

This doll is supposed to be the Baby Jesus. What it actually is is just plain scary.

Korean cuisine

2011-11-19T00:15:00.000+09:00

Kankoku ryouri

Sundubu jjigae is a hot, spicy Korean soup with tofu, seafood, and vegetables. It's served in a hot iron bowl, and you drop a fresh egg in it while it's still boiling.

Japan doesn't do red chili as a condiment to the extent of Korea (we usually do wasabi, and even when we do red chili, it's much sparser than in Korea). Kind of interesting, if you consider the geographic proximity and cultural similarities. That, and the combination of seafood and tofu (both frequently used in Japanese food) makes for an exotic, seriously yummy combination.

Huh?

2011-11-18T06:20:00.000+09:00

E? (you can use this one like the Canuks use "eh?")

So now, when you google "Masi Oka Asahi Gakuen," this blog comes up first.

Disclaimer: All this Asahi Gakuen and six degrees of separation between Pumpkin Mommy and Masi Oka is all speculation, albeit educated speculation.

I'd love to meet him (her) once!

2011-11-14T22:30:00.000+09:00

Zehi ichido oai shite mitai!

I have very few claims to fame, but I do have some claims to fame by association. One is that my junior high school best friend's dad went to college with Scott Glenn.

My recently discovered claim to fame by association is that I (probably) went to the same school as Masi Oka. Now, this is a very loose association. First, said school is a Japanese language school that Japanese speaking kids attend every Saturday, not the five days a week gig most people think of when someone talks about school. Second, said school has something like three or four campuses, and Masi Oka has never clarified which campus he attended (in fact, as far as I know, he has never actually named the Japanese school he attended for nine years, but it's a pretty safe bet it was one of the campuses of Asahi Gakuen, the only Saturday Japanese school in the Los Angeles area where he grew up). Third, I was only there for three months in 1977 (I moved from the LA suburbs to the Chicago suburbs), while Masi Oka probably didn't start school there until around 1980.

Still, Masi Oka is a pretty cool person to be associated with, even if only distantly, and he doesn't know me from...from...

Amaterasuomikami?

It was the best tasting I've ever had.

2011-11-07T23:03:00.000+09:00

Imamade de ichiban oishikatta.

A couple weeks ago, the Pumpkin Princess brought home a notice from the Pumpkin Day Care announcing that her class was going on a picnic to one of the big parks in town. It was going to be a big deal for them, walking to the bus stop and taking the regular commercial bus line to the park. But the part that made me cringe was the part that said the kids needed to bring their own box lunch (bento).

The Pumpkin Princess decided she wanted a Disney Princess lunch. How on earth anyone is supposed to make a Disney Princess lunch is anyone's guess. I managed to talk her out of that one, but she announced she wanted a Melodicci bento. Melodicci is a character in the anime "Tamagocci." Yes, that Tamagocci. Yes, it's a TV show. No, don't ask.

Much web surfing, a trip to the grocery store, and an hour or so of cursing later, I came up with this.

The face is plain sliced cheese, the kind you peel off the wrapper to eat. The hat, eyes (including eyelashes) and feet are nori (dried seaweed). I stacked an additional slice of cheese under the brim of the hat to give it some dimension. The "dress" is a slice of ham I cut with kitchen scissors. I used a straw to cut the tiny circle shapes for the white sparkles in the eyes and her necklace. I had cookie cutters to cut out the shapes of notes from ham and pumpkin.

When the Pumpkin Princess first saw this this morning, her initial response was not that of joy or happy surprise or utter and total amazement at my skill. No, the first thing she said was "where are her earrings?

I think I have created a glass half full person.

It was like Disneyland

2011-11-05T23:25:00.001+09:00

Disneyland mitai datta

My beautiful talented co-worker returned from work stuff in an English city that wasn't London. I asked her how she'd liked it there, and she said, "there wasn't very much touristy stuff going on like London, but the city was pretty to see, especially the older parts. It was kind of like being in Disneyland."

(Pictures taken in Tokyo Disneyland, Tokyo Disney Sea, and the Tokyo Disneyland Hotel)

Too long, too big

2011-10-09T23:58:00.000+09:00

Nagasugi, ookisugi

I'm as much of a fan of loose fitting straight leg pants as the next girl who doesn't like the sensation of belly fat hanging over the waistband. I just don't get why they decided to call them boyfriend jeans.

When I first heard the term "boyfriend jeans," I was really confused because I'd never worn any of my boyfriends' jeans because I couldn't. Well, I could probably put them on, but never wear them. More like swim in them...

Husband is 32 cm taller. When spending weekends at his place became a regular thing, I'd wear his tennis things. Then it got colder and he suggested we go to Uniqlo to buy sweats for me to keep at his place. I knew my bad track record with relationships (nothing had lasted longer than a year until then, and I couldn't seem to stay friends after the breakup) so I bought new sweatpants and a sweatshirt and wore those at my own apartment, while leaving older sweatpants and an older T-shirt at his place (so it would be easier to cut my losses if the relationship ended).

Previous boyfriends have also been a good deal taller and somewhat wider than me. If I borrowed things, it was usually T-shirts and shorts. But I guess "boyfriend shorts" just doesn't have the same ring to it...

Field Day

2011-10-02T07:25:00.001+09:00

Undoukai

The Pumpkin Prince is the one in the green striped shirt. Note the enthusiasm with which he applies himself.

The Pumpkin Princess is not to be outdone by her little brother. The Pumpkin Daycare has gym uniforms for kids in the 3 year-old class and older. They're worn about three times a year, so they tell you to buy them in the size they'll be in their last year there.

I didn't get any pictures this year because the Pumpkin Daddy was doing the lines (no, Brit Friends, he is not writing "I will not create a disturbance in class" 100 times, he was drawing the chalk powder lines on the field so the kiddies knew where to start and turn at each event) and I had the video camera. These pictures are swiped from the Pumpkin Daddy blog.

Three day monk

2011-10-01T06:52:00.000+09:00

Mikka bouzu

The title is a phrase describing an interest that lasts for a very short time. I am just bringing this up as an example, but if, say, a woman just barely on the right side of forty decided that she was going to make a regular habit of exercising for the first time since university, and only keeps it up for about a month and a half. Of course, said woman would be slightly better off than the original phrase, which means "three day monk." A month and a half is much longer than this woman's previous "I'm going to be an active, fit person" phases. So maybe I'll get back into it soon. I mean, maybe she will. I mean...never mind.

I got the mumps at the end of July. The Pumpkin Princess (but not the Prince) got them earlier in the month (they don't vaccinate for them here unless you ask for it, which I didn't) and that's probably how I got them. I'm pretty sure I was vaccinated for them as a child, but I guess it wore off. Took the week off lying around and fooling around on the internet (but not blogging, as you can see) and doing housework.

In August, I got a promotion I didn't want. I get paid a little more in exchange for a lot of responsibilities I don't particularly care for. I didn't have the choice to not get promoted, it was either get promoted or find another job, and I weighed the two in balance in terms of the hassle of finding said new job, the potential hassle of a potential new work environment, and day care logistics, versus the potential new responsibilities I don't want, and the latter won out. My friends in academics would probably say "but that's GREAT, that's what everyone wants, good for you..." but it's only great when you are a born academic, which I am not.

September brought us Pumpkin Day Care's annual field day, the most adorable display of child development known to mankind. OK, I'm biased since the Pumpkin Prince was in three events and the Pumpkin Princess in four. The Pumpkin Princess's class did a marching band, but she played the bass organ so she didn't march. She said she made two mistakes, but I didn't really notice, so I'm pretty sure no one else did, either. The 5 year-old drum major took his job very seriously, and was really really good. Boy's got rhythm. Or something.

Up for October is presenting an overview of my department's work to some ambassadors from interesting places like Thailand and Vietnam (a job I did want) and going to the reception afterward (a job I did not want), doing my part to cover for my old boss while he gets treatment (a job I am happy to do for him given all he did for us for seven years) and grant writing (as we used to say in the 80s, gag me with a spoon).

Let's try counting

2011-07-10T21:56:00.000+09:00

Kazoete miyou

One
One

Two

Three

Four

Five

Six

Seven

Eight

Nine

Anyone know any good goya (bitter gourd) recipes?

Later than usual

2011-07-03T22:36:00.001+09:00

Itsumo yori osoi

Yes, I'm still doing Jillian Michaels, sort of. It's more like 3 or 4 times a week than the 5 or 6 times she recommends, and I end up walking in place with a grimace instead of doing whatever incredibly strenuous move her assistants with 2% body fat do while smiling. I'm doing Week 3, and I am still here. Unfortunately, so is my muffin top. And my weight has essentially stayed the same. To quote Elphaba from "Wicked," "something has changed within me, something is not the same," but it seems to be within me and not something you can really see, subjectively or objectively.

Well, it's the first week of July, and there are only about 3 tomatoes and not a single one is showing so much as a hint of red.

My bitter gourds are thriving, though.

And it's giving me bitter gourds. I've counted at least 4 in various stages of development.

I have also counted at least 5 houses on this block doing this "green curtain" thing, so this neighborhood is going to be up to its neck in bitter gourds. They're not one of those vegetables that are dinner table regulars like tomatoes and cucumbers, so I can already see the bitter gourd crop surplus ending up in the garden trash with the weeds and deadheaded blooms...

(I) tried matching them

2011-06-26T23:15:00.000+09:00

Awasete mita

The Pumpkin Daddy is one of those annoying people who can throw on random articles from the LL Bean (or even Uniqlo) catalog and look smoking hot. He came downstairs this morning dressed in a sweatshirt gray T-shirt and distressed gray jeans, looking good as always.

"I tried matching everything to my hair," he said, pointing to his George Clooney salt and pepper head.

Did Week 2 of "Ripped in 30" yesterday and today. For the first time, the bathroom scale showed a decrease...of 0.2 kilos, which is well within margin of error. Still, that I can get the Week 2 workout without (much) stopping must surely mean something...

Still here

2011-06-23T23:52:00.000+09:00

Mada iru

So, still doing Jillian Michaels. You're supposed to do one 20 minute workout 5 or 6 times a week. It was more like 3 or 4 times a week, but I'm still here. Again, I'm not sure I like her persona in the DVD. I am also unsure about running in place type movements for cardio, since I am working barefoot on my hardwood floor. But the idea of doing intense strength training mixed in with cardio makes sense, and so does having different workouts with increasing levels of intensity. I'm doing week 2 (of 4) now.

I feel different, but I do not look different, and I do not weigh different. I take that back. I weigh slightly more than when I started. I have decided to tell myself that this is increased muscle mass. Because attitude is everything.

In other news, see my bitter gourd plants? Remember what they used to look like? I gave them a bit of fertilizer last weekend. I think they really will create a shady green curtain.

Changing the way I do things

2011-06-12T22:05:00.000+09:00

Yarikata wo kaeru

June 5
30 min walking

June 7
Pilates
30 crunches
6 pikeups
16 pushups
50 squats (20 with iPad)

June 8
25 min walking, 5 min running

And that is the last bit of walking I have done in a while. I've decided to give Jillian Michaels "Ripped in 30" (according to reviews on Amazon.com and such, it's pretty much the same thing as "30 Day Shred" but since I've never seen "30 Day Shred," this is not a problem in the least) a try. The DVD arrived yesterday, and I tried it last night and tonight. Controversy about her persona and marketing strange things as weight loss supplements aside, the idea of doing cardio and following with strength training and going back to cardio again before your heart rate goes down too far makes sense.

However, you will note the use of the word "try" in the previous paragraph. Yesterday, I did it after the Pumpkin Prince and Princess went to sleep. It went fairly well. Tonight, the Pumpkin Princess announced she wanted to try too. I thought it would be easy enough, having her jump around beside me while I go all out...

No deal. She kept wanting to use the mat (I had only one) and the hand-weights (or rather, the water bottles I was using to see if I could make this a regular thing that would make actual hand-weights worth purchasing) so I ended up just going through the motions of curls and presses.

Still, better than nothing. It still wore me out, and it still made me out of breath.

Use of chopsticks

2011-06-06T22:31:00.000+09:00

Hashidukai

Not bad for a 2 year-old, don't you think?

Exercise log

2011-06-05T22:18:00.000+09:00

June 1
Pilates
30 crunches
6 pikeups
15 pushups
10 backward pushups
60 squats (last 10 with iPad. I don't have dumbells.)

June 2
25 min walking (with Cross Walker. End heart rate 124)

June 4
Pilates
30 crunches
6 pikeups (getting better at them!)
15 pushups (with hands farther apart)
10 backward pushups

The plan was to go walking this morning, but I ended up sleeping in...Let's see if the weather cooperates.

I was hoping to shrink my muffin top, you know, have an inch hanging from my belt as opposed to two inches, but that hasn't happened. I have lost no weight. Zero. But my abds have got much stronger, and I think my posture stays good until later in the day than before.

I quit!

2011-05-31T22:59:00.000+09:00

Yameta!

No, not this blog, not exercising, just trying to come up with cute phrases for every single exercise log entry.

25 minutes or so of walking. The plan was to set the timer on my iPod for 13 minutes and walk, and turn around when the timer went off and walk back. Either the armband was doing something to the iPod, or I touched the screen unintentionally, but it didn't go off. I think I walked a little over 3 km. Forgot to check end heart rate.

My schedule will not let me devote more than half an hour a day to exercise itself, so pretty soon I will have to either do something to make walking more strenuous, or stop walking and start running. Hopefully I will figure out what I want to do by next week. If I want to run, I need decent running shoes. Or I probably could make walking more strenuous by wearing toning shoes like these.

Either way, new shoes are in order. My only pair of sneakers were bought in a different millennium.

Not stopping

2011-05-30T23:00:00.001+09:00

Tomaranai

I'm probably going to run out of cute phrases for my exercise logs soon...

Pilates. Apparently a good Pilates session lasts at least half an hour. The one on my DVD is something like 13 minutes...

30 crunches

6 (bad) pikeups

15 pushups

60 squats

I just realized I forgot my backward pushups. Excuse me.

12 backward pushups. There. (And that's the only thing I did more than yesterday...)

Still keeping it up

2011-05-29T06:37:00.001+09:00

Mada tsuduiteru

I haven't been out walking because...well, I'm going to blame the weather, even though part of it is lack of motivation. So I got up this morning and I was going to (yeah, that's what they all say) but it was raining, so I stayed in and did

Pilates flow

6 pikeups

30 crunches

15 pushups

60 squats

11 backwards pushups

even though it is supposed to be better to do strength training at night. But strength training at six in the morning is a world apart from no strength training at all. So there.

Boxed lunch

2011-05-28T21:37:00.002+09:00

Obento

I make lunch once a year, for the annual Pumpkin Daycare field trip to the Safari Park. I spent the week pondering how I would do this, and got up this morning half an hour earlier than usual to make these.

For the Pumpkin Princess, Sugar Bunnies. She voiced her approval during a sneak preview before breakfast.

For the Pumpkin Prince, Anpanman

The faces are egg, ham, and a carrot slice. For the eyes/ eyebrows/ noses/ mouths, I used special punches to cut nori (dried seaweed sheets).

The egg was a little dry, which meant that nori did not stick to it as well as it did to rice or ham. The Pumpkin Princess burst out laughing when she opened her box at lunchtime because the nose and mouth of the rabbit were stuck to the top...

The grownups just got everything tossed into 3 tupperwares :P

Keeping it up

2011-05-25T09:19:00.001+09:00

Tsudukeru

May 24th
Pilates
20 crunches
6 pikeups
14 pushups
11 backward pushups
55 squats

Note randomness of numbers, and how obvious it is that I just wanted to be able to say I did more than last time...

May 25th

20 min walking (Cross Walker) max HR 124

HR not as high as before, maybe I am getting used to this?

Formal dress

2011-05-22T23:26:00.001+09:00

Seisou

The dress code for the party was "formal." So we all compared notes and decided it would be a good time to wear kimonos. As a married woman, for most formal occasions, I wear what is called a "houmongi," or "visiting dress." It's a kimono with standard length sleeves, and a large pattern that is either dyed or embroidered (tradition dictates that formal kimonos have large printed or embroidered patterns. Small printed patterns and woven patterns are considered less formal, even though they sometimes are more expensive. I guess it's like a JCrew cocktail dress being more affordable than a pair of Chanel jeans).

Of course, I do not own a houmongi (or a small print kimono or a woven pattern kimono, or for that matter, a JCrew cocktail dress or Chanel jeans), so I rented one. And I did not know how to dress myself in it, so I went to my trusty hairdresser (some Japanese hairdressers are also licensed kimono dressers). She did my hair and makeup, and then padded me in towels and gauze until I was the right shape (the design of the kimono is such that you want to be as cylindrical as possible) and then proceeded to ~~strangle me~~ dress me in my (OK, the dress shop's) beautiful kimono.

The sash, or obi is just as important, if not more so, than the kimono. The best are pure silk, and are frequently more expensive than the kimono. The way it is tied reflects your age social status. This plain flat tie shows I am an married lady.

Hair is always done up, although these days, most people (including me) get it done the way you would do for evening dresses.

Please don't ask me how I'm supposed to go to the toilet in this thing. Fortunately nor not, I didn't need to.

Move (exercise)

2011-05-22T23:04:00.001+09:00

Karada wo ugokasu

Movement log for May 22nd

"Flow" portion of beginners' Pilates DVD

14 pushups

10 backwards pushups (using piano bench)

20 crunches

5 pike-ups (done very poorly, but oh well)

53 squats

The first step

2011-05-21T11:11:00.001+09:00

Hajime no ippo

I don't know if I have done it here, but I have used my hectic schedule as my reason for not getting any exercise. Then I was reminded that a woman I used to work with started running seriously at age 40 and now runs full marathons on a fairly regular basis.

No, I do not have delusions of grandeur of running a full marathon anytime soon, but I started thinking, if she can make time to run 5 km every weekday morning, shouldn't I be able to make time to walk 20 minutes 3 times a week?

So, I tried, and it worked, sort of, when I can get the motivation to do so. Then the Pumpkin Daddy left us for a week (no, we are not separating, he went to do volunteer work in a part of Fukushima hit by the tsunamis. ) and I was wary to leave the house devoid of adults. But he's back now, so I'm out of excuses again.

So...

May 19th: 20 minutes brisk walking, end heart rate 134 bpm

May 21st: Same as above, 130 bpm, wearing "Cross Walker," which is a tummy/ rear/ thigh shaper that claims to work your thighs so that they become toned by just walking throughout the day

Also, not walking, but I did the "flow" part of the beginners Pilates DVD I bought 4 years ago on Tuesday night.

A man's job

2011-05-08T23:12:00.001+09:00

Otoko no shigoto

At the Pumpkin Palace, cleaning the bath is a man's job. It's a challenging job which requires years of training to learn to do properly.

.That's why it's best to start early.

You missed a spot...

(She) doesn't miss much!

2011-05-01T22:32:00.000+09:00

Yoku mite iru!
I have conjunctivitis. Viral, bacterial or allergic, I am not sure (and neither is the ophthalmologist I saw this morning. And while Japanese medical care does have its drawbacks, I am not going to complain about how I woke up on a Sunday morning with an eye puffed out so badly and stuck together so tightly it could not be opened without using my fingers, and was seen by an ophthalmologist, prescribed medication, and left the pharmacy with said medication in my hand by 11 a.m. the same morning, and only about 4000 yen, or $50, poorer for my trouble). This morning, I could not get my left eye open without using my fingers. It's slightly better now, after 2 doses of oral antibiotics and eye drops, but not much. I'll figure out what to do next after a good night's sleep. In the meantime, I will not let this get me down. Actually, it is getting me down, but it won't take me down without a fight. Or something. Anyway, I'm going to be bright and cheerful and upbeat for my internet friends, imaginary or otherwise.

We went to the 2 local malls to see the Pumpkin Princess's Mothers' Day pictures.

You may recall this image from last year.

I am still not sure what the pink circle over my head is. I have received suggestions that it is a halo. The artist said it was my ponytail holder.

This year, we have this

and this.

Can you see I'm wearing glasses in both pictures? And can you make out the necklace with white flowers on it the Pumpkin Daddy got me for White Day in the bottom picture?

In (somewhat) quake related news (of course you knew I had to say something about the quake in this post), the Pumpkin Family planted bitter melon in containers

and the Pumpkin Daddy hung gardening net in front of the patio door. The idea is to get the plants to grow in front of the patio door, creating a green curtain that will make shade in summer (and help us put a dent in the amount of electricity used by the AC). We made the choice of bitter melon because of its robust, large leaves (as opposed to something like morning glory) and its disease resistance (as opposed to something like cucumber).

That's all 151 cm (4' 11" 1/2 or thereabouts) of me you see in the photo, so you can see how ambitious (and also potentially effective) this plan is.

There's only one container in the photo, but a couple days later, we added another one just like it on the left hand side of the patio.

Of course, the potential drawback is the possibility of a big bitter melon harvest. Anyone know any good bitter melon recipes (other than Okinawa-style stir fry with tofu and egg?)

Today over yesterday

2011-04-26T22:49:00.001+09:00

Kinou yori mo kyou

Today I got up 15 minutes earlier than yesterday and went outside and walked for 15 minutes. Not ran, walked. Not an hour, 15 minutes. Still, this is more movement than yesterday. Or, for that matter, pretty much any given day in the past 4 months.

You haven't changed much!

2011-04-18T23:04:00.000+09:00

Zenzen kawatte nai ne!

Life goes on. Seasons change.

This past Saturday evening, I went to a party of sorts for my university's crew (not crew as in group but crew as in rowing team) alumni. Alumni is the key word here, crew in my university is now defunct. The youngest person there was something like 34 or thereabouts. An interesting collection people, all beautiful, but some more self-assured of their beauty than others (a select few obnoxiously so). Youthful dreams broken by realization of one's own limits, disease, divorce, or just good old fashioned circumstance. The "cool" people then are not necessarily the cool people now, and the uncool people then are sometimes today's coolest. Or hottest. Or both.

I was told by my one of my favorite crew members I hadn't changed much. This is somewhat true, but as I have previously mentioned, I'm a plain person. Keeping your youth is not equal to keeping your beauty, if you only had so much beauty to begin with. Still, I can't help but think there must be a point where the "beauty levels" of a plain girl who stays happy and youthful, and a beautiful girl whose sorrows and meanness work their way into her face cross and the tables turn...

One person said "my contribution to the quake relief effort is to party and shop. It creates tax revenue, and it will boost the economy, which will create more tax revenue." The man does have a point.

I came home to an empty house as the Pumpkin Daddy had taken the Prince and Princess to his parents'. I bathed and went to bed, and got up the next morning at around eight. I had breakfast, did laundry, dusted and swiffed, and then set off to declutter one of the hall closets. I tossed two large trash bags of things that hadn't been used for a whole year, tops. It was a really productive time.

About that same time, one of my newer imaginary friends hosted a walk-a-thon for quake relief. I agreed to sponsor her and her sons, and they (especially the sons) out-performed my expectations. I've paid up as agreed, it's all for a good cause.

Do I smell?

2011-04-13T23:55:00.000+09:00

Watashi niou?

I had the chance to see "Wicked" quite a while back. It was absolutely wonderful, and I had really great company. But I think I am quite the cynic and spoilsport, because in the scene where Fiyero and Elphaba finally reunite and they sing this beautiful song about how "every moment as long as you're mine, I'll wake up my body and make up for lost time" I was thinking "you know, she's been on the run for quite some time, she's probably not showered in a while..."

(This concern only applies to the musical version, in the original novel, water is dangerous to Elphaba and she won't go near it.)

It's been a whole month since the quake, but there are still something like 150,000 people in the refugee shelters, for whom things like baths and showers or even frequent hand washing are luxuries. I think in the Hanshin-Awaji quake in 1994, a lot of the survivors were in temporary shelters within the month. Of course, the area and number of people affected by the quake is nothing like 1994.

So keep us in your hearts, and please remember, and if you see it in a store or a restaurant, it's safe to eat/ drink/ use, even if it's Japanese.

Quake orphans

2011-04-09T23:11:00.000+09:00

Shinsai koji

Foreigners looking to adopt Japanese earthquake orphans need not apply

I wouldn't have chosen this title if I were the one who wrote this article, but the article itself presents an interesting east-meets-west phenomenon. The current head count for children with both parents killed or missing is 82, and this number is expected to grow as the count becomes more complete. The standard issue tragedy is "kids at school, parents at work, kids successfully evacuated, parents didn't." This means that there are very few healthy baby girls less than six months old to begin with, and those who survived when both parents didn't will probably be taken in by aunts, uncles, and grandparents.

There was this news segment on TV the other night, about three kids (a sister and twin brothers) who followed the sad pattern of "kids at school, parents at work". Their uncle (mom's younger brother) and his family helped them look for their parents without success. After a week of waiting and searching, their uncle said to them, "starting today, Uncle and Auntie are going to be your Mom and Dad." Uncle and Auntie already had children, and they themselves were tsunami survivors, but it never so much as even entered their minds to do otherwise.

This is probably what will happen to many of the tsunami orphans. Yes, some of these orphans will end up better off than others, but that is something that can be said for children all over the world. Local and Japanese governments should give the extended family and friends the support (financial and otherwise) they will need to welcome these children to their new families before overseas adoption is considered as a means to find a new home.

The article is right in saying that Japanese emphasize blood ties. Actually, that's an understatement. I once had the chance to visit an infertility clinic (long story, I am not infertile, well, maybe I am now, but with a Pumpkin Prince and Princess to raise my current fertility is not an issue). The doctor there explained to me the various processes, including artificial insemination and IVF, and said that anonymous donors were the norm in the Americas and Europe. He proceeded to say that many Japanese parents-to-be preferred to have some kind of blood connection to their children, and it was pretty common for a brother-in-law or father-in-law to be the sperm donor. It involved a great deal of self control to refrain from running away from the clinic screaming bloody murder at the idea of a father-in-law donating sperm. Having lived in Japan as a Japanese person for two and a half decades, this method of having a child you have a genetic connection with (when the traditional means have failed) now feels much more (but still not entirely) logical.

The "25,000 orphans" in orphanages in Japan as a pre-quake head count are probably not all orphans. Many are probably children with one or more living parents whose immediate or extended family can't (or worse, won't) give them the care they need. This is an educated guess based on how the situation is similar in many developed nations, and how this is the case in the orphanage run by the church that runs the Pumpkin Daycare. Of course, there are those who are orphans consistent with the strictest definition.

If this disaster triggers discussion on how to help these children, it would be one small fragment of good left behind in place of all that has been swept away.

I can't find (his) pants!

2011-04-03T23:18:00.000+09:00

Pantsu ga mitsukaranai!

I tried to buy the usual high cost-performance diapers I get for the Pumpkin Prince, but they were sold out. I ended up getting the high end diapers by the same manufacturer (Mammi-Poko vs Moony, for those of you familiar with Japanese diapers). This is obviously part of the sanitary napkin/ Kleenex/ toilet paper shortage that has come about since the quake. The shortage makes sense to a limited extent, as several high output paper mills have shut down because of the quake. No big deal, the Royal Bottom will be wrapped in more expensive stuff than is usual, but it's an interesting phenomenon.

I think this quake will be one of those things that you either remember or you don't, kind of like how the previous generation talks about WWII. "Right after the war, we had sweet potato skins for breakfast, and nothing else. And we were glad to have them." "For a couple weeks after the quake, we had blackouts, sometimes up to 7 hours a day. And we were glad to have them."

I'm an academic, or at least, my job description says that I am. Last week, I got an e-mail from a big American organization in my field, saying that if you live in Japan and were affected by the quake, submission deadlines for this year's big conference will be 2 weeks later for you than everyone else. We had very little quake/ tsunami damage, but we started discussing the definition of "affected by the quake."

1. Not directly hit, but had trouble peeling self away from the TV and news websites until fairly recently

2. Not directly hit, but couldn't get any work done because of blackouts

3. Not directly hit, and could have got work done but was feeling so hopeless and depressed over everything (and the blackouts didn't help)

4. Not directly hit, and did manage to get quite a bit of work done and would have made the original deadline if the lack of heat hadn't caused you to catch a cold

What do you think? Do any of these count as "affected by the quake?" If you were the selection committee, which explanations would you accept as valid and worthy of a deadline extension?

The temperatures are getting milder.

2011-04-02T23:24:00.005+09:00

Kion ga odayaka ni natte kimashita.

A whole week blackout free. I guess the warmer weather is helping.

Thursday evening, I pulled into the self-serve gas station I always use. All the pumps were being used, but there were no lines. I was in and out in 10 minutes.

There still are shortages. Buying bottled water in the supermarket is a pipe dream, mostly because of the fear of radioactivity.

"You know, according to this book on statistics, they're totally reporting the radiation levels wrong. The highest reading in and of itself doesn't mean anything. I would go with the mean or the mode..."

The Pumpkin Family has decided to take their chances with the tap water. Milk is in short supply, as are eggs, but if you hit the stores in the morning, you'll probably find what you need. An interesting shortage is yogurt. The milk shortage is an obvious issue, but the bigger problem is the electricity (or rather, lack thereof) needed for temperature control.

Stuff at work completely unrelated to the quake is going on. It's so very political and so very petty. Like, you go home and see this father on TV who lost his wife and his babies, and you get a feel for what is really important in life, and then you go to work to face stuff that seemed important a couple weeks ago, but now could really dig a deep hole and jump in it for all you care, but still has to be dealt with.

A request

2011-03-30T23:23:00.004+09:00

Onegai

If you can't help Japan, please at least remember us. If you don't want to help Japan, fine. But please don't say Japan doesn't need help. 170,000 people are still in emergency shelters. There is a nuclear reactor that needs deactivating.

"But what about stuff happening at home?" You are absolutely right. Tell you what, you do your part for an issue happening in your home country while taking a moment to think about what is happening in mine, and we'll say you're good.

Ichiro would need help walking if he had a broken leg. Please don't say Japan doesn't need help, because it's just not true.

"Songs for Japan", the compilation charity album on iTunes, sells for $9 in the USA and 1,500 yen in Japan. I guess I am supposed to feel lucky for the chance to contribute that much more to a worthy cause, but I wonder how the large difference in cost came about...

Karoshi

2011-03-29T22:26:00.006+09:00

Karoshi

(I had no idea it had its own English Wikipedia entry...)

This past weekend, I passed a gas station. There was no long line snaking along the road for half a mile. There was a line of 3 or 4 cars for each of the 4 pumps. I saw the 16 cars at the gas station and thought "wow, no wait at all!"

The scheduled blackouts are still scheduled, but they're cancelled with increased frequency. There hasn't been one since Friday, and tomorrow's blackouts have been cancelled, so that will make 6 straight days that Group 5 has been blackout free. This is a good thing, because one of the generators at work died. We have yet to hear repairs have been successful. We've been only half joking that it was karoshi. I'm not an engineer, but I can't help but wonder if that generator was really designed to run four, sometimes eight hours a day for 2 weeks straight.

On Yahoo! (original USA flavor and Australia/ New Zealand) and BBC websites, the direct aftermath of the quake/ tsunami is no longer to be seen on the short list of current news. The Fukushima nuclear reactor remains. Yes, it is important, but I suppose nice people trying to do their very best to keep their wits and trying to figure out what to do to get their lives back isn't nearly as eye catching as something straight out of a disaster movie. In one of the most developed countries on the planet, 2 weeks after the quake and evacuation shelter residents still only get a slice of bread and a rice ball per person. A day. I wish I were making this up, but I saw it on Japanese network TV. I personally find this far more outrageous than me and my family receiving 1/ 100,000 the amount of radiation in a single session of radiation therapy over the past 2 weeks or so.

Heroic workers, government and otherwise, are working around the clock to try to change this (both the food issue and the radiation issue), but people are just not designed to work around the clock. I hope we don't see any karoshi from these people, either. The generator was bad enough.

Getting through it

2011-03-26T15:01:00.004+09:00

Norikiru

A couple days ago, I was driving right when the blackout hit. I knew it was coming, but I stayed at work a little longer than I planned. I was driving knowing it could hit at any minute, and it still made me jump in the driver's seat when the green traffic light in front of me suddenly went dark.

Something sad I read in the news: a woman in her 60's was hit by a car at an intersection during a blackout (the traffic light was out, and there was no traffic policeman). So someone dialed 119, and the ambulance came within a reasonable amount of time, and took her to a good-sized hospital because she seemed to have a head injury. Well, the hospital couldn't take a CT because of the blackout, so they had to transfer her to a different hospital that was in a different blackout zone (and had the electricity to get a CT). She is currently in serious condition. Based on the information I have, I don't know who is to blame for how much, but it is probably fair to say that she might not have been hurt at all if the traffic lights were in order.

Otherwise, people are starting to get used to the whole thing, scheduling work and food preparation and baths around blackouts, and finding creative ways to get through them when they hit. My friend got a camping trailer battery and rigged it so that he could charge it while he had electricity and use the stored power during blackouts. He gets enough power to have the lights on while watching TV, which is so much better than total darkness. I have another friend who actually moves operations to his camping trailer parked outside. It would have been a great plan if he'd remembered to clean the stove. He had heat, lights, TV and a working toilet, and it would have been great if it weren't for the smell of a year's worth of dust burning. Another friend has solar cells on his roof, which is fine when it's light out but not when it's dark and you need it most.

Of course, some areas are blackout free. The area around the local Japanese Self Defense Forces base gets power during blackouts (duh, how are they supposed to run quake relief operations if their home base does not have power). And then there is where I live...probably because we're on the same grid as the local train station that gets its fair share of traffic. So when people start talking about iceboxes and rigging camping car batteries and living in trailers, I kind of sheepishly slink off...

They've re-zoned the blackouts so that there are 5 subgroups for each group, and promised to give more precise and detailed blackout schedules. Makes sense, most people can probably handle one or two 3-hour blackouts a week if they know exactly when they are coming.

And I will now sheepishly slink off.

Stocking up

2011-03-22T23:00:00.003+09:00

Kaidame

Bread, milk, eggs, rice, batteries, toilet paper.

Actually, I think milk will come of this list of things that are hard to find in stores. They found trace radioactivity in milk from Fukushima about two days ago, so you just know people are going to stop buying milk from Hokkaido...

Something to add to the list: diapers (for both babies and adults) and feminine hygiene products. I've got 1 1/2 packs of diapers for the Pumpkin Prince in the closet, and I expect things will have died down by the time I need to get more. I can deal with the lack of feminine hygiene products if that pack of sanitary napkins went to some poor girl sleeping in her school gymnasium, but somehow I think it went to some local lady who tossed it with about 10 other packs of sanitary napkins in her shopping basket because she "doesn't know when she'll be able to find them next".

The spinach is gone!

2011-03-21T23:19:00.003+09:00

Hourensou ga nakunatta!

They pulled the spinach off the shelves of my local supermarket, because there was spinach grown in our area found to have trace radioactivity. Why spinach? Probably because of the few vegetables being grown outdoors this time of year (which include but are not limited to broccoli, cabbage, scallions, and various greens including spinach), spinach has a large surface area exposed to the air (so that the radioactive debris has somewhere to fall on, for example, most of a cabbage is not exposed to air, and if it were, you could always peel off the outer leaves and everyone and the Geiger counter would be fine with it), and spinach is the most popular.

I guess milk will be next...

The insects awaken

2011-03-20T17:58:00.003+09:00

Keichitsu

When spring comes, the hibernting insects awaken. When there are three blackout free days in a row, the Pumpkin Family goes shopping.

We wanted to get a "spoon set" for the Pumpkin Prince. This is a flatware set consisting of a spoon, fork and a pair of chopsticks in a plastic carrying case. There are all kinds of sets, Pokemon, Hello Kitty, Peanuts, Disney, etc...The Pumpkin Daddy wanted to get the Pumpkin Prince the same kind he got the Pumpkin Princess, so we went to the big department store in the next city.

I take back what I said about the gas station lines not making any sense. There is an actual supply/ demand discrepancy caused by the quake. Actually, quakes. My uncle, who worked for Mobil until his retirement, explained it to me. The oil refineries stop production and run a safety check every time there is a quake. The past week, there have been quite a few aftershocks, so every time they start production, there's a quake, so they've been checking too much and making too little. The story in the oil refinery probably goes something like this..

"Is everyone OK? Production stopped automatically? Good. OK, begin safety check according to safety manual. Check, check, check...double check...great, everything is in order. Ladies and gentlemen, let's get this show on the road, and...(shake, rattle roll) Is everyone OK? That wasn't nearly as big as the last one. Please begin safety check according to the safety manual. Check, check, check, double check...Ladies and gentlemen, let's get (shake rattle roll) Oh drat. Begin safety check, please. Check, check (shake rattle roll) THIS IS DRIVING ME NUCKING FUTS!!!!"

On the way to the department store, we saw a gas station line over a kilometer long.

The parking tower near the department store was really empty. We got to the store at around 11, and only had to go up to the 2nd floor to find parking space, which is a new record (par that time of day is the 3rd or 4th level). The tower is usually packed with shoppers and also people taking the train into Tokyo. The stores were pretty empty for a Sunday morning with nice weather. So much for keichitsu...

Someone made this Scheduled Blackout Calendar. I'd leave them a tip if I knew how. I now have the blackout schedule on my computer and iPad, so I can schedule work stuff and housework around them.

And there is this...the American gentleman, and I call him this in every sense of the word, is Daniel Kahl. He's known for his fluent Yamagata dialect Japanese. I am having problems coming up with a good American equivalent. I think in the UK it would be a lot like a very heavy Welsh accent, but my Brit friends might disagree. Anyway, his American network standard English really threw me off, and I almost didn't know he was. I think most who know of Daniel Kahl would find the lack of accent amusing, whether they share my perspective on the "nuclear disaster" or not.

One thing I would like to add to Mr. Kahl's words is if the international media are guilty of generating and riding the hysteria, the Japanese media are guilty of exactly the same thing.

Cancelled tomorrow, too

2011-03-19T22:26:00.003+09:00

Ashita mo chuushi

The blackout has been cancelled tomorrow, too. I was thinking "fix lunch by 11:30, blackout at 12:20 until 16:00, start fixing dinner shortly after (but not immediately after) blackout is over..." so so much for that.

Before they cancelled tomorrow's blackout, I suggested we go out to dinner on a day we knew for sure there would be no blackout. The Pumpkin Daddy said he wanted sushi, so we went to the local conveyer belt sushi place. We were in the store at around 6:20 p.m. The belt appeared to have less sushi than usual. The Pumpkin Daddy ordered a plate of salmon sushi, and they brought a single piece (they usually come in sets of two) and told him it was the last piece they had, and since there was only one it was on the house. Good service, but it was concerning that a sushi place would run out of a cut of fish before 7 p.m. Part of the quake/ tsunami shortages...

Apparently, Brits have been advised to consider leaving parts of Japan further north than Tokyo. Just a couple of days ago, the British Embassy had released a transcript of a conference with the Chief Scientific Officer of the UK, so I was kind of surprised, but I guess it's more about shortages and traffic congestion than anything.

On network TV, they are running the same 3 commercials over and over and over again. They are for Advertising Council Japan. They're an organization that advocates the use of advertising to educate the public on things like cancer screening and bullying prevention. The networks are running these AC commercials because no regular corporations will sponsor the programs. The corporations don't want to be associated with quake related news, so the networks have pulled all the regular commercials and replaced them with the AC commercials. AC won't pay for the commercials, and they are usually public service related content, so neither the networks or AC make much money off of the commercials. So you're hearing the nuclear physicist say "NUCLEAR ARMAGEDONN!!!!!" and then they cut to a commercial where a pretty older woman talks about how she tells her pretty young daughter the importance of Pap smears because she doesn't want her daughter to get cervical cancer the way she herself did, and then people think CANCER and think I SO DO NOT NEED TO HEAR THAT RIGHT NOW, and...

...they get angry and complain to AC. Gosh, I wish I were making this stuff up.

The international media are saying how calm and collected the country has been the past week. I guess we are calm by most standards, but the toll does show in things like panic hoarding and lashing out in strange directions.

Blackout cancelled

2011-03-19T12:06:00.003+09:00

Teiden chuushi!

I think it's the forecast for warm weather that made TEPCO decide there would be no blackout today. Everyone seems a little happier and a little more energetic...which is kind of dangerous for two reasons.

1. People have been turning to bicycles because of the gas shortages. This is a wonderful idea in theory, but the fact is that some of these bicycles are older models that haven't been ridden in a very long time, and some of these riders are older models that haven't ridden in a while. So you're driving along on a road without a sidewalk, and there's an older model riding an older model, and just as you are about to pass them, they totter in your direction...OK, I made the last part up, but I am sure it is a definite possibility!

2. If you are going to wait in line for gas, you'd want to do it on a warm day, so that you don't end up like the guy who died of carbon monoxide poisoning because he was trying to stay warm using a portable kerosene stove in his car while he was waiting in line for gas. So off you go to the gas station, where the line is already almost a kilometer long at 9:00...and the gas station is scheduled to open at 11:00. So there's cars that end up in line for gas when they thought it was just your garden variety traffic jam, and they suddenly realize it isn't your garden variety traffic jam, but quake/ tsunami-induced panic buying-induced gas shortage-induced long line for gas, and they try to get out of the line without so much as a turn signal. OK, I made the last part up, but only the last part. And I'm sure it has happened, just not in front of me.

I finally understand the hoarding/ panic buying mentality after having made a weekend grocery run. The crowd waiting for the store to open an hour later than usual, the unheated, dark store congested with shopping carts, the occasional empty shelf. The atmosphere of doom almost induced me to buy bread and milk I didn't really need.

I was thinking that the panic-induced (and not actual supply/ demand discrepancy induced) gas shortage would die down by now, but it hasn't. Yesterday, my mom's friend's husband went to the gas station at 6 in the morning. At 10, when my mom's friend delivered sandwiches and coffee to him on her bicycle, he was still in line...

You're finally seeing regular programming on TV. The regular networks were all about the nuclear reactor and the trains in Tokyo stopping. Since TV is all about getting people to watch until the commercials, I guess the marketing choice would be nuclear reactors as opposed to nice people in the refugee shelters trying their very best to keep their cool among blackouts and shortages. So you prop up a nuclear physicist next to your newscaster, ask him (I'm sure there are woman nuclear physicists in this country, they just haven't been shown on TV) if this situation is bad, and he'll say "oh yes, this is very bad, much much worse than Three Mile Island. The radiation level is 20,000 times higher than usual". And people will be glued to the set ("20,000 TIMES!!!") and start to get angry at the government (it's not the government's fault, if it's anyone's fault it would be TEPCO's, and possibly General Electric's) and afraid for their health and start buying Betadine (upon which you would have lost their viewership but not their attention).

Notice how few doctors there are next to the newscasters in these shows? That's probably because all the doctors are too busy dealing with the panic-induced phone calls and hospital visits by people who watched these newscasts in the safety of their living rooms while drinking tea. As opposed to dealing with one of the Fukushima 50. Or, when contacted, will say "meh" which isn't going to get as much attention as someone saying "this is awful this is disaster this is ARMAGEDONN!" (never mind that the nuclear physicist might not actually be Christian...)

The most helpful bit of information I learned this past week is that when you do animal research on the thyroid, you should never, never, never, ever use "iodine-free" animal feed made in Japan because it will skew your lab results. Always use made in USA or EU. Why? Because all food made in Japan contains iodine, no matter what it is. So unless you've lived outside Japan for the past several months and just arrived in Japan during the past week, your thyroid is safe.

Unless you're part of the Fukushima 50. These people are in real danger, and they know it. They are heros worthy of the highest praise. But unless you're actually in the 20km area (in which case you probably should talk to a health care professional in person, and stop checking blogs of people you don't know), don't go out and buy Betadine and take a swig, OK? Have some miso soup or something, it's comforting (and it contains iodine!).

Why toilet paper?

2011-03-17T22:48:00.002+09:00

Naze toiretto peipaa?

Another gas station generated traffic jam. This time, the gas station hadn't even opened yet. There were lots of cars that had the driver's seat fully reclined. My educated guess is that they'd camped out in their cars to be at the front of the line to get gas when the store opened. I wouldn't do this myself, but I can understand how people would want to. Gas is really hard to get.

One of the drivers in the long gas line got out of his car and opened his trunk for some reason or other, revealing a trunk full of...toilet paper. Yes, toilet paper.

Bread, I understand now. It's something you can eat without heating, which is very practical during blackouts. But toilet paper? Someone needs to explain that one to me. My mom says during the oil shock in 1973 (or thereabouts) there was a shortage of paper, including toilet paper. Maybe he is working off of memories of those days...

Traffic obstruction

2011-03-16T22:26:00.005+09:00

Tsukou bougai

Disclaimer: This is a ranty blog entry by someone so far affected by the quake/ tsunami by only scheduled blackouts and a temporary gasoline shortage. If you are looking for actual helpful information, go here.

More working in the cold darkness today. Group 5 had not one but 2 blackouts scheduled today, which meant work did the "backup power" thing Yesterday I found myself getting depressed, so today I made it a point to walk around and talk to people outside my section, jerry-rigging early intervention. I think I left work in better spirits than yesterday.

A new development was that there was an actual blackout in the area around my work. If nothing else, it kept people from asking us why we were the only gig in town running on auxiliary power (we aren't, city hall and the prefecture office do the same thing). My friend said that all the traffic lights were down. There were police officers directing traffic at large intersections, and there, you could pretty much drive/ pedal/ jog as if nothing had ever happened, but at the smaller intersections, things sometimes got a bit scary. I understand there have been car crashes during these blackouts. Drive carefully if you are involved...or do what lots of us at work have been trying to do, which is schedule work so that you don't have to drive during blackout hours, and avoid doing stuff away if it can be done where you are now.

Of course I write this knowing this suggestion is more helpful to some than others...

The Pumpkin Daddy had the morning off (based on the blackout schedule) and went to the store. He found milk and (finally!) bread. The panic buying some people are doing is really annoying. My co-worker reported seeing someone who had something like 6 packs of toilet paper in his cart. I guess he was anticipating a bout with diarrhea...

The food issue has kind of leveled down, mostly because we are a food producing area. The big thing right now is gasoline. My boss has been trying to fill his gas tank at least part-way so that he can drive home to see his wife, but so far, no luck. He has a small, spartan apartment in the area for occasions like this, and he's had to stay there pretty much the entire time since the quake. A popular topic of conversation at work has become the locations of gas stations that still have gas, and how to avoid the gas-station induced traffic jams. My boss armed himself with the information acquired during one of these conversations and headed for the gas station in question. There was a long line in front of the station that stretched a couple blocks, so he knew they were still pumping, and he got in line. So he waited, and waited, and waited some more until about an hour had passed (he came in late, but because of the whole auxiliary power thing, there really wasn't that much to do this morning so we didn't miss him that much), and then...

"A policeman came and told us to go away because we were obstructing traffic."

My boss is probably sleeping in his apartment in town again tonight.

The area surrounding my workplace had a blackout, but the area around my home didn't. I think they'll pick us for tomorrow...which means it will start at 6:20 a.m. Yikes! I should probably turn in early so I can wash with warm water and make coffee before the power gets cut.

Saving electricity

2011-03-15T22:44:00.005+09:00

Setsuden

If you are looking for relevant information about the scheduled blackouts in Japan, please try here.
So here we are with the second workweek (of goodness knows how many) saving electricity. Something about community responsibility makes my workplace especially aggressive in this endeavor.

On the way to work, I encountered 2 gas-station induced traffic jams.

Today's blackout schedule threatened to put our area (group 5) in darkness and silence from about noon until 4 in the afternoon or thereabouts. As yesterday, we obeyed instructions to try to save as much electricity as possible, and turned off most of the lights and all of the climate control. We worked in the darkness wearing coats. One of my co-workers showed up with a fluffy fleece cape. The thing is, so far, there hasn't been an actual blackout in our area yet. Work does the voluntary quasi-blackout by choice.

We'd wanted to get as much done as possible by noon, but we made sure to make a trip to the toilet before that time. Being a large building, the water pressure gets too low for the toilet to flush with 100% certainty when the power is out. We called it a morning when the power cut to TEPCO to backup, and had lunch. I ordered a boxed lunch from a local delivery place which was pretty good. The on-premisis convenience store (residents of Japan: it's a Lawson) was swept clean of rice balls but not egg salad sandwiches. I guess stuff that would keep at room temp like rice is being diverted to the areas hardest hit.

We watched the news over lunch, where the news of the moment was the status of the nuclear reactors in the Fukushima power plant. It's frustrating to see awful stuff going on, and not being able to do anything about it. The debate was whether you could prevent the effects of fallout from a power plant with iodine intake (short answer: yes for thyroid cancer, amount needed is something like a 3 cm piece of konbu)

The afternoon was spent again working in the cold darkness. I am finding working in the cold darkness is depressing. Tomorrow, I am going to try roaming around and find places warmer and brighter to work.

I encountered yet another gas-station traffic jam on the way home. That's how you can tell if a gas station has gas, whether or not there's a line in front of it...

No blackout

2011-03-14T22:38:00.003+09:00

Teiden nashi

WTF? There are people actually complaining that there wasn't a blackout in most parts of the country? Am I missing something?

I called the Pumpkin Granny this morning to ask her what she wanted to do about the Pumpkin Prince and Princess. Our "turn" for the blackout was scheduled for 3:20 pm to 7:00 pm, and she usually picked them up from day care at 3:30. This would mean driving on streets without traffic lights.

Not only did the Pumpkin Granny not know what time the blackout would be, she had not thought about the whole traffic lights issue.

A short discussion brought us to the conclusion that it would be best if the Pumpkin Granny went to pick them up at 2:00 pm or thereabouts.

So I packed up the Pumpkin Royalty and headed in the direction of work. I dropped the kids off at day care, and headed to work...where the entrance was dark. Only about half of the hall lights were on. They were doing their part to save electricity, I guess. My department had the heat turned off, and everyone was working with their coats on. We have backup generators for times like this, and though the blackout didn't happen as scheduled (in fact, it didn't happen at all in our part of the country), they cut the power we were getting from TEPCO and switched over to the backup power source at 3:20 or thereabouts. Then, at around 5, they cut off all power to "non-essential" departments (including ours...could have sworn we were "essential"...) leaving us no choice but to go home.

The Pumpkin Daddy's work sent everyone home after lunch. I got home to find him vacuuming.

Tomorrow's blackout is scheduled from lunch to 4 pm. I'm hoping that doesn't mean they will keep us until 8 pm to make up for lost time.

The night after the big quake, my friend the Tomato Daddy got a Skype call from a co-worker currently based in the American East Coast. "Hey, you guys OK? That's good to hear. Like I said the other day, they're going to be in stores today. Want one?" And the Tomato Daddy said yes.

Which of the following things do you find most interesting/ amusing?

1. That even when the usual land line and cell phone lines are down, you can get through to your friends if you use Skype

2. That someone would call the evening of the biggest natural disaster in this country's history to ask if you wanted them to buy something for you that was going to hit the stores that day

3. That said person could refer to the object in question in third person pronouns and you would know exactly what they were talking about

4. That the object in question was an iPad

Planned Blackout

2011-03-13T23:30:00.005+09:00

Keikaku teiden

Actual info on scheduled blackouts here.

We're getting one tomorrow. My main concerns are

1) The blackout falls on commuting hours. How many of the traffic lights in my commute have a back up power system?

2) What will become of the contents of my fridge?

I am thankful my concerns are this trivial, but the first has potential to become tricky. Apologies to people who have Googled "planned blackout" or something and found no helpful information on this blog.

2011-03-13T22:11:00.003+09:00

My accomplishment for today is having peeled myself away from the TV and internet quake and meltdown coverage long enough to buy diapers and cook dinner, and also not having lost my temper at my kids.

Sometimes, I have really low expectations for myself. Today is one of those days, and I'd say it's allowed.

Neither parent had the emotional resources to play with or pay any sort of attention to the kids, so we just let them watch DVRed programs and rental DVDs. Apparently, the Pumpkin Princess likes Dora the Explorer. She watches it in English, and loves it, which is strange because she doesn't understand English or Spanish.

Why bread?

2011-03-13T16:07:00.002+09:00

Naze pan?

I went to the store to get diapers. I had no problem finding them, and there were plenty left after I took my usual 2 packs. There were plenty of other things on the shelves, but two sections were completely empty: bottled water and bread. The water is not hard to understand, but bread seems a strange choice. I doubt people are mailing it to friends and family in the Tohoku area, since transport is essentially gone in that area. Bracing for a power outage by stocking up on food that doesn't require heating or other preparation, I guess...

Maybe I'll start cooking rice early today while there's power.

I hate having the TV on. The Pumpkin Daddy keeps turning it on, but the TV is like a dysfunctional vacuum. I keep getting sucked in and am not getting stuff done like housework and cooking. So I turn it off, but then I get sucked into the internet. I keep reloading news sites like Yahoo! and the big dailies (Asahi, Yomiuri, Mainichi) and checking on my friends on Facebook. Maybe writing about this dysfunction will be the motivation I need to get going.

I won't watch TV.

2011-03-12T23:20:00.002+09:00

Terebi ha minai.

I do not understand why the Pumpkin Daddy insists upon having the TV on all day. There is nothing but quake related news. We are confused enough as it is, there is no point in adding to the confusion. If watching TV would get food and water to those hit hard, or will save someone still buried alive under wreckage, I would watch all day. But it won't, so I won't.

I also fail to see the need to cancel children's programming. The Pumpkin Prince and Princess have been watching DVRed cartoons all day. Their parents lack the emotional resources to play with them...

Thank you to everyone who has shown concern (and relief) for my well-being.

I'm OK.

2011-03-12T08:08:00.002+09:00

Buji desu

A very short post to let people who check on me here but not Facebook that I and my immediate family are all safe. My house, my parents' house, my sister's apartment, and my brother's house all have electricity, water, gas, and internet. My house is well away from the coast and also the worst of the quake damage.

The devastation, particularly from the tsunamis, is, well, devastating. The TV footage of cars and homes being washed away look like something that I might see if I caught the Pumpkin Prince and Princess playing Legos and Cars in the shower. But it's not, it's real, and there were people in those homes.

Your local Red Cross is probably a good place to start if you want to help out financially.

I was thinking of making a lighthearted post about the nice things my co-workers got me in Vienna. I might later on, but for now, I am thankful for them, my family, and their safety.

Focus today, too

2011-03-06T22:25:00.003+09:00

Kyou mo chuumoku

A half dozen of my co-workers are gone for a conference in Vienna. Bastards.

This weekend, I managed to:

Cook dinner both nights (lasagna on Saturday, nikujaga on Sunday)

Purchase and plant flowers in the pots outside the front door

Put away the Hinamatsuri dolls

Change the filter in the goldfish tank

Get the Pumpkin Princess to practice the piano and do her piano homework (I never said she did it well, I just said it got done)

Get 7 hours of sleep both nights

Write a blog entry containing an image

I managed not to:

Eat potato chips or snack food along those lines after 9 pm on Saturday (but not Friday)

Bring on the workweek! And my co-workers come back on Wednesday. I think they should bring me something nice, don't you?

Focus on success

2011-02-28T23:04:00.002+09:00

Seikou ni chuumoku

1. Cleared off shoe closet

2. Got the hinamatsuri dolls out

3. Planted hyacinth bulbs, which finished blooming a while back, in the garden

4. Pulled out and bagged the tomato plants

And do not, under any circumstances, focus on how hyacinths had been sitting on top of the shoe closet for about a month, going from fragrant to wilted to dried, or how there had still been tomato plants standing in the garden in late February. The point is not about how having dead tomato plants standing in my garden puts me in the same category as people who still have their Christmas tree out in April. The point is that these things all got done. In about two hours.

It's all about accomplishments, right?

Salty!

2011-02-25T23:53:00.005+09:00

Shoppai!

One thing we did in Guam that we could never do in Pumpkin City was go to the beach.

"Yaaaaaaaaaaay!"

"Wait for me!"

The Pumpkin Prince seemed entirely at ease in the water. I later caught him licking the seawater.

Sand in Guam is mostly eroded coral, hence its white color.

By the way, it's swimwear I'm wearing under my microfiber T-shirt. At least, that's what it said in the Land's End catalog.

Actually, we could go to the beach from Pumpkin City, but it would take a few hours just to get there.

And the sand would not be this white.

Landing in America

2011-02-21T17:53:00.000+09:00

Amerika jouriku

OK, not the mainland US, but Guam. But it's a US territory.

Come New Year holidays, the A-listers go to Hawaii. The B-listers go to Guam. So if the Pumpkin Clan heads for Guam for some fun in the sun in mid-February, what does that make us?

We went to the mall,

ate at the food court,

went swimming in the pool,

rented a car and drove around the island,

stopping at a store to buy juice.

Which is, when you think about it, is exactly what we do on weekends in Pumpkin City. We probably should have stayed at home :P

While driving around, we found this obelisk, which stood on a small bay.

Check out this inscription.

"Magellan landed here. Or it might have been on the other side of that river. Or closer to the elementary school up there, since the coastline looked a bit different in the 16th century. Anyway, it was near this place. And the island was never the same."

I have always maintained that a simple approximation is often more useful than a complicated accuracy.

Motomoto chigau.

2011-02-11T04:37:00.002+09:00

So I saw this group of a half dozen girls, maybe legal, maybe not, looking absolutely adorable in frilly pink bikinis of various shades and patterns. They were all slender and pretty, and the only male eyes not looking at them were gay.

I found myself envying them for their youth, and depressed at my bulging parts. Then I remembered that I was never the girl in the frilly pink bikini, and that I always had bulging parts, only slightly less so, and a lot less saggy. I was the girl in the wetsuit, and a black one at that. I was never the hot girl. I was the dumpy Asian girl with thick glasses. I am now the dumpy woman with glasses (though no longer thick, since I can afford high end, thinner lenses, and cute frames). So if I envy them, it would be for their beauty, which comes partly from their youth, but also from who they are to begin with.

I wonder, though, what it must be like for the ex-hot girls. I mean, I am sure they are still hot, but it would probably be in a different way. Do they miss youth more than I do, because there is more to miss?

My friend came over to play.

2011-01-23T22:31:00.003+09:00

Tomodachi ga asobi ni kita.

The Pumpkin Princess's friend from day care came over for a playdate and brought the most adorable gift. She and her mom made these eggs. They're Jewelpets. The faces are painted, and the ears and hair are cut out of felt.

Could decorated eggs possibly be any cuter?

Eye of the beholder

2011-01-22T20:55:00.002+09:00

Miru hito shidai

Back in the late 80s/ early 90s, newspaper print patterns were the trend. Recreating English newspaper pages as a pattern was cool. There were newspaper print pattern pants, newspaper print pattern curtains, and, of course, newspaper print pattern wrapping paper. I had a friend who said "one of these days, I would love to get an armful of Baby's breath (another early 90s trend) wrapped in English newspaper. I would often start reading what was printed and find it riddled with grammatical errors at best. At worst, it would be jibberish. I once wrapped a gift to a friend in sheets torn out from Time magazine and taped a cheap silk flower I found lying around in the house on the ribbon (also found lying around in the house). My friend thought I was Martha Stewart. Or at least, she would have thought I was Martha Stewart if she'd known about Martha Stewart.

So I was amused to find this on marthastewart.com

Coolness is in the eye of the beholder.

Universal law of gravity

2011-01-19T21:47:00.003+09:00

Banyuu inryoku no housoku

My former boss left our workplace about seven or so years ago, but acted as an unpaid consultant type, doing stuff here and there for us. Then she decided she didn't want to do the consulting gig anymore. Which is her choice, really, but the downside of this is that much of the work she did has now become the job of yours truly. Kind of like a Newtonian physics type deal. Stuff always falls downward, including work.

One of the things she did was an hour-long class for undergrad students. When I found out I was supposed to do this class in her place, I asked her if I could see her Powerpoint slides. About a week and a half later, she sent me and my current boss a rather huffy e-mail telling all of us off. Which, well, I can't really do anything about, but I really wish I could have seen those slides, because I have had to spend pretty much every spare moment I have had for the past two weeks preparing for this class from scratch.

So anyway, I'm fine, just very very busy. And I've shown some people what work I have so far, and I've been told it is probably more helpful and practical, if not quite as interesting, as the lecture my old boss gave.

And to my friends who teach formal classes on a regular basis, I have always thought you were cool, but now I think you are awesome.

Lacks basic knowledge

2010-12-30T23:33:00.002+09:00

Kiso chishiki ga nai

Santa Claus came to the Pumpkin Palace and Christmas morning, the Pumpkin Prince and Princess found gifts under the tree. The Princess found a gift that the Pumpkin Mommy had refused to buy for her on her birthday two weeks ago, a battery powered monstrosity of pink plastic that flashes and sparkles and plays "Go Tell Aunt Rhodie". If that's not proof positive there is a Santa Claus, the Pumpkin Princess does not know what would possibly make your sorry soul believe.

"Aren't you glad Santa bought that for you?" the Pumpkin Daddy said to a beaming Pumpkin Princess as she made the environmentally unfriendly contraption play "Lightly Row".

"Santa doesn't buy toys, the elves make them in Santa's Workshop," I cut in.

"Santa has elves?"

"Santa has elves. They work for him, make the toys, package and wrap them, and put them in the proper sacks according to global region."

"Wow." The Pumpkin Daddy was impressed. "I wish I had elves."

And this was where the Pumpkin Prince wrestled the sparkly, shiny, tinkly toxic landfill fodder from his older sister, and WWIII broke out in the Pumpkin Palace living room, even without intervention from Muslim Fundamentalist Extremists or quasi-communist powers going through the third generation of their regime. This did not surprise me, nor did the fact that the Pumpkin Daddy did not know Santa had elves. Just another morning at the Pumpkin Palace.

Starting next time...

2010-12-19T21:45:00.004+09:00

Tsugi kara ha...

The next time you meet up with a friend you haven't seen in a quarter of a century,

1) Take more than one picture with her
2) Take pictures in a well lit place
3) Give the camera to the person who has been taking the most pictures.

Oh well. We'll always have ~~Paris~~ Wicked.

Long story...

2010-12-12T22:35:00.003+09:00

Hanaseba nagai

The Pumpkin Daddy has decided he wants to take piano lessons. He was in band in high school, but he has never had proper music lessons. I admire his "never too late to start" attitude, and the seriousness with which he tackles the variation of the Mozart piece he has been assigned.

(To my non-classical music buff friends: I am trying to be clever. He's playing "Twinkle Twinkle Little Star".)

Behind him, the Pumpkin Princess is swiffing in her Cinderella dress. Long story.

The Pumpkin Prince is also swiffing. The skirt is his sister's. Even longer story.

I want to go too!

2010-12-12T19:12:00.003+09:00

Boku mo ikitai!

The Pumpkin Daddy and Pumpkin Princess started taking piano lessons last month.

The new piano...OK, not a real piano, but an electronic piano so that 1) they can practice late at night with headphones 2) the floor won't cave in was delivered last weekend. They practice every day....OK, almost every day.

Piano lessons are at the teacher's studio three times a month, which is about a five-minute walk from our house. The Pumpkin Princess and Pumpkin Daddy have their lessons back to back, which means they walk there together and wait through each other's lessons. Pumpkin Daddy likes to take my iPad and the Pumpkin Princess takes along her sparkly colored pens and her drawing pad. They leave with excitement and anticipation in their hearts. For now, anyway. Let me get back to you in a few months.

And then there are some who are left behind against their will.

You won't find out until you try.

2010-12-05T07:42:00.002+09:00

Yatte minai to wakaranai.

Some things you just don't find out until you try them.

A length of animal print fabric tied around the waist as part of a dance costume is a good idea on a post-pubertal female.

A group of 5 year-old boys, not so much. By the second half of the performance, some of the youngsters looked like they were going to trip.

Maybe something involving elastic would have been a better idea.

As always, the Pumpkin Daycare Christmas show is five star entertainment. It always keeps evolving.

Getting ahead of yourself

2010-11-23T22:41:00.004+09:00

Sakibashiri

The Pumpkin Daddy decided this past Sunday was a good day to put lights on the tree in our front yard and bring out the Christmas tree. Most years, I insist upon waiting until at least American Thanksgiving day (fourth Thursday of November), but our family schedule was such that it would be either this past weekend or the first Sunday of Decemmber, and who knows what that would bring?

A picture of the Pumpkin Princess taking a picture of the Pumpkin Daddy stringing up the lights

Finished product

Our Christmas Tree for this year. We need a new tree skirt.

You're going to get in trouble

2010-11-22T23:01:00.002+09:00

Okorareruyo

Last night, Prince William's engagement was on the news. The point they seemed to be trying to make was that Wills and Kate are not getting the attention that Charles and Diana got from Britain three decades ago. Which, well, OK, the world is a different place than it was 30 years ago.

Except, one of the ways they made their "point" was by going to Buckingham Palace and showing the crowds around the palace and showing that it was mainly tourists from other countries adding to the head count. They did this by sticking a microphone in front of said tourists and asking "are you English?" and showing lots of people saying "no".

Apparently, most of the Japanese population does not understand that there is a difference between "English" and "British", and that not understanding this difference causes as much, or perhaps more, annoyance as when the average Japanese gets mistaken for a Chinese.

Basic knowledge

2010-11-01T22:39:00.002+09:00

Kiso chishiki

As you know, I am 100% Japanese but spent my formative years in the American Midwest. I have a working knowledge of American culture, at least up until the mid-80's, and what's fit for a 14 year-old, anyway. I know all the songs in "Sound of Music" and "My Fair Lady", and I have seen all the Star Wars movies.

And I've seen "Wizard of Oz". I don't know how many times I have seen it, but I know it wasn't once. Or twice. Or three times.

At work today, I was trying to explain the plot of "Wicked" to my co-workers.

"The basic premise is that the Wicked Witch of the West and the Good Witch of the North are college roommates. Are you familiar with Wizard of Oz?"

"Yes, I've read the book."

(pause)

"Have you seen the movie?"

"No."

Oh.

Well, I guess the average American doesn't know about Chuushingura or Byakkotai, so it all averages out, more or less.

Why here?

2010-10-24T22:59:00.002+09:00

Naze koko de?

I could have sworn you were napping in another room. What are you doing here in the kitchen?

Twice as good

2010-10-15T23:08:00.002+09:00

Nibai ii!

The other day, the Pumpkin Daycare had its annual field day.

There are two Chinese families in the Pumpkin Princess's class (a pair of twin girls and a boy). I was talking to the boy's mom, and the twins' mom showed up and they started chattering away in Mandarin Chinese. I picked up exactly two words, "Nihao" (hello) and "arzi" (son).

So since the average Japanese person would probably only have picked up "Nihao," it's safe to say that my Mandarin Chinese is twice as good as most people, right?

Which is it?

2010-10-08T23:34:00.003+09:00

Docchi nano?

Dear Pumpkin City,

I can understand that you want to screen for developmental delay. Early intervention is important.

I also understand that child development has a very large individual variation.

But please do not tell me the Pumpkin Prince needs a detailed evaluation of his development because he speaks 5 words at 18 months instead of your very strict cutoff of 6 words, and then give me a brochure about how child development has a very large individual variation.

And please don't tell me it's for my own peace of mind. I think the Pumpkin Prince is developing just fine. You're the one who is all worked up over his lack of a single word and asking me to take the Pumpkin Prince to the pediatrician where the pediatrician and I will waste each other's time as he will judge the Pumpkin Prince to be healthy, happy, and developing normally, and give me his standard issue talk on individual variation.

(Disclaimer: I am not a developmental pediatrician, nor do I play one on TV, but, well, come on, this one is plain old fashioned common sense.)

This is serious.

2010-10-04T22:53:00.002+09:00

Yabaine.

So there's this shopping mall. And it has a food court. This is a picture of the food court at around three in the afternoon.

Oh dear.

I give this place six months, a year tops.

Where'd they go?

2010-09-28T22:31:00.003+09:00

Doko itta no?

My darling, my sunshine, love of my life, reason for living;

1. That's not your chair. That's your sister's.

2. That's not your fork. That's your sister's, too.

3. I peeled two good sized Fuji pears for the four of us, not just you. Where have they gone?

Fall down seven times, get up eight

2010-09-22T23:18:00.004+09:00

Nana korobi Ya oki

This phrase isn't so much a phrase as a saying. When you stop and think, if you fall down seven times, you only have to get up seven times (or six if you choose to give up after the final fall). I guess they say "get up eight" because you are not only supposed to persevere, you are supposed to thrive. Or something.

Daruma dolls are painted papier mache. They are weighted on the bottom so they always get up (i.e. never give up) and have blank eyes. You paint one eye while making a wish or setting a goal, and fill in the other eye when your wish comes true or achieve your goal.

And then there is this.

The contents of this plastic Hello Kitty monstrosity are what the Pumpkin Princess decided was going to be her lunch for Monday. I wish I had pictures of the lunch, but this was when she went on a little trip (first train ride for her cousin) while I stayed at home. It apparently contained a sausage with a picture of Hello Kitty, a slice of kamaboko with a picture of Hello Kitty, ground chicken seasoned with ginger and scrambled egg arranged over a layer of rice. It was way too much food for a 4 year-old, and she only ate about a third of it. It's pretty obvious she was attracted to the container and not the food. To her credit, she ate the remainder for dinner that lunch and breakfast the next morning. I have washed out the container and she'll probably use it to store all the capsule toys she makes the Pumpkin Daddy buy every time they go to the mall.

(ETA: found online a picture of what was inside the box)

I look cool from both sides.

2010-09-20T08:52:00.003+09:00

Docchi kara mite mo kakkoii!

When I saw a Krispy Kreme when I was in Yokohama for work stuff, I had to stop by, even though there was a long line that I had to stand in for a good 15 minutes.

My brother and his family were in town, so I had to make sure there were enough to go around. I got a dozen plain glazed donuts and some more with nuts and sprinkles (gotta have rainbow colored sprinkles because to anyone under the age of seven, a donut isn't a donut without sprinkles that get their color from carcinogens).

To my American friends, I probably look like a loser for standing in line for 15 minutes to buy donuts from a chain store. But keep in mind, Krispy Kreme donuts only got to Japan a few years ago, and they are to be found only in places like Tokyo and Yokohama. I think the nearest one from us is about 50 miles away and lacks parking space. Their inavailability makes them trendy and desirable. Kind of like Starbucks when they first got here about 15 years ago. So to my family (especially my s-i-l, judging from her response), I am a cool person who brought home the awesome donuts they saw in the Japanese analog of InStyle or Cosmopolitan last month.

But wait! We had the donuts with chilled green tea! I understand chilled green tea is edgy and fashionable and interesting in the Americas and Europe these days. I'm cool either way you look at it!

You still don't get it?

2010-09-16T23:34:00.003+09:00

Mada wakaranai no?

So I had a bunch of undergrad kids and the topic of religion came up (don't ask) and I asked if there were any Mormons in the group (which is probably illegal in several states in the US, the asking, not the Mormonism, that is, but I'm in Japan so there) and they said no, and so I said know how to make sure? They all looked at me blankly, so I told them to follow me, and marched the group to the cafe on the premises and told them to order whatever they liked, and they all ordered coffee (iced lattes and a shot of espresso, and I said that it has been proven there are no practicing Mormons in the group, and I got a bunch of blank looks.

So when I realized they still didn't get it, I explained (in a careful manner as to not be an obnoxious person telling someone what they already know) that Mormons will not drink coffee or anything with caffeine, or, for that matter, nicotine and alcohol, and one of them said "what, no Regain?" (no, not drug for alopecia but an energy drink available in Japan containing caffeine and nicotine, think Red Bull) and I replied "no Regain, at least not if you follow everything you're supposed to" and the kid was like "wow, how do they get anything done?"

I was amazed that none of the group (all enrolled in a school where admission is pretty darned competitive) knew Mormons won't drink coffee, but then again, I suppose the average American doesn't know there are about 60 days on the calendar Japanese people won't have weddings. Still, with all those cute blond guys pedaling bicycles all over town, you would think they would have had the chance to find out without me.

I'm first!

2010-09-16T23:29:00.002+09:00

Ichiban ni natta!

Apparently, if you Google "Japanese last weekend", a blog entry I made 2 years ago about a trip to Tokyo comes up first.

Is it you?

2010-09-12T23:21:00.002+09:00

Anata desuka?

I've got a hit from Johannesburg. I used to have this blogging friend who hailed from South Africa. She seemed to be in a difficult time in her life when she stopped blogging and pretty much dropped off the face of the planet as far as I know. I'm hoping the SA hit is her, and that she is all right enough to be checking obscure blogs such as this.

I'm not getting any tomatoes!

2010-09-12T22:54:00.004+09:00

Tomato ga zenzen torenai!

It's supposedly the hottest summer ever. I believe it.

Last year, I had so many tomatoes from the garden, I didn't know what to do. This year, the tomatoes somehow get eaten by some insect or other before they ripen. It wasn't so bad until August, but I haven't had a single tomato from the garden in over 3 weeks. Supermarket produce is a lot more expensive than it is most years, too. It's nice to know that the pros have it hard and that it's no fault of mine..

That's a photo from last year, a memory of better days...

You don't have to do that anymore!

2010-09-05T22:52:00.004+09:00

Mou sou iu koto ha shinakute ii n dayo!

So Cinderella went to the royal ball in the enchanted dress. The Prince took one look at the beautiful Cinderella and would dance with no other the rest of the evening.

He loved her Swiffer too much to let it go.

Please don't do that anymore!

2010-09-02T12:07:00.003+09:00

Mou shinai de ne!

The previously described kid in the Pumpkin Day Care with anime red hair is showing a good inch or two of dark roots. I'm hoping his mom won't do that to his hair again, ever.

I love checking the "feedjit" bar. I can tell who some of the visitors are, but others I have no clue, so they must have found me without me telling them about this blog myself. And what is interesting is that some of these visitors I don't know apparently come back every so often to check on me. Which is cool, but I don't know who they are and what they are looking for.

So if I don't know your name, and you are checking this blog, and if you feel like it, please leave a comment and tell me what you were looking for when you got here and whether you found it. This is a blog about the Pumpkin Mommy and her brood, and the Japanese phrases only serve as a minor accessory to what I really want to share. If the phrases are important to lots of people, I might consider being more detailed about them, like how formal they are and whether you can use them on people other than immediate family and friends your own age.

What are they made of?

2010-08-31T22:35:00.003+09:00

Nani de dekite iru no?

The Pumpkin Clan went to a very, very old fashioned cafe. It was so old fashioned, it didn't serve coffee!

Outside, there was a play area.

Choose your desired caliber, cut, dry, cut, hammer, and tie.

We offer a wide selection of heights as a service to our customers.

That's OK, I think I'll stick to these for now.

Of course, it was way too hot to stay very long (for the Pumpkin Parents, anyway).

Without a doubt!

2010-08-29T23:46:00.002+09:00

Machigai nai!

You know what I said about possibly being a geek? I take it back. I am a geek. I am watching my Big Bang Theory 2nd season DVDs in little detached installments. Today I watched 2 episodes while painting my toenails (bright red, of course!) In one, the geek squad was discussing the care and maintenance of Superman's suit, and how it would be cleaned, and how flying close enough to the sun ought to incinerate anything on it that was not Kryptonian in origin, except wouldn't Superman's sweat be Kryptonian in origin and therefore impervious to the heat of the sun, yadda yadda yadda, and I was thinking how I pretty much had the EXACT SAME CONVERSATION in high school except it was about a Japanese comic (Captain Tsubasa, if you must know).

And I wonder why I had trouble getting dates.

Well, then again, there was that whole "girls' school" thing.

Might be!

2010-08-25T23:03:00.004+09:00

Kamo shirenai!

You might be a geek if you are watching a "geek squad" scene in "The Big Bang Theory" and you don't find what is going on strange or funny as much as you would really like to join Leonard, Sheldon, Raj and Howard.

The other day, I logged on to Amazon Japan to buy a work-related publication. When I finalized the purchase, however, I had Alison Arngrim's "Confessions of a Prairie Bitch: How I Survived Nellie Oleson and Learned to Love Being Hated" and the 2nd season of "The Big Bang Theory" in my shopping basket.

Surely I am not the only person who does this, am I?

Let me try!

2010-08-22T22:51:00.004+09:00

Boku ni mo yarasete!

It was so hot today, the Pumpkin Daddy started washing the cars with the kids. The Pumpkin Prince wants to do everything his big sister does.

"Hey, that looks like fun! I want to try!"

"All right!"

"Gotta make sure I don't miss any spots on the Pumpkin Prius!"

"Water is so much fun!"

Wait a little longer.

2010-08-08T23:06:00.004+09:00

Mousukoshi matte.

My darling Pumpkin Prince,

I love you when you toddle to me giggling all the while. I love you when you eat 2 bananas and ask for another. I love you when you stand in front of your high chair and look at me as if to say "is it time for dinner yet?" I love you more than life itself.

And I promise to support any lifestyle choices you may make, as long as they do not harm anyone, including yourself.

But Pumpkin Prince, do we have to start with the whole alternative lifestyle thing so soon?

(No, I didn't choose the outfit, he did. I refused to dress him in the skirt once, but he cried until I did. The hat he found and put on by himself.)

That's (doing) a bit much!

2010-07-28T23:53:00.003+09:00

Yarisugi!

I probably shouldn't be criticizing someone else's parenting, but there is a boy in the Pumpkin Princess's class at day care with red hair. Not nice auburn hair, or carrot top red, or even strawberry blond. (BTW, the kid looks like a full-bloodded, run of the mill Japanese, or at the very least, 100% East Asian, so none of these colors would be natural.) No, I'm talking anime character bright red with a shade of pink. To get Asian hair that color, it has to be bleached before it gets dyed. To think that the kid's parents (or maybe only one parent was involved in the procedure, but I'm pretty sure it was a parent because no hairdresser in their right mind would take part in anything so dangerous) applied two different potentially hazardous chemical substances on a 4 year-old's scalp (or more importantly, so close to the eye area) is in itself cringe worthy, even if they hadn't picked anime character red as the final color.

And even though you managed to get the desired look without corneal damage, using hair dyes on very young children increases the risk of their developing a hair color allergy later in life. The worst case scenario would be, if the kid actually likes the look and decides to repeat it when he is old enough to decide for himself, he'll get contact dermatitis, or worse, an anaphylactic reaction every time he retouches his roots.

2010-07-27T22:36:00.003+09:00

Things I am thankful for

1. Knowledge about which local pediatric clinics have ample parking space, roomy waiting areas, and friendly, down-to-earth, and reasonably competent pediatricians

2. Standard issue health insurance that pays 70% of standard medical care

3. Registered domicile in a city that will pick up the remainder of the bill for kids under the age of 12

4. That 2 and 3 apply for standard medications as well

5. Parents living about 3 blocks away who will look after a sick 16 month-old at a moment's notice

6. A workplace that thinks having me around most of the time is better than not having me around at all

Actually, although I am thankful I have all of these things, every working parent should have them too (OK, maybe not 5, but they ought to have access to someone who can fill in when day care won't).

Lucky!

2010-06-30T00:03:00.002+09:00

IInaa!

Let us review.

Meticulously detailed hair, accurately depicted facial contour and nose, carefully drawn glasses, shirt in a color he actually owns.

This, I understand, is a picture of me. But it could be any other mom. No trademark glasses, hair of generic length, shirt in a color I do not own.

And then there is this. This is also a picture of me.

I don't own a yellow shirt. And what is that circle around the single hair sticking straight up from my head? Is that my ponytail?

The Pumpkin Daddy pointed out that she got the part about one eye being larger than the other right.

May I buy some Plarail?

2010-06-22T22:52:00.002+09:00

Pura-reiru katte mo ii?

Tonight, the Pumpkin Daddy asked me if he could buy these for the Pumpkin Prince.

I told him if he really wanted them, I would get him some for his birthday.

"Him" meaning the Pumpkin Daddy, of course.

In other news, the Pumpkin Princess rolls a perfect pizza crust all by herself when given the proper amount of dough.

Completed pizza (pesto, baby tomatos, salami, onions, shimeji mushrooms, and, of course, cheese).

The Pumpkin Princess draws a picture of the Pumpkin Daddy for Father's Day. The Pumpkin Daddy asked her why he was wearing two pairs of glasses, and she replied that the blue circles were his nostrils. Those of you who know what the Pumpkin Daddy looks like will probably agree that it is an excellent likeness, especially considering it was drawn by a 4 1/2 year old.

The Pumpkin Prince walks. But he still has his baby fat, make no mistake about it. Look at that baby bottom!

How unusual!

2010-05-18T22:26:00.004+09:00

Mezurashii!

Wow, 2 posts in a single month!

My brother took us to a soba (buckwheat noodle) restaurant in Bandai.

Buckwheat will grow in places other crops will not. This is why good soba is often found in places where other culinary choices are limited. Pumpkin Prefecture has fairly good soba (and pasta in general). Central Shizuoka, where I lived for a year, does not. They had wonderful seafood (including but not limited to sushi and fresh prawn), but the soba left a bit to be desired. Actually, pretty much every kind of pasta in Shizuoka left quite a bit to be desired. The sushi lover in me misses Shizuoka. The pasta lover in me does not.

This was the dinner the grownups got (the youngsters got soba and the option of stealing things from their parents' plates). Clockwise from top right: assorted tempura, the tempura sauce, the soba sauce (with scallions), pickles, an empty rice bowl with paddle, bamboo steamer, and a covered ramekin containing chawan-mushi (savory steamed custard containing seafood and vegetables).

This is what was in the bamboo steamer: rice cooked in a soy based broth with assorted vegetables.

There was also this. The picture is quite blurry. There are thin cuts of fine meat (look at that marbling!), a slice of scallion, and shimeji mushrooms cooking in a soy based sauce.

Oh yes, and there was soba.

After the meal, the Pumpkin Daddy was attacked by the youngsters.

Of course, there is always the man who marches to a different drummer.

Tsuki ichi

2010-05-12T23:05:00.004+09:00

Once a month

Seems to be the frequency of my blogging these days...

Here in Japan, the days before and after the first weekend in April are known as Golden Week. There's a string of national holidays starting with Showa Day (April 29th, the previous Emperor's birthday) and ending with Children's Day (May 5th). If you work in manufacturing and the factory stops production (like the Pumpkin Daddy), or if you tack on a couple vacation days in between, you end up with a holiday of a week or more.

We went to visit my brother in Aizu. Which means we had to check out at least one Byakkotai (White Tiger Unit) related site. We picked Iimoriyama, the hill overlooking the city where the young men took their own lives.

The dads are holding their babies. The Pumpkin Princess is holding hands with her cousin, who is her Prince du jour.

(Short version of the story for people who are 1) not residents of Japan and therefore do not see the TV movies on the topic, aired every New Year's eve starring the cute teenage stars of the moment 2) too busy to check out the Wikipedia link above: Byakkotai, or the "White Tiger Corps" were a unit of young men, about 16 or 17 years old, who fought in the Japanese civil war in 1868. Part of the unit was isolated during battle. They were young and inexperienced and idealistic, and when they saw the town they were defending in flames, they assumed their castle had been taken and their lord killed. Their samurai education dictated that if their master died, they were obliged to join him. So they did.)

Iimoriyama was the typical tourist attraction with stores full of souvenir swords, commemorative T-shirts and junk food. Young women dressed in contemporary male attire gave guided tours. For 500 yen, you could use the escalator instead of climbing the hill the old fashioned way.

At the point where the city could be seen, there were monuments sent from Germany and Italy. Actually, they were replicas of the originals sent in the 1930s. The concept of monuments from Nazi Germany and Fascist Italy celebrating boy soldiers committing ritual suicide did not go over well with Douglas MacArthur, and he had them destroyed.

According to the plaque beside it, the original inscription read "from a German soldier to the young soldiers of Aizu". My extremely limited German tells me the current inscription does not.

This monument is a replica of the one from the city of Rome. The original was destroyed by the occupying forces shortly after WWII.

The Byakkotai is sad, but not particularly so. They were boys by modern standards, but by contemporary Japanese standards, if you'd had your Coming of Age ceremony, you were a man. These young men did what was expected of them, and in the eyes of their own society, they'd died the death of heroes. What I think they would find annoying was how their image was used to the advantage of the power of the moment. First their corpses were left rotting in the hills, their families not permitted to give them proper funerals because the new Meiji Restoration government (the forces they were fighting) found it necessary to make a show of what would happen to those who opposed the Emperor. Then, when Japan became more and more militaristic, they were depicted as the ideal warriors for their fierce loyalty to their master (keep in mind, this is essentially the same government that forbid their families to give them proper funerals). After that, Japan lost the war and the occupying American forces decided that glorification of ritual suicide was a bad idea and destroyed the monuments dedicated to them.

I think, though, the worst thing that has happened to them is the commercialism. I mean, Byakkotai butter cookies?

I kind of missed out on the cherry blossoms, so the trip north gave me a second chance.

Spring is here.

2010-04-25T22:09:00.005+09:00

Haru ga kita.

In Japan, the school year begins in April. The Pumpkin Prince and Princess have new teachers and new classmates at day care. And I have new co-workers. I have gained more co-workers than I have lost. One of my biggest gains is a senior level type back from maternity and child care leave. There's more work, but since there's more workers, I'm not feeling it. Yet.

A couple weeks ago, we went to Yokohama. I had work stuff to do, and the Pumpkin Princess and Daddy went to the Anpanman Museum. I'd always thought Anpanman was less commercial than Disney (they certainly are less strict about copyright) but this museum proves me wrong.

Please note very cute but extremely inferior quality headband on the Pumpkin Princess's head (1500 yen= $16 or thereabouts) and also very cute helium balloon (1000 yen=$11 or thereabouts).

And this adorable box of cute breads...did not taste as good as those from the bakery 3 minutes away from hour house, and cost three times as much.

One evening about a week later, we saw this.

Those of us in, say, the American Midwest will probably shrug and wonder why I am making a fuss. However, in Pumpkin City, snow is in and of itself a very big deal. Snow in mid-April has not happened in 14 years.

Fortunately for almost everyone, including the Pumpkin Daddy, who changed his winter tires a couple weeks prior, but not the Pumpkin Princes, who was excited about getting to build the first snowman of this year, it started raining about an hour after the photo was taken, and the snow was completely gone by morning.

I'm home!

2010-03-13T23:50:00.002+09:00

Tadaima!

OK, back from Vienna...much accomplished in terms of both work and play, thanks in no small part to the excellent company (boss and two junior co-workers).

This is the seat belt on an Austrian Air economy class seat. I would have thought it was Wonder Woman if 1) I were flying on an American airline 2) the wings were not there.

Johann Strauss. In gold.

St. Stephan's Cathedral was being restored. How cool are those drapes that accurately show what they are covering?

We rode the elevator to the belfry and saw this.

"Ich fergebe Dir" is painted on a roof. This would translate into "I forgive thee" were it not grammatically incorrect. Not that I would have known if the sign hadn't told me...Anne?

No Starbucks for us, not that I'd complain.

Sorry, no work pictures. I don't write about the technical aspects of work here, unless I need to do so when one of my co-workers is living out an episode of General Hospital.

While I was away, the Pumpkin Prince and Princess stayed with my parents during the workweek, and the Pumpkin Daddy took them to his mom's house on Friday evening. While there, the Pumpkin Prince chose that time to develop a very high fever. This involved a febrile seizure and an emergency trip to the local duty pediatrician (I am slightly disturbed that these did not happen in that order, but at this point, only slightly, since he is obviously fine now). What has happened with the Pumpkin Prince (again, he's fine now, I'm talking about what he and my parents and the Pumpkin Daddy went through while I was gone) makes it hard for me to go on another trip like this, but I do hope that other people at work will be able to, because there is so much to be gained.

It's OK!

2010-02-17T02:03:00.002+09:00

Daijoubu!

I've pretty much been absent from my online world since around Christmas. I took advantage of a sleepless night to do taxes and make a very quick entry.

Nothing bad has happened, on the contrary, everything is fine, if hectic. The Pumpkin Prince and Princess have so far managed to avoid full-force infections of the bug du jour after the Pumpkin Princess's swine flu episode. I am constantly impressed and grateful at how healthy they both are. New Year's had my brother and his family over, a fun time was had by the Pumpkin Princess and her cousin, but I think the Pumpkin Granny found it rather stressful.

Work is busier than ever, but there is not that much I can do about it except to pace myself to produce as much as possible, And when I say this, I mean total work output for my entire career, not the short term. For example, sometimes maximizing productivity involves putting off work that should be done but does not have to be done right now, in favor of dinner and bedtime at a reasonable hour, and opting not to put in extra hours and spending time with the Pumpkin Daddy and Prince and Princess instead.

It saddens me that there are people who have not figured out how to pace themselves, and they become burned out and depressed, and end up staying away from work for extended periods. To a certain extent, it also angers me, because when they are not at work, their work becomes my work.

And I should probably eat my own words, because in just a couple more weeks, I'm headed for my first work related overseas trip since I gave birth to the Pumpkin Princess. To Austria, no less. I've been listening to German language instruction CDs during my commute, but I expect most of the people I encounter will have some command of English.

There's only one thing you can do.

2009-12-16T22:19:00.003+09:00

Dekiru koto ha hitotsu shika nai.

Picture a group of 30 or so boys, five or six years old, on the stage of the local civic hall. The hall is packed, with parents elbowing each other for prime video recording positions. The boys are wearing white shirts, black pants, and black neckties. They are also wearing sequined gloves on only one hand, and black fedoras on which fake jheri curls have been attached. They dance enthusiastically and skillfully to a medley of Michael Jackson music.

There is a time for everything. There is a time for pondering and discussing the irony in 30 adorable 5 and 6 year olds dancing to "Billie Jean" and "Human Nature" and "PYT." There is a time for pondering and discussing what Michael Jackson would have felt if he saw the adorable boys shaking their arms to "Thriller". There is a time to remember when you pinned the photo cards of beautiful children your internet friends had sent you on your bulletin board, and called it your Michael Jackson collection.

However, this would not be the time.

The only thing you can do when faced with a stageful of day care pumpkins trying to Moonwalk is cheer and applaud wildly.

One after another

2009-12-01T22:48:00.003+09:00

Tsugi kara tsugi he

This time, when my 20something co-worker came into work with her pink and blue patterned hose, I recognized them as such, and felt all up-to-date and informed.

My job for the morning was to teach a group of four university undergrads. One of them stumbled on an answer when I was quizzing him. The correct answer was "ADC" but he stammered "A...C...D...um, C..."

I couldn't resist. "No, not AC/ DC. In this particular instance, Heavy Metal would be a bad idea."

I got four blank looks.

"Have any of you heard of AC/ DC? The band?"

Again, four blank looks.

"Do any of you know what Heavy Metal music is?"

Yet another quartet of blank looks.

That's it, I'm going to wear granny shoes to work every day from now on.

That or feathered bangs, 80's style.