Household

The Year of the Rabbit hops on stage.

Fifteen years ago today, Tod started a new job with Swiss Bank Corporation in Chicago. The bank has undergone almost a half dozen mergers, acquisitions and name changes, but Tod is still with them. His role has seen a lot of changes, too, as he's progressed from Unix sysadmin to Unix engineer.

Thanks to that chance interview in 1995, our lives are very different than they might have been. I was going to list some of the opportunities and experiences his job has created for us, but there are too many. Pretty much everything we are and do now is due in some part to Tod's long service at UBS.

So congratulations and thank you, darling, for sticking with this gainful employment thing for so long. I am ever grateful and very proud of you.

For the past nine years I've crafted a Christmas tree out of found objects, bits and pieces, useless odds and ends and occasionally a purchased item or two. This year, we had a box of books that we'd been trying to give away since the summer. A dozen hardcover castoffs became the foundation of the Christmas tree.

I am especially pleased with the way this tree turned out. But it was a 4-step process that took most of an afternoon, so I couldn't do the complete construction on Christmas Day in my usual tradition. Here's how it worked, in case you want to try one yourself.

Step 1: Drill This caused a bit of controversy in the household. Tod didn't want to hurt the books. I wanted to spike them so they wouldn't collapse. He went to work without a better suggestion and so I drilled the books by opening each book to its center spread, laying it page-side down and using a hand drill through the middle of the spine.

Mix and match painted covers

Step 2: Paint I silvered the edges of the pages with spray paint to make them consistent. The titles ranged from Great Grillin' to a 1963 children's edition of the Canterbury Tales and the covers were a range of tacky and plain so I decided to paint them with a mix of green acrylic paints. Because I like the artwork on the Canterbury Tales, I left that one unpainted and dry brushed any of the beige books to coordinate, while giving good coverage to the blue, black and red tomes.

Spools of thread between books make space for lights

Step 3: Assemble This was a little bit harder than I expected. It took several attempts to get the spacing and shape right so I was sliding books on and off my dowel rod multiple times. The dowel I used was thin and flexible, so the tree leans a bit. I slipped a small spool of brown thread on the dowel after each group of three books. This enforced a few inverted Vs big enough for the lights.

Just like a real tree, I need to rearrange the lights - there are some dark patches!

Step 4: Light I topped the dowel with a cut-and-glued star made from a manila envelope, and tucked a string of colored bulbs in the spaces between books. This makes the tree glow gently in the dark.

Packing a disaster emergency kit is a little bit like packing for a camping trip you hope you never have to take.

Though we've had supplies on hand, I've procrastinated making a proper kit for eleven years because it forces me to acknowledge that I might actually need it. But after three big quakes on nearby faults in the last week, I put all of the emergency supplies into one small "go bag" yesterday.

Here's what is inside:

• Shelter: two blue tarps/space blankets/plastic raincoats
• Tools: twine/work gloves/penknife/flashlight/batteries/clips/safety pins/sewing kit/duct tape/matches
• First aid: antiseptic wash/bandages/analgesics/ointments/thermometer/surgical gloves
• Food: energy bars/instant coffee/mugs/cutlery/washing up things
• Clothes: socks/underwear/t-shirt/pants/hat/furoshiki
• Toiletries: towels/soap/toothbrushes/toilet paper/deodorant/tampons/hairbands/glasses
• Papers: notebook/family contact details/pencil/marker/labels/copies of our identity documents/cash/photo of us

The kit does not include water, which is in a separate bag. Tod suggested adding vodka and cigarettes for barter or medicine. We have a list of "other things to grab if there is time" that includes the tent and sleeping bag, coats, hula hoops, zous and so on. But if all we manage is this one bag which now lives at the door, we are stocked for basic survival.

I wonder if people escaped with their emergency supplies during the Kobe or Niigata quakes? Where they accessible? Useful? I hope I never have to know from personal experience but I feel relieved that I have a bag ready, just in case.

The most difficult part of ruthless kipple pitching is deciding what to do with my creative output. I have stacks of drawings and suchlike stretching back over a decade. Part of me says "This is your precious personal history - you can't just throw it out." Another part of me says "Not all of this history is worth recording, so you should edit it down to a handful." The part holding the trash bag says "Argh, who cares? Just let it go. Remember it fondly later, if you can."

I want your advice. If these were your things, what would you do?

Situation
Sketchbooks - there are some drawings in them that are reasonably good, or at least remind me of what I was looking at or doing at the time. Lots of ideas for bigger projects end up in these books, too. But at least half of my average sketchbook is crap - warmup drawings, bored sketches done while waiting, testing out new materials, trying to improve a bad mood through art therapy. These pages have little to offer me now.

Solutions?
a) Keep all the sketchbooks as is - the context of the pages is important even when the drawings are not.
b) Slice out the interesting pages and file them in a new place; toss the remainder.
c) Pitch them all - you are not a real artist and this output isn't valuable to you or anyone else.

Situation
8mm films - I made these in a film class in 1996. I liked them then and the class informs my editing to this day, but haven't seen the films in a long time as I have no projector.

Solutions?
a) Keep them because you made them and the originals show your tape edits and lots of hidden detail.
b) Keep them for raw material - turn them into jewelry or another project.
c) Digitize them somehow, get them online, then toss the original films.
d) Pitch them all - they are uninteresting student films.

Situation
Print blocks & proof prints - I have several dozen of my old lino print blocks. They could be used again someday. Some of them are cute or clever; some not so great. Others were part of a show I did a long time ago. I also have proof prints (& some final prints) of them that remind me of my slow progress as a print-maker.

Solutions?
a) Box them all up and store them somewhere in case you want to print them again.
b) Test print all the blocks. Keep the decent ones; toss the rest along with the old proofs & prints
c) Pitch them all - they are just collecting dust and taking up space.

Situation
Travel journals & mementos - On our first long visit to Japan then again in Singapore, I kept visual diaries of our experiences. There are other journey-specific sketchbooks, the most recent being from Adelaide last summer. In addition, I have a few purchased or found mementos that I hang on to as travel souvenirs.

Solutions?
a) Keep the journals and the mementos because they bring refresh memories of your trips.
b) Release the mementos but keep the drawings and journals.
c) Pitch them all - keeping them is like showing your friends a vacation slideshow - boring.

I want to hear your suggestions and ideas. Do any of my solutions seem right? What would you do?

I'm going to blame summer lethargy, but it's probably more likely that a mild case of depression allowed me to let my room overflow with piles of mess. This was my space on July 10th, before I started tidying:

Piles of fabric & mending, leftovers from projects finished months ago, & odd piles of randomness.

And with a few days of concerted reorganizing with many garbage bags of stuff tossed, things set aside for friends and a suitcase full of flea marketable items, here it is this afternoon:

Clear expanses of usable surfaces and seating for three. Anyone want to come play?

But please don't look in the pantry or the book closet or the hall where I have things stashed for friends to take away. Those spaces will be mercilessly attacked without delay. I will be making a few trips over to Shimbashi with promised household items for Amanda and Kevin and I've already booked a flea market space on August 30th. So all the kipple will soon be gone for good.

If any local readers want a pair of skis and boots, a Coopers beer brewing kit, a VCR, books, CDs, or any sort of miscellany they've seen in my place, give a shout before August 30th. Or come out to the flea market and get all my exciting things for "one coin" prices.

I believe that my gear dislikes the summer. The washing machine overheats every time I use the dry cycle (and has been almost unusable since it was recently serviced); my cell phone's battery mysteriously drains even when it is sitting on its charger; and now my G5 has developed a case of heat death notable for its red LED and screaming fans.

I can't blame them. I don't like the heat, either. Maybe my toys and tools need a treat. What's the electronic equivalent of ice cream?

I enjoy discovering clues to events I missed and then piecing together a scenario of what happened.

It drives Tod crazy because usually the clues involve his late-night actions and I inquire about them when he isn't expecting it. For example, a broken teacup in the trash and a tube of antibiotic cream in the bathroom means I'd better ask if he's ok.

Every now and again, I stumble across a scene that is more mysterious than others. This morning it was this:

These are the pants Tod wore yesterday. They are draped over the counter in the entryway. His underwear and socks are bundled up inside. His shirt is not present. Normally he drops his cast off clothing in the bedroom or sometimes in the bathroom.

So this scene made me scratch my head a bit. Why did he put his pants in the genkan? Was he strip-teasing for someone at the door? Did he go out, get wet in the rain and take off his soaking things when he returned?

I am going to wager a guess that he was undressing late last night after I was asleep and decided to light some incense (in the basket behind the pants). Still wearing his shirt, he carried his pants with him, lit the incense and came to bed, leaving his pants behind. This theory is backed by the stub of an incense stick in the holder.

Does anyone else do this when they see items in their world moved, rearranged or otherwise requiring a story to make sense? Maybe I read too many Sherlock Holmes stories as a kid.

• Enjoy the fireflies (hotaru spots)
• Hike a mountain
• Picnic at the beach
• Sell stuff at a flea market
• Sew hooping gear for Etsy
• Plan autumn travel
• Visit Matsudai during the art triennial
• Attend local festivals
• View fireworks in a crowd
• Take in a baseball game
• Pick fruit
• Spend a weekend in Tottori
• Freeze ice cream
• Swim and slide at a water park
• Grow an herb garden
• Eat al fresco
• Hang out at a rooftop beer garden
• Climb trees in Minami-Izu
• Camp
• Fly kites
• Go ice skating
• Put together ephemeral nature art
• Complete a stamp rally
• Dance at an outdoor music festival
• Eat shaved ice

BANG! The door bounced in my hand as it hit the security bar. Oops.

I called to Tod through the crack in the door to come rescue me, but he didn't answer. It was almost midnight and I was arriving home late after helping Tracey with wedding invitations. Tod had spent the day at a tech conference and banquet. He must have gotten home before me, flipped the bar shut from habit, and already gone to bed.

He was so dead to the world that he didn't hear me shout, knock, or ring the doorbell half a dozen times. He didn't hear the home phone ring (I called three times) or his cell phone (twice). Now I was worried that he wasn't just sleeping, but was knocked unconscious and bleeding. I had to get in on my own.

I examined the security bar and figured out how to take it apart, but I needed tweezers and I didn't have any on my side of the door. What tools did I have at hand? Maybe I could do something with a credit card. That always works in the movies, right?

It works in real life, too. It was shockingly easy to set the credit card against the bar, close the door, and then open the door while pushing the plastic. I was inside in a flash.

I found Tod in the bed, completely insensate from too much sake with the geeks. He was breathing and there was no visible blood so I left him there while I calmed down from my adventure and got ready for bed. Thirty six hours later, I'm not calm yet but I am sure I'll be laughing about this someday soon.

The cedar and cypress trees which cover about 15% of Japan have started pollinating and 20 million people - 1/5 of the population - are sneezing, sniffling, and scratching their eyes. Me included. Pollen allergies run you down and we'll be feeling rotten until April. That is a long time to suffer, so most everyone makes an attempt to reduce their symptoms. There are a bevy of pills to pop but if you aren't so keen on medication, choices involve a little more common sense but less convenience.

Allergy load

My allergist explained to me that everyone has an allergy load that their body can handle. If you go over the threshold, you start to have symptoms. So if you have sensitivities or allergies to things you can control, try to reduce your exposure during hayfever season. For example, I am allergic to oranges. Normally, I can have a small glass of orange juice in the morning and not feel any effect. But during spring when my system is already over its allergy threshold from pollen, orange juice gives me a nasty headache.

Filter the air

In Japan kafunsho season is also mask season. Wearing a surgical style mask has several benefits: it filters the air, hides your runny nose, and prevents the spread of other germs (who wants a cold on top of hayfever?). Masks look dorky and can be uncomfortable to wear, but they do work.

"I don't care how stupid it looks, wear a mask," MJ Daniels-Sueyasu recommends. " The tricky thing is finding one to fit. I saw this guy on the train once and he had the most awesome mask ever; it was camo material and was flush against his face." The variety of masks sold is amazing. This page lists 198 kinds that are specifically for pollen. And those are just the drug store selection. There are fashionable ones, too.

Glasses can help deflect the pollen, so trade your contacts for frames in the spring. If you don't need vision correction, try sunglasses outdoors.

In your house, a HEPA air filter is said to be beneficial, especially in the bedroom where you spend so many hours resting your battle weary body.

Stay clean

The air isn't the only thing you should try to clean. Spring cleaning is takes on a new meaning when you are trying to get rid of pollen in the house. Dust and vacuum daily if you can. Wash your curtains. Change your linens frequently and dry them indoors, rather than outdoors where they will collect pollen. I love sun-dried sheets and towels, so this recommendation upsets my housekeeping. If you sleep on futons, slip them into tightly woven bags before airing them.

Pollen settles in your hair so daily shampooing will help. YS Park makes a shampoo called Pollin that is supposed to help reduce pollen. Don't know if it works, but it does smell nice. If you follow the Japanese custom of bathing at night, you'll reduce the pollen you carry to bed. This could help you have a less sniffly morning.

Tod swears by jala neti, the Indian practice of rinsing the sinuses with warm saline solution, to help clean out the nose and "reset" it for a new day of pollen battle. He does it every day and rarely ever suffers from colds or hayfever. I am not so diligent, but it is refreshing to be able to breathe freely after a neti session.

Alternative treatments

If you plan ahead, you can try a regimen of local honey or bee pollen to strengthen your system against hayfever. Nettle, a mild anti-histamine, is said to be very effective in relieving symptoms. Sales of Chinese blackberry tea rise during kafuhsho season.

The Times Online suggests coating the inside of your nose with Vaseline to prevent the pollen from sticking to your nose.

If you wander though any Japanese housecleaning section at this time of year, you'll see all sorts of pollen cut sprays - you apply them before going outside to help keep pollen from sticking to your clothes. Or you can shell out a lot of cash and wear specially woven fabrics that repel pollen. I don't know if either of these work, but the manufacturers want you to think so.

Acupuncture and shiatsu can help you feel better, though they don't treat the problem directly.

What are your favorite hayfever remedies?

This year's tree was made of ten meters of lingerie nylon, a string of LED lights, and some foil streamers from the 100 yen store.

We had a lovely Christmas dinner and opened many presents. I have a lot of thank you cards to write!

There was plenty of dough so I made two houses. Here is the one that Tod & I decorated on the day I baked:

We had some friends over to decorate the other house last night. It is interesting that the guys built mainly outboard accessories (a car, traffic light, dog poop, tv antenna, crucified santa) while the girls embellished the house itself. The mayhem and results are over on Flickr.

Everything we accumulated over the first thirty years of our lives has been reduced to 3 small boxes containing photos, a few books, two childhood toys, my wedding dress, some jewelry, artworks, and writings. All of the furniture and other household goods we stored when we left America have been given away. Soon these boxes will join us in Tokyo with all of our current possessions. One integrated household is on the horizon.

The "move" from storage went smoother than expected, because the moving guys (one of whom had moved us 9 years ago) saved us the hassle of taking the things to Goodwill ourselves. They have their own donation system and were happy to keep the things we didn't want. So I stood in the truck and pointed at furniture. King sized box spring and mattress - you can have it. Desk, bar stools, dining table, chairs, cabinet, armchair, ottoman, bookshelves, shopvac - take them. Most of the big things didn't even have to come off the truck.

We managed to sort through the dozen or so boxes pretty quickly and packed our photos and bits up into new boxes for shipping. Everything we didn't want, we took to Goodwill with Tod's mom driving the truck that the self-storage place loaned us for the afternoon. Tod's cousin, Goldie, lent a hand, too, running errands and hauling trash to the dumpster under surveillance. People were so kind to us. Moving day would have been a lot more hassle and expense without their generosity.

But there was one heartbreaking moment. When I opened the trunk where I had packed the silver coffee service that had been given to me by my grandmother, it was gone. The trunk was empty except for some sewing things. I stood there in shock. Then I felt guilty for having lost the family heirlooms on my watch. I cried later. But really, what can you do? It is gone. An insurance claim or lawsuit might cover some of the monetary value, but that isn't its real value to me. My mother tells me to not to worry about it, "It's just things. Forget it, it doesn't matter." She is right, but I still feel guilty and sad.

There were a few other things missing - some semi-precious jewelry and the crystal ball Tod gave me as a wedding gift. At least I have the memories of them. And considering the size of our Tokyo apartment, it is a good thing we don't have a huge attachment to more things.

Goodbye, stuff. I hope you find happiness in new homes.

Zoupi says he is getting headspins, but that it is fun looking at the world upside down.

Zoupi ended up knee-deep in Tod's spilled coffee this morning so he had to have a bath - his very first full-body soaking. I've carefully squeezed him out and clipped him to the balcony railing in the sun. Zoupi is pretty small; I hope he dries thoroughly.

The studio bathroom before I attacked it with vinegar, salt and bleach. This is where Jim & Ben shower. It was filthy when they moved in & hadn't been used in years.

And here it is after 2 hours and a lot of elbow grease. Now I will shower here, too, when I need to hose off at the studio. It still needs work, but I got it under control.

This is the toilet after an hour's work. It doesn't look like much, but it is actually better than before and I'll use it without fear of contagion, It is going to take a lot more effort to get rid of the rust and scale in the bowl and the grime in the grout. At least it is well scrubbed and disinfected and though you can't see it in this photo, the rust in the upper basin has been totally scrubbed away.

Cleaning was gross and fun at the same time. I sort of felt like an episode of How Clean Is Your House. There will be more cleaning in the studio as things are moved out to make way for me and my stuff, so stay tuned.

Two loads of wash drying on the balcony

After experiencing the joys of the twin tub in Adelaide, I want more hands-on laundering options. I can't buy a new machine (no place to put it) but I did buy a drying rack, so that I can hang my clothes outside in the sun and wind.

Since this is a very common thing to do, even in our urban highrises, the weather forecast includes a drying forecast, too, in the form of a smiling t-shirt. Today's drying forecast isn't ideal, but tomorrow it will be worse so I wanted to get some of the washing done. Plus it is Monday, the traditional washing day.

I can't stand the heat anymore. I am barely able to think or to do anything when it is 34C/93F inside. So I have finally broken down and turned on the aircon. I know I will regret this in a number of ways but I will do so from the comfort of my 28/82F degree living room.

In addition, I am completely giving up on the dryer for the rest of the summer. I bought a laundry drying rack to set up on the balcony so I can let the sun do some useful work.

Perhaps this will balance out the electrical bill.

The spread in The Sunday Times Travel Magazine (click for a larger version)

Tod's photo of Chowpatty Beach was featured in this article on urban beaches in the June issue of Travel. Isn't it cool that an American photographer living in Japan can sell a photo taken in India to a magazine in the UK?

All hail Flickr and the Internet.

All my summer clothes

This morning I did a huge inventory of all my clothes by emptying onto the floor all my drawers, the closet, and the stored out-of-season things. I put together outfits and color coordinated sets of things and I now own about half what I did when I woke up today. Half of that half is hanging in my closet with intimates and pajamas tucked into a sparse few drawers. The winter half is stored away until the weather gets cool again.

It was difficult to cull my clothes. Some things were lovely and nearly new but didn't fit right; I felt wasteful removing them from my closet. Others were gifts that been loved but finally outlived their welcome; in those cases I felt ungrateful. A few sentimental favorites are still in the mix, even though they are worn out, don't fit quite right, or don't go with anything else I own. I just can't part with them yet. Some of the clothes that I was willing to say goodbye to will be transformed into Morsbags. A few items are just going to be tossed out.

Now if I could practice this same technique on books, I'd be living in a much neater apartment!

Something is happening in my apartment building. The management has become security-conscious. Earlier this month, they installed a boxy security camera in the lobby. There are shiny foil signs on the doors now that warn you that you are under surveillance. And the lights outside the side entrance are working, too, for the first time in at least 5 years.

I like the lights, but the security camera bothers me. I do not like being watched as I come and go and get my mail from the bank of mailboxes. It is creepy. I give the camera the finger occasionally as I go by, or stick out my tongue, or just walk underneath it so it can't see me , but as Tod said, 'Hey, don't do that. They will know to blame us when the wires get cut." As if.

Maybe we need to be watched. The building has been burgled at least three times - a big heist in 2003 and in 2005 there were two incidents in my own apartment. Maybe there was another theft. I want to ask the manager, but I know it is pointless. They will evade the question as they usually do when there is a problem with the building.

So I will just have to keep venting my ire fingerwise at whoever watches the tapes.

We own a house in Pittsburgh that we've been trying to sell for the last year or more. Last winter in a cold snap, the pipes burst and caused a lot of damage.

So we fixed everything with the coordination of Tod's father, Pete, then spruced the place up, fired the manager/realty agent who had let the pipes burst and got it an aggressive agent to sell the house. But with the subprime crisis, the house hasn't sold and has stood empty all year.

This morning I woke to find an e-mail from Pete telling me that someone had broken in and stolen all the copper pipes and wires in the basement. Great. More stuff to have repaired.

This makes me sad and angry. I love the house but I want it out of my life. I can see why absentee owners are considered a bad thing. I hope that I am soon not one.

Anyone want a charming 1930s bungalow?

Fused plastic, crocheted top and pompom, blue bulb in Yoshi's lamp base

In daylight

This year's tree was small, simple and completely overwhelmed by an abundance of gifts:

Spinning!

I made a one-seam dress today. It took ten minutes to cut out and 3 minutes to stitch - that has to be the fastest piece of clothing ever sewn. But...after its made, it takes hours of playing with it to test all the wrapping & draping styles. And twirling in the circle skirt takes time, too. Best to make this dress when you have some free time.

The sewing instructions are from Rostichery. Some of the wrapping ideas I've been playing with are courtesy of a video by Monif C (click the "Convertible Dress Instructional Video" link). who makes these dresses in plus sizes. This is a relative of the Infinite Dress, but much less expensive.

Tod was picked up in a limo bright and early this morning for a week's work trip to London. He sent me this photo from his lace-covered seat as he headed towards the airport and the first-class lounge where he and Zoupi will hole up until flight time. Lucky!

I'm staying home to work and clean the house. Lucky? On my list of tasks this week (this list is to ensure I actually do these things, you can stop reading here):

Saddle soap the sofa and chair; rearrange the living room furniture; wash down all the walls; wipe the ceilings; install a screen door in the office; wash all the curtains; clean up my studio space. I'll also work on the DF booth elements, mail off a few packages, and do some drawing. That and try to eat healthily and sleep soundly.

Tod will be home next Sunday. Already counting the days...

Tod blows out his candle.

The birthday boy couldn't wait to try his spice cake - in fact, he came into my office to apologise for messing up the topping - he had sugar all over his nose from getting too close. (Tod has a flavor!)

So we had a speedy, early afternoon candle lighting ceremony followed by gobbling of a slice each. There's plenty more to share if you hurry on over. I can't guarantee cake after tomorrow morning, though. It's pretty good.

Kitchen light - before and after changing the bulbs

I've always disliked fluorescent lights; the sickly blue-green color and the flickers and hums make me cringe. So the recent bans on incandescent light bulbs in Australia and Canada seemed pretty horrible. But now I've done some research and discovered (as 80% of the Japanese market already knows) that fluorescent lights aren't so bad after all.

In fact, the new compact fluorescent lamps look quite a bit like incandescent bulbs if you buy the "L" color. And they use considerably less electricity so we will slowly replace our incandescent bulbs with CFLs. We stared with the kitchen fluorescent fixtures just to improve the color temperature. Now the kitchen is warm and cozy.

The color isn't perfect. The L color CFL is too pink in the daytime when sunlight mixes with it. And because CFL isn't full spectrum light (there are several single-color phosphors mixing together to make its color) what will it do to our eyes in the long run?

There's been controversy over various aspects of CFLs and Tod wondered if people complainingly questioned incandescent bulbs when they became widespread. I don't know; I'm just happy to have warm light in the kitchen.

A rooftop garden solves the "I want more land than we can afford" problem.

Land is still not at hand, but I have a good idea of what we'll build on it. We will end up with a house that is a blend of Japanese tradition and Western conveniences. Reminiscent of the 1930s in use of light and space, but built with 21st century materials. Frank Lloyd Wright is an inspiration to me & Tod, and to our architect, too. Yay!

Over dinner with Misa and Yutaka last night, I showed Misa this photo from a magazine:

A 1930s Japanese elementary school hallway

This is what I'd like my downstairs hall to look like - sliding doors of glass and wood into the office, bedroom and bath, with bookcases on the other side of the hall with windows above. Misa and Yutaka agreed this was not something a Japanese couple would ask for. I guess having a hall reminiscent of an elementary school is a bit weird and most Nihonjin want Western style homes.

But isn't it a beautiful space?

We talked about the rooftop garden, too. I'm very happy to learn that it's definitely possible. Misa even suggested a rotenburo. That would be a wonderful luxury (imagine the parties we'd have sitting around in our outdoor bath!), but beyond our budget. But we can do trees and plants, no problem.

This lush rooftop garden is in downtown Washington, D.C.

Imagine walking upstairs from the terrace into a garden with shade and color. Follow the path through the garden to my studio packed with creative materials and surfaces to work on. What a treat. I'm hanging out for this!

I know this is a dream, but maybe some of it can become a reality. I do not want a nasty boxy house. I need air and light and greenery. And according to Misa, I need property with a frontage of at least 8 meters, so let me stop dreaming get back to searching...

Bird and Ganesha keep my new plant company

Tod surprised me by coming home from the cleaners with a plant for my desk. It's a beautiful, sweet scented grape hyacinth. I love it.

Tod & I are thinking of buying a house (or an apartment) in Tokyo. I've been scouring the Japanese real estate websites for interesting places in our ku and nearby. It's definitely going to be a challenge to find just the right combination of features, location and price.

This isn't what I'm looking for. But if it were, I'd be set!

The current trend in moderately priced ($500,000 - $750,000) new homes in Bunkyo-ku and its surrounds is a three story wood structure with a plaster exterior trimmed in brick facing. The first floor has an entryway, a full bath and one room in addition to a covered parking space. Living/dining and kitchen are on the second floor, and there are usually two rooms on the third floor. Some plans include a small roof balcony. There is no yard or garden. The square footage is about 960 sq feet (89 sq meters).

For my own reference, and in case you want to poke around yourself, here are the realty websites I've been using and some handy Japanese vocabulary to help you search.

• Homes
• JJ-Navi
• Yahoo Japan

and the numbers in the rooms indicate the size in jo; each increment is about 20 square feet

Merry Christmas with flowers

That's more like me.

In Matsudai this summer, I bought this full-coverage Japanese apron just because I thought it was funny and cute. But the more I wore it in my kitchen, the more I realised it didn't quite fit. I felt like I was wearing an apron taken at random from a hook in another woman's kitchen. So tonight I got out my needle and thread and fixed it.

It fits better now.

Beginning to blur at the edges

For more than a week now, I've been sitting at my desk to the accompaniment of a faint, persistent beep. It's about 60 bpm though its rhythm is slightly irregular; sometimes it seems to skip a beat or double up.

I have wandered around the apartment listening carefully and the only place I can really hear it is at my desk. It's not coming from outside. I've checked all the closets and rooms for a mysterious beeping device and found nothing. I stuck my ear up close to all the computers and peripherals and there's no noise but fan whirs. This lack of source brought me to my recent theory that the old lady next door is on life support.

But that theory was shot down when, in the spirit of thorough investigation, I turned off my computer. The beeping stopped. I turned it back on. After a moment, I heard beeping again. Argh. What can cause a computer to beep at a relatively steady and extraordinarily annoying pace like this?

I'd better take a backup now.

I have disliked Sundays since I was a kid. The cold shadow of undone homework hung over the day's activities. Now that I'm an adult there's still a bleak feeling about the pursuit of leisure on a Sunday.

Today I rattled around the house. I cleaned a couple of cabinets, knit a few rows on my latest project, read for a while, reheated leftovers, made an Indian Party Lamp, and designed our nengajou. Tod tinkered with the stereo and is deep in the music database, deleting duplicates and tidying tags.

Maybe it's the sedentary aspect of Sunday that gets to me. I should go for a walk to stir my brackish blood, but there's oden stewing and a movie waiting to be watched. I guess I'll walk tomorrow.

An overstuffed, bug infested pantry drawer.

The other evening when I started rubbing flour and butter together to make biscuits, I discovered bugs in my flour. Grrrr. Kinda gross, but it can happen even in the best of pantries. But my cupboards are not a showcase of tidiness.

So I tore them apart today, wiped the surfaces clean and tossed all the open wheat-based products and bug-tasty things. In went some of my precious spices I had stored in not-bug-proof ziplocks, including the whole mace and the nutmeg. Anything expired got chucked into the bin, too.

My pantry was a portrait of a forgetful mind. I found three partially used bags of powdered sugar and two of brown sugar plus four unopened packets of unsweetened cocoa. We like variety, too. We had eight kinds of salt, six different chile peppers and two jars of anchovies. (Don't panic, Tod. I kept all the salts.)

A tidy cupboard (but for how long?)

Now my pantry is clean, neat and bug free (I hope). Hooray! Plus I unearthed a few of the interesting ingredients that I'd gotten while traveling earlier in the year, so there will be feasts on the table next week.

Everyone wins but the bugs.

"...and suddenly I'm flat on my back. I think 'Holy shit! I was just hit by a car.'" Tod recounted. "Then I see a van cruise by and slow down. It pulls away, and I think, 'Damn, a hit-and-run!'"

But the van was just getting out of the traffic. The driver and his four mates jumped out, collected Tod's bicycle, offered to call the police and ambulance. Tod, hyped up on adrenaline, insisted he was fine and refused medical help but did accept a ride home in the van, conversing in Japanese about their work.

Luckily, he is pretty much alright. His left shoulder collided with the van, throwing him from the bike onto his back. There's a dent in the vehicle and an ugly swollen bruise on his shoulder and arm. He's got some scrapes and abrasions but he was wearing his helmet, so his head's fine. After a night's sleep, he's feeling achy and tired but otherwise seems normal.

He and the driver exchanged contact details, and half an hour after he got home, the Ootsubo-san called to check up on him and reiterated he'd bear any medical costs and repairs to the bike. (So much more civil than "my insurance company will call your insurance company and we'll settle out of court," don't you think?)

Tod's biggest pain is me asking him to describe his pains. I know he won't go to the hospital if he can avoid it, so I feel like I have to monitor his swellings, aches, concussion and possible sites of infection. He says this accident is less painful than the time he wiped out on his bike in suburban Chicago and he survived that, so I'm trying not to fuss too much.

Anyway, happy holiday weekend.

After seeing myself in a bathing suit for the first time in about 18 months, I decided to buy a bathroom scale to monitor the progress of my thighs.

I've never owned a scale though my parents had one in their bathroom when I was growing up. Scales in Japan in 2006 are stunningly complex. At Bic Camera yesterday, there were three scale-only models and nearly 30 scales that also scanned your body for signs of life. Prices ranged from 1,000 yen for a classic non-digital scale to 20,000 yen for the Cadillac of body monitoring technology.

We decided to splurge and get a mid-range device one that measures more than weight. We now are the befuddled owners of a Tanita InnerScan. If you enter your age and height then step on the scale, it measures not only your weight, but your:

• Body fat %
• Visceral fat
• Muscle mass and "body type score"
• Bone mass
• Base metabolic rate and metabolic age

It's interesting comparing me & Tod. My body fat is at the upper edge of acceptable levels. His is smack in the middle range, but he's got too much visceral fat (I had to look that up; it's the fat around your belly and organs) where my visceral fat, which I always think is too much is actually OK.

My bone mass is also fine and I am, as always, a mesomorph body type.

But my metabolic age is higher than my real age, so I need to do some more exercise to get the metabolism in line. Exercise will also increase my muscle mass. Combine that with a bit of calorie counting and I should be able to monitor my thighs in a shapely downward slope, rather than buying a new and larger swiimsuit.

Rag woven mat, detail

I made this myself on Sunday while visiting the Echigo-Tsumari Art Triennial. At Kinare, the big exhibition center in Tokamachi, they have a hands-on room set up with looms, shibori dying vats and silk painting materials. It took me 30 minutes to weave up this little mat.

Tod took an onsen bath (I was barred because of my tattoo) while I wove. It's been a long time since I last sat in front of a loom. My results are a little bit uneven, but not too bad, considering how rusty I am.

As much as working on this made me happy and left me with a big smile, if I had a loom of my own I'd never use it. I really despise warping treadle looms.

Cross legged

I sit at my desk nearly all day long but I don't want to be completely sedentary, so I'm experimenting with a balance ball as a desk chair. 4,567 bounces into my first day "on the ball", I am enjoying the novelty.

As you can see in the photo, I've figured out how to sit on it cross legged. Although I haven't mastered it yet, I can type from this position. MJ says this is "a one way street to a bump on the head," but I think it's more likely a fast train to backache.

Still, a backache is better than an expanding bottom.

Busy developing. Do not disturb

In place of an enlarger, since I'm contact printing, I'm using a 20 watt light bulb with an iPod box as a shade (props to Kris for finding the right box to use). A wall clock regulates my 12 second count while I have the light switched on. I slip the exposed paper into a black bag in an old film box, then do another set. When I get to twelve exposures, I start developing them two at a time.

For full annotations, see this photo on Flickr.

Darkroom Math & Other Notes

• To double the amount of light (and halve the exposure time), measure the hole in the bottom of your iPod box, multiply by 1.41 and cut the hole to the new size.
• Negatives go emulsion side to the paper to decrease accidental blurriness.
• Negatives (in this case) turned emulsion side to paper print backwards.
• Ensure the contact glass is not casting a shadow on the edge of the negative
• Center the glass under the light if you want to evenly expose two sheets at once.
• High contrast paper works better than medium contrast paper when contact printing
• If you switch from ISO P 640 paper to ISO P 250 paper, increase your exposure by 2.56 times. 12 seconds becomes 31 seconds.
• Don't neglect to clean the contact glass between batches

Preparing the bath

Inspired by the cold bath after the sauna at Komaki Onsen and suffering from the heat today, the boys decided to make a cold bath at home. As usual, they were not doing things by half measures. They went to the conbini and got big blocks of ice and tossed them in pairs into the already chilly bath.

A cold bath is a fine thing on a hot summer day.

Friends have come to stay for a couple of weeks. While we girls were off having a relaxing massage, the boys went shopping. They came home with a new grill and they are planning to break it in tonight with a whole fish. Mmmmm.

Neighborhood dog

On Saturday, I made a pinhole for the digital camera. It was easy. I drilled a 1 cm hole in the center of a plastic Nikon body cap and attached a pinhole with some black tape. Then a took a lot of photos. The best of the bunch are in a Flickr set.

Herb garden

On Sunday, Tod & I went for a walk, hoping to take more pictures, and ended up buying 30 plants, two big pots and some dirt. Then we took a taxi home and got all dirty planting an herb garden in the containers. I hope these do better than my previous gardening attempts.

Tod sets up a movie for us to watch

I spent the entire afternoon sleeping; this stupid headache will not quit. Tod entertained himself installing OpenBSD on his laptop, and then ordered dinner for us and prepared a movie for us to watch (quietly, I hope) while we eat.

We finally found a sofa that combines comfort and style. it arrived today.

I rearranged the living room. It seems bigger now.

Another perspective

Orange Jasmine dreams of wetter days
Tended by the waterer.

Dragon Tree lets out a strangled roar
Voice tangled in drying locks.

Royal Palm recollects lush green
Twice weekly soakings.

I'm cleaning out the closets and have a lot of video gear that I'd like to get rid of. Except as noted, it's all in good shape. I'm just not doing much shooting anymore and I'd rather not see stuff this gathering dust.

Best offer by Friday the 24th gets it, or it comes to the Shinagawa Intercity flea market with me on Sunday the 26th. Pickup in Tokyo or at the flea market so Tokyo/Japan folks only, please.

Sony Camcorder Setup
Well-loved, much used, slightly abused, and partially broken.
Originally paid about 285,000 yen for everything listed.

• Sony 3CCD miniDV Camcorder (TRV-900) - needs repair to power and audio systems - includes camera, iLInk cable, remote, AC adapter, floppy disk adapter, F330 & F730 batteries, & manual
• Sony Gun Zoom Microphone (ECM-HS1) Uses "intelligent shoe", fits TRV series and other models: specs
• Sony Wireless Microphone System (WCS-999) includes transmitter, receiver, 2 tie-clip lapel microphones, & earbud: specs
• Sony Hard Carry Case (LCH-TRV900 ) rugged aluminum body, 2-layers, adjustable compartments , includes shoulder strap & keys
• Special offer: buy all the Sony gear and I'll throw in a basic tripod.

Studio Lighting Kit
Perfect for 3-point lighting setups.
Originally paid 15,380 yen for 3 stands and scene paper

• Mirano 1-Lamp Studio Light 2 available
  100V-6A, tripod base, ceramic fixture on ball head, switch. Extends to about 2 meters.


• Mirano Mini Studio Light
  100V-6A, tripod base, ceramic fixture, on ball head switch. Extends to about 1.7 meters


• Superior Seamless Paper
  suitable for bluescreen work, on 2 meter roll


• Special offer: buy the studio lights and paper and I'll throw in an assortment of gently used 250 & 500 watt bulbs.

Justy VGA-TV Converter (ConnectTV JTV-05A)
Convert computer monitor to TV or camcorder
Retail 21,400 yen
takes VGA in (from PC, Mac or NEC) and outputs NTSC (S-video or composite)
includes cables, adapters, power supply and converter.

Wireless CCD Camera (CP-952)
Spy on your friends and neighbors, or use in a videocrown like I did.
List Price: 29,800 yen
includes camera, receiver, power supplies and battery pack: specs

Twenty three candles lit the apartment last night. The soft glow was delightful--the perfect light for a quiet summer evening.

Electric lights are horrible in comparison. Too bright, too steady. I was loathe to open the refrigerator to bring out the chilled soup; the small bulb at the back was so garish. The oven light was so strong in comparison to the candles lighting the kitchen that the metal spatula cast reflections on the walls.

But this morning, I rediscovered at least one reason why our forebears moved away from using candles. Wax on the table. Wax on the railings of the verandah. Cascades of wax down the wall behind the toilet. The little candle lamp is waxed shut. I must clean up the leavings of our light.

Another use for Japanese towels

Summer breezes blow dust into all my equipment, so I've sewn two Japanese bath towels into simple covers for my mixer and microphone. I won't win awards for interior decoration, but now I can open the veranda door without worrying about ruining my gear. Function trumps form.

We walked into the apartment after our long trip home to find food in the kitchen, fresh flowers and chocolates on the living room table, a basket of soap waiting in the bathroom and clean pajamas folded neatly on the bed.

The homecoming elves had visited. What a blessing. (Thanks, girls.)

Meet my new toothbrush, the Oral-B CrossAction Vitalizer.

I laughed at it in the drugstore; I've never seen such an over-the-top bit of dental maintenance equipment. It's tricked out with bristles in three colors, set in at four angles and at five heights. It has a fat, rubbery handle like the side of an overpriced gym shoe. There are rows of flexible fingers along the sides to massage your gums.

It even has a demo video.

In a fit of caustic humor (and a need for a new brush) I bought this $3 example of technology and engineering put to frivolous purpose. The joke's on me, though. It's an effective toothbrush and I enjoy the gum massaging action of those rubbery fingers.

Our wireless network is great, but doesn't stretch quite all the way through our apartment. It peters out halfway down the hall to the bedroom.

But not anymore. Tod built this nifty parabolic antenna from a thin sheet of metal and some foamcore. It's not the most stylish thing in the house, but it works.

What was my first Google search from bed? Of course... (NSFW)

I was surprised by a summons from the front door this morning. "Yuuubin kyoku desu..." The mailman? Wasn't expecting anything but I buzzed him in.

He struggled to the door under the weight of an obviously heavy box which bore my mother's familiar, distinctive handwriting. Oooooo. Our Christmas presents had been lost in transit almost two months ago. I wondered if she had claimed the insurance and sent us replacement holiday cheer.

But no. It was the long-lost Christmas box! Mailed December 6th, delivered January 26th. There is no indication what caused the delay--customs didn't open it, the box is only beat up in the usual way, it's correctly addressed, and it has no rubber stamps hinting where it's been all this time.

I guess we'll have a bit of Christmas tonight. Thanks, Mom!

Today I acquired an entirely new wardrobe.

A woman on Being A Broad was selling off some of her clothes. I picked up 2 suits, 3 dresses and 8 skirts for a bargain price. Everything fits, is in great condition and will be ideal for working at client offices or running around town.

And yesterday at "Sewing Sunday" with Jo & Tracey, I was given two pairs of unfinished trousers that Jo couldn't bear to look at any more. I finished the first pair this afternoon and they fit like a dream.

Most of these items I'd never have selected for myself. But they suit me nicely. I ought to have other people shop for me.

Now I need to get more hangers.

Allow me to introduce you to my teapot. It's not quite as lopsided as it appears; I need to learn to keep my head still when I draw.

Tod bought me a lovely set of watercolor pencils to replace the ones I gave away in Fiji. I've been using them to draw one or two little sketches every day. Practice makes perfect--or at least improves the perspective.

At dinner this evening we talked about dinner table phrases.

F.H.B. is McQuillin code for "family hold back" - a warning to the family that food was running low and guests should have second servings before the family.

M.I.K. offered the opposite message: more in kitchen.

But the phrase that got us all interested was "I've had an elegant sufficiency; any more would be a burden." It means you're full and don't want any more food.

It turns out that this isn't unique to grandmother Bobby McQuillin. It's from a poem called Spring written by James Thomson in the early 18th century:

An elegant sufficiency, content, Retirement, rural quiet, friendship, books, Ease and alternate labor, useful life, Progressive virtue, and approving Heaven; These are the matchless joys of virtuous love.

"An elegant sufficiency" has morphed into "my sufficiency is suffonsified." Eh? Explanation available at World Wide Words

We went out to Narita today to collect our mothers. We arrived shortly after their flight landed and headed to the meeting point outside Customs. An hour later, everyone else from their flight had come through. We started to worry.

"Maybe one of them fell ill on the plane and they went to the infirmary," I mused.

"Or they tried to smuggle something in..."

"Maybe your mother brought a plant," I laughed, remembering the Christmas that Jean mailed me narcissus in contravention of all known laws.

I scoured the arrivals area--they weren't in the smoking room, or near the currency exchange, or sitting on the benches. They were nowhere to be found. Eventually I was worried enough to call MJ to calm me down. Then I had them paged.

But when they didn't appear at the information counter after a few minutes, I walked back over to Tod. "You know," I began with the light of an idea beginning to dawn, "my dad left a cryptic comment on my weblog this morning. He said the flight was an hour late. But I checked and it wasn't late. Could he have meant they took a later flight?"

Sure enough, they arrived on the next flight from Chicago--an hour later than the first one. What a relief!

The Okaasan-tachi Tour begins tomorrow as soon as my mother's delayed suitcase is delivered.

Welcome to Japan!

The first key-copy shop turned me away.

"We don't do keys like this," the wiry, balding man in a crisp blue canvas apron said as he turned my key over in his hand. "But if you go down the street toward the station, there's a shop that might be able to copy it."

The second shop smelled of cut metal when I pushed open the door. Behind the counter, an entire wall of blank keys hung ready for cutting.

"Irrashaimase," a well-dressed man in front of the counter greeted me. He was looking at some keys on the counter in front of him. I thought he was a customer. Maybe he was the owner. He extended his hand palm up to accept my key.

The man behind the counter, dressed in a faded blue uniform jacket and matching pants, didn't stir from the order book he was reading. To a man who looks like he's been cutting keys for forty years, a foreign woman with a key to copy doesn't merit a glance.

When my key passed across the counter, he closed his book, stood up, walked to the end of the wall and turned a brass handle to reveal a section of hidden storage. More keys!

It took him five minutes just to find the right blank.

Half a dozen options were silently and carefully reviewed, the choices narrowed to two, then one. Even then, the blank had to be adjusted with four passes through a saw to create a wider ward down the side.

Calipers confirmed the size. The man's tarnished fingers ran over the edge to feel for imperfections. He turned the keys end-on. Something wasn't right; he returned the blank key to the saw for another adjustment.

Then it was a quick pass through the copier to cut the tumblers. He snipped off the too-long end of the blank and smoothed the burrs on a rotating buffer.

2500 yen.

When preparing for a long visit by your mother and mother-in-law (or any VIP), don't forget these ten often-overlooked items:

1. Launder the curtains
2. Brush the crumbs from the cracks in the sofa
3. Wipe the fingerprints off all the doors
4. Remove coffee and wine stains from carpet
5. Clean all the light switches
6. Dust underneath the stereo components
7. Scrub the mineral deposits from the shower fixtures
8. Rub the scuff marks from the walls in the genkan
9. Tidy up the cables and wires
10. Wash the floor behind the toilet

Cities are dirty. I learned that when Tod & I lived in a 2nd floor loft on the corner of Wabash and 11th in Chicago. Every time I opened the windows, dirt blew into the apartment. I had the windows open often and the sills acquired a sludgy black grime resistant to cleaning.

Tokyo's dusty and dirty, too. Every surface in the house is gritty ten minutes after it's been dusted. My desk is covered with enough crud to make muddy circles with my coffee cup. And it's not for lack of cleaning. I wiped off the desk on Friday. It's been worse than usual this summer and I'm blaming it on the construction site 2 blocks over.

So bring no white gloves into my house or they will be covered in grey-brown dirt tout de suite and I'll fail your cleaning test.

We are now a two |p�rl| household. Tod's is perl, the programming language. Mine is purl, as done with needles.

What I'm saying is that I figured out how to knit this week. I did a simple garter stitch scarf worked in wool and fancy eyelash yarn for texture and now I've advanced to making ribs. Knit two, purl two...

Knitting is a lot more fun that I ever imagined. I get to the end of a row and think "OK, just one more row, then I'll stop" and then end up with another 20. It's rather like swimming that way. I always end up doing more laps that I plan.

If you think you're getting a holiday present and you want a say in what color it is, please place your order now. It's going to be a scarf...I haven't figured out hats yet.

`

The garden is dead. Summer heat, lack of water and my inattention finally created a collection of dirt-bound twigs and crispy leaves huddled against the veranda's edge. I'll salvage what I can, but I give up.

I'm going to remove the planters and fill the space with a comfortable chair, a side table and maybe a rug I loom myself from sewing scraps and old clothes.

This will be my quiet corner to get away from the computer and breathe some city-fresh air. I'll breakfast there, scribble in notebooks or enjoy a cocktail in the evening.

My mother and mother-in-law are coming (together) to visit for two weeks this autumn. My mother's never visited Japan. Jean, Tod's mom, has been here once before.

I've been thinking of things to make their trip special. I'm sharing my list here, because if I don't I'll forget everything (and there's no Google search on "what to do with your mother in Tokyo"), but also I'd like to hear what you've done with your folks when they've been to visit.

(And yes, Mom & Jean, you're welcome to suggest anything you like!)

• Onsen ryokan - Kishigon at Ikaho or Araki Kosen Onsen in Chichibu
• Taste of Culture class
• Takarazuka Review show
• Party to show off friends to mothers (or vice versa)
• Dinner at Goenmon (tofu in Hakusan) and Hantei (kushiage in Nezu)
• Hakone day trip or overnight (should be good momiji season)
• Asakusa - river taxi - Hamaryuku - Ginza
• Lots of grocery shopping and cooking at home
• Plenty of just hanging out doing nothing days, too.

Tod recently bought a new camera--the awesome Nikon D-70 digital SLR. He's been having a field day photographing everything. I particularly liked this shot of coffee he snapped the other morning:

And keeping with the coffee theme, I took these pictures at a friend's house:

(Digging through my older writing, I've found some essays written for the mailng list that was a precursor to my weblog. For my long-time fan (yes, Mom, I mean you) the next few entries may be familiar. This one was written in June 2000.)

Have you ever bought a $30 cantaloupe?

Expensive melons are given as gifts in Japan. I might have selected another item to present, some French cookies perhaps or a decorative tin of seasonal tea, but the melon seemed appropriate. Tod & I, melon-headed Americans, had to pay a formal call on a neighbor who we had inadvertently upset.

It all started three weeks ago. The imminent arrival of my sister and her family spurred us to take on some tasks we�d left undone when we moved in in February. We bought a low, Japanese-style dining table and zabuton cushions to sit on. I finally moved my office a few feet vertically and set it up on a desk instead of the floor. And we took the initiative to build a deck on top of the triangular patch of mud and weeds that sits outside our living room and dining room.

A bilingual carpenter friend constructed the deck while we were away from Tokyo for a week. We had the fun of arranging the work with Eddy, leaving for Singapore, and returning to find a beautiful deck. We celebrated by painting the outdoor table and chairs.

It was when I was struggling to move the table back onto the deck that I had a hint things might be a bit touchy. Our table is wooden and lightweight, but tricky to squeeze through the narrow funnel of space between our house and the house next door. I�ve done it before, but this time I slipped and bumped the neighbors� kitchen wall. Just a tap, nothing damaging. I didn�t even ding the new paint on the table.

But the neighbor, a balding Japanese man in his 50s, came out and complained. He didn�t yell, of course, but he looked at me and pointed to the table, then the wall and said �Don don� indicating the noise I�d caused. I apologized as well as I could considering I was still holding the table and he went away. I gave up on moving the table and when Tod arrived home from work, we successfully and silently put the table on the deck together.

Two days later, our carpenter�s wife gave me a call. �How�s the deck?� she began. I told her how much we were enjoying it and she launched into a story. �I think you may have a little problem�the noise from the construction upset your neighbors. A man came over and complained about Eddy�s saw. And he said he wants a fence put up between your house and his. He wasn�t very nice about it at all. I think you ought to know this because the Japanese will never complain to you, but they will go directly to your landlord. I know you don�t want to have any of that sort of trouble,� she warned. I agreed, thanked her for the warning, and started to fret.

What should we do? An apology was certainly in order. But my Japanese isn�t capable of much more than simple conversation, much less the rigorous grammar of a formal letter of apology! Miss Manners has nothing on the masters of Japanese etiquette, let me tell you.

There are numerous social protocols in Japanese life. We know some of them�how and when to bow, how introductions are made, when to refill someone�s glass�but our experience is limited by the casual social situations we�ve been involved in. Most of our Japanese friends have traveled and have international attitudes so they just laugh at (or are only slightly embarrassed by) our social gaffes. But a formal apology doesn�t leave much room for error. Screw it up and we could find ourselves alienated for a long time.

So we enlisted some assistance. Tod polled his office colleagues for advice. �Ah, you must begin with some set paragraphs about the weather and the season of the year before discussing the problem and apologizing,� suggested one woman. �Take them a gift,� said another. Two men on Tod�s work team wrote up sample apology letters.

I decided that I was not going to apologize alone; we needed to present a united front. I waited for a day when Tod would be home. Jenn & her husband & daughter arrived from America on Friday night. Saturday we went to the zoo. Sunday was The Day.

I sketched a little card and pasted in the letter that Koki wrote. It was brief and to the point�perhaps that was not in its favor it as didn�t chat about the weather but we understood what it said and it seemed profusely apologetic.

�Recently, the noise and dust from the construction at our house must have been very annoying. We have no excuse; we are extremely sorry.

�However, the construction is not finished yet. Before long, we plan to build a fence along the front of our house and between your house and ours.

�It will be very annoying, I think, but please bear with us. We appreciate your continued patience and goodwill.�

Message complete, my sister and I walked to the fruit shop and selected a melon from the gift shelf. The prices ranged from 1800 yen to 8000 yen ($18 - $80). I picked a beautifully round, ripe, evenly veined cantaloupe with a stem sticking off the top. The fruit shop man boxed it and gift wrapped it for me then placed it carefully in a shiny white shopping bag. It was lovely.

Armed with the right tools, we were ready. Tod wanted a few more minutes to procrastinate, but I insisted that we had to do this before my courage gave out. We had the letter and the gift. But how were we supposed to deliver it?

�We could drop it on the doorstep and run,� Tod suggested.

Good idea, certainly easy to execute, but maybe not as neighborly as we ought to be. We abandoned the thought and walked out to the street. Immediately we got lost trying to find the door to the apartment. There is a clothing shop out front (Sendagi Yashima�Sporty & Casual) and Tod noticed a door to the left. But the door leads into a small entryway with mailboxes and a staircase up to the second floor. No first floor apartment.

We dithered out front for a few minutes while we decided what to do. We even looked at the side of the building near our house to determine that there was, indeed, living space back there. The way in, we concluded, must be at the back of the shop. So we entered the shop and looked around.

Outfits of iridescent pastels and bright summery knits designed for bulky older women hung on hangers lining the walls of the shop floor to ceiling. Behind the outfits, I glimpsed plastic-wrapped stock piled on shelves. A center island displayed scarves and accessories�patterns and colors jumbled into an undefined mass. Floor space was limited to the area created by moving two racks of sale items to the outside of the shop. It was tiny and cramped.

And empty. �Oh, no,� we conferred. �Now what?� We called out a cheery �Sumimasen!� to alert someone to our presence. A woman came out through a hidden doorway. She wiped her hands on her apron as Tod asked �Excuse me, but do you live here?� She looked at him, then at me and called for her husband.

The balding man I�d met the other day appeared. Tod, his shaking hands betraying his nervousness, introduced us both and explained that we lived next door. �Our Japanese isn�t very good�, he said, �so we asked a friend to help us write this. Please read it,� He extracted the card with Koki�s letter.

The man read the note, then he lead us outside. He pointed to the deck, to his wall, to the deck again. He said that the deck was too close to his house�it was on his property (by about 2 inches, I think!). We�d have to fix that. He asked us where we were from�actually he guessed we were American (our reputation precedes us, I fear). He talked to us about the fence and mentioned our landlord. Unfortunately, I didn�t entirely understand what he said. Then we handed him our gift, awkwardly thanked him and it was over.

We don�t know if we did it right or not. He never gave us his name�maybe it�s Yashima, like the store name, and he assumed we�d know. Or maybe he was snubbing us. I am too dense to recognize a snub in Japanese culture. He tried to speak English with us�a word here or there when he knew one and we looked lost. We walked away with mixed signals and uncertainty.

Since we handed over our gift and apology we haven�t seen him or his wife. No more complaints, but no greetings either. I guess time will tell which side of the fence we�re on. We will tread lightly and be prepared to buy more melons as necessary.

Tod treated me to a lovely bouquet of white flowers studded with smoke grass. The two stems of freesia scent the entire office with a citrus-sweet green tea aroma. Heavenly.

It's the first day of spring. It snowed today. But we were warm inside with 24 of our favorite people and a feast of food & wine, and live music. Heaven. Thanks.

When I was a girl, my father taught me to polish shoes. I don't know who taught him--maybe his father, maybe someone in the navy--but I am a link in a chain that stretches back quite a way.

You live in the moment when you shine your shoes. Brush away the dirt, smooth on the polish, wait for the polish to dry (always the hardest part), brush the polish off with quick light strokes, buff the leather with a soft cloth.

When I'm finished, I walk away with spiffy shoes and a calm mind.

Today was the perfect sort of early-spring day to open all the windows and air everything out, so now the apartment is tidy and my sheets and towels smell fresh and clean.

Before my housekeeping binge, I sat out on the veranda and painted for a while. It was more art therapy than Art but I had an adventure while I was painting. The wind picked up and one of the cardboard canvases I'd laid on the wall to dry blew off and landed in the neighbor's garden. Oops!

I trotted downstairs to fetch my painting from our French neighbors who had a baby girl not long after we moved in. Now 18 months old, she watched me cautiously and smiled a little as I walked through their living room to the garden and retrieved my canvas.

Later on, my breeze-animated pillowcases swept a jellyjar-cum-candleholder off the veranda. It crashed into the other downstairs neighbor's yard. I don't think anyone lives in that apartment, so I'll let the "janitor room" know about the broken glass when they come in to work tomorrow.

There is nothing like an all-day brunch with friends to make a perfect Sunday, especially when the brunch menu is Eggs Benedict and apples stewed in wine.

After all those eggs (1 poached plus about 4 in the hollandaise) at 1 pm, I didn't feel hungry til I was on my way home from a meeting at 11 pm. I'm not sure what is weirder, coming home from a meeting so late on a Sunday, or having dinner at nearly midnight.

Next week it's our turn to host. Menu to be decided--check in on Thursday for a recipe.

Through a collusion of time and circumstance, we arrived at the solstice with no holiday cards and a big empty atelier available to us at the kuyakusho (the ward office). So we did what any normal people would do, and we hauled our art supplies down the road and made cards.

We intended to print a bunch of cards using the block we designed at the nengajo party, but ended up doing monoprints which were a lot more fun.

Tod surveys the 86 cards we made in our enthusiasm. I think that we have enough cards for next year, too.

Our unusual household schedule works pretty well under normal circumstances. Tod works into the wee hours so that he can connect with colleagues in London; I rise early because I function best in the morning. We each get some quiet time alone to focus on our projects and we enjoy lunch and dinner together on most days.

But today we begin our holiday. Tourists in Japan are expected to rise early, see the sights before 5:00 when temples and museums shut their doors, then retire for drinks and dinner.

So in about 60 minutes, Tod will be wrenched back into the local time zone. I'll try to do it gently, with a hot mug of coffee and a kiss on the forehead, but it's going to be a rude awakening regardless. Tod will be sleepwalking until we reach Oita, and feeling jetlagged for a couple of days even though we're not leaving Japan.

We figured out that Tod lives on India time. Maybe next year, we'll travel there and I'll be the one making the adjustment.

Jim from Wirefarm and Tod geek out with laptops on the living room floor. Are they Apple poster children, or what?

Jim grew up in Dunmore, PA, about 40 miles from where I lived as a kid. He and I might be the only people in Tokyo who know what heyna means.

On Thursday, we got a new washing machine to replace our dryer.

Huh? New washing machine replaces old dryer? Yes! This Sanyo model AWD-A845Z, similar to the newly launched AWD-A860Z is a washer and dryer in one unit. You put the laundry in, press the course you want, and in 150 minutes, open the triple lids to reveal clean, dry clothes. It's really disconcerting. Call me old-fashioned, but things should come out of the washer wet.

It has a "no detergent" setting that cleans lightly soiled clothes by electrolysis (but only lightly soiled clothes), a blanket course, quick wash, heavy soil cleaning, dry clean mode, and 8 ways to use the dryer (combinations of low and high heat and various times and auto-sensors). Plus it will recycle your bath water. But we'd need a very long hose to do that, since the washing machine is in our kitchen.

Last year's price: 228,000 yen. Now on sale for 110,000 yen. Good bargain for our building owner and a great new machine for us.

I can see this week is going to be weird.

Tod, normally a sloth in the morning, was awake and waking me up at 6 am. We've already had coffee, replayed the Jimmy Carter speech for Zoupi, dressed and gone out for breakfast. Tod's at work and I have just received Final Cut Pro from the friendly UPS guy.

I'm overwhelmed. I think I'll go take a nap.

Tod arrived home safely this morning; he rang me from Narita just before I left for day two of the printmaking workshop.

I'm exhausted from making art all day and Tod's tired from his travels, so we're going to sleep now. Zoupi will post about his Swiss adventures tomorrow, so don't forget to check zousan.com.

Tod's leaving for a last-minute business trip tomorrow. He'll be in Zurich for two weeks, in the wake of a big computer outage, interviewing developers and checking systems to make recommendations on ways to avoid similar situations in the future, but basically, he's going to go show off his mad tech mojo and flex his studly problem-solving skills.

I'd like to go along, but I'm not. An economy-class ticket to Zurich is 350,000 yen (about $3,000). It's a great opportunity to see Switzerland and venture out around Europe, but too expensive.

At first, I was disappointed. But now I am looking forward to two weeks of uninterrupted time to edit Hello Tokyo, drink too much coffee and be alone.

So if I'm not answering the phone, my e-mail, or the door, it's because I'm plugged into my video software. Gomen, ne. I'll still blog. Beginning on Sunday, I'll post a daily progress report of the video. I expect that I will have it done by September 7th, when Tod returns.

Yesterday, typhoon #10 blew through Kanto. I was out in it. My 100 yen umbrella turned inside-out twice and bent slightly at the handle, but it kept me from getting entirely soaked, so it did good service.

Today it was perfectly clear and 35 degrees--the hottest day of summer so far. I know it doesn't compare to the horrible heat-wave in Europe, but 35 is plenty hot enough for me.

We holed ourselves up in the living room, turned on the aircon, and watched Princess Mononoke. Twice. First in Japanese with English subtitles, and then again with Neil Gaiman's really excellent dubbed script.

For our second feature we watched Forrest Gump.

LaQua's restaurants include "Bubba Gump Shrimp Company," an American restaurant chain featuring pallid, oversized portions and a Forrest Gump theme. The movie plays on screens throughout the restaurant; the menu is peppered with quotes from the movie; the drinks menu is attached to a ping pong paddle; and to get the attention of the waitstaff, you turn over a sign that says "Stop Forrest Stop." We tried it a few weeks back and Tod revealed that he'd never seen Forrest Gump. I suppose if we return, the theme will make a lot more sense to him.

Although it's a little late to matter, we both think Shawshank Redemption should have won the Academy Award for Best Picture in 1995. Forrest Gump, which won, just doesn't compare.

The hot and humid weather has depressed my appetite; I just don't find food appealing when I'm wilting.

But the idea of cold fruity drinks is appealing, so I went out and bought a blender. It's chrome simplicity is backed with a powerful motor and a lot of blade.

In the last 24 hours, every meal has incorporated some cold, liquidy treat: gaspacho, blueberry yogurt smoothie, kiwi-banana juice (with rum!), banana milkshake...

I'm looking forward to a mostly liquid diet this summer.

It never fails to amaze me how odd the perspective is from the camera. What seems perfectly acceptable to our eyes is too far away and too spread out when viewed through the lens.

So to prepare for a video shoot we were doing yesterday afternoon, I squished the table and chairs as close together as possible. The plant is arranged so that it peeks into the frame; the wooden sculpture is just fully in the frame. The top of the palm extends out.

Pretty much everything in my living room has been moved to the corner of the room. And thought it looks strange to the naked eye, it seems totally normal on tape.

Despite the careful positioning of objects and furniture, I'm not happy with the way the footage turned out. Once we added the people, the framing was OK, but not great. Next time, I'm arranging it all another way. I'm glad my furniture is lightweight.

The cookbooks weren't the only precious things in the box we shipped. We've reunited our CD collection.

We unearthed the last 99 CDs (give or take a dozen) while visiting the US in February. These were the CDs I had with me in Pittsburgh before we moved to Singapore in 1998. Tod shipped his CDs from Chicago, but I preferred to have my computer for my allotted weight.

As Tod unpacked and presented the long-lost music, we both exclaimed our surprise. We haven't seen these things in over five years. Some we thought we had with us. Others we'd both forgotten about completely.

"Oh, yeah, I missed that one. How did we go so long without hearing it?"

"Hey what's this? Did you buy this one?"
"Do we have two copies of that?"

Surprisingly, there are only three CDs that we have duplicates of: G.Love & Special Sauce, Red Hot + Rio, and Squirrel Nut Zippers' Hot!. Free to a good home, just ask.

Here, Tod's examining stack of CDs that includes Holst's The Planets and Sting's Nothing Like the Sun. Our tastes are eccletic. We range from rap to chanting monks, from blues to punk. I like female vocalists; Tod likes jazz; we both like electronica and hip-hop. Most anyone who comes for dinner can find something they like to listen to. And even more so now.

We were up til 2 am, listening and singing along to old favorites (gomen to the neighbors!) and shelving them in alphabetical order. Our collection numbers about 500. Sort of old-fashioned in these days of MP3s, isn't it?

I hosted guests for two weeks but the holiday's over. I now return to my regularly scheduled life.

After we waved goodbye at the train station yesterday morning, I came home and cleaned. The sheets and towels are washed, the futons aired, inevitable clutter is put away. Everything is dusted, shined and tidy. Tod meticulously vacuumed the apartment.

Evidence of guests has been erased.

Except for one final hint. My To Do list is populated with all the things I didn't do for the past half month. Three big projects and a few smaller bits all have sub-tasks and looming deadlines. It seems pretty daunting, but I'll get through it if I drink enough coffee.

Wet Tokyo with visitors isn't too much fun. It's pouring rain and chilly today. We opted to stay in this morning and read books, order in a bento lunch and just relax.

What are we reading?

John: Kiln People by David Brin. Souls can be copied and imprinted onto clay bodies, effectively allowing you to make disposable clones to do all your boring work and mankind's dangerous jobs. A detective story within a detective story to discover what makes a person a person.

Kris: Wind-up Bird Chronicle by Haruki Murakami. Murakami is a contemporary Japanese author whose work is a blend of Tom Robbins and Kurt Vonnegut. This is my favorite of his books--weird occult dreamscapes set to jazz with a mystery to solve as well.

Tod: Lost in a Good Book by Jasper Fforde. Witty British novel and a sequel to The Eyre Affair, about a literary detective, Thursday Next, and her exploits with the LiteraTecs and JurisFiction. It's full of things that made me laugh aloud. Can you beat a book that has Miss Havisham and the Cheshire Cat in the same room?

Me: The Years of Rice and Salt by Kim Stanley Robinson. What if the Chinese took over the world after the plague in the Middle Ages? Told as a series of stories following a group of souls' reincarnations progressing through time. An interesting premise but slow reading.

In contrast to today's slothy agenda, we hope that tomorrow's forecast sunny weather will let us go out to Mt. Takao for a walk.

Last night at dinner, Tod told me that we was going to surprise me with a new computer for my birthday--the dual 1.4MHz G4 I had been eyeing. "But if you're boycotting, I guess that's not really..." he trailed off, disappointed.

But I was ready with an alternate gift. A sewing machine. Not only can I easily buy a really good European or Japanese brand (Bernina, Elna, Husquavarna Viking, Pfaff, Toyota, Juki) but a sewing machine means I can avoid shopping for clothes. I will make trousers that are the right length in colors and styles I like. Sleeves that actually hit at my wrist. Joy!

Now the big decision is whether to get a regular sewing machine or to buy a serger. A serger means I can easily work with knits and knits make me happy because they don't need to be ironed. But a regular sewing machine is a better all-around choice and I can still use it on knits, just not as cleanly.

I am so looking forward to drafting patterns again. It's been a while. I'd better pick up a french curve while I'm getting the sewing machine.

In four days, friends from US will arrive to stay with us for a two week holiday. I'm really looking forward to their visit.

But even though my house is pretty much neat, clean and well organised for daily life, it's a different story when company's coming. Today I made a list of what I need to do before Sunday afternoon, when we haul out to Narita to pick them up:

• air out the spare futons & duvets
• wash the linens
• make room in the pantry for luggage
• stock the fridge
• pay the bills that fall due while they're here
• tie up loose ends with my various projects
• clean Tod's coffee stain off the bathroom wall
• check the supply of toilet paper, soap and coffee filters
• get some extra "outdoor" slippers for the veranda
• get another stool for the veranda

Tod will tell me I'm being silly, but who wants to sleep on musty linens, trip over baggage in the halls or have to run errands for spare toilet paper in the middle of a vacation?

You've probably seen my carpet peeking out in photos on this site. Like here in this picture of my office from November.

It's the most impractical pale beige color. What I really need is something the color of coffee. Because this carpet which started out pristine when we moved in a year ago is now mottled with little coffee splashes.

Despite attempts to clean them up, those coffee blips and blops have worked their way into the carpet and show up as tiny circular shadows. Coffee pastilles, pale cocoa sprinkles on cappucino foam. Scars of clumsy morning walks through the hall.

Today is a sunny contrast to yesterday's windy, snowy weather. Everyone has their things hanging out to dry--umbrellas, futon, washing of all sorts.

I've done my sheets and they are now blowing about in the breeze off my veranda. They'll take next to no time to dry, even though the sun is going in and out behind the clouds. I do hope they don't blow off into the neighbor's garden or onto the train tracks below. Should probably go pin them down with the giant plastic clamps I use.

When I hung them, I made a tactical error. I didn't notice the layer of grime on the railing until after I'd laid the sheets over it. I should have figured it would be there. Normally, I clean the railings weekly, but it's been over a month and they are pretty gritty. I forgot to do them yesterday when I did the rest of the dusting.

My sheets are going to have little lines of dirt on them. Oh, well.

Five years ago when we left the US, we packed up our stuff for storage. We only expected to be gone for six months, so we weren't too picky about sorting through it.

Today, we went through almost 50 boxes of our things at the warehouse. 11 went back into storage; 10 boxes of dishes, towels and other kitchen stuff went to Maureen, and 26 boxes of random things (books, a printer, more books, clothes) went to charity. Doesn't add up to 50 does it? That's because the rest was trash. :-)

There sure was a lot of natsukashii in all those boxes, but I'm happy that our things are being put to use by someone who needs them.

Related? Maybe.....

Shortly before the end of the year, we replaced our coffee maker. The old one was starting to act up--probably due to four maintenance-free years of service--and we decided that it was probably easier and cheaper to replavce it than to try to fix it.

So we bought a new Phillips 12-cup coffee maker. Compared to our old 6-cup model, it's gigantic. Tod says I don't have to brew a full pot, but how can I not? Coffee is great stuff. I've gone from a modest one and a half mugs of coffee every day to 3 whole mugs. I'm just a little hyper now. O so productive!

We also picked up a thermal carafe. Directly after the coffee's brewed I pour it into the carafe and it's still hot (and more importantly not burned) when Tod wakes up several hours later.

So our home coffee life is improved and I'm getting more done than usual.

We varied a bit from our usual Christmas routine of work-shop-pizza. This year I cooked dinner. Nothing terribly difficult, a nice beef stroganoff paired with a variation on a beet and goat cheese salad from Epicurious and our favorite Tintara Shiraz. They were delicious; definitely recipes I'll make again.

As usual, I sent Tod to work with a tray full of cookies, then collected him from the office at about 5:30. We headed off to Shinjuku to do our Christmas shopping then came home by about 8:30, wrapped presents and dined.

When Tod leaves for work, there is no evidence of the holiday. When he arrives home, the living room is unveiled in all its do-it-yourself Christmas glory. For the past few years, I've been making the holiday tree out of found objects; this year I planned ahead a bit and bought some shiny things. This year's tree was made of three bamboo poles, some glitter-coated plastic snowflakes, beads, and two spotlights.

As you can see, there are a lot of presents under the tree. We received a 25 pound box from Tod's parents on Christmas Eve. I always feel like there's way too much for us and I want to share with others. Our haul of Christmas goodies includes books, music, warm clothes, toys, 18 pounds of candy (all from that 25 pound box!), and my favorite present--a technicolor fur collar from Tod. The books and candy will get shared around with friends but I'm not passing around my furry bit. :-)

After putting away all the newly unwrapped gifts, we finished off the festivities at midnight with a slice of Christmas cake in bed. It's a simple sponge cake filled with peaches and whipped cream and top with more whipped cream and strawberries--surprisingly light and delicious.

I was exhausted from my busy day of cooking, decorating and shopping. After the cake, I dropped off to sleep in about 46 seconds. I hardly even managed two pages of my new novel...

After sleeping in a bit and taking are of household chores, it was about 2:30 yesterday afternoon when I got around to thinking about breakfast. Even with our odd schedule, 2:30 is pretty late. So I decided to skip breakfast and lunch and head straight for dinner.

At 3:30 we were sitting down to a nice crispy rosti, fresh green peas, chicken smothered in carmelised onions, and a salad. By 4:30 dinner was done and the kitchen cleaned. It was like a Sunday dinner at Grandmoms' house.*

(* in case you are wondering, the apostrophe is in the correct place there--my grandmothers shared an apartment for over 20 years.)

Normally, Tod & I dine at a Continental hour--somewhere between 8:00 and 10:00 pm. After dinner, my energy has ebbed and the day is over for me. I might do a little work on my back-burner projects, catch up on personal e-mail, play on the 'Net, or I might just rest.

So when we decided to go out after dinner yesterday to buy a new coffee maker, it seemed like a midnight excursion. But it was only 6:00. We shopped, rented two movies, returned home before 8 and spent the rest of the night on caffeinated entertainment. And went to bed at about 1:30!

Today Tokyo is grey, wet and cold. It's the sort of day that makes me long for a fireplace, an interesting book and a bottle of really nice wine.

Instead of cuddling by a fire, Tod & I braved the rain and went grocery shopping. Not that we had a huge choice, really. I suppose I could have managed to cook a meal from the pantry but it wouldn't have had any vegetables.

Now we are well stocked with food for the rest of the long weekend (Monday is the Emperor's birthday) so if the misreable weather continues, we can build a blanket tent in the living room, read by flashlight, and make short forays for salad and soup.

But if the weather is nice tomorrow, we're taking the Zous to the zoo.

Can't be bothered to form sentences. Woke at 10:00. Made eggs benedict at noon; read The Zope Book for a while. Took a nap on the sofa while Tod finished reading The Diagnosis. Woke up and made a small batch of cookies at 4:00. Took a bath; put pajamas back on. Had a nap from 6:30 - 8:30.

Now waiting for vegetable curry and croquettes to be delivered. With all the napping today, I expect to stay up late again, so maybe will get a head start on tomorrow's work and rescue this day from being a truly "do nothing" day. Or not.

The gifts were ordered days ago; now we've finished the cards, except for stamps & mailing. Holiday obligations are now officially out of the way.

There's still osouji, the Japanese end of year cleaning marathon, to complete, but that will wait until closer to the end of the month. I have a very short list of things to take care of this year. Fix the squeaking hinge on the pantry door; clean out and wipe down the kitchen cabinets; tidy up the container garden; and give the veranda furniture a good scrubbing. Piece of cake.

My grandmother frequently laundered her curtains. Every couple of months she's strip the windows, wash the curtains wipe the windows and rehang the curtains. As a kid, this mystified me. As a young adult, I considered it an old-fashioned housekeeping practice, one that was meant for women who stayed at home without a career. I grew up in a house that didn't launder its curtains every three months. In a tidy house is curtain washing really necessary?

Yes. Yes, it is. When we moved last February, I washed the floor to ceiling (very high ceiling) sheers that I had custom made for the old house. They had 18 months of accumulated dust on them. They smelled bad. It took two washes to get them clean. I rehemmed them, put them in our new living room and forgot to wash them.

Something reminded me yesterday and I stripped the windows and washed the curtains. What a difference. Not only are the curtains cream-colored again (instead of a slightly dingy grey) but the living room smells fresher. My grandmother had the right idea, didn't she?

These days, I balance a life of career and homemaking. My office is ten steps from the laundry (it's true, I just checked) so it's easy to keep up on washing. I take breaks from writing or image editing to clean windows or sweep the veranda. It's a balance that I like. Now I just need to put "wash curtains" in my To Do list a little more often. Early March should be about right...

Every once in a while we'll rent a handful of films and watch them one after another. This weekend was Akira (newly released on DVD with a new million dollar soundtrack), Chocolat, What's Eating Gilbert Grape, and Shawshank Redemption. Not a bad one in the bunch.

So there was planty of input this weekend, but not much output. Must get back to a productive schedule tomorrow!

Following the chain from Arsenic, I'm giving a tour of my office this morning.

1. The equipment rack. Topped by an unused PowerMac 7300, the docking station for Tod's laptop, speakers and some CD blanks. I'd rather have some plants here...

2. The partially broken fax machine and the working printer. Below you can see a hint of our server and my G4 tower.

3. My desk, complete with the ever-present green coffee cup. My LCD monitor sits on a cardboard box to prevent me from slouching too much. My chair sports a fleece throw to keep my legs warm.

4. The video camera. It's sitting there because I still haven't finished capturing the video I shot in September. I've got about 2 hours of tape to go.

5. The veranda. I have the blinds closed in an attempt to make the photo less glare-y. I love the veranda; it's an extension of the office. That's my treasured Royal Fan palm in the left hand corner.

6. The tea station. In the afternoons, when I've finished the coffee, I make pots of tea with this hot water pot. My office is so narrow that it's within arm's reach. Very convenient but I have to be careful when I water the philodendron as it has a tendency to leak all over the tea station.

7. Art supplies. Neatly packed in tin and aluminum boxes, I have paper, paints, brushes and printing supplies. I hardly ever use them anymore, though the small red and black canvas on top of this rack is my summer painting project. I think I will paint over it for winter.

8. The Zous. They are sitting on my credenza where they like to kibitz while I work. They have not yet solved the IE 6 alignment problem, but maybe I'll set them to work on it today. Sama says he'd rather go to the zoo...

Trying to stay away from teh computer is a challenge for us. We spent our weekend trying to stay out of the office. Except for a three hour stint playing Bookworm (Tod kibbitzed and I did the typing), we did pretty well.

One way we passed the time was by watching endless movies: Monsters, Inc.; Rated X (called King of Porno in Japanese); Girl, Interrupted; Rear Window; A.I.

I really liked Rated X. Emilio Estevez directed this film about the Mitchell brothers, two entrepreneurial pornographic filmmakers. There was plenty of nudity & sex (always a plus) but the story focused on the relationship between the brothers. I loved the way the film incorporated porno cuts (bad edits), weird continuity and the canted and rotating camerawork that you sometimes see in porn films. Rated X is set over 30 years from the early 60s to the early 90s and the period sets and costumes were impressively acurate in detail.

The worst film of the bunch was A.I. Man, it was bizarre. Spielberg and Kubrick collaborated on this project for decades and it looks like they kept making concessions to one another. "OK, Stanley, you can keep your signature toilet scene but I have to have a cute, animated talking toy." The acting was choppy and sometimes unmotivated and the film would have been better off ending about 20 minutes before it did.

So the movies kept us off the computer most of the time, but we ended up checking IMDB after every one. I love reading the goofs and trivia...

Tod & I have just returned from a trip to our local ER. He gashed his hand while washing (and breaking) a glass before coming to bed. The cut wasn't horrible, but it was deep and bloody enough to require more than our home first aid kit to handle.

So I got dressed, we bundled into a taxi, explained our predicament and ended up at a nearby hospital which was quite challenging to enter. l'm glad this wasn't a serious emergency. All the gates were closed and when we followed the ambulance route, the entrance doors were closed there, too! A side door with a buzzer brought a guard who led us into a hall with a bank-teller window where a nurse and an orderly summoned the doctor on call.

It was the quietest emergency room I've ever seen. Everyone who needed to deal with us, from the doctor to the clerk who took our money, had to be summoned specially. The pharmacist got a wake-up call to get us antibiotics.

Now it's time for us to go to bed!

Because there are big chunks of time when Tod is awake while I'm sleeping, every morning I look around the house to see what's changed. Sometimes I get a very clear picture of what's gone on while I rested.

For example, if I peek into the sink and find a wooden bowl dusted with a bit of salt, I know Tod had a snack while he was working. If I check in the rubbish bin, I'll probably see the packaging for his favorite pepper-coated popcorn.

Earlier this week, I was out of the house for nearly 24 hours. When I came in the next morning, I saw Tod's sneakers at the door. Not his usual work shoes. He was in bed in a t-shirt. Not his usual pajamas. His laptop was near the bed. I concluded (correctly) that he hadn't gone into the office the day before.

This morning's clues have me confused. Two square zabuton floor pillows are on the sofa. Tod must have been lying down in the living room and using them to prop up his head. The pocket door between the kitchen and hall is partly closed.

I wonder what was going on last night?

I was feeling edgy and distracted until I decided to start throwing things away this afternoon. I pulled 140 litres of useless, outdated and no longer desired kipple out of the kitchen, genkan, and pantry closets, 70 litres from my office and I'm about to start in on the bedroom. I'm not sure how all this junk accumulates, but it does.

I definitely do feel better with less stuff. I would love to pare down to only the things I use at least once a month. It's not possible, since there are too many seasonal and archival things, but it's a good goal.

It's a cool and rainy day; typhoon 16 is to our south, battering Okinawa, and typhoon 17 is heading our way from the east. The perfect day to stay at home and clear out some of our books and other junk.

I've read everything we have, excepting Tod's programming reference books which just don't hold my attention. So it's time to get some new books, but no new books in before we get some old books out. Check out the list at Being A Broad's Sayonara Sale bulletin board. Bye bye, books!

Other stuff has been accumulating at a steady rate, even though I try hard to live by the "one in, one out" rule. I have some new clothes this week, but I haven't gotten rid of any yet, so I must do that today.

Surreality 1: MJ & I met with a would-be actress who was representing a production company. She took us to a temple to meet with the producer. We sat in the middle of a gorgeous tatami room surrounded by worshippers chanting. The producer didn't appear. We booked out of there before we could be initiated into whatever weird cult this might be...

Surreality 2: I had MJ's in-law's over for dinner. And her husband and his brother and their bandmate and their bandmates's bandmate. Excepting MJ, none of them speaks much English. The conversation was pretty wild. We all laughed a lot at one another. (L to R: Kazu ("sexless drummer"), Shingo (rockabilly bassist), Masaki, Mum & Auntie)

Surreality 3: While trying to identify a multi-legged insect (does this bug look familar to you?), discovered that the male platypus is venomous.

There's a stranger sleeping on my living room floor. Mike Lee went the same school as one of our friends. He was passing through Tokyo and needed a place to stay. Our living room seemed the logical choice.

It's good to meet and host people you don't know but who have some sort of connection to you. You never know exactly what you'll get but it's always interesting and an opportunity to learn things. Last night, Mike was talking about his (now defunct) business venture and introduced me to the concept of Extreme Programming. It's lots of best practices rolled into one philosphy and rigorously followed. I'm looking forward to learning more about it; I think it will be useful to some of the projects I'm working on.

For several months, I've been hoping to get out of town to take a walk in the woods. On Friday night, Tod asked me to pick a good trip from our Day Walks Near Tokyo book. I was delighted. We'd go on Sunday.

But yesterday morning the edge of a typhoon tormented us with rain, so we decided on a more urban adventure--Yokohama's Chinatown. After eating lunch, we headed out, but neither of us was really up for it. Halfway to the station, I looked at Tod and made him confess that he didn't really want to go and was just doing it to please me (what a sweetie). But I was tired and didn't want to go, either!

So instead we walked to the video store, rented some movies, bought snacks for dinner and went home. Not quite the day we'd envisioned, but it was nice to relax.

Tod has been "working London hours" for the past week. Because he needs to communicate with his colleagues in London, he stays up late working at home til 2 or 3 am, then gets up at 10, works a little more from home and heads into the office at about noon or 1 pm. He heads home for a dinner break at around 7, and spends the rest of the night working.

He is a night person so this is an ideal schedule for him. I'm quite the opposite. Give me a morning and I'll get things done. By the time Tod's waking up, I've accomplished plenty on my To Do list but by 3:00, I usually want to stop.

When he started this (he's always up late working, but now the office let's him arrive late, so he sleeps late, too), I didn't think it would really make any difference to my schedule, since we don't interact too much during the day anyway. But it does. I seem to be staying up later myself, though I get up at my usual time. I need to adjust myself to this new routine, though I don't know exactly how...

Today is the first day of our 5th year in Japan.

In other words, we celebrated our 4th Japan anniversary yesterday. We had dinner at a posh restaurant with a view and I dressed up because it was a good excuse. Dressing up is fun and far too infrequent. I suppose if I were always jetting off to film premieres and other fancy dress events, I'd learn to hate it, but as it is, I like doing my hair, swiping on some lipstick and feeling fabulous.

Fabulous has its downside, too. As we were walking home, a fat pimply man stepped in front of us, turned around and started walking backwards so that he could look me over top to toe. I glared at him and after a few steps, he turned away. The incident wasn't threatening, but it was a bit unusual. Maybe that's a taste of what it's like to be famous.

Yesterday's fun all involved Zoupi. (You can meet him at Zousan.com) After completing his photoshoot for "Where's Zoupi?", he packed up and headed off to Belgium where he'll be vacationing and enjoying a homestay in Heverlee.

How is it that Zoupi gets a holiday but I don't? I'm not sure, but at least his airfare was affordable--only 870 yen to Belgium via first class airmail.

We priced air travel for an August vacation for us humans. A round trip to the States with a few stops along the way came in at a whopping 198,000 yen (about $1,650) per person. Work committments forced us to cancel our trip, but maybe that's not so bad--it will cost half as much in September or October.

//rant on//

The Japanese real estate system is exceedingly frustrating. With Tod soon unemployed, we'll need to change our housing lease. Currently it is in the company name; now it will need to be in our name. That shouldn't be such a big deal since we have ample funds to cover the rent through the end of the contract.

But it looks like this is going to be a headache of massive proportions. The landlord doesn't like unemployed tenants. They'd prefer to deal with employer-held contracts. I'm not sure what they can do if we continue paying the rent...kick us out? On what grounds?

In addition to that issue, there's the trouble of a guarantor. Personal leases require a guarantor who is willing to disclose all of their financial details to the realtor and to vouch for us. It's like having Dad co-sign your first mortgage.

Guarantors aren't just for foreigners or first time renters. All renters who have leases in their names have guarantors. At what point are the Japanese allowed to become fiscally responsible adults? Maybe never.

//rant off//

If presented with a dilemma--follow your job to Singapore or become unemployed in Japan--what would you choose?

We've decided on unemployment. In about 30 days, the door closes on the current chapter of Tod's wage earning. It's a little bit scary, but it presents a million possibilities for new directions and challenges so it's exciting, too.

In the past, we've leapfrogged over one another when we change jobs. So I guess it's my turn to go earn bread! Anyone interested in hiring a writer/filmmaker, please e-mail me. :-)

Middle of the Night Delinquency

"I am seriously wigged out," Tod wrote to a friend on IRC at 3:20 this morning."Kristen and her friend MJ went out to the convenience store about an hour and 20 minutes ago (it is a 5 minute walk) and they are not back yet. There is no sign of them anywhere. I went to the convenience store and asked if they had been there...the guy remembered seeing them but offered no clues.They were just going for some cigarettes and breakfast foods. They were wearing their pajamas! They decided to go on a 'pajama run' to get smokes for MJ."

We did go to the conbini in our PJs and planned to come right home, but the all-night billiards hall beckoned. We played five games (MJ won all but one) and before we realised it, the sun was rising to the sound of birdsong. Poor Tod was home fretting about where we could have gone in our pajamas.

"I could imagine them going to an all-night ramen place or something under normal circumstances... but not in pajamas. Most places around here are closed at this hour. The pajama run was a 'well come on with me before you go to sleep' kind of thing but maybe they figured I would be asleep and not worry about them. MJ is kind of a wild child, brings our Kristen's party side."

I was very contrite when we returned and found Tod still awake and so worried. He & MJ had egg on toast then I fell asleep and MJ went home. A silly drama with a happy ending.

My lucky husband got a ticket to tomorrow's US-Germany World Cup game in Ulsan, Korea. What a great chance! He's got a full day ahead of him with two flights, a reservation for a seat at a pub to watch the afternoon's game (England-Brazil) being played in Japan, then a taxi to the stadium for the match.

I'll be watching on TV, hoping to see his face in the crowd. Tune in at 20:30 JST and see if you can find him. :-)

What a beautiful day. It's sunny, warm and not too humid. The perfect backdrop for a do-nothing Sunday. I've been reading, napping, and watching movies. I think I'll go for a walk soon and pick up some veggies to grill tonight.

Yesterday's task: build a container for the grill accessories. There's nothing worse than a soggy cardboard box full of charcoal and tools scattered all over the veranda.

I designed and built a simple table with a shelf and a door panel that's hinged along the bottom. The charcoal, blowtorch and other things are hidden behind the door. The upper shelves can be used for trays of food.

Working on this brought back lots of memories of doing woodwork with my father. He had a little shop in the basement and from the time I was 12 or so, I had my own tools. We built bookshelves, mainly, and also my childhood desk which was 8 feet long and 12 feet high. My bedroom had high ceilings and an excessive quantity of books!

I should be polishing an article that's due, but I'm distracted by the number of things on my desk. Here's an inventory:

1. laptop
   
2. scan converter
   
3. digital camera
   
4. DV camera remote
   
5. telephone
   
6. memo holder
   
7. file box full of notebooks and maps
   
8. keyboard
   
9. wacom tablet
   
10. flatpanel monitor on top of cardboard box
    
11. card file
    
12. four dictionaries
    
13. wooden puzzle box used as bookend for dictionaries
    
14. manekineko figurine
    
15. keitai charging cradle
    
16. mug full of pens
    
17. mug empited of coffee
    
18. glass of water
    
19. calendar
    
20. desk lamp
    
21. audio CD
    
22. empty case of data CD
    
23. mini DV tapes (2)
    
24. file folder with credit card statements
    
25. book Tod finished reading yesterday
    
26. notepad and pen
    
27. bank statements to be filed
    

I think that before I can get down to completing this article, I must tidy my workspace!

My kitchen sings a symphony of morningtime domesticity.

The watery swish and thump of the washer sets the tempo for an 18 minute concerto. The coffemakers clucks and chirps melodiously. The psst of spray cleaner on the countertop, whisper of sponge, and the legato smoothness of water from the tap join in the chorus. The tinkle of last night's late night glassware set in the drainer accompanies the mellow clunk of ceramic mugs ready for the finale.

Just before the washer ends the program with a shrill warning beep, the coffemaker gives its highly anticipated solo performance in a last, throaty boil and the mugs beat a one-two timpani as they are set down for filling.

Tod's new toy--a blowtorch. It's the perfect partner for our grill. Although it looks like he might be about to scorch the swordfish he's cooking for our dinner, really the blowtorch is just for lighting the charcoal.

This is a cleverly designed device. It's a torch head that fits onto a standard "gas bombe" canister. That makes is very convenient for refueling since you can buy canisters of compressed gas at every convenience store. The torch uses it up pretty quickly (about 35 minutes of wicked-hot flaming per can) but if you're just lighting a fire, it lasts for quite a few grilling sessions.

No doubt the blowtorch could be used for other things, but so far it's just our grill-lighter. Maybe I'll experiment this weekend with some creme brulee or lampwork beads.

5 am. A cat is crying outside. Its wails echo through the neighborhood.

My dark, sleepy mind conjures a sad scenario--a young cat, abandoned by its owners, stuck in the gully where the Marunouchi line runs, unable to climb out. The trains haven't begun for the day. I imagine phoning 119 to report this. Then wonder if they would help. What would I say? I think of words in Japanese. They don't really make much sense.

The wailing become hoarse as the cat continues to seek help.

I rise from my bed and step out onto the balcony. The source of the crying is a block or two away, and low. Maybe on the tracks. Maybe on the streets above the tracks. But I am not dressed for the morning's grey drizzle and I step back inside and close the door.

Should I have gone to save the cat? Later, after coffee and a shower, the trains are bringing commuters from the suburbs. I don't hear the cat again.

<kuri> devin, my mother would like a hint about what to get you for your BD.

<devin> oh, ok... um...

<lyd> elephant beer steins

<Nemix> elephants would be good as a beer stein.

<lyd> filled with Stein's elephant beer

<devin> hmmm

<devin> a pair of shorts

<devin> or a book

<lyd> or a short pair of books

<kuri> the ultimate gift being a pair of short books about beer and elephants.

<lyd> heh

<devin> yeah!

<devin> by a man named stein

My mother's creativity comes through again in this pair of diminutive books. Inside are six tiny beer bottles and a china elephant. The end papers are decorated with elephants and beer steins, and the covers are made of mulberry paper. Would you guess that Mom's a master of theatrical props?

The gift box also contained two pairs of shorts. Mom's whimsy is tempered with praticality.

Today is Tod's birthday (his 33rd, though he swears he's only 31) and we have many festivities planned--mainly involving food.

First up, an American breakfast with eggs, bacon and toast to celebrate and to fortify for the day ahead. Then a cake to be decorated and other birthday surprises to be taken care of. Perhaps we'll take a walk after lunch, or watch a movie. Friends are coming for dinner; they're making lasagne, so I just have to do the appetizers, salad and bread before they arrive.

I think I'll go start the bacon...