So I know the Cute Counselor is no longer interested in me. However, I did give what she had told me some thought. For example, I used to have a more interesting wardrobe. It was probably at its most interesting when I was in high school and has been on a steady decline ever since. When I was in high school, I used to wear a lot of vintage items. I used to go to second-hand shops looking for interesting, yet cheap (as I was a broke-ass high school student), things to wear. In Florida, it's kind of hard to dress interestingly though because it's so hot and humid all the damn time. I lived for cooler weather. Anyway, as time went by I started shopping more and more at the malls, and now I pretty much only buy clothes at chain stores (ex: Gap, Old Navy, Uniqlo).

For now I'm kind of stuck with what I've got as far as my outside of work wardrobe goes. I'm still trying to save up to pay off my student loans during the break. Once that's done, I think I'm going to get back into vintage style, make it less bummy/more dressy while I'm at it. It's not too difficult to do here in Japan, there are so many used clothing stores. The catch is that it's quite expensive, easily more expensive than going to Uniqlo. I can get a head start by going to some shops back home when I visit for the break. At the same time, I might as well clear out my closets and donate that stuff to Goodwill.

Heck, I need to clean out my room too. I have way too much junk. One step at a time, let me start with my unused clothes. Yeah, that sounds like a good plan for the break.

Back to making things more dressy, I have been checking out what some of my colleagues (both Japanese and foreigners) wear to their classes. Pretty bland stuff, usually khakis (or even jeans) and either a polo or button-down shirt sans tie. If they wear a suit, it's usually a cheap, ill-fitting one. I haven't been wearing suits, mine don't fit well either. (must. lose. weight.) However, I have started wearing dressier slacks and shirts (with a tie). Now that it's cool I've also been wearing a blazer. I like dressing up a bit when the weather will allow. When it starts getting hot and humid again I'll probably have to go back down to khakis & polo shirts myself. Oh well. *sigh*

My last class just now, aka "the robots". The material this week was a little better, but with the crap weather (cold and rainy) I feared the worst. They somehow pleasantly surprised me by being quite upbeat and talkative (in English no less, lol) today.

But still, I feel myself getting into a rut again. I need to snap out of it. I know what I can do, I'm just so f-ing lazy.

For example, my typical day at work has loads of free time. I spend most of that time just playing on the internet. I do make some decent lesson plans, but if I would just put in just a little more time and effort I could come up with some great ones. Also, I could be studying Japanese. While it's something that I don't really want to do, it is something that I need to do (at least if I want to improve my odds of getting a better job here in Japan).

Then once I get home I have two other things that I could should be doing: practicing the sax and exercising. I've been ok about the sax, putting together a decent practice here and there. I just need to be more consistent and also play some new stuff. I've been trying to get my chops back playing stuff that I had played in university. I should get some new pieces just to mix things up a bit. They don't need to be harder, just different. Heck, maybe they need to be easier because I'm not as good as I used to be, and it has been frustrating making mistakes with that stuff when I knew it inside/out back in the day.

Exercising I've been REALLY slack on. Last year when I was really into the gym, I noticed a big difference both physically and mentally. I need to get back into that bigtime. I don't feel a need to relieve stress at all - for real, this job is the most laid-back thing ever AND compare that to the elementary school where ms. you-know-who was on my case all the time. However, I AM out of shape. My clothes don't fit as well as they used to. I think I will stop by the gym after work tomorrow (it's raining today, and the gym is a bit far) and see what the membership plans are like. Actually, there's a big gym close to Shizuoka station. I was planning on heading downtown for a bit anyway. I think I'll stop by that one before I head on home.

And my trip (did I mention I was taking a little trip?) was a bust this past weekend, but I'm actually in a pretty good mood.

To recap:
Friday - classes were better than expected. (The text was an especially boring unit imo, but the kids had a lot of fun with it, go figure.) After work, I went with a colleague for a quick round of drinks and a bite to eat at an izakaya. Then I went downtown and picked up a new blazer and pair or pants. Finally went to the foreigner bar for a couple more drinks, chatted up the waitresses for a bit and then went home.

Saturday - I was supposed to go to Osaka/Kyoto to meet a Japanese friend who has just returned to Japan after living in the USA for a while. However, she e-mailed to say that she felt sick, possibly the flu, and couldn't make it. It was raining all day here as well so I just stayed in and watched some videos. Among them, I watched The Godfather again. Pretty good flick, but I don't know if it is the #2 movie of all time (according to the IMDB).

Sunday - Did some laundry, oh and Tootsie was on one of the HD movie channels so I watched it. Great performances from Hoffman and Murray. That movie is A LOT better than I remembered. Then again, the last time I saw it, I was in junior high school and it was the edited-for-TV version. Still didn't quite dig the ending though. Anyway, then CV came over and we hung out for a bit. We had dinner at an izakaya downtown and then went to a party. It was pretty cool but with work the next day, didn't really want to get too crazy.

So now I'm in the office about to go look over my stuff for today. But first...

Riding the bus in the rain today, I thought about the car once again. Today the commute wasn't too bad. However, doing that during the rainy season was not my idea of fun. I'm planning on being at this university for another 2 years. After that, I dunno. If I can find some sort of tenured instructor position somewhere, I might consider staying in Japan. Otherwise I'm probably going to head home and try to find work at a community college/Intensive English Program, that is, if the economy isn't still in the gutter. Anyway, back to the car. If I'm here for 2 more years, I would get enough use out of a car to make it a worthwhile purchase. Nothing fancy, just a cheap used car that's easy on the gas. Then my other friend was like "You should get a wagon or even a mini-van. That way, if you stay in Japan but move somewhere else, you can use it to haul some of your junk over there." Interesting idea, I think I'll check into it.

Alright, enough procrastinating time to do a little work.

Got up early, dragged my feet through my morning routine. Remembered that my class today isn't until this afternoon, went even slower. Eventually showed up for work. Met some other teachers in the lab, shot the breeze with them for a bit. Went up with them to another lab to check out some new computer software. On the way there, I found 2 USB keyboards in the rubbish bin, one with a built-in USB hub. I took them as I would like to use one with my PS3. I'm using the one with the built-in HUB right now. It was a bit of a pain to get it to work with this computer. It is a Japanese keyboard and Windows kept thinking it was an English keyboard. I did all the IME stuff and still nothing (for example, on a Japanese keyboard, the @ is the key next to the P where on an English keyboard it's [shift]+2). I had to install a driver, now it's ok. Well not 100% ok, the built-in hub is a bit wonky - maybe that's why it was in the rubbish bin. At least the keyboard layout is reading correctly now. It is also more comfortable than the one that came with this PC. So yeah, doing all that did give me a bit of a headache. I downed a couple Tylenol and had a cup of coffee.

This past weekend was pretty crazy. Went out drinking with a co-worker Friday night. We hit it pretty hard. In addition to the beers, we also split a bottle of shochu between us. Still, we managed to make it downtown and met up with CV and her friend. We went to the wine bar for a little taste then went to a foreigner bar. The foreigner bar was quite dead though. That was pretty disappointing. To top it all off, I got really sleepy. After a couple hours of that, we left.

Saturday I woke up late, did housework all day and then there was a little get together for CV. Her birthday is today actually. Oh I also bought her a little cashmere sweater-dress at the GAP for her birthday. We had a little karaoke party. That was fun. I killed my voice though.

Sunday was spent recuperating from Friday and Saturday.

In other news, my last few sax practices have been decent. I am not quite satisfied with the sound of the set-up on this horn though. It just sounds so... generic. I definitely need to get some new mouthpieces, at least 2: one for classical and one for jazz. My fingers are still out of sync too, I just feel so clumsy. Despite my gripes, I am having a lot of fun with it though. I need to get into an ensemble. Maybe the university's wind orchestra wouldn't mind if I sat in with them from time to time. I'd also like to get some people together to play in a quartet. Speaking of sax, I thought more about bringing my baritone saxophone from home - while it needs an overhaul, it is a Yamaha and what better place to get it overhauled than right here in Yamaha-land?

Oh and speaking of bringing stuff over, I also looked into bringing over my car. I wasn't too concerned with the whole driver's side being reversed thing, I've seen a number of cars with the same layout here. However, it's SO expensive. Nevermind. It would basically cost more than the car is actually worth. I do want to get a car though. I was just thinking about how cool it would be to go fishing! The beach really isn't that far away. It's just a pain in the ass to bring even a tiny amount of gear on a bicycle. So yeah, I'm also leaning towards just paying half of my loans off during winter break and getting a head start on the car.

There is a yakitori joint down the block from my apartment. It's a hole in the wall with ambiance. Good eats, good drinks, owner knows my name - nice place.

I just had a rather lousy practice. I guess I had my hopes up after listening to all that jazz yesterday and pretty much every waking moment afterward. Tone was pretty good, but fingers and chops were all outta whack, completely uncoordinated. I felt so clumsy. I knew what I wanted to play and I could hear it in my head, just couldn't get all the other pieces parts lined up. *sigh*

So yeah, if the sax girl calls tell her I had to pawn my sax to settle a debt to the yakuza or something.

I was really looking forward to this practice too. I think that also had something to do with it. Hmmm....

In other news, I had two real strong cravings today that were quite a challenge to resist. As I was wrapping things up in the office this afternoon I had a real strong craving for a cup of coffee. I was just like:
"Man, that would just taste so good right about now!"
But I held fast. One thing would lead to another and before you know it, my sleep patterns are wrecked once again. Then later I saw a co-worker at the train station, we chatted for a bit and he looked like he was about to ask me to grab a round of drinks at the pub. Then the thought flashed
"If he doesn't suggest it, I will."
Then I was like
"No! Don't do it! You're trying to cut back on alcohol, remember?"
That beer would have really hit the spot too. Heh, I'm in my apartment now wondering why I don't just go across the street for a bottle or two. No. I'm going to make dinner, watch a video, and that'll be the end of it.

Oh, but the weather was absolutely gorgeous today. I took my classes outside for a few minutes to do an "observation" exercise - got them to write down everything they could see and hear. They seemed to enjoy it, the mood was certainly lighter once we returned to the classroom.

Anyway, I'm going to get over this bad practice. I haven't been practicing regularly so this is pretty much payback for that. I need to play a little every day. Yeah.

Just finished up a long weekend. It was rather mundane for the most part. A few interesting tidbits stood out though.

Friday night I went with a friend to a wine bar in downtown Shizuoka. Pretty cool little joint. While it wasn't really a dress-up place, I did feel a little out of place in my shorts, t-shirt and sandals. I definitely want to check out that place again, maybe even become a regular.

Saturday I did domestic things all day - laundry, house cleaning, watched some videos (I liked Terminator 4 btw, I don't know what the bad reviews are all about). Then went out with a friend for yakitori at that place near my apartment.

Sunday for whatever reason I started to feel a little glum. Couldn't figure it out. Nice weather, no problems that I can think of, just felt rather blah. I didn't even make it out to my friend's birthday party that night. I guess it would have been good just to get out and try to snap out of it. I just couldn't be bothered though.

Yesterday I went to a jazz festival with CV at the Shimizu S-Pulse Dream Plaza. That was pretty cool. Great weather, good music, I even had me a few imported beers and some boiled peanuts. I hate to nitpick btw, but the jazz vocalists - great voices but their pronunciation was SO bad. ("When I FERU in RABU UIZU you..." ugh.) I talked with a few of the musicians here and there. One of the jazz saxophonists teaches at a high school in my neighborhood! She actually goes to the yakitori joint near my place occasionally. We talked shop for a bit and she was like "We should have a jam session sometime!" I was like "Yeah! Sounds good!" on the outside but I was really thinking "Let me get in a few months' worth of practice and I'll think about it" - lol.

But yeah, the jazz festival got me really pumped up about playing jazz again. I actually can't wait for work to be over today so I can go home and practice. (note to self: in my free time today I should probably download and print out some stuff to practice.) Oh and one of the big bands there didn't have a baritone saxophone. I don't know if they don't have anyone at all to play the part, or that person was just absent at this performance. I mean heck, if they don't have one I can bring my bari back with me over the break and jump right in. They were an amateur group, about as good as my high school jazz band - heck they played one of the charts (almost as good as ^_^) we did! Now that I think about it, I didn't see ANY baritone saxophones at this thing! Most of the groups were small combos, the saxes they did have were alto & tenor. Thing is, my bari needs an overhaul and it would be a tremendous pain in the ass to get it from Orlando to Shizuoka. Well, maybe I just need to get it from Orlando to Narita then I can kuroneko it to my place in Shizuoka. Hmmm...

Well one of my classes this morning just got canceled. For the semester. Sweet. One less thing to plan for. I do need to use the time constructively though. The typhoon got me out of work mode and as such I didn't plan a few classes. I guess I'd better go do that now.

Got some classes then long weekend. I totally forgot this was a long weekend too. My weekend plans look like this:

Saturday - gotta do laundry, it had been raining for about a week straight until the typhoon passed through. I need to buy groceries. Also gotta clean up the apartment. I'd gotten a bit slack on the housekeeping since classes started back up again.

Sunday - a friend is having a birthday party Sunday night. Until then I don't have much to do. I'd like to go somewhere and take advantage of the nice weather.

Monday - day off, I suppose recuperating from the party will be in order but I don't anticipate drinking much/at all at the party - did I mention I was getting a bit tired of alcohol and wanted to cut back?

Heck, maybe I'll visit some used car lots and see what's going on. I haven't done much in the way of exercise at all lately. I need to hop on the bike and ride around. I've been taking the bus to work due to the bad weather. I need to start biking to work again.

I just realized that the longer I wait, the possibility increases of the technology items I want to buy with my funding getting cheaper/having better specs. I don't need anything right now. Perhaps I'll just wait until towards the end of the funding period and then buy. Too bad the funding doesn't carry over - I could buy a really sweet set of toys with that much to play around with. Oh well. (ETA: I just did some price checking... I actually can buy both a NetBook and external BluRay drive with my funding IF I pay for the JALT Conference registration out of pocket. Hmmm....)

Dang, I need to prep my classes for today. Not that I should be complaining though, after I knock these out I'm free for the long weekend!

Well, I just heard the warning on the city's loudspeaker system to take care due to the excessive wind and rain. It's really coming down out there too. Listen to that rain and wind howl, dang. Still no word on whether classes at the university have been canceled or not. Hmmm.... Morning classes have been canceled. Looks like afternoon classes are still on, grr...

In other news, I made a reservation for a flight home for the winter break. Including all the taxes and fees, for the days I requested it's gonna be about $1500, ouch. Still, I should have enough saved up by then to pay off my student loans once and for all. Afterward I'll be poor but that monkey will finally be off my back. I think I'm going to skip the moped and just save up for a car when I get back from the break. (or I can just pay off half of my student loans and get a head start on saving up for the car, hmmm....)

I was also thinking about my career and stuff. I have 2 more years at this university. After that I'm going to need a more permanent position where the salary and benefits continue to grow the longer I work. I'm not asking for a professorship, but a tenured instructor position at least. If the opportunity to do that is not present here, I'm going to have to go elsewhere. It might be time by then to find a job in the states somewhere, either an adult ESL gig at a community college or intensive English program for international students at a university. If this university does offer me a tenured instructor position, I daresay I might just become a lifer. I really like living and working here. Once I get a car, I'll almost be settled down. If I somehow manage to get married, this apartment is big enough for a family.

ETA: The typhoon has passed. There's but a light breeze and no rain. Thank goodness they already made the class cancellation announcement. If they waited until now, morning classes would still be on. *whew!*

Turns out I don't have quite enough for the BluRay burner + NetBook after all. That and I need to use some of my funding to pay for registration at the JALT conference in November. So I figure I'll just buy one item with my funding and get the other item out of pocket. It will be a sort of belated birthday present for myself.

Classes are going well. Today I had a class that I've nicknamed "the robots", but they were actually quite lively. Last week's classes while not exactly the best ever were pretty good considering the 2-month break. They all basically just wanted to catch up with each other and talk about what they did over the summer break - which I incorporated into the lesson, they just had to talk about it in English.

( Oh and finally, some pics from Silver Week 2009. )

I was a little bored, feeling stir crazy so I went for a bike ride.
my bike route today

It wasn't exactly like this as I had gotten lost after I got out of the tunnels. Speaking of which, those tunnels were awesome. They were like something out of a Studio Ghibli anime. I gotta snap some pics of these things. I also nearly wiped out on my bike on a patch of gravel right in front of a 7-11, that was embarrassing. Still, it was a pretty good ride and I got to see a part of town that I'd never seen before.

Anyway, I didn't do much else today, practiced the sax, did grocery shopping, and cleaned up a bit. Tomorrow night, one of my classes is having an enkai and they invited me to go. That should be fun. (^_^)

We have been having some fantastic weather here lately. Took some long bike rides. I've also been doing good with my schedule:

• Study Japanese - going over stuff I already know is boring, but every now and then there's a word or phrase that I've forgotten about
  
• Research - I've been going over some notes from one of my colleagues. He wants to do a joint publication/presentation. He's already done some of the background. If I design a project and gather the data, I'll be the main author and he'll co-author.
  
• Work Out - The facilities are limited, but I can do a chest/back and arms/legs rotation. I really just need to sweat actually, and riding my bike all over creation has been pretty good for that.
  
• Play Saxophone - I have good days and bad days actually. It's still terribly inconsistent. I just gotta keep at it.

I've been trying not to think about CC too much, but yeah. Her room is right next door. Every time I walk by, I want to pop in and have a chat. I've been keeping it down to one a day. Also, I've been trying not to overstay my welcome when I do stop by. I was able to help her with a computer problem the other day, so I felt pretty good about that. Our conversations are still quite good, I've just got to be careful not to let my feelings get the better of me. *sigh* I feel like an addled schoolboy.

I might have to get a new cell phone.

1.) I'm still paying for eMobile internet service. Since I have fiber optic in my apartment and I don't do any computing on the go, this is unnecessary. I suppose I could just cancel the internet part and keep the cell phone. However....
2.) The camera on my cell phone stopped working. When I go to access the camera, it starts to load, hangs, and then quits.

Not that I do a lot of picture taking with my cell phone, but I think this might just be the nail in the coffin. There's no English support, not even an English mode on the phone, coverage is spotty in this area, and other than februaryfour, no one else I know has this.

I think I'll go to the electronics store today to see what's out there.

Watching the World Volleyball Grand Prix (womens), Japan vs. Korea. They're playing in Korea and right now the Japanese team is playing very well. High Definition women's volleyball... (^_^)

So I took the day off (from the travelers, lol) to run some errands downtown. I bought some clothes (shorts & t-shirts), A Dictionary of Basic Japanese Grammar (good reference book), and some saxophone stuff. I didn't really need the clothes, but I just wanted to mix things up a bit. I did need a good Japanese language reference book. I still need to get a text/workbook. The sax stuff, just maintenance goods.

After I got home, I did the little bit of sax maintenance and then practiced for a bit. (I took my sax back to the apt for the summer.) I've had to take the practice sessions down a notch. When I first started getting back into this my first few practice sessions were pretty intense, trying to pick up where I left off I guess. However, after thinking about it some more they weren't really quality sessions. If I had made a recording I would have heard lots of little missed notes, inconsistent tempo and rhythm, lack of dynamic control, etc. I started to notice these anomalies while listening critically during today's practice. So yeah, I'd be better off playing more basic material correctly versus playing advanced material incorrectly. That and my endurance isn't quite there yet, my chops get worn out rather quickly. I need to build that back up.

(oh btw, Japan won in straight sets - dang.)

Street Fighter 4 continues to vex me. It's really quite difficult. I beat it for the first time on medium with Zangief, of all characters, yesterday. I got to the boss with Blanka and E. Honda today, but haven't even gotten close with any other characters. There are a few new wrinkles in the game engine that I need to get used to. It's been such a long time since I've played any fighting game regularly. (I suck, basically.) At least I'm doing quite good with the driving game.

I've got nothing planned for tomorrow. I have the following on my "to do" list though (in no particular order):
1.) practice
2.) study Japanese
3.) go for a bike ride
4.) buy groceries

I think if I could maintain a similar set of activities (need to throw in "play video games" and "watch videos" lol) for the rest of the summer that would be great.

Monday night I had a dream. I dreamt that I was in the saxophone shop looking at that vintage sax and another customer there was interested in it. We got into a bidding war and I ultimately lost.

Tuesday was payday, but I had classes so I couldn't do anything but wait for....

Wednesday　(my research day) - I went to work for a bit, prepared some materials for the speaking final exams. Then I took the bullet train to Tokyo. Changed trains and then went over to the sax shop, down into their used horn section, and sure enough, the one I wanted wasn't there. I asked the sales dude what happened, as it's still listed on their website. He checked the computer and.... someone bought it. Yesterday. (ToT)


I was noticeably disturbed, shocked even. I staggered out the door and took a look at a couple of other stores. One store was really overpriced, ugh. I got out of there quick. This one smaller store had a sale going on, but no used horns. The sales dude showed me a few new ones, two were way out of my price range, but the other three were pretty close. I tried them all out, and this one Yamaha just spoke to me. It was just a bit more than I wanted to spend though. So the dude was like, "I'll throw in an extra mouthpiece and a box of reeds..." - which I was going have to buy anyway. So that package cost as much as what I had planned to spend by buying everything separately. Sold!

So yeah, I bought a new tenor saxophone! After coming all the way to Tokyo, using half of my research day no less, I didn't want to leave empty handed. If I were to get a modern horn, I'm glad I got a brand-new one. Its history starts with me. A used modern horn more than likely was owned by some kid who played in junior high/high school and then got tired of it and quit. Indeed, most of the used modern horns at that first shop looked more banged up than the vintage horns they had.

Anyway, I can't wait to really give my new sax a workout. I'm going to bring it to work tomorrow and practice after I'm done with classes. I downloaded some sheet music. But first I need to remember my embouchure & breathing, play some whole notes, get some vibrato going and then scales back under my fingers. Reality check - it's been years since I've played a tenor saxophone, about 7 months since I last played ANY saxophone. (I did play my alto a bit over the winter break, when I wasn't keeled over due to that stomach virus. Anyway...)

( Set-up details for the technically inclined )

In other news, I saw the eclipse today before I went to Tokyo. The eclipse was shrouded in clouds for the most part but it did peek through a few times - it was pretty cool. My students had a TV broadcast from Okinawa on their cell phones and it was awesome.... chilling actually. If one could get that from a cell phone video, imagine what it must have been like in person.

Today is Monday, isn't it? Time flies when you're having fun...

After a big breakfast, we hit the road. First we went to a Mt. Fuji shrine. People wanting good luck on their Fuji climb stop by this shrine and give a little offering. I think it was actually a temple though because there were Buddhist nuns and priests all over the joint. Then we stopped by a sake brewery, and that was really cool. They let us see how sake is made and then there were free samples at the end of the tour. I bought a bottle of a very clear and dry sake, one of the best I've had in Japan, maybe the best I've had originating from Shizuoka. (The saleslady was really cute too ^_^)

After the brewery, we went for our little picnic. Unfortunately, it was really cloudy. Fortunately, it was really cool and refreshing. Combined with the breeze and low humidity, it could have easily been a day in mid-autumn. Next we went to see a waterfall, the same one I saw last year. It's a nice waterfall, so I was glad to see it again. Then we decided to call it a day. We got stuck in a pretty bad traffic jam on the way home though. We finally made it back to his place and we made yakisoba for dinner. That was quite delicious. After dinner we had a few drinks and chatted for a bit, then when one of the Japanese dudes was leaving I hitched a ride back to my place with him. Nice enough guy, but I think he sees me as a "rival". He's pretty shy to begin with, but he was even more guarded when talking to me. I asked him "So, what did you do last weekend?"
"Why do you want to know?"
Yeah dude, I want to know exactly which bars you go to and when, so I can then show up and steal all of your thunder. lol.

Work this week is deceptively busy. Giving out the last of the listening/writing tests, which then have to be graded. Then I need to whip up their speaking tests.

That was quick. They showed up at 3:15 and were done by 3:45. I've got it set at a comfy 27 C (80 F). I can't believe how much more relaxed I feel now. Ahhhhh! (^_^)

I'm gonna take a quick shower and then go see if I can round up some music.

I've decided not to go home for the summer break after all. There definitely is time for it, but I'm planning on going home for the winter break anyway. Besides it'll be hotter than hell in Florida right now. I'd spend most of the time at home seeking refuge from the heat.

So.

August and September - no word yet on if/when the committees are meeting. I'm not about to ask. Here are some things I want to do to fill the time:

• Buy a sax and get back into playing regularly. I saw a nice vintage tenor in Tokyo a little while back. Next paycheck, I'll take a little trip and buy it if it's still there. If not, then pretty much any used modern horn will do. Heck, I can get a used Yamaha here in Shizuoka. I can't really practice at my apartment. I can keep the sax in my office. Over the summer I can just practice whenever. When the term starts back up, I can then practice after hours. Students who are in band are always practicing at that time. I can just go to the same general area and practice there.
  
  
• Climb Mt. Fuji, either early/mid August. For that I need to get into shape, which brings me to...
  
  
• I'd like to join a gym. Thing is, there isn't one nearby. What I'm afraid of is that I'll sign up and then pay 10,000 yen a month for something I hardly ever use. I have this fancy new bicycle. I haven't done any serious biking recently. There are roads that lead out of my neighborhood up into the hills. I should just pick one and GO. I need to just do some cardio, any cardio, to sweat and get my heart rate up. I've kind of soured on the biking to work idea - I get too hot and sweaty. I'm pretty sure the students would rather I not be dripping in sweat as I teach the class. There are only a few weeks left in the term anyway. I'm just gonna bus it for the rest of the term, and do my biking exercise after work.
  
  
• Study Japanese. Here I go again. What I need to do is buy some textbooks and make myself "go to school". Go to the library and study. Really study. No killing-time-on-the-internet-pseudo-studying. Listening and speaking are my strong points. Kanji and grammar and my weak points. I give my students advice on how to improve their English all the time. I need to take my own advice and apply it towards Japanese.
  

Yeah. I need to get off my ass and do this.

Unfortunately, I have nothing to do. :/ My gf and I are still "taking a break". I am seeing a movie tonight with a friend, so that's something. After that though, it gets pretty thin. A friend of mine from high school is in Tokyo on business. They've got his itinerary planned down to the minute though (welcome to Japan), so he doesn't know if he can take some time to hang out. The best chance for hanging out is Sunday. So I was thinking that I could just make a daytrip out to Tokyo on that day anyway. That way if he can meet, he just has to give me a ring and I'm in the area. If he can't then I guess I could just look around, maybe check out some instrument shops, maybe see if some Tokyo people can meet.

My laptop has been acting up so I was also thinking about redoing it. Now that I have a fast internet connection, downloading updates will be a breeze. I think the heat is getting to it. (Hurry up July 18th so I can has AC!) It will also be 3 years old in August. I'm not really tempted to buy a new one though. Except for perhaps playing newer games, this one does everything I need. I have a bit of laundry to do as well, so I can just stay in on Saturday and do all that.

Work is going well, busy but well. This is the last round of classes until testing starts. I'm giving them their final over 2 weeks. Next week is the listening/writing final, the week after is the speaking final. Once I grade all that and turn my grades in, this term is done. The last day of finals is the 31st. I figure I'll take my time grading everything and turn my grades in on/around the 5th. No word on my committees yet. I was thinking of popping over back home for a couple weeks in Sept. I'm seeing flights for 74000 yen. Not bad, but you gotta figure in tax and other misc. fees. Hmmm....

I've been trying to write this up for a while now.

Work is going ok. Getting busy, but ok. Lots of little things have been coming my way and it's been a challenge to keep on top of everything. I'm afraid something is going to get overlooked sooner or later. The end of the term is coming up, a month to go actually. After that, I'm not quite sure what's going to happen. The next term doesn't start until October. As much as I'd like to think that we're going to get all of August and September off, I seriously doubt that's going to happen. I do know that some of the committees I'm on are going to meet and do some work. From what I gather, they're going to try and schedule those meetings at the beginning/end of the break in order to give everyone as much consecutive time off as possible.

I've been feeling kinda lonely lately. Part of that is homesickness. Odd that as I haven't been homesick for a long while. I guess I was due for a bout. Checking out family/friends' pics on facebook has really done it to me. Maybe I'd better just not check facebook as much. Also, I still haven't made many friends here outside of work. Moreover, my work friends are all older and married so they've got their own thing going on. Lastly, I haven't seen Miyuki all that much lately either. It was much easier to deal with the infrequency of meeting each other when we were living far apart, as it was something that just couldn't be helped. Now, she just lives about 10 km away and we still hardly ever see each other. I can meet where/whenever. She however, has been too busy to meet. Also, the few times we do get to meet, the mood has been well, kinda awkward. We did have a talk this past weekend, and she says her feelings for me are still there, mine are for her too. I don't want to put a timeline on things, but if we keep having these awkward moods I have to wonder if we really are right for each other after all.

In other news, my stimulus money came in. Good timing too as I just paid off my Saitama Residents' Tax. It is payable in installments, but I just wanted to get it over and done with so I paid the thing off in full. As the thing is from Saitama, the only place I can pay it off is at a bank downtown. I ended up wasting half of my day Wednesday to run this errand, and I didn't want to do that again, so yeah.

So I've been watching more of my digital cable TV and I'm actually kind of underwhelmed. It just doesn't have as much stuff as the digital cable TV package I had back home. On the flip side, my internet connection is about 5 times as fast, so I guess it balances out. With a good torrent, I can download a 700 mb video in about 2 minutes, a DVD-R image in 15. It's like having video on demand. Just the other day, I was in the mood to watch Tombstone and didn't feel like riding all the way out to the video store to rent it. Found a torrent, started it up, ran down to the Family Mart to get a drink and a snack, came back and the download was done! I might even cancel my digital cable. Still, it does have a lot more foreign sports and news, so I guess it's worth it for that. Oh and there is an add-on fishing channel. It's like 10 bucks a month. I might have to look into that.

Speaking of TV fishing, there was a fishing show on regular broadcast TV last night. They were going for yellowtail snapper. First they tried using live horse mackerel for bait. That wasn't producing anything so they switched to cut bait and then they landed 2 big snappers. One was 11 kg and the other was 10 kg. They served one up as sushi at the end of the show. It looked absolutely delicious, wow.

So yeah, I've been feeling kind of blah lately. Also, somewhat stunned at the news of Michael and Farrah. That really puts things into perspective. Oh yeah, and now Billy Mays, the Oxiclean guy. I totally went down to Target and bought some because of that infomercial!

At any rate, I'm going to try to not waste my Monday now and actually do some work.