You know what would be pretty sweet? Livejournal not logging me off after every time I post an entry. That would be pretty sweet.

I took another paper practice test, for which I don't have the answers (that's a total of three practice tests taken, friends). And two short online tests. I kicked particle ass, and only failed by 2% on verb conjugation. Duuuuhhhhh...

The more I study, the more I think that by the time the test is in my hands, I'll be such a mess that I'll just start gnawing on the paper like Boggins the Adam and Joe Dog.



Then I will do a poo on the test center floor, and lick the proctor's knees.

The important thing is... God, what is the important thing? I think I have to go to the shops before they close. Crap. It's raining.

Oh, and James is pretty sweet, I'll give you that. Not in the "awww" way, but in the "awesome" way. I'm thinking that because I'm going round to watch the X Factor and complain about the JLPT, and I like doing that. Also I'm bringing him some groceries because he is sick and I'm a chump. Ha...


I'm pretty sure I've griped in the past about how I always do stuff for boys, and they just sit about while I cycle/drive endlessly to their homes, but actually, I must like it. I mean, I really do enjoy traveling by myself and zipping along the river. I like the exercise and the fresh air and the break for sitting around staring at Anki or my textbooks.
And really, I wouldn't do something if I truly hated it, no matter how good the prize is, right?

Hhuuuuuuu.



Maybe I'll pick up some chocolates while I'm out.

I want... The Life Aquatic.

It's very much time for me to be watching that movie.

But I am studying.

God, I hate studying.

No not really (well yes really)

And I want to illustrate for Laurel

And finish the poster for The Lion King

ARRRRRRGGGGH What is this stress, it's Sunday! In the middle of a three-day weekend!! WHAT THE HELL IS THIS?!!

I need to get out but I don't know where to go.
This feeling happened last year, as I recall, and I wound up going to Kyoto by myself. In Kyoto I felt a lot of despair, but also some grim independence (no, I was happy, really)

Ok, back to studying. Vocab.

I've been listening to podcasts, to boost my grammar and random phrasal skills.

"Though you say that, it isn't the case that ___"

Dakara to itte, ____ dewa nai


little by little...

Cramming for the test
Under my kotatsu is
Making my butt numb.


A haiku for the JLPT.

Practice test tomorrow.


Study study study.

Got up.

Immediately got under the kotatsu and turned it on.

whrrrrrrrrrrrr

Ooooo.

Sorry you're hearing me winge and moan so much lately.

I nearly finished my Glinda skirt. I need 2 more meters of blue netting, and it'll be finished tomorrow night.

But it's a tiny bit small. And I'm having one of those days, and so that together, with the frustration of not having a proper top for this thing... well, I'm feeling like a fatty fatty fat fat, who cannot dress herself.

I saw a corsety-type piece in a shop today. It would need a deal of tulle and nonsense across the chest and arms to make it decent for school, but it could be done painlessly. I've got the excess fabric.

Started sewing a jabot. It's harder than it looks, to get the fabric to fold properly. But I think with some hidden thread and judicious application of an iron, it'll end up looking pretty damned good.

Shower, potato soup, bed.

I went out with the intent of buying a slinky nightdress with which to seduce my boyfriend. Instead, I bought an awesome shirt, took the best purikura of my life, and patted a stray cat for 15 minutes.

Why don't you have slinky nightdress stores, Japan? Or rather, why can't I buy anything I want for less than 10,000 yen? ($100)

Akk. akk.

Tralala, what else. Rogakko (deaf school) was a blast. I taught an awesome shogakko (elementary) lesson today. The 5th and 6th graders made paper pumpkins and bats and so on, and decorated a Christmas tree. HA! Chugakko 2/3 nensei (8th/9th graders) did various crafts that turned out well. One of my favorite funny students did a hilarious dance. Lunch was a very delicious fish. CAN'T ARGUE WITH THAT.

Also, tomorrow and Thursday I have no classes, because of exams. WORD. Tonight I'll make potato soup for a gathering of ladies tomorrow, and eat a pizza and work on sewing my Halloween costume. I'm going to be Glinda the Good Witch. HELL YES. I've got a nerdy pleated blue skirt second hand, and 5 meters of tulle that says "This skirt is going to be totally awesome".

Ah.

I really need to tidy this place too if I'm having folks over tomorrow. Hurr.

I guess my brain is back to normal, because I just had regular dreams about not being able to finish my Halloween costume on time.

Sorry about blarghing on about my lady-problems forever. Especially after not saying anything for so long.

But, it's true, that you just need to say things from time to time.

My life is actually really happy. I thought about it at work today... "Hey, everything is really good, isn't it?" I also thought about what I want to change in order to make what I want happy. Operation Magical Life, commence!

I haven't talked about it much... to anybody... for various reasons
but now I'm starting to say things...
I'm in a really good relationship. It makes me really happy, because I love being with someone who is my friend, too. So that happened! Aaaaaahahaha I'm so happy!

The time from when I realized I wanted more than friendship, until getting that, wasn't really that long. Maybe 3 months? Ahahaha. But that felt like forever!
I feel lucky.

You definitely don't have to tell me how ridiculous this is, but I've had this thought recently... I've got all these great plans for my life, the things I want to do, the places I want to go. But lately, I'm thinking, "I want to get married". Not instead of doing all those other things, but on top of them.

I want to get married, and now, and I'm pretty sure it's because I'm feeling adrift and a little lonely, and that's an awful reason to get married and I'd never do it, but for crying out loud.... it's as if I want to skip to that part of my life.

What is going on with me lately? I don't think any of this stuff is me at all... I mean, it's all in me and I'm the one being weird, but it's so not normal for me.

I gotta let go of myself!

Screw this. I'm going for a walk, and to take purikura of myself.

My brain has been SO SCREWED UP this weekend.

I know that part of it is from the fact that I've been ending my period yesterday and a little today. I HATE that. GO AWAY, you stupid bastard. Stop messing up my life.

So there has been that. But the really weird thing is that I have been wanting sex pretty much the worst I've ever wanted it. And by me, I mean my brain. On Saturday night, I woke up twice in the night after dreaming about sex, and thought, "Oh, did I just...? No, I didn't, DAMN." Last night, I had 6 more smaller dreams. That is RIDICULOUS.

I don't know. It was a truly "What the hell is wrong with me" moment.

Gala says that when you don't ask for exactly what you want, of course you will be unsatisfied and it's your own damn fault. She's right, of course. For me, and I know this is a bad thing and I know this about myself, it's so damn hard to ask for what I want, ESPECIALLY when what I want involves another person doing something for me. I can't even say "I want sex, give it to me" unless I'm 100% sure the other person is thinking the same thing, and is in fact minutes away from saying the same thing to me.

On one hand, that means I'll never just sleep around. On the other hand, I'm probably coming off as frigid, and I'm letting myself down.

Arrrgh. This is so stupid.

Something is off in my life, and I don't know what it is. Like.... something got stuck somewhere, and I'm waiting for it to catch up. Or jam up the works and break free. And that's really strange, because I'm actually quite happy in my life. I have a good job, good friends. I live in a lovely city, and I have a great man in my life. I have a thought about what to do about JET, I have almost zero stress.

Arrrrgh.



/vent

The weather is trying to decide if it wants to plot giant rain pellets down on me or not.

I climbed up the Bizan last night, in the dark. The only wildlife we saw was jumping camel crickets and giant spiders, but no tanuki or wild dogs or killer snakes. So, a win?

The ridiculous thing was that you climb up this mountain, scrambling through the underbrush, and then you decide for the sake of your knees to take the road down... well, we took a path and eventually hit the road, but then we couldn't get off this mountain. We got stuck in a graveyard for a little bit, and finally tumbled out down a hideously long flight of stairs into the back of a huge cemetery on practically the wrong side of the mountain.

Why is descent so difficult!

Phwelllll.... I have just returned from a 4-day jaunt to Tokyo!!
Wheee!!!

We went to Tokyo Disney Land and Sea for two days, and first, though I decided to go, I was really anxious about the whole thing. I've felt slightly averse to Disney as this giant corporation, and I was worried about what it would be like and what it would feel to me to go and kick it at Disney Land for 2 full days.

And in the end, that was really lame thinking of me, because it was a theme park, and the point was to go and have fun, and I had gone, so having fun was of course what I should be doing! The world is silly enough without self-sabotage, so why do it, right? So had fun I did, and it was simple as that, and I didn't over-think anything or agonize or let anything get in the way of having a nice time with my friends.

Then, Tokyo for 2 days. Yessssss!!! Our feet hurt SO BAD, but James and I tramped all over town, riding the trains up and down from Ikebukuro to Ginza. Akihabara was NERD CENTRAL! to the max, and it was awesome. James bought three rockin' t-shirts, and I picked up tons of pamphlets for maid cafes from the girls on the streets. RAD.

Ginza was great, because we went to Kabuki-za and watched one act of kabuki (the good, exciting act). It was modern kabuki, so there wasn't much wailing, but it was from a psychological play about revenge and motives and ooooOOoOoOOoo, etc. The next day, we were back in Ginza for adventures in the Sony building (I bought some Carmex and Altoids, hahahaha, the things you miss!) and drinks in a fancy-pants pub.

And OF COURSE we went to Harajuku, and Shibuya crossing and the Hatchiko statue and Shinjuku because how could you NOT. Harajuku was mad shopping, I spied a dozen things I want to go back and buy. What I did wind up getting was a Lamb Chop eco shopping bag Yes, Excellent!

We rounded out the whole thing by going to Tokyo Tower. The wait for the higher part was an hour, and I elected not to go up because I was sooooo sick of standing in lines, but I really regret this in retrospect. Actually, I started to regret it while I was still in the tower, but by that point we wouldn't have had time to catch our bus home, and so the moral of the story is, I made a stupid decision and next time I'll know better! (Grr, Argh, I feel like such a moron!)

Yeah, we all have regrets, right? Fight harder next time, right!!




For me, Tokyo was huge and a little overwhelming, but really accessible. I got kind of anxious and shy, and really retreated into myself, which was lame of me, but it is what it is. All that, I can deal with on my own, but I was spending all my time with other people, and that put the pressure on them when I wasn't being extroverted (James said to me, "You know, you should be asserting yourself". I was perfectly content being carted around, but I know it sucks to cart someone else around. Sorry!)

Boils down to... now that I've been in the city once, I'll feel much more confident going back. Some cities, like SF, you can just rock like crazy on the first try, but Tokyo is soooo huge and full of soooo many things, that no matter how much I looked at guide books and wrote down lists of ideas, I couldn't have done it right.

Be back next week. I want to become a better traveler!


Ears rocked this week by the following:



VNV Nation!!
Bliss. Makes me feel very heart-achey, but blissy.

And hooray for humming random songs under your breath, and having your companion continue humming them, no questions asked.




HAHAHAHA YES!




Yes Yes yes!!! This is the acoustic version, but both versions rock my face off!!

Ah yes. It is raining.

And my futon got completely wet. Ah yes. Ah well.

I want to go get a hair cut, because I know that it would look really awesome at a certain level. But somehow, I can't really do it. To tell the truth, I'm kind of... proud of my hair. I'd say "vain" if I didn't spend half my time hating it. But I'm really proud of how it looks, and how long it's grown. It's weird, because obviously it will grow back.


Some stuff rocking my face lately:



Nick Cave and Kylie Minogue, "Where The Wild Roses Grow"

Nick Cave is basically a cover model for a romance novel. Yes! Win!




Oh my god, yes. YES! YES!

If somehow you have been living under a rock, here is something amazing. I cried.


Then, when you have finished wiping the tear from your eye, please enjoy:




Yes yes yes.

YES! YES!

Yesterday I went to the all-awesome Happy Rafting in Okobe gorge out west. It was run by all these crazy dudes from all over the world: Australia, New Zelly, Ireland, etc. We were the only gaijin group there (of about 10 rafts?) but all the Japanese folks were super awesome... I mean, you're out to get yourself chucked down a river like mad. You had better be a bit in the mood!

Honestly... it was the best man (10,000 yen) I ever spent. There was rafting. There were bagels. There was more rafting, and getting pushed out of rafts, and jumping off cliffs, and paddling, and floating like an otter, and splashing other rafts, and falling and shouting and laughing.

The exhilaration of being out in nature, being free to just float along, was astounding. I can't describe how great I felt. It was as if every physical and mental need was being met, over and over again.

A perfect day.

Later, there was brutal exhaustion and a super-lame 3-hour journey home (boo on you, railway system).

A perfect day.

Tonight I ate homemade cheesecake and tried to will someone to kiss me with my brain. But it didn't work (this time).

Word up in the hood, livejournal. What's happening?

I went to the park last night with good friends and bags of drinks. We lay on the ancient castle walls and got drunk. The remains of 1 am apple fritters are cluttering the sink and stovetop. Houseguests have crawled home after bleary lunch-donuts and coffee, and all my blankets are out airing on the balcony.

Good, good night.

My feet look really small all of a sudden. I guess it's because they're so far away, down there, from my eyes.

We are now entering this BS season known as "The rainy season". I celebrated by getting a third of my hair torn from my head. Thanks, Kami no Mori salon! You definitely have my business from now on!!

Next I celebrated by eating chocolate pudding OM NOM NOM NOM and a dinner set from my favorite hipster organic-y shop, YRG.

Dear YRG. I come to you because your dinner and lunch sets are an orgasm of delicious flavor in my mouth. I entrust my tastebuds to you without question, without reproach, and with completely faith in your culinary skills. Never do I come to you to be given the meal that I had last night. EVER.

I ate your dinner for the following reasons:
1. A year of eating kyushoku has conditioned me to eat things even if they are smeared in bad seaweed or slathered in little crunch dead fish with eyeballs that look at me angrily.
2. I was really hungry.
3. You guys are really hot.

THAT IS IT. I hate to say it, but that meal was more fit for a mermaid. And while I enjoy fish, I do not enjoy fish BITS in such quantity.

Oh, and
4. You made me a magical delicious smoothie with which I washed my meal down.

I think it says something, YRG, that you gave me a meal full of food that I don't like to eat, and yet I ate it all, and I will be back for more, blindly ordering the dinner set without bothering to decipher your chalkboard menu.

It says that you are an amazing place to eat, and I still trust you.

Please don't abuse that trust.

It blows my curtains out the balcony door.


The wind around me blows strangely. I can't recognize the smells.
In the last few weeks, I've been getting a strange read off a few people, and it's been screwing with my head. I saw, after writing it all out, that I was depending on these weird things for my happiness, and the result was that I was begging for table scraps and loitering for compliments. It shook me to think that.


But the weeks have been kind, and the days have been fair, and though I am often as bored as two boards with a hole bored through them, I do enjoy the things I do.


My old supervisor is in Tokyo, studying to prepare for her next job: teaching Japanese in Germany. She and I have been texting back and forth. I'm happy on two accounts. For the one, and the most important, I think of her as my friend. I hope she thinks the same way, and I want to keep texting and mailing with her for a long time, and visit her in Germany. It's a powerful feeling, realizing that someone you know has become your friend.

And for two, we write mostly in Japanese. While my spoken Japanese is absolute horrendous crap, writing and reading is.. getting better. Slowly. But it's there.

Wow!

Ok, hum... well, let's see.

My Golden Week was... well.... it's hard to know where to start. But my hitchhiking partner summed it up as follows, and it's pretty accurate:

"6 Kyushu prefectures via 22 cars, 8 hells, 7 onsens, 7 Moai, 5 nipple shaped stones, 3 ferries, 2 days of heavy rain, 2 mysterious pistols in a backseat, and one volcano, matsuri, net cafe, and soccer game apiece."

All of those things happened, and more. In a summary fashion, I would add 1 surprise birthday meal, 1 creeper, 1 mysterious OctoberFest, 1 chance encounter with a fellow Morrisite (Hi Paul!), 2 heavy backpacks, 3 pitched tents, and 1 umbrella.

And about a zillion other things.



The awesome thing about Japan is that it's 10:40 pm, I just got into town, and I can still go pick up my books from the post office and grab some dinner at this time of night.

I love knowing a place.

A night of tacos, laughter and Jane Austen with good friends.

Lately, it seems like life is a big old string of awesome. There are bad points, sure, but the good points outweigh them.

I ruled the shogakko. And the English Club. And the photobooth.

Starting today, I won't have any free time until Sunday night (I went all day today, and just got home). If I could make a cool graphic, I'd show you how a certain percent is me sitting at my desk in frumpy clothes, and how a certain percent is me rocking out hardcore. Basically, you put a shoe in one hand and a rock in the other. Which is heavier? It is the rock. That is because the rocking out hardcore percent of the next 4 days is definitely higher than the sitting at my desk percent.

Math. I wield it like a mighty sword.

Last night I very personally and intimately killed several people in my dreams. The kind of killing you do with your bare hands and teeth.

Today I teach elementary school. I'm not feelin' it. I always come out of those classes feeling like I suck, but we'll see...

Yesterday I bought the application for the summer JLPT. Turns out that my brain was totally out to lunch, because July is only for levels 1 and 2 (I'm level 4). Er, lame! I'm out 500 Yennies. That sucks. Boo on me for not paying closer attention!

Today it is going to rain again.

Last weekend was stellar. If I could have just a repeat of that every weekend, I'd be set. Luckily, this weekend looks like it's gonna be pretty boss as well! There is HanaHaru Matsuri (Spring Flower Festival?) outside my apartment, it's a friend's birthday, there is a charity music concert at the dance bar, a fancy-dress dance party at the gaijin bar, and some sort of school music concert on Sunday (where I can zone after a weekend of insanity!). There will be dinner and dancing and drinks, oh my.