A Night of Pampering with Paul Bunyon

Jen and I decided to have a girls night tonight. And so we poured ourselves a glass of blush wine, soaked our feet in the tub for about twenty minutes, painted our toenails a lovely shade of pink, and put on a hot face mask. Without a doubt, the best part of the evening was the face mask. It has a woodsy smell and as Jen and I laid on the floor in our toasty living room with the lights dimmed, we both felt as though we were lying next to Paul Bunyan, an extremely relaxing, comforting Paul Bunyan. We never wanted the face mask portion of the evening to end!

RC Cola

For whatever reason, this is one my favorite pictures of me and Curtis. We were having a little bit of MacBook fun two Christmases ago.

 

I called him this morning- Wednesday evening Vegas time, and had a very random conversation with him because I had woken him up. It mainly involved me being extremely chipper and him communicating in variations of “mmm.” Maybe I’ll try calling him again now. It’ll be kinda late here, but oh well. You’ve gotta do what you gotta do when you both work at the same time, even though you live in completely opposite time zones.

A Change in Behavior

I think that the weather has been affecting Jen and me a bit more than we’d like to realize. And here’s how I know. Our apartment has been in a state of constant clutter for the past few weeks. It’s not like it’s messy, but it’s certainly not what one would describe as clean by any means.

It used to be that we would clean the entire apartment from top to bottom every Friday night after we both got off work. And I will admit that Jen did more cleaning than me, but she got off work an hour before me and without a commute. But the winter has stretched along so far that now neither one of us has any motivation to do actual cleaning. Of course, we still tidy and pick up our clutter at least once a week- I picked up my room, and the living room on Monday, but other than that, it’s a struggle. We’re both just so sick of cleaning in the cold that I think we’ve gone on a subconscious strike.

I  think it’ll turn into a wait and see kind of deal. If the weather is at least halfway decent tomorrow, perhaps we’ll do some intense cleaning. But maybe it’ll be cold, and we’ll just do some superficial cleaning. Only tomorrow knows.

It’s the Most Wonderful Time of the Year

Well, I’ve had that song stuck in my head for the past few days, and I would have to argue that right now, it is in fact NOT the most wonderful time of the year. In fact, I would go so far as to venture that this is the most UN-wonderful time of the year in Japan. It’s the weather that’s killing it for me. In December, one day the weather was beautiful and the next it was cold. It was a pretty decisive change. But now, the weather just keeps going back and forth.

On Monday, it was so warm that I barely needed my coat, but yesterday it was snowing in the morning and evening. I mean, for real, what is up with that? It’s really making me dislike Februaries in Japan. And this had been going on for a greater part of the month. Thankfully though, February is almost finished.

But then, I have to go through all of this weather nonsense in March as well. Spring- get your butt in gear and commit to Japan already! Don’t be shy, everyone here really likes you. I promise.

Oh, Tokaido Line

Seriously, the Tokaido Line has become my new best friend lately. I take it two days a week, soon to be three. It’s part of the JR company, but it runs in an ‘X’ pattern to the Chuo line, my train line. In my mind, it’s the long-distance line because I have to take it to work places that are nowhere close to my home, and usually not that close to Nagoya either. On Wednesdays and Thursdays I take it northwest to Ichinomiya and Gifu respectively. And starting on Fridays, I’ll take it southeast to Toyohashi.

Now, I used to complain about having to go to Ichinomiya and Gifu, which are 15 and 23 minutes away on a Rapid train, but that’s has come to a screeching halt. It takes 43 minutes to get to Ichinomiya on the Rapid train. It’s killing me already, and I haven’t even gone there yet.

But here’s a mystery of the Tokaido line. In Nagoya, there are seriously three different platforms for the Tokaido line. Nos. 5 & 6 only go to Gifu and Ogaki, 1 & 2 always bring me in from Gifu or Ichinomiya, and I’m pretty sure there’s one more, but I can’t remember it right now. I don’t understand why there needs to be so many platforms. That’s just guaranteeing that people will get on the wrong train and end up lost in the middle of the boonies. So, if you find yourself traveling on the Tokaido line in Nagoya, study the maps carefully to make sure your train actually goes where it’s supposed to go.

A Blogging Dilemma

Dear Viewers,

I’ve come to a very important conclusion. As much as I love writing blogs about completely random things, I really like reading other people’s blogs just a bit more. But the problem lies in the fact that I know very people who keep a blog and actually keep up with it. Even my beloved roommate has not updated her blog since Saturday, and refuses to update for reasons unbeknown to me. So, listen to my heartfelt plea and update you blog and let me know about it! Because if you’re not a regular blogger, I stop checking your page.

Love, Rachael

What is up with the Weather?

It’s snowing right now, but nothing’s sticking, so it’s just cold and wet outside. So not a great combination. And here’s the thing, for the past two days, it’s actually been pretty nice outside, albeit extremely windy. The weather forecast predicted rain today, not snow! I think Japan just needs to get its act together and figure out what season it wants to be a part of. Because it really should’ve snowed yesterday on my day off and I didn’t have to go out into this nonsensical weather.

And it’s no wonder that I woke up really early this morning and turned on my heat and then had to turn it on again when I woke up. If it was cold enough to snow, of course my room would be freezing!

My Big Fat Greek Wedding

Jen and I agree that this is a great, great response to the ever difficult “why do you love someone” question. Too bad it’s now immortalized in movie form and no one could ever say it to either one of us, or anyone that we know.

Tulla: Why? Why do you love me?

Ian: Because I came alive when I met you.

“At Home Karaoke” by Jen and Rachael

Lately, Jen and Rachael have been passing the cold Kasugai evenings at home singing karaoke (Japanese pronunciation: [ka-ra-o-keh]). Now what this entails is sitting at the table and alternately choosing songs to play on their computers and then singing along. Jen and Rachael don’t have the technology for any actual karaoke equipment, but that doesn’t matter to them. They have a grand time anyway!

In the course of an evening, they might sing along to anything from late nineties pop to motown to random Japanese music. Please take note that Jen does a lot more singing along during the Japanese songs than Rachael. She just hums. As of the past few evenings, they have been reliving their high school days by playing N Sync, Nelly, LFO, and a large number of other high school girl fantasy groups. They even did the cha-cha electric slide. But Rachael feels a change in the wind and will hazard a guess that their karaoke selections will change to a much more mellow older style this evening.

Jen doesn’t quite have the same musical skills as Rachael, but what she lacks in harmony, she makes up for in emotion and song selection. Jen is always able to find the best songs for them to sing along to. Rachael does a good job of keeping the music going when Jen gets distracted by a friend who has just come online that she wants to talk to. But both Jen and Rachael recommend trying out your own at home karaoke and see where your musical whimsy leads you. Happy Singing!

And Now, Some Good Japanese Music

I’ve become a big fan of M-Flo. Listen and let me know how much English you can pick up.