Ju-ichi/Ni Gatsu
It's December now, huh?
November seemed to last a million years and fly by in the blink of an eye. NaNoWriMo had a lot to do with that.
We started the month with a long weekend and I went to Nick&Matt W's birthday party, a tea ceremony, and a Beethovan concert.
The following weekend a bunch of peeps came out here for the local Culture Festival, and to see my calligraphy on display.
On the 15th I went to CostCo with Sam and Yoshiko. We also stopped by the community centre to see Angela's debut tea ceremony.
The next weekend was a long one and I spent most of it at Nick's house at his thanksgiving house party, and the end of it at Sam's for her thanksgiving/Christmas (ThanksChristmas!) house party.
And I finished the month with another visit to Nick's place for his Video Game Party. And throughout it all I was typing away madly to reach the dealine. As you know I finished on the 28th, and am now trying to purge it from my memory so I don't get the shakes when I see Microsoft Word.
Had to finish it before the 30th, because that day about 20 of us met in Tadotsu to do part of the 88 Temple Walk. We took a very bizarre route, starting in Tadotsu and ending in Zentsuji. We hit up 6 temples and it was a wonderful time.
I'm pretty a-religeous, but I do appreciate the feeling of the pilgrimmage. and we got an interesting lecture at the Zentsuji temple, as it was the birthplace of Kobou Daishi, who was in turn the father of Japanese Buddhism.
The most interesting part, for me, was going into the Kaidan Meguri . It was on the level of sensory deprevation, and I find I want to go back and try it again.
A good end to the month, if it did leave a little exhausted.
December is already off to a too-rapid start.
The 5th: went to Takamtsu for the debut performance of Kagawa's new JET band: Paper Tiger! It was, I believe, a resounding success! We went to Benny's after but I had to bail early to get some sleep.
The 6th: Was picked up by BOE chiefs and Angela at 9:30am, to go into the mountains to see the town of Gomyou. It was the chief's idea to show us part of our city we might never see otherwise, and I was glad of it because it SNOWED like MAD that day! It was a total flurry and we both felt like we were home. Of course it was painfully cold but *singsong voice* woooorth iiiit! We saw a dance by some highschool students, and bought art and food from the locals. We drove on to Okuboji Temple.
While there we met two incredibly friendly pilgrims. The two men were clearly good buddies and were thrilled to have reached the final temple, and to mee us there as well. They gave us paper name slips to leave at the temple, as proof we came, and let us take some pictures of them. After that we had some piping hot udon for lunch and regained some feeling in our limbs. We drove back to the city all full and warm and sleepy.
In the evening I went back to Tak for Lindsay M's birthday party at Sea Dragon. It was fun, but I had to bail on the karaoke, too.
The 7th: The JLPT. I had not studied at al for the test and had reached my Zen state of not carrying, so I wasn't worried. The test room was too warm, and the proctors were kinda mean, and I was sleepy and had a cold, so it was a loong ass day.
But we finished it up and went to Youme Town for some X-Mas shopping, and then Angela, Sam and I trained it home.
Now I'm trying to catch up on anything I let slide over November, as well as plan for Sheldon's imminant visit. The AJET christmas party is this weekend and I will be hosting people, so I have to clean, too.
*sigh* Where am I going to get the energy I need to keep this pace up??
November seemed to last a million years and fly by in the blink of an eye. NaNoWriMo had a lot to do with that.
We started the month with a long weekend and I went to Nick&Matt W's birthday party, a tea ceremony, and a Beethovan concert.
The following weekend a bunch of peeps came out here for the local Culture Festival, and to see my calligraphy on display.
On the 15th I went to CostCo with Sam and Yoshiko. We also stopped by the community centre to see Angela's debut tea ceremony.
The next weekend was a long one and I spent most of it at Nick's house at his thanksgiving house party, and the end of it at Sam's for her thanksgiving/Christmas (ThanksChristmas!) house party.
And I finished the month with another visit to Nick's place for his Video Game Party. And throughout it all I was typing away madly to reach the dealine. As you know I finished on the 28th, and am now trying to purge it from my memory so I don't get the shakes when I see Microsoft Word.
Had to finish it before the 30th, because that day about 20 of us met in Tadotsu to do part of the 88 Temple Walk. We took a very bizarre route, starting in Tadotsu and ending in Zentsuji. We hit up 6 temples and it was a wonderful time.
I'm pretty a-religeous, but I do appreciate the feeling of the pilgrimmage. and we got an interesting lecture at the Zentsuji temple, as it was the birthplace of Kobou Daishi, who was in turn the father of Japanese Buddhism.
The most interesting part, for me, was going into the Kaidan Meguri . It was on the level of sensory deprevation, and I find I want to go back and try it again.
A good end to the month, if it did leave a little exhausted.
December is already off to a too-rapid start.
The 5th: went to Takamtsu for the debut performance of Kagawa's new JET band: Paper Tiger! It was, I believe, a resounding success! We went to Benny's after but I had to bail early to get some sleep.
The 6th: Was picked up by BOE chiefs and Angela at 9:30am, to go into the mountains to see the town of Gomyou. It was the chief's idea to show us part of our city we might never see otherwise, and I was glad of it because it SNOWED like MAD that day! It was a total flurry and we both felt like we were home. Of course it was painfully cold but *singsong voice* woooorth iiiit! We saw a dance by some highschool students, and bought art and food from the locals. We drove on to Okuboji Temple.
While there we met two incredibly friendly pilgrims. The two men were clearly good buddies and were thrilled to have reached the final temple, and to mee us there as well. They gave us paper name slips to leave at the temple, as proof we came, and let us take some pictures of them. After that we had some piping hot udon for lunch and regained some feeling in our limbs. We drove back to the city all full and warm and sleepy.
In the evening I went back to Tak for Lindsay M's birthday party at Sea Dragon. It was fun, but I had to bail on the karaoke, too.
The 7th: The JLPT. I had not studied at al for the test and had reached my Zen state of not carrying, so I wasn't worried. The test room was too warm, and the proctors were kinda mean, and I was sleepy and had a cold, so it was a loong ass day.
But we finished it up and went to Youme Town for some X-Mas shopping, and then Angela, Sam and I trained it home.
Now I'm trying to catch up on anything I let slide over November, as well as plan for Sheldon's imminant visit. The AJET christmas party is this weekend and I will be hosting people, so I have to clean, too.
*sigh* Where am I going to get the energy I need to keep this pace up??