emeraldmountaintea

parents visiting

2012-02-16T22:17:00.014-05:00

While my parents have been here staying with us, I haven't had the time to remember to post! I guess I don't think about it as much, because right now I can just talk to them about my day instead of having them read my blog, hehe.

It has been good having them here with us. And things have been very tough lately as well. Financially. Several expenses came upon us at the same time, on top of the bills we already pay every month. Hub's laptop hard-drive crapped out on him one night, so we paid around $180 for a new one. We went and had our taxes done at H&R Block, and found that we OWE around $2,000 in taxes. Turns out that the whole year that I did the dog-walking (for which I received checks that had no taxes taken out), I could have made quarterly payments toward my taxes. Instead of getting it in one lump sum, now. Which is a huge blow to our savings.

That drive back to the apartment was silent and bleak, to say the least. Almost suicidal. But we gotta pay up.

A good thing (I hope), is that while my parents went to visit my brother at his neck of the woods, he told them that he no longer wanted his current car (the 3rd car he's been through to date, one wreck after the other), a 2006 Honda Civic. So my dad is planning to give it to us, and transfer the title to me. Wow, never though we'd get a second car this early! My parents had to put TONS of cash into this car, though, after they took it off my brother's hands. Hub and I put $500 towards it, to try and help them out...

Because my brother, from the time he was in high school, hasn't ever been able to keep any of his possessions in good shape. Past iPods, phones, CDs, DVDs, his CARS - all scratched to hell, dinged, bashed, misplaced or lost.

My parents paid to fix - a dying/dead battery, dead headlight, a terribly cracked rear bumper hanging by duck-tape, and paid to give the whole interior a good damn wash because of nicotine fumes and cigarette ash imbedded into the seats, and a thick layer of dust on the dash board. There are still a smattering of cigarette crater-burns in the front and back seats.

What a mess....Hub and I will DEFINITELY take care of this car MUCH better.

More news, updates later. Take care everyone.

the musician

2012-01-28T12:31:00.003-05:00

I managed to sneak a vid of hub the other day. We don't have many vids of each other, we should take more! He wanted to play with my mum's acoustic guitar, hehe. He says that he was trying to play the song 'Rocket Dive' by hide. Hub used to have/play a guitar when he was younger! I think that it's probably still back in his parent's home in Suzuka.

resolutions, parents, etc

2012-01-20T00:38:00.012-05:00

I made a few new year's resolutions, but plan to keep up with them, the best I can because let's face it - how many of us really keep up on them after about 2-3 weeks? The one I'm making a bigger effort on is to lose weight (oh that's original...). I've put a counter on the top of the blog, so I can periodically weigh-in. I hoping to Shred at least 3 days a week. So far, I've been good on it, even though the first couple of times I was extremely sore for a day or two afterwards.

Another resolution I made, is half an "experiment". This resolution is to not be the one to contact my "friends" (what few I have) first. Let them contact me, about getting together or even to say HI. For years I've always been the one coming up with plans to visit people, the one saying "Hey, how's it going? We should get together etc etc." Never them, keeping in touch with me. I'm tired of it, and I feel like I'm reaching out all the time.

I'm guessing that this resolution will result in me not keeping any of the "friends" I have. Lol. Or at least never hearing from them. And so far? I've been right. If I don't contact them first - then I'll never hear from them. Until maybe months and month later?

Speaking of friendship and all, I've started reading the manga "ナナ" (Nana). In short, it's a girl's manga about 2 girls who become best best friends through many hardships, etc. And both of their names are Nana.

I know it's cheesy, but reading it makes me jealous! I've never had a 'girlfriend', or a friend who would drop anything for me, etc. Granted that in grade school I hung out more with the guys, because I had more in common with them (i.e. video games, anime, etc.) I've never been a girly-girl.

~~~~

So yeah, Takeshi's still miserable with his current job. And he'll stay that way, no exceptions, until his next job. We had a big falling-out the other night (which prompted me to put up a status on Facebook in tearful despair, and then take delete, since I didn't want him to see it...). It happened when it was night - it was late - Takeshi was getting off of work soon - and it was POURING rain. But little me does not look outside too often when inside, doing my own things.

A few minutes after I decide to get in the shower, he ended up calling my phone in the living room about 6 times, and texting me - asking me if I can come get him from work. I did not see the text message until I got out of the shower. By that time, he got home. SOAKING WET. And very pissed.

I felt horrible ok? I had failed him. It was an accident and bad timing for sure. But he had needed me to come get him so he didn't have to bike home in the rain - and I didn't respond. I'm feeling like the biggest piece of crap at this point.

Long story short, he makes me feel bad about it a little more, which makes me burst into tears for the rest of the night. He remains silent, which is how he shows his anger...

This eventually turns into a discussion about me not taking care of the house as much as I should. Washing all the dishes, taking out the trash, etc. so he doesn't feel obligated to do it when he gets home from work. Which he WILL do. I wish instead he'd bug me about it, then to do it himself.

But it's true what he said. I slack off on that stuff sometimes. I have no excuses. I'm not the same person as him, I'm not as proactive sometimes. I can be very lazy. I'm not proud of it. It obviously doesn't help HIM.

This leads to me, in sobby tears still, full-out cleaning the bathroom at 1:30am.

This ends with both of us falling into despair AGAIN about our situation - no savings, no graphic design job, not being where we want to be, being miserable at his job, not liking where we were forced to move to, etc.

Conclusion is: I'm making better on doing things more, when I say I'm going to. Not slacking as much. Because I do want to help him, so he doesn't have to worry about the house-stuff.

~~~

In other news, my parents are visiting the States right now, before they move to their third 'post' in another country, Jordan (eww...worry). And they're staying with us (2nd bedroom this time!) on and off, since they're flying around the metro area shopping, and going to doctor's appointments. Originally I wanted the four of us to go to NYC (like I went with them last time), but hub decided not to go. He told me I could still go - but I didn't really want to without him - AND nevermind that we can't afford it, even if I was to go halfsies on expenses with my parents while we were there. So they'll be going to NYC for 3 days. I tell ya, it's been a little weird sharing one bathroom with 3 other people!

looking back at 2011

2011-12-31T16:00:00.030-05:00

Well it's about 8 hours until the new year rings in.

This past year has been chock full of the good, the bad, and the horribly ugly. I'm just going to list as many major things that I can remember, about this past year, negative or positive. No chronological order to it.

• I graduated college in May, finally receiving my B.F.A., although my parents were not able to attend my graduation - but my uncle and aunt did

• We moved from Lancaster, PA to Alexandria, VA in the hopes of starting my career in the design industry

• I gained a lot of experience in interviewing for positions...

• My grandfather died at the age of 95, on July 11th, 2011

• I worked for 1 year plus some, as a dog walker, and loved the opportunity to be around dogs again, every day

• The relationship between my younger brother and the rest of us, his immediate family, has seemed to deteriorate even more

• Takeshi and I went to the Spy Museum in D.C. for the first time. Still no where NEAR my favorite museum in D.C.

• I got to reconnect with my older cousin Matt, and his wife Kathy

• I got to reconnect with a friend, Ashley, from college who lives in VA - to realize I had made a real friend and someone I really do love to visit - and to see her as a mum, now! ;)

• Takeshi and I celebrating our 3rd marriage anniversary, which included going to Florida. There were a lot of firsts for me there - being in Florida for the first time, being to Disneyland for the first time (as an adult, haha...), swimming in the ocean together for the first time

• Hoping for the best, and trying to plan out things for my career/our financial savings to begin, etc. and having everything fall through

• Wanting 2011 to have been our year where we finally were on an up-curve. To be able to have moved for the last time. To settle down somewhere, and find jobs that support us and that we actually like - and not getting any of it, in the end

• Seeing mum and dad again in the summertime

Hub and I have many hopes for 2012. Maybe this next year will OUR year. The one we're not in a hurry to get through. Oh, but it goes by so fast, no matter what.

But what is even better than us hoping for better - is us planning and working towards better. Because in the end, that's what will get us there. I have a feeling that in a year's time, there's a good chance we won't be Frederick, because like I said, this area is pretty much a dead-end for us (= hub's career). But who really knows? At the start of 2011 we never thought we'd be here, even!

I hope everyone has a safe New Year's Eve. I hope you're able to be with friends or family. I hope that if this past year hasn't been all you've wanted it to be, then you look towards 2012 with renewed motivation for your goals, continued passion for what you love to do, and an never-ending eagerness for a better future.

xmas day & new year's plans

2011-12-27T22:55:00.009-05:00

Heyla everyone. Another belated post!

Forgive me if this post is short and sweet (although I may ramble). I'm having a bit of a nightcap before bed. I wake up for work at 10am tomorrow.

Christmas Day was really great! Takeshi and I drove to Forest Hill, MD to spend some time at my uncle's (my mum's oldest brother) and aunt's house. There ended up being a lot of people there! Most of the people I knew, some I had met a LONG time ago and had since forgotten. It was good to see everyone again and touch base. Good food was eaten, good drinks were drunk, good conversation was had. My uncle and aunt have 2 airedale dogs, my other uncle has a German sheperd, and my cousin and his wife brought their pug - so it was great to have so many puppies around to hug and pick up (mostly the pug!). Being away from dogs constantly, with the dog-walking business in Alexandria, made me really pine for some dog-attention. Darn, we've got to get our own doggy sometime soon in the future! ;) I was a little nervous about Takeshi trying to mingle with my relatives again, since he's a bit shy when it comes to people he's only known for a little bit, nevermind all of the people he didn't know at all, who were there. But he seemed to rub along with everyone, and that made me happy. It's what I yearn for these days - the coming-together of my family no matter what side of the 'family' they're on. And to have it go well! ;)

Our plans for New Year's Eve are to once again have my best friend from high school come over! It's really becoming a tradition I think! I have my fingers crossed that the hub will come home that night before 1am, and to not be too toasted. I know how the restaurant crowd can get together for drinks after dinner service, on holidays (and any other excuse they can pull out of their ass).

We're planning to have ODEN! Oh - my god - so delicious! It's been so long since we've had it. We already bought 2 packs of ready-made tofu delectables/fish cake items at the local asian mart. That stuff isn't cheap either! $10 a pop. Jeeeeez.

I also bought some konnyaku (I'm more of fan of it, than TK) and some napa. Hub has already prepared the broth for it. It just sucks that we don't have the traditional "ceramic oden pot" for it. I looked for it in the couple of asian marts we frequent, but they were either too expensive for me, or, they were "cheap Korean/Chinese knock-offs" as hub put it. Ahem. >__>;;

So we should have a good night. It stinks that I'm due in New Year's day to work at around 5pm-ish I believe. But I can't really turn it down. I needs' the money and all...

It definitely will be the first time in a while that hub will have off when I don't! Hehe. Have a good weekend everyone.

brooding

2011-12-16T15:35:00.006-05:00

I'm writing a quick post before I'm due at work at 5pm. I have about 1.5 hours till then.

Lately, life has been ok. With me, the internship is great. I'm getting some good chances to bulk up my portfolio, and the people I work with are probably the some of most easy going men on the planet. I just wish I was getting paid for something I actually like doing, instead of cashiering. The part time job is what it is. I just hope to get the most hours I can out of it, which = more money. For the time being, I'm going on a good track, until hopefully we're able to move AGAIN next year perhaps. I hate moving around. I wish we didn't have to. But Frederick does not offer much of anything to Takeshi's career. He's having a tough time with his current job right now. Which translates to frustration at home.

I want to help him. I always do. But this is something that I can't fix right now, it seems. This restaurant is the best he could find in the area, when we put ourselves into this mess of moving from VA, etc etc.

I can't MAKE him be happy about his situation, or demand that he deal with it better, though I wish he would just a little. He's not. Sometimes I don't even ask him how his day was. Good chance it was, "ok...I guess." Or he rants about stupid things that happened there that day. (And I listen because I know that if you don't do it, your brain would explode.) It's awkward. I don't want to remind him about his crappy feelings about this job. But for the time being, we have to be here, since the internship is the best thing that came out of the whole thing. It's not a paid design job, but it's the next best thing.

Ideally I'm sure we'd like to move to a bigger town/city. Where he can find a restaurant he wants to work at. Sometimes I think his standards are too high, for the right job that he wants (because of the type of dishes/food he likes to produce). Sometimes I think that he'll never be happy, EVER TRULY happy, no matter where he works - unless he works at the Alinea restaurant in Chicago, etc. But that's a hard place to get into, I believe. Insanely popular, fine dining sort of place.

I know, that for him, he's not pleased with his lot right now. But sometimes I just can't stand to see him glum and frustrated because that makes ME depressed. I still have a lot of hope for the future, especially with getting the internship. I can't be depressed every day about how all of our plans fell through, and we were pretty well forced to move here. It's not a shitty place. It's just not for us, in the long term.

I guess I just usually try to be mostly happy with what we have, wherever we are. Try to enjoy little things, like days off together. It just seems that he can never really do that; his job and surroundings are always bringing him down.

I just hope that the new year brings some POSITIVE changes for the both of us. I want to see him eager to go to work everyday, because I know, at the core, that the culinary field is where his heart is. I hope we're able to start saving financially. I hope that I keep moving upwards in my field as well. We'll just have to see!

To end, a random photo of the Frederick library we visited the other day! Have a good weekend everyone.

turkey day photos

2011-12-08T23:31:00.010-05:00

Photos of our quiet Thanksgiving. The chef outdid himself as usual. ;) I helped though! And made pumpkin pie.

We put up the tree a few days before

A present sent from the inlaws! Incredibly adorable!!

Wonderfully painted ornaments from Armenia, given to us by my parents

my pumpkin pie ;)

hub pickling some veggies

brussel sprouts, eventually was sautéed with onions and bacon

the chef at work

stuffing made with homemade turkey broth

Everything together! They made awesome leftovers.

quick post

2011-12-02T12:25:00.003-05:00

I'm planning to post about Thanksgiving for us, which will mostly be photos of the yummy food Takeshi cooked that day. (I helped!) Work has kept me busy mostly, and the internship as well. Working on Black Friday was crazy, though I didn't have to go in at midnight or whatnot. I came in at 8:30am and worked till 2pmish but it was still steadily busy all day. I cross my fingers that the hours I asked for, or that I'm available for, are given to me consistently. I know it won't be perfect, but I hope to earn at least enough each month to help us earn savings instead of just 'leveling off'.

I'm sitting at the desk now, still wearing PJs. I go in today 4pm til 9:30pm. Not too bad, but I could do more hours. Tomorrow was originally free on my schedule :( but a manager came up yesterday and asked if I could take on a shift - UH YES!! So tomorrow I work from 6pm til 10:30pm. Hurrah.

Today, the 2nd, is Takeshi's birthday!!!!!!!!!! He is 25 today. I'm gonna call him じじ "jiji" from now on. Hehe, just kiddin'! ;) Here's to 25 more years of celebrating his birthday. TK あいしてる。＾３＾）

More soon. Have a good Friday everyone!

holidays and family

2011-11-23T23:14:00.023-05:00

This is a rant post for the most part....so mum and dad (and other relatives who may read), sorry - I just have to rant sometimes.

So it's Thanksgiving tomorrow. Thousands and thousands of people are traveling as we speak to get back to family, relatives. But another year goes by, and it's just the two of us, hub and I. I have a lot of bitterness sometimes when thinking about how distant my relatives can be most times towards my immediate family. Especially my dad's sister, my aunt, and my brother. I've always wished to have a extended family that is close to each other. Where I know all of my cousins well and they know me well, and we're like best friends. The only problem is that almost all of them are not close to my age, they're either way younger or way older. And that makes it hard to connect with them, IF we had better communication to begin with.

I feel as if my family has always been the "black sheep" of my entire family, on both sides, mum and dad's. I think sometimes it's because of politics or religion - which in my opinion is a sure fire way to end relationships, if one cannot abide the other. I always feel that the rest of my relatives have their own "circle" to worry about. Almost like 'clicks' in grade school.

I could never see myself and hub going to my dad's sister's house for holidays, even if she wanted us, which she doesn't. My brother and I have never ever been her 'favorite' niece and nephew. That title has always been reserved for her husband's daughter's children. My aunt to this DAY hasn't been able to spell Takeshi's name right. My 80-something year old grandmother says it fine.

What's my aunt's excuse? It's pretty easy to see that it's because she doesn't give a rat's ass. What's more important? To ramble ON and ON about her adopted son, who lives in San Francisco who is ALSO a chef, like hub.

The thing she chose to do recently made my blood boil. A little while ago my grandfather passed away. My dad and mum had coincidently planned to fly to the States to begin with for their usual visit to the States. My aunt had been talking with my father about the funeral arrangements and such and I believe he had informed of which day they would be flying in. So please schedule the funeral on a day after they've arrived to the States, so they can attend. (Nevermind the sad fact that my dad hadn't been able to be there when his father passed away.)

This women, his OWN SISTER, "forgets" the dates my dad gave her, and schedules the funeral on the day before they're supposed to land in the States.

So because my aunt didn't think TWICE about re-asking him about the dates - my father is not able to attend his own father's funeral.

My father may not get too hot over it, but I sure as hell am. That's lower than low. You would THINK that the one person who'd look out for you, so you can make your parent's funeral, is your sibling. But that doesn't happen in our family too often.

Sometimes I really think we're all not made of the same blood. It's ridiculous. I'll probably never forgive her for it. Not that she and I were great girlfriends before.

On my mother's side I have my 2 uncles, and 2 cousins.

My one uncle (mum's oldest brother) and aunt live in the same state as us. I'm very grateful that they seem to genuinely like Takeshi. It's a lovely change from my dad's sister. Last year they actually did ask us to come over for Thanksgiving. We ended up declining because we had already made plans to cook at home (again, we never expect relatives to call us for this reason). This year we haven't heard from anyone, and I'm afraid that since we said "no" last year, that that was our last chance. Hence the no asking-again this year. I like my aunt and uncle and would like to see them more often.

This goes for my uncle's son, my cousin, as well, and his wife. I've never known my cousin really well, but they're lovely people. And they also seem to like Takeshi some. My cousin and I are far apart in age. So this makes it's hard to find things to talk about. Their professions are totally different, they have more money than we do. They're not struggling financially, they a social life. They have a better life, as far as I can see it. Conversation just ends up dying after a while. I feel bad. I feel like a little kid compared to them. How can we ever stack up? It's awkward.

With my mother's side of the family, I always wonder if they only contact hub and me to get together out of some obligation. "It's the nice thing to do." But we're not FAMILY family. We're not at their 'core'. So I wonder if they really like us being there, or if they take pity on us, since my mum and dad don't live in the same country right now.

I want to be wanted by my relatives. As much as I want to be asked over for the holidays, I am NOT going to call them up and invite myself. "Can we come over this year for Thanksgiving??" - It seems so pathetic of me to beg them. And I feel that since all of my relatives know and relate to my parents more - that without them in the States right now - I don't have a lot of 'pull'. How can I ever cross their mind NOW, since my parent's aren't physically here to invite over. I feel that since my parents moved overseas for my dad's job, that they are out of sight out of mind to our relatives for the most part - and so is my brother and I. It's as if we went and moved with them.

I envy people who have families and relatives that cherish each other and have each other over for the holidays (or during rest of the year, even). I daydream about it sometimes.

But you know what? We DO have family members who truly want us - it's just that they don't live in the same country. Takeshi's family would DEFINITELY have us over for every holiday no matter what, if we lived close by still. GOD I miss my Japanese relatives! Lol.

So, in closing I'd just like to say that, again, this was a rant. A way to get this off my shoulders and speak my mind. I hope to not offend any of my relatives who read this. (but how many of them do, anyway???) I always welcome a chance to strengthen bonds with family and friends, since these relationships are important to me.

In the future, Takeshi and I will have a little family of our own one day. But until then, it's just the two of us. Hopefully soon it'll be the three of us, because I'm desperately wanting a doggie! ;)

orientation, chores

2011-11-17T23:34:00.024-05:00

Another huge gap in my posts! Yikes.

Since my last post, I have been able to (FINALLY) find a part time job at a local retail place. The last 'cloud' over me though, is that the position is seasonal and I will be up for evaluation at the end of the year. I hope that they decide to keep me. I'd rather not have to do this search AGAIN in a month's time...One month of pay...yay. I went out today to buy the necessary khaki pants for the job, since I do not own any.

The internship has been great. I enjoy going there on my 2 days a week. I wish I could work there more, but right now, the *paid* part-time work needs to dominate my week.

Tomorrow I wake up early to go to the motor vehicle building to hopefully get my Maryland license! I've been waiting forever to obtain it, since I needed the last of 2 proofs of residency here. I finally got it, so off I go again. And also to hopefully get MD tags for the car as well, on the same day. Personally, I'd rather stay in bed tomorrow morning with the hub.

Hub and I have been slowly searching for a bed and bed-frame for the guest-room, mostly to be used by my parents when they visit in January. We decided to check out the local Mattress Discounters Warehouse, since neither of us had ever set foot in one. We just wanted to peak at what they had and for what price. What we had to deal with was a bunch of old, fat, rude salesmen. I've dealt with the usual salesperson who prods and pokes you, and drops hints to buy something. I get that. But these guys were borderline MEAN. The first guy talked our ears off for what seemed like 20 minutes, showing us one mattress after another without giving us a word in. After telling him that we were just LOOKING and not planning to buy anything TODAY - he pretty much ignores what we say and pulls over his bloated associate to show us more mattresses in the back. We finally were able to get out of the conversation and were walking off to the door, when they start, LOUDLY, talking to themselves about us, "What happened?" "They didn't want to see them, I dunno." "What???"

Y'know what? Screw you fat blowhards. I'll never buy anything from anyone who acts like that.

So that soured our morning just a tad, that day. But we had a good weekend over all. Takeshi's birthday is coming up soon! :) About 2 weeks away, on December 2nd. He'll be 25! I've already bought a couple presents online. I always like to make his birthday card, so I gotta make time for that.

I end with recent photos! :)

We recently went back to Old Town and ate at Pizzeria Paradiso

While in Old Town, we could not skip visiting Restaurant Eve (hub's previous work), so we sat at the bar for a little while and he caught up with people. Yummy things I had - 2 drinkies and we shared some smoked deviled eggs and fresh pork rinds. We left happy. :)

View from the MVA parking lot. Not used to seeing mountains everywhere!

My FAVORITE guilty pleasure. 'Bath bombs' from Lush. I got me' a Satsumo Santa recently. Can't wait to try it out!

So, Mr. Chef accidentally placed a hot sauce pan ONTO the kitchen rug the other day. Now we have a circular spot of half-melted rug there.

The inlaws sent us a box the other day! Totally unexpected. Good stuff - shirts and socks mostly. Also, I need someone to tell me HOW to wear the leg-warmer things?? I've never owned a pair. O_O Help.

We had homemade gyoza the other night for dinner! It went pretty fast with the two of us.

one down, one to go

2011-11-05T22:24:00.019-04:00

So, since the last time I posted, I ended up getting the internship at Frederick Magazine!! :) やかった〜！

I started this past Wednesday. I'll be going in on Wednesdays and Thursdays from about 10:00am till 3:00pm. The art director is a really nice guy and it turns out that he went to the same art school as me in Lancaster, PA! What a small world huh?

An even weirder coincidence - a long way back (when we were still in VA) I had traveled to Annapolis, MD (close to where I'm originally from) and had interviewed at a magazine firm, which I ended up not getting. Come to find out now, from talking to the people at FredMag, that before me they had another intern who interned there for about 6 months. She ended up leaving because she had gotten hired!.....Guess where? At the same place I went to in Annapolis. Damn. She's there now. I lost that job to her, and NOW I'm where she was!

This just makes me feel even more motivated. If she interned at this place, gained experience, and ended up having a full-time job because of it (and a glowing recommendation from the art director here), then that's what I want. I've always wanted it, but hearing about her good fortune, makes me yearn for it even more.

So my plan is to intern here for at least half a year (that'll make it at least until next May), puff up my resume and get some good pieces to add to my portfolio. Right now, they have me working on ads, and working my way up to articles. I work with two graphic designers Matt and Joe, who are very nice and patient with me (but in my opinion, I've caught on just fine so far). I'm the only girl there in the design department, so that makes me the prettiest by default. ;) But I can run with the boys, no problem.

Now that I've thankfully found the design portion of it, my only concern is finding a part-time job still. Fortunately, I've been offered a part-time position at a local retail store. I also interviewed at another retail store the day after that, but I won't hear a decision from place #2 until the middle of next week. This worries me a little, since I don't know how long place #1 will extend their offer to me, while I wait for place #2's answer. I plan to call place #1 tomorrow, to let them know the situation. If they cannot wait until the middle of next week, I'll just take their offer instead.

If place #2's answer is 'yes' then I can always turn around and take their offer instead. So I'll see how the game plays out!

I end with some recent random photos. Have a good weekend everyone!

downtown Frederick at night, totally empty and still

TK and I walking through downtown

my work space at FredMag :)

first snow of the year! In October?? wow.

I caught this before it melted! interesting, 'wrinkled' snow

renn fest and the search

2011-10-26T23:09:00.015-04:00

Well how about the job-search update first. Which isn't much of an update. Since we've moved here, I've applied to about 11 local retail businesses and haven't gotten a word back from them. I've called back to most of them, but it hasn't really gone anywhere. Which is not really surprising. Different place, same shitty job industry. But what else can I do?

I can only keep doing what I'm doing - sending out applications/resumes.

The only thing that is resting HEAVILY on my mind every day now (and I'm sure hub's as well), is that we are definitely LOSING money every month that I don't have a job - ANY job. And since we moved (since moving = $$) our savings were cut into. Even with a slightly lower rent, we still can't afford to live with just Takeshi's salary.

I *am* going to meet with the art director at a local magazine business tomorrow about interning there (unpaid). I had sent out a bunch of emails to "design" places in the area a while ago, asking general inquiries about interning/working at ANY place to get me some more industry experience. I'm crossing my fingers. I'd really like to work there, gain some experience, put it on my resume. But you never know. And even if I get it, I still need to find a job where I earn $$$!!

Takeshi is probably going to meet with a manager/chef? person next Monday at a restaurant in Woodley Park, D.C. As far as I understand it, they've been favoring him to be possibly be a sous chef there. But he is unsure if he will like them - what the cuisine is like, what the pay will be, etc. So we'll see about that when he goes.

On a happier note, this past Saturday I was able to make it to the Maryland Renaissance Festival with my high school friend Natalie! Hub, sadly could not go this year, (since he never EVER has Saturday off without asking in advice, and) since his new days off are Mondays and Tuesdays. So no weekends off right now at all. But it's actually nice sometimes to have weekdays off with him since places don't close earlier, and there are less crowds out in the middle of the day, since everyone's at work!

My other best friend Todd works at the festival, and was able to give us 2 free tickets! :D Yay. The weather was lovely and bordering on cripse, I ate things were bad and yummy, drank a new favorite drinky, a "Snake Bite" (half hard cider, half beer), and bought a few trinkets for the hub and for myself. We took in a sword swallowing show which was quite good, got Starbucks on the way back to her house, and had a quick dinner. We ended up meeting quite a few people from high school (some people I remembered their names, other I didn't...). It was fun to catch up with them. All in all, it was a good day. I felt like I was back in high school in a sense, before hubby and all (not that 'after hubby' was bad! ;D). It was just me and Natalie chatting, being silly. It made me forget my new 'adult' woes for a time - but only a short time. I definitely want to go again next year, with TK! :) Have a good rest of the week everyone.

Natalie and Todd

Todd and I being weird. But mostly him ;)

new apartment

2011-10-16T21:29:00.010-04:00

So far, the new apartment has been quite nice. It also seems that the neighborhood has improved as well, over the last one. It's quieter, and has less bratty children running loose in the parking lot.

This 2BR apartment has about 900-ish square feet to it, while our last 1BR apartment had about 775 square feet. We have a lot of closet space, with 2 in the hallway and 1 in each bedroom. We did end up having to sacrifice on kitchen space a little. Our last kitchen was a nice square-shaped space, whereas this new one is a 'single-line' space with parallel countertops. It's a little hard to move around in there with 2 people. But thankfully we ended up having enough drawer/cabinet space to put our HUGE amount of kitchen tools/food.

So we're all settled in pretty much; everything is out of boxes and we have all the utilities/service stuff figured out and set up. The only thing that takes more time is obtaining new state tags for our car. Takeshi was able to get his MD license pretty much within one day of going to the motor vehicle administration (MVA). My process to get mine has proven frustrating...I've had to go and get a 'new' Maryland birth certificate (was born here!) that the MVA would accept ($30). Also, I need another piece of paper that shows proof of residency in MD. So far, my name (and new address) is only on the apartment lease agreement. Hub put his name on the cable account so that's a no for me. Just waiting for some mail with my name on it, so I can go get this license already! I hate going to the MVA and so far I've been there 2 times without success.

I've been applying to tons of retail places in the Frederick area, and calling back later on to follow up. Tomorrow I call some more places I sent applications to. Fingers crossed for a job SOONER rather than later. Seasonal job opportunities have also been listed lately, since the Christmas season will be upon us before you know it!

panoramic of living room/kitchen area

bedroom 1 - for us! ;)

bedroom 2 - storage/future guest room

late night wednesday

2011-10-06T00:15:00.003-04:00

Hub's first day at work was today, and we found that his hours are about half of what he worked at his last place. The hours, so far, for the morning shift at this place are crazy because he's due into work at 6:00am! Which means he's getting up at about 4:45am. But he gets off at around 4:00pm. That's about 10ish hours of work. This WOULD be an improvement IF he was getting paid more at this job, but he isn't getting paid more than his last job. Which means he may not be earning as much as he thought he was going to.

Which makes my finding a job even more important. I've applied so far to some general retail-ish businesses in the area, and plan to start calling them to follow up.

I do wonder now if I'll ever get a job as a professional graphic designer, the thing I went to college for. It's painful to see certain other former fellow students at my college in PA, who have design jobs right now. They're not the most awesome jobs ever, but it's graphic design. My dad told me that the time might come where I may have to essentially give up mostly on the idea of trying to land a design job, and try to find something else to delve into, for our financial future, for just a chance to move up professionally, somehow.

I hope that doesn't come to pass, but I have terrible thoughts of just doing something mundane and totally not design-related for the rest of my life. Telling people, "Yeah I have a major in Graphic Design - little good THAT did me...". I don't want to end up a jaded failure, forced to do something I don't really like to do, just for the sake of a paycheck and being able to LIVE.

Right now, it's what we need, more or less. So I have less of problem of doing that for now. But I'm uncertain about my future as a professional designer. Maybe freelancer at best?

Facebook is 'poison' for me, most days because I end up scrolling through people's 'lives' and comparing myself to them. "Oh she's already an assistant manager at suchandsuch...he just bought his first house....". I end up feeling like I'm behind on my own life. :/

new place

2011-10-03T14:09:00.016-04:00

So we didn't end up moving to Florida. We ended up not moving too far away from our last apartment in Virginia.

After my food poisoning episode push our schedule off course a little, we started to doubt the move to Florida. Too far, too much money and all without either one of us already having guaranteed jobs there to begin with. I had one second-interview scheduled but there was no guarantee of that going through in the end.

So we started debating 2 alternative choices; lay low by staying in our current apartment, buying back the lease, and getting TK's old job back, and me getting a job anywhere - or - still move somewhere where it's cheaper to live, but somewhere that's closer to us = less moving costs and time.

We chose to move. Takeshi, a year ago, ended up "staging" (chef term for work for a day(or more) without pay) at a restaurant called Volt in Frederick, MD. Afterwards they, at that time, extended a position to him if he wanted it. It just happened that, in the end he took a job at Restaurant Eve in Alexandria instead.

So a few days ago, we went to Frederick and he spoke to the chef/sous chef again. They gave him an unofficial 'yes' and told him to come back a day later for another 'stage' just to get the feel of the kitchen again yadda yadda. So hub was pretty well sure of his job. So that solidified it for us.

Time to pack all our crap up and go! With just the two of us. Argh. And one of us *ahem* doesn't have very good upper-arm strength. ^__^;;

But we did it. It was painful at times, since the hub ALWAYS packs the "books" boxes so full that it's about 80 pounds...Good thing for us that most of our furniture is from IKEA so it can be broken down. Since it was only two of us, we ended up packing for about 5 hours during the first day (the 29th), took a break for dinner, and then went BACK out to the truck and carried out lighter stuff until about midnight. The next day (30th) in the morning we packed the rest of the small things in the truck and our tiny car and just left. Drove up to Frederick, signed the lease 1 hour before the office closed and got our keys to our new apartment. We then started UNLOADING the truck and the car, and was carrying in the last piece, our couch, in the evening just as the sun was going down.

While we were sitting amongst our heaps of boxes, Takeshi told me that this process reminded him of a man in Japanese history called Toyotomi Hideyoshi. According to legend, he built a castle overnight. Yeah, our story seemed similar I suppose. We ended up packing and unpacking all of our belongings in about 2 days! We were moved into our new place pretty much overnight.

So here we are. Hub starts work on the 5th or 6th I believe, and before that gets here, we've been working on getting as many things set up; new car tags, internet, possibly cable, calling our old services to cancel them, etc.

I'm searching for job openings in the area. I don't plan to hold out for a design job up here, for the most part. This area's definitely not as bustling as the area we were in. I need to have a job somewhere, so it'll probably be some kind of part-time gig.

Here are some photos from about a couple weeks ago, before we moved. TK and I went to D.C. one day, and I took some photos on my rainy, cold last day of dog-walking. Have a good Monday everyone.

back from FL

2011-09-24T20:55:00.012-04:00

I actually started writing this post on Thursday, the day after we returned from our 4 day trip to south Florida. But on Friday we decided to see my best friend in MD, since it was our last chance to do so, before the move.

We had dinner at some restaurant and went to his house to say goodbye to his mum, who I've grown close to as well. Played with some cute doggies. :)

The next day we decided to wake up early and take a fairly short trip up to Lancaster, PA (where we lived while I was going to college) to go to their farmer's market. We both miss it, and the hub wanted to say hi to his old fellow chefs at the restaurant he worked at in Lancaster.

I felt fine when I woke up, but as we were driving up there (which takes 2 hours 30 minutes) I felt a knot in my stomach that wouldn't go away, and began to worsen.

So long story short, and a few disgusting details later, I definitely had a stomach flu/food poisoning. Not good to have while on the move. Takeshi asked if I wanted to go back, but by that time we were more than half way there. So I said (stupid me), no we should still go. And at the moment we are driving through downtown Lancaster I end up having to open the passenger door to puke. Takeshi is freaking out a little, trying to find a place to pull over. And everyone around us is, I'm sure, is wishing they hadn't just seen that happen in front of their eyes. And it's pouring rain outside.

Our plan is to drop me off at a local cafe (because I just CAN'T be in a moving car anymore), so he pulls over in traffic really quick and drops me off at a small outdoor parking lot which is literally about 20 ft. away from the cafe. I stumble through a line of bushes to be in between two parked cars - and I can't stand anymore.

I never made it to the cafe. I end up in a fetal position on the ground next to a storm drain in between the cars. I'm getting soaked, my shoes, my socks, my pants, and I don't care. I want to be unconscious at this point.

I feebly get out my phone and text Takeshi through pain and nausea:

"I need you

Can't get to cafe

Outside now on grpound

in bushes where you left me

need to lie down

please

come find me

in parking lot outside

Please"

After what seems to be forever, I hear him calling my name. He finds me and tells me he'll have to run back to the car, where he parked it. He comes, he parks the car in that same parking lot, and I throw myself into the backseat and lie down. I'm just so happy to be inside somewhere, that's dry and quiet.

So anyway....after that we get home a lot later than we had thought, with traffic on the way back.

This morning at 8am we went to an urgent care clinic, and they pretty much told me the same thing I already knew. They couldn't give me anything to treat/cure it - the only thing they said they could do is give me an injection of anti-nausea medicine, but since we don't have health insurance, it would have cost a fortune, on top of the price of the visit itself. So we left, came home, and I promptly fell asleep.

Hub ended up coming in later and falling asleep as well on the bed. I woke up at 8pm feeling better, and just didn't want to be asleep/laying down in bed anymore. He woke up a few minutes after me, and being the wonderful man he is, made me chicken noodle soup from scratch! So, so good. And while I was asleep, he did the laundry and went out and bought me some juice. Did I mention I love my hubby?

So. It's good that I'm getting better (knock on wood). The bad thing is that this knocks our schedule totally off. Originally we were planning to have been packing our stuff and picking up the truck tomorrow or Monday already.

So we may still move to Florida. But we are talking about alternatives now, perhaps just finding a cheaper apartment in this area. I don't know. We'll see.

throat scratch/research

2011-09-09T22:44:00.006-04:00

Hah. What a weird combination for a title.

So I guess I scratched the back of my throat somehow a few days ago. Thought I was coming down with something (OH my god - anything but THAT right now). But I took a look with a flashlight and I can see a mid-sized red scratch on the right side. Ouch. Gargling with salt water will hopefully help it.

The research continues full-throttle, as well as me sending a TON of emails to....pretty much everywhere on the east coast. I've already sent about 20 emails tonight, to at least 8 states. It's part of the plan we finally came to put together today, of how the rest of the month will go. Since we were able to extend the apartment notice until the 30th.

You cannot BELIEVE how....horrible it's been to debate this issue of, are we moving? Or not moving? What if this happens? What if this happens?? What should we do?

There's been a lot of sleep lost, a lot of late nights talking until 2-3am. Frustration, a lot of helplessness, etc. All of the usual happy stuff. :D

I think things are still tense but in a better way - in a focused way, since we've made a decision on what to do. We can actually now work towards something.

Today was my last day with the dog walking. It was very anti-climatic. I guess it wasn't as hard for me to say goodbye to the doggies, because my mind is too busy thinking about our plans to move. Though it will suck to go from seeing them everyday, to not having them around at all again..........

We need to get a dog sometime sooooon! xD Heh.

plans?

2011-09-07T22:18:00.019-04:00

So this whole business has been going on for about a month now. And it's almost too much to spit back out in a blog post, but I'll do my best to sum up.

Basically, hub brought this up a month ago, saying that it was about that time for him to move on from his present job. He's big on what he can learn as a professional wherever he works. When the learning starts to ebb, he's usually ready to find another job. That time period, so far in the past, has been 1 year. We have been in the D.C. Metro area for 1 year.

And in that 1 year, I have unsuccessfully searched for a graphic design position. I have not been able to, in my eyes, start my career. I want to be employed. I can NOT dog walk or do other part-time job crap until I'm in my 30's or something...

So.

We hatch this 'plan'. For him to leave his job (which he was already going to do), and for me to quit my part-time dog walking, and to kick my job-hunting really into high-gear. And to move from our present apartment to perhaps somewhere else in the Metro area. We were more optimistic/hopeful about this plan, because recently I've been off to multiple interviews/hearing back from people I've applied to - the most I've had since we've moved here.

And to do this within a months' time.

But now.

The time is getting damned short now. The 4-5 interviews I went to ended up in nothing. I still have no sights for a job. Takeshi's culinary industry has always been, and probably will always be more reliable, compared to mine. And he's been out of college, working professionally now for at least 3-4 years.

But we've made decisions to end certain things now - we have until the 25th to move out of our current apartment. Both of our last days of work are this Saturday the 10th. Takeshi can only start looking for jobs until after he's left this job. Bad thing about being a chef is the hours. He doesn't have the time to actually go to interviews because he'd have to take time off. He works at least 15 hours a day.

It does feel like we were too hopeful, like I said. It feels like we've chosen to dig ourselves into a hole, we've chosen to be so risky. We've never been in such a clueless situation before.

So. What to do?

Last night we had a debate after hub got home from work at 11pm until about 2am.

These were our thoughts that night:

Basically, the way things are going (or NOT going...) with my job search, there is a HIGH probability that we'll have to move, again, with only Takeshi's new income at wherever he gets a job. But the cost of living in the D.C. Metro area is crippling us financially, since we got here. It's too damned expensive. We don't know if we'll be able to stay in this area that way.

A different way to look at my particular situation is that, with my entry-level experience that I have right now - perhaps I'm trying to reach a level in the D.C. Metro area, that I'll never be able to get to. The standards of, or what constitutes an "entry-level graphic design position" this area is more difficult than what I can qualify for. I need a stepping stone to start my career, but most or all of the "stones" in the D.C. Metro are too far away for me to leap onto. (Weird metaphor?)

So. With the issue of the cost of living, and my career troubles, we had to come up with a different way to try to obtain those things.

And our thoughts are now geared towards moving to a smaller city/town. Quite possibly not even within Maryland, DC, or Virginia. Smaller towns have lower costs of living for sure, and their standards for design jobs are different.

We saw both of these things in Lancaster, PA when we lived there. We actually saved money on TK's income ALONE, and I was still in college. We need to save money right now. And I need an easier way to get into the design industry. And if, in the worst case scenario, I'm not able to get "hired" in that new city/town right away, we need the backup plan of being able to sustain ourselves with his income alone. I could work as an intern somewhere to gain experience, and get another part-time job.

So yeah...........these past couple of months have been....heavy. And it's not over yet. It's going to get even crazier. But hopefully for the better.

I've started researching some locations already. Since we're working on a fast schedule anyway, we'll be hoping to make the best decision soon. And then even more decisions after that. There are so many "what-ifs" and so much that's just going to BE unknown. We just need to make the best 'educated' decision.

We have to make it work somehow, anyway. We don't have a choice. We have work to do. We have until the 25th.

Send us good vibes and rainbows. D:

Night all.

running out of time - where to go

2011-09-07T10:19:00.002-04:00

I'm going to blog about this whole recent situation when I get home today. There's so much to say about it, that I've wanted to blog about it, but just started to talk about it tires me out!

Gloomy/rainy weather today too. Bleh...where am I, London?

More soon.

tropical storm and me

2011-08-27T17:52:00.019-04:00

First of all, I'd really like to thank GaijinWife for recently sending us some goodies in the mail from back home! :) Everything has already been dug in to believe me, because it's all delicious. Hehe. And I finally got the two green ceramic bowls I'd been wanting from her. They've already been used for things that aren't tea. Lol. Perhaps their tea-holding days will come soon.
ありがとうございます！

~~~~~~~~~~~

So anyway, it's just me and the dark, rainy weather today. I was hoping Takeshi's restaurant would close today or something. Though I'm sure I'll have fun driving in this same weather, to get him tonight! Waah. ;__;

Oh! - I know what will pass the time!

Thank you Katy!! Oh Chocochip what can't you make better? <3

This morning on the way back from dropping him off, the rain hadn't started just yet, just ominous clouds. Just as I got home it started and won't stop until tomorrow afternoon-ish they say? Just hoping the power doesn't go out today or tomorrow. The lights have been flickering a little! I was being lazy today and hadn't taken a shower yet, and thought I'd just wait. But then I decided to take it a few minutes ago, because they keep saying things on the news like, "Well if you're water goes out blah blah."

This is me in the shower:

(taking shower at normal leisurely pace) scrub....scrub....scrub

(big light flicker)

............SCRUB.SCRUB.SCRUB >____>;;;

Now I'm all squeaky clean. Yay! And the lights are still on for now.

A few days ago when Takeshi was still taking off from work, we decided wake up a little early and to go to the farmer's market in Dupont Circle in DC. Takeshi says that it's one of the largest farmer's markets in the area? Something like that. It was humid and hot outside that morning which was gross, but the market itself didn't disappoint. It was very large compared to the ones we've been to the in the past, and in the end we bought a lot of good produce. I decided to buy a small canary melon, which I had never tried before. It's pretty good, I like it. A very light, sweet melon. We didn't buy anything really perishable like dairy or meat, because we had to ride the metro home after that.

patterns/textures of the marketplace

our haul :)

And now for some miscellaneous pics and a vid. :)
Have a good weekend everyone.

the hub at Starbucks

GaijinWife squid! with a drinkie :) once the hub opened the squid, it didn't last the night.

Ralph doing his 'dead poodle' trick!

wordless wednesday

2011-08-17T19:55:00.012-04:00

This past weekend we had a visitor! :) A client needed me to dog-sit their Beagle-mix, May.

My recent attempt to make tatsukuri! I think I succeeded on the taste of it, but the "mixture" ended being a little too stiff. Next time I'll cook the liquid combination for a little less (soy, mirin, sugar).

a good bounty from the local HMart :)

some days

2011-08-15T22:38:00.002-04:00

For a while now I've seen this "exercise" done on other people's blogs. Thought I'd take a stab at it.

- Some days I'm tired of hearing other wives or girlfriends moan about how their husband or boyfriend doesn't get home until 8pm or something like that, when I WANT to sneer at them and tell them to stop bitching about it. Because my husband doesn't ever get home before 11pm on weekdays and never before 1am on weekends. And that the only CONSTANT day off he has is Sunday, but his other day off always changes, so it makes it near impossible to plan anything to do on his days off. But most days, I remember that I knew the kind of hours he'd be working in the food industry when we were dating, and that I could never ask him to do anything different, because it's what he loves.

- Some days I actually take naps that are only about an hour and a half. But most days I end up taking 3-hour naps, even when I set the alarm on my phone. Because I like naps, and I like sleeping, even though I usually feel really groggy after a nap!

- Some days I really start to resent the choice I made to be a Graphic Design major, because I haven't been able to find a full-time design job in over a year now. Some days I feel like Takeshi resents me being the weak link in the marriage. I feel like I'm stuck somewhere between a student and a professional, still. But most days, he tells me that he supports me and has faith in me. I remember that I can't see myself doing anything else as a career and be happy. I want to work hard for our future, because I know he works hard for it.

weird list

2011-08-09T22:58:00.017-04:00

Hiya everyone (all three? of you. haha...) Just working on the freelance project I was hired for, surprisingly by the natural history museum I interned at in PA for college. Nice people, close-nit. Just doing their seasonal newsletter. Mostly just plugging in articles, info, and pictures.

I've made a list of recent weird and/or not so great events that happened to me. Thought some of them were funny. Maybe you can relate!

-- It's morning and I'm on my way to drop off hub at work, as we do everyday. We're on the main road, and we're in the center lane. Suddenly out of the corner of my eye to the right, I see something ricochet off of the windshield of the car next to me. It flies over to land right in front of OUR car, and I roll over it.....and see a ploof of feathers fly up. Oh jeez. That's the first time I've ever hit something while driving (though I hope the poor guy was dead before I rolled over it...).

-- It's morning again on another day. I'm making breakfast, and am about to slice a bagel down the center. We don't have room for a bagel slicer, and we don't really eat that many bagels, so I am using a bread knife. And I proceed to miss the bagel all together and slice my finger. Nice way to start the morning. x__x It wasn't deep by any means, but it HURT. Ugh. This is why my chef husband watches me when I use things in the kitchen!

-- So about 2 weeks ago-ish, we're in the car together in Old Town, and we find ourselves with a sudden flat tire! Our front right wheel just deflates in a matter of seconds. It's a good thing it didn't happen with just me because, I have never had to change a flat tire. And I don't think I could EVER get those damned bolts off of the tire to take it off in the first place anyway, they're so damned tight. So Takeshi fixes us with the spare tire. I go to our local dealership the next day to have them repair my flat. They say it will take an hour - 2 HOURS later they're finally done. What the hell?...But I didn't have to pay so all I did was give up my time. Whatever. It repaired right? Not even. That NIGHT the air-pressure light comes back on. So, I go back to the same dealership a couple of days later, when they have a spot, and THIS time it's with Takeshi in the morning. We figure we can get him to work afterwards. They say again - it'll take an hour...An hour and a HALF later, hub is seething and for good reason. He goes out to talk to the idiot of a service-department guy we've been dealing with and complains. The guy acts all huffy and bothered - so sorry we're ruining your day. Takeshi comes back in and swears that WHEN he said that, he looked out there and saw our car just SITTING there! And a minuted later they drive it back to work on it. Oh shit....that's not even acceptable. But we wait for another 20 minutes until they drive it up for us. The guy's like, "Uh so we patched it, but no guarantees it's gonna hold...". So we just sat here for almost 2 hours again, for you to tell me that you couldn't really fix it, and that I might need a new tired anyway???? THANKS a ton. But at least, this time as well, we didn't have to pay. --- Switch to that night - guess what light comes on again? WHELP - new tire here I come! I call the local Firestone tire place and make an appointment. I go and they check out my tires. And they didn't have good news for me. The front tire with the slow leak in it? Actually had had a NAIL in the shoulder of the tire. No wonder it kept leaking...=__= Not ONLY that, but all four tires were officially balding and deemed unsafe for the state of Virginia. AND they were unbalanced to top it off. OK true, I needed to think about my tires more - but how, HOW could the other dealership NOT tell me these things? "Oh and uh yeah there's a NAIL in your tire." Unbelievable. So I have no choice - I need to get 4 new tires now. So a purchase of only around $70 turned into a purchase of $500. And I had to stick around for 3 and a half hours for them to install them and balance them. Sometimes I feel like I LIVE at these car places!

-- Have you ever had a cat jump on your back from behind you? Because I did, a few days ago and it's scary!! And painful. :( I had been doing some cat-sitting for work. The cat did not mean it in a mean way (he's really sweet), he mostly did it to get my attention. But GOD his claws are long and sharp! My back was all scratched up from me twisting around to rip him off of me. I look liked I had been attacked by some movie-poltergeist or something. xD

-- Have you ever been riding around at midnight on a major road and seen a fox standing on a street corner? Because I did, a few days ago. And it was weird. He was standing there looking around, probably wondering where the hell to go! I was hoping we wasn't going to get hit.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

So that's my list. :)

I'm currently looking to go shop for things to ship to GaijinWife and family. :D Exciting! I love receiving and sending parcels. And I get those green cereal-maybe-tea-ceremony bowls. Yay!

おやすみ, all.

moving on

2011-08-05T00:38:00.019-04:00

So hub and I have been talking recently for the past month-ish about moving on.

Moving on from his current job, and moving to wherever the next job opportunity takes us. Or should I say HIS next job opportunity. Because I am still, as I always have been, the weakest link, the dead weight.

Oh yes! maybe I can move to another great big city and get hired by a bigger and better dog-walking business.....shoot me now. I know Takeshi has been saying to me that he wants both of us to move to any place based on the fact that we'll both get hired there. But sadly, it's still a matter of ONLY him, leading us, supporting us, having a guaranteed job. In over a year, I haven't had any luck in this area, and right now, for weeks, I've been applying to places all over the country, and yet again have not heard a word from anyone.

Somedays I really do start to resent my major in Graphic Design...Maybe if I had gone into another field, I wouldn't have all of this grief. It's true that many other industries are taking a dive in job openings right now, but still, maybe I would be better off financially if I had chosen another career path. But at the same time, no one really knew how bad the economy would be around this time, and how long it's still been declining for.

Hub told the head chef today about his plans to leave the restaurant around the end of this month, and had told the executive chef a few days before. And he's been met with well-wishes and support. People will miss him for sure. He's definitely a hard worker and gains respect wherever he works.

I got jealous of him, when he was telling me these things in the car last night.

I don't have a "team" at my job.

In this type of job I don't every talk to my "fellow employees". I work alone every day. I don't talk to anyone. Hell, I've never really met any of them in person. No one's going to miss me when I leave this job. Dogs may miss me for all of about 3 minutes. I'll probably miss them more, because then I won't even be able to spend time with other people's dogs when I'm still pining away for a dog of my own.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Mum and Dad left a few days ago. They'll be back in January they say. They're usual month-ish long stay before they fly straight to their new country, Jorden for 3 years. Not really soothing my nerves at all, knowing what kind of area of the world they'll call home. Why couldn't they have had the option of going to the embassy in Barbados? ;-)

Since we're doing the whole moving scene again, there's a high chance we could be in another state when they come back! I wonder if they'll be able to even visit us then, since it would be out of their way. They usually have always stayed in the D.C. metro area, since it's what they know.

Mum and Dad with their old friend Darlene (far left in white), who we met at lunch one day

This is where I get my weirdness from :)

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Takeshi and I finally got to go eat at Restaurant Eve (where he works!) a few weeks ago. The day before that I actually ended up buying a a one-piece dress that I got to wear at dinner, since it is a fine-dining establishment. ;) I felt very feminine indeed, since it's the only dress I've ever owned, other than the godawful thing I wore for one night only, to high school prom. We arrived for our 7pm reservation, and stayed untilllllll abouuutt 11pm!!! We got a 9-course tasting menu, and then got a drink at their bar - so those types of things take a while. =__= All in all, a delicious meal at Eve.

Oh my such awesome deserts

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

I apologize for having to look at that damned white line in all of my photos lately. I need to take in my iPhone to the Apple Store and have them fix it. I think it's a case of a dead pixel...

eavesdropping

2011-07-25T20:02:00.021-04:00

It's not hard to do in the apartment building we live in. As I type this, I am still listening to a pair of gangster dudes outside sitting on the stairs, about who's shagging who around here, and who they'd like to shag. Who knows how long they'll be there...

I'm tired of feeling like I'm not living in my own space, but rather living in a mess hall. Where you can hear conversations you'd rather not listen to. The stairwell outside is very echo-y, so it makes loud people even louder. I daydream about using an air horn on them when they're unaware, or throwing out a stink-bomb on them (but that would just leak into everyone's apartments anyway).

Yesterday, hub and I went to a Walmart because he needed to get some brand of black work shoes they carry. We were going through the aisles, and had to squeeze by a group black teenage girls who were just dicking around.

He went through first - and I came through second - just in time to hear one of the girls say,

"Excuuuse me - 'Knock you over with your cart. Ching-chong-ning..."

Which is an obvious racist-Asian noise/name whatever that people say. I WANTED to turn around and say something really nasty back to her, because she's an idiot, but in the end, I really didn't want to start anything. I don't have as much moxy as Corinne does. ;-)

I've always said that we don't live in the most educated area - and Walmarts (no matter where they are) attract and collect all the low IQ people into one store. I've never been in a store in which I've seen SO many public outbursts, fights, or racist comments made. Bleh.

~~~~~~~~

In other news, the parents have been here for about a week now. They're spending a lot of time shopping, stocking up on things for the next country they'll be moving to soon, so I've been tagging along. Takeshi had off yesterday, so the four of us had dinner at an Indian restaurant. Delicious stuff!

Here are some photos! The ones at the end are the photos from when we went to visit my cousin and his wife, and ended up going to a nearby park/marsh.

Me and my college friend's 3-month old. :) Can you tell I'm not used to holding a baby?

because he's my hub :)

A HUGE Asian food mart we found ("HMart") and checked out the other day

their pug Wesley! We love him

that's it, i'm movin' to south dakota

2011-07-15T10:19:00.006-04:00

I only say that because (and I'm not serious by the way), I looked up the unemployment percentage rates of all the states in the U.S. and South Dakota is at the top of the list, with the lowest percentage of 3.2%.

As opposed to D.C......which is sitting pretty with a whopping 9.8%. Damn. No wonder I've had a hard time with getting a job in the D.C. metro area. Even Pennsylvania (which we were living in before Virginia) has a better percentage than that. But I can't see us living in PA again, unless one or both of us get a sweet job offering.

Speaking of the job search:

The other day I spoke to an old college friend of mine from Silver Spring, MD who works for a souvenir company, and told me about a possible opening for an Illustrator/Designer. So I sent them my resume, portfolio, the whole lot, and they told me they were impressed. So silly me I start to get my hopes up. Turns out in the end that, they, "thought I have real talent that shows in my portfolio" but ended up not taking me because of distance between here and Rockville, MD, and my lack of work experience. To which I wrote back and said (in a polite manner), how am I supposed to start somewhere and GAIN work experience in the design industry when everyone wants me to have 3-5 years experience already? She surprisingly wrote me back, to say that she understand my frustration. Ok... T__T whateve'.

So it didn't work out. I shouldn't have gotten so worked up about it, but you can't but put a little of yourself into every resume you send out. I TRY to stay emotionally neutral these days, but it's hard sometimes to keep it up.

I got the "declined" email back from them while I was out dog-walking. I couldn't help it, and I got very weepy. The dog was probably wondering what the hell was wrong with me! Walking around with my sunglasses on, with big tears streaking down my blotchy face. I felt really defeated (once again). While I was driving to the next dog's house (with big crocodile tears in my eyes), the next song on the radio, when I turned it on was titled, "Good Life". Ironic.

Sooooooo, actually yesterday I got 2 - count em' - 2 calls for interviews. One is for a retail job (cuz I'm looking for any full time work now as well as design work), tomorrow. The other one is actually from a design firm in Old Town! I was SO surprised they called me. And I'll be going to that on Tuesday. Fingers crossed. But you never know. As always. :/

job, funeral, misc.

2011-07-08T20:45:00.003-04:00

I'll be doing a post after this about our visit last weekend with my cousin Matt and his wife! Now, onto some updates...

Takeshi ended up seeing his friend from college yesterday, it turned out, instead of Monday. I dropped him off a the metro and he spent a good few hours chatting at a restaurant before heading back to Alexandria. I'm glad they got to catch up.

Recently, to make a long story short, my grandfather (my dad's dad) had a bad accident at the retirement home they leave in. Ended up falling out of bed, tried to get up, gashed his head on the night-stand, and broke a vertebrae in his neck. Not good. And the real strange thing is that the DAY this happened, I ended up calling them to say hi and chat. It was a shock to hear my grandmother tell me that it had happened THAT morning...After that, in the hospital, he contracted pneumonia for a while, and became even more delusional than he already had become at the age of 95. So now, we have received word from my dad's sister (who has been with him this whole time during the ordeal, and who located the closest), that he is circling the drain pretty much, and will probably pass soon. Maybe next week. It's hard to determine these sort of things. I feel really concerned for my grandmother, since they have been married for 69 years! But dad's sister tells us that from what she has seen, grandma is holding up OK considering the situation. Dad and mum are coming back next week, and it's terrible irony that this had to happen now. There will probably be a funeral in the near future, but I'm not sure where. They may hold it in Maryland where they live now, or perhaps Pennsylvania because most of our relatives live there, and I'm sure they'd want to attend. I am not religious in any sense, and do not see myself sitting in church, but I am considering going to the funeral. I'll need to buy "funeral" clothes, as I've never been to one. I feel sad to see Pop leave, since he's the only grandfather I've ever had. My mother's parents died when I was very little, and my brother may not have even been born yet. More on this, as we go. We'll see how it unfolds.

I've always been looking for a better (full-time graphic design) job. But now, seeing as we are (still) not able to actually SAVE any money, I've been renewing and energizing my search for any jobs in the area that could give me full-time and good enough pay. I'll still look for graphic design jobs in the meantime, but I need to help us save money right now, or we'll never be able to buy a house, get a dog, have a kid, or anything else we'd want to do in the future.

I'm waiting for this summer weather. to. END. Being a dog walker, you have to go outside in all kinds of weather, and I agreed to that because I knew the job. But this humidity right now is unbearable. I'm usually sweating like a pig for most of the day. Yuck! And then dogs lick you and you feel even more sticky, and then their fur gets on you. I love taking showers even more these days! ;)

hot as anything

2011-06-28T16:39:00.008-04:00

No I'm not talking about the imaginary countless number of guys who hit on me while I'm walking dogs. More like the insane heat and humidity lately. I'm pretty sure I don't look as cute as I wish I would, when I'm out in the midday sun, melting.

So, Takeshi has strep throat. He had been feeling awful (again, after just getting over some bug), for the past few days, and then started waking up in the mornings with a temperature of 101-102F. So this past Sunday I drove him to the "mini" clinic in town to see the doctor on staff. She just confirmed to him yesterday that his "bug" indeed has a name, and prescribed meds for 10 days. We're supposed to go see my cousin this coming weekend, so hopefully now that he's on medication, he won't be in danger of spreading it.

Both of us have had another long stretch without any "personal time", again. Sorry to give too much info, but it's something I really struggle with continuously. I don't know exactly how much Takeshi struggles with it, or thinks about sex, but, I would wager that he might not have the same amount of "free" time to even think about it.

Me, on the other hand. It makes me feel like an addict sometimes. But most of the time, it makes me feel not sexy. T_T The same reason behind why the hub keeps getting little colds is the same reason we don't have a sex life. His schedule. The lack of - him.

- I'm going to stop now. I should limit the amount of space per post, that I'll let myself brood about it...Sorry again for the T.M.I.

At this point I don't think we'll be doing anything for the 4th of July (again this weekend, Sunday). I know we'll be seeing my cousin on the 3rd. Hub has been talking with an old culinary friend of his, about getting together and catching up on the 4th. But I don't think we'll be doing anything special. They haven't even THOUGHT of anything to do yet. Men confound me sometimes. Ideally I'd rather have him go off, take the car, and visit with his friend. Hub rarely gets "dude time" in these days. I know we try to spend as much time as we can together on days off, but I want him to see his friends too, sans wifey.

Y'know, normal dude stuff you always hear about.

The trip I took to my college friend's house in Culpeper went nicely. It was great seeing her again, and meeting her 3-month-old son. The first time I've ever held a baby I believe. He was fascinatingly cute to me. I couldn't help but feel little pangs of mummy-longing once and a while. But I am still very much aware that we are not (financially) ready for any little munchkins right now.

I leave with a work-in-progress shot of some art-stuff.

cloudy thursday

2011-06-16T15:01:00.009-04:00

I got back earlier today from dog-walking, so I'm going to do a proper update!

-- I don't know if I had mentioned it yet on this blog, but, just recently I had had a freelance job (the place in Bethesda that I originally applied to for a posted "assistant" position). It just recently came to a close as well. The freelance work they needed done was mostly a catalogue for their clients they deal with, and were working towards a pretty tight deadline. They told me that the clients, in the end, needed the catalogue delivered to them sooner - so they told me, "we can't afford to do designing anymore, and just need to put the info on the pages, and print it out a.s.a.p.". So my services were not needed after that. They say they may contact me in the future to perhaps revisit the design work for them, but there's no guarantee.

-- My parents are coming to the States again to visit, and this time it's in July, not December! I'm really looking forward to them visiting, and wish they could just move back to the U.S. altogether. They'll be staying for about 2 weeks. I hope that the 4 of us (this is including my younger brother) can get get together again for lunch, but knowing Mike, I'm hoping that my parents will be able to at least locate him and make contact. T__T; It seems that a lot of my family members (relatives mostly) have the "I don't care about keeping in touch with you" gene. Mike seems to have contracted it.

-- I'm deciding to grow my hair out. How long? Until it bugs me, or until it becomes really unmanageable. As far as I know, I've never had my hair longer than about shoulder length. My hair is about that long right now. Why am I doing it? For a change I suppose. I want to see what I'd look like. And also, getting your hair cut costs money. We're cheap these days when it comes to certain things that I wish we could buy. New clothes, better bed sheets, etc....Anyway, my hair isn't the greatest in my opinion because it's thick, frizzy, and wavy. Because of my "fluffy" hair, my MIL started calling me "プードル" (poodle). Takeshi's hair is growing longer too, so much that he can wear a small ponytail too! I know that so far, he's only ever wanted to get his hair cut at that Japanese salon in NYC. But I don't know if we're going to be able to take that trip again any time soon, because of time and money.

-- In my spare time I've been trying to develop/nurture/search for my own style of illustration, since I love doing it besides being a graphic designer. The point at which I first found this style of mine (and liked what I had come up with), was when we were living in Japan. And ever since then, I've wanted that illustrative style to come from my memories of living there. I'm working on a digital piece right now - every picture I illustrate uses one of the thousands of photos I took of Japan, as it's background. I'll upload a screenshot of it here in the near future. :)

-- This Saturday, I'm going to visit a friend I met at college, at her house in Culpeper. I'm going to visit not only her, but her brand new baby son! Wow, how things change. The last I saw her at graduation - and now she's a mum. So that'll be fun to experience a baby! Maybe holding him and such. Just being close to a baby of a person whom I know, is new.

I leave with an old photo of me and tousan! :) TK, him, and I went on a day's trip to Nagoya, I believe...

late update

2011-06-10T10:56:00.003-04:00

I live! I don't know if I should keep apologizing to "everyone" about not posting as much, since I never know exactly how many people stay-tuned. I've been meaning to post about Florida, and other such recent events, but life takes hold and I find it's been a month or something, since I've posted! Yikes.

I'm heading off to dog-walking soon. I'm glad today isn't as hot as the past 2 days, though it's still going to be in the mid 90's. Because of the humidity, it has seemed hotter still, during the day. I'm reliving my memories of the summer months in Suzuka! Good god that was awful humidity. You just never are able to be DRY. Takeshi doesn't sweat that much really, only if it's unbearably hot and humid. I, being the pasty, delicate gaijin that I am, would be sweating bullets from the minute I woke up in the morning to the point where my PIL would FINALLY turn on the エアコン at night. But then, being the penny-pinchers they are, they'd turn it off again at bedtime. I can't get on them too much about that, since we do it too.

I'll write more when I get back today, hopefully! Gotta fly. :) Puppies await.

Florida Trip, Misc.

2011-04-26T21:10:00.009-04:00

It's been a while. Again. T_T

I have been wanting to post, really I have. Just can't get past my everyday rut. Next Tuesday we'll be heading off to Florida, and be there for a week. Hopefully with no hitches.

I've been thinking of going out tomorrow to browse for a different swimsuit situation...right now I have sort of a bikini top that a bought in Japan, and a pair of MEN'S swimpants, also bought in Japan - because I couldn't find a pair of women's that fit my fat ass! Darn those Japanese women and their small hips and shoulders and everything else. Lol.

So needless to say, I could wear something a little more feminine. I pulled out all of my summer clothes, which mostly just consist of old t-shirts and skirts that are too small for me now.

I've been experiencing another bout of melancholiness/under-motivation lately. Just the usual bunch of factors in my life get me down again and again. It's like a rain cloud of "problems" that I can sometimes push away - but always come drifting back, to settle over my head from time to time. Job problems, frustration over Takeshi's neverendingly-shitty work hours, and not being happy with my body.

I'm hoping that the trip will help us be a COUPLE again. I don't even remember what it was like to be a giddy girlfriend anymore. I know it hasn't been that along ago that we've been married but, for me the nature of the relationship could be better. It seems that we're roommates sometimes, y'know? We work to gain money for savings, we chat about the day (if there's anything different to talk about) when he finally gets home at around 1am.

I guess I'd want to have (a) kid(s) in the future (when we're not struggling with finances), but then I think - TK's work hours are terrible, and right now it's just me. Would the kid never get to see him? There's a chance. Unless he finds a higher management position that pays more but allows him to have a LIFE, he's going to continually have to work all day and night, everyday. I feel like I'd probably be raising the kid by myself pretty much. This future possible scenario doesn't appeal to me at all right now. I remember a while ago (when I still passionately badgered TK about his work hours...) when I realized something that blew me away. I guess I was under the impression that as soon as *I* got a job, as soon as *I* could get paid well enough - that it could take away some from his "work obligation". That he could be around more, maybe be able to work for less hours in the day. The thing I realized was that - I can't help it. I can't make a difference. Even if I do make a really nice amount of money in the future, it won't change anything. It doesn't matter what I do, his work hours will always be what they are. And that realization dealt a BIG blow to my overall self-worth and usefulness. No matter what I do, I won't get to see him more.

I heard somewhere I while ago that Japanese men are first married to their jobs, and second to their wives. Has that got any truth to it, ladies in Japan? :/ I know Takeshi wants to have a life, and be home more, and spend time with me more.

So blah, yeah. Don't take this as me having a final decision on this relationship yadda yadda. No dramatic actions. I just need to spill some thoughts out, is all. Don't go crazy, parents I know you read this stuff...T__T

All I can do? - Push away that cloud, for now. Think happy thoughts Laura, if you can.

hub's blog

2011-04-14T00:53:00.005-04:00

I'm putting this out there - the hub has put in his blog for a nomination from Saveur (food related) magazine. He's excited about possibly winning and getting some recognition for his blog, as he puts a lot of effort in his culinary skills! It would be quite a feather in his cap. :) If you'd like to, please follow the information to put in your vote! Below is taken from hub's Facebook page:

"Please nominate tk1202 for 2011 best food blog awards under the category for "Best Professional Blog" by Saveur Magazine!! Thank you for taking your time and I really appreciate it!!

"SAVEUR 2011 Best Food Blog Awards - Saveur.com
GO HERE TO VOTE ---> Click
VOTE FOR THIS URL -->: http://tk1202.blogspot.com/

spring, hurry up already

2011-03-29T20:38:00.028-04:00

So I guess I should make another post before March ends! Hmm so what's new.

Last Wednesday, I got into a fender bender while driving at night to pick Takeshi up from work like usual. I was sitting at a red light and my car gets a good "Bonk!".....hmm??? Oh great. Nothing too bad: two scrapes/dings on my back bumper, but still needs fixing. So the dude has been (so far) pretty nice about it and wants to write me a certified check, on the 15th of April. The crappy thing about getting the car fixed is that the shop needs it for 3 days??!! Sigh. So I factored in rental car costs for 3 days to what the guy owes me. Times like this, makes me wish we could afford another car! But if we don't have to pay for it, then whateve'.

Our 3 year marriage anniversary is coming up on May 16th! This year we decided to take it up a notch and GO somewhere, instead of just a nice dinner somewhere. :) Aaaand we're going to sunny Florida! Which I have never been to, so I'm excited to hit those beaches!! I love the ocean. We'll be staying at a rental condo in Daytona Beach for a week for NO CHARGE, thanks to my best friend's very generous and AWESOME grandfather who owns it! So, so nice of him. I'll be calling him sometime soon about information and such. That saves us about $300-$400. Lol. From Google Map it looks like the beach is only a 5-6 minute walk away. Nice. :) So, jazzed about that, and reading up on places to go and see. Anytime I step out outside right now into the chilly breeze, I just picture myself on a white sandy beach, playing in the water. Hehe.

Going to the D.C. Cherry Blossom Festival on April 9th, which should be fun. But I've read about the peak blooming time for the cherry blossoms in D.C. and by then, it will have ended. So TK and I are going a weekend earlier (this Sunday) when it is still the peak blooming time, to see the trees. And dawdle around, since we don't get to go to D.C. that often.

2 possible job prospects are going on right now, but I don't want to get my hopes up again, of course. We'll see.

Made my very first batch of miso soup the other night! Very proud of myself, and it didn't taste that bad! :) Even Takeshi said so! Since he's Japanese AND a chef, his "critique" of my Japanese dishes definitely count. Lol.

Dog walking is going well for what it is. Got a new dog - or puppy I should say! Golden Retriever puppy (about 11 weeks old now) named Ace who is the chubbliest, adorable thing ever, and bites everything in sight. I hope that changes soon!

I leave you with recent random photos! Have a good week, all.

Sam, Sussex Spaniel :)

Pete at the park

Hazy day in Old Town.

Ace the Golden Retriever - energy!

Always-cheerful Sydney. Black Lab. I love him to bits.

Old Town from 14th floor from client's apartment

Mimsy the tweeny-weeny poodle

Miso soup!

Dexter deciding to get a drink a different way

Having fun with Sam!

Baltimore and Philly in 2 days

2011-03-04T18:38:00.048-05:00

It's March now! Spring is getting closer and closer! :D

So, as it would happen, Takeshi had last Saturday AND Sunday off which is so unusual. So we decided to take advantage of it and go somewhere! It ended up being 2 places where we knew we could drive to (without a 4+ hour trip) and still have time to do things there during the day. We went to Baltimore, MD on Saturday then drove up to Philadelphia, PA that same day, stayed in Philly overnight, next day finished visiting Philly, and then drove back Sunday evening.

All in all it was a good trip, even though we found out that (for us) there's way more stuff to do in Philly than in Baltimore. And second, the trip greatly improved our opinion/view of Philadelphia, since the LAST time we were there, it sucked. That was mostly due to the fact that we were rushing to catch a flight to move to Japan (in 2008-ish?), and I we ended up going to the emergency room at midnight because of my sinuses. Long story short, we wasted about 3 hours, $300, and about a 10-minute visit from a doctor to tell me that they really couldn't give me anything for my misery.

But it's true that we didn't really get to SEE Philly that much, that time. I had also been to Philly a couple of times before on college trips, but those days were spent at the art museum.

In Baltimore we went to the National Aquarium, which I hadn't been to since grade school, and Takeshi had never been to. Even though I have a fondness for the place, Takeshi and I agreed afterwards that the aquarium back in Japan, in Toba is way better. They walruses and penguins there. :) We tried looking for a place to eat lunch at in the area, before we would head off to Philadelphia. We wanted to find somewhere unique to Baltimore that would interest us (and not bankrupt us), but didn't find anything and settled for a Panera Bread. Took a short stroll through Baltimore's "Little Italy" which was very sad-looking and deserted. Kind of a shady area too...

Got to Philly and went to the Reading Terminal Market, an interior market with multiple, different food stands, grocery shops, herb shops, etc. After that, since it was getting later, we decided to search around for a hotel for the night. We wanted to stay in Philly without busting our wallets on the room. Oh the magic of iPhones! We just searched online in the car for 10 minutes, called some places, and finally found one that was decently priced. We ended up getting a "suite" which included a walk-in closet, and a tiny kitchen area, both of which we didn't need to use. The place was older for sure. We could see uneven paint-jobs on the walls and ceiling, and the oven looked dirty. We through our stuff in the room and looked around for a place to eat. Takeshi already had a place in mind, some restaurant he had heard about through the grapevine again, called "LaCroix" located in the Rittenhouse hotel. Talk about a fancy hotel! I felt so out of place sitting the marbled, glistening lobby outside of the restaurant doors. We were dressed in casual clothes, and everyone else was walking around in dresses, suits and ties, and looking very important. Dinner was very good, and a higher price came with it of course...The restaurant had some very good drinks on the menu - I had a blackberry bourbon drink of some kind, and then a very delicious Vanilla Cappuccino martini. I usually take photos of each of the courses whenever we get tasting menus, but after the first drink I pretty much just gave up. Haha. :) Besides the place had lower lighting, so the few photos I did take in the beginning weren't that good.

Left the restaurant at around 10pm-11pm, and walked back to the hotel. Thankfully it was close enough! But Takeshi got turned around a little with the directions (I wasn't the only one having drinks!), and we ended up passing a huge fountain in a vast circle.

The next day, we finished up our trip with first going to a Japanese grocery store I had found online, named "Maido!" located outside of Philly. Cute little place in a cute neighborhood. Small place, with a small counter on one side of the store where people could order affordable dishes, with a small TV attached to the wall airing Japanese TV. Man I miss watching TV back home. I stood there for 5 minutes just watching it. We got some things we probably couldn't find anywhere else in person, beside ordering it online, such as okonomiyaki-ko. The young guy who run us up spoke English very well (made me wonder if he was Japanese-American or a Japanese native). At the end when he finally took a look at Takeshi's card and saw his name, he uttered a small "arigatou gozaimashita". I guess both of them were wondering the whole time if the other one was really Japanese and knew the language! Hehe. :) I wish I could have had TK speak Japanese. I miss hearing it SO much. I like it when he speaks the language, I don't know why.

After that we went to the Little Italy of Philly! Much better. Lots of good tiny shops with yummy merchandise. We went into a small cafe which I had again looked up online and read about, called the "Rim Cafe", owned and run by one very charismatic Renee, from Nice, France. He was a trip! And so was the decor. And his drinks were oh so good. I definitely want to go back there whenever we go back to Philly.

Baltimore National Aquarium

the lovely travelin' couple :)

We got there almost when it opened so the line was next to nothing

sea turtle getting fed some brussels sprouts

manta rays

different jellies

sculpture in the harbor

walking to the Reading market right after arriving the parking in Philly

Reading Terminal Market

random photo of our little hotel room kitchen

a little tired from driving!

restaurant in the Rittenhouse Hotel

huge fountain while walking back from the restaurant

the view from our hotel room the next day

downtown Philly

photos of Little Italy in Philly

crazy interior photos of the Rim Cafe

very unique, hand-made chocolate blocks Renee uses to garnish drinks! yumm

my drink! A Vanilla "White" Volcano

Renee himself! Preparing TK's Cappuccino Brulee

jazzy Saturday

2011-02-19T16:51:00.009-05:00

Quiet Saturday at home, listening to jazz on the radio. Takeshi took the car (and I think I left my phone in it last night too...くそ！) But anyway, I got to sleep in today. :) Finally finished a book today that I had been reading for a while, so now I can start on some books I bought myself for my birthday. It sucks that we opted to leave a lot of "things we didn't need right away" back home in Japan at the inlaw's house. It's got a lot of photo albums, childhood things, etc, but I also left a ton of books of mine, which I'd like to be able to read again! But gotta wait until we decide we want to spend a LOT of money to ship those boxes back. I don't even remember how many boxes of things we left...I know I left my french easel...that didn't fit into a box for sure. They're probably collecting dust in that upstairs storage room they have in the house.

Still working on a painting I started for Takeshi for his birthday - this shit takes a while! Haha. Especially when it's for someone else. Also because I'm doing it in oil paint which does take a while to dry - and especially long, since the way I'm creating the imagery is to use thick layers of paint on top of each other. I want to create a very textural painting, so after each "layer" of paint I need to wait about 1.5-2 weeks for it to mostly dry so I can apply the next one on top. It's going good though. It's based off of one of Takeshi's dishes that he created....last year? Something like that. I'll show you the comparison photo when it's done. :)

On Valentine's Day I decided to bake cookies for the hub. :) They came out pretty good in my opinion, and I had a lot of fun making the icing from scratch for the first time! Takeshi had some food coloring, so I used the red and yellow. Takeshi unfortunately didn't get home until about 2:00am that night, since the restuarant was no doubt bursting at the seams with VDay customers all day long.

And now a random photo for you:

Tired hub on his day off. I did NOT show this to you, by the way. Ssshhhh. ;)

make the post already!

2011-02-14T22:12:00.021-05:00

ARGH Ok here I go - making this post finally after procrastinating. My birthday shpeel' and recent random stuff.

Birthday was good, but I ended getting my monthly THAT very day (too much info?). This ended up making me suddenly at one point in the day, feeling depressed and sad that my parents, and my brother couldn't be there to celebrate with me. My parents can't because of their jobs, but my brother can't mostly because he doesn't like talking to the family unless he's in trouble. I started getting really teared up while I was driving us to dinner that day, Takeshi was really confused, I'm sure...

We had a good dinner at a tiny, local sushi place, and got a HUGE amount of sushi, so I had to take some home, which is fine with me. :) Yum. More sushi for later that night! Anyway, photos from my birthday, certain things I gifted to myself ;), and other random photos.

Self-gifts
Designer Toys

Teardrips

Qee Bear

Lunartik

San-X

Rilakkuma stickers & Mamegoma eraser

Racoon Kireizukin Seikatu plush

Kamonohashi Kamo platypus mug

Momo Sushi restaurant

Hub totally surprised me with his present! Did not see that coming. But it's not really only mine., he uses it as well. I'd be one stingy person to hog such a neat thing all to myself!

pizza, car brakes, snow

2011-01-30T22:28:00.027-05:00

So we had our first big dose of snowfall so far this winter in northern VA. For this past Wednesday they were calling for snow to accumulate in the afternoon/evening hours and boy did we get it. Enough to throw everyone into a panic anyway, of course. I was walking dogs that same day and it was cold cold cold. Mostly the wind that makes it seem 15 degrees colder.

spray paint? on a building under construction

choppy cold waters

Takeshi was home that day as well. The past week before that, I had called the local Hyundai dealership to schedule a day to fix our extremely squeaky brakes. Wouldn't cha' know it, it was the day we were supposed to get all of this snow! But we headed out anyway after I got home from dog-walking. It had started to flurry a little bit as we made our way to the place. Once we got there the dude behind that counter says, "Um, we don't have you scheduled for today at all. Maybe you called the dealership in Fairfax?" What?? No, I know I called the right number, but whatever it didn't mean anything now. Fortunately, he was able to pencil us in still on short notice. Yaay! So we ended up sitting around and drinking free Starbucks machine coffee in their waiting area, for about 2 hours in total before heading out finally. While we were there it SNOWED. And the streets and street signs were almost unrecognizable.

while we were waiting...uh oh

We had the commute back from hell pretty much after that. What should have taken us about 25 minutes to get home, it took 2 hours. That's what all the radio/weather stations had ended up calling the evening, "the commute from hell", since the snow started right before rush hour, making travel unbearably slow for thousands and thousands of people across the D.C. metro area, Virginia, and Maryland. Reports of thousands of people just abandoning their cars. I know we didn't get 2 feet or anything and people who live in snowier areas may be scoffing at me right now, but it still sends everyone around here into chaos, and it's still annoying to deal with!

day after the snow, walking on Old Town streets

Onto warmer things like....pizza! :) Lately Takeshi and I have been very fond of seeking out places that serve Neapolitan pizza. That's Takeshi favorite type of pizza and I'm just happy eating pizza anyway! Heh. After we've been to a new place, we usually rate them and compare them to the other places we've been to. And also - I've started to really like...olives. I've ALWAYS hated olives since I was little. My mum is the olive lover - I'd always give them to her to eat instead! But at one pizza place, they serve a little complimentary dish of olives, lightly covered in olive oil before your meal. And I decided to try for kicks - and I really liked them. I couldn't believe I'd ever say that, but I did! Maybe I just never had a good olive before now. Is there anything you guys hated (or liked) when you were little, that you feel differently about now?

"2 Amys" in D.C. near Georgetown/TK having a coffee :)

interior shots

ice, fog, wordpress

2011-01-19T00:33:00.005-05:00

Out-of-the-ordinary weather we're having in our area of Virginia recently. Yesterday evening we had a bunch of freezing rain and sleet come down on us, to turn every flat surface into an ice-skating rink. Always fun when walking dogs who are "pullers"! And tonight we had a thick level of fog everywhere in the area. I was driving to pick TK up from work at around 11pm and it felt like I was driving through a dream!

Also, I posted again on Wordpress. Password has changed so comment me below if you'd like to be considered to get it again. :) Just give me an email to send it to.

e*m*t on Wordpress

I miss Suzuka. I miss Japan. I wonder what the in-laws did today?

おやすみ。

matcha mochi

2011-01-15T23:27:00.029-05:00

Yum I love mochi (sorry GW! ^_~), and the today I finally got to make a recipe for matcha mochi 'cake'. Link is here. It's a nice thing having mochiko be affordable! I've already made lots of chocolate mochi before this, but the matcha version is yummy too!

the good stuff

very good stuff

Takeshi gets to try it tonight! I'm sure he'll like it. :)

Speaking of things from Japan, Takeshi tells me that this year, my SIL will be coming to visit the States!! I'm so excited I can't wait to see her again. We never got to 'bond' as much as I would have wanted when we lived there. She's the closest thing I'll ever have to a sister, and it's funny that she's the same age as my younger brother as well. Both Takeshi and I are the oldest child in our families, and have 1 younger sibling.

She knows a good amount of English so that was always nice, but so much of her time was taken up by finishing off college and/or working part-time in Nagoya. So needless to say, she wasn't home during most of the day. She'll definitely stay with us, so there's a good chance we'll try to go out and buy an air mattress for her (and any other future guests). TK also told me that his friend/coworker Kato-san might be visiting the States as well. This is also cool news. :) TK will probably ask for days off of work, for both visits, so all of us could go somewhere together.

In some bad news, the 2 washers and 2 dryers in our apartment building have stopped working...Takeshi tried doing laundry on his day off this past week, and ended up wasting a $1.75. Great. Now we've returned to the time when we lived in Lancaster, where we have to go OUT and drive to a laundromat. Such a pain in the ass. And we called the office about getting them fixed, and they said, "Uh that's not what we do here - call the number on the washer." ...... So we called THEM and they said they'd give us a refund (however that's gonna happen), but - they can't tell us at ALL when the machines will be fixed. Seriously?

Gotta' love this American customer-service... God I miss Japan's customer service. Seemed to have a lot more competence. So that's what we'll being doing tomorrow, doing the laundry, down the road.

Hope everyone has (had) a good weekend! Recent photos:

finally bought a jewelry box, instead of keeping my earrings in an old 'Dean & Deluca' tea tin!

tadaa

finally, finally finished this oil painting - now to wait for it to dry

again

2011-01-14T22:15:00.008-05:00

Another deadline by which a possible future job is supposed to call me with a yes or no or anything has passed. Again, I send an email and leave a voice message on the interviewer's phone to hope for some kind of answer. Again another chance of receiving some human decency is nonexistent.

I'm feeling down today to say the least. Yes, I have a part time job, so I have some kind of money coming in, but it's not enough to actually make any kind of savings per month.

Again I am not being useful at all to this household. When will I be proud of myself? And have a full time job doing what I got my degree in?

I hate trusting people right now at all with "getting back" to me, or saying "hey I know someone in the industry etc etc maybe they could help you find something". It all turns to shit, and it ends up being nothing.

They say it in the beginning, but later on, I email back again and again - and I get dead silence. Not even a "Hi, sorry I can't help you" response. Or when they finally do email me back, it's about 2 weeks later with, "sorry we filled the position already." No shit? You THINK? I think I got that by now...

I hate people right now. I want to put them in my place, to be hanging on every response, that might mean a job in the end. They may have been in that position before in the past, looking for a job, but they obviously don't give a shit now.

I continue on my search, it's my only option. I try to "numb" myself as much as I can now, with interviewing and such, so I don't get my hopes up. But it's hard not to feel something every time.

runaway furball

2011-01-08T22:54:00.030-05:00

I had a BIG scare this past Thursday when walking one of my usual dogs. The dog has a history (with other walkers who work for my boss) of running out of the front door within a split second if you don't stop him, and to wiggle his way out of his leash/harness. I knew about the slipping out the door problem, but I've had a pretty good system which I use on him - throw treats as far as I can, down the stairs to the den and then whip out of the door a second later. He falls for it every time. ;) Oh puppies, so gullible. Sometimes on walks, he's very ADD when it comes to where he would like to walk. As soon as he sniffs out something in the air, he pulls really hard in a total different direction all of a sudden.

But this day, he didn't want to go a certain way (which is the same path I take him everyday...) and he pulled really hard. So I stop for a second and try to coax him etc. - and he just wiggles up and out of his harness and runs. And I'm left there with my jaw open and an empty leash. I try to call him because he's only a few feet away - and he just BOLTS into the strip of woods behind the town homes. I start running full throttle after him up this hill. Every time I try to sweetly call him and walk towards him, he runs farther away. Shit. Not good.

And as luck would have it (said sarcastically) his owner was home with a cold. So I ran, panicked back to the house and had to tell the guy that basically his dog escaped from me just then. Happy news I'm sure he wanted to hear through the haziness of sickly-ness. So, frustrated, he asks me what my plan is. Uhh....I don't know. I'm a search party of one, dude. I'm mine own task-force. So with his suggestions, I run out of the door with a box of treats, and a huge bag of dog food to try and entice him to me. I run to the last place I saw him, spot him, and continue to follow him into the next neighborhood. I'm climbing through people's back yards, and showing him the food and treats but he doesn't want them. Just stares at me for a minute and then scampers off again. Obviously, me with treats and food, can't compete with running free in the woods.

So long story short, the dude finally comes out to help me! Thank gawd. Even though I did feel bad for him that he was outside and sick... We ended up cornering the pooch in someone's backyard. I threw down some treats on the ground in a line, closer and closer to the guy - and we pretty much tackled the dog onto the ground while he was still munching away on a biscuit. I'm just glad we got him before dark! >__>;;

So that day was eventful. And I got some good exercise anyway!

I've starting walking a new dog recently. A German Shepherd name Pete. Nice boy, does well with commands. I little to energetic at times though! And a huge crybaby. :) Some recent photos of Pete and of the poodle trio again, since I know my mum fell in love with them when she ended up meeting them over the holiday.

Ralph

Mimsy

the Trio; Mimsy, Hugo, Ralph

On my walk with Pete, down to the water's edge in Old Town

Mr. Pete :)

Here is a video I took the other day of another dog I walk, a black lab named Sydney. He's the sweetest dog I've ever met! When I started having to walk him with another dog to save time, I would walk Sydney to the dog's house and tie him up outside for a minute to go inside and fetch the second dog. Evidently Sydney pitches a fit when he can't come inside too! And he howls and howls until I come back out again after 2 MINUTES. Crybaby! He's a good boy, though. :)

interview, chinatown, kushi

2011-01-04T22:58:00.032-05:00

Good evening. I'm in my PJs on my laptop. Comfy. :) Takeshi's at his laptop on the couch.

Today I travelled yet again into D.C. for an interview for a Graphic Design position. Takeshi dropped me off at the Huntington station, which is the closest to us in the area, because it was his day off today as well. I didn't want to hog the car! He went off and visited some places he fancies including some herb/spice shop in Falls Church. I rode the metro without too much hassle and arrived at my destination waaaay too early. I walked up and out of the Stadium Armory station at around 1:18pm but my interview was at 2pm, and it was only about an 11 minute walk to the office from that location. Shit. I lingered around in the nippy-cold for a short time at the station's entrance, but decided against staying in one place for a while. The office I interviewed at is in northeast D.C. which is not an area I already have stereotyped, but after seeing the area, I have to say it was pretty...shady. Half-residential area with the typical rundown row houses smashed together with the black rod-iron fences in the front.

The interview itself went well. Prettily-dressed Laura wasn't the only person there for an interview though! Argh. I know other people (who knows how many) are going to be competing with me, but it's another thing to sit with them in the same room with your portfolio, waiting to be called upstairs. The lady interviewer was very nice and laid back. It seems the position went from sounding like just a basic "Junior Graphic Designer" position listing online - to actually being "the only Graphic Designer at this company" position.

As in - you are THE Graphic Designer. Everything design comes to and through you. Hah.

Oh well - I actually still am very interested in working there. But, like all interviews I'm lucky to have these days, I'm trying to not all moon-faced about it. They may choose me, they may not. I move on in the meantime.

After the interview process ended I headed back towards VA on the metro. When I jumped back in the car, Takeshi suggested we check out a place in D.C. we've been interested in, called Kushi. Some Japanese small dish/sushi restaurant. Close by Chinatown. So we ended up deciding to ride the metro again, to save us from evil D.C. rush hour traffic, and sparse parking. I was in my interview outfit which included shoes that aren't meant for walking long distances. They chafe awful...maybe time for some better dress shoes! Once we walked out of the Chinatown station....

Me: Hey, guess what nationality you are now?
Takeshi:.......Chinese.
Me: *snigger*

I'm a mean person. It's true though! People just assume he is if he's in a particular area. The other day we were in a international grocery store in an area of Virginia that has a large Korean population. We were in the checkout line and the jiji bagger dude smiled and said something to Takeshi in Korean (probably something like, Thanks, have a good day). Takeshi just stared at him and walked off. I couldn't help but laugh as we walked out...poor Takeshi.

Anyway, we went to the restaurant and had a very yummy meal, and then went to the Starbucks afterwards to get Takeshi's coffee-fix, before getting on the train back home. Some photos from today!

me on the train back to VA after my interview

heading to Kushi in D.C.

Takeshi at the table looking at cooks behind the counter

some interior shots of the place

yummy food :) click for a larger view!

interesting sculpture on the way back

shot from the Starbucks across the intersection from the Chinatown station

Takeshi! with coffee!

new year's summary

2011-01-04T21:56:00.007-05:00

New Year's night ended up being not as celebratory as I had hoped it have been, like last year. For me New Year's usually starts when Takeshi is able to get home that night from work finally. And it's usually always, always after midnight anyway, so I'm used to that at least. But this time, he finally got home (after we went to pick him up, and drive home again) at around 3:30am. Ho' boy. My friend Todd came over as planned and we goofed around with his new shiny iPad. We had gone and bought some snacks and a four pack of Guinness for Takeshi (his favorite). Todd brought a whole bar with him in several large bags, so we really didn't need to buy anything for drinks except things like juice, soda, etc,. to mix with.

So yeah, by the time Takeshi got home we were all feeling a bit sleepy. Takeshi tried to stay up for a bit with us but soon went to bed. Todd and I stayed up for a little bit, until about 5am watching half of a rerun of Star Trek and then watching a weird infomercial about some exercise plan that makes you look like the incredible hulk afterwards. Doing rapid-fire chin-ups on some sort of contraption attached to your doorframe, stuff like that.

Todd had to leave for work the next morning (aww c'mon it's New Year's day for christ-sake). I finally woke up at about noon to have some breakfast with him, while Takeshi was still asleep. He never woke up to see Todd off, but I figured I'd let the poor guy catch up on some sleep for a change! So yeah, not the party I thought we'd have, but I mostly knew the game was up, when it was already 2am and we hadn't heard from Takeshi yet. Ugh. Oh well there's always next New Year's. :)

new year's plans

2010-12-30T22:18:00.011-05:00

Plans for New Year's Eve tomorrow night? My best friend Todd is coming over from Maryland after work, and after we pick up Takeshi from work (at like, 2am if he's lucky...), we'll have something to munch on with drinkies most likely. :) It does suck every single year that Takeshi's job does not allow him to EVER have New Year's Eve off, and furthermore, to be able to be out BEFORE midnight of the new year. It happened last year too of course, and the year before, but from what he's been telling me, this time it might be so damned busy at the restaurant that they may get out very very late. Whoopdee doo.

It's supposed to be a little warmer for a change tomorrow, in the 50s I heard on the radio. No dog walking tomorrow, since all the clients are home with their dogs. I still need the car though, since I have an interview in D.C. next week and I need to go print some updated pages of my portfolio. I hope I can get better quality pages than when I went to the Staples down the road. They looked like shit, with visible printer lines running down every image on the page. Hopefully Office Depot can do better.

Parents have up and left again back home, overseas. See you next year mum and dad! Thank goodness for Skype eh? I definitely liked eating out a lot while they were here! I know I have no shame. Usually we don't eat out that much!

I guess this will be the last post I make before the new year is here, so everyone please have a fun and safe new year's! 2011 here we come. Some recent photos to leave you with!

walking towards Ford's Landing Park in Alexandria while at "work"

at the start of the park looking over the water

squirrel!

coming to a close

2010-12-23T11:36:00.005-05:00

It's almost 2011! Wow, that year went fast huh?

Still been visiting with the parents. I'm a little sad to realize that by next week they'll be back on a plane to Armenia. :( They're kind of like Santa, because they come to visit me once a year, right now. Christmas Eve is this Friday, and my parents, Takeshi and I, and my brother are going out to eat dinner that day, and perhaps hang somewhere afterwards. We're having Indian cuisine at an old favorite restaurant of theirs, so it should be good eating. :)

I actually was able to finally see my brother the other day, after not seeing him in person for about 2 years. That was nice. I drove down to the Annapolis area in MD and we had lunch with my parents and then coffee. Still skinny as a rail and smoking, which we all wish he'd stop, but hey whatcha' gonna' do. I hardly see him enough to influence him. Lol.

New York City was fun, except for the part when I LOST my cell phone somewhere. Either in a taxi we had just gotten out of, OR dropped it on the street right looking to hail the taxi. Either way, I wanted to shoot myself since that iPhone had access to all 3 of my email accounts, had contact lists, etc etc. Very bad. I changed almost all of my passwords for my emails, and other sites, deleted some things. I did all I could do at this point. My parents were very nice to me and bought me a new iPhone. I am making it a law unto myself not to put anything on this new iPhone that could get me in hot water IF I ever lose this one too. This whole event almost makes me want to change back to just a regular phone. The only thing you have on there are phone numbers.

Takeshi asked me the other day if I'm thinking of what my New Year's resolution will be. I hadn't thought of it at all. I know he'll definitely make some. Maybe the only 2 major goals I have for the new year is to 1.) Get a full-time job (if not a full-time graphic design job) and 2.) to get a dog.

They're calling for snow this Sunday and Monday! Granted it won't be on Xmas Day but it's still sort-of a white Xmas. :D Haven't had one of those personally, since I was in high school!

parents, computer, NYC

2010-12-10T23:47:00.002-05:00

God who even reads this blog anymore? Lol. Who knows. Sorry for no pretty pictures for people to look at this time...

I've been away for a bit again, because my parents arrived on the 2nd for their visit-the-States trip. I've been speeding around the area with them for the most part, while working on the weekdays as usual. Just before they arrived, I had a mishap with my laptop.

Takeshi ended up spilling (my mug of) chamomile tea over my keyboard....it was placed in a crappy spot for sure. And it was an accident but he didn't ever really say sorry. But I guess I didn't feel hurt cuz' we'd have to spend our money anyway to fix it - and maybe because it wasn't as bad as when he ended spilling hot milk/coffee into the BACK of his laptop.

But it did fuck up my laptop in the end. I tried soaking up the tea as much as I could and wiped it down, but it got into the keyboard of course, and several keys promptly would not work after that. Certain keys that I need to spell out my username and password to even LOG IN to my laptop. Not good.

I just got it back today. Took to a small place 20 mins. away to replace the keyboard and it seems fine for now, but no one can really know exactly how much water damage was done to the inside. Only time will tell - and maybe it'll just crap out and die on me one day in the future. Bleh.

Parents and I are leaving for a small trip to NYC on Monday. Will be staying there until Thursday. Should be fun but I feel guilty and sad that Takeshi can't come with us. He luckily has off for 4-5 days on X-mas week anyway.

cold toes

2010-10-19T21:29:00.014-04:00

So begins the season of me always needing to wear thick socks or slippers around the house! Brr.

Just brewed a pot of some 'wellness' tea of sorts, that we bought in Japan. I forget the name of it...it comes in a white box with black print. Takeshi would know. Hmm. In any case, working outside walking dogs does have its dangers with catching a cold! I feel twinges of ickyness once in a while. Drinking this tea makes me feel better! I hope it actually works though!

We also have started having bath nights on Takeshi's days off. I LOVE taking bath and I miss the deep deep bathtubs in Japan! American tubs pale in comparison. But we still enjoy baths anyway, and we bought bath salts at Mitsuwa last month! Can't let it go to waste. ;) But we've found that the 'hot water' doesn't really get hot enough for baths. Takeshi likes his showers/baths TEN times hotter than what I can stand! So for him, it's probably even more of a disappointment! So what we've started to do is boil a pot of water on the stove and throw it in with the 'hottest' water from the shower. It definitely makes a difference in any case.

Parents are coming to visit in less than a week from overseas! Pretty jazzed about it. I'll be going to New York City with them for a few days in the middle of December. It should be fun - they've never been and I always love going. The day they arrive is also Takeshi's birthday as well. :) He'll be a ripe 24. Hehe. He is SO hard to shop for (as are all men?) so I am making him a gift, like I have in the past. I'll post a picture of it when I'm done! I wanna keep it a secret since TK's on Blogger too. xD

Both of us have come down with colds of a sort. Mine has been going on steadily for about a month. I have extremely terrible allergies all year round, so I had just chocked it up to the dry air or whatever, walking dogs, etc. But I went into a walk-in clinic today and there's good news at least - I don't have any infections or godawful problems and such. Just allergies. :( Bleh. Doc gave me a prescription for some antibacterial stuff to take for 10 days, just to rule that possibility out. I also bought a "neti pot" yesterday at the store, so I'll be using it frequently to see if anything gets better. Here's a description of a neti pot if you haven't heard of it!

The sensation of using the neti pot, for me, is more than a little uncomfortable, but I'll deal with it!

Thanksgiving for us was quietly spent at home this year. Takeshi cooked. It was very yummy. :) I surprisingly convinced him to watch a Lupin the 3rd movie with me. He's not much of a TV/movie guy at all, so it's always a treat for me when we sit down together to watch a movie!

Random photos from the recent past weeks! Have a good start of the week everyone!

Walking in Old Town with Sydney

Mimsy the poodle

crimson tree in one neighborhood I frequent at work

near the water in north Old Town

can anything else fit?

jazz before the week begins

2010-10-11T21:17:00.011-04:00

I'm beginning to use the 'radio' on my iTunes a lot more these days, mostly for jazz music which is one of my favorite genres. I find my personal collection of songs is somewhat boring right now. Haven't come across anything new lately that I like.

Yesterday was a nice day overall even though we had a little mishap with doing the laundry. This building is so fricking old and I guess that goes for the door to the laundry room downstairs as well. We both go down to the floor below us to do laundry (which is not free, mum yes). We're about to throw in the clothes to the wash, and I decided to go grab something from the apartment really quick before that - and I can't open the door. A little piece of the metal doorframe has wedged itself in between, so that we couldn't open it. And the crappy, cheap door handle looked like it was about to fall off any minute. Had come loose and wasn't secure at all. And that room is hotter and more humid than a Turkish bath. If both of the dryers are running, it's hard to breathe in there after a while! So TK finally got the door open after hitting and tugging the shit out of it. Afterwards, the door itself had kind of bent from the door handle up. Crappy-ass door. We could have been stuck in there and we hadn't brought anything with us. I know what I'll be calling to the office about next...

Finished the laundry and then went to Old Town Alexandria to walk around a bit. Ended up going to a pizza joint down there for a late lunch/early dinner, called 'RedRocks Pizza'. Place was nice in decor and all, and the pizza wasn't so bad. We left and went to the Barnes and Noble Booksellers store in the area. I saw a book I have been wanting to get that's been released but only in hardback! I'd rather wait and spend only about $8 for the paperback instead of paying up $25.95 for the hardback now.

Learned that mum and dad are probably coming to the States in December for a visit, so very excited about that. :) Christ, I see them more and I do my little brother who lives miles away from me! Such is the way of Michael, I suppose.

I hope that kaasan and tousan will come to visit us in the States again sometime soon, but as I hear it, my MIL might come on her own next year. My FIL will probably be caught up with work and all. :/ My SIL at one point expressed an interest in visiting the States again too, but I don't know about that, since she's fairly new to the workforce, right out of college etc. Still would be nice to see her again though.

I love this time of year, Halloween, Thanksgiving, Christmas. Winter is also my favorite season. I just hate the small (gradually growing) tidbits of Christmas being thrown at us ALREADY in October. Ridiculous. As one comic said, "Santa needs to stop poking his ass into other holidays." Right you are sir.

Here are some recent photos from last week along with a video of one of the puppies I walk. :) Ganbatte everyone. Have a good week!

me trying to get Grace to go up for a walk

abandoned parking lot I found while walking a dog in Alexandria the other day

apartment building I go to - where one of the dogs lives

certain things we bought for the apartment recently - rug for the kitchen, outside mat for the balcony, and a light-up pumpkin to be festive for Halloween :)

blog bump

2010-10-04T01:51:00.003-04:00

Ok so I'm mentioning another blogger for anyone's consideration!

My best friend Todd has started a blog of his own, and it's been created to help anyone with any kind of questions concerning the plant world, gardens, soil, landscaping, etc etc. He has just completed a degree in Plant Sciences from the University of Maryland and is very knowledgable.

I have asked a million questions of him in the past, and he's still the first one I go to, when I have a problem or just want to gain some info about the plant world. So if you ever have an inquiry, feel free to drop a question on his blog! ;)

http://gggazette.blogspot.com

another rainy week?

2010-10-04T01:35:00.006-04:00

I hope not, but the forecasts don't look to great. I don't like walking dogs in the rain! Granted it's kind of fun watching THEM have fun getting wet, but in the meantime, Laura is turning into a melting, curly-haired mess. Seriously, I don't know why I do my hair before I leave the house. One drop of moisture on my head, turns it into a poodly-rat's nest.

Had a good Sunday today. Went to Tyson's Corner mall again, milled around, went to the Cheesecake Factory for dinner. :) Very yummy, and also a plus because I have leftover chicken enchiladas for my dinner tomorrow. Always nice to eat something that tastes better than anything I could make!

Tonight we tried doing some highlights with Takeshi's hair. We used the Gatsby hair bleach stuff he bought at Mitsuwa. It went ok...we admitted he would have been better off going to a salon. Definitely. I tried my hardest to brush on the bleach (with my FINGERS in BAGGY frickin' gloves they give you - retarded) on little strips of his hair, but some parts look like, and I'm quoted the hub, "panda spots". Sorry! I tried my best. Lol. But it doesn't look terrible, and we can always try making it better in the future by thinning his hair out, etc.

Makes me wanna do something with my hair, but I don't know what I'd want to do. And I sure as hell wouldn't trust myself to do it at home. Salons all the way, for me!

a different outlet

2010-10-02T18:47:00.004-04:00

So I finally decided to make an account on WordPress as well. I may in the future move my blogging entirely to WordPress instead of Blogger, but for now this second blog accomplishes something Blogger cannot. Password protected posts. Sometimes I need and want to write about more personal things/issues that I don’t want the whole internet community being able to see.

For now, I guess is that I can post the URL link to a protected post on Blogger – those whom I’ve given the password to will be able to then see it. Or, if you can choose the option to follow both of the blogs.

If you want to ask me if you could have the password to the posts, email me at bigteamug@gmail.com.

Here's the link:

wordpress

NYC Trip and Dog Walking

2010-09-28T17:33:00.035-04:00

Ok so I didn't find the time/energy to this post on Saturday! But I'm doing it today. :)

So, we originally went to New York city because 1.) TK had off on Saturday (unheard of!) and 2.) We had a bunch of places in the NYC area that we had been wanting to visit, and 3.) NYC's just a cool place to go to!

We woke up at 4am and left at 5am. That was not fun. The sun hadn't come up yet of course. But it was neat to see the changing off the light when it did come up slowly, as we traveled along. I did managed to snap one or two photos of the sunrise while we were crossing the Delaware Memorial Bridge. Takeshi was snoozing beside me at this point.

We arrived in New York City a little earlier than we thought we'd get there, at around close to 10am. So we had a little time to mull around before getting to our first appointment by 11am.

We planned to definitely go to the 'Hairmate' salon (which has many Japanese hairdressers) in downtown to get our haircuts. Takeshi rarely trusts any other places in the states - he says they would understand the kind of look he'd want more than any American salons (probably). We planned to visit the Mitsuwa grocery store in New Jersey as well.

So since we were going to go to Mitsuwa last, we figured we'd get a hotel in Hoboken somewhere, and ride the subway into NYC etc. Well we ended up getting a hotel in NYC after all, but it was a really cool, small place called the Gem Hotel (http://www.thegemhotel.com/chelsea/index.iml) in Chelsea. It was on a whim, after calling place after place while we were busy seeing things that day (not the best way to get a hotel in NYC, I know). But we finally settled for them because everywhere else was $200 and up a night. F*ck that! Ick.

The TINIEST bed we've slept in since our bed in Leopalace in Suzuka. It was small lengthwise and widthwise. But it wasn't too bad, and it was very comfy. But we were so tired by the end of the day, I could have slept on the floor and been ok! And the hotel was fairly new, and that's always nice to have in a hotel.

So we made it to the haircut appointments. I chatted a little in Japanese with the girl I had, named Kozue. Mind you it was fairly basic stuff. Lol. While Takeshi was getting his hair cut the girl he had had recommended another ramen shop in town besides Ippudo, which had been my idea since grooogrux recommended it to me. She said this other place was better than Ippudo, so I figured that if I was going to take advice from someone about Japanese ramen, it's gonna be a native, right? So off we went for lunch! And it was GOOOD. For the first time since living in Suzuka, I was the only non-Asian person sitting in that restaurant! That's always a good sign for a foreign cuisine restaurant, and you see a lot of natives eating there! That means it must be good. ;) The place was called Terakawa Ramen.

After that we bopped around town some more, just taking in the sights and sounds. We ended up on Times Square at around 9:30pm and found a BBQ joint right off of Times Square for dinner, called Virgil's Real BBQ. It was good stuff and we only got appetizers! They were frickin' huge! We shared some buffalo wings and BBQ nachos. YUMMY. After that we were trying to find something to do and had an idea. The last time we came to NYC we ended coming across a themed-bar/restaurant in NYC called the Jekyll and Hyde Club (). We didn't plan on it, but we had a good time. So we thought, hey let's find another themed-bar to go to since it's late enough at night for a drink. We began searching forever on our iPhones for a club that wasn't MILES away by Subway (since we'd have to ride it BACK to the hotel afterwards too). We picked one, some kind of crime-themed bar. We set off and rode the subway and then walked a million blocks to where it said the address was. WELL, there was a bar there, but it didn't look like a themed-bar. It actually looked like a regular, shifty, dirty bar with fucked-up lookin' bouncers outside. So we said nevermind.... So long story short, after that we spent what seemed like an hour walking around looking for a place to drink - and at THAT point we didn't even need somewhere themed. We were dead tired and wanted a quieter place at this point. So we finally settled for this little bistro place and shared some white wine, and some mussels. At like, midnight. It didn't help that the place had low lighting for effect, and was playing jazz music. I could have slept in the chair I was sitting in.

So we shuffled our tired legs back to the hotel after a return subway trip, and pretty much leapt into bed as soon as we got in the door. So ended our time in NYC.

The next day we were going to be heading home, but not before stopping by Mitsuwa on the way to buy some much wanted Japanese groceries! It was awesome. I wish we had a Mitsuwa near us! Also, beside the grocery store there was a Sanseido book store, and a store with Japanese ceramics/dish-ware in it. At Sanseido I bought 3 manga for studying purposes. I thought it might be fun to practice Japanese by reading some manga, since I haven't bought any manga/graphic novels since high school! And back then they were in English too. I bought the first manga of "ドラえもん" and the first two manga of some manga called "ルレグゥ” (I think I got that right - the title font on the cover is a little wacky and hard to figure out!). The thing I wanted the most was to have furigana in the manga, because I am no kanji expert!

So, we ended up buying a LOT of groceries to last us a while, including Japanese mayo (not Kewpie but pretty damned close), okonomiyaki-ko, pickled ginger, daikon radish, etc etc etc!

Now onto the dog-walking. A summary anyway. Yup I've been at for about 2 weeks now. Overall it's fun, being outside with my furry buddies, even though I will experience the occasional dog ripping up things in the owner's house when I arrive, and a dog running OUT THE DOOR as I try to leave, and so on. I walk all kinds of dogs and I've put together a mix-match of them below. :)

gettin' to it

2010-09-23T20:31:00.002-04:00

Sorry for not posting for a bit here. I am going post about our NYC trip and to bring people up to speed with the dog-walking job (I started doing that last Monday). I've just been having a lack of motivation to do it, and especially since I've got lots of photos I'd possibly want to post along with, so I've been sorting through them. Maybe I'll be up to it this Saturday!

no human contact

2010-09-11T17:47:00.003-04:00

Sometimes I really do hate being alone at home during the day, right now. Somedays I'm fine with it and I find things to keep myself busy. But sometimes I really crave human contact, just speaking with another person. From the time Takeshi leaves in the morning until he gets back at midnight, I don't speak, of course. What am I gonna do, talk to myself?

I'm not that crazy yet...

Yet.

I think he's been looking online for another job possibly, with better hours than he has now. Which would be so nice for both of us. But mostly for him. He works at least 14 hours a day right now.

Sometimes I wish that he had a job in another field, so that he could have more of a 9 to 5 schedule. Like a job that Sarah's, or GW's hub has. But then, Takeshi would be a different person, and maybe not be the guy I fell in love with. Cooking/the culinary field is in his blood and defines him as much as design/art/creativity defines me. So it's kind of a catch 22.

We're going to New York NEXT weekend. I asked him cuz I forgot. God Laura, you're losing your memory. Anyway, yay next weekend.

I was thinking today that when we go, I'd like to visit the UNIQLO store. I love that store and I miss it! So many cute clothes in there. And who knows - Takeshi, even in his EXTREMELY DEFINED TASTE in clothes - may, MAY actually find something he likes. Perhaps even *gasp* a new pair of shoes. He needs a new pair desperately.

NYC also has a Yoshinoya. We went there once, before we moved to Suzuka, and of course they were everywhere, then. Lol.

Yumm...love their beef bowls. Very tempting, also, to go there.

Gah the sun is setting. It's 6:01pm. The ending of another boring day of waiting for the "gears of my life" to start turning. That interview in D.C. cannot come soon enough. But a part of me is really scared though, and almost hate going to interviews. Because so far, I've been let down do much by possible job positions that went nowhere, after waiting and hanging on for weeks at a time. All I can do, is do my best each time I get an opportunity, so hopefully, that time, it'll work out in my favor.

crisp touch of fall

2010-09-10T15:19:00.026-04:00

Fall is coming, fall is coming! No more humidity! That's what I like. :) It's gradually getting cooler and cooler. Today it's currently 73°F (22-ish°C), with a bit of a breeze. My toes are pretty chilly since I'm sitting right next to the open window. And I hear the ice-cream truck tune playing outside. When is that guy gonna' stop coming around? Jeez. October??

Anywho, things are a bit busier now as it turns out, these days. Ummm....jeez where did I leave off with all this job bullsh*t? Hard to keep track sometimes. The interview with Panera Bread was a no-go. Went in and ended being 10 minutes LATE because of traffic (yeah yeah the usual excuse), because a local firehouse had taken up a huge chunk of the main street to try to collect donations from cars. But my lateness went unnoticed anyway because when I arrived it was about 2pm, and the place was slammed with the lunch-rush. I ended waiting about 12 minutes for the manager to come out to speak to me. The usual questions were asked, yadda yadda and only $8 an hour for cashiering? Ehhhh..... And you'd like it if I could come in really early to work, at about 5am?..........wow. That's frickin' early.

I left after that and since then haven't received a call back. Whatever.

So it turns out that I'm going to do the dog-walking part-time job. The dog-lady (her name is Ellen but I call her that so Takeshi knows who I'm talking about lol) left me an email saying that I can probably start this next Monday. She said she'd be calling me today, but I have no idea when since she is evidently returning from vacation somewhere. This is a good thing.

But on top of that going through, I got an email earlier this week from a design agency in D.C. which I had sent my resume to, to set up a phone interview with me. The president of the agency ended being the one to call me yesterday (which is different), and we chatted for about 15 minutes about what I expected of a position, salary etc. So now I'm scheduled to go in for an in-person interview this next Thursday at 4:30pm.

I knew that once I got the dog-walking job, I wasn't going to STOP looking for a design job. No way. I just hoped that I wouldn't get into this very kind of situation, where I've committed to one person, but am having the opportunity to get a better job almost right away after starting the first job. Ellen is a very very nice lady, but I will drop this job, if I'm offered the graphic design job. I can only hope that it will be as non-uncomfortable as possible. Lol.

So mum and dad, people who are interested - we shall see won't we? I'll keep you posted.

In other (sudden) exciting news, we're probably going to NYC next weekend! Yaaayy. We'll probably leave AT THE CRACK OF DAWN tomorrow (Sat.) drive up to perhaps New Jersey, check in sometime, and then ride the subway into New York. The big motivator for going is that there are not really any hair salons that Takeshi fully trusts to do his hair the way he wants it. I guess this means giving him a haircut that guys like getting back home in Japan. There is a hair salon in NYC that he knows will do it right, and he's about due for a haircut. And also, I'll probably get a haircut myself. My old haircut has grown out, and it would be nice to get a new haircut for the interview as well!

We're also thinking of trying to get to Mitsuwa, a huge Asian/mainly Japanese grocery store/super store? in New Jersey. So that should be cool too. We'll drive back on Sunday at some point and be back in time for me to do the dog-walking the next day, on Monday. Should be a BITCH to wake up so early tomorrow though. Takeshi mentioned a time, something like 5am? Shit. I am not a morning person and he knows it. Lol. But I can suck it up when I need to.

I love New York City because it's so amazing of course, and also it holds many memories for us, since it's the place Takeshi took me to before we left to go live in Japan. It's the last place I saw before I left the U.S. (and at the time, didn't think I was going to be back for a while)

So to end, here are some photos again. The first few are some "home decor" things we bought at Ikea this past weekend of the apartment. And after are some photos from this past weekend also, when we went to an event in my home-state, the Maryland Renaissance Festival. Have a good weekend everyone.

Decorative "tree/bush" in pot

Wine rack! We need to buy some screws so that the thing doesn't brake off the wall from the weight of wine bottles lol, before we put the bottles on it

A mirror! The first mirror we've ever had, aside from the bathroom mirror - what are we vampires? And we need.....screws! to put it up finally

Oil painting still in the works since last. year.

Me in the center with my two friends who are working at the festival this year! They work there as original historical figures, wearing the traditional clothing of the time

Untitled Work

2010-09-03T17:26:00.007-04:00

Here is the finished work that I have been working on, on-and-off for almost a month. I'm pretty pleased with how it came out. My personal artwork began to change ever since I was living in Japan, and most of my art now stems from the memories of living there. Sometimes I'l use stock images from online, but I try to use the photos I took there. I can incorporate colors, images, buildings, people, culture, and textures into these works. I'm trying to pinpoint my own style, and for whatever reason, being in Japan (or maybe just being in another country for the first time) helped me to begin that process. I miss Japan, and a part of me will always be very sad that I am not living there anymore. I don't know when we'll get to go back, but I hope it's soon! Please click for a bigger size.

sh*tty wednesday

2010-09-01T21:08:00.005-04:00

I haven't posted anything for a bit, since there wasn't anything new or interesting going on, most importantly with job news. I've been so nervous, anxious, and frustrated with finally getting any kind of income that I have a hard time focusing on things. I can't do something for very long, besides searching for jobs online. I bounce off the walls.

Yesterday I actually went for a casual interview for a dog-walking job. The lady is very nice and is actually a fellow (retired?) graphic designer who owns the small company. They walk dogs in several areas in the immediate area. After hearing the details, the pay doesn't seem bad at all, especially for only about 3-4 hours of work a day. And it's not boring cashiering or retail work. Just before I went to meet with her, I checked my email and lo and behold there is a response email from a small graphic design studio that I sent my resume to. I was so jazzed of course, and wanted to call this other lady right away to talk about it, but I had to wait till after the dog-walker interview. So later, I call and I talk to this owner of the small design studio briefly about the nature of the position. She had to leave for a meeting so she told me to call her today at around the same time.

At this point my goal is to never get too engaged and hopeful about a possible employment - but could you blame me? First Graphic Design job possibility and the lady said she "likes my work." I've never heard that yet from anyone (or get an email back at all). So I was daydreaming about the future for sure.

I wake up today SO damn nervous that I don't eat breakfast right away. As soon as it's about time, I give her office a ring. No answer. So I tried her cell phone number (which she gives in the office's voicemail message). Nothing. So panicky-me I call her office once more and her cell once more in a span of about 15 minutes, before I leave a voicemail on her cell phone. And then a little bit later I call her office again. And she picks up.

And she "admires my level of enthusiasm" but OBVIOUSLY, being the panicky idiot that I am right now, I bombarded her with calls. She was not pleased of course, but assured me at the end that she will call me back. Which right now, I am half-believing. I was kicking myself mentally the whole time she was talking to me, and I would have burst into tears and groveled over the phone for being such a f*cking annoyance to a busy BUSY business owner - but at the end I said "I apologize." And we hung up.

I feel like shit right now. Recently, I took on the mindset that I as a person who is competing against who KNOWS how many applicants for a single job, needs to be the squeaky wheel so they don't forget about me. But this time, it ended up smacking me in the face. I risked annoying her so that she considers going with someone else. Great going Laura. REALLY GREAT. The first chance you get to have a design job, and you might have fuckin' blown it. She said she'd call me back after she gets stuff laid out and figured out - but a big part of me doubts it. I feel like I blew it at this point...

So I had a bit of cry, ran to the bed, covered up and slept for a couple hours. Wanted to be unconscious for a bit, so I wouldn't have to worry about anything. That's usually how I personally deal with stress - I sleep. I actually had some weird dreams too. Can't really remember them though.

I actually have another interview (got called today) on Friday for a cashiering job, but I hope to get that call before then. But actually, unless that job can pay good enough - the dog-walking job by my calculation would pay me the most right now as a part-time job. And it seems more fun, and I'd be moving my butt around and not sitting on it, or standing in place for hours. So, between those two I'm hoping I can take that dog-walking job in the end, if I don't hear from the studio.

People have been giving me advice about job hunting, and I appreciate it. It's mostly the same set of tips, and I've done most if not all of them by now. Thanks to everyone who has left me a kind word or words of encouragement. It's not easy these days and I am lonely. But it's nice to get messages from people.

It also pisses me off when people I know or who have talked to, who already have jobs but don't know when to INSERT foot in MOUTH when talking to me about it. One of my old high school friends was chatting with me the other day on Facebook. She's in school right now to become a lawyer. LONG story on that, which I have a lot of opinions about but that's another post.

Anyway, we were talking about maybe hanging out sometime soon, and she asks me what my "schedule" is like right now. Psh. My schedule? I don't have one. :/ But I say I'm "available most Saturdays right now blah blah". And she shoots back and says, "I'm free some Mondays, but otherwise only on weekends. :( working full-time sucks." Oh it does, does it?......Poor you. I know what sucks more though - not being able to pay all of your bills every month.

So I send back the message "Well at least you have a job."

She hasn't gotten back to me yet. Maybe she JUST then realized how fucking rude that was to say, or maybe she's just busy busy busy busy.

Anywho....what else to talk about that's not depressing....

I've been on Photoshop in my spare time recently, when I need to take a break from searching for job every day. I'll post the art here when I'm done, and probably on Facebook too. :)

Have a good rest of the week everyone. Send me some sunshine. <3

a nice tuesday

2010-08-24T20:33:00.019-04:00

We had a nice Tuesday today. Takeshi's day off. We went down to Tyson's Corner mall, which is the largest (ritziest) mall in the area. I always like going there and walking around because somehow it makes me feel like I can actually afford that lifestyle. Lol. Bloomingdale's, Coach, and a dozens of other stores which will max out anyone's credit card in a damned hurry. We decided to take a trip to one of the mall's eyeglass stores which also has a small eye-doctor attached. Both of us were in need of a vision test - last one I had was about 3-4 years ago!

Cost us more than I thought though, at a total of $140 for the both of us. We don't have any health insurance right now, so we pay the total amount....cry. :( I found out my eyes are pretty much the same as they were, and I probably don't need a prescription change, which is good. On the bad side, I took the test where they puff air in your eyes (everyone hates that test!) - and I was told that the fluid pressure in my eyes are on the high side. They are still in the "average" level on the scale of things, but on the higher side of average. I was told that this puts me at risk for possibly getting glaucoma later on in life. Now, they told me at the age of 23, I'm not going to get it any time soon, but I was told to definitely keep up on the annual checkups. Kind of a bummer, huh?

Anywho, we bought some tea leaves at Teavana, one of my favorite stores. We bought 2 flavors of tea leaves, with the stores tea tins which I had saved at home. That way you can just pay for the (rather expensive) tea leaves and not have to crap out another $10-15 for a tin to put them in. The girl who served us was pretty chatty and bubbly in the beginning, but I have never seen someone change moods so fricking quickly! It was hilarious! She quickly learned that I was not made out of money and that I wasn't going to fill up BOTH tins all the way to the brim, which would have cost me about $42 a tin = about $85 total. Fuck. That.

Christ lady, I'm not rich. I LOVE tea, but...jeez. And she got so sad. Psh! She could have made it a little less obvious at least.

Me: (looking at the price of tea leaves as she weighs the tin) "Could you take it down a little? To about $20?"

Her: (about to shovel in ANOTHER scoop of tea) "....Oh....down?"

Me: "Yeah, less."

Her: (glumly and quietly pours some out)

Here are some recent photos! Have a good week everyone.

tea that TK picked - Earl Grey White

my tea choice - Youth Berry

yummy cheeses we bought that other day :)

Multiple "wash clothes"(?) over time from MIL. I want to use them - but how?? Any of the ladies back in Japan - what do you use them for? Any ideas?

the key lime pie I made! No longer around, though ;)

CD Depot, in College Park - sold some of our DVDs there on Sunday - got $32!

And now some photos of my handsome hubby (cause I'm shameless) from when we lived in Japan. Found these the other days while rummaging through my external hard-drive!

key lime pie

2010-08-16T20:03:00.012-04:00

I'm attempting to make it from scratch for the first time! I'm waiting for the pie crust to bake a little in the oven right now. I hope it comes out ok! I've only been able to make it because yesterday we took another trip to the GrandMart (international) grocery store. They ended up having a CRAZY good price for limes! 8 limes for one dollar. I love limes, so darn right I'm gonna get all 8! :)

And even after needing 4 limes for the recipe, I still got 4 left for anything else. Water with lime is always tasty. We also bought some more shiso (white) miso paste, ebi furikake, and I snatched another pack of natto. Takeshi bought another head of nappa cabbage, and made a whole big new batch of homemade kimchi. The man loves his kimchi! I also had to find use for some leftover buttermilk we had, and it was close to going bad (if not a little already...) so I made a big batch of waffle batter. Yaay. Waffle mix and key lime pie. Nothing but good, healthy food here. ;)

Totally switching it up - bought some liquid roach bait and a huge-ass fly swatter. Sigh. Little buggers are back again, but I doubt they ever really "left". Roaches can live through a nuclear holocaust. Argh. Here we could be spending money on new clothes or shoes or something, and we're buying shit that kills bugs. Blah.

humid night

2010-08-11T02:16:00.005-04:00

Just an update on recent goings-on. It's late, about 2:16am. Takeshi went to sleep already at about 1:30. He felt sleepy all of a sudden, even though we slept in until about 11am today. I guess I'm more used to staying up, so I wasn't feeling as tired. I was hoping we'd have some *cuddle-time* but, not gonna' happen. Such a bummer. A big bummer. I've been deprived of *cuddle-time* for a while now. I don't mean to sound rude or raunchy but I wish the hub would have the same overabundance of "enthusiasm" that GW's hub does.

It's another set back with the fuckin' hours he works, that's all. He's usually too tired to give a crap at night when he gets home, and the only time when I might see an opportunity is on Saturday night, and he's had some wine or something. Is it a bad thing that most of the time, we end up having *cuddle-time* after we've had a glass of wine already? Psh.

Sorry if this is too much info. Sometimes I feel like I'm stalking the man once he gets home, but then it usually ends up being the usual love-pinches and squeezes but nothing beyond that. Makes me feel bad sometimes...

Went to Georgetown today, for a sudden interview for Takeshi at the Blue Duck Tavern. He'll probably go do a day's work there in the near future to truly see if he likes the environment and such. Essentially he found out that he'd be able to work there from roughly 3pm to 11:30pm (8 hours), 5 days a week, for $15/hour. Instead of the place he works now, in which he works roughly from 10am to midnight (13-14 hours), for $8/hour. In doing the math, he figures that if he decides to take this new job, he'd have to probably work another part-time job in the morning before the job at the Tavern (doing prep work at another restaurant, working at a cafe, etc.) to be able to make more savings per month. Right now, with his hours there's no way he's able, time-wise and energy-wise, to have another job.

It sucks that I'm not able to contribute more to the savings per month right now, with not having an official graphic design job somewhere. I'm waiting to hear back from Petsmart (after the drug test I took on Monday for it), on if I passed the test (no reason why I shouldn't!) and when we can finish this shit so I can have a job there hopefully. But even that won't even pay me as much as if I had a full-time job. And benefits would be nice too!

I'm happy I found a place that has a good possibility of hiring me finally, so that I can make money, but I feel like I'm still letting Takeshi down since it's not my "graphic-design job". The "job that will fix everything" sort of speak. It almost makes my possible part-time job feel like it doesn't matter. :(

That's also not to say that I'll stop looking for a full-time job! I search everyday still.

The way we figure - the only way to be able to move out of this low-income apartment building, and afford more than this, is for me to get that graphic design job somewhere. Ugh. It never ends! Always some kind of shit-situation to crawl ourselves out of. Lol. Slowly. :/

up and down

2010-08-04T21:48:00.018-04:00

It's been a little while since I posted. I've wanted to, but my mind is in all directions these days. Somedays I'm bouncing off the walls and can't concentrate on much, waiting and searching for a job.

Recently I've had 2 separate job opportunities arise (one part-time job, one graphic design *paid* internship), that I was pretty hopeful about, and then they just went to the shithouse. I guess I shouldn't hope TOO much with these things. Just setting myself for disappointment, and there's never a guarantee that it'll come through for me! I've tried to stay detached from this stuff now, and just keep searching.

Today was fairly nice though. I finally set up an interview at the local Petsmart store, for Friday. I'd like to get a part-time job there (I applied for a cashier job (blah), and then as a pet-bather at the groomer's section), but again, I don't want to get my hopes up. I went for an interview at the other place, and they still didn't take me in the end.

Went to the gym today and ran on the treadmill like a sweaty-hamster, and felt very good about myself. Got back, took a shower. Came home and had an orange as a snack (a lot better than recent snacking habits...)

Right now it's 10:10pm. A little while ago I made a cocoa mochi cake - just waiting for it to firm in the fridge and then I'm trying some. :)

Takeshi's been talking to his mum back home a bit. They correspond a lot through email these days, since video-chatting with is weirder for them all, I think. But Takeshi does use international calling cards instead. Seems the economy back home in Japan isn't too much greater than the economy in the States. SIL is still living with the PILs, broke up with her long-time boyfriend Jumpei. :( Sad to hear, since I met him a bunch of times and they seemed like a cute couple. Also, since Jumpei is part of a family which is really good, old friends of Takeshi's family. And they live in the same neighborhood! SIL works in Nagoya as an English teacher's assistant? I believe, and it's a bitch to commute from Suzuka to Nagoya every day. She's bummed because she can't afford to move out of PILs house right now at all on her salary. Hope things get better for her soon!

Recent photos:

Old Town Alexandria - Torpedo Factory. Old factory turned into artist gallery spaces. Lots of unique art to wander around and look at

Old spice and tea store in Old Town. Every space in that store was filled to the brim with stuff

Outside view of the back of the Torpedo Factory, along the dockside

We bought a waffle-maker! :) Takeshi's been itching to get one for a while. Lol.

Mmmmm waffles are good :)

white wine

2010-07-26T00:19:00.002-04:00

Sitting in the couch enjoying a glass. :) Hub is next to me on the floor, ironing out one of his chef's jackets for work.

Went to an interview today actually, for a part-time job. It's in Old Town Alexandria, so I'd probably have to take the bus, but it pays $12 an hour which is way more than I thought I'd get right now! So I hope I get it!!! They said they're hiring 2 people, so my chances are a LITTLE better. It depends on how many people actually interviewed that day with them. Hopefully not like, 20!

Send me good vibes please! ;)

Good news as well on the bug-fighting front. Apartment apparently is having a routine pest-control visit this Tuesday to treat the whole building. Thank YOU! Saves me money, from buying all kind of traps, poisons whatever. So looking forward to Tuesday. And nice to know for the future, that the apartment does in fact cover pest-control visits, and that I can call to schedule an appointment at the office if I find more buggies around. Hopefully not!

f*cking ROACHES

2010-07-22T01:57:00.002-04:00

We have them. I'm pissed.

We are clean people. Judging by what I've seen so far from the rest of our neighbors in this apartment building, I HIGHLY DOUBT they give two shits about cleanliness. Which means the bugs were brought on by them, not us. And besides, we just moved here recently. We'd have to be total pigs to attract roaches THAT fast.

Any tips? I've only seen little ones so far, and even though I REALLY don't want to see a huge honking roach crawling around - it usually means that there are more somewhere else.

I've seen the majority of them in the kitchen so far, but I have seen one or two in the bathroom?? And when I see them, I kill them but I know it's probably just the TIP of the iceberg. We did buy Raid roach spray the other day, but I usually can't run and get the can every time I see one, or it would be gone by the time I'd turn back around. I usually get 'em with a tissue. And wash my hands afterwards. :(

This Sunday I'm thinking of getting some roach traps, or even better - the poison stuff that the roaches can eat, and bring back the nest where it slowly kills the nest off (hope to god). I've read tips about prevention, and I'll be even MORE of a clean-freak after today, but I hope I can actually make a difference.

I doubt very much that the apartment would cover an extermination person to come out and treat the building. Definitely would come out of OUR pockets.

The first time I saw the buggers was down in the laundry room, which happens to be the room directly below our apartment. And that's even GROSSER idea, of having roaches crawling all over your laundry, if you leave it out in big, huge, damp piles. Which is EXACTLY what SOMEONE in this building has repeatedly done. It's disgusting. And I have to move the shit over, so I can actually work the fucking washer and dryer, too. The last time I went down there to do laundry, I took a bunch from the pile and threw it on the floor. I don't give a damn, let 'em get dirty. Who just leaves their damp laundry there for hours??

Also - it's a very small room - and the dryers there run SO HOT. Above normal, really. So it stays very warm and humid down there. Just the right kind of place to raise a roach family.

Anyway, there's a good chance the bugs are originating from there, but what do they eat - detergent?

I've killed numerous types of bugs already in this place. Roaches, flies, nats (one is still evading me), millepedes (pukes), small spiders, and one measly cricket.

I am the bug-warrior-woman. Hear me roar.

My hubby on the other hand, is very afraid of getting near any kind of creepy-crawler.

Aren't I supposed to be the one on top of a chair screaming?

I'm about ready to buy a whole bunch of bug bombs or whatever, and blow this whole apartment building into oblivion.

So yah, any tips would be appreciated, if anyone has had to deal with roaches before!

kabocha and 100 posts

2010-07-20T02:06:00.003-04:00

Happy 100 posts to me. :) Wow that's a lot of hunting-and-pecking the keyboard!

Down the main road aways' we have found an international grocery store called "GrandMart". This is our new favorite place to go and find unique and hard-to-find items, such as foods from Japan and such. This grocery store combines so many different countries together in one place - I've never seen it before. From what we have been able to identify, the store sells a large amount of Korean and Latino foods, then followed by items from Japan, Pakistan, Afghanistan, much from South America, India, and some from Africa.

They have so many things there, and we've been pleasantly surprised a few times already, finding out what they have that we like. I was able to try my first lychee fruit - the actual fruit itself, not anything "flavored" and not in a can. I definitely would always pick, eating the actual fruit hands-down! We buy our rice there from now on, since we found a Japanese brand of rice being sold there. They have all types and cuts of meat, from the usual to the less-mainstream cuts including, all kinds of critter feet (duck, chicken, pig), WHOLE cow tongues, tubs of cow and pig blood, big flaps of pig skin by itself, duck, rabbit, goat, frogs legs, and last but not least WHOLE pig heads. They run about $15 a piec--a head...

Takeshi was thinking of getting one the other day, but he thinks that $15 is still a little much for a pig head, since he says it's mostly bone and skin. I just don't want to have that thing staring at me in my freezer all the time! And Takeshi mentioned that, "It would probably take forever to defrost". .....Eww..... Defrosting pigs head. Anyone hungry?

I did buy a kabocha (Japanese squash) the other day from there! I was so happy to find them. I loved eating kabocha at the inlaws house. So today I made some kabocha amani (=sweet simmered kabocha). Ran out of soy sauce though, but still had enough for the recipe, which is basically simmering the squash in water, suger, and soy sauce. I'm happy to find that they sell multiple grocery items from Japan including, Golden Curry, Kewpie Mayo (expensive, damnit!), and (angels sings) furikake!! (=condiment for sprinkling onto rice)

I. Love. Furikake. I have missed that stuff so much!

All of this food kind of helps to bring me closer to Japan again, even if it is only in my head! But it brings back so many memories for me, because food for me, is probably one of the strongest 'switches' that can do that. And of course I do lovelovelove my Japanese food. ;)

melon juice and study books

2010-07-15T17:28:00.022-04:00

Melon juice. We have a lot of it now, actually. This past Wednesday Takeshi had off so we decided to go check out one of the farmer's markets from a list he'd gotten from work. Seems that Restuarant Eve supports and/or buys from many of the nearby markets in the area, and I was hoping we'd be able to find one again. I didn't know if we'd be able to find a farmer's market within a convenient distance from where we live. So we got there and it was significantly smaller than the one we'd favor up in Lancaster, but it had good sells there. Mostly fruits and veggies, with one stand selling homemade icecream (I was very tempted...), and a couple more selling poultry and dairy, flowers and such.

We bought some carrots, plums, cherry tomatoes, and I picked a yellow melon. Which they said was "seedless" - but it wasn't. Psh. I was hoping, having it being seedless and all, that we could just slice it up and all - but in the end decided to make juice out of it. Oh boy did I get a lot of juice. Almost 64 ounces of it. I hope I don't get too sick of drinking it, since I have to use all of it up now! And the stuff is pretty well sweet on it's own, so no sugar is needed.

After watching GaijinWife's vid of Shou and Marina's metcha-cute, chu-fest, I want to really begin to seriously study Japanese again. Even though I wish I could pay for classes somewhere for this instead, a fire has been lit in my belly sort-of-speak, so maybe I can talk to my MIL on the phone next time we ring them! Sometime, maybe I could talk to Takeshi about doing some speak-only-in-Japanese days. It's true what GaijinWife also said in a reply on her blog, that one needs to live in Japan for a bit to be able to work on becoming fluent (or at least better at conversational Japanese!). Time to open up my many many Japanese-study books. :) I find that most of the time I'm better at writing sentences and such in Japanese, but that won't do me any good with actually talking to people. Lol.

Random photos:

really cool spice and tea shop in Old Town Alexandria

Whole Foods Market in town. It's so nice to have one of these nearby again!

Old Town Alexandria views. Only about 12 minutes from us.

Unique, quirky coffeehouse called "Misha's" in Old Town. Their coffee is SO fresh. Very different taste than any coffee I've ever had. I couldn't help but think of Khea and Missha when I saw this place!

less than

2010-07-13T17:55:00.007-04:00

I guess I'll stick with this new design template for the blog. I hated it when Blogger decided to change everything up. Oh well!

So yes, we've moved now to Alexandria, VA. Getting down here was a big pain in the ass, with finally getting the green-light from the apartment office, and THEN trying to get a truck as fast as humanly possible, because the hub is definitely not one to take it easy. We packed up all of our stuff, just the 2 of us (couldn't find anyone to help us in such short notice). Just 2 of us on a STINKING, blazing hot day. And we all know I'm not good with the upper-body strength right now. So it was hard to say the least. Worked straight through until we finished - I had shove bottles of water at Takeshi so he'd actually stop to drink in the heat. And in all the blur and rushed business of lugging stuff up and and down the stairs out off the apartment - we locked ourselves out. With nothing on the outside to help us. Had to rush next door to our neighbors, (girl also named Laura, and her fiancee) and groveled to use her cell phone to call the apartment office. THANK GOODNESS a technician was on call there 24 hours and only charged us $50 (still hurt though...) to unlock our door for us. We sat in the back of the truck, in the semi-sun waiting for about 20 minutes for him to come, until we could finish packing.

Left the house RIGHT afterwards to drive down to Maryland to drop off the 2 bicycles my friend had lent us last year. His mom was nice enough to let us stay the night, since we couldn't have made it to the new apartment in time that day, before the office closed, to get the keys and sign the paperwork. Started off bright and early the next morning and drove the rest of the way to Virginia. Signed the huge stack of paperwork, and then went to unload and move everything IN. That day was more humid and hot, since we're more south now. My friend Todd helped us move in that day, and we could NOT have done it without him. We were very grateful. And here we found it was his birthday that day! I felt bad. In the end we wrote him a "thank you for your help/happy birthday" check.

Fast forward to now. I can't say that things are going well for me in the job department. Takeshi already had his new job settled out even before we moved, or else we wouldn't have moved. Because of going to college full time in the past, I haven't had a job since about 2007. And I'm desperately wondering if I'll get one again. Even a part time job. Early on after moving here, I went to the shopping center nearby and filled out applications to multiple places. I'm hoping that if I keep bugging them from time to time, they'll have me in for an interview at least. But I haven't heard anything, from anyone, except "We're not hiring right now."

Every day I check job search engines for graphic design jobs, send my resume, cover letter, etc. etc. Nothing at all yet. A lot of places don't want entry-level people. They say, "must have 3-5 years experience". I don't even have 1 year of experience. You gotta start somewhere though.

I know the economy is pretty much shit right now, but I can't help feeling like a total failure. This move was supposed to be the beginning of me making a difference finally, to work and earn a living. Takeshi's never seen me as a worker before in all the time we've been together, only a student.

I totally HATE it when he comes back from work at night and asks me again and again, "So, no calls from anyone?" And I have to keep saying "no". I wish he wouldn't ask me. It makes me more and more anxious and stressed out. I stay at home all day, sit infront of the computer and search and search. Then I eat, then I sleep at night. Wake up start again. I feel my life slowly oozing down the drain. I'm nobody, sitting in this apartment by myself.

I'm getting desperate with even finding a part-time job in the meantime. What do I have to do, clean houses? Wash asses? I don't feel like I have a purpose right now. My life is at yet another standstill.

Takeshi works even longer now. He's gone from 10am to midnight. He gets Sundays off, and one other weekday off a week, which they say will change and never be the same from week to week.

One of Takeshi's old colleagues from Lancaster mentioned a term to me, when we met them for dinner one night, right before we left town. She said I'm a "kitchen-widow". She smiled sadly a little and said, "Well that's what my husband is too, since I'm the one in the food industry."

That term sums it up extremely well actually.

So in short, I sit here day after day, wishing, hoping, searching. Staring at the walls. I wish I had friends nearby. But I don't even have the car with me anyway. I know I wouldn't feel as lonely if I made contact with other humans during the day. Or even a dog. But we can't get one until I have an income too, because trying to support a little furry thing right now with just one income is not reasonable.

Meh

2010-07-07T10:47:00.001-04:00

Don't know who still reads this blog besides the parents. Haven't been in a blogging mood as of late. Lots of things going on.

waiting sucks

2010-06-24T21:00:00.004-04:00

Well, waiting sucks but what sucks even more is that people can't work fast enough at the apartment place. They really don't know how urgent we are with our schedule, since we have to be out of our apartment here by the 30th. Which is pretty damned close.

Takeshi called them today (again) (but hey can you blame us for being a little nosey about this?) and the lady pretty much had a fit at at over the phone, about how she can't do anything to make the process go faster, blah, blah, steam. So they told us that they cannot guarantee that we'll be able to move in by next Wednesday = the 30th. Great. Uuughhh...

Plan B? Put stuff in storage somewhere in VA close as possible to the apartment community, and find a hostel to crash at.

Meanwhile, ALL of our stuff has been packed up inside of our apartment since yesterday I believe, except for some toiletries and clothes. And the inside of the place is terrible right now, with the outside heat and humidity and no air conditioner. Falling asleep has been tough - the other night I tossed and turned and sweated until I finally fell asleep at about 4am. We broke down the bed already so the mattress is just laid out on the floor. I think we're definitely hoping to finally leave our now boring, uneventful, and swelteringly-hot living conditions for something else!

But now all we can do is wait for the call from the apartment people! Get your sh*t together already! :/

Trip to Alexandria

2010-06-21T20:25:00.015-04:00

So we just got back from a trip to the D.C. Metro area, but mostly Alexandria, VA. We arrived there on Thursday and left Sunday afternoon. We went to look at as many apartments as we could, and also make some job appointments. Mainly with Takeshi doing another "starch" (for-free-work-day) at a restaurant in Alexandria, while I went to downtown D.C. for a part-time job interview. The drive down was fine and uneventful, but jesus the traffic down there is worse off than what I remember! And TONS and TONS of construction going on with the highways and roads. Everywhere we went there was construction, making things a little bit harder at times to find exits and such.

On Thursday we were much more productive than we thought we'd be! We saw a total of 4 apartments. Most of them were equal to each other for the most part, interior-wise. With appliances and size of rooms. Most of them were garden-style apartments which is where you're not in a huge apartment complex but sharing a smaller building with maybe 4-6 different other apartments. Then one we saw, was actually the only "complex" style we looked at, and it was probably the oldest.

On Friday I dropped Takeshi off of at the King Street metro station and then drove and parked at the Van Dorn station down the way. Sat at the Station Armory station in downtown D.C. for a while since my interview was at 1pm and I got there at about 11:30am. It was a nice day fortunately, so I found a bit of shade and listening to my iPod while watching people around me. Some elderly ladies choir/group came by for a while, but after listening to them chirp out oldies tunes, I mostly just stuck to my own song lists. ;)

The view from where I sat at the Navy Memorial near the metro stop

Interview went well, lady was nice. Long story short though - ends up I can't take that one anyway, even if she ends up calling me later on. It ends up being waaaayy too far away from the apartment we're waiting to get approved on right now, since I'd be riding into downtown D.C. from Virginia everyday, paying about $4.50 roundtrip - while only getting paid part time at $9/hr!

My best friend Todd was actually free that day and came up to meet me after my interview. We had a nice lunch at a favorite restaurant of ours nearby. He stuck around with me the whole day pretty much, since I don't know WHAT I would have done all day by myself - mostly would have stayed in the hotel and watched TV - which is actually what we both ended up doing anyway. :) We wandered out at about 8:30pm and walked to the KFC across the street a ways. I got KFC for dinner and Todd couldn't resist the iHop located in the bottom floor of the hotel next to ours. I usually don't have a huge love for iHop but KFC isn't five star cuisine either. We were trying to pretty much safe as much money as we could with eating out the whole few days we were there...

At the end of the night, I dropped off Todd at one station, and thankfully Takeshi called me to tell me he was done, so I made my way to the other station without having to drive all the way back to the hotel, and then have to leave again to get him!

Takeshi and I stayed up really late that, till about 2am, talking and deliberating about the shitty situation of having all of these apartment we'd been looking at being above our budget which is $1000 MAX. A lot of apartments said, "Oh we don't have 1 bedroom available....but we do have 2 bedroom?" But yeah, that jacked up the price to definitely over $1000. And that's really more space than the two of us need at this point. So that night there was a lot of nervousness, stress, urgency, and fear coming out in the two of us, as we tried to figure out what to do. We even brought up the crazed idea of trying to maybe waiting it out still a little in Lancaster, or trying to move somewhere else less expensive like Philly or something. We couldn't really come to a solution yet, really, so we went to bed pretty silent.

Fast forward to the morning of Saturday. I find out pretty damned quickly that I have a severe stomach bug. Something I ate at that fucking KFC last night? Probably. I hate fast food. This was NOT the time to get this sort of shit. When we're supposed to be traveling around A LOT all day long around town. From about 7am to 11pm that NIGHT I had constant stomach pain, nevermind nauseousness. It was almost unbearable. It was like someone had my stomach clenched in a their fist, with a burning sensation as well. So yeah, worst pain I've had in a long long time. Takeshi had actually ended up looked up 2 more apartments to look at that morning on the fly. And he needed to have someone there to navigate for him. I knew he was worried about me, but I also knew he had the same mood of "why TODAY of all times?!".

I almost decided to stay in the hotel when he asked me what I wanted to do. But I felt really bad about having him go and do this shit himself. I had to help him do this. :( So I crawled into the car with him, laid back in the seat, gritted my teeth and off we went. I almost tossed what little I had in me twice while driving that day. It was terrible. The first apartment we went to, I just couldn't go in with him to see the place. So I sat in the car with my eyes closed and wished someone could knock me unconscious. At the second place, I actually crawled out to go with him. We went up to the apartment, and even though it was mostly air-conditioned in there, I was sweating my ass off. She was mostly talking with Takeshi, since I wasn't feeling well enough to utter more than 2-3 word responses. I had to leave finally after 5 minutes of standing there. I was wilting like a pukey, white-faced daisy next to them. I certainly didn't want to barf or something in front of the nice lady...

So fast forward again to that night - Takeshi and I get in a stand-off.

TK: "Ok that's it - let's go to the emergency room."
Me: "What?! No!" (still in fetal position on hotel bed)
TK: "This is ridiculous for someone to have severe stomach pains for 24 hours!"
Me: "It's gonna cost us a shit load of money!" (no health insurance)
TK: "I know that....but..."
Me:"....I feel better! Seriously" (I had at this point started to nibble on some crackers. Was telling truth)
TK: (a little pissed at my bullheaded mood) "Fine! But if we end up going anyway in the end, and they ask why we didn't come sooner, I am NOT going to be blamed."
Me: " Yes yes of course! It's obviously my choice. Fine."
TK: "Ok fine."

I took a little risk with seeing if I would be able to sleep the rest of it off - which I did - which is good. So ends the terrible, stomach flu episode. Bleh.

So we're back home in Lancaster for now. Waiting for hear back from the apartment we ended up going with. Then comes the packing, and the moving truck. Oh boy. Random photos!

Huge bunch of jackfruit at the local 'international grocery store' in town

We went and visited pet shop in PA a few days before our trip. Kitties are funny. ;)

blog stuff

2010-06-14T10:45:00.003-04:00

Hey everyone -

I've noticed that for the people who have followed my site, my profile pic thumbnail has not changed. It's still the previous one i.e. illustration portrait.

Could you guys maybe try to unfollow and then follow me again to see if it changes? It's confusing me! Thankya. :)

And also to anyone who would like to follow me, please feel free to add me! Shameless plug I know. x(

Also -

I've been debating whether or not to change the title of my blog. I love the name, but I've been wondering if it applies to my current status. I created this particular blog because I was living in Japan, thus the name emerald-mountain-tea.

I'd have to give it a LOT of thought as to a new title, since I don't know if I could come up with anything I like as much as this one. Any thoughts?

not a morning person

2010-06-14T09:41:00.009-04:00

Sitting here at my small desk at the internship. It's about 20 mins til 10am and this cup of coffee is doing nothing for me. I think I spoiled myself this weekend by being able to sleep in until 10am both days. Man that was nice!

Our apartment is getting stuffier and stuffier and more humid as the weather switches from just heat and sun to humid, rain-forest downpours and back again. That makes for a really gross interior climate! We have the AC unit sitting in the closet, but since we're close enough to moving anyway, I think we'll be toughing it out.

The more I read the blogs from all of the ladies back in Japan, the more I wish we both had more "Japanese exposure" here. Living in an area with a higher population of Japanese, I don't know. Yesterday Takeshi said that while writing a message back to someone in Japanese, he had to look up some kanji. Obviously he won't ever totally forget his first language, so I'm not too concerned about it, but I do wish he had more access to that culture. Nevermind him though - I want some!

I'm the one who is obviously going to start forgetting the Japanese I've learned if I don't use it. I really really want to, in the future, find a way to take some Japanese language classes. I've never learned Japanese through an official course or anything, it was always Takeshi teaching me and then later on, me trying to keep studying on my own.

It also makes me really sad that I guess it's pretty much a fact that we probably won't get to visit Japan again until there's a wedding or (sad to say) a funeral. The only wedding that could be important enough to spend the money and time to fly over would be SIL's wedding. Not that Takeshi doesn't care about his friends getting married. And as far as funerals, I don't even want to think about that!

As much as I want to get over this fact, I still find myself pining away...I can't help it. I love Japan a lot, and I truly do feel a loss of not being able to be there - to experience the culture, the people, and the sights I came to love.

Alright enough self-pity. (for now) ;) I'll whine again another day.

After my internship ends this Tuesday, we'll be focusing on looking for an apartment in the D.C. metro area. Takeshi is, I think, pretty sure with which place he'll be choosing to work at, from the two he's already seen. I think we'll be cutting it a little close, depending on how fast we find an apartment that works for us. We have to be out of this apartment by the 30th. And we need to rent a UHaul moving truck and move all of our stuff out and move all of it into the new place. With just the two of us, which is doable but I'm no burly muscle man for sure - but neither is the hub. ;) But he's stronger than me, by far so I hope I can help as much as I can!

rich lady winery and enka

2010-06-12T23:17:00.007-04:00

(I accidently couldn't get my old blog design back after I found out Blogger completely changed their list of templates and etc. Oh well.)

Here are some recent trips and events which happened, but before that, enka -

I finally got an earful of Jero's famous hit-song "海雪" ("Umiyuki"= ocean snow) and I gotta say I like it. Of course he made my eyes bug out when I found out he was African/Japanese-American! It's refreshing to see a African-American artist not rapping about the usual sleazy things! Hah. He's got a good voice too. I'm not a fan yet of enka overall, but Jero definitely turns me on a little, to it. ;)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vmf1oyo6_WI

Anyway, a couple weekends ago, we decided to go and visit a local Lancaster winery which Takeshi had heard some good things about from coworkers. The drive wasn't long, and it took us off of the major roads and onto good ole' country roads - rolling right past (and through) farm houses and silos. Almost felt like you were driving through someone's property, the buildings were hugging the road so much!

We finally reached the winery which turned out to be some family's huge mansion of a house, with a separate "tasting room" building to the side. Nothing but farmland below us (oh yeah - it was on top of a huge hill). It was pretty hot out so we scurried to the door and went inside. Long story short - rich husband decides one day to start his own winery. And that's it. They had oodles of money to it. And I wouldn't be such a hag about it, if it weren't for the slightly-snobby wifey-lady running the tasting room that day. She gave us a quick tour of the rooms where they made the wine. When we got there, there was a middle-aged piggy couple chatting brightly with her at the main counter. Obviously they knew each other. So it was very awkward for Takeshi and I sitting in the corner, quietly have a go at the tasting offering of cheese and wines - while the other four chirped on about the weather, and why the rich-lady had purchased that particular expense marble tiling from Italy, blah blah blah blah. And then she'd come over to us and politely offer us the next wine sample. Which were pretty big, considering I had to drive us home. She'd only fill the glass up about 1.5 inches but we tasted about 5 or 6! All of those added up and I was starting to feel it around the 3rd round. We had the option of, if we didn't finish the glass all of the way, to pour out the remains in this small porcelain basin, before going on to the next wine. And since I was getting fuzzy, I started to pour out the last 10%, consistently. Takeshi had been doing it too.

Rich-lady: (looks at basin after we've both poured out another bit) "Wow I think this is the most wine I've had poured out before! Haha...." (said with a slight bite to her tone)

Me: "Oh I'm sorry! Heh......."

I really wanted to say, that she should stop bitching to someone who may or may not being a bottle from you today (we didn't). And I still had to fuckin' drive home after that - what did she want me well and shit-faced for the winding-country roads? And actually some of them I didn't like at all, so I poured those out anyway. Give me a break! It's not the best wine I've ever had anyway, but the experience of going there soured my impression of the brand in the end.

rainy day

2010-06-09T12:32:00.010-04:00

Another really really dark, gloomy, rainy day. Can't stop yawning at work. Thank god my back is turned to the boss-lady but then she's easy going and has been yawning too, so whateve'.

So it was actually Takeshi's last day at work yesterday. He had to leave at some point before we move, and time got away from me, so I had forgotten!

The drumbeat

2010-06-07T10:54:00.008-04:00

The steady drumbeat continues, as we are already a week into June! Hard to believe that in a few weeks we will (hopefully) be in another state, a new apartment, and new surroundings. Worst case scenario is that we can't find an apartment in time, or that someone will let us rent but we need to wait to move in - if that's the case then all of our crap goes into storage and we camp out at a local hostal in the D.C. metro area until then.

I've been sending off bunches of inquiry emails with resume attached to place after place, but no word back yet. Ugh.

Takeshi is pretty much guaranteed a job at 2 restaurants so far, and is planning to perhaps do another stage (day-of-work-without-pay) at another place in Alexandria as well.

This past weekend was good. Saturday night was humid and god-aweful. Tossed and turned and sweated my buns off until I finally fell asleep at 2:30am. Mr. Sleeps-like-Log next to me had no problems of course.

We went grocery shopping and then to the liquer store. Bought some Disaronno Amaretto for myself. :) And we bought a bottle of vodka to mix with anything else in the house, since we've gotten tired of having to be creative when mixing drinks! I wanted to buy some sake, but I'm fond of serving it in a sake drink set, bottle and cups etc. So I held off. I want to find a real pretty sake set online perhaps.

Girl's Best Friend?

2010-05-29T13:57:00.002-04:00

Man, I need a dog. Some little furry thing to keep me company during the day. It would probably greatly encourage me to get out of the house more often!

A little bit of frustration with college things. Today we're (seniors) are supposed to come in and take down our gallery pieces. This is one little piece to take down. Honestly most of me doesn't care about picking it up. It was the same with other projects during the semester that the professor would turn in back to us - "Here take it home." What if I don't want it?

The way it works is - I have already laid out pages in my portfolio with the exact same piece.

No interviewer wants me to drag in huge mounted pieces of work on black matte board - when I have the same exact work in my portfolio book.

So yeah, I don't really care about getting it. Don't know why I'm being so 'bleh' about it. I also haven't been able to find a good time to get my senior show banner and posters from a lady there, either. Jane's never there on the only day a week I have off right now, Thursdays. When am I gonna be able to get them?? Gah. うざい。

Last night we were both feeling blue, since I brought up an old topic up again, having to do with Takeshi's work schedule in general with the food industry. Kind of just beating a dead horse really, but, I guess I bring it up over and over again anyway, from time to time.

I always thought that once I got out, got a professional job, and brought another income to the house then Takeshi could maybe work less demanding hours or have another day off. To be able to take off some workload from him. But he was telling me that, no matter what, his schedule no matter what job he has, will more-or-less be this way.

I feel defeated about it a little. To know that there's not much that I could on my side that could make us have more time off together than we do now. Of course it always depends on the job he has.

And I can't ask him to do something else in the food industry - I'd hate myself to make him do something below what he loves to do. If he was doing something else then he wouldn't be the Takeshi I know and love. So it's a catch 22.

It's not a totally hopeless situation, and it's not like we never ever see each other. Life brings different things at different stages. We'll find a happy medium. Also, this has gotten me thinking about kids, and I told him this. Taking into account his schedule and such, how it could play out. I dunno - so much to think about that my head felt like it was going to explode last night...

On a lighter note.

Weather is getting warmer! Wow, almost feels like summer now finally. :) But now, some nights I wish we had the AC installed into the window already, but I know we'll try to go as long as we can to go without it! がんばります！

Something that makes me happy is to know that the closer we will be to D.C., the better opportunity we will have in the future to go see the cherry blossoms bloom! That would be a great thing to do on our days off together. :) With little furry puppy in tow.

Everyone enjoy their weekends!

The loudest bike in the city

2010-05-26T16:17:00.012-04:00

The internship has been going swimmingly. I'm glad I actually enjoy my non-paid job everyday, even though it's definitely not the environment to prep me for more fast-paced, tear-my-hair-out future work environments. I'm never the person who gets excited when the job description says something like, "Our company is fast-paced and never slows down; you'll be a pin-hair away from going insane everyday. Wanna join?"

...Nah.

Some lady screamed at me on my bike - MY BIKE - this morning while on my way to work. I have insanely out-of-shape breaks on my bike, that blare out horrible SQUEEKS and SQUELCHS. I was going downhill and saw the woman near the bottom, and as I got closer I started to press on the brakes more, since I didn't want to cream her from behind. She didn't hear me I guess, and I kept saying louder and louder, "Excuse me!" Nothing. So I couldn't really stop and I kept breaking in short bursts, right behind her

"SQUEEK SQUAWK SQUEEEE EEEEK"

She finally spun around frantically at the last minute, stepped to the side, and practically bellowed at me, "GOD get OUT of the WAY!!" I probably would have been really startled by that, but I hadn't had coffee or breakfast yet, so I was still fairly blank.

My answer should have been, "Shouldn't that be my line lady?", but I sped away with a "Sorry!" instead. Take a chill pill lady. But I suppose I would pee myself if I heard that sound right behind me! Everyone else I've had to SQUEEK by is startled to a certain degree, but that's the first time I've had someone just plain flip out. It made me laugh a little! Good thing I was around the corner from her when I did.

The moving schedule is still turning it's wheels slowly, and before you know it it'll be time to jump ship and head down to the D.C. area. We're able to stay in our apartment until the end of June.

Takeshi is feeling pretty secure with his options for jobs in that area. This past Saturday he went to work for free for the day at a restuarant in downtown D.C. - they told him that they would definitely hire him if he came back to them at the end of his search. He's doing another work day at a place in Frederick tomorrow as well.

Laura on the other hand, once again, is feeling inadequate and has not been able to get anything so far. Didn't know it would be this tough. But I keep in mind the state of the current economy and the statistics of the amount of college students who can't get into a job in their field right after college. Bleh, statistics. I guess I am one now!

I keep looking though. I think my best bet is to start somewhere as an intern, get my foot in the door that way - and in the meantime have a part-time job.

Graduation and Internship

2010-05-12T10:09:00.010-04:00

Graduation went by fast to say the least. The week prior to it was spent coming into the college building early in the morning, to join with the other seniors to mount our senior thesises for the senior show. I'm not much of a handy-woman with tools and measuring so needless to say I got help with my boards! The two days of installation turned out to be very frustrating - somehow a lack of coordination and scheduling befell whoever had been in charge, and a majority of the time (on both days) was spent waiting around for things to happen. Lots and lots of puttering around on our designated floor and wondering what the hell people were doing, and "why are we standing out doing nothing?!"

Things that probably would take us until about 2pm to do, turned into us waiting for people to finally install temporary walls and such until about 7pm. Seniors were angry and annoyed when we finally were able to leave!

In any case, the senior show was very neat. As the displayed artist we were told we could do whatever during the show - it was ours afterall! I was surprised that a lot of the graphic designers decided to stay on our floor, and some even stood by their work the entire time. Not me. There was no way I was going to stand there and gaze out from my little corner for 3 hours. There was way too much else to see around the entire building - all of the other majors had their work up as well. Also - what if someone had come to me and had been interested in offering a position or internship? We're moving back down to the D.C. area soon, and I'd have to decline by default. My aunt and uncle were able to come, and Takeshi came of course. Nothing special afterwards, aunt and uncle went home, so Takeshi and I went home and chilled for the rest of the afternoon.

Even though on that next Monday, seniors were supposed to come and take down their pieces, I couldn't because I had already started my internship and wouldn't get out until after the college building closed. So I was able to come on my scheduled day off, Thursday. Someone had taken down my art from the wall, which was nice because then I wouldn't have to wrestle with 3 large sheets of glass (cheapo-crappily-cut glass with sharp edges) and somehow take off the temporary shelf all by myself...

Graduation day came fast after that, on Saturday. My best friend Todd came up Friday evening to stay the weekend with us. He ended up having to go to an interview on Monday in Philedelphia. It was easier for him to leave from our apartment instead of driving all the way up from Maryland in the morning.

Graduation was held at a hall on the campus of Franklin & Marshall college nearby, since our college doesn't have the means or space to hold our graduations ourselves, yet. The day was windy WINDY. So windy. I liked the skirt I was in, but wished it was sooo much longer. Todd had to hold one side of it as I walked everywhere! The ceremony went by fast, since there's only 60 of us in the senior class.

Almost almost!

2010-04-26T10:42:00.002-04:00

We finally are car owners again! We can go out into the world outside of the Lancaster! Hehe. Such a great feeling. After all this time of not being able to be independent in that way - it's almost a euphoric feeling to know that we can drive ourselves somewhere - anywhere!

Tomorrow is the last day of classes! Yaaaaaaay! :D Good god, where did the time go? Senior thesis wrap-up time is for tomorrow during class, but I'll be trying to get as much of it done as I can. I'm only in the mood, at this point, to mostly just come in, and turn it in, and leave (hopefully).

We still need to figure a lot of stuff out after school ends. For one, I'll be interning 4 days a week at 2 places starting on the 30th. And then in the meantime, we will be figuring out jobs, and an apartment in the D.C. Metro area. Exciting stuff.

Will have time to write longer posts after classes and graduation!

Head Coming Back Together Again

2010-04-16T23:57:00.004-04:00

OK well -

Fortunately, I've finally found an internship. Went for an interview today and I know I'm starting on the 30th. At this point I'm not totally whether or not they may be able to give me a full 32 hours a week consistently, but I know I'm working there at least 3 days a week, which may be about 24 hours a week. And at least I'm finally able to start hacking away at my required 200 hours any way! Banzaiiii. :)

I've been living in silence in the apartment since Takeshi left for Chicago! Lol. I definitely wasn't able to throw any huge blow-out parties while the hub was gone. Har har. I have such a non-social life right now. Such is the life of a college student (who works less than she parties).

Speaking of which, I won't be a college student for very much longer!!!! Our last of classes is on the 27th, Senior Gallery Show is on the 1st of May, and Graduation day is on the 8th! It'll be here before we know it.

Head Explodes

2010-04-15T14:44:00.004-04:00

I never thought it would be this hard to find an internship. I hate this puny town. A lot of businesses here have the same kind of 'dickishness' which is not getting back to me at all, to tell me whether I had gotten it or not. So I haven't gotten it? Fine. Just let me know!

I went for another interview a few days ago - come to find out it's pretty much between me and another girl in my class! I don't really like for competition to be that close - as in having to look it in the face every day! Long story short, I felt kind of good about it, but it ended up going to her.

I have another interview tomorrow and another on Monday. I'm waiting to hear back another place as well. Either the end of this week or the end of next week, I'll receive an email, they said. I think I'm competing with about 2-3 other people for that job too. If ALL of these don't end in internship for me, then I have to start looking all over again. Which will not be good. It doesn't help that we don't have a car (yet). I can't search for places that are too far away from the city, or it's going to take hours to get to a possible internship and back everyday. Hopefully I won't have to look at those faraway places, but it's a possibility.

It's hard to keep my moral up. I've already been turned down by 6 businesses - which, out of a small-ass town in PA, is a HUGE percentage.

A lot is riding on me getting an internship and finishing my 200 hours in a timely fashion. If I fail to do that, then our schedule for moving back to the D.C. area is very well fucked. I don't want to screw this up.

Anyway.

Takeshi has been away in Chicago since Tuesday. Pretty quiet around the house. I usually am clamoring to get home after classes, but now it's just so....quiet there! And I know that he's not eventually coming home at the end of the night, so, it takes some of the excitement of going home, away. I'll be glad when next Monday comes around, and he's back!

Photo Tuesday

2010-04-06T13:50:00.006-04:00

My 'pregnant onion' plants are huge now!

Takeshi's rosemary

My new peppermint plant!

Takeshi's new 'bloody dock' plant. still never heard of it or seen it before!

Bring on another week

2010-04-04T23:50:00.002-04:00

We had a fairly pleasant weekend, now that Takeshi is off on Saturdays too! I can't remember the last time he had 2 days off a week instead of 1. It was maybe when we first moved back to this area, last year. Went to the market on Saturday morning to get groceries, and also brought home 2 more plants. I had my eye on a small peppermint plant, and Takeshi bought a "bloody dock" plant. Not sure exactly what it's used for, but he seems to know. I can't wait to see my peppermint get HUGE. :)

Still working on thesis stuff - got a lot of work done on it this weekend, but I still have a lot to do, of course. The banner and the sandwich boards have gone up outside of the college, so they look great, in my humble opinion. Will have to take photos here, shortly.

This weekend, we had homemade pizza for dinner one night, and today Takeshi made some homemade cinnamon buns. Yum.

Warmer weather is hopefully here to stay! I'm loving all of the sunshine.

Gloomy Sunday

2010-03-28T13:40:00.002-04:00

Hopefully we'll find enough cars to want to go look at, when April 3rd rolls around. Just looking for the best deal on a Honda Civic LX.

Roughly about 4 weeks left of classes until graduation. Why does senior year mean that all of your professors give you ten times the amount of work to do? I wish I had a lot less projects to worry about getting done on time, and enjoy my last year of college! Hmm.

Starting in April, Takeshi has asked for Saturdays off as well his usual Sundays, which gives him (and us as a pair) two days to get things done for figuring out everything from apartments, to jobs, etc.

People are Boring

2010-03-24T09:17:00.013-04:00

My Folklore class makes me want me to sew my ears shut. The class is centered around discussing folklore or rituals in food, or family oral stories, etc. But it's slowly transformed itself into an hour of sitting here and listening to people's shallow, materialistic, and godawful boring personal stories. God, people are fricking boring. Now I know what George Carlin was talking about. It's not even anything interesting. Listening to a girl talk about how her father and uncles have worked at Giant grocery stores for 30 years. That almost made me guffaw, it was so depressing, and bland. So what if they did? Sentences upon sentences that start with, "Um, well my __________ went here and that place has this, and they do this...."

One girl started blabbing about how she went to Japan, but who knows for how long. It infuriated me so much listening to her grandly "inform" the class about sushi...And I KNOW she's a total anime geek - so that's probably why she went to Japan in the first place. Whereas I have family there, and I never went there because of some cartoons, and oh wouldn't it be totally awesome to get even MORE anime and to go Japan? I usually don't think I'm totally superior to anyone, but I know that I know more about the culture than she does. I lived it - she just vacationed there.

And it's always the same 3-4 people answering, since the teacher doesn't make it a rule to choose people, and go around the room. Having to listen to Pennsylvania Dutch/ PA area blabber is even more unbearable. I have to sit here and listen to how they think other countries and cultures are, just because they spent the summer there. I don't give two shits about sauerkraut and pork, or chicken and waffles, shoofly pies, or Amish food. The teacher the other day said nonchalantly, that organic food is "elitist". Are you kidding me? I have a feeling she might be a republican.

Having this class is making me hate being in this town even more. Why did my college have to be in Pennsyltucky? Where they hate seafood, or anything of another culture anyway...Where they don't season their FOOD - no one does! Everything is so bland here. God forbid they put anything in their food besides lard and butter. And the artisty/vegetarian students in this school think they know it all, just because they eat veggie burgers and spent the summer in Italy. Yes, they're OH so cultured now. And then they return to a state that should be in the south. Bleh. I'm ranting only because I'm in the stupid class right now! Heh. The feeling should fade as soon as she sets us free at 9:45.

Finger-Lickin' Good

2010-03-21T18:57:00.008-04:00

We just had dinner and boy was it good. Takeshi whipped up some home-made fried chicken and I paired that with a veggie dish. Right before coating the chicken pieces in batter, we tossed it with old bay seasoning, garlic, and a splash of soy sauce. Along with that, I took a full bunch of fresh, locally-grown asparagus and fried it with chopped garlic and a little butter. A very good Sunday dinner!

Classes end next month, which is getting crazier to think about, by the day. Senior thesis work is moving along, but I wish I had less classes to worry about overall! Finally turned in projects for our Multi Media class. It's a basic animation, but I'm proud of what I was able to do. Definitely don't want to do it for a living.

The somewhat space-ship console-looking interface of AfterEffects

This past Thursday I went to see Jane again to look at the banner and sandwich boards for the Senior Show. They look awesome and it's really cool to see one's design work in such a large format! The banner must be about 9 feet long. I can't wait to see them put it up on the front of the building, soon. I think she told me the end of this month?

This will be also be the week of calling possible internship sites to set up interview dates, after I sent them a cover letter and resume. I've contacted 4 places in total, so hopefully I've got enough chances to be taken in, so I can complete my internship. I'll be nervous until I've gotten a yes from someone! Fingers crossed.

Pudge-free Mind for About an Hour

2010-03-09T21:00:00.003-05:00

Watching Biggest Loser: Couples right now. I try to catch this show as much as I can, because it makes me feel better about my pudge for about an hour, compared to the 300lbs.-ish women on there. I'm a evil person for feeling that way, sure, but they're just gonna' melt off all of that fat by the end of the show anyway. Probably'll look better than me, and have a six-pack too. Damnit!

Spring break has started since yesterday afternoon. I'm making it a goal to get on the Wii Fit every single day during break. That's the thing about college sometimes - takes up my time at home too. Gotta sit in front of my laptop in class for hours and at home for hours. Gahhh. Hopefully when I get into my career, I won't have to bring my job home everyday. That would be very nice. :)

Laid Back Sunday

2010-03-07T20:12:00.003-05:00

Yesterday I decided to do the laundry myself instead of waiting for us to do our usual, dreaded "Laundry Day" today, on Sunday. Even though both of us usually like to go to the laundromat together instead of alone (it's boring either way...), I wanted to give us (but mostly Takeshi) a break from that. Just to have a Sunday, his only day off right now, to actually breath and to not go anywhere unless we want to. But as fate would have it, we live in small-town U.S.A. where there is pretty much nothing to do without having a car, and even THEN, nothing is open on Sundays because people need their church-services. Blah.

I broke another wine glass while I was washing it today. My hands are mostly small enough to get inside those things, but I exerted a little too much force (i.e. not much) to break off a chunk in the sink. Have a small cut on the side of my hand. Itches. :(
GAH these breaking dishes and glasses! Will we ever have good luck, and keep some stuff around for a good while?

Everyone at college thinks that having Monday classes and THEN starting spring break on Tuesday is retarded. I agree. I'm almost in the "break mood" but then remember I have to wake up for class tomorrow. Almost there. And it's only a 3-hour class. Fah. I can do that.

Takeshi will be going to Chicago to do a stage at the Alinea restaurant April 13th thru the 19th. I looked at the hostel he'll be staying at. Looks a lot nicer than the imagery I had in my head when he said "hostel". I just grumble a little at the hours he'll be required to work - about 12-13 hours each day. Roughly from about 11am to midnight. Ugh. How does he do it?...

Fingers crossed for Spring getting it's big, flowery butt finally here, so I can do some spring cleaning!

March Already?

2010-03-03T11:59:00.015-05:00

きょうは木曜日だよ。まいにち、日本ことをおもいます。。。
じかんははやい、ね？

How time flies. The other day we were ringing in the new year, and now it's March. Yikes.

It's hard to believe I'll be graduating in roughly 3 months. We're still researching places to move to after graduation. Still haven't narrowed anything down, which stinks. We've started to factor in "secondary cities" in our list of places. They may be a nicer transition than coming from a small town with a lower cost of living, to the big city where you have to live in shoebox-sized apartment for about the same amount of money.

Spring break is next week starting on Tuesday. I've never had a spring "break" ever, I think. Where I go off to the frickin' beach or something. Probably just working on classwork. I KNOW I'll be trying (in vain) to get through this animation work for my After Effects class. That class is a huge failure. The 2 teachers who lead that class are cool, 30-something guys, but as far as them knowing the basics of teaching a totally new program to us - they totally screwed up. Their way to help us with learning this program was say to, "Look at tutorials online - they can teach you better than anyone ever could."

----So why do we need you guys, then? Why am I PAYING to teach myself the program, essentially??

ばか。

Sooooo frustrating, this excuse for a class. うざい！

Anywho.

It will be nice when my parents are finally able to come back to the U.S. after doing their tours in other countries. I believe that's about 5-6 years from now. It will be nice to have family to visit. I wish the two of us and Takeshi's family could be closer to each other as well. Just build a teleporter to Suzuka-shi and then we could go whenever we wanted, without having to spend thousands of dollars to fly over! Oh world-of-the-future, where are you? Funny to think that people in the 1980s and/or earlier thought that by the year 2000, we'd all be riding in flying cars and all. Hah! Or, at least have a healthcare system that works for everyone.

I've been missing Japan a lot lately (as I have ever since leaving...) but mostly because - I miss the overall personality of the Japanese people! Here, I have to deal with loud, nosey, rude, and crass Americans. I never ever had anyone in Japan invade people's spaces without good cause, and everyone has more respect for others. Here, people just in CLASS, listen to their f*cking music loudly for everyone to hear and not use their stupid headphones. And the teacher told them to USE the headphones - but then they became inconsistent with their "rule" because not once have they ever told those people to "hey use your headphones please." Ridiculous. Some people should be stopped from ever having children, so they can't carry on their stupid genes.

The only time I ever saw Takeshi's friends or whatnot get rowdy was when they were drunk! Haha. Yeah, so overall, I miss that type of culture greatly. Americans could learn something from Japan - and from other countries as well.

Here is a recent classwork assignment for one of my college classes. We had to create wacky, whatever-you-wanted, business cards!

Blog Bump

2010-02-26T13:17:00.002-05:00

Takeshi has started his own blog! It focuses on all the delicious dishes he makes in his spare time! What a wonderful hobby to have. ;) But seriously, the field of culinary art is his passion, and he experiments a lot and pushes boundaries. So take a peek at his blog if you're interested!

http://tk1202.blogspot.com/

よかった！

2010-02-16T14:12:00.007-05:00

I'm in Senior Studio class right now. Just got back from my critique group - critiquing our logos for our senior thesis, fictional company. I put forth a logo that the prof liked a lot, so I can now move on to doing little changes instead of being back at square one again. Whew. よかった。I was really worried about this logo for senior thesis. I definitely want my logo for this to be awesome, and I think I have a really good start right now. To tweak it into a logo that I'm very pleased with and proud of, in the end.

YES it snowed a TON over my birthday weekend, and then AGAIN during last week, which caused my college to close on Wednesday and Thursday. Crazy, crazy. I think (I hope) we won't see any big snows again for a while, and perhaps not again before Spring gets here. Takeshi baked me a cake for my birthday and it was the cutest little cake ever! I love, love, LOVED it. He received many smooches.

layers of strawberry and crepe!

Takeshi unfortunately had to work last night (Valentine's Day). The day before, I bought two large "linza tarts" at the local bakery as presents. They were very yummy. And the hubby was extremely thoughtful yet again, when he arrived home at around midnight with some roses for me! Aww. More smooches. It makes me feel very unworthy!

This past Saturday, my friend Astrid and I tagged along with another college class to the Indian Echo Caverns, near Hummelstown, PA. The class was some kind of nature studies class, but our Folklore class prof asked if anyone would be interested in going along that day. The caverns where very beautiful, and we had a good time. And they even let people take pictures! - with flash! That was very unique, since I know almost any kind of cavern I've been to in the past doesn't allow photos at all. I definitely was snapping away with my Nikon the whole time the tour guide was talking.

A Boatload of Snow?

2010-02-03T22:03:00.003-05:00

The weather reports are calling for another big snow shower/storm on this Friday evening, and mostly on Saturday! This Saturday just so happens to be my birthday as well. I like having my birthday on a weekend this year (finally), but why couldn't we have a huge crap load of snow hit us on a weekday? Ah well.

I'll be turning 23 this Saturday. I doubt I'll feel any different. Takeshi got a bit mopey before his 23rd birthday with the "Ahh I'm getting older, oh woe is me". I don't feel that way yet. Check back with me when I turn 30. ;) Haha.

I don't know if we'll get to do anything ON Saturday for it. Even if Takeshi's work decides to close down due to tons of snowfall, who would be open to go out to eat - and would we want to go on a snow-trek for a meal? Who knows. We'll see.

Man, I wish I was snuggling under a kotatsu right now!

Saturday

2010-01-29T11:45:00.007-05:00

I haven't posted in a while, because of the usual growth of classwork and overall college-anxiety! I'm missing the winter break, where I could get in about 8-9 hours of sleep. I like sleep.

Schoolwork is constant, and so is the freezing weather! It's also hard to believe that I'll be graduating with my Bachelor's degree in about 3-4 months. I've been a student for so long (12 years of grade school + 4 of college) - I'm not sure if I'll transition well enough to becoming "not a student". To finally be out in the world with my degree and my skills. ;) Scary stuff.

After I graduate I still need to complete my 200 hours of an internship somewhere in the city. I'd love to broaden my scope and be able to take an internship in York or Philadelphia, but we have no car. I need a place where I can walk to (and hopefully not to the other END of the city).

One thing I'm happy about is that my idea and print-work for this year's Senior Show has been selected! It was down to 3 of us and we were asked to do multiple revisions within a short time period, but it all payed off in the end. My design for the event's postcard, 18" x 24" sandwich boards for the exterior front of the college, and a huge banner to be hung on the facade - will all be up for this year's show! It's an awesome thing to see your design up and out in "the world", not just as a class project. I have to make more revisions to my design, and also create some more print-work for the show, which in turn earns me a stipend of $200 from the college. Not a bad deal! So that's the highlight of my whole college career, for sure. :)

We just ran out of soy sauce a week ago, but we want to make a run to get it from the Vietnamese grocer in town instead of the usual Latino grocer we go to. Only crappy thing is that the Vietnamese place is farther away, and no one wants to walk or bike for long when it's 21 degrees F outside with blustery winds...I also just finished up my last packet of natto from that same grocer. I want to buy more, and yet it's still not exactly the same as when I'd have it back home in Suzuka - because we don't have any Kewpie to go with it!! That totally completes my memory of what natto is. American mayo tastes weird with it! Actually they do have Kewpie at that Vietnamese grocer, but it's overpriced (of course). :( Aww.

emerald*mountain*tea