Saturday April 8, 8:02 a.m.

I kinda figured that this was going to happen in CNN. Ever since John Roberts came on board as this overqualified national correspondent, he seems to have gained more and more of his old job back. He's been the go-to guy as replacement host on "American Morning", "The Situation Room" and even "Anderson Cooper". And he's done it faster than anyone else new on staff. John King must be feeling quite green right now. And then I see on TVNewser that one contributor has been crowing about the temporary team-up of Roberts and Heidi Collins on Anderson this week stating that although she doesn't think he has a particularly likeable screen persona (yeowch!), Roberts is a top-notch interviewer. It's good to know that all those chats with Iggy Pop and David Bowie all those decades ago have served the former J.D. Roberts well. Anderson may have to look over his shoulder but I think Wolf Blitzer will be getting his bags packed very soon.

Interesting thing...just one year after former Canadian Peter Jennings gave his sign-off from ABC, we got former Canadian John Roberts becomign the star quarterback for CNN. Americans must be scratching their heads about who these people are. Do all Canadians sound so stentorian and uninflected? Then again, as an antidote, you can take a look at former Canadian William Shatner.

Still, sticking with the wonderful world of American network news, I heard about the impending jump of perky Katie Couric from "Today" to the coveted throne of Walter Cronkite and Dan Rather on CBS. She would be the first sole female anchor of "The CBS Evening News". It would also make her very first nighttime CBS anchor to have had a cameo in a Mike Myers movie ("Goldmember")...now can Cronkite and Rather boast about that, huh?

As for news here, there was a scary reminder to that sarin gas attack on the Tokyo subways 11 years ago when a Korean pickpocketing gang tried to escape from the cops by spraying a whole bunch of people with some mace-like substance on the platform of Nishi-Nippori Station on the Yamanote Line back on Thursday morning. Well, at least, the officers got one of the guys. About 27 commuters and at least one cop had to be treated.

In my own little (and hopefully, far more peaceful) world today, I should just be meeting JJ for her appointment and then coming straight back home. I checked the Japanese Immigration website for any potential hiccups about getting that re-entry permit. Nope, I can still get it on the same day that I apply. So off I will go on Monday straight after The Class Act. It'll cost me 6,000 yen to get the multiple-entry, though. But I absolutely know that I will have to return home this Xmas at risk of being written out of the family will...not that there's any guarantee that I'm even in it as it is.

Friday April 7, 9:40 p.m.

It was pretty cloudy when I met The Madame at the West Exit of JR Suidobashi Station this morning...rather gloomy, in fact. I thought we were gonna get another douser. However, we were saved from the wet stuff although it stayed overcast for the most part. And The Madame likes it this way since she's a bit sensitive to the sun. We made our way over to the Tokyo Dome area for our afternoon at L'Aqua, the shopping/spa complex next to the Dome.

Our first stop, though, were a couple of the rides. The Madame was armed with some free passes for both L'Aqua and the amusement park area. We chose the Ferris Wheel known as The Big O for our first venture. The Big O is called as such because it is the only Wheel on the planet that doesn't have any hub or radii filling in the ring. And it was an auspicious ride for me since it was the very first time that I'd ever been on a Ferris Wheel of any sort in my life (you can start oohing now). Each cab had a stereo piping in the latest J-Pop hits from a device bolted to the wall resembling a cell phone. Although I didn't let her know, I was feeling a little antsy at first as we made our 15-minute rotation up and down. My fear of heights is still there.

Afterwards, we used the remaining ride passes for the much tamer carousel. The Madame opted for riding the gorilla for some giddy reason that she couldn't really explain. I, on the other hand, just chose a nice little loveseat for the gentle ride around.

Then, it was off to the wonders of the spa itself. The Madame had free passes for those. We had quite a few attentive...almost unctuous...staffers leading us the way. L'Aqua the Spa is one of those places that just yells class and naturalness. All the lockers were tastefully apportioned in faux-wood and browns. And the general theme seemed to be a mix of resort inn and spa. At the front desk, the two of us received our spa clothing that we were to wear inside the grounds. I went to the Men's locker room; the male staffer kindly spoke to me in broken English and led me to my locker. I had received a a numbered wrist bracelet which acted as locker key and internal credit card. I stripped down to nothing and donned on my brown-fiber clothes and joined my barefoot companion outside. As with my gym in Urayasu, most of the folks walking around all shriveled like were of the geriatric persuasion.

The Madame and I decided to make the low-heat saunas our first stop on the 8th floor. We went for the room with the lowest temperature...40 degrees C. It was a darkened circular room with a bench running around the circumference. We sat there for about 10 minutes. It was quite comfy there since as any standup comedian would say when it came to the topic of Calfornia summers, it was a dry heat. To be honest, I didn't even really work up a sweat. Then, the two of us tried to go into the hotter 45-degree chamber which looked more like the typical sauna. The Madame took just two steps before bailing out. What a difference 5 degress can make for some.

Instead we went back out into the main hall where there were some chaise longes just laying out there as if they were on the Lido Deck of a cruise ship so we just laid out on them for a little bit before heading all the way down to the 5th floor where the massage areas were. We decided to go for a bit of Taiwanese reflexology at a clinic called Wu Lai. This did cost us some yen, to the tune of 3675 yen for the 30-minute basic, for which we beeped our bracelets at the reception. Remembering our somewhat turbulent time at that foot massage place in Taipei several months ago, I was a little nervous about having my feet pummeled again. However, this time, the masseur was quite a bit more gentle on my tootsies although there were a few instances of wincing (such as my left big toe). It was so relaxing that the 30 minutes just seemed to fly by. The last 5 minutes had my feet wrapped up like a mummy. And we got a record sheet telling us what was ailing us via the feet. I was surprised at how accurate the chart was considering some of my aches and pains. The chart got my wizened shoulders and neck right along with a spot-on diagnosis of my sinuses.

Then, it was time for lunch so we ended up at this wabisabi place just across the floor from Wu Lai. We both had the special which was basically miniature versions of penne, hamburger, very mild chicken curry and stewed eggplant. It was all quite good. The Madame remarked how odd it was to be having lunch while dressed in pyjamas. Well, it is a spa after all...

We went all the way back up to the 8th floor to a small cafe where we just drank some rather steeply-priced drinks. I paid a hefty 550 yen for an Iced Caffe Latte. We followed that talk up with another descent back to the 5th floor (I think we were getting our exercise that day) and to the lounge area which was filled with snoring folks in reclining chairs hooked up to small flat-panel TV screens. The Madame and I took adjoining seats. Just by luck, there was a Korean language learning program on NHK 3 so I practiced a bit of my greetings there before switching to the big political news of the day which was the voting for the new leader of the Democratic Party of Japan. The procedure which involved handing in slips of paper either for Ichiro Ozawa or Naoto Kan had the media attention of a coronation. By the end of the counting, it was indeed the elder Ozawa who got the top prize...although considering the longevity of previous DPJ leaders recently, I'm not sure if it's much of an honour.

We finally decided to get ourselves back into our civvies again. All in all, I paid 4,625 yen for the day at L'Aqua. Not exactly a cheap experience but again it is a spa...I think I would be more worried about the amenities at a cheap spa. And I think if one considers the experience as an annual treat instead of a regular workout, then L'Aqua will not be a disappointment. The Madame and I spent another hour walking through the Tokyo Dome area. We came across Bubba Gump, that restaurant built to the theme of Tom Hanks' magnum opus. The Madame had been to the one in Universal Studios Japan in Osaka and fell in love with the menu. She was slightly disappointed that Bubba wasn't part of the spa complex but I think its inclusion would rather defeat the purpose of a healthful resort. The items on that menu seemed to scream "Cholesterol!" To add insult to injury, there was another restaurant owned by former sumo wrestler Konishiki, who hails from Hawaii, which boasts this mammoth hamburger. In fact, most of the items could have conquered some of the lower-ranked sumo. We agreed that we would make a beeline for Bubba Gump's in the near future and headed our separate ways.

I made my way over to the Toranomon Starbucks for the first time in a few weeks and for what would probably be the final time. The chirpy manageress was there again plying customers with some new blend of coffee. The OL did come and to her credit, let me know immediately that this would be the final class. To be honest, I didn't react too much to the revelation. I kinda figured that our days together were numbered since it was fast approaching three years since we first met, and the fact that she was now juggling full-time work and night studies at Aoyama Gakuin University. There just wouldn't be any time or energy left for me in her schedule. Still, it was kinda sad since The OL was the very first student in my freelancing career (The Beehive and The Class Act were carryovers from my ol' school). And she was a most loyal student. In fact, she made nice by stating that her place would probably be taken over by her older sister who has expressed an interest in learning from me. If everything works out, I could be teaching her sis most likely on a regular basis after Golden Week back at The Tea Room in Ichigaya since she works in the area. And The OL left some hope in that she may have some time during the summer to see me during that time. Still, I'll miss the old girl. Not sure if I am depressed about the fact or not, but I did end up having some comfort food at the Lotteria burger joint in the station mall when I got home tonight.

I checked my messages. The Satyr sent a slightly snarky mass mailing to me and some of the others from the ol' school about his plan for a drink out tomorrow night. Apparently, the replies have been slow in coming. Well, I definitely gave him my regrets. After today's draining of my finances at L'Aqua, there won't be anything for drinking in Shinjuku even with payment from JJ tomorrow morning and I am desperately trying not to siphon anything from my account. At least, he knows how I feel whenever it came to some of the planning that I've had to do in the past. I also got a couple of messages from The Madame herself. Looks like she really wants to go to that 100% Chocolate Cafe on the 16th. I've also sent word to Skippy. Her second message asked whether I would be game for "The Libertine" with Johnny Depp. She pegged me right when she pointed out that this wasn't my type of movie. But I said that I would go. Maybe we can fit in that Bubba Gump's afterwards.

Well, finally, I don't think this will cause any major problems with my trip to Korea but I realized today that I haven't gotten my re-entry permit yet. I was mentally kicking myself for that oversight while at the same time sighing relief that I did realize it in time. I'll have to head down to Immigration on Monday to buy that. The good thing about those permits is that I can just hand in the application form and get that stamp on the same trip. I'm glad then that SIL decided not to come this Monday. Again, I'm not too worried about it but it's good to know that even if in the unlikely event that I can't get it on Monday, I still have two more days to go for it.

Ugh...long day.

Friday April 7, 7:40 a.m.

GC sent me his message in as many days. The two of us were commiserating about our belt-tightening needs. I think it's rather true that nowadays whenever I purchase something, I ponder how tax-deductible it is. GC's friend has been applying for a couple of positions in Tokyo. One is an accounting job at none other than Studio Ghibli, the magic factory that legendary animator Hayao Miyazaki of "Princess Mononoke" and "Spirited Away" fame built. Actually, I saw a short documentary on Miyazaki's No. 2 man, Toshio Suzuki, on NHK last night. It was done as a "day-in-the-life" special. He basically comes off as the prototypical grumpy/lovable father/martinet type who populate most of corporate Japan's middle management.

Speedy also sent me what was frankly an unnecessary message forwarding 006's apology for pulling off a dotakan, or sudden cancellation, on Wednesday. I'm already well aware of 006's busy schedule at her company. He also wanted to show me a small prepositional error in her message to further give me some insight about how I can help her. As soon as I saw that part in his message, my temperature started rising a bit. It might be as irrational as all hell, but I've never been too good at taking backhanded advice from anyone and the way he phrased it, it seemed to go into that direction.

Well, I do have that outing with The Madame for L'Aqua today. I checked the website for the complex. Hmmm...there doesn't to be much for me there; all the amenities seem to be geared for women. I'll just hold my tongue. I am bringing the spoon so that she can prove to me her Uri Gelleresque power.

Thursday April 6, 10:33 p.m.

Managed to make it through another Thursday OK. One of these days, though, I'm gonna have to realize that coming too early to class is almost as bad as coming too late. I kinda gave the juku boss a bit of a scare when I came to the house 45 minutes early...as I often do during the night sessions on Tuesday. Problem is that the boss and her hubby were still in wake-up-and-brekkie mode when I arrived. I think the boss was just a little panicked that she hadn't put on her make-up. I don't particularly care about such things but then again, I'm not a woman. I'll promise to be a bit less diligent on that score next time.

Went to the local family restaurant for lunch before doing the hour at the gym. I sometimes wonder if working out there just once a week is really worth it. I haven't seen any sort of progress in my spare tire in months. Really, I should be doing this three times a week but I just don't have the time nor interest. The night before during 001's lesson, 001 told me that during her drinkathon with the erstwhile 002 and their mutual friend last weekend, she had related the news that I was going to the gym. The reaction was one of disbelief. I knew it was just a jest but there was a bit of it that still stung. Having been a regular member of the gym for over 18 months and not having anything to show for it doesn't really sit well with me. Sometimes I just think fate has intended me to stay fat.

Anyways, I got home, did some laundry and made dinner. I then headed to the Starbucks in Mitsukoshimae for the third lesson with B2 and B2B. It was probably the most successful lesson so far although I think we still need to settle down a bit more. However, the banter was much more easier amongst the three of us, and B2B seemed to really appreciate the extra text on basic English conversation I gave him. I joked to B2 that she may have gained a rival for her affections in the form of that book. Still, I'm just happy I got through the hour intact.

The Satyr has kept me updated about how his plan for that little drinking outing is going on Saturday. I'm still undecided about whether to go or not; I just have to be careful about these things from now on. But he has stated that I was doubtful for the event so at least he's made it easy for me to pull out.

The Kanto has been getting a few soft jolts over the past half-hour. I hope it's not a sign of much stronger things to come.

Looks like the race for the leadership of The Democratic Party of Japan is gonna be between two veterans and former leaders, Ichiro Ozawa and Naoto Kan. The vote is tomorrow, and I'm betting even money on Kan since there are quite a few of young turks in the party that wouldn't be too happy with Ozawa and the man himself has some health issues. However, I probably won't hear anything until I get home tomorrow night. I'm off with The Madame to that Korakuen spa, L'Aqua, from the morning, and then I've got the OL for her first lesson in almost a month.

Thursday April 6, 7:12 a.m.

It's brilliantly sunny out there once more. I hope it stays that way. But I may have to watch out for pollen again. Just another month, I tell myself...

I got a letter from ol' GC for the first time in several months. He came out with a rather sad bit of news. The school that he's been with ever since he arrived on these shores years ago may be on the slow fade to bankruptcy. The kids have just not been coming in. I wonder if it's a matter of changing demographics or perhaps the scourge of NOVA has entered even that little pocket of ruralism. I'm kinda surprised that he hasn't gone for his Permanent Residency; he's been here even longer than I have, so he's well over the minimum time of residency to apply.

There was a bit of a kerfuffle on the Keio commuter line last night. A couple of trains "grazed" each other which caused one of them to derail. One person ended up dead but aside from a few other cases of light injuries, the biggest damage was a lot of very unhappy commuters trying to get home.

Well, I gottta head on out to teach the juku boss at 10. Then it'll be my weekly visit to the gym, a bit of dinner before heading out to see B2 and B2B.

Wednesday April 5, 11:11 p.m.

It looks like NHK has changed its lineup. I was expecting to see the usual 10 p.m. news but instead, it was some sort of This Day in History-type program followed by some sort of artsy little show which seems to be espousing some slow life themes while sporting jazzy/Latin background music. Sigh...time to check the TV guide again. Anyways, it seems as if the host for this month is none other than perennial tarento, Marina Watanabe. And tonight's theme is Spring Cleaning. Ahhhh...I'm relaxing already. Mind you, I do like the fact that the program is playing a lot of Chet Baker.

It was rain for most of today but thankfully that stopped by the evening. I had lunch at the neighbourhood tonkatsu place then stopped at Maruzen to get that text for B2. I ordered the CD for the text which will eventually cost me 5 Soseki's (that would be 5,000 yen) once it arrives on my doorstep. Man, what voice actors must get paid for a disc to cost that much.

006 had to pull out so I only taught 001 tonight. It was the first time that the former cancelled with a little more than an hour before class time so I'm not sure what this will mean for my money. My ol' school, being the chiselers they are, would only compensate teachers, even if a student pulled a no-show within a few hours of the scheduled class time, only if the teacher were willing to come all the way to the head office to pull computer duty. Considering the clients have already paid all of the fees to the school in advance, I've had quite a few epithets for them about their policy.

001 was her usual fun self. She confided to me that she had gotten together with 002 (Speedy and I are still hoping that she'll return to take some classes, but according to 001, the school is just too darn far for her friend) and another mutual friend known to me. Looks like I was one of their many gossip topics to laugh about (or at).

I just heard that PM Koizumi has become the 3rd-longest serving Japanese leader in the postwar period. Hmmm...that should make him want to leave even more quickly before his supposed departure in September.

Well, I ought to hit the shower now since I gotta hit the hay and then wake up to get ready for the juku boss' lesson in the morning.

Wednesday April 5, 9:40 a.m.

Welcome to my 1500th blog entry! I was about half a day behind schedule but I was just feeling too tired to bother last night. Maybe I'll celebrate with an extra Big Mac....nah, on second thought...actually, the last couple of days have seen me without much of an appetite at night. I haven't bothered with dinner at all. Not sure if this is the male version of menopause coming on. Maybe if I start getting heat flashes or mood swings, I'll get a better indication.

I had a half-hour trial lesson at the juku last night before The Milds and McGirl showed up. The potential new guy is a pretty energetic fellow with a love of French cuisine and a gift of the gab. If he does decide to join our humble abode, it'll just be a half-hour at first. With his personality, those 30 minutes should just zoom by. The big word is IF, though. He was a little surprised that our little school is in a small room in a house.

The OL is back on my schedule after almost 3 weeks away. And B2 is still being a glutton for punishment; she will indeed be coming for her 3rd seesion with B2B in tow. Time to get that text for her. Skippy has also gotten back to me about that trip to the Maid Cafe on Sunday. She's been able to wrangle The Kid for the outing. I guess in his case, it would be appropo for him since he's still a pretty young fellow. The Satyr has also thrown out an invitation for this Saturday seeing if he can get some of the ol' school gang together for drinks. I gave him a wait-and-see since I'm not exactly sure if I can really afford these benders anymore....and yet, I'm still going to a Maid Cafe and yakisoba on Sunday.

The Wild Guy is indeed going to be tying the knot pretty soon. I do wish the man well...a lot of us had thought that he was nigh-unmarryable due to his...shall we say...volatile personality. But I'm still skeptical about him getting married so soon after meeting the girl. As far as I know, I may be the only one outside of his family that has been told of this upcoming wedding. It will be quite the talk of the town.

It's pretty wet out there but the rain has let up. Should have washed away most of the dreaded pollen. There may even be some mood-lightening negative ions out there, too.

Tuesday April 4, 1:39 p.m.

Just enjoying my brief time before tackling the lesson plans at the juku. Well, they're not exactly the most pressing things. I really only have to plan for one lesson, that for The Milds and McGirl (if she shows up...she may be stalking her punk rock singer again somewhere in the country). And I just have that half-hour trial lesson when I come in for an guy who needs it at work. He wants to do a group lesson but that will depend on how he does in the trial. If he's too low, he stays a solo act. Of course, The Siberian doesn't need a plan. As long as the cat is there, he's happily distractable.

The Beehive was a bit subdued today although my pics of Toronto informed Ms. Tulip. She showed me her copy of the TTC map so she's already started getting ready for the big move. As I thought, her hubby's company will take care of the accomodations which will be a great boost for them financially. However, we were missing Ms. Alp and the de facto leader, Ms. Travel. Ms. Travel has been away for a few weeks since her younger brother has been in a coma for some time. So basically, it was the chattier pair of Ms. Perth and Ms. Tulip alongside the quieter pair of Ms. Jade and Ms. Tea. Unfortunately, the group will be even sparser next week so it was decided that there would be a rare Tuesday morning off.

As for B2 and B2B, I'll see what happens tonight on the e-mail. If she doesn't say anything by the end of tonight, I'll start assuming that our brief relationship will be null and void and save myself any further handwringing (and money) for a teaching arrangement that wasn't looking too good in the first place.

TV Tokyo is showing "The Devil's Own", that early 90s suspense flick with Harrison Ford and Brad Pitt as Irish-American cop and IRA terrorist respectively. Well, at least I have been reminded that there was at least one other celeb who hadn't gotten along with Pitt even before Jennifer Aniston and the rest of the Friends. The movie almost looks like a prequel to Ford's latest thriller, "Firewall"...same grim-faced man having to go to extreme measures to protect his beleaguered family. Margaret Colin is portraying the wife du peril in this one.

Another small story in the local news. Often reporters have to cover some sordid stuff like rapes. Well, it looks like one Fukuoka TV reporter wasn't satisfied covering just sexual assault cases. He had another life secretly taking part in them thanks to some victims over a cellphone dating service. He's made his 15 minutes now...he's been arrested by the police and fired by his station. In a way, his case reminds me of the one last year in which another intrepid TV reporter who always seemed to scoop his rivals at city fires ended up getting arrested for setting them himself.

Anyways, gotta get back to duty...

Tuesday April 4, 7:48 a.m.

Just finished off that Sacher Torte that I'd received from The Matron yesterday. Yep, it was well preserved. And the taste is a bit different from the Starbucks variety (yes, I will dare compare the original from The Hotel Sacher to a version from the Seattle-based cafe); it has a bit more of a liqueur kick. Still, it shares that heaviness so I can understand when The Matron warned me that I shouldn't eat it at night. I think I may be more animated at The Beehive today.

Shard and I had our first real conversation in many a month. Recently, his correspondence had been more in the form of forwarded links to articles or websites. He'd sent me an article clipping by snail mail a few days ago pointing to defrocked CNN barfly Robert Novak getting "Tool of the Year" honours. Apparently, it had been a point in one of our threads. Despite Novak being a tool that has outlived its usefulness, I still kinda missed some of those political shows that used to populate CNN such as "The Capitol Gang" and the Judy Woodward show although "Crossfire" was one show that needed to be jettisoned and was by none other than Jon Stewart.

The Dancer sent me some further advice to give to the soon-to-be Toronto-bound Ms. Tulip. Housing prices in the T.O. are apparently ridiculously in orbit. Yup, I'd heard about the rarefied rents but I'm pretty confident that Ms. Tulip's hubby's company will be taking good care of the family in terms of accomodations.

Looks like along with the rest of Japan, the satellite channel SkyPerfect has also started to rejig its lineup. It's now "The Brady Bunch" and the very first "Star Trek" episode filmed (not aired) with William Shatner, "Where No Man Has Gone Before". Interesting how this episode and the allegedly final episode of the entire franchise, "These are the Voyages..." from "Enterprise" have their titles based on lines from the original "Space, the final frontier..." intro.

I've yet to hear from B2 about the next lesson, supposedly slated for this Thursday. She hasn't gotten back to me about the time. I did send off a message to her yesterday. To be honest, if she doesn't get back to me, I won't be too disappointed. It doesn't seem to be working out.

Tuesday April 4, 12:00 a.m.

Came home to find that there was a massacre on my laundry line. I'd forgotten the part in the weather forecast yesterday about the gale-force gusts. As a result, I had a few casualties in the form of downed clothes including one good bathtowel which has been demoted to the second floor apartment. I'm not sure if I'll make my good neighbour call downstairs. The guy can keep it if he wishes or he can just put it on the mailboxes for someone to pick up.

The full Class Act was back. The Matron has come back from her tour with her daughter in Europe. She got me a nice little souvenir in the form of a true Sacher Torte...not the Starbucks stuff that I'd been noshing on. I guess the stuff must keep quite well. It was packed in a thin wood box. It must be all that chocolate coating which keeps it fresh. Anyways, I know what I'm having for breakfast later today. The Matron actually bought it from the Sacher Hotel in Vienna, the supposed birthplace for the rich dessert. Nice of her to put it in the original bag.

SIL was in her usual good spirits but I won't be seeing her for a couple of weeks. I guess she needs a bit of relief from the shenanigans that I often wreak in her lesson.

The Part-Timer was in good form as usual. And I had my second student for the "English in Cooking" program last night. Nope, the new one isn't as fluent or as accurate as her predecessor but she does put out the ol' college try. Hey, that's all I want in a good student. Certainly she's a far cry from the Denmother's kid.

I got mail from The Wild Guy for the first time in a long while. Looks like he and his girl are still lovey-dovey. In fact, he intimated that he has a big announcement in the next few weeks. Ooh, boy...I hope he hasn't gone off the deep end and decided to get married already. That's a sure road to the dark side.

I sent out mail in turn to The OL to see if she's OK this week for a lesson since she's cancelled the last couple of times, and I sent a missive to Skippy to see if she's still intent on heading to that Maid Cafe on this coming Sunday. I'm also interested if The Madame was successful in sending that telepathic message over to her. Yeah, you heard me....

Monday April 3, 7:36 a.m.

Just four entries away from the big 1,500. Should reach it by tomorrow night at the latest.

Well, the sun is out and it looks like it's gonna be a nice day out there. Last night, we had a rather major spate of thunder, lightning and squall activity for a few hours which wreaked a bit of havoc with the satellite TV. However, things calmed down so that I was able to watch 3 hours of J-Pop oldies. Such was my Sunday night.

Physically speaking, I have been better. My neck is still suffering either from chronic pain or just from that overzealous masseuse. My tongue is sore for some reason and I've developed a few pimples here and there. Well, either I've been unconsciously sexually active on the spectral level or my body is doing some major rejecting.

The two major national stories right now are still the capture of the murderer of that 9-year-old boy and the search for the new leader of the Democratic Party of Japan. As for the first story, the suspect said that he'd wanted to kill anyone he could get his hands on. As for the second story, the leadership choice won't be made until Friday but the media seems to be predicting it will be former kingmaker Ichiro Ozawa.

It'll be a long day today but at least for half of it, things will be pretty laid back. The Matron will return after a couple of weeks away due to the one-year anniversary of a relative's death and that trip to Europe. She should have quite a lot of stories to tell. And SIL is always a laugh-a-minute.

Sunday April 2, 3:47 p.m.

It was quite the movie-laden day and night yesterday. After the session with JJ, I met up with Movie Buddy for the first time in a long while at the main intersection of the Ginza and we walked down a little south toward Tsukiji to catch "A History of Violence" which has been scoring high in the TokyoWalker popularity ratings. One sign that we were in for a good experience was when we found out that the tickets were only 1000 yen each. Considering that most first-run theatres charge 1800, that was a very pleasant surprise. Also, another one was that the seats were very plush in the 435-seat theatre...almost on a par with some of the new movieplexes.

As for "A History of Violence", it was the first time that I'd every seen a David Cronenberg movie on the big screen. I'd never caught any of his old horror flicks like "Shivers" or "Phobia" or even "The Fly" at a theatre. However, I'd certainly known of his reputation for some rather bizarro scenes. "Violence" is probably his most mainstream effort to date. But as is often customary for him, he filmed the movie in his (and my) native province of Ontario (I'd suspected that there was something awfully familiar about his Philadelphia...it turned out that all of that city's scenes were filmed in good ol' Toronto).
At 96 minutes, it was a short flick but it benefited from the lack of time since it was basically a one-man vengeance movie...however, unlike a Jean-Claude Van Damme, Steven Seagal or even an ol' Clint Eastwood feature, Viggo's second starring vehicle after that movie about some Hobbits also had some damn fine acting. It also deserved its R-15 rating here as it had brief but truly grisly acts of violence and even a pretty violent sex scene (of course, being in Japan, the censors did have their way with fuzzing up that scene on the staircase and some of Maria Bello's private parts). What also worked was the slow but inexorable deterioration of this once-ideal family model into a breaking-apart-at-the-seams example of dysfunction although there was perhaps a glimmer of hope at the very end. I was glad that there wasn't this "all-is-forgiven-let's-all-hug" scene but was also relieved that Viggo Mortensen's character didn't end up shooting himself in the head.
Another nice little touch at this theatre, the Togeki, was that at the end of the movie while we were all filing out, the staff handed out free bottles of Caffe Latte. I think for some of us, that refreshment was well needed. There was especially one guy behind MB and me during the movie who was wheezing like a patient on a malfunctioning ventilator, although the heavy panting did stop during the sex-on-a-staircase scene....really.

MB and I stopped off at Ginza Yamano Music back at the main intersection since he wanted to find a DVD of some form of Shakespeare's "Hamlet" as a visual reference for something for his kids at school (I guess he may trying to educate them a la Robin Williams in "Dead Poets Society"). He couldn't find a good one but he did find a double-pack of "Daredevil/Elektra". He was mulling over whether to buy it since he'd already rented "Elektra" at the local Tsutaya for viewing last night. I just told him one word "Extras". That, plus the fact that he'd really wanted to see the director's cut to Ben Affleck's contribution to the Marvel oeuvre put him over the edge.

We got home and did the usual ordering to Domino's Pizza before we settled for the second movie of the night, "Stealth". Y'know, it wasn't that bad of a movie although Josh Lucas won't be scaring Viggo Mortensen anytime soon. The first few moments of that flick told us all we needed to know..."Stealth" is just one big computer game with a thyroid condition. It was fun and entirely forgettable. I guess where Jamie Foxx is concerned, "Stealth" continues the age-old tradition for recent Oscar winners to follow up their award-winning movies with some light-as-a-feather stuff. Just like Sir Anthony Hopkins with "The Silence of the Lambs" and "Freejack". Discuss. The only big surprise was having perennial British villain-playing Richard Roxburgh come in under the radar as cantankerous Dr. Orbit. We didn't even realize his contribution until we saw his name in the credits.

Next on the mediocrity parade was the director's cut of "Daredevil". Actually, I spake too harshly there. It wasn't too bad when MB and I had seen it at the theatre a couple of years back, but it didn't particularly merit too highly on the meter on the scale of superhero movies. Perhaps it was the "Gigli" effect that Ben Affleck had brought to the movie. However, the director's cut was a far better version than the original. Things actually did make sense this time around. I could actually see the fight scenes without all that murkiness and Affleck actually did acquit himself better. Plus, the new version got back a whole new subplot. The special on the Making of the movie laid out on the line when it came to the theatrical and DVD versions. The producer defiantly argued for the inferior, allegedly snappier, theatrical version while the director politely argued for the original DVD version. I think if this is the thinking for studios from now on, the original theatrical release will be for the marketers and beancounters' satisfaction while the DVD stuff will be for everyone else.

Finally, it was "Elektra". I don't think any DVD version could have saved this one. Nope, it's just not a good movie. Very leaden in pace with a slip of a story. And it obviously tried to ride the wave of all those Chinese wire-fu movies like "Hero". Nope, Jennifer Garner won't be making this her secondary name role next to her star-making turn in "Alias". Terence Stamp was pretty much wasted here. The extras were only notable for some guy involved in the movie who talked and looked a lot like Comic Book Guy from "The Simpsons". Couldn't understand half of what he was talking about which put us into the right frame of mind to call it a night and hit the hay.

Woke up earlier this morning to see MB who had risen a couple of hours earlier to continue his love affair with the Playstation Portable. We chatted a bit before heading on out to Skylark for the traditional Sunday lunch that we do after a night of DVD debauchery. It was a good chat with a good friend that I hadn't seen in a good long while. Probably the next flick we'll see is "V for Vendetta" later on in the month. It's hard to believe that we'll be entering Golden Week once more by the time that comes out.

The only news item of note is that the cops got their man in that horrible case of a little kid getting thrown off the 15th floor to his death in Kawasaki. To be more accurate, the psycho turned himself in stating just matter-of-factly that he had just wanted to kill the boy and a cleaning woman (he didn't go through with it with the latter). The tragedy is that the man is a husband and father of three. The wife and children will now proceed through Hell for the next number of years.

Well, I gotta get started on the lesson planning since Monday will now become the busy day for me.

Friday March 31, 11:22 p.m.

My Star Trek calendar suddenly decided to fall partway down so immediately I thought that someone big in the various casts of the Trekverse had gone to that starship in the sky. Well, as it turns out, nothing untoward has happened of yet.

That 3-hour special of "Music Station" included arguably the most popular singer in Japan today, living Barbie doll Ayumi Hamasaki doing a cover of an old TRF song. She definitely looks more and more like the singer that she's often compared to: Madonna. I was half-expecting The Material Girl herself to suddenly pop on by.

While that music show was going on, I was caught unawares that on Fuji-TV, the final chapter of "Lord of the Rings", "The Return of the King", was playing. Talk about your strategy for counterprogramming. However, it's just Part 1. Part 2 will be on tomorrow night. There probably won't be a dry eye in the house. Strangely enough, I'm gonna be seeing Viggo Mortensen fighting the relatively more mundane Earth thugs in "A History of Violence" instead of evil wizard-created things.

Off in the news, The Democratic Party of Japan is in shambles once again. About 6 months ago, the main opposition party to PM Koizumi's Liberal Democratic Party was in a crisis of leadership after having lost big in national elections due to the relative inaction of then-leader Okada. So, in late September, the DPJ chose a young guy by the name of Maehara to lead and rejuvenate the troops. Well, so much for that plan. Just 6 months later and yet another scandal later, he's calling it quits after letting that bumbler, Hisaya Nagata, get too carried away with an unsubstantiated e-mail supposedly accusing an LDP member's son of taking a bribe. Kinda feels like that Canadian political fiasco involving the Progressive Conservatives after Kim Campbell had that summer job of a prime ministerial term before screwing up big time several years ago. In any case, the entire DPJ executive has resigned en masse, much to the LDP's glee. I bet those guys are celebrating in the izakayas and hostess bars of Akasaka tonight. As for the DPJ, it's back to the drawing board.

Looks like there's been a further lead in that horrible story involving a homicidal maniac who threw a little kid over the 15th floor balcony of an apartment building in Kawasaki. The security cameras got a fairly good, if not perfectly sharp, image of the culprit running away after he did the deed.

Having my unexpectedly expensive lunch at Beckers today, I was mulling over the fact that back home in Toronto, Beckers is the name of a convenience store chain while over here it is the name of a fast food chain. And then I came across the realization that there are a lot of English or faux-English words which have different meanings in the West and in this nation.

For example, the word "gorgeous" is used in the West to mean someone who is just extremely beautiful. Over here, the word exists to describe something that looks extremely expensive; back in the US then, the word "opulent" would be more appropriate for what Japan's "gorgeous" is used for.

Another example. "Mook" is a goodfella term for " a guy". Over in Japan, it doesn't have the slightest connection with organized crime. "Mook" is a combination of the words "book" and "magazine" and describes a glossy publication based on one specific topic whether it be on traveling in Korea or a buxom model's bikini shots. So I guess the combination includes the magazine's glossy pictorial style and the book's focus on a theme.

Then there is "gravure" which is a very rarely known expression unless one's in the printing business. It is a certain printing process. But in Japan, it's not only used far more often but it has a more titillatingly exciting meaning to describe pinup models....gravure idols.

And of course, there is the aidoru...the Japanized form of idol. In the West, an idol is a young singing or acting phenom who attracts a lot of attention and worship from the general public. On the other hand, the aidoru is a young singing phenom of very limited talent who attracts a lot of attention and worship from a very otaku segment of the public.

Now that I'm off of my educational kick, I can give congratulations to The Stick for sticking it out and getting that new job. She starts Monday.

Friday March 31, 7:34 p.m.

Smellin' like coffee and cigarettes once more after The Madame and I had our 4-hour chat at the cafe in Shinjuku. Hope the air freshener can take care of this odour by tomorrow night. Once again, most of the conversation centered around the girl's deepening interest in all things spiritual. Well, I listened as much as I could while digesting all that cake and sandwich we'd ordered from the Afternoon Tea Set. I believe that she really does believe in what she says. That's about as far as I will go for now. In fact, I gave her a little challenge...she has to telepathically send her birthdate over to Skippy. Hmmm...this should be an interesting weekend. And next week, when we meet up for our next little trip to the Korakuen spa, L'Aqua, I'm bringing a spoon to see if she could pull off a Uri Geller on it like she claims to have done twice.

I got home to find out that Movie Buddy will indeed be coming to my humble abode for dinner and a movie. I'd asked him earlier to confirm this for which I got a slightly testy response saying that he'd already gotten the discs. Well, if he would've been a bit less vague about it... In any case, The Satyr has given his regrets and I haven't heard anything from Skippy so she's most likely a scratch.

The specials week is still going on strong which means tonight is "Music Station" for 3 hours. Got most of the heavy hitters out there like Mika Nakashima, AI, Dreams Come True and a couple of the Johnny's Jimusho acts amongst others. Flaky Cocco is even appearing tonight after a 5-year hiatus. Once again, she's smiling but not talking. Her song hasn't come up yet but I can only assume she's gonna barely spit out something. I swear, she must have a phobia or something. The show is also featuring blasts from the past. Of course, the ever-present square in the corner of the screen has popped up showing the reactions of the various artists' faces during the clips. Everyone is carefully keeping a neutral expression for some of those old 80s idols' acts or Morning Musume unless an artist they really like appears. But it is amazing how long "Music Station" has gone on starting from those idol-fueled days through the Komuro Family and now to the current love for all things R&B.

Just before I met up with The Madame, I had a quick bite at a fast food restaurant called Beckers located in the basement shopping area of Shinjuku Station. I'm not sure if it's because of the rent or the faux-wood decor inside but their fare is amongst the most expensive of the junk food set. Just a reconstituted chicken-sandwich set with average fries and a cola set me back 700 yen.

Well, still gotta make those plans for JJ before meeting up with Movie Buddy.

Friday March 31, 9:09 a.m.

Well, it's the last day of the month. People are prepping for the annual drunken orgies at Cherry Blossom Viewing. They're gonna have to drink a lot of sake, shochu and beer to keep the unusual chill out, though. Also, a number of the TV shows are getting ready for their annual makeovers. "Mezamashi Terebi", the Fuji-TV show announced the various lineup changes. Fuji's noontime flagship show, "Waratte Ii Tomo" has started jettisoning some longtime resident tarento to replace with some new folks next week. And of course, the specials have been going on all week long.

My neck, and by extension my head, has still been bothering me so I've taken another couple of Tylenol. I think my posture in front of the computer is to blame.

We've got another psycho on the loose. Apparently, some guy dressed in black may have allegedly thrown a little kid to his death from the 15th floor of his apartment building. The same guy may have also attacked a cleaning woman some time ago.

Well, I've just got The Madame today for tea. I think I may be able to catch a quick bite before I head on up to Shinjuku. She really likes that rather staid tea room across from the station that we'd gone to before. I've yet to hear from Movie Buddy about Saturday. I hope he makes contact fairly soon. I would like to bring in Skippy and The Satyr into it but it might be too short notice, especially for the former. I find that the Japanese need a whole week's advance warning at least.

Thursday March 30, 3:27 p.m.

My neck is still feeling pretty sore even though (or perhaps because of) the masseuse's ministrations this morning. She really went down to town on it. I'm sure all you Swedish massage fans must be shuddering in horror. Yep, in shiatsu, the neck is fair game (within reason, of course) for a lot of laser pinpoint acupressure on the scale of an Exocet missile (a salute to all you Falklands War observers) making contact with a piece of tofu. I mean, I can move it all about but the stiffness and pain are ever underlying. Maybe this free weekend is a fateful necessity. The masseuse advised me to actually join up with twice-weekly sessions partially assisted by my National Health Insurance. Hmmm....I don't think things have gotten quite that bad yet. Plus, I can't even afford the time.

I actually walked from my station over to Urayasu Station (took the easy way out by taking the subway back) for my weekly session at the gym. Then, I spent about an hour at the Starbucks across from the station. I ordered their version of the Sausage McMuffin. Pretty basic...just a flat piece of pork (or thereabouts) covered with a slice of cheddar (or thereabouts), both being sandwiched between a couple of English muffins (those were indeed real). Not too bad. Being there after the lunch hour, the population was pretty sparse in there. I neglected to carry along my crossword book so I had to buy one of those English-learning texts at the book store just under the gym to keep me company before I met the juku boss.

Speaking of whom, I met her at 2 p.m. She just said in passing that she actually did have the day off today. I was initially annoyed internally since I could've used that time to teach her but then again, it was her day off and perhaps she wanted nothing to do with English learning this week. Plus, I think I enjoy my time off too. Double plus, she was kind enough to make the 10-minute walk up to the station from her place to give me my month's pay. Put the whole thing straight into my account.

As such and since I still had Speedy's pay for me in my wallet, I decided to splurge and get some stuff for the apartment. I figured that if Movie Buddy will be staying over once again later on Saturday night, I'm gonna have to get those cleansers and air fresheners up and running once more. I also splurged on the groceries. I decided that I'm gonna make the Chinese chicken stir-fry that has kept me alive all these years. One splurge day every few months is not a bad thing.

I saw on The Stick's blog that she hasn't been able to find a new job quite yet. In her second-last entry, she mentioned that she had interviewed for some position but she was being a bit vague about it. I asked her cheekily if she had been trying out for the Japanese version of MI6 or CIA. Over here, noone has any idea who or what runs the intelligence gathering service in this country....the second-largest economy on the planet. A bit mysterious, if you ask me. However, before I get too tangentialized, her last entry read that she didn't get it. I gave her my best encouragement.

As for Movie Buddy, he threw me the offer of "A History of Violence" which, unlike the underperforming "Syriana", has gotten some pretty good numbers amongst the local viewers according to the TokyoWalker website. And yet, the movie is only playing at just two fairly far-flung theatres in Tokyo. One is all the way in the northwest near the Toshima-en Amusement Park (uh-uh for me) while the other is a small place between Ginza and Tsukiji.

Got the word from Speedy that I've got another new student for that "English in Cooking" project on Monday. The student is more ideal for the project in that she needs the English whereas my first guinea pig was overqualified (though fun to talk to). It ought to be a busy Monday.

I also sent one across the bow of The Denmother about that one lesson with her feckless kid in terms of fees to be paid. She did offer to send it by registered mail. And I would like to think that she's still worthy of my trust but I haven't heard from her in a number of days now.

Thursday March 30, 12:32 a.m.

Once again, my neck, shoulders and back feel like a snitch's head in a Mafia vice clamp. The fact that the weather has gone wintry again hasn't helped. I'll see if a hot shower relaxes those tight muscles a bit and then take a couple of Tylenol. I'm still headed for the massage clinic today.

Looks like I got my weekend a little early this week. I've got no lessons slated and then I got a message from the juku boss saying that she had to cancel our lesson on Friday morning which leaves me with just that tea with The Madame. At first, I wondered if some of the boss' famous scatterbrainedness was at work again and she misunderstood about the Fridays that I wouldn't be available. However, it looks like she really did mean this Friday. Still, she gave me further incentive to hit the gym since she offered to meet me at Urayasu Station at 2 p.m....most likely to give me my packet for the month.

I decided to play culinary Santa Claus this afternoon and picked up half a dozen doughnuts courtesy of The Doughnut Plant branch in Otemachi: three of Valrhona Chocolate and three of Caramel. Then I brought it over to Speedy's where SB and the boss himself tucked themselves into some saccharine goodness. We also gave one to 006 since she usually doesn't get time for dinner before her rather late lesson. She said that after that sugar bomb she would not need any more food for the rest of the evening. Always like to be of service.

So, I start my impromptu weekend. Looks like Movie Buddy will be headed over here on Saturday so I figure it's time to clean up the mess chez moi.

Ahhh...but first that shower.

Wednesday March 29, 9:34 a.m.

My body felt like one very tight knot last night, especially after the ferocious squall that hit the area during my time at the juku. Almost felt like I was coming down with a cold or something. The pain has eased somewhat this morning but I think I will really have to get that rubdown; I'll probably be admonished by my masseur for not coming more often but, hey at 1500 yen a pop, it's not something I can really afford to do that regularly.

I found out at The Beehive yesterday that Ms. Tulip's hubby got his marching orders. The whole family is headed for Toronto, my hometown, of all places for the next half-decade. So, part of the class was on some Q & A about home. I'll probably bring some pics for next week. I've already got her going on the "eh?" Most of the ladies once again took me out to lunch near Tsudanuma Station at a restaurant called "Konnichiwa" which serves Japanese-style pasta dishes. Cod roe spaghetti with nori, anyone?

Then, it was off to see The Teacher for her first Tuesday outing. She wanted me to help her fill out a student assessment report for one of her own charges in that Japanese language school she started working at. How years of filling out such reports can help one. I was treated to a sundae there.

But before I could declare my first day without having spent any money on food, I did succumb to dinner and ate out at the family restaurant a few floors under the gym at Urayasu. And then I ended up getting this blancmange-like thing at the convenience store for breakfast...something I now regret. I'm always a sucker for lots of whipped cream (internally applied, of course) but man, that combination literally made me sit up and stay still for a bit.

The juku cat has gotten friskier again. It was taking small chunks out of me and The Siberian during our 90-minute session. At least, the cat was able to keep The Siberian distracted since the latter likes the former so much. I'll appreciate anything that makes a potentially painful class go that much faster.

It was just Mrs. Mild and McGirl in the previous class. McGirl was never really all that much on the ball but last night, she was especially lost. The boss told me that she's become an okkake, or groupie, for this punk rock singer. She actually went all the way up to Aomori Prefecture several hundred kilometres north to catch his concert up there. And she'll probably head over to this live house in Yokohama in the next couple of weeks to catch her throat-screeching hero. I even met her brother who studies under the boss an hour earlier. He comes off as a pretty good well-adjusted kid (same name as me, too); he even stood up and assumed an "At ease" stance while talking with me. Well, they all start that way, but...

Got home feeling distinctly ague-ish last night so I didn't even bother to check things on the computer until this morning. Had about 6 messages waiting for me which is rather a lot for me. The Madame gave her regrets but it'll be strictly just tea due to other plans this Friday. JJ has asked for another 11 a.m. lesson this Saturday which means that I can conceivably see Movie Buddy far earlier than expected. Maybe we'll catch "Syriana". If MB goes for it, I can check if Skippy and The Satryr are up for it as well.

I found out this morning that disgraced architect Hidetsugu Aneha (the toupeed guy who knowingly falsified building specs so that hundreds of people ended up buying units in potential deathtraps) has paid the biggest price yet for his malfeasances. His wife, who apparently had been ailing (which could have forced Aneha to do his dirty deeds for the medical costs), decided to end it all and threw herself off the 7th floor of an apartment building in my city of Ichikawa (also the city of the Anehas)...not theirs, though, since they live in a rather dilapidated house. Needless to say, she didn't make it. I'm not quite sure if the widower is gonna make it either.

I only have the classes at Speedy's tonight. 001 starts the new text and I'm continuing on with 006. I had been thinking about heading to the gym today. I do have the time but I don't know if I frankly have the energy. If I'm procrastinating, so be it.

Tuesday March 28, 7:28 a.m.

I'm feeling a whole lot better after going to bed with a stiff neck and a throbbing headache. Glad that I still have the Tylenol. That one bottle has lasted me for years.

Listened to that Ruiko Kurahashi CD single last night. Well, her voice can't really hit the high notes as smoothly as before and it's just a little more ragged now but...well, I can say that it's OK. The song, "Hirenka" was originally written in Korea. Hmmm...the rather overwrought orchestration seems to be have that "Winter Sonata" vibe. It's certainly different from any of the current J-Pop out there.

Could be an interesting day out there. I have The Beehive again. There was talk a couple of weeks ago about my predecessor being back in town sometime this week but I've yet to hear of anything. If he does make a surprise appearance, it'll probably mean lunch somewhere. And then I have to shift into The Teacher's lesson right afterwards, followed by my regular stint at the juku.

For the past few days, there have been massive protests in Calfornia involving thousands of people supporting illegal alien rights. Finally, a counterforce worthy of Lou Dobbs. And Ive just heard that the big guy himself will be in Mexico in a couple of days. Hmmm....stay tuned.

Monday March 27, 10:58 p.m.

It was pretty warm today and the cherry blossoms have started blooming a week ahead of schedule which apparently means that it'll be a good business year. Of course, we all believe that a groundhog can really predict when Spring will come, too, eh?

It was once again just The Lady at the house today since The Matron and her daughter are off searching for Mozart in Europe this week. And SIL was just as animated as ever. We got into this rather hilarious topic about how T-shirts with some of the most unlikeliest choices for kanji printed on them were all the rage back in the 80s and conversely how a lot of T-shirts (and many other products) still pack some of the weirdest English statements.

In between the lessons at the house, I went off to HMV and ended up picking up the latest EMPIRE film magazine for subway reading and I finally got that Ruiko Kurahashi single, her first release in many years. Standing orders are that, even with my current money supply, I pick up anything I deem buy-now-or-regret-it-later.

The Part-Timer was back after a week's absence. She's been doing fine in her grammar. I'm kinda wondering if I should ramp things up a bit. Speedy let me know that I may have another student to teach in "English for Cooking"; unlike the way-gabby student I'd just finished with last Saturday, this one is lower on the totem pole of English ability so I'll probably have to go by-the-book. Also, he informed me that SB's days with us are numbered since she's now looking for a full-time job. It'll be too bad to lose her...she's an excellent speaker of English.

I've had some very intriguing mail today. First off, The Quarterback sent me a message checking his contribution to YouTube in the form of his video. He has a side project with a little film studio. Apparently, the lad has filmed himself dubbing the President of the US in "Independence Day" during that inspirational speech in English. The Q speaks flawless English usually but he gave his dubbing a distinctly Japanese accent. And only the people who know him realize it is him who is pulling this little early April Fool's joke. I didn't find it particularly hilarious but it was intriguing.

The other message was from Skippy. In her usual happy-go-lucky way (I swear, her words dance around like she does), she asked me if I would like to join her in a trip to one of those Maid Cafes in Akihabara. Initially, I was rather taken aback considering that the newest trend for otaku was, I thought, solely a male enclave. I wasn't quite sure what to think or how to respond but then again, I decided that this is one of the reasons I've come here (no, not to wait for a Maid Cafe to evolve for visitation privileges)...to have any sort of cultural experience in this country. So I can go in my capacity as amused and bemused Canadian. I'm gonna perhaps send some feelers out there although I don't think there will be too many takers as "brave" as me, especially if those folks have girlfriends. I am interested in finding out why some of these young ladies have been willing to put on the cat ears and tails to titillate doughy anime freaks. Physically at least, I do fit the profile. However, I'm kinda wondering how the waitresses will take to serving women...even a self-professed otaku like Skippy. But apparently, the project has begun.

On the news tonight, the top story on NHK was that Aum Shinrikyo guru and the mastermind behind the sarin gas attacks, Chizuo Matsumoto aka Shoko Asahara, had his appeal rejected by the Tokyo High Court for dismissing the death penalty sentence due to insanity. Of course, the defendant's laywers have promised to appeal to Japan's Supreme Court. As much as I would like to see the nutjob get the gallows, I do respect Asahara's lawyers (although the families of the victims will disagree with me) for fulfilling their job to the letter and defending their client most vigourously. I'm sure they have been vilified and perhaps even gotten their fair share of death threats.

On a happier if wistful note, the skier with the adorably hangdog expression, Mr. Harada, officially retired from competitive ski jumping after 28 years at it. His peak was at the 1998 Nagano Olympics when he and the rest of the ski jump team got the Gold. His most famous expression was when he managed to barely spit out in a high-pitched squeal "Ya-a-a-a-tta!" (We did it!) on seeing one of his fellows clinch the top medal, and then break down in tears in front of an ecstatic reporter. But that peak was truly a peak and not a plateau since in subsequent Games, the ski team frankly did bupkiss. After that little screwup in Turin involving his disqualification from one of the events, I guess Harada finally decided his days were up. He got a little misty-eyed in the studio when he was watching footage from those heady 1998 days.

Back to my little world, The OL informed me that she'll have to cancel this week's lesson as well due to the demands of her job. So, hopefully, The Madame still has that Friday night open and is willing to go out for dinner with me.

On a very personal note, I've been slowly coming to the realization that I'm starting to develop OPO...Old Person Odor. Ugh! There is BO (just plain body odor). Everyone (yes, women, too) gets that at all ages after the usual demands and stresses of the day. But there is somethng to OPO. It's this smell of moldy mustiness from a room of deteriorating books and paper mixed in with the usual sweat and reeky mixture of cigarettes, coffee, and especially on a Friday night, booze. But in my case, I don't smoke and I rarely drink. But I do hit the caffeine and of course I sweat. So I think my debut of OPO can just be chalked up to the slow aging of my body along with the other discharges. No wonder the young folks despise the parentals nowadays. I, for one, would like to smell like Old Spice and not Old Person. However, some of my older students have given off the familiar stink, men and women so I'm not alone here. I've tried to splash on a rather generous amount of cologne but that usually dissipates by noon. Well, maybe I'll just have to be a bit more aggressive in my efforts.

I did send that response back to Movie Buddy about Saturday. Yep, I'm open for business if MB wants to do the ol' DVD night.

And I paid my rent for the month. Thus, the huge hemorrhaging of my bank account has finally stopped during this rather steep month of March. I took a look at what I've got left. It's not bad but I vowed at the ATM that the leakage will stop and I will begin to replenish.

Monday March 27, 7:57 a.m.

Looks like my latent bit of ESP has been on the loose again. I simply mentioned in my last blog entry that Morning Musume may be becoming an endangered species due to the up-and-coming AKB 48, and sure enough when I checked out the J-Pop forum, there were no less than 3 topics about the possible demise of the group....possibly all stemming from a 2-hour special of Utaban back on Thursday in which Musume Classic and MM: The Next Generation both showed up.

Having had to teach The Carolinan on that night, I turned on the telly to see the very last 30 seconds of the show in which I only saw members of the old MM walking off the stage with hosts Takaaki Ishibashi and Masahiro Nakai, presumably to some post-show dinner. I guess I must've missed something special, according to the comments from several of the posters who had seen the whole thing. Apparently, the hosts have been accused of bullying the Next Gen girls, with the Classic girls even referring to their kohai as mild as eating a ton of white rice. That prompted a torrent of flaming towards the hosts and the program in general for their tactics; one accusation talks about the fact that the producer of the show is also the manager behind the rival AKB 48. Interesting...considering that up until the end of the week last week, the show and Ishibashi in particular were shown in a vastly different, more positive light. A bit defensive, are we?

Well, for one thing...I think Morning Musume is on the decline but not because of Utaban. Again, the two hosts can be abrasive but they've always been that way and not just towards the MM. They haven't changed. For another thing, the group has been on the decline for the past number of years with songs that seem to be more in tune with kindergarten students. That remake of the kids' show song pretty much summed up the group's career course with me and it was released a couple of years ago. And finally, using that corollary about variety shows being scripted down to the last smirk or joke, the so-called dissing of the recent bunch may have just been that. Plus, also noting the martial culture of Japan generally, the two hosts and MM Classic could have been engaged in the age-old tactic of being cruel to be kind. A wake-up call of sorts.

To be honest, I have a feeling that the group itself will probably sing its swan song later this year or early next year with a few of the girls going on to become full-time tarento or singers. That was the case with the 80s Onyanko Club in which some of the grads have become household names to the extent that most people have forgotten about their original roots.

On even more mundane news, Movie Buddy contacted me after several weeks of being in thrall to skiing and PSP. He just left the cryptic line of whether I was available this Saturday night. This probably means he wants to go for another DVD night at chez Haruhiko. Hmmm....I'm thinking about it. I'm not sore at him for leaving us for a sport and technology. However, I am just wondering if I'm really up for a whole night of movie-viewing. Yep, I'm that tired. Still, I've enjoyed our talk on all these cinematic in the past. I'll get back to him by tonight.

Speaking about confrontations in a pop-cultural icon/family, I'd been reading through my latest hobby of Wikipedia about the various cast in Star Trek Classic. It hasn't been any sort of secret that the late James Doohan and the living George Takei openly despised William Shatner for his showboating arrogance and underhanded dealings with fellow actors. It was a bit of a surprise, then, to read that Doohan finally forgave Shatner in 2004. To be honest, I'm rather skeptical about that claim, and sorry to say, but Doohan was fully suffering by that point. And I think Takei has been rather two-faced about his recent relationship with the good Captain Kirk. He once praised him only to knock him down again on a very recent edition of The Howard Stern Show. Certainly Shatner hasn't changed his ways; in fact, he's been able to use his pettiness to his advantage in becoming a 2-time Emmy winner and...a singer again. I'm sure Scotty is rolling in his...orbit somewhere.

Sunday March 26, 8:07 p.m.

Lazy Sunday night. To punctuate that point, I'd taken a nap...the first in some months...earlier this afternoon. I figured I had to pay back some of my sleep debt, now a medical term that CNN ought to be patenting as its own. I read on Anderson Cooper's blog that along with sleepwalking and sleeptalking, there is also sleepsex. A lot of the responses from people to that article were pretty cheeky on the university frosh level of things. I can only dream of that myself... In any case, I'm sure Anderson was bravely trying to keep his smirk in check.

Was going over my schedule for this week. The way it's looking I may have a pretty light one in the middle. I've only got Speedy's classes on Wednesday and then a completely blank slate on Thursday.

I saw Liza Minnelli on Larry King Live. Man, does she have Jerry Lewis' condition or what? To be honest, I could only watch just a bit of her before hurriedly switching the channel so that I didn't have to suffer the effect of diabetes. I'm left wondering if Andrea (SCTV) Martin's take on her all those years ago was somewhat more accurate than I'd thought.

Sunday March 26, 2:11 p.m.

I'm in a day which can't seem to decide what kind of weather to have. We've had some rain, some cloud, some sun and some wind.

On my way to see JJ, I noticed that there were quite a few women dressed up in kimono. I gather that it's the annual graduation weekend for university. I could consider it a mourning day of sorts. After 2-4 years of relative bliss in societal moratorium after years of suffering at the hands of overbearing teachers and bullies in the regular school system, the grads can now look forward to decades of overbearing superiors and bullies in the regular work system.

Then, on arriving at Kiba and walking toward the Gatharia Mall, I saw this long line heading into the main department store. I wondered if there were some sort of celeb or one of Team Japan's members were signing autographs. I found out that it was actually the line to buy the last of the Nintendo DS platforms. Not surprisingly, Starbucks was more crowded than usual. I actually had to wait 5 minutes for my Caffe Latte (sounds awfully spoiled, I know..) And then just after JJ's arrival, my nose had a massive hay fever attack. I had just taken some of that medicine when my nose started filling up like a water balloon. If things had been really quiet, I would have heard the histamines chewing up my nasal passages. It was like once every 30 seconds that I had to stifle myself from sneezing or I had to drain my schnozz into my tissue. Happily, the meds kicked in halfway through so I was more or less professional again by the end of the lesson.

Got home to grab some lunch at Subway and then get some bento from the supermarket. Unlike the last couple of nights' devotion to Taco Rice, I'm gonna just do it automatic tonight.

Shard told me of this place located in Kyobashi called the "100% Chocolate Cafe". It's ironic that it took a friend all the way in Toronto to tell me of this Japanese version of Willy Wonka's Chocolate Factory that's less than half an hour away from home by subway. I had no inkling that the Meiji Company had decided to build this ode to the cacao bean in this rather staid business area next to the glitz of Ginza. From the pics, the cafe looks interesting. It's less whimsical than Willy Wonka's emporium but has a cooler vibe. It's not just a cafe, though. Apparently, there is also a museum attached to it with perhaps even free samples of chcoolate from all over the world. I am so there! Maybe if I have some time this week and I'm in the local vicinity I may just drop in. If things are good there, I may even drag Skippy and the others. You guys can take a look at the website via http://open.meiji.co.jp/sweets/choco-cafe/top.html

Almost forgot to mention that this weekend is the social event of the year for the anime otaku. The Tokyo Anime Festival is being held as I write in the Tokyo Big Sight by the bayside. There are probably thousands of the nation's grungiest looking at the latest manga, anime and cos-play fetishists just carousing through the huge convention centre. Bring your own deodorizer! I wonder if Akihabara is closed this weekend.

Move aside, Morning Musume. Your 15 minutes are up! The female counterparts to the Johnny Jimusho's himbo machine could possibly be pushed over the edge into pop culture history and nostalgia music shows thanks to AKB 48. No, it's not a new semi-automatic gun (although there are probably those who would like to use such a device on the girls for their brand of idol music and dance). It's actually 48 girls and women ranging from 12 to 21 years of age. Not sure what they're being marketed for but they've certainly made a splash in their home vicinity of Akihabara (hence the letters). However, this group, which could be four times as big as MM, has been doing its own singing & dancing act although the choreography can't be that elaborate since there is only a limited amount of room on stage. The Satyr was in the electronics district recently when he saw the girls on a double-decker bus surrounded by cellphone camera-flashing geeks of all ages. 48 band members!. Sheesh....they'd probably need an intermission after all the introductions are made.

And finally, I just read on The Japan Times website that the powers-that-be here have declared that by 2010, a new version of Tokyo Tower will be built in the shitamachi district of Sumida Ward. It'll be 600 m high and have all the latest transmitter equipment to facilitate all those television sets going digital. They mentioned by name that Toronto's CN Tower, which has had the title of World's Tallest Free-Standing Structure for 30 years, will be outstripped by this new construction. Hmmm...as happy as I am that the top two structures will represent both my nations of birth and heritage, I'm a little wary about having a behemoth like that erected in an area which is a high-earthquake zone. The New Tokyo Tower could easily become the World's Longest Free-Lying Structure unless some of the cutting-edge earthquake-resistant technology is put into play.

Saturday March 25, 8:33 p.m.

Made my way over to The Tea Room about 10 minutes before the official opening time. But the cute diminuitive waitress saw me approach and let me in anyways. The New Yorker arrived right at opening time. I seem to always catch that particular waitress off-guard with my order; I only ordered an iced tea. Mind you, I don't think I've ever ordered one of those which could explain her slight double take. As for The New Yorker, she's good in practice but her actual production just isn't nearly as good. However, she became the third student that has professed a great interest in this aura-fixated fortune teller named Mr. Ehara. Her sister and SIL are also fans. But more on that later.

The New Yorker told me what her sister, The Carolinan, had told me a couple of days ago. They would be meeting to see if they could get into Omotesando Hills. Good luck, I said somewhat sardonically. Considering that the place had opened just a month ago, the crowds would still be trying to stuff themselves into Tokyo's newest mall. I figured that gaijin enclave, Fujimamas, would also be crowded, so I suggested they could try the hot dog emporium, Hansens, just around the corner, if they couldn't fit anywhere else.

Meanwhile, I headed out to Kinokuniya to get the latest edition of the Oxford Picture Dictionary for SIL. I also picked up a Dell's Crossword Puzzle Book since I'm rapidly flying through my current book. The Anime King said that he would send me a couple of similar books but I've yet to hear anything from him or get any of those SEGA packages that he said would be showing up on my doorstep on the way to his home in Canada.

Then, it was off to Speedy's for the third and final lesson for that giddy girl in "English for Cooking". She wasn't the only student that would be there today. Speedy was getting another one for counseling for a homestay stint in Canada. As it was, the giddy girl was almost half an hour late due to some guy probably offing himself on the subway tracks. She was still good to go for the lesson and at the end, she may have hinted that she may be interested in some regular lessons which pleased Speedy no end when I told him afterwards.

While I was there, I was checking my e-mail when I saw that Skippy (another giddy one) told me that she had actually met the famous Mr. Ehara at an invitation-only event. The kimonoed psychic even analyzed Skippy's aura, much to her delight. She also professed that she'd sent a telepathic message which he received with ease, apparently. Hmmm...I remain unconvinced. But I did forward her message to the other believers, the aforementioned Sisters of State, SIL and even The Madame. Perhaps, they will start that English-language appreciation society for all things Ehara.

I was pretty exhausted by the time I got home...I guess the giddy girl and The New Yorker did tucker me out. I had my second helping of Taco Rice in as many nights since I had those fixins to get rid of. Feeling pretty full right now. Saturday night on TV involved me switching once more between the 2-hour special of "IQ Suppuri", that mental game show, and another one of those magic shows (I told you that magicians are having their fifteen minutes). On the magic show, it was the king of all Japanese magicians, Mr. Maric, who was wowing the guests tonight. Mr. Maric has been around for years, and his first claim to fame was back in the late 80s. He basically disappeared from the tube for virtually a decade when the magic boom came back into vogue in the last year. Tonight, he was impressing The Kameda Bros, those cocky boxers from Osaka.

I've got another lesson tomorrow with JJ and then I can relax a bit. Still gotta figure out what to do with her for the lesson.

Friday March 24, 9:30 p.m.

Taco Rice was as savoury as ever. I even have fixins left over for another round tomorrow. I had received a number of manju from the juku boss this morning which she had gotten from another friend of hers after a trip to someplace rural and scenic. Manju are those sweet-bean-filled buns that I've been eating since I was a kid even in Toronto. I made the mistake of heating one of them up in the microwave; the bun felt like cardboard. From now on, I will put the remaining ones in their proper place, a convection toaster-oven.

Tonight was again a TV night. I was switching between a couple of food-based (there's at least one show a night somewhere on the Japanese TV spectrum that deals with cuisine) shows. One was on TV Tokyo. It was the "Debuya" special. Debuya roughly means "fatso" and so the two hosts are appropriately outsized. One is named Ishizuka, a famously fat tarento who's also one-half (or should I cheekily say three-quarters) of a comedy duo called Honjamanaka (I think). The other is Papaya Suzuki, another tubby TV personality whose claim to fame is sporting an afro and showing his 70s disco moves. The two often go everywhere in Japan and often outside of the country with a bunch of fellow tarento guests in search of outsized portions in restaurants. Since it was a special, the target was outside of Japan...specifically, the growing city of Shanghai. Towing along gay tarento Kaba-chan, former Japanese national women's volleyball team captain Nakabayashi, and another cutie from the 90s, Sakura Uehara, the dirigibilic duo checked out some of the culinary action in the Chinese city. One place they tried was famous for serving some mucho spicy fare with lots of chili peppers. Mr. Ishizuka was sweating most profusely while the others begged for a gallon of water. As an aside, it's interesting to note that Debuya had actually also visited Toronto some months ago in another special. They even visited the St. Lawrence Market. I wonder if they hit Greektown on the Danforth.

The other program was on NTV. It was also a 2-hour special version of a cuisine-based show hosted by comedy duo 99, Hiroshi Yabe and Takashi Okamura, who are probably the most widely-known duo in the geinokai who still do stuff publicly together, except for fellow Osakan pair Downtown. 99 has their flagship show on Saturday nights on Fuji-TV, "Mecha Mecha Iketeru", but on their Friday-night primetime outing on NTV, the boys host this program in which they invite guests to a swanky restaurant of the week, try the various dishes and then guess their prices. It has a "The Price Is Right"-type of vibe in that the boys and the guests have to guess the prices as close as possible. The monetary gap between their guesses and the actual costs will build up against them. The one person who ends up with the largest gap has to pay the check for everybody. And since the restaurant is as far from a McDonalds as could possibly be envisioned, the bill can go up into the hundreds of thousands of yen (mere thousands of dollars in America).

Speaking about Okamura, arguably the more popular half of 99, he's had his share of slings and arrows thrown against him...mostly by the Morning Musume fans since he has often verbally abused the girls when they've appeared as guests on "Mecha Mecha Iketeru". For the record, everything on comic-variety TV is scripted ruthlessly to the last smirk so I wouldn't take any of the antics with anything more than a grain of shio. He's apparently a fairly decent sort outside of the tube, especialy since he knows the pressure cooker of Japanese show biz. Not that he needs someone like me to come to his defense but I recollect a special episode of "Mecha Mecha" when the monkey-faced guy actually joined up with the boy-idol-manufacturing emporium known as Johnny's Jimusho (home of SMAP, Tokio, Kinki Kids, etc.) for a few days to show everyone what it's like to work as one of the young, cute and hairless-chested. Okamura's time with the boys was filmed as much as raw documentary as anything else so it was a bit of a shock to see the guy who often abuses folks get abused for real by the big boys at Johnny's. While he was working with some of the younger boys in the dance studio, they were berated by the drill-sergeant like choreographer and then by the most popular member of SMAP, Mr. Trendy Drama himself, Takuya Kimura. Okamura even got some tutorial from Masahiro Nakai, the gabby leader of SMAP who's also on tons of variety shows; Nakai-kun also tore a few strips into the seemingly left-footed Okamura at one point out of frustration. Not happy-go-lucky at all. But it seems as if Okamura got some lasting education out of his brief experience from the Johnny's boot camp. He's currently wowing a lot of folks here with his commercial for a soft drink called Nuda where he's breakdancing like a pro to a song by Queen. So let's be a little easy on Mr. Okamura, shall we? I think the point is that no matter where you are in the tarento hierarchy, most likely you're yelling at someone AND you're being yelled at. Just like in a regular company.

Friday March 24, 5:13 p.m.

The day started out at Urayasu McDonalds where I had my Hotcake Set with a hearty Sausage McMuffin on the side. I was watching from my vantage point on the 2nd floor of the restaurant and saw quite a few people running to the MUFG branch across the taxi and bus cul de sac. I gather since the 25th is on a Saturday, people were racing to check their paydays today.

My first Friday class with the juku boss was quite smooth. I had been slightly worried that I wouldn't have enough material or chatting points for her in the 2 hours, but I needn't have fretted at all. The first hour was devoted to TOEIC Listening but ended up going 20 minutes longer followed by a 10-minute break (at her request, not mine) and then the last several minutes based on chat. Like a lot of my favourite students, she likes to tangentialize. She also liked the fact that I now have Thursday mornings free since I dumped The Denmother's son. It's always nice to have an alternate slot.

Speaking of that minor fiasco, The Denmother sent e-mail over apologizing for her son's waywardness but not explaining what was up with him. Not that I really needed or desired any explanation. I already had an inkling about his nature from Mummy's rants about him and his problems with authority figures. She did offer to send over any remuneration. However, since I'm rather loathe to give out any bank account info, I just told her that she could hand it over to me the next time we went out for a drink....believe me, the money isn't worth the leakage of confidential information. However, she just got back to me saying that she didn't want the issue weighing any further on her mind so she will send it over by genkin kakitome (postal delivery of cash)...yes, the post office has special envelopes in which actual cash can be sent. Apparently, postal workers can be trusted here. Just as apparently, the word "postal" has of yet to be given the insidious meaning that it now has in the States. In any case, The Denmother did ask whether it would still be possible to teach him past April but she basically answered her own question with a "Probably not, eh?" You got that right, sister! I feel sorry for her. But then again, there are probably a lot of family friends who feel sorry for my Dad for having me as a son.

Afterwards, I had my outing at the gym for the first time in 2 weeks. I actually did put in a good workout. I still feel pretty bloated, though. Just the usual middle-aged folk riding dem bikes and doing dem aerobics.

I guess the workout did rev me up a bit. I not only got the laundry done but also did some vacuuming and even prepped for The New Yorker and the final "English in Cooking" lesson for that enthusiastic woman tomorrow. Now, the only things I need to do for the rest of my night is just make that long-awaited Taco Rice and then continue my education in all things Hangul.

It's clouded over considerably since this morning but this time I'm home so hopefully if the rains come pouring down again, I'll be able to minimize any damage in terms of wetness. However, although it is officially Spring now, it's still pretty chilly. I do wonder if those cherry blossoms are gonna be coming on schedule, let alone early. Well, one sign of the Vernal Equinox, though. Television has already gotten into Specials mode once more as the Winter dramas have ended their run and the Spring dramas are chomping at the bit to premiere next month. The sports guys on the tube must be feeling like they're having a great time this year so far. The Winter Olympics have come and gone (despite the massive failure of the athletes), the World Baseball Classic managed to grab 30%-40% ratings thanks to the miracle of Team Japan, and now we've segued into the annual high school baseball championships at Koshien Stadium which of course will go into the regular baseball season. And what is this? We even have this little thing called the World Cup coming our way in June. This is gonna be really something every 4 years...the Winter Olympics, WBC and The World Cup all in the same year.

From the sublime to the ridiculous, pachinko parlours have often brought in themes into their machines to attract people from other walks of life. For the old school anime otakus, there have been machines with Space Battle Cruiser Yamato (yep, let's sing that catchy theme tune) displayed on the digital screens. Now, for those Korean drama fanatics, new machines have been developed with that really treacly series that launched the entire Korean boom that's been grabbing Japanese middle-aged women for the past couple of years "Fuyu no Sonata" (Winter Sonata) with ever-smiling Yon-sama. And y'know....there are probably plenty of chain-smoking obatarians who would be more than happy to send those tiny metal balls flying into the maze of pins while listening to that insipid theme song.

Thursday March 23, 9:29 p.m.

Forgot to mention that The Rolling Stones are in the country doing their latest tour. They did their Tokyo concert last night at Tokyo Dome. And the PR boys have said that the 1 millionth person to see a Stones concert at the home of the Giants strutted in last night. As I spin my finger in the air in a "Whoop-dee-doo" gesture, the world's most rock-bound geriatrics stayed at The Four Seasons in the Big Sushi. As a bit of info, apparently the guys who paid top yen (in the form of 50,000 of them actually) not only got a great seat in front of the strutting Mick Jagger but also got a little tote bag carrying stuff. The bag has a picture of a geisha on whose kimono is printed lots of little Stones logos (the big lips, baby).

Actually, I've got a story about those guys (you are welcome to do your own whoop-dee-doo gesture if you wish). Several years ago, when I had first joined the ol' school, I had to go to the aforementioned Four Seasons Hotel to do a series of level checks with some of the new young staffers since they would most likely be called upon for English help from the special guests. I had a brief talk with the hotel manager (a nice if slightly starchy fellow....but he is a hotel manager) before I got started with the kids. He mentioned that The Stones and Mariah Carey had stayed there before. I asked him about how The Stones behaved. He just rolled his eyes. Well, I can assume his eyes probably fell out of his sockets last night although it's hard to even imagine Miwk and Keef being able to keep up with the groupies at their advanced age. Frankly, I would think that the Golden Diva would be the more demanding of the two.

Thursday March 23, 9:18 p.m.

Well, it was just 45 minutes before meeting up with him when oops he did it again. The feckless Denmother's kid called me up to apologize and cancel due to some "trouble". That's three damn strikes, you're out, kid. With just one more Thursday, I think it's pretty useless to help this one so I've sent off a missive to his Mom that I've washed my hands of him...politely, of course. He is her son. I can do without the aggravation since I have tried to keep up my end of the bargain this month but nothing.

The kids were good today. They're headed off to Switzerland tomorrow for 2 glorious weeks of skiing in the Alps. Must be nice to have a doctor Dad. They were pretty nonchalant about the whole thing despite this will be their first international outing without Mom and Dad to tag along. Then again, the girls have about 14 others accompanying them so there shouldn't be any problem. That, of course, will not allay Mom's fears.

The Carolinan arrived at the Tea Room about an hour earlier than I'd expected which was just as well since I could use the early arrival home. We spoke about Cherry Blossom Viewing season which is just around the corner. She said that she makes it an annual habit. I, on the other hand, becoming increasingly more unsociable as the years pass, said that if I'm invited...I'll think about it.

Well, now that I'm back home I still have got to get some planning done for the juku boss for her Friday lesson. Then, it's back to the ironing.