Tuesday the 25th (more commonly known as Christmas) I woke up early-ish and unwrapped a few presents I brought back from America when I went home for Thanksgiving. I had a super ralaxing day that involved no leaving the house ans only putting pants on to answer the door then the pizza guy came to deliver lunch. the the late evening I called home to wish everyone a Merry Christmas (gotta love time-zones and holidays.)
Wednesday morning I Skyped with a few more family members. In the middle of one such call work phoned me asking of I could come in and cover for another teacher who was supposed to do overtime but called in sick. I begrudgingly accepted and went into work for four houes on the second day of my vacation. On the way home I did some retail therapy in Nipponbashi (my favorite shopping district.) By the time I made it home I had gotten another call from work asking me to cover for the same teacher the next day too. I said if they called EVERY other teacher first and they all said "no" I'd come in. Just my luck I got the call a few hours later and my vacation was shortened another day.
The worst part of the extra work on Thursday is that I had to set an alarm in the morning which was the ONE thing I didn't want to do over vacation. The shift wasn't that hard but I was pretty ticked off all morning and more than once mumbled the line from Kevin Smith's Clerks, "I'm not even supposed to BE here today." More retail therapy was needed on the way home. As a sign of things looking up a belated Christmas present was waiting in the mail for me when I got home. After unwrapping second Christmas I started to get my apartment organized and ready for it's New Years cleaning (a tradition here in Japan.)
I finally got to enjoy my second non-working vacation day on Friday. After sleeping in I went back to Nipponbashi one more time to look for a new pair of headphones to go with the new computer case I'd put together the previous week. In the afternoon I did a big load of laundry (at the laundromat as it was too cold to use the washer on my balcony) and did te week's grocery shopping. In the evening I made spaghetti and watched TV late into the night.
Saturday morning was slow but I met two of my good friends for lunch at the local curry shop. They just got back from their honey-moon in the Philippines and regaled my with tails of their trip. We went back to their place after lunch and played video games all afternoon. In the evening my friends wife made a very delicious dinner for all of us.
I was wide awake a bit earlier than I would have liked on Sunday but was well rested so I rolled with it. It was rainy outside and would be all day. I caught up on an old movie I'd been wanting to watch in the morning and went out for lunch and a haircut in the afternoon. I played video games with the same friend from the day before but online this time. We ended up playing for almost twelve hours with nothing but a short dinner break.
Today (December 31st, 2012) I slept in a good amount. For the first time in over a month I had a chance to make my Monday morning to Sunday night phone calls home. I headed out mid-day to take some pictures around town. It was quite chilly out but very clear and sunny. I stopped for lunch at the Hard Rock Cafe uptown. Coming out after lunch it had clouded over just a bit and started snowing gently. It was really beautiful as I rode around a bit more. I came home n the afternoon and took a nap. A while ago a friend called to make plans for this evening (we're going with the traditional watch TV, play card games, and go wo a shrine after mid-night.)
I think this will be the first on-time post in almost a month. Sorry for the continued delays but more about that in the next post. Happy New Year!
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