4 weeks left

Sorry about not updating everyone about yesterday. It was the peak of craziness for the week!

Well, to begin... I finally fell asleep Wednesday night after 5am sometime... O.O Yeah, I know. I have no idea why I couldn't sleep but I wasn't the only one of my friends who had a rough sleep night that time. I was just up the latest! So besides that throwing off my sleep schedule entirely, I got to my skit practice a little late because I almost crashed my bike 3 times on the way to school. I had to ride my bike because as of late, the buses have become unreliable for getting me anywhere on time in the morning. We totally aced our skit! Or that's how I felt anyway, even though I was exhausted and not in the right mind! I barely managed to stay conscious for the afternoon. We got lunch and ate it on a nice sunny patch of grass then I hung around waiting for my psy partner to practice for our presentation. Well, needless to say that one could have gone better since I in a normal state have no sense of time, so Katie + sleep deprived = major timing fail -_-*
Well, I hope it still turned out okay. We had to breeze through the second have of the presentation but we weren't the only ones to have issues with the 10 min max for time. *sighs* Hopefully, it turns out okay! I had my paper done at least! I don't understand how so many people didn't... I really don't get it. So I am good with time management but bad with timing?????
Yeah, I don't get it either. Whatever.

I got home and took a 2 hour nap before dinner and hanging out with the host family for a bit. Chihiro made me a friendship bracelet. Yes, girls in the audience you know what I mean. Those twisted string bracelets that you just tie around your wrist and don't take off ever. It was really cute. I watched a couple episodes of Conan last night and chatted with some people on fb chat then had issues failing asleep again. Not as bad this time though!

I think it was about 3am this time... but I woke up and skyped with Jon. Skype is really a bad thing to use if you have a bad internet connection. It can't connect. So we switched to using gchat's video feature. The only real reason I have a gmail account... ^_^* Because I got that all my stuff (this, googledocs, and youtube) are all linked... so if I delete it, bye bye blog and well. Stupid GOOGLE! Then there's the Facebook scandal going on too, even I've heard about it here in Japan. Stupid Corporate America and your insatiable greed--you're the reason we're not going to recover!

*cough cough* Anyway, I cleaned my room today and am just hanging out before classes tomorrow and getting ready for Tokyo! I leave for Kyoto by train after 9pm and get on a night bus at almost midnight there bound for Tokyo! I'm not bringing my computer so relax! You'll have a long time to catch up on blogs! I'll do my best to take more pictures than write in my diary while I'm there. I know someone will have their computer so I can charge my camera when necessary! Yay for computer addicts! Otherwise, today I'm just reorganizing my desk because since I've been sick things have just gotten crazy in my room. Hence I cleaned it! But I'm going to go do that or take a brief nap since I'm getting a sleep deprivation headache again. 45 mins-1 hour max so as not to further mess up the cycle! I think my body is telling me to go home because it's trying to align with home's time zone. Not yet! Just another 4 weeks from today! Love you guys! Bye bye!

Inconceivable!

So, somehow just from reading through my lines for my skit during our 3 meetings which were no longer than 20 mins and reading through them twice here tonight. I have successfully memorized my lines for my skit... I have proof as I practiced it with my host dad and he never had to feed me a line once! What?! It's okay. I don't get it either... I wish I could do that for vocab or grammar structures!

But anyway, today I started off exhausted since I stayed up til 2 trying to write out my practice for my in class essay test and making my vocab list. I got to school on time from the bus because I got off early and walked the rest of the way in. I swear, I cannot ride the bus and expect to be on time every again! I don't understand why we're having this trouble now and not back during winter! I never had this problem back then and I still got on at the same place and same time. But oh well, I made it in time barely for my test and started writing. I stayed a little over on the 50 mins but I managed to do closer to the max character limit. I don't understand how that happened since I never got another chance to reread my practice version and last time we had this I barely made the under limit. Oh and my essay in class was completely different from my practice. I don't think there is a shared sentence between them. I'm soo confused how it happened. I hope it turned out well! I came out feeling oddly confident in it but we all know how that can end up sometimes...
Afterwards, I met up with my group for our last practice session before dress rehearsal (which is 25 mins before class starts)! Then I got lunch with one of the partners and ran to class. After class I went home and slept because 1. I forgot a coat this morning and only realized it was cold after I was waiting at the bus stop, 2. I'm still sick, and 3. I was so sleep deprived. Did that for about 2 hours only too wake up feeling a different kind of crappy and had to take care of that so I could focus on my psychology paper and presentation (which I just found out my updated version of the powerpoint has been corrupted... WHY?!?!?!) and memorize my skit lines.

Oh, I failed at not speaking at all today. I was good for like 2 hours then I had practice and people kept asking me questions. Can anyone explain to me if someone has lost their voice, why would you ask anything but a Y/N question? Are you an idiot? They can't answer you! I digress...

I don't understand the thought process of my host mother either... because my stomach was feeling sick I got a plate of spaghetti with eggs instead of plain rice... Oh Japan! Well, I haven't felt very sick otherwise today! Yay! I actually took some meds and had a very energetic afternoon, which some people might have noticed via Facebook... *>.> <.<* Ooops... sorry, I don't consume a lot of caffeine often... But yeah, it's 9:36 pm and somehow I'm ready to go for tomorrow! I guess I'll just have to re-update my slides for the psychology presentation tomorrow!

Oh, exciting news! I can breath through my nose again! Yay! It makes me soooooo infinitely happy!!! I couldn't live with not being able to day after day. I couldn't sleep last night because I still couldn't (another reason I was soo tired this morning). It's like having someone stuff thick cotton balls up the back of your throat towards your nasal cavity and pouring glue into your nose. Due to the tension of this you clench your jaw- cutting off your air supply and causing the rest of your body to begin to burn and tense up from lack of oxygen to the blood and muscles. Hah, yeah... that sounds comfortable, doesn't it?

But yeah, night!

Meh, could've been worse...

So although, I'm still sick today could have gone worse.

I got to classes and didn't do as hot on my quiz in Japanese as I wanted. I just couldn't get the vocab to stick as well Japanese to English as English to Japanese... strange... so I missed 3 on that part and 1 on the other... out of 10... but yeah, I made it this time and tried really hard! I've just been a mess because of this. My brains all confused and rattled, I was almost convinced a cold wasn't from a virus... yeah, logic is not my strong point right now...

But after having my teacher get upset with me for watching her instead of looking at my notes and looking for the answer to the question she asked that I already knew what the answer was, I squeaked out in a completely pained and broken voice in Japanese that I had no voice. I didn't talk much the rest of the day. Whenever I could avoid it I did. Unfortunately, I had to practice with my skit partners so I mouthed the words and then began to whisper then... by the end, I remembered whispering is worse than regular talking so I stopped that too.
I was beginning to worry about my psych presentation I had to give that afternoon since my partner for that kind of left me high and dry over the weekend... I threw together a powerpoint from my stuff and sent it to him since I wouldn't see him due to classes until 15 til it was due. I also grabbed a bento on campus, ran and informed my psych prof of my lack of voice to see what we could do since I really can't help it if I have no voice and have to talk for at least 5 mins of our presentation... Lindsey was a saving grace to me because she gave me some throat lozenges... I need to ask her where she got those. But otherwise, psych class ran out of time for me to do the presentation so we're going Wed now-- not really what I wanted since now my paper, presentation, and skit are all due that day... I only wanted the skit to be left to do... grrr...
But yeah, today was the longest I've been awake since Friday. By the time I was out of psych I was exhausted and bumping into things, ie walls. Fortunately, I foresaw something like this and took the bus today. Expensive yes, but safer than riding my bike!
I felt really specially getting the get well's from everyone on facebook. I didn't notice them until this evening because I was being a good, diligent, slightly procrastinating student! But yeah, Thanks everybody! I'm feeling a bit better but that's after a nap and now I've got to memorize what I'm writing for class tomorrow and start memorizing my skit script and maybe get some work done on my paper... The only necessity is the writing for class... Sakubun test... ugh.

Yep, that's been my day. I got told I looked like I slept 2 hours last night when in fact it was about 8... but what can you do? I looked like crap even through the makeup, maybe I'll try harder tomorrow... maybe...

Okay, on to working now so I can shower and feel better and sleep lots!

PS: On a good note, my anthro teacher extended the due date of our next paper by another 5 days. YAY! I don't have to stress out now! (He did it mostly because he barely started grading our last ones...)

Recovery? or Just a Cover up?

Okay. Let's be Brief.

I'm sick. I have been since Thursday night. I have mostly stayed in my room in an attempt to keep the rest of the family safe since I thought Miwa finally had gotten better! So no yukata dress wearing, no traditional dancing, no ninja festival. I've probably slept half of the weekend and watched anime/read manga the other half.
I caught up on Bleach finally, still have not heard back from my cousin Paul... !!! ,
and started and finished reading an adorable series called Shugo Chara! It was only 51 chapters! No worries!

Now I'm going to write my paper that tomorrow's presentation is on and compare it with my partner's later when we have our skype meeting. Yeah, I feel lazy but I'm too sick and didn't get a chance to get permission from the host family early enough to not impose. Then I will memorize the new 50+ vocab so hopefully I can get 10/10 on tomorrow's quiz. Pray that it doesn't rain or we might have a similar sorrowful reenactment of last Thursday- the cause of why I am like this... miserably ill and failed to do fun stuff this weekend. Then Monday night come up with what I'll write for my essay test on Tuesday, then tuesday night I'll memorize my lines for my Japanese skit so we can blow that out of the water! I need a good grade on this to make me feel more comfortable with my B. Wednesday I'll turn in my presentation paper and be finished until Friday! Where I show up to classes and then relax and pack until Tokyo!! Remember, Thursday is a national holiday no school! After Tokyo for 4 days, I have my recovery day and back to school for a little more than a week and finals!! It's sure coming up fast! Oh well! Paper time before my energy runs out again and I pass out for another 3 hours!

PS: I would like to note that this is the first time in a long time my host family has made something that I could not eat. Thankfully it was only part of the meal and completely separate from my raw tuna and rice. On a normal stomach, I'm not sure I would've been able to handle these two other things either but oh well, especially not today. One of these things had a consistency that reminded me why I went through an entire box of tissues in 2 days... and the other was long strings of raw beef... I didn't want to throw up here again so I kindly passed saying my stomach was upset.
<.<* ugh, that was a close one. Ugh, now I can't get that stuff out of my head... eww.....

What? Down with the sickness AGAIN?!

Congrats! It's the Friday before all my stuff is due... all meaning most of my projects and presentations and quizzes and tests before Golden week and the end of the semester... and I've managed to get real sick. Not, I'm not sure if this is allergies... I mean real ill. It happened because of a very rough day yesterday which resulted in my sprinting over a mile to school in the pouring down rain and still missing my quiz which should not have happened since I wasn't running late until the bus got stuck in bumper to bumper traffic for 40 minutes. Not dwelling on it anymore...

But yes, now I have a very sore throat, my eyes and head ache, my nose is temperature sensitive and runny, did I mention I ache all over, cannot focus, am always tired? Oh and I forgot the kicker! Because of the running in shoes that aren't meant to be worn for stuff like that I not only have blisters but my shin splints are aggravated again... so no it hurts whatever I do... ( -_-*)

It couldn't have come at a worse time, actually it could have come when I was leaving for Tokyo... but anyway, I'm supposed to be going to this yukata (a springtime kimono basically) wearing event and learn how to do this traditional dance with a friend of mine on campus tomorrow... feeling crappy so we'll see how I feel tomorrow about that- afterwards, I'm going to the sem house and finishing my psy therapy meetings and hopefully figuring out everything for that paper & presentation since it's due on Wed/Mon respectively- but since the presentation is on the paper that means I'll finish the paper first... we have another huge vocab quiz on Monday so I have to study for that too because Sunday I'm still planning to go to the ninja festival- I might bring it along for the train ride to memorize- it's a long 2/3 hours... but yeah... so my Sunday is shot for time!
Tuesday is my Japanese writing class's sakubun test- basically an in class essay. Then Wednesday is turn in the psy paper and do my Japanese speaking skit! Hopefully after that it's easy street! Well, Thursday is a national holiday so that's nice. Get a break between that and Friday then off to Tokyo!

But yeah, did a little bit of work today and took a 2 hour nap... I was OUT. Going to take a shower when I'm allowed so in like 1/2/10 minutes, they always make me feel better. Then I'm going to relax and get some sleep. I cannot afford to be sick well, financially yes but experience/time worthy no!

This might turn out daijyoubu...

Okay, so after looking at my attempts at budgeting and keeping things in perspective, I've decided to pass on going to Den Den Town again this weekend and go to the Ninja Festival for sure. Downside is it will probably cost about $50 for the whole day -meaning: the to/from train ride, entrance fees for castle/museum, eating, maybe A souvenir. It's expensive yes, but it's going to be awesome! I know it! Come on, a day of ninja research!?!?!?! Yeah, enough about that.

Well, I did okay on the lesson test, I swear there is no good test I will ever have from her... My only saving grace is when I do really well on my other projects, and get my homework and attendance and anything else that can raise my grade! Ugh... I digress, surprise we have about 50 new vocab words for a quiz tomorrow, what? Yeah, my teacher was described as a "tool" and I'm starting to believe it more and more. That's almost as much as we have for a lesson test (over 2 chapters) and let me point out, I have another one on Monday with another page and a half of new vocab... I fear for this upcoming test on these... >.<

Quick Random Rant: If you have a facebook but never use it, what's the point of having one? It gives people the false hope that you might be easily contacted...

Anyway, today was well. Alright, minor worries about my upcoming psy project/paper that's due in a week- although less than that since we're giving our presentation is Monday. My skit that's next Wed also came to mind, but I can handle that. Maybe? The end is coming and I can feel it everywhere, people are getting cramped for time and wanting to do more stuff and I'm like, "well, that's nice but I blew a lot of my money and time out earlier--now I'd like to relax and timely work on things..."
Oh well, we'll see how that works out.

Time to attempt to memorize the rest of this ridiculous vocab! Night!

My Japanese is what?!

Well, it's Tuesday night and I've barely managed to focus enough to get my studying done for my minor vocab and kanji quiz tomorrow. It's hard to focus when you already know all/most of it. Oh well, next chapter it's not as bad. But I've played quite a bit of Chrono Trigger- going to beat it soon! I'm going through video game withdrawal but it's not these games I have access to that I'm suffering for! Oh well...
I managed to bike in the light rain today both to and from class! Yay! I saved 440 yen today! I also took my lesson test in my speaking class and I think it went well? But really with those, who knows... only the teacher right now...
As promised, I stopped by the hajimemashite(nice to meet you) spot today and chatted in Japanese to a few people. It was really awkward for me and I was feeling really tired so my japanese was failing for a bit before I warmed up. I didn't realize how crappy it can be when I'm not comfortable with the person/situation... as a result, I went home and chatted with my host mom for a while in an attempt to practice my speaking and more complex grammar structures that don't allow me 5 minutes of picturing it in my head before saying it. Again, my writing is greatly improving but I still feel like I have that verbal block... GRR! I'm trying to remedy that now with the help of Mai and Keck-san and anyone else who can/will speak Japanese with me.
Oh well, I found out everyone's going to a Ninja festival this Sunday... I need to find out these details so I can decide if I can go. It sounds like a ton of fun! But, we'll see. Well, I'm unusually tired right now so I might actually go to bed! It's almost midnight!
Good night! おやすみ！

What a Weekend .,!?

Okay, so to recap what my weekend was like...
Friday, was late to class because I was up super late the night before working on our script for our new Japanese skit and almost forgot my actual homework that night too. I missed 3 buses to get to school on time, it was raining pretty hard so I couldn't bike. I ended up having to stay until 5pm at school that day because we couldn't meet at 11... At least, we finished it and they seemed to like it. I am finished for the day normally at 11. Well, I met Mai and her friend for lunch and then we hung out until the meeting at 3. I was sooo tired but it couldn't be helped. I got back home and fell asleep for maybe 30 minutes before being awoken by people coming home. It sooo echoes here! But yeah, I spent the rest of Friday night chilling out with the family, having dinner, and then watching anime while the customer was here. I ended up being up late again because of that (>.<) of course, and I found out I was going somewhere with my host family the next day so I had to hurry and cancel other plans.

So I was up by 8:30 to be ready by 9 for this trip to a far away place with pottery and such. Well, they were running a bit behind but that was okay. We all piled into the car and off we went. After half of Pirates of the Caribbean in Japanese, we made it there. To Germany!!! Or a look-a-like German town. It was cute! But yeah, we caught fish and drove one of those swan boats, we couldn't make any pots but that is ok. It is actually just painting them,(・_・;) Im not good at that. I never can decide what to paint. But! I got to pet a cow because everyone was afraid of it.(;^_^A
We ate sausage and pizza and strawberry pocky and custard cream kit-kats. It was amusing.
After that, we went to a tea store and I embarrassed myself because the owner served us really strong green tea, which I attempted to try and ended up not being able to even keep a straight face... -_-* At least, he didn't see the face. Then we went to a plant store and I used a Japanese-style toilet for the first time, not too different from John Bryan state park... if I recall correctly...

The reason we went to the plant store was because we were going to visit Miwa｀s mom at the cemetery next because it was her birthday today. We went there and switched out her flowers and tidied up her grave. It was interesting getting to see how Japanese people treat death and such. Then we headed home and I took a short nap, almost decided against going to the crazy club later that night when I realized my shirt for tonight was gone. I messaged my host parents because I thought maybe it had gotten mixed up with their stuff again but they came home and apparently, it was in the queue for getting ironed still. It's been since Spring break since I last wore it so I didn't remember. Thankfully, as I finished getting ready for the evening, Miwa ironed it for me. I was tired already but possibly because I hadn't had dinner yet and had been up so late and up so early so many nights in a row.

By the way, this club was called Yoru-sta... You're a star. Haha, funny. But anyway, what's the funniest part is that most people there were dressed in cosplay costumes! So I wore mine and Lauren did hers too, we met up with some friends of hers and got Karaoke and dinner (more expensive than I wanted... again -_-) but then when we got to the club, it was $10 more expensive than the site said... >.<* Good thing I had taken out a large amount of money or that night would have been a waste as I wouldn't have been able to get in! I did get to karaoke a lot because 2 of our group was very busy getting ready! Karaoke room, changing room, eating room, crazy room, it has a lot of names.

Well, the club was a lot of fun! Japanese dancing = crazy arm movements + the 2-step.
It was awesome! Not like awkward American clubs where people are grinding and groping and ew... Everyone had costumes and wigs and had 2 drinks included with the entrance fee so were mostly intoxicated but it was again, awesome! We danced the whole time! Well, I did anyway and made some random friends with Japanese people because of my impatience with awkward want-to-dance-but-can't-because-I-haven't-drank-enough-yet people... 11-6am... That was a long night. I wasn't feeling well with greasy food in my stomach so I just used my 2 drinks for water. I was very happy with that choice! But yeah, there were tons of people from FF7,9, and 13. But only a few from FF6,8, X/X-2. There were lots of Eva fans and I was yet again, the only one from Vampire Knight again but it's okay. I'm unique! Most people knew me or of me by the end of the evening. It was funny. For starters, I was one of the first people to dance and I got random others to dance with me. I was super genki and bouncing was part of my dancing, I was also one of very few gaijin there. If only I had been Selphie because my hair, for once, stayed curled out the whole night... perfect outward curl too!! >.<* I also got to dance on stage with a bunch of people, no worries! I wore shorts under my skirt! I know how to take care of myself! But everyone was really nice and fun and I made friends with another Rei from Eva and these 2 Alices from Alice in Wonderland. They were adorable! I danced with Ichigo and got pictures of Cloud and Yuna and others. I danced with a lot of other people too but I can't remember who now... my memory is rather shot with how tired I was/am. A ton of people wanted to get my picture, including the people who ran the bar. There were 3 areas of DJs, a basement that was really stuffy and small, an outdoor basement area which got cold easily, and a higher basement bar with a bigger room and air conditioning, it helped a bit when there weren't too many people there. But it was sooo much fun because the music was all anime/video game stuff! I recognized a bunch of it too and knew a bit of them! It was soo much fun, I'm really glad I went even though it was expensive, I figure that'll be the last time I wear my costume here because I don't think I can handle too many more all night events like that. Especially if they're expensive... ^_^*
I actually spoke to a good number of people there, most of which were Japanese and didn't speak any English. Yay! Cultural exchange! Also from this event, we have come to realize what a few of our favorite FF characters do in their spare time:
Cloud goes out partying and drinking on the weekends- hah! He has personality now!
Vincent is basically a night club singer.
Sephiroth is a night club DJ and an awesome one at that!

That's all, I remember now. Once it ended we gathered our stuff and headed back. I was concerned because I could feel myself getting grumpy since I was nearing the "24 hours of being awake" state... My patience kind of disappear when I get there. But we got back to Hirakata station and I thankfully had a bus waiting for me there! Yay! I jumped on and ended up riding back with Pat - another guy from KG who I ran into at the Ring during Spring Break and found out he lives near my neighborhood. So we got off at the same stop. He was also at a bar in the same area so it was funny. He was still partially intoxicated or getting hung over? I'm not sure but it was entertaining. My ears might have stopped ringing sooner but he let me listen to his music as well and it was soooooooooo loud. I thought I was back at the club. Oh well. -_-* I got home at about 7:00 am and everyone was awake. I felt bad but asked if I could shower before I went to bed because I smelled of smoke and was sooo gross from all the dancing. I didn't want to get that grossness on my futon and around the house. Miwa understood and let me but I had to wait until she finished getting ready. I'm not supposed to take showers in the morning for that reason but I'm sure she appreciates me not stinking up the house since she's like myself and really doesn't like the smell of smoke. I had a slice of bread for breakfast- it was whole-heartedly welcomed! I had been craving one since late greasy dinner. But then I went upstairs and passed out until about 2pm when I set my alarm. If I slept all day, then I wouldn't sleep tonight! Haha! I can still think logically!

I'm taking today off so just homework and sleep and relaxing/recovering so I can be ready for the week. Everyone else in the house has been pretty busy and have been out so I haven't had an issue sleeping.

Fast-forward, please?

Tsk, tsk. No one's been reminding me to update the blog...
Well, I've been really busy >.> <.<*
watching anime, procrastinating homework, and messing up my sleep schedule more...
thanks all...

Well, I've spent a lot of time on Facebook this week and I realize... wow, I need to re-evaluate what I do with my time... Facebook just isn't worth the time I invest in it. No worries, I'm not getting rid of mine! I'm just going to try to do other things when I'm bored or have a minute than get on there, so if I'm suddenly not poking you multiple times a day-that's why.

Well, Monday was a long day of classes and meeting new people and not sleeping enough because I was up too late watching epic exciting episodes of Detective Conan. I had class and it was rainy, so I stayed in for the day. Unfortunately, this epic part of DC was 14 episodes long so I continued this bad situation of staying up late watching more. Again, it's a bad thing when I have early classes or just get awoken extra early by super loud small children... >.<*

Well, I really haven't done much all week besides sleep, watch anime, study for a test, and do a bit of writing here and there. Yay! I'm writing! Unfortunately, I've spread myself out again-I have a new idea that I'm attempting to keep short. ^_^****
Oh well, today I had psy class and we found out about our papers/presentations that are in 2/3 weeks. I'm excited! We're going to do something really fun!!! But before that can happen we need to finish the psychotherapy sessions... ^_^***** and I need to finish writing my part of my script for my Japanese skit... oh man!

Can we just fast-forward to Tokyo?!?! I'm going the 30-5th of May and will be in a hostel with 3/4 of my friends. I'm taking a night-bus so NO talking... >.< uh oh. I'm not thinking I'm taking my computer but we'll see how I feel closer to the date!

So, I met a lot of Japanese students earlier this week and I think I'm about to get that crash-course on speaking Japanese outside of class now... I got a phone call today from one of them- she was really quiet but I couldn't meet with her because of another meeting... I'm planning to meet 2 times a week in the afternoon probably for doing my swing club lessons- maybe something on a sat too. We'll see how I'm feeling about that later too! I just need to get through this crazy busy week and I think it'll chill out. Hopefully, well I'm going to try to get my sleep schedule back to normal now! Wish me luck! Oyasumi!

Chill All Better!!!

So after a very... unproductive Friday, I feel tons better! When I mean unproductive, I mean I watched anime and slept all day... then was up until 2:30 am then finally managed to get to bed and slept until about 11:50. I've been genki ever since!

Today, I played it pretty chill since it's my first day being better. I don't want to over do it! So I messed around with my music and videos on my computer, came up with another random little story. Yeah, that's right! I said LITTLE! I'm excited! This one might not break 60 pages!!

I finally got a copy of a song that I've wanted for a while and it's funny because it fits perfectly with my story idea. I didn't realize it until after I had written a bunch of my ideas out already. Yay for coincidences!

We made takoyaki for dinner which was tasty, crazy, and an adventure! For all of you non-japanese culture savvy people. Takoyaki is basically a very watery batter with cabbage and whatever else you want in the middle. We usually put tako=squid but we switched it out for hotdogs and imitation crab meat too. They asked me which I like the best but I don't really know. I love crab... but it was with the hotdog slices and well, I've eaten a lot of squid now... It's just not alive or moving at all!

But other than that, today was pretty calm and quiet... I'm going to give into my mood and write now. Bye!

Catch up Cold?

So apparently it's Thursday and I haven't updated since Easter! Sorry to those of you who have been diligently checking back everyday or even every other day. This week's been a bit crazy and I've been feeling a bit under the weather so sleeping has been occurring a bit more to fend off the worst of it!

Monday was a beautiful day and or was that Tuesday... Well, frankly... I had class all day Monday so I didn't get to enjoy it much and was basically bouncing out of my chair. That was also the first time I'd had chocolate in 2 days. I guess I was going through withdrawal or something. But I had a ton of good ideas for my stories thanks to classes but still haven't gotten to writing the actual text yet.

Tuesday was the beautiful day that I took a bike ride on my way home through the park and got all those lovely new pictures! Then I spent the rest of the day memorizing my presentation for Japanese. We went got sushi for dinner- the family and I. It was nice.

Wednesday, I nailed my presentation. Or I think I did anyway... I managed to get re-obsessed with DN Angel again... especially after getting the 2 amazing soundtracks! Yay! Well, Started feeling funny nose-wise like I was going to sneeze on Monday but it progressed into worse things by today... I had a real hard time paying attention in class. I was so miserable I just wanted to go home. So I did and took a nap and then ended up staying up late to take care of a few people and things. I managed to get into my classes no problems too! Yay! I can't believe it! The next question is as to whether or not I can get my linguistics class that was closed... if so man, it will be great! Oh, and I'll need to hope that all my stuff here get credited for my Miami Plan back home then we'll be all peachy-keen!
Although I did find out that I'll only be 2 classes short of a spanish minor... dang you SPANISH!!! Especially at this point, I don't think I could handle the only options left to me for it-I'd have to attempt classes over the summer at Sinclair and somehow get those to count. Somehow...

Thursday, woke up feeling crappy and exhausted because of lack of sleep but went to class, bought my tickets to Tokyo and went to class again... barely made it through that but I did and got home on the bus. Been asleep more or less since then... I'm going to go grab a glass of water and move around for a bit and probably do my homework so I can go to bed early tonight and make sure that this IS only ALLERGIES. I really, honestly cannot tell. I'm acting as if it's illness though to prevent others from catching it just in case. My ear pressure's off, my nose goes runny and then dry, my eyes are super watery, my head hurts around my sinuses... I can't tell... >.< Oh, well. If not homework then a few more episodes of DN Angel! Bye!

Meester Easter! Yesu-sama=Jesus

So, we're not going to talk much about yesterday... but it was a bit rough, as a lot of my plans fell through so to speak. My internet was um... troublesome as well.

But today was better! I went to Easter mass and found some familiar faces! Yay! I hung out with them for a bit, we ventured into Book Off and I bought 2 more cds for a grand total of 500 yen! I'm really not going back for a while now! REALLY! Again, it was an awesome deal since I got a lot of beautiful music (65 songs) for that price. Then I went to meet everyone for enjoying O-hanami! "Honorable Flower viewing" is the direct translation but it's really a codeword for people to go get drunk in public under the pretty cherry blossom trees. I did not partake in those drinking affairs but I'm okay with that. I didn't get to wear my kimono like I wanted to because I still don't know HOW to put it on... nor do I have all the necessary accessories. That will come in time/when we go back to the flea market! But again, oh well. Later days...

I've realized I cannot go swing dancing this Wednesday night as I have to schedule for my classes back home during that time... *sigh* I have my priorities in line... even if I'm saddened by it. It's okay. I might just be getting overwhelmed by the crazy Japanese ideals of "Ganbari!" (do your best) but I've got my classes figured out for the whole year and I may be taking 19 credit hours! 2 of the classes are joke 100 levels for my Eng major that I HAVE to take and haven't been able to get into them before. So again, intro to poetry and fiction... hah! Then 2 300s for my major, getting into SPN 303 for my math credit will be happening because I'll be taking it with David Motta! He was my teacher for SPN 312 and we're basically covering the same material. I know he'll let me in! Then I have some history class that will not be as bad as 111. I hope. But we'll see on DDay!

Anyway, I've got a bad headache so I'm going to go shower and pass out so I can wake up in the morning for class! Night all! Happy Easter!

PS: I forgot to mention, I got an egg for Easter from the Hirakatashi church! I didn't know if it was boiled at first, but pleasantly surprised that it was! I also got to meet the priest for the English and Spanish masses. I'm excited! Apparently, he's from Mexico so this will be fun catching up on my Spanish.

PPS: Oh and it's always annoying to find out that I'm 2 classes short of a Spanish minor... Maybe, maybe we'll talk about this later... Not for Fall semester anyway! It feels so weird to not take Japanese... but I can't with my schedule...

PPPS: Yeah, it took me half way through mass to realize when they said "yesu-sama" they were saying "Jesus"... where do they pull "yesu" from? What language says his name like that? Seriously, any ideas?

free-standing deals

So... today went pretty well. I can't really complain except that I was tired and hungry for a lot of it and my friends keep getting sick! I'm not concerned about getting sick at all (I've survived living in a house with 2 9 year old children who have both been sick multiple times and Miwa-san's had a bad cough too for I'm not sure how long), but if everyone is sick then no one will want to hang out... ~_~

Otherwise, it's been a pretty good day. Things went well according to my mind, I took a nap this afternoon cause I was really tired again. Best to fend off any illnesses in the beginning, right? But I've been revising one of my stories today and tidying up my room a bit. I hung out with the family tonight and we made some decorations for celebrating Toru-san's bday on Sunday. It was supposed to be a secret. They told me that anyway, and then Chihiro told him everything and showed him the stuff. ~_~* I don't think they understand what a secret is... ^_^* Probably a good thing at their age! But we did that for a long time and then I attempted to make something out of paper and it turned into a free-standing flower popping out of the ground. I had no idea what I was doing for the majority of its development but it turned out well. I'll grab a picture of it later because now, I'm going to try to budget out my money and the things I want to do so I can get a good idea how much I want to spend going to Tokyo... That's kind of important. I also found out I have a test that golden week's friday... stupid teacher being a jerk and making us stay... I wanted a WEEK off, oh well. I'll just hang out at home and rest and study in the beginning and then enjoy it later!

I might be going to Osaka Castle tomorrow- I might be learning how to tie an obi tomorrow. I might be going Hanami viewing on Sunday after church in my kimono. This is all tentative and it's starting tomorrow... geez!

But yeah, budgeting now! Night!

Ending the Week on a Good Note?

So, I managed to finish my paper last night and skype with Alyssa for about an hour and a half before remembering more homework and passing out around 2am. >.> <.< Oops. ^_^*

It was a bit of a tiring day yesterday, I skipped my first class for the sake of my health and I was sad the whole time I was conscious. I missed my Psy class- my favorite class because I wasn't feeling well yet and I was exhausted and had to write my paper later that night so I took a nap instead of going to class. *sighs* It did help, so I am grateful but I don't want to do that again. I like that class... a lot. It's fun and interesting! At least, I got all the notes so I didn't miss anything besides the discussion. With a very ill stomach, I managed also to eat sushi for dinner... I'm not sure what some of it was but I now know that I do like salmon! But only if it's raw? Oh well... Sorry Dad...

But today, I was feeling MUCH better. I unfortunately rode the bus again because it was raining today... it was warm too but it made it muggy. Eww... Well, I finally did something to my hair after more than 2 months of being here. I wore my hair in a half up thanks to the hair ties I bought in Seoul! I had it up all day and I got lots of compliments on it! ^)^ I also wore my new purple ears with my purple sweater! Yay stuff from Korea! I took another nap today because I was yet again, exhausted. I did finish up my Japanese presentation on Swing Dancing and finally got some kind of response from the Swing in Osaka group! やった！ So I'm totally going the first day they start next week. I won't go too often because it's $15 to get attend and get a free drink but I am definitely going next week! I miss dancing soo much! Did I mention we watched a movie in class the other day about hugging in Japan and then our teacher told us that she had never hugged nor received a hug from her mother. I about broke down. Just watching it made me all teary-eyed. Now you can understand. Without hugs, I would wither and die. It's TRUE!

But yes, before I go on another ADD tangent, I have been working in classes on this old story of mine, collecting new ideas and organizing how to apply them and make it overall better through anthro and psy. I'm so glad I took these classes! ~_~* Even though anthro can bore me to death sometimes... other times it's entertaining. Maybe one of these days, I'll have a chance to actually restart! That's what I have to do for it anyway, unfortunately a lot of my material for it is back home so Mom and Dad? Got a favor for you? Want to hunt down the notebook and scan in a couple pages for me? ^_^*

I'd REALLY appreciate it! ^_^ But tomorrow is Friday, I'm going to be productive or something and there's a mass at 7pm... We'll see how good my Japanese is now... Goodnight all!

PS: I love comments! Anyone can post now! I set it that way for a reason, Mother!