blodeuedd

Christmas back home was wonderful, though we experienced a few setbacks. Originally, my plan was to only take half a day off work, leaving (and arriving) on Christmas Eve. Then I thought that that would be cutting it close, and that it would be better to leave on the 23rd, just in case there were any delays. B2, who was in Europe, was also supposed to arrive that same evening at roughly the same time I would, but in Montreal, so he'd arrive two hours later by bus.

My flights went as planned, with no delays, and I was in Ottawa by half past six.

B2, however... landed in Montreal at 2:30 p.m. on Christmas day. Originally, he was supposed to fly from Berlin to Munich, then from there to Montreal. As you may have heard, much of Europe has been thrown into chaos by the weather, which my brother said in most places was a joke (but it seems that Paris can't handle half an inch of snow), and his first flight was delayed, but he did manage to get to Munich, which was good because since he was officially in transit, the airline had to feed him and put him up in hotels.

So here's what happened to him:

He got to Munich late, but might have made his connection, except a security agent searched his carry-on bag three times, in the process damaging his gift for our mother. By the time he made it to the gate, they had already closed the doors. So he went and stood in a long line of people who had also missed their flights, waited for hours, and was finally told that he could get a flight to Zurich, and from there to Chicago the next day, and from there they'd get him to Montreal. They put him up in an airport hotel, and the next morning, he went back to the terminal and stood in line some more.

He made it to Zurich, then waited... and waited... and waited... and finally was on a plane to Chicago. By now it was late on the 24th. He'd been keeping us updated via phone and email, and called from Chicago on Christmas Eve to tell us that *fingers crossed* he'd be in Montreal the next day.

He finally got the airline to give him a hotel room in Chicago, and he also got a $45 meal voucher, but he said the cheapest thing on the dinner menu still came up to almost $30, once you added tax and tip. And the cheapest thing on the breakfast menu was $17, so he couldn't even have breakfast before plodding back to the airport, early on Christmas morning. We were at Dorval to greet him (with a sign, even: Baron von Latefürchristmas) and then rushed home to open our presents, with a pit stop at what was supposed to be Tim Horton's, but ended up being Harvey's because Tim Horton's was closed. On Christmas Day! Can you believe it?!

My gifts included books (very thoughtfully chosen by both my brothers, though one is a hundred-pound thing that I have to lug back to Japan with me -- thanks, B1! XD;;;), money, a pair of lovely peridot earrings (real gold and everything, which means I now own actual jewellery!), and the usual stocking stuffers, though my mother got me tights instead of socks this year! I got the lucky gratteux (lottery ticket where you scratch off numbers/pictures) this year, though I only won $3; I'm pretty sure that ever since my mother started the tradition of giving each of us kids one of those in our stocking, twenty years ago, it's only happened once or twice that either none of us won anything, or more than one of us won something. Without fail, there's one lucky ticket, though none of us has ever won more than $20.

Since arriving, I've gotten to know the two new family cats, Merlin (a.k.a. Merlin le malin, Merlichon) and Beulah (a.k.a. Madame, Toutounnette), both lovely black cats with yellowish-green eyes. They're not related, but strangely enough, neither of them can meow properly. My parents got Merlin when he was a kitten, so he's presumably always been like that, but they adopted Beulah when she was about two years old, and think she might have been abused and so lost her meow at some point. Instead of meowing, she creaks, and Merlin makes this weird noise that sounds almost like a pigeon cooing.

I've been checking the forecast and so far, there doesn't seem to be much hope for a snowfall before I leave. Bloh! Oh well, at least there's snow on the ground.

A last thing I'd like to note is that I'm sitting here typing in nothing but a t-shirt, track pants and socks, and it's no doubt at least -10 outside, and the heater in this room isn't even on. And it's kind of surprising that when I turn on the cold water tap, the water that comes out is ice cold.

Being rather proud of my Halloween costume, I sent a picture of it to my mother, who it turn showed it to her coworkers. Apparently, they all thought I look just like her! We had a good laugh over this, because I look absolutely nothing like my mother. The only things I got from her are my hair (I'm wearing a wig in the picture), my eyes (which you can't see very well as it's a full-length shot) and my skin tone (which is mostly covered by the costume). Apart from that, I got everything from my father's side of the family.

I slept until nearly 11 this morning! Go me! *cheers*

Now I want to be productive for the next couple of hours (cleaning, etc.) so that I can Get Stuff Done the rest of the day. I have big plans for November, and they need some advance preparation.

Happy Halloween!

Can one go into cheese withdrawal, I wonder?

So for the past three nights, I've gone to bed between 11:40 and midnight, and each night I've woken up at exactly 0:40. And I don't know why.

I got an email from my aunt this morning, regarding my posts about Vienna: Your pix are great! I just find it hilarious that my 67-year-old aunt actually typed "pix". XDDD

And now for the story of the reasons behind my brief life sans internet, in case you cared. ^.^ ( Boring story goes here. )

In other news, I've got the travel bug, and I've got it bad. Sunday, Emily and I met up for our first strategic planning session of our Assault on China*, and there was much poring over the map, much discussion about means of transportation, and pondering what we were going to eat. In China, not at the restaurant.

Today I went to a travel agency to look into tickets, and we are nearly booked! I go back tomorrow to pay for them. And then I get to go crazy looking for info about travelling in China! :D

Also coming up is my blink-and-you'll-miss-it trip to Korea with Eda, which will be very, very exciting. And spicy. And hopefully full of fabulous, cheap shoes. :DDD Damn, I have to get in gear to keep my promises to Haengbok-sshi, or Eda's gonna make me some more Inui juice! D:

All right, bed time!

I'm feeling way too chipper about everything. ^_^;

* We need an official name for our trip. Journey to the West would be appropriate, no? XD

Hello, all!

I am safely in Vienna, and now I remember that those wacky German keyboards are pretty much the same as English ones... except the y and z keys are reversed. XD

I arrived last night (by Finnair, very nice airline) via Helsinki, and going by the delicious-looking cloudberry and lingonberry and lots-of-other-berry jams and other products, I need to go back someday. Also, reindeer! :D

Anyway, I spent most of the morning waiting for my family to show up. After eating my weight in cheese at the breakfast buffet, I parked myself in the lobby with my book and waited... and waited... About an hour after I'd estimated they'd arrive, I told myself that after I finished my book (I had about 5 pages left) I'd go out and hunt for an internet café, but they showed up right about them. Turns out their flight from Montreal was cancelled, so they were put on another flight, and everything was off by about an hour and a half.

So I accomplished pretty much nothing today, except finish my book, and we walked around a bit, then went back to the hotel to rest, then went out for supper.

Very exciting stuff.

Take care, everyone!

This probably won't make much sense to anyone but those concerned (i.e. myself and my brothers) but I want to post this just so I don't forget about it, because I just split my sides laughing.

There's been this running joke for years about my feet being perfectly round. It originated (I think?) when we were watching Fushigi Yuugi together -- so that would be about 10 years ago! -- and my brothers thought the close-up of Chiriko's foot with his seishi symbol was hilarious, and somehow this led to them accusing me of having spherical feet. Anytime is a good time to bring this up, so now that we're in the initial stages of planning our annual family trip, the following exchange appeared in my inbox:

B2 writes:

Pending receipt of your answer to this inquiry, please be advised that effective January 1st, 2010, all passengers boarding international flights with feet deemed "roughly circular," as per the guidelines set out in the International Foot Roundness Screening Protocol (IFRSP) subsection 4(i through iv) are required to pay a minimum accommodation fee of US$260 and up to US$475 for feet deemed "perfectly circular" as per the guidelines set out in the IFRSP subsection 6(i through vii). Refusal to consent to these fees can result in penalties including detention for no more than 21 days pending criminal prosecution under the International Air Traffic Security Act, INTERPOL, Section 16, subsection 4(b), schedule A.  I mention this knowing that M-A will be travelling with us and wish to avoid any possible delays in our travel plans.

B1 replies:

Good call on the regulations. And just to clarify, you misread the sections and the penalties for perfectly circular (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Circle) feet include, but are not limited to, incarceration for a minimum duration of 6 years and extensive sanding of the feet in question so as to remove all circular and ovaloid qualities. Specifications reagarding the duration of the sanding process, as well as the techniques and materials employed in its execution, can be found in the International Foot Derounding Protocol  (Chapters III through LII). Failure to obtain any angled sections in the foot will not be held against the sanders and can result in accusations of high treason and is punishable by death.

B2 again:

Thank you for the clarification. I would also like cite the final judgment in the first case tried under this new legislature, James K. Henderson v. The Republic of Korea, International Court of Justice, 2010:

"[...] the court cannot uphold imprisonment and physical restraint as reasonable grounds for refusal to comply with the regulations of the International Foot Derounding Protocol [...] as prior knowledge of the perfectly round feet [...] and the regulations and affects of the Protocol having been made public several months prior to its effective date [...] demonstrate beyond this Court's doubt that the accused did knowingly and recklessly persist in boarding, occupying and using the facilities of overseas-bound aircraft after having had ample time to comply with the regulations of the Protocol and take subsequent actions to ensure that its standards were met prior to boarding any aircraft. [...] By the power vested in it by the International Court of Justice Legislature, this court finds the defendant guilty on all counts, [...] and sentences him to be placed in a container of sufficient volume in which for him to be completely submerged in a quantity of vegetable oil at least twenty-seven (27) times greater than the volume of his person, and confined to this container in the presence of a quantity of vegetable oil equivalent to that of the adorementioned, until breathing has been sufficiently restricted so as to cause cessation of life."

According to this precedent, detention is not grounds for defence so M-A you'd better make sure your feet meet the requirements of the IFRSP before we leave.

XDDD

Also, when we were having Christmas over Skype, the conversation turned to clothes and after they hated on many a trend (B2 thinks the creator of Crocs should burn in hell for all eternity), they enlisted my help in designing the ultimate pair of overalls: satin silk, pinstriped and skin-tight. A revolution in business attire.

XDDD

This is it, my last night in Canada for... I have no idea for how long, really. As long as I can take trips with my family every once in a while, and my friends come out and visit me, I don't really have a reason to come back, do I?

I spent this evening with my family, and it was happy and sad. Happy because we celebrated my birthday (I got my traditional feast of shepherd's pie and fresh berries) and had a game of Scrabble, and sad because we buried Stanley and Fluffy in the back yard. Fluffy's ashes had been sitting in their little urn in the living room since 2005, and Stanley's in a small wooden box since last December.

The moment was sort of interrupted when my brothers, who were digging the grave, had one of their typical arguments with my father about how to go about it. My father didn't want to bury the urn and the box, just the ashes, but then B1 couldn't get Fluffy's ashes out of the urn (they were in a plastic bag), so there was discussion about how to get them out. "I'll get another bag and we can rip this one open and transfer them." "What's the point in that? Just dump them in the ground!" Finally, B2 ended up smashing the urn open with his shovel, and we got on with the solemn business at hand.

Incidentally, this reminded me of a sort of similar (and hilarious) scene in Michel Marc Bouchard's play Les grandes chaleurs, which has been made into a movie. I hope I can find a download of it somewhere someday!

Oh, I also had my little bonfire. Did you know that pictures burn in the most satisfying way? :D There weren't as many cards and letters as I thought there would be, but now I remember that I gave a whole pile of them back to G at one point, saying that since he'd written them, he could do as he liked with them. >:3

I'll leave you with that, as I have to finish packing. I'll be picking up timbits tomorrow morning, so Eda, if you still want some, you'll have to come meet me at Kichijouji on Sunday evening! ^_^

As promised (a long, long time ago...), here are my thoughts on Dream Live 6th. In bullet form, copied directly from my Hawaii journal, since I wrote them down on the flight. For me, the show was:

- Silver Pair synchro fail (baka pair win?!)
- Tezuka & Sanada can sing
- Shitenhouji are ravers at a gay disco!
- Yuuji = sparkly crop top
- Higa with leis
- Yakiniku battle
- Ichinensei get a little song
- High school uniforms: sequined badges, WTF Fuji?! (Mao with polka dot tie!)
- Still like A Shiraishi better (B not feeling the ekusutaji~~ quite so much)
- Flying Taka!
- 5th Horio really, really short*
- Koori no emperor & Hyoutenka no jounetsu medley
- B Gakuto SO MUCH CUTER with that wig
- Hardly any talk at all compared to DL5 (perhaps they had less rehearsal time after Shitenmyu's super long run?)
- Luke C. needs to learn to pack his junk better. >_<
- "Do Your Best" & "Kimi to nakama de/Good Combination" blast from the past
- Can't remember what had me screaming "OH MY GOD! D:"

I still can't remember what had me yelling, but when I get my hands on the DVD and watch it, it will hopefully come back to me. ^_^

* I think he must be going through a growth spurt, because when I saw him on stage on Friday, he didn't seem that short anymore. Does anyone care about him enough to confirm/deny this?

And here's what my brother thought! I was very proud of him for wearing his (my) kirakira mitt and waving his (my) light stick around just like everyone else, though he had but a minimal understanding of what was going on, having only watched the anime up to the end of the Hyoutei arc. His comments:

- I didn't understand anything
- I was surprised at how many people had light sticks
- I felt tall
- The screaming was insane
- Everyone seemed to really like the guy in yellow [Sanada]
- The parsimonious use of pyrotechnics was a bit strange [my brother's way of saying that he didn't expect random fireworks at a musical about tennis XD]
- There was lots of energy, but I still didn't understand anything

And there you have it, folks. Tomorrow (possibly), my Very Silly Review of the newest show. I'm half-tempted to once again transcribe it as is, random Japanese included. :D

Kirakira mitts are mostly done. My mum helped out by ironing. ^_^

I took my brothers out for sushi and karaoke last night, and it was revealed that B1 can sing! B2 we knew about, what with him being the lead singer and guitarist of his band, but I can't ever remember B1 singing, so it was a nice surprise. We had fun belting out Bon Jovi and Green Day songs together. <3

Today we rented a car and I drove us all out to Fuji go ko, though we only saw four of them. Very pretty, the weather was perfect, and we had a lovely view of Mt. Fuji. On the way back, I was telling my father about how disappointed I was to learn that the "san" in "Fuji-san" was another reading for the kanji for mountain, and not Japanese people calling it Mr. Fuji. My father said "Mr. Fuji" sounded a bit too formal, that he wanted a closer relationship, so I suggested "Fuji-kun".

"Fujikins?! 8D"

One of the things my family brought along was scans of all our family slides, including this picture of me when I was eight years old and heading off to Camp Woolsey (that's Brownie camp for you non-Ottawa folks!). ( Click here for lolz! )

It's nearly 2 in the morning, and I've not been getting half the sleep I should this week, but that's okay, because I finally have curtains in my sewing room! Somehow, the thought of welcoming my family with a sink full of dirty dishes wasn't as distressing as the thought of making them sleep in a room which had fabric pinned to the curtain rod in lieu of actual curtains. Cleaning the bathroom can wait until tomorrow morning, because I figure that if I'm to get up early to help Becca move, I may as well wake up SUPER early and finish getting my place ready then.

I handed over the costumes earlier this evening, and I think I must congratulate myself. First of all, I'm proud of the work itself; secondly, though I did get to bed very late these last few nights, there were no all-nighters, nor was there any panicked running around. Now I can sit back and relax, and hope that everything fits.

Yesterday, we took the kids to the Inokashira Zoo, and a grand time was had by all. There were three of us herding 11 four-year-olds, and we managed, though we did have to raise our voices at times. But still, they were just so cute it was hard to be harsh with them, and I was too busy taking pictures, anyway.

B1 gets a kick out of making me laugh, but this is the first time he's done it this way: ( we are loving siblings )

XD

So this evening I went back to Parco to check out the last of the sales... and ended up spending nearly 10,000y. But it was all in the name of cute shoes, cute slips and awesome pants. How awesome are these pants? For starters, they're green (almost exactly the same shade as my green jeans, in fact >_<), and also the lining of the pockets has POLKA DOTS. But best of all, they're those weird double-waisted pants (like the red ones Mao-chan is wearing in the Dream Live 5th pamphlet) which means I can wear two belts at once, should I choose to do so.

Actually, I lie. The best part of those pants is that I bought them in a regular Japanese shop, i.e. Not Uniqlo.

They Had My Size. Or rather, I Am the Right Size (for their largest size). This is Good, but it also opens up a whole world of dangerous shopping possibilites... ^.^

Also, Japanese salesgirls are too damn cute, and they're chatty. Even chattier when I'm wearing my cute rainboots, as I was today.

And now, time for some more So You Think You Can Dance Canada as I sip my camomile tea.