Entries this day: AM_foodage AM_meditation AM_so_far Harassing_Tiny_Tracy Mari_and_Chika Naori Tomoko Work francois lesson_with_Shimpei pink_cow_with_Ami

AM foodage

9:01am JST Saturday 26 May 2007 (day 13576)

Made a vegetarian roboyaki dish this morning. 2 eggs, garlic, carrot, and cheese. Pretty good. Actually the first bite was delicious.

AM meditation

9:00am JST Saturday 26 May 2007 (day 13576)

Meditated for maybe 4 minutes this morning. Super tired and falling asleep.

AM so far

9:12am JST Saturday 26 May 2007 (day 13576)

Didn't take a shower this morning, so my face is feeling a bit ooky. Did draw a few lines on my first of four canvases; forgot to write down the time spent on the edge. I'll call is .2 hours, because so far there's been something like 4.3 hours, and .2 hours will make future calculations easier. Plus, I spent 12 minutes on it.

Plugged in my computer's battery to get a bit of charge so I could write on the train. There are no seats, so I'm squatted against one wall, and my knees are beginning to wonder if they will have a chance to stand soon. Haven't checked email since yesterday around 2pm, though I imagine I'll be able to get a signal at work.

Forgot to import the pics from last night, so I won't be able to use my 80 minute break to do anything with those. But I plan to meditate some and work on chatforest.com

9:21am JST Saturday 26 May 2007 (day 13576)

Sitting next to David on Inokashira line to Kichijoji. He's zonked out, presumably after working late at The Pink Cow (where he works).

I'd like to figure a way to write a little code or macro that I can use to calculate days old during my lessons. I'd like to enter a birthdate and have it pop out the current days old along with days old starting from 10,000 or their age, whichever is more appropriate.

Harassing Tiny Tracy

11:21am JST Saturday 26 May 2007 (day 13576)

Tracy hasn't worked at the school for a few months; during this time (on Saturdays), I took over her room with a window (and electricity) (but today no internet signal). Today is her first Saturday back at work, and I'm still in her room. Jamie and I knew she'd be upset, but my lesson started at 10am (until 11:20am); hers started at 11am.

I've got a huge break of 80 minutes after this first lesson, during which her lesson will end and wittle bitty tiny Tracy can have her room back. (She calls herself Tiny and pretends to be really young)

She seems to have gotten over it, but she was all, "no.. why are you doing this to me?" in a way that got me a tiny bit riled up slash apologetic, but I'm sure it will all be okay in the end.

And on the other side, if things go all to crap, I don't really care; I've been planning to stop working here on Saturdays. I've been working 6 days a week (okay, 5.5) for a year; I'm about ready to scale back to 4.5. And I'm about ready to switch jobs altogether. I guess I should start looking.

Mari and Chika

3:40pm JST Saturday 26 May 2007 (day 13576)

Mari and Chika did pretty well today, though they didn't do homework, and I could pretty easily tell. I sat between them at the corner of the table, with "a flower in each hand," as the Japanese saying goes. They scored the same today; for the past several weeks, I've been keeping score; usually Chika wins, but they were pretty evenly matched today.

The grammar was asking where various shops were

Where is the _______?

It's between the ___ and the ___.
It's next to the ___.
It's around the corner from the ___.
It's across from the ___.

I had them help me make 27 shops that we could shuffle around on the table into a map that we could reference for some freestyle conversation. I determined they have no idea the importance of articles in English, so we'll look at A and THE next week. Chika is in charge of bringing back the shops.

Naori

12:09pm JST Saturday 26 May 2007 (day 13576)

Sigh. Naori cancelled.

Tomoko

6:05pm JST Saturday 26 May 2007 (day 13576)

Tomoko is a tall funny girl at EV Kichijoji who seems to always take Jamie's lessons on Saturdays. I have a crush on her, and wanna do the boom boom, as they say in their lessons; apparently all their conversations come back to sex.

I sat in on their lesson today, and for two pictures, Tomoko sat on my lap.

食べたい！

Work

6:11pm JST Saturday 26 May 2007 (day 13576)

Seem to have survied work well intact. Yuria, who cancelled the previous 6 lessons (one hour (paid) each), didn't cancel today, but left her 1 hour lesson 36 minutes early (after arriving 4 minutes late). I would just be leaving the school, but thanks to her early departure, I'm already in Shibuya waiting for Shimpei for our sorta-weekly language exchange.

Second to last student was ペラペラ Satoko, who didn't really have a topic; we ended up talking about Tomoko a bit and I can't remember what else.

Oh, Carl the artist, who encouraged me to paint a few more canvases and display them, gave me a URL for the gallery where people can show paintings in Harajuku. He said that was the URL, or else it was within a couple clicks of the correct URL.

Jamie and Tiny Tracy were working hard when I rocked out.

Chatted with Michael a bit after he had the Japanese SDF (Self Defense Force) soldier (I can't remember his name), the man in whose first lesson with me I had been falling asleep until he said he was a soldier. I was like, "really? so, you're strong, yeah? let's arm wrestle."

(( I've beaten every other student with whom I've arm wrestled. ))

When we locked hands, his was like iron. I knew instantly he would win. He won.

So Michael finished the lesson with him, and I was like, "dude's tough, yo; you should arm wrestle his ass," and Michael was game.

Student crushed him in a trice.

We joked about that for a while, and had our own little arm wrasslin' match after the guy left. We declared it a draw; just like me an' Super Dave Osborne in high school, we couldn't get the other past that critical not-yet-beaten point. Funny how we were both rubbing our respective (torn) muscles after that.

francois

6:19pm JST Saturday 26 May 2007 (day 13576)

Ack. Just got an email from Shimpei; he forgot Francois at home, so I won't get him (Francois) back until Monday or Tuesday.

6:26pm JST

He just emailed me again:

I'll come to Shibuya for chinese lesson tomorrow.
He will be sitting beside the sexy receptionist by tomorrow afternoon.

I replied

ありがつっ、mate; you're forgiving for breaking my heart crushing my dream.

lesson with Shimpei

9:19pm JST Saturday 26 May 2007 (day 13576)

Talked to Shimpei about Ami situation, and thanked him for his previous advice, which turned out to be quite worthwhile.

1:24am JST Sunday 27 May 2007 (day 13577)

And, the language he gave me tonight also turned out to be worthwhile, while talking to Ami at McD's.

pink cow with Ami

1:10am JST Sunday 27 May 2007 (day 13577)

After meeting Shimpei, met Ami at Hachiko for a bit of a wander including our first time to プリクラ, our first time to マック, and our first time to The Pink Cow.

We got a bit sidetracked in the booth after the photo shoot at the プリクラ, so we missed the first option of choosing four pictures of the 8 that were taken. Most of those that were automagically selected were fine, so no worries. Plastered little hearts and stars and kanji etc on the pictures and printed them out. Chose not to wait for the single pair of scissors to become available before leaving.

At マック、 we Talked, and I found out that she already Knew, and I was a bit shocked, but it made me like her all the more.

Headed to The Pink Cow, where we found Brazilian night party in effect. Got drinks and nachos (the utterly delicious kind were not available) and chilled on the sofa munching as the place slowly became more crowded. Then time for us to dance dance dance dance, which we did with much energy and many smiles and kisses.

Tired after a while, so helped each other finish her Long Island Ice Tea before leaving, where upon the stairs I helped her finish the last of the drink.

A bit sidetracked in a semi dark part of the street, but ultimately made it to the station, where we confirmed our plan to meet for ultimate in less than 9 hours from now.