Entries this day: Soness_shopping TELL_auction Zzz_trains_are_late

Soness shopping

6:25pm JST Friday 6 November 2009 (day 14471)

Met Soness on her way home from Thailand! She's back after a multi-day adventure, just in time to go to the TELL Auction, but is choosing not to go, and has found someone to use the ticket. Nice. She and I met in Gotanda toilwt and then she joined me to the BIG SHOES shop where Soness helped me pick out some nice new dress shoes (black leather slip-ons) to match my suit. I dunno where my previous ones are. Did I leave them in Motosumiyoshi?

Randomly saw Soness's friend Blake who she introduced as her husband because they played husband and wife in some kind of acting thing.

TELL auction

11:07pm JST Friday 6 November 2009 (day 14471)

Tonight I attended the TELL (Tokyo English Life Line) Connoisseurs' Auction, basically to network with a new group of people in Tokyo. I had bought a ticket for Soness as well, but she was too tired to go, having just gotten back from Thailand. She called Yoshioka, owner of Ben's Cafe in Takadanobaba who joined me instead.

Most interesting was the live bidding, most of which was on varieties of wine that had been donated. There were a few non-alcoholic items, mostly involving travel, and then a hand painted silk screen and a photograph of Princess Diana from her last trip to Tokyo back some years ago. The photographer, David Stetson, offered a photo session with whomever bought the painting. I think it went for 130,000 yen, though I didn't keep careful track.

I met David the photographer. He's a big guy (rugby in university) and has been in Tokyo for a while. After we traded cards and he saw my "freestyle healing," He said he's broken 29 bones, including his shoulder, so he has a lump that feels similar to mine, though his is actually his bone, which didn't get medical treatment for a couple weeks and had begun to grow back by the time he got back. They were like, "we can re-break it, but it's won't likely be better than what you'll have if you just let this be," and he let it be.

Met a woman named Paola ("it's Italian,") owner of Yoga San in Setagaya. She actually approached Yoshioka and I, basically to tell us she had donated yoga lessons. But what wasn't specified on the description: it's a ten class course, and I assume each session is an hour. So I promptly went over and bid 50,000 yen on it (written auction) after confirming with Yoshioka that I could borrow 20,000 yen if I had to pay tonight (I didn't). I guess it makes sense that we didn't have to pay; how were they going to track down everyone who had won the items and possibly left the premises? Of course just call us the next day or so.

Anyway, I hope I got the classes. She said she may call me for some freestyle healing. Cool.

She was on her way out when she said HI to Yoshioka and I. I was like, "thanks for telling us," and she was like, "there was just something about you," or something like that. Hmmm... could it be my new shoes? New tie?

Zzz trains are late

12:09am JST Saturday 7 November 2009 (day 14472)

Just got on the train that was scheduled to leave at 11:40pm. Apparently someone's train of thought included jumping in front of a train around 11pm, cause 11:02pm was the time stuck on the marquee for a while. That train was about 45 minutes late when it left, but then they started tossing trains down the line like greased watermelons and the 12:06 train was only 5 minutes late.

My train just left about 30 minutes late (it was behind the backlog of trains on the other side of the platform as they got more and more on time, and it got more and more late).