Entries this day: Home_improvement Japanese_Lounge_Night bourne_supremacy

Home improvement

6:38pm JST Sunday 11 April 2010 (day 14627)

During daylight hours today (after sleeping through at least 5 of them (except for helping Bananna get up at 6:30)) I basically worked around Chez Soness. Successfully completed: installing a cute shelf above her refrigerator on which I placed her modem and wireless router. This was intended to reduce the number of wires stringing from her kitchen to her desk. To keep electrical wire clutter down as well, I bought an outlet box and tapped into the electrical wire running where I put the shelf.

Interesting that I didn't take any pictures of the process. Hmm!

I also looked into planting the water fountain in the garden. This will require running an electrical wire from the shed (? (it's the nearest electrical outlet on her property)) to the fountain, and therefore require keeping the connection dry, even though it'll be in a garden with water hoses spraying, rain falling, earthworms squirming, etc.

When looking at where I can connect the outlet, the *easiest* solution would be to simply plug in an extension cord to the light that's dangling from its electrical wire attached to the top of the shed. That wouldn't be really pretty, nor stable, though.

Sooooo, I'm considering extending the wiring to add a light switch on the wall near the door (instead of pulling a string which can be hard to find in the dark). The easiest way for me to think about it would effectively triple the number of wires: current wires running from the current light location to the switch where they'd be split into two more pairs: one set running back to the light, and one set running to the garden fountain.

But it seems like there should be a way to limit the number of wires between the light and the switch. I guess confoozion comes from needing the fountain and light to be switched independently; I can't figure out how to do that, *and* have the switch away from the light, *and* limit the number of wires.

Japanese Lounge Night

7:59am JST Monday 12 April 2010 (day 14628)

Went to Japanese Lounge Night last night, arriving around 7:30 (I think). I sat at Emiko's table with her mates from English school: 一人, Akinari, Akiko, and Shin. They had just finished eating, so were unable to help eat my burrito. I chowed it methodically, while answering the basic questions we get asked, "where are you from?" and "what Japanese food do you like?" taking a brief break to go play a shoulder slung taiko drum on stage. After I finished drumming, I finished the burrito, and then Emiko gave me the rest of their salad, of which a significant portion remained. As I was finishing off the salad, using knife and fork as taught in the US, 一人 was like, 「すごい、フォクは上手ですね。」, or "wow; you're so good at using a fork!" And I laughed it off, and then he goes on to the most ridiculous question that westerners get asked all the time, "can you use chopsticks?" (( hint to anyone who has considered asking this question: don't ask. )) I took it a step further and claimed to not know what "chopsticks" were. Emiko assured them in Japanese that not only was I quite capable of handling chopsticks, but I carry three sets of "my hashi" in my backpack. (While normally true, (and I would have been happy to break them out to promote the idea that things can be reused) instead of throwing out new chopsticks at each meal, ironically last night I *wasn't* carrying them, as I had dumped my bag contents a few days earlier, and not sorted through everything.)

Japanese Lounge Night did *not* feature Kumiya, who normally organizes it. The lineup seemed to have a different flavor of performers than most nights, including comedy ukelele, and a comedy shamisen. However, Toshi played one of my favorite shamisen songs, so I asked if he had a CD; he'll send me one from his teacher in the mail.

I chatted with Emiko a bit; Akiko gave her a flyer for an annual (?) event where single men in Chiba invite single women from Tokyo to come out for a night to find themselves a partner. Wow.

I'll see Emiko on Wednesday during our normal English lesson timeslot, though this time I'll introduce Sho, who may help teach her some accounting while I'm in Thailand.

bourne supremacy

8:38am JST Monday 12 April 2010 (day 14628)

Bananna and I chatted a bit last night, discussing our days and how to best clean up the place before Soness gets home tonight. Then we watched Bourne Supremacy until 2am, and I'm tired now.