Spendorexia Nervousa

I'm trying to cut back on my spending. Today I came up with some new rules to cut back and added them to the old ones:

1. No drinking alcohol.

2. No buying coffee, coffee grounds, tea, or soda. Only water, juice, and tea bags or loose tea.

3. No eating between meals unless I'm hungry.

4. No eating dessert, chocolate, or candy.

5. No buying clothes.

Skillet Skones!

This afternoon I came home during my lunch break and made a recipe for "Basic Bannock" from a backpacking book I made photocopies of because I'm too cheap to buy my own copy. Anyway, the recipe was really easy and you just put the little dough patties on a greased skillet and cook 'em till they're brown on the top and bottom and cooked through.

They were good.

When I went back to work, I started thinking, as those who love bread but don't have an oven will do, if I could make more bread-like things on the stove. I really love scones, but to buy one in Japan that is decent really takes a chunk of change. Could I combine my favorite scone recipe with this bannock recipe to make a bread worthy of breaking my fast every morning?

Tonight, I answered that question with what I have dubbed "Skillet Skones."

Ingredients:
1 cup all purpose flour
1/4 cup sugar (any kind)
1tsp baking powder
1/2tsp salt
1/4 cup milk
2Tbs butter
hand full of dried fruit (opt.)

Directions:
1. Mix all dry ingredients in a mixing bowl. Slowly add milk until dough is binded (bound?).
2. Melt butter on skillet over med or med-low heat.
3. Divide dough into 4 equal parts and form them into balls. Then squish the balls onto the hot, buttered skillet until they're about a 1/4 inch thick.
4. Keeping the heat not-too-high so you don't burn them, lightly brown one side and then the other by flipping the skones. When you think the middle has lost it's dough-y-ness eat. Enjoy. Tell your friends without ovens.

Roma Numa

Drip Pot Woodneck

A friend gave me drip coffee maker. I finally used it the other day with overwhelming results. Overwhelming because I made coffee so strong Magic Carp was up all night.

Here's a photo.
Thanks, Mrs. Olson.

Lake Yamanaka Camping

The snow on Fuji-san in the distance was a beautiful back-drop for the weekend. I was camping near Yamanaka Lake in Yamanashi Prefecture, Japan.


View Lake Yamanaka in a larger map

At nearly 1000meters above sea level Lake Yamanaka isn't so high up, but at the base of Fuji-san it's a lot colder than where I live! Last year at this time, the campsite was covered in two feet of snow with temps dropping below freezing... even during the day! This weekend it wasn't that cold and there wasn't snow, but I was still uncomfortably chilled at night. During the day, there was so much to do, we were too busy to feel the cold.

This being my first big camping trip with the Boy Scouts organization and because I was not as prepared as I would have liked to have been, I was unsure of what the weekend would be like and a bit apprehensive. Fortunately, I need not have worried.

The trip was to a Boy Scouts of America (BSA) Klondike Derby. Unfortunately, without snow it is impossible to race sleds on skis. The organizers had plenty of other events for the scouts and crew members to do on Saturday, including first aid and throwing hatchets (the best-liked activity of the weekend for the scouts and crew members and the most nerve-wracking for me).

It was really nice to get out of the crowds and into the country. The only thing I didn't enjoy was sleeping in the cold on Saturday night. My mummy sleeping bag was too large and roomy. Even with all my clothes stuffed in under and around me, there was too much dead air space for my body to heat up. Another problem I had was my sleeping pad. Since I sleep curled up in a ball, most of my body just wasn't on it (= conductive heat loss). When I stretched out, I lost my pocket of warm air around my chest. Sometimes, you just can't win.

What did win, however, was the campfire. When everybody got together for the campfire, I was unsure what would happen. Every group was supposed to present two songs or skits. It was no youtube, but the theory behind the program is pretty exciting. Presuming groups don't just throw something together last minute (my group did), I saw great potential for shenanigans rivaling post-game ultimate cheers.

All in all, a stellar weekend. Wish you were here. Even though there were somethings that I could have planned better, next time I'll remember: Be prepared.

Family History

Genny and Kathy were walking around an outdoors man store and checking out camping equiptment.

Genny drew Kathy's attention to a collapsible drip coffee maker.

Genny: Hey, mom, look at this. That's useful.
Kathy: Yeah it is. (Pause.) Or you could just use your sock. (Pause.) That's what my grandmother did.
(Big pause.)
Genny: Wasn't your grandmother a four foot eight Puerto Rican woman?
Kathy: Yes.
(Pause.)
Genny: She went camping?
Kathy: No. It was a clean sock... That's just the way it was around the house.

Rob Kostelnik The Amazing

Grocery Shopping

Sometimes when I grocery shop, my mind wanders to odd places. If I got scurvy from my poor diet, would I either go to a doctor and have to pay the difference from the national health insurance deductible or buy an onion and eat it raw? If I got pregnant, would I either spend the majority of my money on a balanced diet or on doctor's visits? Sometimes I start thinking of my mother when she grocery shops. She is incredibly slow, has to walk up and down every aisle, and is a general pain to shop with. She compares the prices of everything from toilet paper to peanuts and will climb the shelves in pursuit of a good deal. Then I think about how I do the same thing and console myself with the knowledge that I don't drag anyone else into it.

With housemates numbering from six to eight with the accompanying six to eight boyfriends, girlfriends, and justfriends, an hour of silence during college was a miracle and I soon learned that grocery shopping was meditative. Driving to the store (the only time I ever used my car), finding parking, walking into the store and taking my time were all pieces of a soothing ritual. I can still remember exactly what I would do at the store. After taking the elevator up from the garage, I'd have to go out into the ground floor parking lot for a cart. Of course the smaller cart that just carried the hand basket was my preference as I rarely bought more for myself.

I'd enter the store and turn immediately to the left. Bakery. Deli on the left. Produce: fruits then vegetables. Greens on the right. With that phase over, walk into the other half of the store. Turn right and walk down the organic food aisle then up the next aisle, ethnic foods. Here I'd deviate and go look at the meats department. First fish then beef skipping the rest. Of course the milk would then be directly in front of me and I'd have to make the age old decisions: Soy or cow? If soy, what flavor? If cow, organic or generic? Half gallon or gallon? On it would go until three hours had passed, I'd walked up and down every aisle (including the baby food one), and I had maybe eight or nine things in my basket.

When I graduated from college I moved around from family member to family member before settling down on my own. Unexpectedly (to me at least) I have less money now than in college. I also have less time to spend at the grocery. On top of that, I live in a country with a language I can't read. Grocery shopping has lost some of it's initial charm, but our relationship is stronger for it. I walk to the grocery store. I'm not sure if the bicycle parking is free for more than 30 minutes. Perusing the aisles I can't read the labels and the directions on the packaging for preparing the food is unintelligible, so I stick with the drinks and prepared food sections.

I try to skip past the produce section, but if I have the time I will walk slowly up and down every aisle breathing deeply. The oranges are my favorite, but the mushroom section has a comforting odor. Seasonal fruits are a delight. I have spent minutes standing in front of the strawberries inhaling as strongly as I could and ignoring the weird stares. I look forward to melon season.

It's likely I will someday be a replicate of my mother wired on coffee and walking up and down the aisles with two full carts and four grumpy teenagers waiting to get back to life outside the grocery store. Until then, I think that no matter how poor or rich I might get grocery shopping will remain a source of entertainment and relaxation, even if I can't read the labels to check for the presence of dyes, chemicals, and mango.

Nara Trip: Chapter One: I Go to a Park Pictures

Pictures from Chapter One on Picasa

Nara Trip: Chapter One: I Go to a Park

This morning I found myself in Yagi-shi in the middle of Nara prefecture. So I decided to go to a park. In fact, I decided to go to Nara Park. After a brief stop at the Softbank store to see if they could fix my phone that got dropped in the toilet last night (no, they couldn't) and another at a Tully's to grab some coffee (left) I made my way to Nara Koen right near Kintetsu-Nara train station.


Since I first walked down some shopping streets I ended up beginning my tour with Sarusawa-no-Ike pond (right). This pond had a very lovely view of Kofukuji Temple's Five-Story Pagoda and Nan-endo Hall. The Five-Story Pagoda (below left) is a National Treasure and the second highest pagoda in Japan. Built in 1426, the pagoda now standing is an exact replica of the original built in 730. Alternately, Nan-endo Hall (below right) was constructed in the 18th century.











Also in the Kofukuji Temple complex is Tokondo Hall (above middle). You can go into the hall for a small fee, but I decided to just stay out and watch other people go in. It's like they were making prayers for me. Since this strategy worked so well at Tokondo Hall, I took it on for the rest of the temples too: other people ring the bell and acknowledge the diety/buddha while I look on and sponge off their spiritual cleansing by proximity. Come on, it's the oldest trick in the book!


As I was walking around, I of course saw the famous Nara deer (or shika as they say over here ("When in Rome... ") or Sika Deer as they say in U.S. zoos, or Cervus nippon as they say in more academic circles). While not especially excited at the nearness of them, I do think they added to the overall ambiance of the temples and shrines throughout the park.


After Kofukuji Temple, I wandered towards the Nara National Museum (right). Since it was still early when I first passed the temple, I decided to come back to it when it was colder outside. When I did, it was so late that unfortunately I only had an hour in the museum and so only got to look around the East and West wings and not the original museum building pictured here. Although I did not get to see any of the Todaiji Temple treasures, they did have a special exhibit on On-Matsuri and Kasuga which was really interesting. Although not all of the plaques on the exhibits had English translations, for the most part the beauty of the pieces, whether they were silk paintings, reliquary shrines, or scrolls of edicts or inventory, was enough. I would recommend you designate two hours if you go, though, so that you're not caught halfway through the museum at closing time.

With a bit more wandering, dazed and confused because I refused to continually check my location in my guidebook and it seemed every public map I looked at was of a different park (very confusing), but anyway I eventually found myself walking up the lantern-lined pathway to Kasuga Taisha Shrine. Unfortunately, I was so enthralled by the stone lanterns, I kind of skimmed over the shrine bit to get back to the pathways leading to, from, and around it. I guess it's a testament to the beauty of the over-all layout of the park that you can walk down a path and feel just as at-peace as if you were sitting in a quiet church. Because of this infinite regress (word choice?), I decided to put a picture up of lanterns in Kasuga Taisha Shrine (left).

Outside of Kasuga Taisha Shrine is a beautiful botanical garden. Even though it's the last week of December and all the leaves have made a brown blanket over the entire forest floor, I found the walk through the woods refreshing. It reminded me of hiking in the woods back in New York and I was left with the thinking to myself, "If it was summer, I wouldn't have to worry about startling a rattler. Isn't that nice?" And it is.

The next point of interest in Nara Park was Tamukeyama Hachimangu Shrine (right). Keep in mind, though, there is a lot between point A and point B, but this is supposed to be a chapter, not a Bronte book. Just like with Kasuga Taisha Shrine, I was wandering without a map and it made my path just a little different than the average course. I came upon the shrine through the back entrance and that's why the photo looks a bit run-down. I didn't realize my mistake until I got on the internet and tried to confirm the name of the shrine. All the photos on google were of the front entrance to the shrine which looks quite grand. The back entrance I came in and the side entrance I went out were not so grand, but their authentic/eclectic (I can't think of the word that really describes it for me) looks were yet impressive where they lacked grandeur.

Right next to Tamukeyama Hachimangu Shrine is Nigatsudo Hall (left). From what I've gathered, this place is famous for two things. Firstly, it's got a killer view of Nara city. Even though I got there a bit late in the afternoon and a haze had just settled over the hills in the distance, I was still able to see quite far and the peak of Daibutsuden Hall in the distance was the ultimate teaser for this tourist. Secondly, apparently there is some ritual (annual?) at the temple in which fires are lit to give it the appearance of burning down. Yeah, you don't believe me or think that it doesn't actually look like it's on fire, but I seriously thought that the pictures I was were of the temple burning down.


Daibutsuden Hall (right) was more impressive than I thought it would be, but also more crowded than any other area of the park. The inside of the hall is filled with magnificent, giant statues. I thought that the Buddha would be the main attraction, but he's flanked by two giant, though smaller, attendants. The detail in these giant statues is incredible. You need to put down your camera, zone out the buzz of the crowd, and just concentrate on the statues. Even then, though, you'll leave feeling like you didn't get to really appreciate the hall. At least, that's how I felt. The gift shops were in the hall with the statues as well as right before the exit. I guess that's just an inevitable symptom of being one of the main attractions of the city.

Traveling out Nandaimon Gate (below) I started heading back to Yagi. Of course, I stopped at the National Museum on my way back to the station and then had to wait twenty minutes at the station for my train(!), but it was a really great day. Somewhere between Kasuga Taisha Shrine and Tamukeyama Hachimangu Shrine I started to get hungry, but I wasn't about to over pay for poor Japanese food so I neglected to eat lunch. By the time I was on the train, I was incredibly hungry. Maybe next time I'll bring a bento.

Sing When You're Winning

I know it's been a while and I'm working on something with a bit more substance, but this morning I wrote a cheer while drinking my coffee. You'll see a bunch of babble in the last verse; that's Japanese and I think different conjugations of our team name (Iku). Just use the ol' rise and fall of every other syllable of Shakespeare class:

I drink.
I sing.
I rock.
I dance.
I party hard at every chance.
I huck.
I bid.
I pillage.
I burn.
I score us points on every turn.
I catch.
I cut.
I sky.
I mark.
I appreciate a drunk land shark.
Iku.
Iko.
Itta.
Kurru.
Ultimate is all I do!

Creeps

Recently I've met the most creepy person I've ever met in my life. My list of creeps is short. When I lived in Europe, I was encountering creepy men everywhere. In college I just met jerks, but they were not creepy; they were just jerks. Now, I think that in "the real world" I have met a real creep. It's enlightening. Combining the sleaziness of being my superior and the annoyance of my own dependence upon his company, he not only has taken the cake, but he has baked the cake, hollowed it out, and is waiting inside of it to pop out at the most inappropriate time possible.

Mainly as a reaction to not having men hit on me in high school, there were creeps around every corner in Europe. I wore my high school ring on my left ring finger and turned it around so it looked like a wedding band every time I road the trains. In Amsterdam walking around the city one night another tourist came up and propositioned me for sex. This was definitely creepy, but I just got pissed off and swore at him. Seriously, 50 euros? I'm way better than that.

During college, all the guys that were creepy got warned and told to stop. They stopped. This was made easier by the fact that they were all below me.

Now I find myself face-to-face with someone I can't fake being married with or swear at or just dismiss because he's my boss. He hired me under false pretenses, he makes inappropriate suggestions, and is overly familiar in his written and verbal communication with me. In the states, I'd claim sexual harassment and get his behavior changed faster than a NASCAR oil change. Unfortunately, I can't do that because I need his company (meaning an institution, not a social relationship) for my visa.

What if you had to deal with a creep for a limited time? I've been brainstorming and have come up with the following stratagem: Suck it up a few more weeks, get my contract translated, figure out how much notice I need to give him before I quit, get my visa, quit.

So after these six years of meeting creeps, will my newest approach take care of the creeps? Pretending to be someone else works if they don't know who you are. Swearing works for creeps who I don't need to have a relationship with. Explaining to a guy why he's creeping you out only works when you both know you're better than them. Before the 1964 Civil Rights Act what did women do in situations like this?

Daily Commutes

I'm currently in the process of looking at apartments I cannot afford. Because I am looking at the lower end of the housing bracket, finding conveniently located apartments is difficult since I work at two separate occupations separated by 1.5 hours of trains. One (Job A) of these jobs is consistently 5 days a week, but the other (Job B) is only one day a week with the possibility of more sporadically throughout the year.

I can find a small apartment for under 50000 yen near a train station that is a block away from Job A and an hour and a half away from Job B. There is another apartment twice the size of that one and semi-furnished for a little over 50000 yen a five minute bus ride from Job A and an hour fifteen minutes from Job B.

The question is this: Is a commute of over an hour a few times a week worth it if you're paying low rent on your apartment?

Lost beach

When I was in Hawaii, the people I stayed with took me to the Lost set. Here are some of the photos I took with my camera phone.

This is a photo of the beach next to the set. There were dozens of giant sea turtles feeding just feet from where the water was hitting the shore. It was really beautiful there and, as you can see, the weather wasn't too bad either.

These are my friends in front of the set. They weren't shooting that day, so the entire set was surrounded by that orange fence and the actual huts themselves covered in plastic wrap. Because all beaches are public in Hawaii, they can't really keep people away from the set and even during filming, people are allowed to come down to the beach.

This is Sawyer's cabin, shrink wrapped. Since his cabin was right next to the orange fencing, it was pretty easy to take a photo of it. To see a shot of the back of this cabin from the show, go here.

Mr. Eko's church from season two.

Finally, here is a really short, shoddy videos I took of the set with my phone (if it doesn't work, it's probably hanging out with the roan):

Very Badly Burned

Do you know what sheet beating is? It is when you take someone out back, cover them with a bed sheet, and start wailing on them. That is what a sunburn feels like.

Parasol

The other day I went to work at the preschool in the morning and my conversation school in the afternoon. This humidity and heat kills me, though, and even though I purposefully wore white and cotton, I had sweat about five gallons by the time I got to my conversation classes. So on my train ride, I made the decision to get myself a parasol and I stopped in the store next to my station and picked one up.

Now, I was not sure what the difference was, if any existed, between an umbrella and a parasol. Most of the parasols I've seen around Japan have been black, lace-y, and carried by old women. So I was slightly surprised to find two separate sections of umbrellas in the store. One seemed purely full of rain umbrellas. The other had a smattering of frills to it and so I assumed this to be the parasol section. I thought that this was the only thing separating the rain-deflectors from the sun-rejectors, but hoo, how wrong I was.



These are the labels from the parasol I eventually bought. Now, I don't know Japanese, but I like to think I can understand them anyway (that there are English translations helps too).

The top left label reads something like this:

"Precautions for Use!
This product has a pointed end. Be sure to check the safety of your surroundings before using umbrella.
Do not use the umbrella as a walking stick.
Do not use the umbrella if the handle of the rib tips are damaged.
Do not swing or throw the umbrella around.
Do not use the umbrella against gale force wind as it may break.
Do not touch the rib structure of the umbrella.
When the umbrella is not completely dry, keep it away from clothing and other items as it may cause color transfer.
*Please watch young children when they use the umbrella."

Unfortunately, the tag below had something else to say about the color fastness of the product:

"UVoutex Fabrics
Healthy, Cool, Comfortable
This fabric, absorbs and dramatically reduces ultraviolet rays
protects your skin from these damaging ultraviolet rays
keeps you more comfortable and cooler because of its unique shading qualities
has the qualities of colorfastness, softness and is durable through frequent washings"

So is it colorfast or not? Only time and an unexpected shower will tell.

Intellectuals v. Celebrities

On a recent road trip, some friends and I were discussing the failure of Americans to view intelligent, smart people as famous. Celebrities known for personalities and looks are more likely to be household names than people who constantly analyze, challenge, and shape the way we think.

Intelligent people should have a more prominent standing in today's pop culture, but a person's intelligence is not proved by their intellectual capabilities alone. In the introduction to their list of the top 20 public intellectuals, Foreign Policy magazine wrote that, "part of being a 'public intellectual' is also having a talent for communicating with a wide and diverse public." Intelligence is useless if you can't communicate your ideas to the public. Not only should you be in open communication with your peers with your findings and ideas, but also with the entire public as well. In order to do this, not only do you need to communicate effectively with the language of the intellectual, but also in a way intelligible to the upper, lower, and middle classes and the various ethnicities that compose our society.

It would be easy to say that the reason there aren't too many intellectuals in US pop culture is because they don't make an effort to explain their thoughts to the general public, but that's not true. Television, radio, and print are all accessible media where academics and intellectuals have presented the views to the public. Not only are there television programs like CNN's Larry King Live and CBS' 60 Minutes, but also shows like The Daily Show and its spin off The Colbert Report that use humor when presenting current events, authors, and politicians. NPR hosts several programs across the country aimed at informing the public of current politics, scientific innovations, and literary criticisms, to name some of their programming. The person with the highest IQ in the world writes a newspaper column, there are new books published every month, and countless magazines for every subject imaginable.

Albert Einstein was an international celebrity in his own time, but would you call Stephen Hawkings a celebrity? Have you read one of his books? Have you ever read one of his interviews or heard him field questions? How many people on Foreign Policy's list have you ever heard of? I'd only heard of three: Muhammed Yunus, Al Gore ,and Richard Dawkins.

Bowtie!!!

Here is the bowtie I made for my father for Father's Day. Having never seen him in anything but a necktie before, I must say he looks quite dapper. I used the pattern in the Knitter's fall 2005 magazine with Wildfoote sock yarn in the color tom cat. (linen stitch, two US#0 dpns)


The dashing young man waiting for his date.

A close up on the accessory.

Prom Night '08: Woot!

Socks, cardigans, sweaters, and dresses

As requested, here are the photos of the items mentioned in the previous post:
Interweave Knits holiday 2007

Interweave Knits spring 2006

knit.1 spring 2006

Knitter's fall 2005

Interweave Knits winter 2007

Vogue Knitting winter 2007/2008

Vogue Knitting spring/summer 2008

What should I knit?

Recently, my father bought me a tush-load of Wildfoote sock yarn. Now he's already told me that he doesn't want socks, so I'm going to make him a bow tie instead. It will not however take a tush-load of yarn to make a bow tie so I'll have plenty left over to do with as I please.

Sock yarn is very exciting to work with. It is much thinner than the more commonly used yarns and the smaller gauge is much more finished and durable than the preferred larger gauges of today. (For more info, see Interweave Press' Knit So Fine and Kristen Rengren's article for knitty.com The Joy of Vintage Patterns.) Unfortunately for me, picking a pattern is like picking my nose with my pinkie toe: really hard. They're all so pretty! I've narrowed it down to 5 different types of patterns though and hopefullly that will help.

The first is the sock. Socks are generally quick to knit. I have three nice patterns for socks in the correct gauge. Two are lacey patterns from Interweave Knits magazine (spring 2006 and holiday 2007) and one is a ribbed thigh-high (um, I'll probably shorten that) from Knit 1 magazine (spring 2006).

The second is the cardigan. Cardis are pretty vintage in the knitting scene: the old shell and cardi combo as they say. I have a cute 3/4 sleeve pattern from Knitter's (fall 2005) that, if I double up the yarn, I can make on US size 5 needles. I don't really want to double up the yarn, but the cardi is just so cute.

The sweater is another knitting standard. I've found two nice patterns that have the right gauge from Vogue Knitting magazine (winter 2007/08) and Interweave Knits magazine (winter 2007).

Lastly, there's the dress. The dress isn't really a standard, but the lacey pattern I'm looking at from Vogue Knitting magazine (spring/summer 2008) has a delicate and classy feel to it.

Anyway, vote or don't vote. I've got to find a pattern for a bow tie...

In other news, I learned gas is 50yen more expensive per liter in Japan that the US today.