The Ghost of Jumper Cables Past

Last night I was washing the dishes, my doorbell rang.

It was an older man (somewhere between the age of 30 and seventy five - this country doesn't age for fifty years then BAM! they're older'n hell). He stood leaning forward into the doorway, hands on hips, making very direct eye contact.

"do you drive that suzuki?"
"yeah, i do" i reply
"yer light's on"
"oh, thanks!"

i shut the door for just a moment to put on my shoes, but when i open it again he's gone. completely. i checked the street as i walked to my car. he just went [poof] in that single instant.

Thank you headlight fairy.

Me too, kid, me too

one of the questions that invariably comes up in my conversations with japanese middle school girls (don't look at me like that - i'm a teacher, remember) is whether or not Adam-sensei has A Girlfriend. In Japanese or suprisingly enthusiastic English, it always comes out.

Just yesterday a student took that conversation in a direction i hadn't heard before. hearing that yes, i had attained A Girlfriend, the 8th grader clasped her hands and looked hopeful.

"ohhhhh I definitely want to marry a foreigner." (she's assuming that Girlfriend is Japanese - she's not)
"why's that?" I ask
"I want half babies! they're soooooo cuuute."


PS japanese middle school girls are also fascinated with my arm hair.

Mornings are hard....

Here is an actual email I sent to my office in order to explain why I was late to work (rarely happens!) a week or so ago. Reading over it today i decided it belongs here:

On January 30th, 2009, I arrived at [middle school x] at 9:45 AM. Though I did not miss any scheduled classes for that day, I did come to work an hour an a half late. I apologize for my tardiness and offer this explanation.

The night before I had driven down to Otsuchi-machi in Iwate to stay at a friend's apartment. The times I had done this previously I would leave for Takizawa at 4 AM and arrive back in town well before the start of school. This particular morning, however, I bumped back my departure to 6 AM, thinking I'd drive straight to work. While I left promptly at that time, traffic apparently caused by an accident on one of the small roads outside of Otsuchi meant that it took a full hour to get out of Kamaishi, a trip that usually lasts 20 minutes. Soon my car and i found ourselves trapped in the bumper-to-bumper shuffling grid of south-central iwate rush hour (which, confusingly, exists. When I realized, quite belatedly in retrospect, that I would not arrive at work anytime around 8:15/30, I pulled over to call the company. I also purchased a sandwich at this time (delicious). My car soon was soon back in that bizarre phenomenon of inaka rush-hour traffic. Escaping this, I made good time heading west through the mountains at my car's top alpine speed of 60 km/hr. At some point, most likely while busy wondering if I would actually get there in time for my first class, I missed a turn somewhere and ended up... somewhere else. I don't know where. Lots of cattle, though. I followed signs for the misleadingly-named Kamaishi expressway (which curiously starts in Hanamaki city and ends at Hanamaki Aiport... rougly 60 km short of its namesake). I picked up that highway and took the toll road north traveling at speeds previously thought impossible in my current vehicle. Deemed impossible, in fact, or at least a very bad idea, by my mechanic at my last inspection. I got to school just in time for second period, grabbed my materials, and spent a surprising amount of time teaching some 15-year-olds how to pronounce "discipline."

[from then I do some very sincere knee-scraping which I will spare you. in the end, nobody got hurt and i didn't get fired. hoorah.]

TEST IS OVER

ok, so... I'm really going to try to get back to posting on here. once a month. I'm done studying, my life is in order, and you have a right to know what's going on in my life. Maybe.