Snow and Trash and Frostbite
Jan. 27th, 2008 10:50 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
blacklillyHaving been moaning about how cold it is here, and how it felt so much colder than last year, I was a little disheartened to return to Ina last weekend to find 3 inches of snow, and a further plunge in temperature. I don't know quite how cold it was, I didn't check and no one wants to talk about it being -8 so who knows. What I do know it this:
- it's so cold that I've had to limit the amount I drink because I don't want to go to the bathroom as it has become an exercise in torture.
-Cooking is also painful, the floor is blistering cold and if I accidentally go out there without putting on my slipper things bone ache results.
- I also found that my olive oil has frozen solid. It's currently thawing by my window.
-Going outside is pleasant in the sunshine, but night results in brain-freeze similar to eating ice cream too quickly.
- And school. We have to sit on our own in our classrooms with the aircon and the space heaters going and it still doesn't get rid of that numb feeling in your toes, despite the double socks, and boots I've taken to wearing. I even wear fingerless gloves in class because I can't write properly with frozen fingers.
Anyway, last weekend I went down to Gifu to meet up with my friends Kim and Rachel and watch John Waters movies. It being a cold day, we went for a walk along the river (which is beautifully clean - possibly the cleanest I've ever seen) and thoroughly deserved the rather fabulous outdoor onsen at the end of it. You can peer out of the bath at people skating at the park on the other side of the river, and they can try peering at you in your birthday suit. I stayed in rather too long and ended up with my face a shade of red that I can't actually describe other than "third-degree burn". It returned to a suitably pinkish colour by the time we arrived at the Natural Cafe. Going to onsen always gives me the munchies afterwards so we had prawn crackers, a salmon Ceasar salad; and a fabulous cheese, onion and mochi chijimi. Chijimi is a Korean-style pancake usually made with squid and other veggies, fried up and served in squares with a soy, vinegar and chilli dipping sauce. Scrummy. Then we took the bus back to Rachel's where we watched Pink Flamingos and Serial Mom whilst chowing down on the three kinds of curry Rachel has cooked up for us.
This week I've been attempting to pack away things, as it's only two weeks until I move. I've done nearly all of the books, though I suspect I will take them all out and rearrange them again. It seems like there's a lot of stuff here, but I suspect it's just the limited space which makes it look that way. It won't actually take very long to pack it all away so I may just wait a little longer before doing any more. I was finally given my new address yesterday. Whilst working in Yokohama, I'll actually be living in Tokyo. It's 17 minutes by train to Yokohama, which equates to about an hour by bike.
More to come later...maybe. I may go back to bed.
- it's so cold that I've had to limit the amount I drink because I don't want to go to the bathroom as it has become an exercise in torture.
-Cooking is also painful, the floor is blistering cold and if I accidentally go out there without putting on my slipper things bone ache results.
- I also found that my olive oil has frozen solid. It's currently thawing by my window.
-Going outside is pleasant in the sunshine, but night results in brain-freeze similar to eating ice cream too quickly.
- And school. We have to sit on our own in our classrooms with the aircon and the space heaters going and it still doesn't get rid of that numb feeling in your toes, despite the double socks, and boots I've taken to wearing. I even wear fingerless gloves in class because I can't write properly with frozen fingers.
Anyway, last weekend I went down to Gifu to meet up with my friends Kim and Rachel and watch John Waters movies. It being a cold day, we went for a walk along the river (which is beautifully clean - possibly the cleanest I've ever seen) and thoroughly deserved the rather fabulous outdoor onsen at the end of it. You can peer out of the bath at people skating at the park on the other side of the river, and they can try peering at you in your birthday suit. I stayed in rather too long and ended up with my face a shade of red that I can't actually describe other than "third-degree burn". It returned to a suitably pinkish colour by the time we arrived at the Natural Cafe. Going to onsen always gives me the munchies afterwards so we had prawn crackers, a salmon Ceasar salad; and a fabulous cheese, onion and mochi chijimi. Chijimi is a Korean-style pancake usually made with squid and other veggies, fried up and served in squares with a soy, vinegar and chilli dipping sauce. Scrummy. Then we took the bus back to Rachel's where we watched Pink Flamingos and Serial Mom whilst chowing down on the three kinds of curry Rachel has cooked up for us.
This week I've been attempting to pack away things, as it's only two weeks until I move. I've done nearly all of the books, though I suspect I will take them all out and rearrange them again. It seems like there's a lot of stuff here, but I suspect it's just the limited space which makes it look that way. It won't actually take very long to pack it all away so I may just wait a little longer before doing any more. I was finally given my new address yesterday. Whilst working in Yokohama, I'll actually be living in Tokyo. It's 17 minutes by train to Yokohama, which equates to about an hour by bike.
More to come later...maybe. I may go back to bed.