Weekly Update

After the veritable flurry of blogs of last (two weeks ago? Time is strange here), I gave it a miss for a while, being all blog-ed out. Now, however, I am back and refreshed and ready to write some more. (?)

Not too terribly much has happened since the last post. Classes, homework, just the daily grind. Honestly, the days start to blur together because of their sameness.

However, this weekend, Dan Leech made an appearance. Dan is an OU grad who is studying on a Fullbright grant near Tokyo, and decided to come visit us and hang out. Dan is a lot of fun. Thursday, John went to meet him at the train station while some of us went to go drink in a club room until Dan met us. Then we continued to drink in the club room. It was a good time.

Friday, I don't think anyone had classes, at least I didn't, but I was awakened from a hungover sleep by my phone ringing with Mom on the other end wishing me a Happy Thanksgiving. After she let me go, I went back to sleep for a couple of hours.

When I finally rose, I had a leisurely morning of talking on the computer, taking a nice long shower, and then getting dressed. Dan took a shower in the dorm, too. He had stayed in the club room the previous night since there aren't many hotels around here. But, anyway, a group of us went down to a local ramen shop for lunch. This place has great ramen. Unfortunately, Jessie and I (the other 3 monther) had to go early to look at King-sensei's car to make sure our bags could fit. He'll be driving us to the airport instead of us having to worry about shipping bags and navigating the trains and such. It's much better this way.

After looking at King's car, we had a little while free. Then, we went to Nagoya Dome at 3. When I say 3, I really mean that I was ready at 3, when I was told we would be leaving, then we waited for 20 minutes on someone, then caught the bus, then waited at the train station for more stragglers. If there is one thing I can't stand, it's having to wait on people. I'm normally a patient kind of guy, but if someone says, "Be ready to go at 3," it means you need to be ready to go at 3. So we didn't end up getting to the dome until around 4:30. Anyway, we went shopping. The dome contains an extremely large shopping mall. I only bought one thing, but I blew money in the arcade trying to win an Elmo head for Grandpap. I didn't get it. Came close, but the crane cheats.

We met some people in Fushimi for dinner. At the Hard Rock Cafe. It was a going away party for Jessie and myself. I say "a" because I'm sure there are many more to come. The food was delicious, if slightly pricy, but that's Hard Rock for you. Since it was a going away party, Jessie and I got balloons. Then we got dragged up to the stage to dance to "YMCA" in front of the entire restaurant. Jessie was embarassed, but I rolled with it. It was a good time. We bought some souveniers in the gift shop, then retired to a nearby bar for some drinks. Many people were to be out the whole night. The trains stop around midnight. I however, did not want to be out until 5 in the morning when the trains started again. So I returned. On an incredibly full subway car, I might add. We were literally packed in like sardines. From the subway to the railway, and from the railway, I walked home from the station, finally getting into my room around 1:30. The doors locked at midnight, so I had to knock on a window and ask someone to come open the door for me. I called Dad, talked to some friends for a little bit, and finally collapsed into bed. All in all, a good experience.

I'll be home soon. I'm excited and sad.