Nothing much

It's been a while since my last update, but honestly not a lot has really happened since all the excitement of April. It's been gray and rainy for pretty much the entire month of June; we had one afternoon a couple days ago when the sun actually came out, and it was exciting. I was going to go to the beach with some people this Sunday, but it's looking like it'll probably be rain again so it might not happen. I'll get to the beach one of these days.
I discovered that, oddly enough, sheets here are super expensive. I wanted to buy another set of sheets so that I could rotate them more easily; since it gets so humid in my apartment I want to wash them more than once a week, but that's sort of impossible with only one set of sheets because I need a full day for them to dry so I can only do it on weekends. So I went looking for new sheets on par with my old ones, only to discover that the cheapest sheet (that's sheet, singular - I haven't been able to find any sets) I could find was 2500 yen, and it's not even a nice soft high thread count. I don't remember the exact prices of sheets in America, but I'm fairly certain I didn't pay more than like fifteen bucks for my nice sea foam egyptian cotton sheets. I don't mind paying a little bit more for quality, but I'm not happy about paying a lot for something subpar : (
Anyway, I'll stop ranting about sheets now, lol. I was serious when I said there's nothing happening here!

No pictures, but a post nonetheless.

So, this past month I've been pretty busy. Parents visited in early April, for my birthday! and it was fun. We went out to a restaurant in Shinjuku for a birthday dinner, and it was quite good actually. We never did have 900 yen parfaits, but we did have crepes from a crepe stand in Shibuya, which, while not quite living up to mom's, were still pretty delicious. We took a day trip to Kamakura to see the Great Buddha, and also took a day trip to Nikko to see Ieyasu Tokugawa's mausoleum. We got to Nikko on a rickety old train that rivaled the Fujikyuu from last May; however at least on the Nikko train we actually had seats, and were not packed in like sardines (that only happened in Tokyo, almost every day). Nikko was a nice break from the city, all mountain air and trees and quiet. The mausoleum (we ended up touring Ieyasu's grandson's mausoleum instead of Ieyasu himself's, because it was cheaper, haha) was pretty fantastic, despite all the stairs. I have pictures... in theory, anyway.
Then I had about a week of rest after my parents left, before my friend Jon visited. He timed his visit for Golden Week, so I didn't have to take any more time off work. With Jon, we went out to an izakaya and to karaoke with some of my coworkers, and we also went clubbing with a couple of my friends. We hit a couple of museums and galleries as well, and walked around the Imperial gardens. Did some shopping in Shibuya and Harajuku, poked around Ginza. Oh, and we went down to Yokohama and walked around Chinatown, and thought about going on the giant Ferris wheel until we discovered it was like 1000 yen to ride it.
Now, things have slowed down and I'm not really doing a whole lot... just relaxing and hanging out at home, watching some Japanese dramas and being angry at the weather for still being cold even though it's already May. I'm thinking of trying to take a vacation soon, I have a friend who wants to go to Guam so I might try to see if she wants to go ahead and do it in June or July.

New post coming... eventually

My camera is acting up again, so unfortunately I won't be able to do another picture post until it decides to behave. Sorry! I'll keep trying, my camera just does this occasionally so I don't think it's permanent (well I really hope it's not, anyway). It just likes to randomly not read pictures sometimes. I think that on my next paycheck I might just bite the bullet and buy a new one. It's just getting kind of ridiculous the number of times my camera randomly decides to malfunction in new and interesting ways.

New post coming soon!

Promise!

More cherry blossoms

We've been getting a lot of little earthquakes recently here; just small tremors that sometimes wake me up at night. Just had one a minute ago, actually.
In other news, I went to Ueno Park a couple days ago for some more cherry blossom viewing. Ueno Park has a ton of cherry trees lining a couple paths, so as you walk through you're under a canopy of blossoms. It was really pretty, and it was kind of funny to see all the salarymen having picnics underneath the trees, haha. Picnicking under cherry trees is quite popular here, but there's just something slightly incongruous about seeing a bunch of suit-clad businessmen sitting on tarps having yakisoba and takoyaki under the trees! I'm planning on heading out this Sunday myself with a couple friends to do our own picnic under some trees, in Shinjuku Gyoen.
Here are some pictures from Ueno; I forgot to get batteries for my camera before I went, so they're just phone pictures again. I have a couple pictures of the salarymen and some more of the trees, but they'll have to be a different post.

Concert and cherry blossoms

Yesterday I went to a TOKIO concert. My first concert in Japan, whoo! It was at the Budokan, a pretty big arena in central Tokyo that was originally constructed as a sumo stadium; lots of artists have played at it through the years though. The area that the Budokan is in turns out to be absolutely gorgeous in spring - it's right next to a moat lined with cherry trees that were all in bloom. Lots and lots of sakura overhanging a moat, it was soooo pretty. So before making my way over to the stadium, I first walked around and took a bunch of pictures of the sakura; lots of other people were doing the same thing though, so I had to fight my way through. The place was incredibly crowded, because three groups of people were all converging at the same time - the people going to the concert, people just there for the cherry blossoms, and people heading for nearby Yasukuni shrine. There were police all over the place trying to keep order.
And here are some pictures! Aren't you all excited? They're all pictures from my phone; I tried to take some pictures of the cherry blossoms with my camera, but it was out of batteries and I didn't have time to try to run to a convenience store to pick some up. So, I picked up a couple uchiwa at the concert; these two are of Nagase and Taichi, my two favorite members. The Taichi one is actually going to be for a friend, though. Uchiwa are traditional for Johnnys concerts; generally you wave them around to show support for your favorite members, haha. And then, sakura! These are just a small taste of the scenery surrounding the entrance to the Budokan. I had no idea before that it was such a pretty area; the stadium itself is pretty cool too. I guess I'm just used to American stadiums that are surrounded by parking lot, not cherry trees and a moat.

My Fridge!

Check out my tiny fridge! Isn't it cute? Well, kind of drab actually... I looked for other colors but all they had was grey. Oh well, it's the perfect size for me anyway. That pink bag next to it is non-burnable garbage that I think should go out on Thursday... have to double check that. I should post a picture of the garbage schedule next; separate days for burnable, non-burnable, papers, PET bottles, glass bottles, and hazardous items (like broken glass etc). No dumpster to just toss it all into whenever, and it's frowned upon to leave garbage in the little wire cage designated for it (to keep the crows from attacking) more than just the night before. If we didn't have that little cage, it wouldn't even be the night before, it would have to be the day of so that the crows wouldn't get in and make a mess.
And you get a bonus, too - the inside of my fridge! Nothing terribly exciting, just some apples, an orange, leftover pasta (I can have leftovers again! whoo), eggs, yogurt, green peppers, part of a red pepper, carrots, and some leftover store-bought mabodofu (which is this spicy tofu dish that I've become rather fond of since I've been here). On the arm is orange juice, coffee, and pasta sauce.
Then finally, a picture of the storage unit I just bought from this place in Shinjuku. It's a household goods store, and everything in the place is 1050. It borders another store that sells smaller goods for 300. Unfortunately everything in the smaller store seems to be decorated with cutesy hearts and rubber ducks. No thank you. I can probably pick up the same sort of things at a 100 yen store anyway.