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Generally there is not to much we miss in Tokyo, it has most things we could wish for.Patrick does often speak wistfully of his Sumo Breakfast he used to have every weekend in Richmond after training; Bacon, eggs, toast, tomatoes and who knows what else.

I miss nice cafes.

I am hoping to have found the answer for both our wishes in a cafe/restaurant not far from here, which I just accidentally discovered on line… cross your fingers for us! We are going to have a look tomorrow if we can bear the weather.

The image I stole from their website, Tarlum is the name, hope they have such lovely cakes tomorrow.

The weather has been so horrid and humid this last week that I haven’t been at all inspired to go out and take photos or do anything interesting.Patrick and I were very excited to find yellow watermelons in the supermarket a little while ago, but apparently everyone else has already seen them, so thats not such big news.

I did see some more odd watermelons in The Japan Times a few days ago though.

Farmers have started growing square watermelons. I think it is done by putting the melons into square containers when they are young… Ha! Bet you haven’t tried one of those yet.

I couldn’t find the original article from the paper, but have stolen a pic from ananova.com.

I had an awful dash to work today when a shift was messed up and I had to rush to a branch I had never been to with no time to spare.

The trains here are excellent, but could possible be marked a little more clearly at times. Finding the correct platform is usually quite straightforward, however, if the platform is shared by more than one line, things get horribly confusing.

Today I had to take the Saikyo line, which shares its platform with two other trains. On the noticeboard that announces the arrival times for each train and whether each will be local, or rapid, or express, or semi express or… whatever else they are… the line is called something completely different. Eeehh… why is it done this way?

Luckily I asked another commuter at the platform rather than trusting my instincts today and was given the correct arrival time.

15 minutes and a few stops down, I saw my platform assistant hop off the train and carefully check all the departure times at that station and a few of the signs along the platform. She then ran back into the carriage and told me that if I took the train next to ours it would get me to my destination much faster.

So sweet!

I chatted a little to her for then next few minutes and found out that she was on her way to get some travel vaccinations as she leaves on a world trip next week. If only I hadn’t been so flustered in my rush to work, I might have thought to get her email address and maybe be able to repay her favour one day. I’m so disappointed I didn’t.

I think Patrick and I miss out on meeting a lot of sweet people just because it is the two of us travelling together, we are not quite so approachable, probably even more so because Patrick is easily mistaken for a local.

We do have our lovely friend at Kuchaina though, who seems to delight in us despite our togetherness. We went to dinner there again on Friday and I was a little sad when we were seated by an unfamiliar staff-member.

A few minutes later, however, our friend dashed out from her hiding place and into the middle of the restaurant to wave madly and yell “Konbanwa!” at us before rushing back out to her evening’s post in the kitchen. A very welcoming reception.

So, I am 100% better now, and it’s my Friday evening, so I don’t really have any excuses left for not posting anything.I am happily listening to a student’s CD at the moment, he gave it to me on Friday after I mentioned that I was leaving. It is his CD as in he is the artist, not as in it’s his copy of Britney’s latest…

The CD is The Three Semicircular Canals, and the band is Hypercube. Go buy their stuff if you can, Ken shouldn’t have to spend his weekdays as a salary-man anymore, it’s not suited to him at all.

I guess my conversation with him on Friday got me back to thinking about how people choose to live their lives.

I’d love to know what proportion of people would say they are entirely happy with all their decisions and priorities in life at any given time. How many are convicing themselves they will get around to all the good stuff later? How many people have an achievable dream that they are convinced just can’t be realized?

Over and over people tell me they want my life, people from all sorts of different circumstances. I don’t know how serious these statements are, but they often seem quite sincere.

I can’t think of many lives I’d prefer to mine, and if I do at any time come across one, I tend to just begin planning how Patrick and I are going to fit that type of life into the one we have going now.

Are Patrick and I merely unbelievably lucky? Are we naive? Lazy? Greedy? … Or are we doing something others have missed?

I enjoy dreaming, and know that the grass is definitely always greener… so understand that quite a few of the people saying “I wish I could do that..” are just having a little dream for a minute, and then will quite happily go back to what it was they were doing.

Does seem an unhealthy number actually really do want to change their situation. What is it that separates us from them?

I just sat down to write a post begging for advice on how to cure hiccups, as I had been hiccuping for 2 hours non stop and was exhausted.

Dr Patrick decided to take the matter into his own hands and crept up behind me and yelled in my ear.

Did anyone actually believe that giving someone a fright cures hiccups? It does!!

Amazing.

Now I can sleep.