winter

It's a typical December day in western Japants.

The wind-chill is below freezing, my sliding door and window are open to try and suck out some of the dust from my very unfiltered living space, and I look like this -->

That's a warmfuzzysweater underneath my Dinosaur Comics hooded sweatshirt. I would have another full layer underneath my warm corduroy pants, except I am washing just about every piece of cold-weather underthings and overthings that I own.

Why? 'Cause for Hokkaido adventures commence in 72 hours \o/ And after THAT? Touhoku adventures. And then Chubu adventures. I'ma wandering down the local train network (well, starting off on the expresses because I realized there's no feasible way to get from Sapporo to Akita in a single day otherwise x.x durrrrrrdurrdurr I fail geography), stopping off at a few of the larger cities on my way back down to Kansai.

I initially had no plan whatsoever but to maybe try a couple of the inns / hostels I happened across in the metropolises, and take refuge in 24-hour internets cafes if that didn't work out. But as departure day approached I got to thinking maybe my spirit of adventure would be less dampened if I had an actual sleeping room for sleeping times. To that end, I joined this couchsurfing / international exchange network a Siberian dude at a dinner party told me about, and sent off one request for crashspace for each of my stopoff points, not expecting to have much luck given that it's the holidays and most people are off having their own fun travels.

The morning after I sent the requests, I'd gotten affirmatives from all three peoples :D These are vouched-for and peer-reviewed experienced hosts, with confirmed identities / addresses and so on, so safety factor is high. The network is very efficiently self-regulating in that respect, to minimize on creepers. PLUS they all sound like for-seriously awesome people! Two of the three have been around the world and back again, one of 'em is actually a current JET, and one is a BRAIN SURGEON. SUPERNIFTY.

I am all kinds of excited about this trip ~/o/ (that is me running around with my arms out making whooshing noises)

Speaking of UNEXPECTED:

HOLY CRAP SNOW!!! LIKE, SNOW! Outside, in Isobe, this morning when I woke up, and blowing in my face as I walked to work and YES! Very yes!

This is snow outside my apartment!

This is snow ON A F***ING PALM TREE (circled for your convenience, because there's so much SNOW you might miss it!)

...This snow was all gone by 10:30 am D: The town was dry as a bone by noon o'clock. BUT, I still managed to make the best of it. I threw snowballs at the students I saw outside before I even got into the office, and after two minutes of sitting inside thinking "Wow, just...wow. SNOW," I got my butt back out there and constructed a wee-tiny totem to the snow gods, who made me the happiest snow-bunny this morning.

Here he is, the littlest snowman. Yes that is a flowerpot next to him. FULL OF SNOW. Love him, for he is fabuloooouuuus (I only noticed later, after he was but a puddle on the stairs, that the pictures I took made him look pretty flamboyant. Hip thrust out at a flirtatious angle, winking right atcha, arms thrown wide open to the skies going "Look at me, world, I'm spectacular!" Aaaawr ;__; I miss him already)

Japanese Work Ethic

There is a Category 1 typhoon heading for Shima.

I am still at work. That is all.