Falling face-first...

Lst week was another relentless week with more than the usual going on. After my TV fame moment I set to work preparing the current edition of the Fuzzy Peach, our prefecture's JET magazine, using Word and copies of Photoshop that had only Japanese and Brazilian language abilities. So now I know how to say "merge images" in Brazilian Portugese which I'm sure will never, ever come in useful. Oh well. The stress of struggling with three languages clearly contributed to my worsening cold and resulted in my staying at home on Wednesday and sleeping until 11 (it seems to have knocked my appetite on the head too, which is never a bad thing when lent is coming up). Anyway, I finally finished the Fuzzy at 10pm on Thursday before realising that I had yet to reinstall the printer (after the big computer breakdown) and this almost become a major trauma as nothing was working and about 14 other languages kept popping up. Suddenly all I could think was, "je ne suis pas un famille polyglotte" which, along with "une salle de bains" and "ou est le bibliotheque", is about the only French I can remember. And it didn't help. But by 2am I had finished printing it out and stuffing it in envelopes and had prepared the address labels ready to send in on the rush that was to become Friday.

Friday was one of those days where everyone wants a piece of you, only at the wrong time. It sometimes seems like people only have work for me to do outside of work hours, and as four o'clock came it seemed to become "test the students" time. And then when I finally got away Nao chan wanted to talk to me, and then her friend wanted to talk to me, but I simply didn't have the time! So I made my excuses and rushed off home to pack for the weekend and the doorbell rings. It's 2 of my elementary school girls who live in a building next to mine and are often to be found running around my apartment block. So I let them in, thinking they'll run around the hallways, but no! They want to come in to my apartment and given that I won't let them, they want to stand at my doorway and talk to me for a seemingly endless amount of time. So after I close the door on them for the third time and get ready to jump in the shower they ring the bell. Again. So I get in the showeranyway and start singing loudly, knowing they'll hear it outside...

I finally got away at 5:35, speeding on the highway to mount Daisen. It was a nice drive where I found out what happens once you go over the top limit on the car's speedometer- the car just gets faster. This would actually be alarming if the speedometer went above 140 kms an hour (approximately 90 miles an hour). But then the speed limit on the -ahem- "express"way is half that.

I was heading to Daisen for a ski weekend with some people I'd met at the Naked Man festival and it was great fun. Steve booked rooms for the 12 of us in a hotel on the mountain and we spent the night eating, drinking, watching American Idol and doing a spot of karaoke before passing out.

Saturday came, and with only a couple of hour's sleep (due to nasty alcohol and the heat in the bedroom) we headed out to the slopes, myself and a very funny girl called Breeda being the only beginners. And thanks to the very patient teaching of Steve and Alex we were soon (well after about an hour and a half) getting down the slopes by ourselves. And falling. And being jolted on the ski-lift. And falling again. Breeda and I spent half our time laughing at the contorted shapes I kept ending up in, some of them feeling rather painful, but both decided we love skiing and are going to do it again.

So after skiing, Steve, Alex, Virginie and I headed out to an onsen and then to dinner at a very stylish restaurant which felt more like something you'd find in London or New York than Yonago, Tottori and served some of the richest, tastiest waffles I think I've ever eaten.

From there we headed to Katherine's apartment (where everyone was staying) to get ready before heading out for a big Tottori ALT party which seemed quite crazy. The bar was like something from a seventies disaster movie (all beige velvet couches, glass walls and black paintwork) and the music was a very bizarre mix, with live bands, and DJs who were playing very, very muddled sets. But the drink helped, and the people were hilarious, (thanks to Jess, who was my beautiful dancing partner for part of the night) so we managed to stay till the end, although we were flagging by the next bar and returned home, Alex and I making a trip to Lawson via an ill-advised detour. Through a sopping paddy-field. D'oh.

Sunday was almost like coma day. I perhaps slept for an half an hour on Saturday night and Sunday morning seems rather disjointed. We all rose and eventually Katherine, Jess, Virginie and her friend (whose name I can't spell), Steve and I were in a very nice restaurant having paninis and enjoying the french bossa-nova lounge soundtrack that was playing. Actually i was enjoying it the most, but i may have been delirious. And we spent the afternoon in the cinema waiting patiently for Jodie Foster to shout, "where's maaaah baaaabyyy?" in the rather ludicrous but entertaining "Flight Plan".

It seemed a shame to have to head home to an empty apartment, but the lure of sleep was too much and by 9:30 I was out cold. And this week? It's back to the usual school routine with what could have been a dreary Monday night transformed into a JoyFull night of conversation, gossip and laughter with the marvellous Nickname Pending. Thank you miss!