y'know, a thought just occured to me...a lot of people i've read or listened to have complained about how, when a friend of theirs gets involved in a serious relationship, hanging out with the new couple sucks because the friend becomes a different person around his/her significant other. i really consider myself blessed in that regard, because all my friends are just as cool around their respective s.o.'s, and, in most cases, the s.o. is just as cool. another thing to be thankful for, i guess. :-)
today was the first official meeting of all the miyagi-ken alts in sendai. scott and kate (who rock) gave me a ride, and we stopped by the cafe croissant to get sandwiches for the future use. then we got to the kencho (prefectural office building), and, after greeting several friends, we got down to introductions. kind of interesting, a little tedious. i dunno, i just find getting into groups and officially getting to know a bit of a waste of time. talking with people in small groups (and, more importantly, informally) works much better, imo. but it was a little cool. one of the questions asked, who's your hero, elicited quite a few reactions from me. mine would be fyodor dostoevsky (my introduction partner spelled the name correctly. props to him.), robert e. lee, bill mallonee, bono, among others. i kind of feel dostoyevsky to be a soulmate of mine, although i think (and seriously hope) i won't ever have to do time as a political prisoner, or become a compulsive gambler. but, besides the fact that his books seriously speak to me, he was educated as an engineer before he turned to writing. "the famous person wears the same size waterskies as me..." back on track, the seminar was alright, lunch with some osaki-area jets was cooler, and getting to see everyone was coolest. i hitched a ride back with an osaki jet, and went to a basketball practice at the town gym. i rocked the house, but that's because i'm american, not because i'm talented. i think i scored about half my team's points the second game (the only one we kept score), and we won handily. i'm taller than all of the men who showed, so i got to clean the glass a lot. even registered a couple of blocks. all in all, a good workout. :-)
wednesday was a half day, and i had only one class. after school, i came home, slept, worked out, with to the town's english conversation "class", then came home and ate a ton of spaghetti.
tuesday was normal. monday i did nothing at the elementary school, and hogged the computer in the teacher's room.
saturday, after watching the first half of game four of the alcs, i went to sendai to meet up with d, the zao alt. bought the new collective soul and downset albums while at the hmv there, and i plan to buy _agaetis byrjun_ by sigur ros next time i'm there. after eating at a cool sandwich shop in sendai and drinking a rather bitter guinness, d drove me to yamaya, an import liquor shop, where saren (who met us on the way), d, and i hunted for alcohol for the night. i got a can of guiness (which turned out to be a lot smoother than the bottle i had with lunch) and a bottle of peach schnapps, just about the only hard (well, 48 proof) liquor i enjoy straight. and i got some spaghetti sauce. we then proceeded the d's place (which is pretty large and very well kept) and played video games, drank, and went to a local restaurant around 10 for dinner, where i ordered a true indian curry dish that d had given the restaurant. it was really tasty, and very spicy. i went through a couple of glasses of water. i *have* to get that recipe. :-) upon returning, i fell asleep while d and saren played perfect dark.
the next day d showed me and couple of other jets zao-san, the local mountain. it was really cold and windy at the top, but there's an absolutely gorgeous crater lake around the summit. after dinner at a japanese "pizza" restaurant, d dropped me and the others off at the shiogama (?) station. twas a really cool weekend.
been listening to: bjork, shonen knife, sigur ros, wilco, yo la tengo, smalltown poets, and collective soul.