A Pretty Picture Post for my Parents and Peeps

No major adventures lately, due to a combination of rain and softball that leans heavily on the wet side.  Still, we try to get out and about, and I walk on the dry days, so I wanted to share a few of the more picturesque moments in the past few weeks with all of you.

 

First up, as I've explained before, I tend to go out to lunch or to dinner with a group of girlfriends, exploring new options or sometimes revisiting old favorites.  One person had expressed interest in a restraunt named MK where servings of raw food are brought out, but rather than grilled like at Sho, you boil the food on little burners placed flush in the middle of the table.  Carolie had brought a friend of hers along, Miyuki, to translate for us and to enjoy her company, and she ordered several rounds of vegetables, meats, meatballs, and dumplings for us to sample, which we dumped into the bowls of boiling water and scooped out with chopsticks or slotted ladles.

 

 

When our stomachs were pleasantly full, we ordered dessert:  a steamed bun filled with a purple sweet bean called an azuki bean.  Popular in Japan, they fill everything from the steamed buns to little pies to even a new azuki bean frappucino from the only Starbucks in town (which, by the way, I tried and absolutely loved; the sweetness isn't too much to enjoy, and little pieces of the bean float throughout the drink--delicious).  The Hub absolute despises the desserts made with azuki, but I can't seem to get enough.  At MK, they'd even used edible paint to decorate the buns to look like lucious peaches--a definite delight to most of the girls in the group.

 

 

 

As promised, I want to keep everyone (read:  Dad, mostly) abreast on the growing rice fields near the house.  With all of the rain, I've missed being able to walk as often as usual and was afraid I'd missed quite a bit of the growing season, but when I returned last week, I found the plants had shot up, flourishing in the sodden ground.  I snapped a few shots of the nearest fields so I could visit with them upclose before continuing on my normal "off the beaten path" route.

 

 

Waving at the local residents walking their children to school, I continued, jumping when a crab darted out in front of my feet, snapping its claws at me ferociously as it scurried in a sideways manner and continued.  I managed to snag a picture of this poor crab, but only because I think it had been injured.  Fascinated, I watched for more; Lauryl had warned me once before that they become very noticeable in the summertime, even making their way into the homes of the people on the first floors of every building.  Before my walk, I'd kinda squealed with glee when watching them, but as I drew closer to the water, greater quantities of the pinchers appeared, their size growing larger just as the amount had as well.  When several larger crabs (whose bodies were easily larger than my palm with oil-slick-rainbow-colored shells) stopped scurrying quickly away and began more of a protest with pinching, I decided to end the little hop-squeal-jump-walk dance I'd been performing to get around them (all the while, the eyebrows of the Japanese people I'd waved to kept jumping higher at the same rhythym of each of my squeals) and head back for the house, learning my lesson most convincingly to wait out that path until the summer crab season is finally finished!

 

On, yet, another note, I've mentioned to a few of you the concept of "Engrish" before, but I'll try to explain it again.  The Japanese are taught English in grade school, but it's very rigid and not conversational; often, the older nationals only understand written English if anything at all, and we're advised that should we have questions, it might be easier to write them down at times than to try to have a spoken conversation.  However, when English translation is taken literally, rather than conversationally, odd statements come out, as the sign to the right displays.  Hub snapped this shot at work where some construction work is taking place so the need to block one side of traffic is necessary.  Hopefully, you all can appreciate it just as much as I did when he brought the picture home!

As a last shot, and just because I selfishly promote the beauty of the kittens, I thought I'd give all of you the chance to see what they do on a daily basis:

 

 

Important stuff, huh?  Have a great day/night everyone!