My Newly Buried Car sends a Christmas message...

MERRY CHRISTMAS!!!

It's snowing hard again - my once Unburied Car has become Buried again overnight. This time though I've left it at school, so it's the caretaker's job to dig it out, not mine -  mwah ha ha, that'll teach him for not lending me his snow mower.

 

But what am I saying? Let's banish such un-Christmassy thoughts! 'Tis the time for giving and making merry! I'm feeling full of festive cheer at the moment - I can't wait to get home and see my family and friends again. I hope they like the random stuff I've bought for them.

 

That's if I can get home of course - the heavy snow has been causing several train delays and cancellations, so it's a little bit touch and go at the moment. Fingers crossed the weather holds off...

 

Anyway, I'm not back in Japan until January 7th, so this will be the last post for a while. In the meantime...

 

HAVE A MERRY CHRISTMAS AND A HAPPY NEW YEAR!!!

Nyu High School: Cold.

It's Nearly Christmas...

I can't quite believe it's Christmas in four days... and in two days' time I'll be getting on a plane to fly me back home! What utter madness!!! What on earth was I thinking when I booked a flight back to cold, damp England when I could be in Thailand instead, lounging around on a beach sipping cocktails!? What a fool I've been!

 

But seriously though, it really is cold and damp in England, although technically slightly less cold and damp than my house in Asahi, since we have a thing in England called "central heating". This marvellous new invention means that houses can remain at a liveable temperature throughout the winter, which also means you can avoid the situation where it's actually warmer inside your fridge than in your kitchen. Yes, that's right, I'm now huddling up to the fridge for warmth. No need to worry though, I'll be in Thailand soon. No, wait, I won't will I? I'll be in England.

 

Damn.

 

But seriously though, my kitchen really is that cold. When I got home from work the other day I decided to have a round of toast with Nutella to warm myself up, but I discovered that the entire jar of chocolate spread had frozen solid. I put it in the fridge to warm it up a bit.

 

But don't worry Mum, my legs haven't fallen off from frostbite yet, and I really am looking forward to coming home and seeing you and the family this Christmas. Just make sure the thermostat's turned up nice and high when I get back - I want to get a sun tan from the radiators.

 

And speaking of Christmas, here's a few pics from the Fukui JET "non-denominational festive gathering", also known as Festivus (although the event was sadly lacking an aluminium pole).

NEWSFLASH: I've just found a website where you can buy genuine Festivus poles. 'Tis a Festivus Miracle I tell ya!

Sam did a fine job of cooking the peas I brought for Festivus. Look at the pride etched onto his face.

Around 100 ravenous guests shovel down the turkey as Festivus gets into full swing. If you look very carefully on the right of the photograph you can see a classic piece of internationalisation, as a Japanese woman and a Western woman demonstrate their respective gestures for "myself". See, the JET Programme is worth the money.

The spread of food was amazing - everyone outdid themselves this year. And, of course, the peas were top notch.

Here's another one of Chihiro's origami letter creations (see the November archives). I just love what's written on the front, it really put a smile on my face!

My Buried Car - are there blue skies ahead?

Escape to Victory!

Welcome to the next thrilling instalment of "My Buried Car". Regular readers will remember that on Thursday night I was forced to give up after three hours of digging because my car became beached like some sort of crazy snow whale. I'd managed to deal with the defeat by drowning my sorrows in mint choc chip ice cream, but I came back on Friday afternoon with eyes blazing, my battered soul hungry for fiery vengeance. There was no way this pathetic white fluff would beat me - with the mighty mama-san dump at my side, I knew I was invincible.

 

All hail Lewis! The Fearless Snow Avenger! Shoveller of Driveways! Clearer of Access Roads! Wielder of the Dump!

 

Now read on adventurers, as we go back to the frozen Ice Kingdom of Fukui...

Here's my car at 2.00pm on Friday. On Thursday I'd managed to move it just over halfway along the road after 3 hours of digging - all I needed was one last push and I'd be free... Unfortunately, this time I had to do it without the miracle of David Bowie, since the rain made it too wet to use my CD player. So I just thought about Bowie instead, and that helped.

After over an hour of digging I'd only managed to move the car about 20 metres, and it had gotten stuck 3 times. Twice I'd managed to dig it out, but the third time was more difficult, since the car had skidded sideways into some deep snow. Things were looking bad.

I was getting nowhere fast, so I did what anyone in the same predicament would do - I had a tiramisu. Mmmm... you just can't beat a good tiramisu. Then I had a brainwave...

I suddenly remembered somehing I saw on "Ray Mears' Extreme Survival". When he was stuck in the desert he put some planks of wood underneath the tyres to give them some traction, so I decided to replicate the situation using the only thing I had at hand - a bread board. And do you know what? It worked! I knew watching that programme would come in handy one day.

Finally, after another hour of digging, I'd managed to carve a rudimentary path to the end of the road and used good old "mama-san" to smash my way through the piles of ice and snow dumped there by the snow plough. This is it - will my car be able to make it through the snow?

SUCCESS!!!!! My car has been freed from its icy prison! Fan-bloody-tastic! I quickly nabbed a passing student to document the moment of triumph forever... Snowboarding here we come!

My Buried Car on Wednesday afternoon.

The Continuing Saga of My Buried Car

On Thursday afternoon, for the first time in days, it stopped snowing. With the re-emergence of long-forgotten blue skies I decided it was the perfect weather for digging out my poor little snow-entombed car.

 

My car was rendered immobile by snow on Tuesday, and I've been living like a hermit ever since, only venturing out of the house to go to school or buy snacky treats from the Circle K. It's been hard, but on the plus side it's given me a bit of time to get re-aquainted with my seldom-used-in-recent-months Playstation 2. Oh, how I've missed thee.

 

However, a crisis is looming - the weekend is coming closer and there's a serious chance that I might not be able to go snowboarding if I can't dig my car out in time, and will instead have to spend the weekend eating sandwiches from the Circle K and hoping the kerosene for my heater doesn't run out. To make matters worse, I've finished all my Playstation games. The race is on....

 

To aid me in my Herculean task, I thought I'd ask the school caretaker to let me borrow his brilliant "snow mower", but unsurprisingly he was reluctant to let go of his favourite toy. Instead, he gave me what's known in Japanese as a "mama-san dump" - a great big sledge thing with a handle, so-called because it makes it easier for old ladies to move around snow. Not exactly the manliest tool, but it moves snow a lot faster than my old shovel, so I'm not complaining.

 

And so, it begins.

I cleared the snow off my car on Wednesday night, but by Thursday afternoon it was covered again. Beside it you can see my trusty shovel and the embarrassingly-named yet dead useful "mama-san dump". To aid me through my labours I decided to stick the Best of Bowie on my cd player - good old Bowie, perfect for every situation. The time now is 3.45pm.

By the time I'd reached track 6, "Starman", I'd made some significant progress. I felt the tuneful wailings of classic seventies Bowie had certainly helped in this achievement.