I'm not kidding, its really like a zoo here.- July 8, 2008 The other day when I said that it was like a zoo here, I had no photographic proof. Now I do. Aside from the baby birds, and the silkworms, and the rats (no photo), we now also have moths and.... A Japanese Rat Snake discovered in our bath this morning. (Before judging us when you look at the photos, please remember that we do not actually use that bath we use the local bath down the street. This might explain the mess.) The thing we are worried about now is that the snake or his buddies..http://www.bastish.net/2008/07/im_not_kidding_its_really_like.html Baby Blog- July 7, 2008 While not nearly as fun as my sister's baby (twin) blog, I feel like I should make a baby blog of my own. Meet, in order of oldest to youngest, Buna, Kiri, and Tochi. The egg will be Gumi. 100 yen (or your choice of baby bird) goes to the first reader that can tell me the relationship of the names.http://www.bastish.net/2008/07/baby_blog.html It was just a perfect day. I'm glad that I spent it with me.- July 7, 2008 What a perfect weekend! Saturday I woke up freezing in just the goretex cover for my sleeping bag under the roof of the Naeba Shrine in Akiyamago. I happened to be in Akiyamago for volunteer fire brigade trumpet practice the night before, so intended to use the opportunity to make a two day ride up a dirt roadhiking trail that is the only direct route to Gunma, where we will be meeting customers on the 19th. I wanted to make sure the trail had not been washed out in the last downpour a...http://www.bastish.net/2008/07/it_was_just_a_perfect_day_im_g.html Sakae Mura Ekiden- July 6, 2008 Today was the Sakaemura Ekiden relay race. Tomoe and I were recruited to one of the local teams (6 people on a team) about two weeks ago. Since then Tomoe sprained her ankle so was not able to run. Luckily we found a replacement, and were able to join. For some reason (because I am a foreigner) everyone had big expectations for me and put me in the anchor position, but in the end, I let three people pass me and we went from 6th to 9th place out of 21 teams. If I start training earlier (like.http://www.bastish.net/2008/07/sakae_mura_ekiden.html The Zoo- July 4, 2008 Tuesday we joined the "Nonomi Biraki" mountain opening festival at the top of the nearby mountain. This time we drove up, but I brought three bikes in the hopes that I could entice some locals to ride down with me. In the end I only found one reluctant semi-local (only living here for one year) to join me on the amazing ride down a dirt road into the ski-hill. The mountain has a man-made lake used to save all that winter precipitation for use in the rice fields in the summer. It looks like..http://www.bastish.net/2008/07/the_zoo.html No Rainy Season- July 2, 2008 It looks like there will be no rainy season this year. Every day we look at the forecast and are happy to see rain for the next day, but every next day we wake up to blue skies and sun. There is enough spots of rain that the plants are all growing, but I have no idea what they would be like if we were getting as much rain as expected. A few days ago there was a nice mist just barely hiding blue skies as I went down to check on the water in the rice fields. I ran back and grabbed my camera,.http://www.bastish.net/2008/07/no_rainy_season.html |