Busy

Life has been pretty crazy the past few months. Trying to keep up with everything and finding time to blog about the fun stuff is just not happening lately! I'm only on right now because I'm taking a break in between writing two papers for grad school ;)

Updates?

I climbed Mt. Fuji! I need to type up the whole story so I never forget the details, because it was an exciting and crazy journey. I injured my foot near the top of the mountain and was transported down. My foot is healing, but slowly. I am back to walking normally, but cannot do more than a mile walk at the gym without pain and cannot do anything outside of walking on flat, level surfaces. Even though the healing process is very frustrating, getting to the top of the mountain was worth it! Jeff's already planning a trip next year to climb it again - I'm done! I did it once, that's it.

I'm in my last semester for my graduate certificate. I lucked into two rather busy classes at once, so that's fun. I'm excited to complete this certificate and getting excited about all the paths my career could take. I stumbled into something I love over here on this remote military base.

I have a very special visitor coming to Misawa soon. Which is part of why I've been stressed for school - trying to get a couple major assignments complete before said visitor arrives! I haven't seen this person in years and I just cannot wait. Expect major picture overload on Facebook and eventually over here too.

The heat wave has finally passed Misawa. Those few hot, humid weeks are miserable but they went by quickly this year. I'm looking forward to fall weather, but I'm not too thrilled about all the snow shortly after! This will be my last full winter in Misawa, so I will have to soak up as much winter fun as I can. Hopefully my foot will heal enough that Jeff and I can finally go snowboarding this year!

Otherwise life has been pretty normal - working and trying to relax. My schedule recently changed back to days so I'm able to cook dinner with Jeff again. After months of working nights, I'm enjoying it thoroughly. We haven't had the energy to explore much lately, but we've continued to enjoy all the amazing food in Japan.

I should get back to my homework now! Only two and a half assignments to go before I can relax and count down to vacation! (My work day count is in single digits, hooray!)

From my Phone

So let's talk about technology. I love it. It's been an absolutely essential part of living overseas and staying connected with friends and family far from us. But sometimes, it's a pain in the ass.

 

Jeff's iPad died last week. I bought him that for Christmas. We can't get it fixed unless we make a trip to Sendai (5hour drive) or Tokyo (9hour drive), or back to the states to get to an Apple store. Boo.

 

My laptop decided to crash days later. I just bought the laptop in June! I had to wipe it and start it from scratch again, losing all my files on the computer. I'm trying not to be bummed. I didn't have a ton of personal pictures on there that weren't backed up already, but I did have a lot of work pictures and videos that I lost including quite a few that I hadn't uploaded to our Facebook page yet. I'm in the middle of semesters right now, so I didn't lose anything I need to turn in or other such catastrophes, but I did lose a lot of files and resources I had planned on using for graduate school and my career. But when push comes to shove, at least the laptop is working again and I can move on from here. Once I re-download all my programs and find as many files as I can.

 

Onto a brighter note, I finally grabbed a microSD to grab the pictures from my phone. I don't remember my phone has a camera the majority of the time, but here's a few.

 

 

 



 

The Japanese think of everything. These minimalized drink holders fit into the bag with the food so everything can be carried in one hand.  I've said this many times, but McDonald's in Japan is like the fast food you dream of, or fast food the way it was intended. It's absolutely delicious. I don't think I'll have a huge problem giving up fast food when we moves back to the states :)

We tried a new ramen place a few weekends ago for a lunch date. Neither of us were too enthused with the ramen, it was just okay. But it was nice to get out of the house.

 

Have you met Jeff? He loves video games. And shooting arcade games. He couldn't resist this one when we were wandering through the stores. He said he was doing great until I tried to join and help...

 

It's like Guitar Hero with Taiko drums! I played, and I'm about as good on this as guitar hero, although it's slightly easier since there are no buttons. You just bang on the drum with the sticks provided. Entertaining.


I'm off to set up my laptop again! And be very paranoid that it will crash again, since I haven't figured out WHY it crashed the first time...

Action Shots

I've had the added bonus of working on my photography skills at work lately. We're doing a basketball league through the summer for the teens, so I volunteered to photograph the games. It's been fun fiddling with the settings to get the best shots I can.

(I've blurred all the teenager's faces, but you can see the great action shots)

Otherwise life has been pretty quiet lately. I've been reading lots of fluff to make up for all the dry textbooks I endured during the winter.

Jeff and I have gotten into weekend lunch dates since I work most evenings. Yesterday we tried a new ramen place and today we went for one of our favorites: sushi. I love that we can go out for delicious foods and not ruin our diets, since it's all healthy. I will forever love french fries, but Japanese food is amazing too.

Break

Whew, a short semester is no joke. I'm looking forward to a short break from research and presentations and trying to keep the time zone differences straight. Going to school half a world away is a unique challenge sometimes.

Now that I can come up for air, I've got time for other interests.

Like cooking. Jeff and I have enjoyed cooking on the few nights a week we are able to enjoy dinner together. Working opposite schedules isn't ideal, but it's shaken up our dinner routine and made us appreciate cooking when we have the chance to do it together.

Exercise is back on the plate! I've slacked the past couple of weeks. I decided a new workout was needed, so I found Les Mills Combat and decided to try it out. I really enjoy the kickboxing in some Jillian Michaels and Turbofire workouts, so I figured I'd dive right into the whole thing. I tried one workout last week and LOVED it. I'm looking forward to this week, although I'm pretty sure it's going to kill me.


I also finally tried paintball! Jeff loves it and has been trying to get me to go for years. We finally got the chance today.

It was a fun experience, although there weren't too many people there to play. Somehow I managed to get shot in the neck twice, so that's fun. Those welts will be an interesting story all week. I was told I wasn't too bad for a beginner, although slow. What can I say, running and diving didn't sound all that appealing ;)

We have plans to try again when we can get a group of friends together and make it more fun. Maybe pull some other newbies in so I'm not all on my lonesome.

I took a break from shooting getting shot for a round and took some pictures of Jeff playing.

I'm going to finish enjoying a day where no homework is due! I have a handful of discussion posts left to do by the end of the week, but that's nothing now that the big research project is done. I even managed to enjoy a book...in the span of two days. I need to stop reading so fast, it's getting expensive.

Around

I'm around, just haven't been taking pictures or doing anything super exciting. I'm in a short class for the summer and the pace is pretty crazy on top of everything else. Only a couple more weeks though!

We did go to the American Day festival last weekend. I didn't take any pictures, but I'll have to look for some to borrow just to show what the festival is. It was fun, Jeff and I both got burnt and are going through the lovely peeling process.

My Favorite Salad

Lunch is hard. I'm not a morning person, so bringing lunch doesn't happen. There's so much fast food on base and healthier options are slimmer and often take longer to prepare.

I've been working on it though. I'm trying very hard to avoid the delicious french fries 10 steps from my office and take the extra steps to the gym for a salad! Our gym has a little shop that sells smoothies and salads and everything is delicious.

I've been addicted to this salad lately. It has spinach, cucumbers ,broccoli, chicken, chow mein noodles, and mandarin oranges. Delicious!

Transfer

My laptop has been dying for a few months. Since I started grad school, it has decided to freeze and other wonderful things every time I go to do school work. I had to resort to using Jeff's computer, which drives him crazy.

With another semester under my belt, we decided it wasn't worth the headache. I bought a new laptop.

Now I'm in the fun phase or transferring all my files, pictures, music, etc. And figuring out a new operating system, since my new laptop upgrades from Windows 7 to Windows 8. I'm slowly figuring out how to work the new windows...

I forgot how much of a headache transferring everything is. I have most of my photos backed up on an external anyways, but transferring all the documents and music, re-downloading virus software and other applications, and setting up everything I need to run takes a while! And I lose the extras like the free copy of my parents' Microsoft Office that was installed on the old laptop. Oh well.

I'm off to play with this laptop some more. The great news is my school webpage loads in 2 seconds flat. Much better!

Fitness

This week was pretty good as far as fitness goes. My goals of no fried food and no soda have been successful so far. I just have to make it through work tonight and resist the delicious smell of french fries from the first floor of my building.

Workouts:
Tuesday - sprint/jog/incline intervals and sauna
Friday - aerobathon! Kickboxing, crossfit, and zumba with the teens at work

I'm also getting trained in archery tomorrow. I don't know what that entails, but it'll probably work my arms?

Next week will be harder because I'm working nights. Here are the goals for next week: no fried foods again and four workouts.

Fitness This Week

I put my iPod in the washing machine last week. It was very dead after the spin cycle. The BX did not have iPod nanos in stock. I bought a shuffle, but realized I was losing playlists and fitness, which tracks how far I'm running. Since I've been enjoying running, I didn't want to give that up. Amazon refused to ship an iPod nano to me, so I'm waiting patiently for it to ship to my mom who will very nicely ship it to me. Sometimes living overseas is fun...

The iPod mishap screwed up my fitness routine last week.
M - I went to the gym - I don't remember what I did though! (This was the morning I killed my iPod...)
T - Turbofire Fire 45
W - Jillian Michaels No More Trouble Zones
Th - Nothing. I bought the iPod shuffle Wednesday evening and thought it charged all night but it did not. I was so frustrated I sat on the couch and did nothing. Whoops!
F - 2.7 mile run with Jeff and 100 pushups!

I was very excited to tackle 100 push-ups. Jeff and I ran and took breaks along the way to do pushups, crunches, and planks. I lost energy for the ab work quickly. I became very stubborn about doing as many pushups as Jeff though. I was a little sore Saturday...

Today I did jog/sprint/incline intervals on the treadmill. I'm enjoying pushing myself through running, but I also need to start working on some incline/hill work so I can make it to Fuji this summer.


My food goals this week:
-No fried foods
-No soda

While I've been doing pretty good with working out, food continues to be a struggle. I get stressed or impatient or tired and I reach for fried foods. Jeff and I get lazy on weekends and binge. I grab a soda just because. I'm trying not to guilt myself over all of it, but just focus on the next week and doing better. I have salmon defrosting in the fridge for dinner and I just finished my morning juice, so I'm on the right track!

Hirosaki Castle Cherry Blossom Festival

We recently went on a trip to Hirosaki Castle Cherry Blossom Festival. Hirosaki is a town about two and half hours away from Misawa. It used to be the capital of our prefecture, but was replaced by Aomori because of its more centralized location.

Hirosaki has a castle originally built in 1611 although the current structure was built in the 1800's. There are over 2600 cherry blossom trees planted all around the castle grounds, making it one of the most popular cherry blossom festivals in Japan.

We signed up for a base tour so we could just hop on the bus and not have to worry about parking or directions. It turned out perfect, because parking was crazy. We were hoping for a decent day, but it was chilly and raining off and on. It wasn't terrible, but we were both wishing for bluer skies! We sucked it up through the wet with hoods, but most Japanese had umbrellas. They got a little ridiculous in the crowded sections and poor Jeff kept getting hit since he's a head taller than most Japanese. His head lines up with all of their umbrellas...

Here are the pictures!

We tried to steer clear of the crowds by sticking to the less centralized sections of the castle grounds.

He loves pictures!

Growing bamboo and trees.

One of the more crowded sections...

The oldest cherry blossom tree in Japan.

Hirosaki Castle

Best.picture.ever

The food section was the most crowded. So many delicious smells. I'll never get used to seeing an entire fish on a stick though...

The most amazing ramen after a chilly, rainy day

We had a lot of fun exploring a new town and getting out of Misawa for the day. Both of us really enjoy seeing pieces of history like an old castle in northern Japan.

When Jeff Takes the Camera

We went to Hirosaki Castle recently for the Cherry Blossom Festival. I'm usually the one taking pictures and continually asking Jeff to pose for pictures.


I hand Jeff the camera for one second so I can dig something out of the backpack, and this is what he does.

I have 20 more pictures just like this...

Walk around Town

I had to take some pictures of my town for a college course, so I thought I'd share a few shots of Misawa.

I walked out the main gate and down the street about a block for these pictures.

Street signs in Japan

The intersection just outside the main gate

Other corner of the main intersetion. (That plaza has delicious authentic Naples pizza - small world!)

There are a lot of bicycles in Japan

A bicycle shop

I stopped at the visitor's center right outside the gate to get a picture of the cherry blossoms. They're almost done blooming.

Which means petals all over the place...

We have more cherry blossom trees on base than in Misawa city. They line all the streets and make it gorgeous in May!

Cherry blossom trees on base

It was a rare sunny day for these pictures. We've been getting a lot of rain lately. I'm just glad it's not snow!