Baaaaaah Humbug!

    When life gives you lemons… you:

     a) suck it and have a lemon face;

     b) make lemonade

We all know the correct answer is “b”, but this week I chose “a” and poor Ninja has been faced with a lemon face, or “salad face” as he likes to call it, a few too many times this week!

Scenario 1: Couch shopping Monday night. Let us all imagine coming home each night and not having a couch to sit on – it’s a sad, sad existence, which leads to us sharing a mini ottoman! Our Karratha sofa couch was deemed too big and heavy to make the voyage, we thought we could get a funky futon here instead… WRONG! Most couches here are made to fit their owner’s … i.e. midget size, and vinyl is, unfortunately, very popular! We spent 2hrs at Nitori trying out dozens of couches until we pick this ugly, leather beast. The backs were too low, or not enough stuffing, or too small (call me Goldilocks), or too ugly – yes, this beast wasn’t the worst to look at – … it happens to be incredibly comfortable so I’ve made a deal that it can stay a year or two and then be sold to the highest bidder when we are decorating our new house!

The ugly beast

Scenario 2: the 20min walk to work each day causes me blisters! Not one pair of shoes I have can prevent them – I’ve tried socks, innersoles, etc… the situation is dire… and the maximum shoe size here is size 8… only 2.5 sizes off… (call me the ugly stepsister). To add to my 'Eeyore' moment, Amazon US, which sells really comfy, ugly walking shoes, doesn’t deliver shoes here! “oh well, doesn’t matter anyway”.

Scenario 3: I bought the wrong bread. I come home to a taller version of Jamie Oliver, who has cooked, washed, and cleaned (ok 2 out of 3) and all he asks is that I bring home some bread so he doesn’t starve each day… and I got the wrong bread. The bakeries here are big on white bread – it’s been blogged before. It’s full of sugar. We buy brown. I bought brown. I bought brown fruit bread. Damn…. it.

Scenario 4: It’s been raining non-stop since Friday. Japan doesn’t do rain like Karratha – no great big down pour for an hour – they have constant sprinkles that lasts days… possibly weeks! Sayonara Disneyland – you will have to wait until it stops raining! Ninja and I decided to brave the sprinkles today and headed out for our first cycle… so it rained a little harder. We had to pick up sandwiches from our local Tully’s coffee shop as we had no edible lunch bread (!) and the Tully’s staff laughed at me… or at my wet pants… baaahhh humbug!

But this self-deprecation and wallowing must come to an end as I’m reminded that we are living a once in a lifetime experience, we have our health and we have another year to visit Disneyland! 

There are two sides to every story, and the other side to these are:

Scenario 1: no couch means we cuddle up in our superb king-size bed and watch TV (cable installed in the bedroom on Friday). We’ve been without the bed for 6 months and are very happy to be reunited! Plus we’ve discovered we have more channels in the bedroom, including an Aussie channel, which sometimes plays AFL!

Scenario 2: I get 40 mins of forced exercise everyday and get to walk passed all of these beautiful places. Who cares if my feet hurt! Ninja gives a good foot rub anyway!

Marino's Football Training ground

Nissan building- I walk through on my way to Yokohama Station

Bay Quarter - near Yokohama Station

Scenario 3: Fruit toast for breakfast was lovely!

Scenario 4: the new bikes worked a treat. Sure, we look ridiculous in the helmets – I can’t decide whether they are retro chic or just gumby hats? But we have far to explore and these bikes will take us places! And Tully’s can shove it, I’m going to Starbucks only from now on!

My new wheels

We found a bike for Ninja - a Giant!

By now you would have read Kept Ninja’s blog, he’s back and in fine form. The baseball was a great night out – soon to be repeated I hope! One find worth a giggle was the “beer snacks” they gave me… hmmm.

Fish are friends, not food

ewwwwwwwww

No promises for adventures next week – it’s weather dependant!... bring on the Typhoon Songda!

Xoxo

Karate Kate