A Grown-Up Moment

Last night I was admitted to an alcohol serving establishment without being carded. It wasn't cheating on my part either - we were at a wine tasting event. This is a first for me. I'm twenty-three, and most of the time I am mistaken for a twelve year old. I usually consider it an accomplishment if I can walk into a PG-13 movie without hassle. I'm marking the day on the calendar.

My glory didn't last long. Tonight I went to a Deal or No Deal mock up and got carded again. My streak as an adult was over. I didn't even win anything.

It snowed in Colorado yesterday, so here's a spring photo to make the people back home feel better (or jealous).

Casanova

Peter has been highly amused by my neck troubles. It really is not that bad, but my range of motion has been limited. Specifically, I can't look to the left. So Peter likes to come up behind me on the left side and try to hand things to me, just to make me turn my entire body to see him. Since he is amusing himself at my neck's expense, I thought I would amuse myself here at his expense.

This is a photo of Peter the Romantic Cow (taken at our Bachelor/Bachelorette party)

The only injury I have had in Japan that was traumatic enough to require a doctor was a concussion last summer. How did I get the concussion? Peter gave it to me while trying to be romantic. He was on duty at the hospital that night. I came by in the evening to have dinner with him and keep him company. He grabbed me and dipped me to kiss me... and dipped my head directly into the stone windowsill in his office. I spent most of the rest of the night laying on the floor of his office. Luckily, the ER was right down the hall. Admitting that my concussion came from a kiss was embarassing enough, but since both of us worked at the hospital at the time we were friends with the ER staff. By the next morning, the entire hospital knew about my concussion and Peter had aquired the nickname Casanova.

Days When I Shouldn't Get Out of Bed

Yesterday I pulled a neck muscle while getting out of bed and couldn't turn my head all day. I suppose I probably deserved it for snoozing my alarm too many times. But is was still not exactly the way I wanted to start the day. The fact that I can injure myself while doing nothing makes me think that ignoring my New Year's Resolution to work out more often is probably a good thing. Imagine the damage I could do with a weight machine. Anyway, I have learned my lesson. Clearly getting out of bed is dangerous, so I have decided to be lazy.

The pets are stongly in favor of this plan. This is a photo of them taken several hours after the alarm went off, and they still hadn't pried themselves out of bed.

Jeopardy!

Alex Trebec and the Clue Crew from Jeopardy! travelled around the Asian military bases last week and held contestant auditions on the military bases. Peter and I went to try out.

Round One is a pre-test. If you can remember enough trivia under pressure to make it to Round Two you are pitted against other potential contestants. You ring in to answer questions, and the people with poor reflexes are elliminated. Round Three is an interview.

Peter and I didn't make it past Round Zero - Following the Directions to the Test Site.

Clearly, the people too stupid to find the test aren't worthy of taking the test. We went to the wrong location on the wrong day. We did, however, find the Alex Trebec autograph signing. At least I got an autograph for my effort!

Alex is the first famous person I've "met."

I Don't Know That I Don't Know

There are times when I am so utterly clueless that I don't know where to even begin asking questions. Most people feel that way about math. I feel that way about small children. If you want to make me uncomfortable, hand me a baby. Someday we'll have kids and I'll either get over it or we'll get a nanny.

But one place where I never expected to have that clueless feeling is...while shopping.

But I did. That's right. I admitted it. I had DIFFICULTY spending money.

Obviously, there is a language barrier for me here. I only know a few words of Japanese and I certainly can't read it. They have three different alphabets!! But there is usually enough English around for me to get by. (In fact, there is a surprising amount of English used in advertising, which makes me wonder if knowing English is "cool" or a sign of social stature. Or maybe it just works it's way into society because they are all multi-lingual.)

The biggest way the language barrier affects my shopping habits is by making it difficult to locate stores. There are buildings all over the place that I am afraid to walk into because I can't tell if they are shops or houses. Once in the store it's sometimes hard to find things because I can't read the signs. The only way I am going to find the shoe department is by walking through the ENTIRE store (Peter thinks this is a good thing). There are also a few products that I would never buy because I don't know what they are and the directions are in Japanese. But those also aren't products I'm looking for, so I don't miss them.

Last week, I decided that we needed more drinking glasses. Our current set has been biting the dust for a year now and it got to the point where we needed to wash a cup every time we wanted a drink. So I went to a store that I know has a home section. The hunt began. In America, I would be looking for 6oz. or 8oz. juice glasses. I found the dishes. I found wine glasses. Beer mugs. Champagne flutes. A can of Campbells Tomato Soup and a can of SPAM. A knife rack and a picnic basket. Pokemon chopsticks. Insanely ugly huge glasses. But where were the juice glasses?

Answer: In a box labeled "Stacking Iced Coffee Glasses."

Additional Note: Next time I need soup I should look next to the champagne flutes.

Here is another example of Japanese-English that almost makes sense, but doesn't:

(Clicking on the picture will bring up a bigger one that is easier to read).

News I Didn't Want

Peter's name was put in for deployment again. So as of this fall this blog will be back to it's original purpose of keeping friends and family reassured that Peter is alive.

I did not post much this week for several reasons. The first was because it was hard to find things to say that did not touch on the topic of Peter leaving, and that couldn't be discussed until the important people had a chance to hear about it. If you're an important person and you didn't get a phone call yet, it's because there aren't enough hours in the day when Peter isn't working and you would be awake. The second was because I am having a hard time finding nice things to say. Particularly about the military - but at least this time they gave us warning more than a few days in advance.

It's a bummer.

This is Rambo, helping unpack Peter's seabag after his last deployment got cancelled.

This is Why We Don't Go Shopping

Last weekend Peter and I both were in the mood to spend money. This rarely happens, but when it does we should not leave the house with our wallets. Last time, we ended up with a new computer. This time, it was furniture. A carpet for our bedroom. A new computer desk. And an entertainment center. But the entertainment center was only $40 so it hardly counts!! The act of buying it all drained our mutual desire to spend money, so when they offered delivery and assembly for $40, we turned it down. It seemed ridiculous to pay as much for delivery as we did for the actual piece of furniture. To make a long story short...we should have paid the fee. I have been assembling furniture all week. Peter and several of our friends helped too. We actually wore out our screwdriver set. I took some photos now that it's all finished. First, the old set up, so that you can appreciate why the new furniture is exciting.

Notice how the TV doesn't actually fit IN the entertainment center. I would also like to mention that the cabinet on the left side has to be pried open with a knife. But hey, it was free, and you get what you pay for right? That is the old desk and kitchen table too (also all free).

Here is the new furniture - complete with a semi-normal dog sitting in front of it.

The entertainment center. Helping to build this was the most use I've gotten out of my engineering degree since I graduated.

And the desk. I built a large part of this myself.

Finally, this is one of the hazards of being a small person. This is me IN the entertainment center.