May

May 22 Well, this is it - my last day of freedom before U NO WHO gets home to tell me all the things I've done wrong. Or haven't done. Or??? And a lovely day it is, too. Overcast, gale force northeaster, periodic rain, 8 degrees C.... If she checks the weather for here before she leaves Honolulu tonite, she may decide she has pressing business in the Islands, and will stay a few days (weeks?) longer. But then she'd realize her flowers weren't getting weeded, the houseplants are either dry or over-watered and there's no one looking after the gallery, at least not properly. So she'll be home on schedule, and someone else may actually get to do some sailing, if the weather settles down a bit! And SHE can put the cat out at 4 AM. And SHE can have heart-to-hearts with her son about the etiquette of turning on the clothes dryer at 5:50 AM with a large rock mixed in with his clothes, and then going off to work, leaving it thumping and banging away. right ouside our bedroom door.... Ya, maybe having her back won't be so bad, after all!

May 18 The cat's still away, so the mice will play - but only for a few more days. Then its back to doing all the things SHE thinks I should be doing. I have talked to her a couple times - her official excuse for not doing these updates or reading her email is that she can't find an internet cafe. Guess maybe you have to get off the beach first???
They did tour the island (Oahu) one day, and were setting out to hike up Diamond Head another day but were also spending (the operative term here) time contributing to the local economy.
Meanwhile, the world keeps turning, the rain keeps falling, and yes, work does get done, even without the taskmaster's presence.

May 16 Hi folks! It seems Lynne and her sister are having way too much fun in Hawaii to worry about such mundane tasks as updating her rant. So I guess its up to the webmeister to put something in, just to keep the dust off.!
Spring is finally happening around here, in fits and starts. We get a few nice days mixed in with some not-so-nice. Today is one of the latter. Overcast and threatening rain.
My big excitement for the last few days has been getting my boat in the water. Bought it last fall, so had all winter to anticipate the pleasures of a summer's sailing. Finally got it launched last Wednesday, but it was too late in the day to bring it home the 30 km from its winter resting site. Of course Thursday and Friday brought gale force winds, so spent 2 days running back and forth to check mooring lines etc. Typical 'new father' nerves! Thankfully, Saturday turned out to be the perfect day so motored home on calm seas. Still have to get the mast up, but at least now I can check it out the window instead of driving for an hour!

May 12 Sayonara from Japan, I will be checking my luggage in a locker at the train station in about an hour and spending the day in Kyoto prior to taking the train to the Osaka airport.

Yesterday I went to the 4th Imperial property the Shugaku-in Imperial Villa, this is a lovely property on the outskirts of Kyoto, complete with operating rice paddies (local farmers plant and harvest the rice but are not allowed to sell it) 3 tea rooms, waterfalls, all set on the side of a mountain. I spent part of the afternoon teaching a Japanese Botanist how to make beads, there was a lot of sign language going on, for future reference the two critical words you need to know how to say are hotter and too hot ! In the evening I was taken out to a Hot spring at Kurama Village in the mountains North of Kyoto, On the drive out there was some wild wysteria blooming, very pretty, the hot spring was suppose to be a natural sulpher pool, I sure couldn`t smell any sulpher!

Need to go sit on my suitcase again!

May 11 Late this morning, did a preliminary packing job to check and seeif everything that came out of my case would go back in.... Seems to all fit, but it seems to have gained weight! Yesterday morning I went off in search of a Post Office to mail the 7 Post Cards that I wrote Sunday. If you don`t get one you either don`t rate or the Postal system ate it! Later in the morning I went to another of the Imperial Villas, also accross the streeet from the hotel. The grounds are the Sento Imperial Palace but the only building still standing is the Omiyo Palice which was home to the Empress Dowager. The tour was basically in Japanese but the guide only stopped twice the rest of the time we walked incredibly slowly in a loop through the grounds, the guide lead at wedding procession speed, I found it very difficult to walk that slowly! I guess the speed was to allow us to absorb the Imperial Grandure!

In the afternoon I attached myself onto a group of Glass bead artists going to Nara, we went to see the Todai-ji Temple which is the largest wooden structure in the world, it houses the biggest buddha in Japan, we went to the Nara Hotel for `Coffee` after that, the coffee was 800 Yen a cup and I thought 400 was steep! After coffee we went to see the studio of one of the Japanese Bead makers, He sits on the floor with his legs out straight, I tried it and felt like I needed the family bible to get high enough! His beads ranged from 12900 Yen to 48900 Yen. Supper was at a Japanese `pancake` restaurant, where once again the food just kept coming and coming and coming..... back to the Hotel at about Midnight.

May 10 Looks like it will be another sunny day here. Actually got picked up at 8 yesterday morning, drove to Osaka to visit the Satake glass factory. We got a tour of the `factory` from Mr Satake he is the third generation to run the `factory`. They weren`t actually pulling rods yesterday as it was the first day back after a 10 day Golden Week Holiday. Normally Golden week is a 7 day Holiday, which is actually comprised of 3 different one day holidays. The last holiday which was the day I arrived is to honour the Boy Child! But this year since the third holiday was on a Thursday many people took the Friday as well and turned it into a 10 day holiday. Sounds like the North American School system! Even though they weren`t pulling rods they were making beads with the satake glass, a lead based glass. They use kerosene burners to heat the glass and the beads were air cooled, no annealing.... they don`t anneal anythng until it is more than 3 cm thick. Mr Satake said it is partly the large bushy flame that is produce by the oil burner. I will post pictures when I get back to Canada! Next stop was the glass Wholesaler in Osaka, there was some Spanish glass there called Flosing (Sp?) that was painted float glass for fusing, the painted side was really dull while it was still in sheet glass. (the unpainted side looked like a streaky antique glass) There was a sample board that had all the different colours fused as sandwitches between two layers of float glass for a rather ineresting effect, not sure what happens when you abut peices, I think the paint would ooze to the surface like you get with dichro?

Back to Kyoto, I wondered around by myself in the afternoon and visited Nijo castle, it has been registered on the world heritage list of UNESCO. The grounds are not nearly as impresive as the gardens of the Imperial Palace, the Katsura Imperial Village, and the silver temple! I think I may be hitting a temple overload! Walking back from Nijo castle I bought myself food for supper from grocery stores and a Parisian Style bakery. Oh yes I should point out that I wasn`t lost on the 9th, I knew exactly where I was I just couldn`t find where I was going!

May 9 6am in Kyoto! I`m being picked up to go to the Satake Glass factory at 7, hopefully to watch glass rods being pulled. Really cut picture on the home page today! Actually my hair looks just like that this morning, as it is muggy and overcast and my hair was slightly damp when I went to bed, as I tried out a Japanese public bath before supper. They have one pool with an electric current running through it, guess which pool I climbed into first... Really weird feeling, I couldn`t figure out what was going on, it sort of felt like the world was in slow motion, I changed pools. The water is incredibly hot!

Yesterday morning I walked up to Kiyomizu-dera, (The Clear Water Temple) that was the temple that we tried to go to on Saturday but I spent to much time shopping! The view from there was great, You actually get to go into that temple. Most other temples you just walk through the gardens and admire the architecture from the outside. I stopped for lunch, I had taken the time to memorize the Kanij characters off of the picture board outside the restaurant before I went in, they gave me an English menu! I had Tempura with noodles, but the noodles were in a broth so the tempura was soggy, oh well, still tasted good. In the afternoon I got dropped off at the bottom of the walk up to the silver temple, Ginkakuji Temple, The temple had some really neat manacured sand , not quite a zen garden as there was nothing but sand. All these temples have walks up through the hills but the tourists just get to go on a short loop through the gardens, listening to the bull frogs.

Then I was suppose to walk back to the glass studio.... Oops somebody wasn`t paying attention to the first corner, I realized I`d gone to far when I got accross the river, my orientation was suppose to be a blue intersection sign, So I turned at the first one after I got back onto the South side of the river and wandered up and down residential streets for 40 minutes, two nice Japanese ladies asked me if I was lost.... at least I think that`s what they asked! One had a cell phone so she phoned and I was rescued, I was only on the wrong side of the mountain! I would have been OK if I had walked to the temple in the first place, but distance when your being driven is much harder to gage! Also I had been driven up and down the street I was walking on numerous times so the buildings all looked familier! Anyway after my 3 hour romp my feet are sore even with being soaked in the Japanes bath.

May 8 Sunny finally! Actually the rain quit yesterday about 9:30 in the morning, before we went to the Katsura Rikya Imperial Villa, It is famous for it`s gardens, The azaleas were in full bloom, there was also a type of wild azalea with much smaller flowers that were just past prime so the ground under those bushes was a red carpet were the flowers had fallen. The Japanese guide kept yelling no photo, no photo, there were 4 places that it was legal, but I think I may have a few illegals in amongst my legals! None Japanese had audio head sets that we could listen too at each stop, but most of us never listened to the intro, I listened to it just before I handed the set back, the reason we weren`t allowed to take pictures was to protect the moss? OK. After the tour of Katsura we stopped at a sweet shop and had a bowl of Matcha. Matcha is the whipped powdered green tea that is served in the tea ceremony. In the afternoon I attended a Ikebana class to watch and was given my own private lesson on a straight up arrangement. Later in the afternoon we walked through the fish and vegetable market, it is a covered street that runs for 3 or 4 blocks, and was full of all sorts of yummy looking things! One of the more interesting things I have found in Japan are heated toilet seats, most private homes have them as do some restaurants. They are quite cosy on damp day! Also ran into my first Japanese style toilet yesterday... I think the Japnese that use these all the time must develop really good calf muscles! Last night I was introduced to Shochu a fermented clear liquor, it can be made with rice kome, wheat mugi, Sweet Potatoe imo, I had a glass of the Kome Shochu, in a neighborhood bar and the bartender insisted that I have small samples of the other types as well to compare!

May 7 Another rainy morning in Kyoto but I think it is going to clear off and be sunny! I checked out my site and noticed that I now have chinese characters scatteed throughout my prose! Adds interest to the site....?

Yesterday I went on a tour of the Imperial Palace grounds, the tour had way to many people on it and it was drizzling, the azaleas are all out in bloom at the momment and really lovely. This is the season to prune the Imperial pine trees. They prune the trees twice a year, all of the new growth is broken off by hand on each tree, I think there are two thousand of these carefully manicured trees. The trees are lovely, but I think that job would suck. Next stop was the building where the traditional kimono fabric is handwoven, none of the handwoven ones were in the store for sale but since some of the obi fabric gets only 1 cm a day woven I can imagine the price! One of the women was using her nails as the beater, the nails on her two index fingers were each carefully notched like a minature comb, not sure what she would do if she broke a nail... doubt if they would give her a month off work until her nail grew in again. At this point it was pouring so we took a taxi to the Guom district for lunch . The taxis are interesting the seats all have white lace seat covers (spotless) and the drivers wear white gloves with the fingers cut off. Lunch was a traditional Japanese pancake layered with pork etc... Spent the rest of the afternoon wandering around in the rain shopping and drinking tea. We were trying to go to a hill top temple but spent too much time shopping so never made it that far. Dinner was at a restaurant were the meal is a set course, there were two versions there a 52,000 Yen and a 75,000 Yen per person, the courses are brought out one dish at a time, the final course is a bowl of miso soup, a bowl of rice, a plate of Japanese pickles and a cup of twice brewed green tea... of course the whole meal was washed down with sake. I ended the night by taking the sub way home by myself, I actually got on the right train going the right way and off at the right stop.

May 6 Good morning from Kyoto, Started this with Japanese Characters, don`t figure to many of you would understand them unless you could get hold of my keyboard! it`s 8:15 am here on Friday morning, it`s 8:15 pm Thursday night in NB, since my watch is analog and doesn`t have a date I didn`t even have to change it! The keys are all in weird places on this keyboard the @ sign is with the ` but the ` is the upper case so I keep getting my text turning into hot links... to nowhere!

It`s raining here today, I have been told that I brought it with me, first rain in weeks here! Off to the Imperial Palace today and then out for lunch with a Japanese friend of someone else that I don`t know! I was met at the airport which was lucky as I might still be standing in front of the ticket machine trying to buy myself a ticket, I could easily have got onto the wrong train too. Who knows where I would be this morning. When we got to Kyoto, my escort had left his car in a parking garage I think the cars must be kept underground on a grid a bit like that number puzzle game, that has one empty space, the attendant fed the parking ticket into a reader and a few minutes later the car was spit sideways out of a door in the wall, facing the exit! Actually went for a walk and a small Japanese style snack before i gave up for the night, three different kinds of raw squid ....(tried to write this last night but after being up for 28 hours I couldn`t get logged on I was forgetting the s in beeds.....) Think there is some weird characters showing up in this even though I am using the English Keyboard! I just saved what I wrote and have a bunch of jibberish in amongst! You can ignore it as I doubt if I can get rid of it!

May 3 24 hours and counting until I board the ferry... (07:40) step one on my way to Japan . My bags have been packed unpacked repacked, condensed, so far I haven't had to sit on it, but who knows what last minute additions I'll find today! I keep trying to remove clothes. I know I won't wear at least 30 % of what I have packed, the problem is which 30 % to I turff! Overcast and drizzly today here, hope it is nice in Japan, as my clothes are probably better suited to Hawaii than Japan! I'm hoping to be able to send email updates from Japan otherwise the web meister promises occasional new pictures on the home page!

I picked up my travel insurance in Saint John yesterday, I thought some fo the disclaimers were pretty cute, the first one is 'THIS POLICY MAY LIMIT BENEFITS SHOULD YOU FAIL TO DO SO' . What do they think I'm going to do, check into the Wakiki Hilton with a private nurse? But the clause I really like is 'IN CASE OF EMERGENCY, PLEASE CALL (BEFORE SEEKING MEDICAL ATTENTION): WORLD WIDE COLLECT 1 416....' I'm suppose to tap the stretcher bearer on the arm after the earthquake and sign language put me down I have to phone to make sure you are the authorized Medical Aid?

I think that I can access the email on my home page while I'm away, lynne@ fireballbeeds.com, I'd love to hear from people!

May 1 Well it's raining again! (But the house isn't leaking!... much) This morning it was just foggy but the fog has solidified and is now falling from the sky. No one would be dancing round may poles winding up ribbons here today! And the winner of the Caliente Flower Beads is Georgette. from cyberspace?

Stuart got home at 10 pm last night and was off to work at the lobster plant at 8 am this morning. He came home for lunch and said it was already boring and he had only been there 4 hours. Hopefully it will get better, at least he's not one of the people that has to rip the tails off of the lobsters... icky I think that would turn me off real quick! Lobster season is open here now, may pick up a couple tomorrow as we're off to Saint John again, I have to pick up my copy of my travel insurance, I got persauded that a Klutz like me travelling to the Orient wasn't a good idea without travel insurance! My shoulder still hasn't totally recovered from body surfing down the mountain two months ago. One of the things I can't do is open the bathroom window at 4:30 in the morning when it is raining... That is when the cat wants to go out, but he often changes his mind if it's raining, and then forgets that he changed his mind at 4:45 and wants out again.... Much more peaceful to just help him out in the first place, but I can't hold on to the cat and open the window at the same time! When it's not raining I don't have to hold onto him so no problem... (My husbands solution is to put him out before he goes to bed, so poor Duddley will no doubt be spending the next three weeks outside!

Tried another bead with CZ's (cubic zirconiums) today, only lost one and I think that was because the glue wasn't dry... actually the glue caught on fire and in the process of flinching the CZ fell onto my immaculate work bench and is gone forever! Other than loosing the one CZ, I think that the other 4 went on perfectly, 80% success rate, getting better, will try and post the picture of the finished bead tomorrow night ! My gold leaf that got drowned looks like it will peel off of the paper, but is no longer smooth, it looks like skin that has been in really hot water for way to long.... Might get an interesting texture.

My next freebe will be something from Japan or Hawaii you'll have to trust me, the draw will be June 5, no picture will be posted until after the draw.... A SURPRISE!