David Joiner's Blog, page 4
November 29, 2020
Week 44
Thanks to the pandemic, this was our first Thanksgiving without our cats, who remain at our mother-in-law’s house in Japan. As you can see in this photo, they’re obviously holding up all right.
Thanksgiving has come and gone, and December is only two days away. We stay...
November 22, 2020
Week 43
With Thanksgiving around the corner, I’m afraid we’re not going to celebrate it very traditionally. I did order Thanksgiving meals for the holiday, at least, but really I’m looking forward to making a dent in my sake stash. I’m thankful, among many other things, for my sake and two tanuki drinking buddies!
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November 15, 2020
Week 42
I never watch American TV, but prefer to spend my down-time reading. The exception to this is “Potsun,” a Japanese TV show about people living in isolated parts of Japan. We have a VPN subscription, which allows me to indulge occasionally in this distraction. And hey, it helps my Japanese!
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November 8, 2020
Week 41
Javelina (peccary) statues at the entrance to the Desert Museum. Mask-wearing remains in effect, though Arizona’s coronavirus numbers are spiking again. Given that there’s nothing much to do these days, I should be writing a lot more than I have been.
Last week was dwa...
November 1, 2020
Week 40
Our new fold-up reading chairs somehow remind me of Vietnamese cyclos. Here, in the shade of our front patio, what better place could there be to get through more than 900 pages of War and Peace?
The timing of my move back to the US was terrible, and my wife’s first mo...
October 25, 2020
Week 39
The entrance to Yume Gardens in Tucson, Arizona. We had to make a reservation to see the gardens and gift shop, though we were the only visitors there.
Less than a week and a half ago the lone Japanese garden in Tucson reopened, so I thought I’d make use of my annual m...
October 18, 2020
Week 38
I’ve been reminded lately, by pangs of nostalgia, of the distinct changes of season in Japan and parts of Vietnam. Pictured here, hanging on one of our walls, is a poster of what is said to be the world’s largest canvas painting – it sprawls across a canvas measuring 3.65 m x 20.5 m – which Fujita Tsuguhara completed in 1937. ...
October 11, 2020
Week 37
I sort of hoped it would enter our front patio, but since there was no promise of rabbits, ground squirrels, or chuckwallas so close to our house, it trotted on.
It seems that October brings out the coyotes, or perhaps we’ve just been lucky to see a few on our evening ...
October 4, 2020
Week 36
I’ve started to wonder if there’s a way to use this Taisho-era woodblock print by Kawase Hasui for the cover of Kanazawa. The print shows a street in the Shimohondamachi（下本多町）section of Kanazawa from around 1922. (https://livedoor.blogimg.jp/a_delp/imgs/f/a/fae07e25.jpg)
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September 27, 2020
Week 35
My reading goal between now and the end of 2021. That’s an average of one book per week for the next 65 weeks.
If I’m on what I consider to be week 35 of the pandemic, then what’s this news about it lasting until early 2022? I may hit “Week 100” before this is all said...
