the-week
Last Week Today! S2024E9
Was a busy (two) week(s) since the last one, so let’s catch up with happenings:
🎂 March 20th and 31st marks “Birthday Week” with the fam, as it’s BoyType and MonkeyGirl’s turns to celebrate getting one year older. And me and SuperWife’s time to be broke AF. BoyType wanted a miniPC for his birthday to tinker on so he combined all his loot and bought one on his own after making sure it could FortNight OK; he wanted to be able to play with his schoolmates. (Don’t tell him I was going to make sure he could play on my Xbox when he told me the first time, but this is a better way since I want him to learn to troubleshoot technology.) MonkeyGirl wanted cashola plain and simple. The big issue this time was me trying to pay lots of bills and have some cash left for our trip and then some foolishness happened that delayed me hooking her up with her gift for a few days, annoying the newly minted 11-year-old. I said, “get used to having deferred dreams for the sake of necessities, especially in this family,” which is a lesson she needs to understand as she learns how to manage money. In my own childhood, my parents were constantly using my allowance stash like a petty cash pot to cover bills and things that would come outta nowhere, so I got used to waiting well past my allowance days to “make a withdrawal;” at least until I was able to get a bank account. She’s got her own account we monitor, and a lot more scratch in it than I did when I was 11– I’m making sure it doesn’t burn a hole in her pocket now.
🎌 One of my BFFs came back home for a visit with his wife and kiddo. He’s from Atlanta, spent lots of time in Japan and both moved back at the same time in 2008. He’s still there in fact, settling down for the long haul and I had done the same until we came back in 2021 (but I’ll tell that story another day.) They wanted to know what it’s like to stay in a RV so we set BigHank up for a driveway camp for them. Other than the water pump being broken because stupid me didn’t winterize it well enough, it made a good guest house for them. So glad to see him again and catch up with everyone. Of the things I miss the most about JapanLife, kicking it with my friends is the biggest.
🤦🏾♂️ After our guests left, we had one day to prep for our spring break trip to Jacksonville. Thanks to the aforementioned water pump issue, we wanted to get it fixed before getting on the road, and in our haste SuperWife and I didn’t properly lock the cargo “basement” hatch. To make a long story short, our spare tire slid out of there along with a few items all just 300m up the road but by the time we noticed, of course it was gone. Who could pass up a perfectly good commercial grade tire & rim just lying on the corner of the road like that? I’ll be buying a replacement before we head on our next journey in May; until then, are there any Pick-A-Part specials for these things?
🏖 We made it to Jacksonville Beach without any troubles actually. I’ll be posting a more detailed trip report in the next few days, but here are some snaps for your consideration: [gallery type=“rectangular” link=“none” ids=“543910,548926,543868,541099,542056” orderby=“rand”]
And that’s all I got, see ya next week! 👋🏾
Last Week Today! S2024E7
🤦♂️ OK, I skipped out on hella posts for this category. I know, I know… I'll backfill them later, but I really hadn't done much of anything noteworthy I guess so there wasn't the motivation to post one of these… Which is not the point of course, so I'll just shut up and get on with this installment. Just watch out for the backfills if you're keeping up with this on the socials or RSS or email or whatever.
🩺 I had my yearly physical exam, and it went well except for the one note under intensive fasting glucose being 101mg/dL which to make a long story short, prompted my doctor to admonish me about getting enough exercise or else worry about diabetes being a thing. Other than that, I'm just as healthy as ever.
🏋️ It's no secret that since returning Stateside from Japan, I haven't really been getting enough exercise, walks, runs, all that jazz and have low-key been stressed and a bit depressed. I have zero motivation to go to a gym; I don't like doing routines so much to begin with, but I really don't like being in a room with total strangers trying to figure out how to make my body do stuff to burn fat. It literally makes me even more stressed out than just jogging/riding a bike by myself. SuperWife and I had been going to the gym together at first, but her job changed, and our schedules fell out of alignment for that; I lost my motivation about a year later and here we are. I tried going to the little gym in my area, but my job no longer subsidizes gym membership, and probably more influential, the guy that runs it keeps asking me to join a "boot camp" class. I don't want to join shit, I don't want to be around people, leave me the fsck alone, I'm already anxious as hell just being there. So I stopped going.
🚲️ Excuses aside, I'm just gonna go and buy myself a bike and do what I used to do overseas that kept me fit in the first place. I used to cycle all over the place. I can't walk or take trains like I did there but I'm going to try to at least bike around here and get out more. Did you know I once went almost a whole week without leaving my house a few months ago? (Working from home has its downsides too!) I miss Japan for my social life and urban living more than anything; it kept me on the "life gym" plan where my mind and body constantly got a workout every day without effort. Just living my daily JapanLife kept me fit. Now I actually have to actively work on it. I appreciate any tips on keeping motivated and healthy from y'all out there reading this please.
🚸 Moving on, the kids are doing well. I just realized we'll have 0 mini-mes that will be in elementary school after this school year. Little Monkey will be a middle schooler. When dafuq did my cute little simian who learned to climb up my back like a ladder and sit on my shoulders get to be on the precipice of teenagedom?
🚗 At the other end of the scale, The Big One just passed her written Drivers Exam and is now permitted. I really wasn't ready for this one. It's not like she's chomping at the bit to drive (kinda opposite actually – she frequently takes our fledgling bus system around here) but it's always good to have another driver in the family in case something happens. I wish I had the cheddar to get a hoopty for her and Boy-Type (he'll be at a permittable age this time next year 😨) to drive… But even if I did, we can't afford the insurance on a 16 year old right now I'm sure.
🎨 Speaking of Boy-Type, his drawing skills are getting very good. Fingers crossed for him to be the next Akira Toriyama or Hayao Miyazaki. I'll settle for him just being that guy that paints to cool murals in trendy shopping plazas and shops like his uncle does back in Tokyo. Getting paid to do what you like to do is the shit. One of the classes at the arts high school he'll need to pay attention in is Creative Business Management. I hope he soaks it all up when the time comes.
🦸♀️ SuperWife is out here doing her thing and will attend a intensive technical training bootcamp style class this summer since she'll have more time for that while the school district is on summer break. I think she'd make a great tech support technician or level 1 project lead; her time management is better than mine and that's always been half the job for me. I can't wait to have crazy "vim vs emacs" type discussions with her. LOL
🏁 Lastly, I'm looking forward to spring, warmer temps, and getting back out in the RV. We're set to head down to Jacksonville, Florida for a few days during the first week of April and I can't wait. I love being on the road with the tribe and I feel we're at our best together out in the world exploring like this. We've hit daylight savings already and 25ºC/80ºF was hit for the first time last week too. Just gotta hang on a bit longer to shake these winter doldrums!
Last Week Today! S2024E1&2
In the tradition of those of us who can't do the daily "my day be like" journaling posts, there's the tradition of the weekly post that sums up what happened the week before. In my nod to one of my favorite TV shows, Last Week Tonight, I'm swashbuckling (🏴☠️) the hell out their title and using it on this blog series. Shiver me timbers! And, I'm ripping off my buddy James with the formatting here. Walk the plank!) Also I'm late AF as two whole weeks of January already passed. GyattDayum 2024 is already faster than '23. OK, let's dive in.
🎄So Xmas came and went with little fanfare other than the usual merriment of a Japanese/Afro-American family with very little time and money can make on such occasions. We exchanged gifts with each other, everyone got generally what they wanted but most of all just was glad to be able to enjoy time off with each other, my mom and oldest brother.
🛣️ Big Ass Hank (our RV) got some time on the road -- we hustled down to Orlando for some R&R in a warmer place than metro Atlanta. We used our Boondockers Welcome privileges for a nice layover spot in Live Oak, FL when traffic got too much and continued on down the next day. Normally this is a 6 hour drive, but sometime between 2008 and now, about 5 million more people decided to move into the space between us and Central Florida, making I-75 look like a 320 mile urban expressway complete with crack-ups and speed traps every 20 miles. A train between ATL and ORL is needed.
👨👩👧👦 Once in Orlando, we kinda didn't do much except be in awe of our campsite on Lake Dora (a COUNTY park with cheap camping that blows some of the really expensive sites away) and Old Town Orlando's Eola Park area. Orlando is a nice town even if you're not visiting the theme parks; worth the visit just to hang out and chill for 2 days.
👨🏾💻 I actually only took a few days off for the holiday; my on-call shift usually has nothing going on this time of year and I work from home. But there were some bonkers edge cases coming into my queue and I really wish I could talk...vent about them here. I'm compiling them elsewhere, and someday dammit...someday I'm gonna sing like Dionne Warwick!
😷 Of course in the middle of all this, my entire household got sick! It wasn't COVID but, that didn't stop my doctor from probing my schnoz...
🎌 There's lots of Japanese related stores around our part of Atlanta, and we kinda never visit them... So since the kiddos had their Xmas/お年玉 money burning holes in their pockets, we decided to check out Tokyo Kuma (which seemingly got TikTok'd and Instagrammed to death in the last 4 months) and Kinokuniya Atlanta (which has been a 20 year pipe dream 'til now because I swear they were 6 months from opening a location in Buckhead in 1999, but it didn't happen. Were those just rumors?) Needless to say, I'm glad these are a little out of the way for me, else I'd be treating it like the Daiso or DonKi I so miss and desparately want over here.
🚊 I've decided to try my best to advocate officially for bringing a good transport solution to at least my part of Atlanta and Northern Georgia. The ATLTrains concept along with Beltline Lightrail and I-285 BRT concepts need to be combined somehow. Going down to central Florida and seeing Brightline along with SunRail, Lynx and the fledgling but strong grassroots changes in THAT area makes me think we still have a fighting chance up here. And Atlanta ain't doing nothing but getting bigger. It's high time we all started thinking regionally and collectively about solutions not just involving 2 ton machines on asphalt all the time.
And that kinda catches us up! If you read this far, you've got stamina. Or you're just really bored. Either way, thank you and see ya next week!
The Week ending 12.24.2023
The week before Christmas — not much going on except the twice checking of lists and making sure of naughty or niceness.
The Tribe: celebrating one week since school holidays began, they mostly got into their Christmas shopping/making. I’m really glad Wifey and I made point of instilling making stuff rather than buying stuff for gifts. People should appreciate sweat and creativity more than good credit and next day delivery. I also taught them how to burn leaves. Here in GA, our trees don’t totally de-leaf until about now; no point in raking until then.
Me: still working and teaching myself NixOS and some tinkering with indieweb and fediverse stuff. Really now thinking I need to learn more web stuff. I am mostly a “this is what I want to do so let me learn how to do it” guy and I’m thinking the thing I want to do is gonna be really hard (for me) so I need to sit and really think which way to do it.
Next up: after Xmas we’re going to Florida in Big Hank, our RV. Just a few days. No Agenda. Just go and see what’s up down there. When we get back, there’s a big family gathering on New Year’s Day (which is why Xmas is just for the Tribe this year).
Feels: somewhat melancholic with peaks of satisfaction and optimism. I miss Japan around this time because O-Shogatsu is coming and the hustle into that calm period is a dopamine hit. There’s a similar vibe for Christmas but I don’t get to see the whole of humanity doing it like I did in Tokyo. But I’m extremely satisfied to see Wifey and Kiddos mixing what we did in Japan with what we do here. It’s really cool to see the excited expressions on their faces.
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