Category Archives: Uncategorized

Wandering through a pharmacy looking for goose grease to rub on the boils, I have a very strong madeleine moment. My mother had a beautiful dressing table. It had a large mirror and a glass surface on which were her … Continue reading →

I was always very bad at those ‘spot the difference’ games. You know, two pictures that look the same but have lots of subtle difference, like the cow in one picture is black and in the other it is white. … Continue reading →

Well, today I am 65 years old. This is usually considered an important milestone as I now gets cheap travel, reductions on coco and carpet slippers. Indeed the great Shinto gods, who understand, did not want this day to pass … Continue reading →

We are booked to play the Naha Haari Boat Festival, http://www.naha-navi.or.jp.e.ni.hp.transer.com/magazine/2227/  as part of our 2017 tour. It is incredibly hot. We play and the crowd goes wild. Young women sit on their boyfriends’ shoulders waving cigarette lighters. It is … Continue reading →

By midnight on Sunday my new yard is  ready to go. She has been fashioned by Opinel, rasped and sanded but she maintains a very rustic appearance. I have made her more robust than the original yard as I feel … Continue reading →

How all occasions do inform against me to spur my dull Scaffie launch. She has been ready to go for the last 3 weeks but I snapped the yard, the tides fell wrong and the weather was bad. Then the … Continue reading →

On the event of anything in Japan, kind folks send wonderful orchid displays. These hang around until the blooms fall off and then they are junked. This has appeared too cruel to me. It makes me think of Black Beauty. … Continue reading →

It is Saturday morning, so I go down to the Octopus Shop to get my prescription filled. It is my favorite place. https://quietripple.wordpress.com/2014/09/27/fishmonger/ To my dismay I find that all has changed. A big new building has been underway next to … Continue reading →

The school to which I went from the age of 5 to 13 displayed each hapless infant’s performance on huge boards.  My shame was visible to all. The ultimate tribute was a gold star. I never got one, until today. … Continue reading →

Okinawa has a season called the Rainy Season because it rains a lot. It more or less comes after the Tax season. So, we really have 5 seasons here: Winter, Tax, Rainy, Summer,  Autumn. Last night it rained like crazy. … Continue reading →