Happy thoughts

I’m currently playing the waiting game……both today and for the rest of the week.  I have no classes today, so I’m playing the waiting game for 4:15 to get here so that I can go home.  I’m playing the waiting game for the rest of the week because I’m ready for the three day weekend.  I only have four more mornings to wake up, and four more days of school!  I’m playing the waiting game for our trip to Australia.  Exactly one week from tomorrow, we will board a plane and be bound for Cairns!  I keep thinking these happy thoughts to get me through the day! 

Last Friday afternoon my JHS had a road race.  What does that mean?  Basically all of the kids are assigned a race: the short, medium, or long race.  Each student (unless they’re on crutches or something) has to run in one of the races.  The shortest one was about 1.5 km, and the longest was 4km.  All week long whenever I asked kids if they were excited for the road race on Friday, I kept getting the same answer: NO.  When I asked if they liked running, I also got the same answer: NO.  So why do this?  ……because they HAVE to.  I’m not sure who’s in charge of when this road race is held or why it’s ALWAYS in December, but this seems like the WORST time of year to have it.  Why can’t we wait until March or April when the trees are budding, the grass is a little greener, and the temperature is much warmer?    I felt bad for the kids on Friday.  Although it wasn’t nearly as cold as it has been, it was still a little chilly.  They had to wear their uniform gym clothes—a short sleeve shirt and navy blue shorts.  They kept shuffling around saying “Samui!  Samui!”  (I’m cold!  I’m cold!)  I let a couple of girls try out my new gloves with the fluffy fleece lining on the inside.  They LOVED them and kept going on and on about how soft and warm they were.    They asked me where they were from, and I told them that they were a Christmas present from my sister.

Watching the race was okay.  I kind of felt like the outsider again.  Each teacher knew exactly what they were doing and where they should be going.  Each was assigned a roll—water hand-outer, stop watch person, start gun shooter, organizer of parents, etc.  I was the the awkward foreigner wandering around looking for a friend to talk to.  The beginnings and endings of the races were fun—cheering on the runners.  The ends of races took a longer amount of time because there could be a 15-20 minute difference between the first and last person through.  As if running in the cold wasn’t bad enough, the weather decided to take a turn for the worst.  It started to rain.   Everything and everyone was wet.  Luckily, I had enough layers on up top that I never felt it.  The bottoms of my pants, however, did indeed get soaking wet.    Once again….whoever has the bright idea to do this race in December every year is not my friend.

Friday night was our annual Kuma-gun Christmas party.  Since Ian took the car up to the city earlier in the day to work, I had to take the train to Asagiri.  As soon as I left work, I stopped by the house very quickly to change clothes and then quickly pedaled my little butt to the train station to catch the 4:32 train.  Margo picked us up and took us to her house where Mary and Ian were already busy at work making pizzas.  There was a TON of prep work to do before people came over.  Ian made the marinara sauce, and then we had to make two batches of dough, cut up alllllll of the toppings, set out the drinks, etc.  While Ian made the sauce, Margo put the finishing touches on decorations, I kneaded the dough, and Devin and Mary cut the veggies and meats for toppings.  We were finished and ready to go before the first guest arrived.  The only downside was that we had to wait for Melissa, who was bringing the cheese.  She had to stay late at work and then pick up David in Hitoyoshi, so she was one of the last to arrive.  Pizza making is NOT a quick thing to do…..especially when you have several hungry pairs of eyes watching the clock on the oven tick down.  I worked as quickly as possible, but all-in-all, it took about two hours from the time of the first pizza going in until the last one came out.  I lost track of how many pizzas I made.  Meat pizza, veggie pizza, Hawaiian pizza, sausage and beef pizza, ham and mushroom pizza, green pepper, tomato, and bacon pizza, and oh so many more options went in and out of that oven! 

 

There were a few times when I felt like an idiot while making pizzas.  I knew that we were getting a late start and that people were hungry, so I got a bit frazzled.  Pizzas are easy to make, right?  Dough, sauce, cheese, toppings.  The very first pizza I made, I patted out the dough and tossed the cheese on.  Ian said, “Ummm…are you going to put sauce on that?”  *face palm*  A little while later, I was back at it again!  I put the ingredients on in this order: sauce, toppings, cheese.  Doh!!  After working at a pizza restaurant for 7ish years, you’d think I’d know how to make a pizza! 

 

Not only did we have pizzas, but everyone else made delicious desserts.  Krista made peppermint brownies, Shara made sugar cookies, Sara made gingerbread cake, David made homemade eggnog, and Joe made everyone’s favorite…chocolate chip cookies!  After everyone had their fill of pizza, we watched a movie that David had worked on the set of before coming to Japan.    To end the night, we had birthday cake.  Ah, yes.  The debacle of the night.  Both Katakin and Brian have birthdays in December, and we said that we would celebrate their birthdays that night since we’d all be together.  However, guess who didn’t show up?  BOTH Katakin AND Brian.  I’m not sure if Katakin forgot or what, and Brian was visiting his friend near Ashikita.  That didn’t stop us from celebrating!  We all signed their cards and gave them to whoever would see those two next and ate our fill of THEIR birthday cake.

I guess I had so much fun at the party that my body just didn’t want to accept sleep when we got home.  I tossed and turned for a good long while (VERY uncommon for me!) before FINALLY falling asleep sometime after 2AM.