Wet Sand

Winters are usually dry here on the Kanto Plain, especially when the winds are coming at us off the Gobi Desert or the Mongolian Steppes. However, this year has been particularly dry. People in our neighborhood have been having trouble with their wells getting filled with sand if not drying up completely.

For several years now we have only used our well for the clothes washer and the bath/shower. Our drinking/cooking/toilet water comes from the municipal water line. That is probably a very good thing. We are also having trouble with our well now. The piping keeps getting choked with sand. The washing machine seems to be working okay, but the oil-burning (non-tank) water heater that supplies hot water to the bath/shower keeps malfunctioning, and sand in the lines seems to be the culprit.

I've heard cold showers can be good for you, but...

***

My mother-in-law's health definitely seems to be on the upswing, which is a very good thing. Hopefully that means she'll stop being so %$&#* spoiled. She and my father-in-law have been treating us as their own personal restaurant. I know that we need to be patient, but it's still not an easy thing to deal with. Usually FIL will show up just as my wife is starting to cook, and then he'll give their meal order. If it happens to be something different from what she's making (which has been the case most if not all of the time), that quite often means our dropping everything and making a second supermarket run. Even then a good portion of the time FIL will bring things back uneaten afterward and say, "She decided she didn't want this," or, "She says this is too hard," or, "She says this has too much of a fishy aftertaste," or, "This has carrots in it, and she says she doesn't want carrots today," or the like. My wife has been EXTREMELY stressed out.

This morning I hoped to have bread for breakfast for the first time in over a week, but just as I was getting it out FIL showed up, said, "She decided she wants to have bread this morning," and made off with our entire bread supply. My wife, who had already started cooking a Japanese-style meal for them, was furious. I, being a bit fed up with having nothing but the same menu for breakfast day after day after day, was not happy, either. Maybe we should make them pay for the food to which they've been helping themselves this past week. It's not like they're using even half of the monthly "rent" I've been paying them, anyway.

***

The news still hasn't gotten off its Chinese gyoza obsession, and they're still going on and on about the JDS Atago incident. You'd think they'd have something else to talk about, such as celebrity gossip.

(Yes, that was meant to be sarcastic.)

***

The current school year is drawing to a close at Ye Olde Academy. Final exams just ended, and the end-of-the-year activities have begun. The various problems I've been having came to a sudden, ugly, snarlying head, but after a cathartic venting I decided to try to patch things up (i.e. mend fences) rather than fight. I just had a very difficult (and rather bizarre) discussion with my chief and closest working partner...with whom I've had so much difficulty getting along lately...and have hopefully worked things out to some extent. I guess I'll be continuing with the international program after all. Besides, if I don't do it, who can?

It actually made me feel a lot better being told that. I guess I'm really not so obsolete. Not yet, anyway.

This has been a very difficult and disturbing year. Maybe even a cursed one. I can't say I regret its passing too much, though I have no idea what the new school year will bring come April.