School and the Halloween party

School like usual. After I headed home, did some shopping and laundry and then took a nap. Got up and headed out around 8:00. Halloween is a newer holiday here in Japan. When I was here in 2005 there were some decorations here and there but not much really happend.

Now halloween is a bigger holiday and there are a couple common things that people do. One thing that is pretty much a thing that foriegners do is the Yamanote Run. This is where a bunch of people dress up and run around making noise and acting crazy on the main line in Tokyo. This tends to annoy people on the train and JR has often posted notices on their website asking people not to do this.

The other common thing that people do is have parties. This is the one that I oppted for. Temple had a party at Muse and it was supprisingly packed. Most of the girls dressed as either Geishas, Nurses, School Girls, or Race Queens. It was pretty good. I met some cool people and barrowed a couple different costumes.

From there a bunch of people and I all headed to Curtain Call in Roppongi Hills for a supprise birthday party. I stayed there till morning and headed home.

School, work, work party

School like usual today. After work, Mason, and some people from work and I all headed out to Warawara where we had some food and drinks as a going away party for one of counselors who is leaving. It was fun and I took the last train home.

School and work

School like usual, working on law and other stuff. After school some friends and I went to Sukiya for dinner and then on the way to work I noticed the garage pictured with a disco ball in it. I think I'm going to be installing a disco ball in my garage when I get a place with a garage.

School, haircut, and work

I woke up a little later than usual but I still made to class on time. After class I headed to Shinjuku where I got a new SD card for my camera since the other one broke and got some new shoe laces since those broke too. Then I got my haircut and headed back home for a shower before heading back to school. I love Shinjuku. I think it's my favorite part of Tokyo and it had been a while since I was last there, so it was good to be back. I headed back to school for law then then to work after. After work Mason and I got some food at a place in the area and then played a couple games at the arcade. Good times.

Monday

School like normal except that one of the kids at school decided to bring his PS3 and the new game "Little Big Planet" so after class I played Bionic Commando, Super Puzzle Fighter II Turbo, and Wipeout HD. Then him, two other friends and I all headed to Saizeriya for dinner. After dinner we headed back to school and played Little Big Planet and Puzzle Fighter till the school closed. I'm not a PS3 fan but that game was pretty good.

Lazy Sundays

Sunday my back was still hurting for some reason so I just hung out at home. Watched a couple movies, did laundry, and worked on school stuff.

Work, and sleep

Woke up this morning and found a mail that was sent to my phone last night at 2am from my private student saying that his condition is bad and he can't have a lesson. It's just funny cause of course there was alcohol involved. I guess it was good cause I was able to go back to sleep for a little longer and then I headed to Andrew's with my computer so he could fix it. He just ran a restore and everything was good. I know how to do that but I didn't really know the key to hit. Oh well, he showed me a couple other things to speed stuff up and then I headed to work. For some reason my upper back was killing me this morning and it lasted through the day. Weird.
When I got home I went to bed early hoping to wake up and head out around 11 but instead I slept through my alarm and wasted the Saturday night sleeping.

Friday!

School like usual, and then I went to bed early when I got home. I'm glad the week is finally over. With all the tests and papers, I'm glad it's finally over. The only problem is that this morning when I turned on my computer, I downloaded something that gave my PC a virus so I gotta figure out how to fix it.

School and work

Today the 4th group gave their presentation in HR and I had no tests so I was able to relax and spent the afternoon playing Metal Slug on the school computers till it was time for law. We got our tests back and I got a B, so I'm pretty happy cause I thought I did worse. After law, Mason, Andrew, and I all headed to a Ramen place near work and ordered a ton of Gyoza. When work finished, Mason and I headed to the arcade, played a couple rounds of Wangan Midnight, and then headed home.

School, tests, and work

Mircoecon like usual followed by a long and painful finance test. I think I might have managed a C on it. Anyhow, after the test I headed home and took a nap till I had to get up and head back to school for law. In Law we reviewed the memorandum that we're working on and then I had work like usual.

School, Test, and work

School like usual, but during and after HR, time was spend studying for the law test. The law test seemed pretty tough, but we'll see. After the test I headed to work and then back to school to study for the Finance test tomorrow. Headed home at 11 and wound up staying up till about 4am studying for finance in vain.

School and study

Microecon and Finance. In the afternoon I studied for the law test tomorrow and then had law class and went home.

Sunday, Sunday

Since I was up all night seeing sweet drifting I woke up after 12 and spent the day doing laundry and working on school stuff.

Work, Work party, and the smell of tires

Headed to Takehito's for his lesson and then to work after. The Katsuya near my work has a new Shrimp cheese katsu don, which is a ricebowl with egg, breaded shrimp and cheese. It's awesome so I had that for lunch. After work I stopped home and then headed back out to Shinagawa for the work party. Of this type of party, it was probably the biggest I had been to. They usually have parties at some of the larger schools and they are usually smaller, but this one was pretty big and the CEO showed up at the end to say a few words to everyone and help with the clean up.

I left the party and headed home to change and grab my camera. I headed out to Kawasaki and met up with Mason. It was past 12 by the time we met up for the cops had already closed down all the parking areas and had the signs up discouraging the "Roulette Zoku", the people who race around the C1 loop.

Around 3 we wound up in Oifuto, a shipping area in Shinagawa and drove around there to get familiar with the area. We noticed a lot of tire tracks painting the road and decided it might be worth it to stick around for a bit. Stopped at a near by convenience store and got a meal to eat while we waited for something to happen. There were many cars parked along the side of the road waiting and some people were waiting on the median, some even with lawn chairs. The road is a 6-lane road on both sides so it has plenty of room for sliding. On the way back to the car from the convenience store there were a couple cars that drifted by and we knew it was on, but then it went quiet. We finished eating our food and about the time when we finished eating, it started back up. From there was was about 1-2 hours of street drifting! It was awesome! All of the drifters had papers taped over their licence plates to reduce the risk of getting a ticket. At about 4:45 everyone started leaving, so I think some police may have been on the way, so at that point we headed home. It was a good night.

School and meeting up with the host family

Microecon and Finance, followed by Ramen Jiro for lunch. After lunch I worked on stuff for finance and then had law. When law finished I hung out at the school for a bit and then headed to my host family's house. We had some good sashimi and then headed to the Onsen.

School and work

School in the morning and work at night.

School and work

Wednesday was pretty busy cause I had a test in Microecon in the morning, followed by a quiz in Finance. In the afternoon one of my friends and I headed to Keio for lunch and we got the Spaghetti there. It was less than 3$ and it was huge! I could barely finish it all. After lunch I spend the afternoon in the computer lab working on my paper for law and then going to law. When school finished I headed to work like usual and then home.

School and work

HR in the morning. After HR some friends and I headed to Keio for lunch and then back to school where I worked on Microecon and Law homework till it was time for Law. When school finished Mason, Andrew, and I all headed to McDonald's to try the new McRib sandwich. Like most things at McDonald's it wasn't that great but when you have low expectations it isn't hard to meet them. I went to work and on my way home I saw 4 guys sitting in the waiting room in the station playing DS.

Holiday!

Today is sports day, which means that people don't work but play sports. I just stayed home and worked on school stuff. Oh, I did some laundry too!

a lot of lessons

Worked in Shinagawa today and taught ten lessons. It was pretty hardcore

Work and party!

Headed to Takehito's for his lesson and then to work till 6. After I got home I took a shower and went to bed. I had my alarm set for 10:45 so I woke up , got ready, grabbed some food and then took the last train out to Roppongi where I met up with some friends from school. We went to a club called New Lex Edo, which is a pretty well known club and very popular among the European models. One of my Japanese friends was there and he loved the model girls, it was hilarious. I guess the club has pretty good PR casue they had pictures all over of all the celebrities who visited, from Harrison Ford, to the Red Hot Chilli Peppers. It was pretty cool and since some of my friends know the owner we got in for half price.

Friday

Finally the week is over. After school I went back home, watched a movie and went to bed.

HR test and work

Got to school super early to study for the HR test. When I actually took the test, it seemed a lot easier then I had origianlly thought. After the test I went straight home and took a nap casue I was up till 2 the night before studying for it. Woke up in the afternoon, got dressed, and headed back to school for law. After law I headed to work. Busy day.

School, work, and study

School like usual, but all the time between classes was spent studying for the HR test tomorrow. When I finished work, I headed back to school to study till 11:00 when they close the building and then studied more when I got home till I fell asleep.

School, study, work, and study

School today like normal. We had a guest speaker in HR and then spent the afternoon studying for the HR test on Thursday. After law I headed to Work and after work Mason and I headed to Al dente, a pasta place near work. When I got home I studied for a bit and then went to bed.

School

Headed to school, had a test in Microecon followed by Finance. Went to Toto Don for lunch, which is a pretty good place where they put raw fish over a bowl of rice. Three of my friends have iphones and sometimes use them to save their seats while they get the ticket for their food. Had law in the afternoon where we talked about the next paper for next week. In the evening I met up with a friend for dinner and then headed home.

Work, Laundry, and homework

Today I woke up and headed to work in Meguro. It's a little smaller than Tamachi and it seems noisier. There was some kind of festival going on outside and they were blowing whistles and it was super noisy. When I went outside for my break I was looking for a combini but they weren't as close at Shinagawa or Tamachi. I went to three different combinis looking for my favorite grape gummi candy and none of them had it. Defeated I returned to work for my last four lessons. After work I headed back home and one the way home the train stopped at one of the stations and some crazy alarm went off and I though I was going to die. After a couple minutes the alarm shut off and I didn't die. When I got back to my my part of town I stopped at the grocery store and got some cereal and sushi for dinner. When I got home I did some Laundry and then tried to study for Mircoecon.

School and work party

School in the morning, then not long after I got home I headed back out to Shibuya where I met up with people from work for a going away party for one of the employees. We headed to some restaurant called "American" It was all you can eat and drink for 3 hours. We were in a room for about 12 people on the side that also has a Karaoke machine. After we finished eating we busted out some classic songs like "Eye of the Tiger" and "ぼくはくま" (I'm a bear). When we left it was getting close to the last train so some of the people went home, but the rest of us went to a photo booth for pictures. After that one of the teachers suggested a club called "Air" which is the same club that they went to in the movie Lost in Translation.

It was ok, but wasn't too busy so we all hopped a cab to Roppongi. When we got there Maria, one of the teachers recommended a place that one of her friends works at so we could get free drinks. We went there and it was pretty weird. Other than us, there was maybe 4 people in the place. It was a bar with a pole in the middle of the dance floor. We all sat at a table on the side and had a few drinks. The weird thing about the place was that there was a midget dancing on the pole and some guy with a huge camera taking pictures. It was pretty weird so we got out of there as soon as possible. When we got out I got a mail from one of my friends who was around and I met up with him at a place called "St. Elmo's Bar" possibly named after the movie.

School and work

Usual day, school and work

School presentation and work

Headed to school early today to meet up with my group for HR. We reviewed the presentation and then presented. Our presentation was about the difficulties that Pizza Hut faced with opening a franchise in the Soviet Union. We had a really good presentation and I think people enjoyed it. After HR, I had law followed by work.

School and work

School in the afternoon like usual and then off to work.