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Family, photos?
Tod’s mom, Jeanie, and her husband, Tim, are visiting us. They were last here in 2018 but it seems like hardly any time has passed. Our days have been packed with activities that I have enjoyed so much I have forgotten to take pictures. But here is a daily log of highlights since their arrival…
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Artsy Koi Nobori
Koi nobori are carp streamers that fly on Children’s Day. On Friday, May 3rd, I’ll host a koi nobori art activity at the Soil to Soul Farmpark kids’ festival. Megumi and I both saw artsy foreign koi nobori that are making the rounds on social media and she was inspired to ask me to do…
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Stripey Tiles
The Tiles Mines have finally yielded a finished product at 555! For the last two weeks, in between rainy days, Sakaguchi-san has been coming over to lay the tiles I laid out in stripes in November. Yes, they sat there for six months before anything happened to them. My plan was creative and complicated. The…
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Hammer Knife Rotor
Feeling overwhelmed by the long grass today, I asked Kawasaki-san if I could use the hammer knife rotor. He gave me and Tod a quick tutorial and off we went. It’s been a dream for two years to try this beast! It is a powerful and complicated machine with a lot of controls. A pull-start…
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Pitching rice
Today was the first planting day for the Oyama Senmaida season. The Sake Owners came out and it was nice to see the people I met at the tasting event last month. I signed up to assist with the planting and was delighted to find that I really didn’t have to do much. Kawasaki-san and…
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Flea Market
At the end of last year, Mamiko asked me if I’d help her organise a flea market at Hangar eight. Sure! Several months of planning, design work, recruiting vendors, and enticing customers culminated in a good success today for the International Mottainai Flea Market. We had 27 vendors and lots of people came to shop…
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Teaching the Birds a Song
This morning I opened the window and heard loud and eager songbirds. A trio of brownish birds held a concert in a tangle of vines and trees. I listened. The cats listened. It was glorious. I tried to capture a video, but the sound quality on my phone doesn’t do it justice. Here it is…
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28 hours in Aomori
Yesterday I got on a plane for the first time since September 2019. I flew north to Aomori for work with Rob and CCJC. I was called in at the last minute to assist on a video shoot for the launch of Coca Cola’s new Ayataka tea products. My key task was driving, but I…
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Cutting grass, inaka style
Recently, I started hearing the buzz of kusukari-ki, our pared-down country lawnmowers, around the valley. I took it as a clear sign that grass cutting season had arrived. Last year I made a mistake and started cutting the jungle at 555 in March…several weeks before everyone else. That meant I trimmed back flowers and forage…
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A Walk at Bodai Dam
We unexpectedly found ourselves taking a walk at Bodai Dam yesterday. How do you unexpectedly end up at Bodai Dam? You start by running errands in town. When Tod says, “Let’s just drive over this scenic place I saw on the map, because we have a little time and the weather is good today” you…
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