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Passport Diaries

Where Globe-Trotting meets Beach-Combing

March 2, 2009 Japan

Temptation and Victory

“Something always happens as soon as your husband deploys.” I hear that all the time, usually referring to kids. Sometimes cars. Well sure enough, Chris was gone a week when, within 24 hours of each other, the hot water heater stopped working during the coldest week of this winter, one of the headlights tried to hang itself, and the washing machine refused to drain all the frigid water out. “You’ve got to be freakin kidding me!” I hollered at the washing machine around midnight. I would have no dry clothes in the morning. I restarted it and went to bed. (update: it worked that time for some reason…who knows)

The hot water malfunction was established Saturday night, so I got up early Sunday so I’d have time to old school boil water for a bath before church. I put two inches of freezing water in the tiny tub and continuously added boiling water, but 45 minutes later the water had only upgraded to Really Really Cold. Fortunately, somewhere in the process I’d looked at the stove and thought, “All this hot water and not one cup of tea?!” and sacrificed a cup of my would-be bath for some tea comfort. I think that’s all that got me through the morning. The bath water wasn’t even lukewarm so I gave up and got dressed for church.

The Definition of Temptation: Pounce was veeeeeeery interested in the small amount of water at the bottom of the deep tub. A little too interested. He leaned way over with his little kitty butt in the air. Without Chris here to toss and squeeze the kitties they’ve gotten a little soft. Maybe a small push…? But no. I overcame temptation. To be nice I did pick Pouce up and hang him over the edge so he could sniff the water or whatever he was trying to do, but he freaked out and fluffed his tail up to the size of his body. This was nice, because I’d been feeling cold and sorry for myself all by my lonesome this chilly weekend, and that made the lack of hot water funny instead of tragic.

Even better, right before bed I heard a mighty ruckus and Pounce flew into the living room at 3/4 fluff capacity. What the heck?! An intruder?? Did the cats break my new shrine sale vase??? I went to investigate and found a sopping wet, very surprised Mouse puddling outside the bathroom. I chased him around the house with Chris’ towel and finally pinned him down in a disgruntled heap in the living room and dried him off.

The Victory: I was online looking at this Japanese bar I want to review. It was all in kanji (characters), but I looked at the half-dozen tabs at the top of the page and thought, “Maybe this means menu.” A click revealed pictures and prices. Oh. My. Goodness. I recognized a character and found what I wanted….isn’t that the beginning of reading?! Whoa!!! Victory indeed!!

Categories: Japan

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Comments

  1. Rachel says

    March 2, 2009 at 1:45 pm

    I miss your Kitties- Jeff would have taken them if I allowed him too 🙂 It is frustrating when all those things break or fall apart at once. Even overwhelming! At least things can only get better from here!

  2. McKay says

    March 2, 2009 at 2:02 pm

    YAAAYYYY! I’m so happy for your character victory! Awesome!! And, yes, I’ve heard something always goes wrong too, but that seems like a lot. Hey, I found a fun comic that you might enjoy in your spare time (plus, she is always looking for ideas for stories – I think your most recent post certainly would be inspiring) http://www.jennyspouse.com

  3. San Diego Farmgirl says

    March 2, 2009 at 2:51 pm

    So, you refrained from pushing Pounce into the bathtub, but he pushed Mouse in? What’s up with that? haha

  4. Hannah says

    March 2, 2009 at 5:44 pm

    I am so impressed with your ability to read Japanese! I followed your link and tried my luck in finding the menu tab. I clicked on an arbitrary link and found… a page full of Japanese character, with nothing resembling prices or food. I guess I still can’t read Japanese.

  5. wendy says

    March 3, 2009 at 2:30 am

    I know what you mean about everything going wrong when the hubby is gone. Within a week of Matt leaving I got my first flat tire ever and the water main broke for the entire neighborhood (I had to boil water for 3 days). Also, more recently, just before Matt got home the kitchen sink plumbing that I did failed and water was flowing out of the cabinet onto the floor. There were also many other minor mishaps. What’s the deal? Do I just not notice these things when Matt is here? Or do they just not happen?

  6. Evelyn says

    March 4, 2009 at 3:51 am

    Someone has discovered that my facebook profile somes up in Japanese…do YOU know anything about this??

  7. Brea in Texas says

    March 5, 2009 at 1:11 am

    I’m impressed with your goodness. I used to take every opportunity possible to push my cats in water when the option presented itself. 🙂

    ~Brea

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