Met Non and Ryo in Ginza to watch Up in the Air movie with George Clooney. It was a kind nice, slow paced movie that did not leave too much of a memory an hour after we left the theatre.
As always with Club Leo we have dinner after the movie. This time Ryo had made reservations at Aux Amis des Vins. We had a fun time talking about everything and nothing in particular. The food was so so, and quite expensive.
Wednesday and “no overtime working day” ๐ A Japanese government invention to decrease the work hours of their employees. That has now spread to private companies too, like Sony Ericsson.
I left the office at 6 pm, which is an hour earlier than when we absolutely should leave the office on a “NOWD”. Yamanote-sen (JR commuter line) was more overcrowded than usually. One reason may be that I went in the opposite direction than I usually do when I go home.
Pulling myself out of the cart at Yurakucho station along with what felt a thousand other passengers I could not do much else than follow the slow pace of everyone else. My destination was easy enough to find. Just walk along the rails back towards Shimbashi.
At the Coca restaurant located under the rails of Yamanote-sen I found Mash-san and Chie. They had started eating and drinking, waiting for me.
We had a good time and after a while we were joined by Saito-san. Continuing to eat spicy food, drinking and talking. We had a good time ๐
At around 10 pm we finished and continued to Tori Ichi just around the corner. It’s a yaki-tori restaurant, though our purpose tonight was not to eat but have a last drink before going home. And of course to speak Swedish with the owners wife ๐
In the evening, after a gym session, Chie and I went to Red Pepper in Ebisu. There we met Non, Ryo, Andreas and Jonas for St. Valentine’s Day dinner.
We had a lot of good food and talked about รฃยล รฃยยฒรฃยยจรฃโล รฃยโขรฃยยพ (ohitorisama) which basically means a person without a date. That was what Non, Ryo, Andreas and Jonas were. Andreas and Jonas kind of had dates but they are in Sweden so it was a bit difficult to have dinner together.
We talked about other things than people without dates as well. Like what to order for desert. We all had apple pancake with vanilla ice, but I also had strawberry sherbet. Yummy!
Oh, almost forgot. Valentine’s Day in Japan means you get chocolate… If you’re they guy ๐ Though we have to pay back in a month’s time when it is White Day ๐
Today is the day when 2009 becomes 2010 or maybe 2009++ would be be the correct way of expressing it in C++ (a programming language). Anyway, the weather was again great, though a bit chilly in the wind.
Coco and I spent part of the day in a long walk in the sunshine. And the rest of the day we spent resting together with the rest of the family. And preparing the New Year’s dinner. In order to prepare the dinner Chie and I also went to buy groceries. To get the kani (crab) and shells and some other fishy ๐ things we went to the fish market.
As always on a New Year’s eve the fish market was chaos. People are so afraid they will not get the things they want for dinner so the fight their way around. I walked around as normal, while Chie was fighting ๐
As you may have guessed, we had kani (crab), grilled scallops, and hand rolled sushi for New Year’s dinner.
After dinner Coco was tired and fell asleep at once. While the rest of us was able to stay up for the new year.
Went to Tokorozawa for the New Year today. Once we arrived in Tokorozawa I took Coco for a long walk (on the wild side). When I take Coco for a walk I let him do almost anything a dog wants to do, which I think he is a bit unused to since his mother is a bit protecting.
Back home again Coco and I had a rest before Coco helped Chie prepare dinner. Tonight was shabu-shabu, think sliced meat that is dipped in hot bouillon together with a lot of vegetables. Delicious ๐
After dinner we all relaxed some more before it was time to go to bed. The time to go to bed in Tokorozawa is much earlier than in Tokyo… For some unknown reason ๐