Beer Bread

S's package of wedding favors includes this "Beer Bread in a Bottle." The recipe reads, just add a can of beer and bake. Mm, sounds extremely easy. And I'm running out of my bread. Why not?


Ta-da. This is beer bread out of the bottle and fresh out of the oven. Yeah, it was extremely easy. I will have a bite later.

Man, It's Comfortable!

I moved to DS's place to spend a couple of nights because I'm bed-less. I'm housesitting GM's place, but today her brother-in-law came and took the guest room. So, I had to move out while he is there. Thank Buddha, I have DS's place!

DS and her family are out of town, so I'm home alone!

So, I poured tequila in a glass and sat in front of TV. I turned on TV and found it was totally blue (I mean, the monitor was connected to DVD, not cable). I'm always frustrated by this. Usually, kids fix this for me. But today, I didn't have anyone to fix this. I called DS, DS's brother, but I was transferred to his voice mail. Damn. Anyway, I left my emergency (?) message. Luckily, he called me back in a minute. I went like, "Thank Buddha, D, my savior!" I guess that he may have thought, "What the hell Duck is doing in my sister's home?!" But he told me how to fix the problem.

Isn't this a super comfortable relationship? I love DS family!

Wedding

Ohhhhh, it was a heart-warming, moving wedding party. Well, I don't remember since, but I've been really easy to be moved, especially during wedding ceremonies. Well, I'm getting old obviously.


The flower arrangement was fantastic. I think S chose orange and pink as her wedding theme colors, which is very S. Nice.


Lovely people. S was gorgeous. Happy marriage, S!


Voodoo donuts is awesome! It's totally Oregon. Good choice, S and T. I couldn't eat the whole, but it was still awesome.

PowerPoints

I know that I really have to prepare PowerPoints for the classes in the fall term. I'm teaching two classes as an adjunct instructor, in other words the cheapest labor of the university, in the fall term. Two classes that I haven't taught before are too much for me. I have to prepare myself to get over the fall term, but I just don't feel like doing so. The weather is perfect―80-somehting, super sunny―there's Two and a Half Men in the evening, and I haven't recovered from the graduation extravaganza series yet. Ahhhhh, I'm panicking! The fall term is coming soon! Ahhhhhhh!

Awesome Gifts!

These are awesome! JR, my dissertation adviser, gave this RG umbrella and RG cap as my graduation gifts. RG is one of my research sites. I can't wait till rainy days come! Thanks, JR!

Graduation BBQ

DS and RN threw a BBQ party for me this evening, inviting fellow Rotarians and my friends from school. It was a perfect evening to have a party outside. Some people couldn't make it, but JR and PC, S and T, D and T, and M (she couldn't bring her husband and daughter, ugh) from school showed up. They are awesome people. They brought cards and gifts anyway, though I said no gifts. I appreciate their thoughtfulness.

A made these cookies for me. They look professional. I wonder why she doesn't make business with her skill. Thanks, A.

AP, a Rotarian, told me a secret. The university president came to the Rotary meeting this Wednesday for me! MT, a Rotarian, asked the president, who is also a Rotarian of a different Rotary Club in town, to come over to make my surprise lunch more special. I completely believed that he happened to be at our meeting this Wednesday as a guest speaker. So, everything that happened during the meeting was totally arranged for me! Oh, my my my my! I was surprised again!

Rotary had another surprise gift for me. A $500 gift card. Wow, that's a lot. I'm almost scared, thinking of how I can pay my debt to Rotary. I don't have a stable (and wealthy) income (I will be a dirt-cheap adjunct!), so I can't make a financial contribution to Rotary, ouch. But I was thinking of donating $500 to Rotary to express my gratitude when I leave this town. I'm not leaving the town for a while, but I donated $500 to Rotary yesterday anyway.

I want to thank DS and RN for putting the party together. It was a nice, relaxing, peaceful party with lovely people.

I Can't Say Wow Enough

Wow, my Rotarians are fun-loving people! I knew it, but they are seriously so. And they are pretty good at surprising me (a lot)!

Today is Wednesday, the day the RC has a regular lunch meeting. So, I went there to see people and be teased by people.

I was a little bit surprised at seeing my adviser there. "Hi, JR, what a surprise! Are you here because the university president gives a talk today?" The university president was a guest speaker for today. And he said, "Yeah, something like that. And I've got a free lunch!" Yes, free lunch is always an incentive, hee hee hee.

Anyway, I took a different table and started chatting with my lovely Rotarians there. Then, I saw one of my committee members. OK, something is going on, I thought. But JH didn't say anything special. We just had a small talk, and he left for John's table.

Then, the talk of the university president began. He started talking about a brief history of the university. He said, "The university was pretty international from the beginning. There were 10 international students in (I don't remember what year). One of them was from Japan. H (my name), you are from Japan also. Will you come up here?" So I came close to the podium. Then, JR and JH approached me. And my eyes caught one of the Rotarians bringing out the robe! "Oh, my my, what's going on here?!" And JR said, "You can't escape this." Oh-uh.


JR put the robe on me, I felt like Harry Potter, the university president read his congratulations, and JR gave me my certificate!




The official graduation ceremony will be this Saturday, which I'm not planning to attend because I have no friend to graduate with. And the certificate is supposed to be posted (sometime in September). Even during the ceremony, the certificate isn't handed to graduates (they get fake ones). That's the university rule. But I got the real one today, in August! I was told later that a powerful Rotarian nagged the university to issue my certificate for today. Wow, I knew she was powerful, but she is really something. Besides, I've got congratulations directly from the university president. I'm not a super student who deserves special attention from the university president. Wow, I was totally speechless.


And I also got a lovely hand-made card with everyone's signatures. The back of the card reads, "This card is brought to you by MB Cards." MB is my friend's 10-year-old boy. He created this card. Awesome! I will keep this in a frame.

Well, it was a pretty surprising day today. I can't say wow and thank you enough to those lovely people!

Is Beer Stronger than Wine?

I realized that I easily get drunk with beer this evening. It's weird because beer contains less alcohol.

GM and I went for early dinner this evening, and I have a couple of IPA that is my favorite. I didn't eat much because it was early for eating. Probably because of that, I got drunk. Mm, just a couple of beer made me drunk ... mm, I think I've become cost efficient.

The problem is, beer makes me full, and I prefer wine ... well, tequila (replacement of shochu), especially this time of the year. Oh, man, I want to drink shochu with sukiyaki, ugh!

Done

Phew, I'm done with the translation work. I finished it this morning. It's really nice to do "real" work, not stupid teaching stuff, because people appreciate your work. And I like working under time pressure even though my face skin broke a lot. I realized that I was missing this feeling of working for compensation!

If translation work keeps coming in, I'd love to focus on translating work. But it's not likely. Then, I have to look for a teaching job that I'm not sure if I like. Geez, teaching is not rewarding at all, financially and emotionally. Yeah, I know I don't like it.

Happy Ending at Last?

I kept watching this British drama, though I was so irritated. It's about a love story between adults. Man, it's not straightforward, which irritated me. Maybe, I've been so used to American simplistic happy ending stories.

Anyway, the last episode of Season 4 was kind of happy ending, which relieved me. Now, I'm curious about how the story develops after this.

Human Network

It's interesting to see job opportunities spread via word of mouth.

I have done some translation work with a documentary filmmaker, and he told his fellow documentary filmmaker about me. And his fellow documentary filmmaker offers me translation work.

Wow, I'm impressed by the power of word of mouth. And now, I kind of understand why social media are powerful now. Well, social media are not my case, though.

I appreciate that the filmmaker who I worked with first spread my reputation.

You know what, I realized that translation work is more rewarding than teaching (Teaching sucks!). People say "Thank you" each time I submit my work. Yes, workers need appreciation! I learned that through my dissertation research. People want to be appreciated! Me, too! I don't like teaching! Uh-oh ...

Another Car Accident

I was in bed. You know, I'm a morning person, and I'm pretty sleepy by when it hits 11:00. So, I was in bed. And I heard a car crashed into somewhere. My bedroom is facing to the street, and I realized that it obviously happened on that street. After a while, I heard lots of sirens of fire engines and ambulance approaching. Then, they stopped right there. I saw red and blue lights flashing out of my window. I called my roommate, "Hey, Y, there's a car accident right there." We went out in our veranda to take a look. Yeah, there were fire engines and ambulance, but we couldn't see the crashed car, hidden by those emergency vehicles. I was in PJ, so I didn't bother coming close to the site. I hope no one got hurt.

Again, this is a straight street. I wonder why this guy bothered crashing into wherever. Weird.

Car on Fire!

I went to school to so some errands. On the way home, I was driving on 18th and saw a car crashing into a tree along the street and catching fire. Oh my Buddha! I have seen crashed cars before, but I believe this was the first time for me to see a burning car! It was totally surreal. But I don't understand why this guy crashed into the tree. The street is totally straight. Why did this guy bother to steer his car out of the street?! I don't get it.

Problem Not Solved

Damn, I hate this area manager of the university housing office!

She emailed me in mid July by saying that she would refund my $40 in two weeks, so I waited and waited and waited ... And you know what? $40 hasn't been refunded. Of course. I was pissed off! I emailed her last Thursday to tell her that I'm pissed off. Again, or as always, she ignored my email. I tried to be patient until ... today. But I was totally pissed off by her disrespectful attitude. So, I called her supervisor and again, or as always, I was transferred to her voice mail. I left my angry message. Then, I got an email from this stupid are manager by saying that my money would be refunded in a week with the PDF of her order. I was shocked at looking at the PDF. The PDF says the refund order was placed TODAY. What the fucking this asshole was doing?! She said in mid July that my money would be refunded, but she obviously didn't place her order then! And she just kept ignoring my request until today. Because I contacted her supervisor, this fucking asshole took action. What an asshole! I'm totally pissed off! I requested her explanation of why she didn't place her order in mid July. And also, I sent an email to the university newspaper about this. If the paper is interested, it will contact me for details. Fuck the area manager!

Hippie House

I saw a house share ad on craigslist yesterday. The location is really close here, so I thought it'd be convenient to move. Anyway, I went to take a look at the room. The exterior of the house ... wow, hippie. The color of the walls ... wow, hippie.

The owner of the house turned out to be a middle school teacher, looking quiet, laid-back, a little bit emotionless and hippie. The house is quite small with three bedrooms and one bathroom. One bathroom is a bummer but should be manageable.

I don't know why, but I felt good about this house. So, I took one of the bedrooms, colored light blue and blue. I asked the owner who is remodeling the house if he is going to repaint the room. He said no. But he said, if I want, I can paint it on my own. Actually, the room was painted blue by the previous renter. Wow, hippie. Am I going to paint the room? I'm not sure if it's worth of my labor because I may live in the room for only 6 months.

Life Jacket Exchange Program

The county's search and rescue organized the first-ever Life Jacket Exchange Program today. I was curious about what this event is like, so I went to the venue as a volunteer.

I realized that the event was about half donation half trade of life jackets. People who had life jackets that they didn't use anymore brought them to the venue. Some just donated them. Some traded their life jackets, especially their kids' jackets, with bigger ones. And some got free life jackets.

By the end of the event, about 200 jackets had piled up. Water activities are not my things because I'm afraid of water, but it's amazing to see lots of people do water activities (that's why they have life jackets).

Second Batch

The second batch of interview tapes started flooding in. I haven't started translating them yet because I don't have my earphones with me. I will do tomorrow after I come home. Anyway, I watched some of them. This time, the interpreter did a better job, which will make my job easier.

BBQ

My adviser and his girlfriend (who is also a professor of my school) had a BBQ with their advisees and their partners. I had known he is a homey person before, but I confirmed that he is really a homey person. He prepared all food, grilled meat, served food. And he even baked a blueberry pie and pumpkin pie from scratch (he made crust!). Wow. I asked him, "Why are you doing a professor?" And he said, "I know I should be a gardener or fisherman." Yes, indeed.