Obi-Wan Shinobi

As promised, we spent this weekend enjoying our seemingly neverending adolescence - dressing up as ninja and running around making sword noises much as we might have done 20 years ago. We were far from being the only adults in costume and I'm not sure if that's astonishing or completely normal for this country. Once we had dressed up, bought our plastic swords and set out on our ninja scavenger hunt, the answer seemed to come to Sifton in a flash. "Why isn't everyone in Japan doing this right now?"

On the cusp of brilliance

It seems Newton was right - for every meal we've diligently cooked recently, there was an equal and opposite blowout this week. I counted four dinners and five lunches out out of seven and I'm not in the least bit remorseful about any of them (although my wallet seems to be losing as much weight as I'm gaining). At least now when someone asks what I did in Japan, I'll be able to give them a genuine account of all the amazing food and drink, rather than mumbling something about tupperware and leftovers.

Hanami and you

As promised, it was an eventful weekend and for the first time in several weeks, we actually felt like there was some space between Friday and Monday. The weather can't decide weather it's chilly or warm but the cherry blossoms have put their collective foot down and declared Spring officially here. After all the work parties, the last thing I probably needed was more rich food and drink, but that didn't stop us heading to Shukugawa with our little picnic swag. Tarp below, trees above and good times in between.

Up to their old tricks

Everything seems to be gradually normalising now; the gloom seems to be passing with the first few rays of Spring sunshine. Enkai season has officially hit and while I don't have quite so many workplaces to go to parties for this year, there's still a remarkable amount of drinking to be done. Friday was our end of year party, last night we had an extra one for our section of the office and this Friday is the farewell. I wouldn't be at all surprised if a "new year" and "welcome" party came hot on their heels - anything worth doing is worth doing until you throw up, I suppose.

The sweet taste of victory

As far as the weekend goes, this post is exactly what it says on the tin. We won a pub quiz. We ate a lot of desserty things the next day. This is about as clever as I can be on a Tuesday morning. I may still be suffering from the aftershock of my sugar crash.

Himeji hanami hangover hilarity

"We'll need to get the train at about 10 to get to Himeji on time", Lisa's message ominously warned in the wee hours of Saturday morning. This would probably have been a good time to go pay up and go home, but having another whiskey and bellowing out "Pretty Woman" seemed like a much better idea.

It wasn't. Or was it? By this stage, not even my hindsight could see straight.