Stranger in a not-so-strange land
My server is not healthy and needs upgrading so this site might be up and down for the next little while.
For now, I’ve been playing around with the gallery code – click the gallery tab. It should show the latest updated pictures. Is this more useful than my writing a post linking to the latest gallery? It’s certainly easier for me 
I know at least one of the two regular checkers of this blog is getting impatient for pictures… so without further ado, wait no longer!
 High Tea in Yokohama |
 First Easter Bunny |
 Yokohama with Danielle |
 Climbing a Mountain… and a cake. |
Golden Week has just ended and I am sick. Not sick of having time off, just getting over a feverish, stuffy-headed cold.
A quick recap of the events, more for my memory than anything else:
Saturday – Hospitals. Lots of hospitals. Both Layla and Tamie are getting healthy and news is looking good on all counts. Thank goodness for that.
Sunday – Spent the day in Ebina, looking around. We headed to a park with a 75m slide, found a temple we knew nothing about, and hit up Starbucks for our weekly(?) fraps.
Monday – Went clam-digging with the in-laws. About a million other people had the same idea and we were stuck in a huge crowd – luckily the ocean is large and we all fit. Layla decided she wasn’t afraid of the ocean anymore and ended up having a blast. I think this is where I got sick.
Tuesday – Headed down to Enoshima for the first aquarium/beach visit of the season. Enjoyed the dolphin show with another million people – Layla didn’t cry and was quite proud of the fact. I was quite proud later when we left the aquarium and she wanted to play on the beach, fearless of the waves that petrified her only a year ago.
Wednesday – Went to an outlet mall in Minami-Machida called Grandberry Mall. Found out that I’m too big for even the XL pants. Shamed and sick, I went to bed early this night.
Pictures? I got ‘em. You want to see ‘em? Click below:
 Saturday |
 Sunday |
 Monday |
 Tuesday |
… Wednesday still to come.
Saturday was a day of hospital visits (unfortunately no doctors give out lollipops here). In the morning, we took Layla for another checkup – she’d been to the doctor a couple times during the week because of a seal-bark-like cough that turned out to be croup. Saturday was a scheduled check to see how it was progressing… not well. Not only does she still have croup, but apparently is in the middle of an asthma attack too. She needed the nose vacuum and her cries were heard throughout the entire hospital floor. After the vacuum, she had to suck on medicine (in vapour form) for ten minutes, which isn’t anything except for the fact they attached a monitor to her thumb that reminded her of when she was checked into the hospital… then the tears flowed again.
After Layla’s ordeal at the hospital, we headed to Hon Atsugi for lunch. Tamie had a dentist appointment at 2, so we had enough time for lunch beforehand. I took Layla home while Tamie visited her dentist… after the dental, Tamie had a doctor’s appointment of her own, so we played some more before Layla took a nap. Tamie came back just in time for dinner. Lots of doctors on that day…
Today we decided to hit up the park instead. The sun was shining, the sky was blue and the kid was eager to slide so slide she did. Twice. There were too many kids about and Layla wasn’t about to have to wait in line to have fun so we bailed on the playground. We looked around the park a bit, stopped for a snack, and played frisbee and toss the child for a while before Layla asked for her expected frappuccino.
For two days we’d been hearing “I want a matcha fraponiconni (and various other Layla pronunciations)”. Today, she finally got it and she enjoyed it. I think Starbucks should hire the kid and put her in a commercial here – she’d be a hit. And I hope we’d save a fair bit of money if we were employees.
At dinner tonight, we had some strawberries for dessert that Layla was eager to have. As usual, we told her to finish most of her food before she could have dessert and she begrudgingly was convinced to sit and eat her food. When she finally finished, she looked at my rice bowl and told me I needed to finish the pieces of rice I didn’t eat before I could have my dessert. I don’t usually make the effort to get every single grain of rice as my skill with chopsticks isn’t that great and neither are my patience for such things. Also, eating rice follows the rule of diminishing returns. Layla didn’t care about that though – she went so far as to pick up my bowl and use her own spoon to feed me – telling me to open my mouth for the “rice train”. Real cute.
As usual, you can check out the gallery for pictures of the weekend:
 Saturday |
 Sunday |
Been experimenting with wordpress and php to see if I can come up with a better, more “unified” look and feel for this blog and the gallery… ended up installing another theme (called K2, for those interested). I hacked on it a bit, tweaking a few sizes and styles to get it looking a little better.
To get the gallery link to work as I wanted, I had to install the “Page Links To” plug-in. This actually worked really well and got things going in the right direction.
So give it a test and see how you like the gallery. It’s in early beta yet, so it might change on you if I’m editing it as you’re viewing it. (Yah, I know I shouldn’t be mucking around with a live site, but luckily I know the admin and he says it’s okay).