And then I realized, I'm just slutty.

Well, the mushi-pan rose nicely this time but there isn't much flavour. I couldn't tell that there was any chai in it at all. There was a strange taste though which is probably from the flour. I should have used all the sugar. Well, I will try it one more time with the original recipe and see how that turns out now that I know it will work. Maybe I should look for regular flour and see if that makes any difference. I don't know what else to change unless that's really what it's supposed to taste like.

The wine is really delicious.  Really sweet and easy to drink -- could be dangerous.

I need to find a better way to make carbonara.  I don't think the egg cooks enough in the hot oil and it cools down way too fast.  This time tasted the best though in all the times I've cooked it.  But now my tum is not happy with the eggs. :(

I had to defrost my fridge last night because the door wouldn't close properly and ended up dropping the eggs. Three cracked so I made tamagoyaki with my (relatively) new tamagoyaki pan tonight and it was a huge failure. I guess it wasn't hot enough or there wasn't enough oil (even though it's a coated pan it still stuck!) or something but it kept tearing and wouldn't roll properly. I scrapped the first two attempts and managed to make a good third one but it only had two layers. :< The recipe from my new cookbook is good though--not so sweet.

Chapter 12 word count: 1,130

As I was saying to trivialaffair today, it's probably a good thing this is the last chapter because I'm getting reluctant to write it. I don't hate Eq (yet) but I am not so excited to write it anymore? I'll be glad to finish it and move on to something else. Though I have it all planned out already so I don't know why it takes so much effort to get to it. It might have something to do with the heaviness of this last part. I've never written someone dying before.

I didn't have any classes today due to finals but I hardly got anything written. I did some research for Tomoko and talked to Jun. He said he might come back to Toyochu next year but he doesn't know yet; the BOE will make their annoucement in March about placements. He might get moved back to high school. Then I went out for lunch with the 3rd year teachers to this awesome pizzaria. Set lunch included salad, pasta and pizza, a drink and dessert for ￥1550! It's near Basha Michi, where we went last time, on the #1 bus route.

I will write a bit more before Himitsu at 10. I'll try to hit 1,500.

Well, that experiment kind of failed.  The cake is kind of bland and it didn't rise much.  I didnt taste brown sugar or soy sauce.  I tried adding more flour and that helped a little bit but still doesn't look like the picture.  I need a scale.  There goes another 2000 yen at least. :/  The steamer worked alright but I still might buy one anyway if they aren't that expensive.  I'd be able to put more water in the pot that way. 

So I took my bed apart (on the off chance that, provided K stays over, he doesn't want to share) and found that my pink futon is not so pink on the bottom anymore. :/  It's not moldy, I think.  It's not the black spotty stuff that shows up on the bottom of matteresses... maybe just water stains?  I have no idea.  I sprayed it with Febreeze and am airing it out a bit outside before it starts raining. 

I found a few recipes for brown sugar mushi pan.  I want to try making it!  But I don't think I have the right pan for it?  I don't think you're supposed to have the cups sitting directly in water so I might have to invest in a new pan for that.  And then I could try making chawan mushi and Sho's green pea custard. :D  I have most of the ingredients for this so maybe I'll pick the rest up tonight.  I'm suppsed to bring a "present" or something to Tomoko's on Saturday.  Some homemade sweets that aren't so sweet or typical?  No hearts here.  Maybe I'll try adding chocolate chips to it.  I'll post about it and how it goes with pictures.

I've more or less straighted up my room... now to move on to the bathroom and kitchen.  The kitchen is alright, I just have to do the floor and I should wipe down the counter.  I did the dishes this morning.  But the bathroom.... I thought I just cleaned it.  Well, like... less than a month ago?  I guess I didn't do such a good job.  >_>  I've got my list together for shopping as well so I can do that before picking K up at the staton.

I bought running shoes yesterday.  If I want to get fit I need them since I know my ankles aren't so great (from those basketball days) and my gran has knee problems so I probably will too.  They were only 6800 yen for Nike so I went for it.  However, now my bank balance is below my float which freaks me out.  It's not like I'm broke but it makes me nervous to have so little now.  I told myself I can't take out more money until payday which is this weekend, thankfully.  If I have to eat soba for the next few days, so be it.  

I need an upbeat playlist to clean to. 

I made sukiyaki for one. Well, sort of. I used chicken cuz the store didn't have any beef. I ended up going to the bulk place so now I have all this produce that I hope doesn't spoil before I get a chance to use it. The had only 1 cabbage left so I ended up buying it even though it was kind of yellow in the middle. I don't know if that's okay or not. The soup is SO sweet. I didn't realize it would be. I tried to fix it with more dashi and soy sauce but maybe it's supposed to be that way. I've never tried sukiyaki before but I think I'm going to skip the egg dipping. It'll be easer on my stomach that way. But yay for using my DS cooking game! Well, is it a game techincally, if it's not "fun"?

But I did get to try some new veg: chrysanthemum leaves.

I take that back. The egg cuts down the sweetness.

Well, it actually is Thanksgiving this time, I will repeat entry titles.

Dinner was great. I only wish I had cooked more... I met Andrew and Bruno in Shinjuku around 11 and we did grocery shopping. We were in the supermarket for about 45 minutes, picking up all the ingredients we needed and debating about a few things. We had to ask for a whole raw chicken from the meat counter specifically because they only had cooked ones. And then wandered around Shinjuku looking for pie crust (or pie "sheets" as they call them here) for another 45... we went to three different department stores before being told we could find them on the 8th floor of Keio department store. There's a specialty baking shop there! You can get pizza crust, cakes, dough, and any tool/utensil under the sun. We got back to Takadanobaba around 12:30 and started to get our cook on.

I made kabocha potage again (but it wasn't as flavourful as the last time I made it, but everyone liked it), mashed potatoes, roast chicken, stuffing, gravy. The chicken came out perfectly! It only took an hour and a half and the meat just fell off the bones when I went to carve it. And the stuffing was moist and fluffy~ I should have cooked the potatoes longer, that's the only thing. They were a bit hard to mash and I like my potatoes really whippy. And even without the neck and giblets, the gravy was pretty tasty.

Andrew made pumpkin (kabocha) pie and it turned out awesome this time. The last time it didn't set up so it was more like... pumpkin mousse. We decided against buying cloves because he was never going to use them except for making pie but I think we should have. I like my pumpkin pie to be spicy. The texture was perfect though! I took pictures; maybe I'll post them later.

I was a bit late getting home but I mangaged to talk with my friend Heather on Skype at midnight for an hour or so and that was really great. I should make a point of doing that more often since I have a webcam finally, after all these years.

Today, I watched a crapload of D no Arashi and did laundry. Tomorrow, I have no classes so... I don't mind being tired since I won't be doing anything anyway. I'm going to try and write a bit now (which I have been saying all day, I know) and then watch Shukudai-kun. It's on at 12 for once; tonight's guest is Sekai no Nabeatsu. I have heard this name so much lately and I don't know who the fuck it is. Tonight, I'm going to find out!

je_ficgames, I will finish you!

It never seems like I get to accomplish as much procrastination on the weekends as I used to.  Probably because the level of shit that I find the need to do has risen to appalling extremes not that I have made it my mission to watch Dの嵐.  I thought about writing the next part of Equilibrium because I got the perfect idea for this chapter but I didn't get around to it, or couldn't find the right start (as is becoming the norm for me these days). 

Saturday when to Hiroo and had my 3rd treatment and met Justin for dinner.  I had a really fun conversation with the nurse for like half an hour about Japan and pop culture.  And you bet JE came up. X3  She's asked me who my favourite actor was and I said Nino and she was like "What?  Why!"  Ahaha... he is a great actor and cute (even if he looks like he's 13).  Went back to the restaurant Andrew and I found when I was there last and while it was good... the オススメ menu wasn't a great as the last time.  I was a bit disappointed but had some really great mushroom risotto.  Met up with Andrew and went back to his place and studied and watched some Star Trek before bed.  I fucked up and thought that Rie had planned Taka's birthday party for Sunday night but actually it was Saturday so I missed it.  I was probably going to bail anyway if it had been Sunday... I don't feel so bad blaming it on my sheer retardedness rather than just being too tired/cheap to go.

The test was great.  I got off at the wrong station and had a little freak out but the officer at the koban was very nice and helpful.  It was only another 10 minute walk to where I needed to go in the first place and once I got to the right route, I just had to follow all the people.  I thought the test was at 11:30 but actually it was 11:50 so I had lots of time to spare.  Went to the wrong room at first; I read the sign where all the test numbers were posted correctly but for some reason thought that 1102 was on the 2nd floor... another blonde moment.  I've been really bad for those this weekend.  But the woman beside me said I was in the wrong place and another took me down and showed me where I should go.  When I walked in all the kids were like "Eehh?  Sensei?" (They must have ALT's too)  It was a bit awkward because I knew all eyes were on me as they showed me to my seat.  I was expecting it, since I wrote the test for 2nd grade kanji but it's different when you are experiencing it in real life.

It was easy!  There weren't any questions I didn't know but I did make one mistake for sure.  I'm confident that I passed and maybe in the high 90's!  I just have to wait patiently for the results to come.  It was really irritating because the kids were whispering to each other and asking to go to the bathroom through the whole test.  Why didn't you go before?  It's 40 minutes!  Can't you sit still and hold it until it's over?  I know it's a test for kanji at a low elementary level and they were all 7-8 years old, but it really took away from the seriousness of the test.  I was so tempted to look over to the kid beside me and shush him but I refrained. 

Came home and caught up on my fic reading and watched a Hanadan special on TV... Just was lazy.  I wanted to get a load of laundry done but it was rainy and shitty so I couldn't.  I went to bed at 10pm and woke up on my own at 5:30 this morning.  I could have gotten up but decided I liked sleep better.  I'm expecting a pretty relaxing week at school.  Midterm exams are on Thursday and Friday so I anticipate having more than a few classes cancelled for self-study, especially for 2nd and 3rd years.  Fine by me.  With this plot bunny in my head, I'll have my own thing to work on.  I could be ambitious and take my Japanese textbooks to school and keep on doing some studying.  I want to write the level 8 test in October and unlike 2nd year where I could already read half of them, the 3rd year words are pretty new to me. 

 

Wow, that brings back memories... I used to love that show.

I got home around 5 after grocery shopping and have spent the entire afternoon dicking around the Arashi comm's and transcribing the lyrics from the Utaban performance.  Thanks be to Yvonne for telling me about that word processer because it makes looking up kanji by radical much easier than listening 46329 times to try and catch the word.  I just need to figure out how to turn on the furigana because they insist on using the randomest readings.  Jerks.

I should cook but I am forever faced with the same dilema: I don't want to do the dishes in the sink.  I also snacked on these delicious treats from Pesto bakery I picked up this morning.  Some kind of Okinawan thing made with black sugar... basically its bread soaked in molasses or something sweet and left to harden.  Like a giant, sweet, crunchy crouton.  Divine.  Will definitely be eating more of those in the future.  I am also sufficiently caffinated.  Thus, I am not hungry.  But I need to cook that chicken and daikon or it too, like everything I seem to buy, will go off before I can eat it.  If I cook it at least, it'll keep for a few more days and I can eat it later.