Sea Lions

on Pier 39 at the famous Fisherman's Wharf in San Francisco. Apparently these creatures started hopping up on the docks in 1989. I guess no one ever made them move.

Aren't they cute?

Californication!

Lost my shoes during this jump over looking the Bay Area of San Francisco and Oakland.


Making it to California meant that my world trip was coming to an end. We visited San Francisco, Oakland, and Walnut Creek. Did lots of jumping there because we were having the "San Fran Jump Off" competition with my Australian friend Debs.

PS. We WON!!!

More California pics to follow!

Oktoberfest!!

Jumping with German beer. Yippee!

My most avid blog readers

are Eto San, Mayumi, and Yoshi!

Thanks!! Here is their good-bye jump for me!!

I taught them English conversation every Saturday morning for about a year. I really enjoyed teaching them and hated to say good-bye, but now I really enjoy my work-free Saturdays.

Miss you all!!!

Little Fish, Little Pond - Fish Therapy!!

I found another 1000 yen treat that involved animals this weekend. Only this time, there were no fluffy kitty cats to pet and play with, instead there were lots of tiny fish to eat my flesh!! Well, maybe I'm exaggerating a bit. They actually nibbled and sucked on my feet removing dead skin.

Sounds gross, huh? It wasn't. It was fun!! It was a bit scary at first, but just ended up tickling in the end.

They're called doctor fish or "garra rufa" and apparently they were originally used in Turkish baths. It is said that they have to ability cure many skin diseases.

Can you tell we're faking it? I was a thespian in college and attained many great acting skills so maybe you can't.

37 ! !

This is what it looks like.

I'm heading out for my birthday dinner with Shojiro and forcing him to take my picture on the train. He hates doing that. I love it!

THE refrigerator!!

Ta daaa...... Here it is!!! My new super-duper fancy fridge!! It makes me so happy. Now that I own such a large, shiny, family-size home appliance, I finally feel grown-up. Well, just a little. I still like jumping and that doesn't seem very grown-up like, now does it? Yay!!

And just because Carolyn Algie asked what it looked like inside and what all those drawers were for, you get to take a little peek inside. This is for YOU Carolyn.



The top is the regular fridge part. There are big
shelves in the door so it really holds a lot.









The two drawers under that are the ice drawer on the left (there's an automatic ice maker!!) and the deeeeeep freeze on the right. Apparently I can put hot stuff in there and freeze it really fast. Haven't tried it yet.





Next comes the vegetable drawer. It's deeeeeep!











The freezer is on the bottom. Can you see my ice trays that are shaped like fish? I also have stars. Cute, huh? Frozen fish ice cubes anyone?