Katriona's Diary

Today it’ fine :) The weather forecast says it’s becoming rather hot today, but at the moment, 10:15, it’s just comfortable :) A beautiful autumn day. I was impressed to see how Susuki, Japanese pampas grass look beautiful in the morning sunlight!





The subtle sweet scent of the fragrant olive is still in the air, the persimmon trees bear many fruits - still green - and I can find many flower buts of chrysanthemum. They are, not showy but elegant beauty of this time of year.




The tiny flowers of fragrant olive.




Persimmon fruits are now going to ripen.




Chrysanthemum flower buds, they are still tiny X)


And now I’m retired, no need to go to the office and can stay home to enjoy these things on such peaceful day. I’m quite happy about this X)


…there is some unwelcomed, but cute thing in our garden XD It looks like still humid after many rainy days…




A toadstool!

Yesterday it was fine and the air was fresh, the perfect day for strolling around town. In the cool autumn air sometimes I smelled the subtle sweet scent of fragrant olive.　It was good to have such comfortable day at last after many gloomy, rainy days.


I met a friend and we together visited some old building in Tokyo. It was build about 110 years ago as a private house, the family of the rich businessman had lived in it for decades. The building and garden are not particularly big but beautifully crafted traditional Japanese house, had miraculously survived the big earthquake in 1923 and horrible air raids during the WW2, and were donated to and now taken care of by the Japanese National Trust.


It has one grand Western style drawing room - before WW2, it's quite popular to have a Western style room in the Japanese style house - but other part of the house are all in the traditional Japanese style. From each rooms we could look out the nice garden and trees in it, the breeze from the big windows was really comfortable. And this old house reminded us our own grand parents' houses though this one is far bigger and more grand.























It was a really nice visit! We have sit down on the tatami floor and enjoyed chatting for a while, stayed in this house far longer than we've expected. XD We also visited the nearby sculpture museum, some big temple, strolled around in the big graveyard, and had nice lunch, teatime and supper together X)


It's really amazing and fortunate that there still remains such beautiful old house in the midst of Tokyo. And it's a good one day outing :D

This morning it's raining again. In September we have had so many rainy days. On some days it rained heavily, on some we had just a little rain... and, rain has been recorded on 35 consecutive days in Tokyo area now. This is the record, I heard. This means we have had a little sunshine for whole month, farmers must have much trouble, let alone the damages caused by the terrible floods in various areas. I often buy green vegetables for my rabbit and found their prices were going up :( It's really unusual situation, this continuous rain makes us feel rather depressed, weakens our motivation :(


Though the weather forecast says we'd have some sunshine on coming weekend, I'm going to meet my friend and enjoy walking somewhere - hopefully. At the moment rain seems to ceased but the sky is grey and very gloomy :( I hope the weather forecast is right...

Today it's cloudy. No rain, little wind. Cool but rather dark, depressing day. Because of the high humidity there is another mushroom appeared in our garden :(





At least with not-high temperature and no rain, garden cats can relax on the wooden verandah. It's good.








I have done some necessary research on internet, wrote one letter, did some trivial domestic duties. But the things I have wanted to do did not progressed much :( I long for the fresh, fine autumn days...

Now it’s becoming cooler day by day, the autumn comes. Though we have had unusual changeable weather this year still the autumn cooler air makes me feel … this is the good time of trip! Last week I went to Aomori, not for fun but to help the house-cleaning, still taking a bullet train, the long train journey, staying in the unfamiliar city are somewhat touched my “traveler’s sentiment”.




Hakkoda-maru, the former train ferry connecting Hokkaido and Honsyu(main island) before the underwater tunnel was opened on 1988, now moored at the wharf near Aomori train station as a museum. I have used the ferry boart when I was young many times and loved the voyage to Hokkaido, so it’s great to visit this museum ship on my visit to Aomori.




The view from the window of the bullet train going back to Tokyo from Aomori.


So, I’d like to travel somewhere. But it’s a bit difficult at the moment, for I still have some necessary steps after the retirement and am uncertain about some schedules, also, recently the weather is quite uncertain, sometimes dangerously so. Maybe I’ll plan some day trip in coming Oct., and maybe at the end of this year I’d be able to make some pattern of my life…

Yesterday it's sunny and hot. We washed many clothes and towels, and aired my futon mattress on the wooden verandah. It's really good to have sunshine after many wet days :) The day before yesterday my sister and her husband visited us, they stayed overnight. They left here yesterday evening, and today we have more washing than usual, the towels or pyjamas they have used. But this morning it's raining again :( I hung the laundry mostly in the bathroom and turned on the dehumidifier. The weather forecast says tomorrow we'd have some sunshine again, I'm looking for it very much. The continuous rain makes us feeling rather depressed :(

The day after the retirement from the office, I've woken up & left home very early and took the bullet train going to Aomori, the northernmost city of Honshu, the main Island of Japanese archipelago. There Mrs.M, my distant relative, lives in an apartment near the train station by herself. She is 89 years old, widow for about 15 years. I have met her just a few times before, mostly on someone's funeral, so I'm not close to her. She seems to be not good at tiding and clearing the rooms, and I heard she loves shopping. Thus, her apartment is now full of the things, 2 small rooms are so cluttered and one cannot even get inside, I heard. Now she is old and frail, and is going to have the handrail installation very soon. Her son and his wife, living in Tokyo, was going to visit Aomori to clear the stuff - to get rid of at least one roomful of the stuff she had accumulated for years. Though Mrs.M's son was not well also, had some physical disability. Therefore I and other two decided to help them. Mrs.M can not do the cleaning by herself now but 4 adults have worked for 3 days. When I first entered the apartment (and this is the first time for me to visit Mrs.M's apartment) the situation was... just as I had expected. I have helped some... hoarder-like friends to tidy their house once or twice in the past, and have read many articles about the old people who has serious trouble giving up the stuff and keeping their houses tidy. So I was not surprised, still the situation was simply a mess. In a rather small room there were 4 chests of drawers, 4 wardrobes, one clothes rack - in & on them, there were countless & all kind of clothes and various kind of boxed stuff, also on & between the furniture there were many packages of toilet rolls and tissue papers etc etc. There was little room to walk in, and everything in this room was covered with dust and vermin's frass... no wonder, I heard Mrs.M had not entered this room for many years X( We concluded every clothes were too big for Mrs.M who was now getting old and smaller, and too dirty to wear - and we had no time to bring them to dry cleaners. So we put everything into big plastic bags to bring them to the local garbage dump. I believe I have thrown away more than 300 clothes - maybe more than 400? Some clothes looked very expensive though we tried not think about their value, otherwise we would not be able to clear the room within 3 days... And of course we handled many other stuff also. One member have driven to and back from the garbage dump many times, I and other have made many many garbage bags and carried them to her car... Well, then after 3 days we have cleared most of the stuff from the room, also made enough room in the hall for the handrail installation. in the afternoon on the 3rd day I took the bullet train and came home. It was a looong 3 days, I was of course very tired. But, this was somewhat the precious experience, to think about my own life on the old age... how we should reduce our life, etc. We will all get old eventually and become incapable of taking care of our lives, and most of us would be alone on our 90s (if we can live so long lives)...

Today, we had a kind of retirement ceremony in the office then luncheon in the function room of the nearby hotel. About 25 employees retired, all same age. On the luncheon we enjoyed talking much, about various memories in our careers. It's good. Then, when we left the hall, A nice bouquet has been delivered to me, from the former co-worker who is of my age but still works in our office. It's so kind.





So, now my office career has officially ended. I feel a bit ... odd about this, after my loooong working days. X)

When I was young, I have bought T-shirts with cute design on my trip sometimes. I think, back then people tended to wear oversized T-shirts rather than fitted ones. And on my foreign travel, it's often difficult to find the suitable sized one - I mean, smaller one X) Thus I have many oversized or too long T-shirts, which I haven't worn for years - so still clean and in like-new condition. For years I have been thinking that I should shorten them and wear them, and I have done it today at last! - with my mother's help XD Because there are many of them, and mother is good at sewing - unlike myself X( X( X(




This one is what I got on the hiking tour of Stevenson Club many years ago, and other members of the tour were all big Westerners. We have all worn the same T-shirts on the event, it's fun, though needless to say this shirt was toooo big and long for me. I must have looked like a little kid wearing her parent's clothes XD








I measured every T-shirt, decided how short to remake them, cut the fabric and pinned their hems... and mother sewed them by machine. This afternoon, we shortened 7 T-shirts !! And I have 4 more long T-shirts I need to shorten XD

For more than a week, we have had quite changeable weather - all over Japan. It' raining quite heavily every day in various places, very heavy rain which could (and did) cause many damages. Thankfully in our area Yokohama we haven't had much damage, still this is anxious situation. The Mother Nature seems to lost its sense :(

This morning when I woke up it's sunny and very windy, then soon it became cloudy then rain came! The wet wind blows from south so it's rather hot and very humid, I turned on the air conditioner. Yesterday the weather was just like this. And I found many mushrooms in our garden X(