Monday 20 June 2011

Fathers' Day

Oh, goodness... even the title of this blog has had me checking for the spelling. Despite what Wikipedia has to say about it, I'm sticking with the apostrophe where it is, thank you very much!

So quite the lie-in yesterday. I think it was about 8 o'clock when I got up. Although Kayo gets up early with the children through the week, it comes round to me to get up at the weekend - usually around 6:30...ouch! I don't mind so much on Saturday, as I often head off to the squash courts quite early anyway, but it is a rare treat on a Sunday. It did cross my mind to ask the children to stay with their grandparents on Saturday night, ensuring the lie-in, but then thought that having NO children was hardly the right way to go about celebrating Fathers' Day...

So here we are caught in the middle of the rainy season, and for sure it was a "Cat in the Hat" kind of day, sitting around not doing too much, however my presents were a highlight.
First I should tell you about some gardening Aimi and I have been doing. Come Christmas (especially) there is one vegetable that I miss, and have been unable to buy in Japan, namely, runner beans. My mum came up trumps this year and sent me some seeds, and here is the result thus far. Aimi helped me plant them although when I told her how quickly and tall they would grow she was initially concerned about attracting giants... Anyway, they certainly seem to be coming along OK, and I'll keep you posted when we start picking them. The T-shirt I am wearing, also shown here,
is Aimi's picture of herself with the beans, and they are obviously much bigger than her. This is the latest in a growing line of quite unique shirts that I have been given by my children, and they are all terrific.

My other present was a couple of cans of "draft" Guinness to have with dinner. A welcome change from the ice-cold fizzy lager (bleugh!) that is the norm here. Obviously Kayo had arranged for there to be two cans so that I would share them with her, which, much to my surprise, I did!
Here is the back of the shirt as drawn by Tadashi. It is, apparently, and I am no expert, a Dragonball character. I suppose I should take more of an interest... In the background, the computer is displaying the ball-by-ball update of the third cricket test match between England and Sri Lanka. If I could, I would sit up and follow the cricket until close of play at around 2:30 in the morning Japan-time, but work and early-rising children don't allow it.

Oh, the joys of fatherhood!