Complaintastic!

Gah! I'm full of the fuss right now, so I'm gonna. And there's nothing you can do to stop me! Well...I guess you don't have to read this entry. However, you just might miss a comical story.

Weather
Bah. The weather is my first complaint. Let's break this down simply. On Sunday, it was a very gorgeous day. It was in the low 80s and wonderful. Spring had really sprung. On Monday, it cooled off. It was still around 60 though, and just as nice; you just had to wear a jacket. On Tuesday...it snowed.

Seriously. It's still snowing today. It's just light flurries and it's definitely not sticking to anything, but COME ON! Snow!? It hasn't barely snowed a flake all winter. And then the weather got so nice and warm. Then, you just yank that away and give me snow? No, deal! This sucks. It's so fricken cold right now. I hate it. Grump, grump, grump. >:-(

Pigeons
Grrr...my mortal enemy, the pigeon. How I hate them. How I hate the way the coo loudly in the morning and wake us up, even on days we can sleep in. How I hate the way we have to have an ugly pigeon net covering our porch so they won't get in. We have a gorgeous view, but we never look out, because all you see is the stupid net. I hate them. Everything about them. Nasty flying rats!

Today, my hatred of the skyrats took another step. You see, one got onto our porch. Yes, despite the fact that we have a horrifically ugly pigeon net, one still got trapped on our porch. This is actually because of the freaking weather! It's been crazy windy lately because the snow was blowing in. No really, the wind has been terrible! In fact, so bad that it got part of our net snagged on our satellite dish. This allowed the pigeon to acciddently sneak onto our porch (I could explain, but really, do you care HOW he got there?). Unfortunately, he got trapped by the same net that let him sneak in.

What a conundrum! Now is where I will point out that this is probably karmic retribution. Back in September, Sam (the Sada ALT) got three pigeons trapped on his porch (pretty much the same way the bird got on our porch today). We laughed merrily at his predicament, because, honestly, it's kinda funny (but not today! So no laughing at me for at least a week!).

Anyways. I messaged Chris to call me and I told him about the pigeon. It was imperative that we got the bird off of the porch ASAP because his pigeon buddies where trying to 'rescue him' and it was highly likely that they would just get themselves trapped as well (that's what happened to poor Sada Sam). So Chris called Mihara-san who's response was that A: we needed to get a net and B: pigeons weren't dangerous. Great, that meant that WE had to catch the damn bird. But even better, when Chris asked permission to help de-pigeon our porch, he was denied leave (despite the fact that he didn't have anything to do at his school). So that left the problem to me.

So I girded my loins, grabbed an old sheet that we needed to throw out and went to catch the alien intruder. Remember, it was very cold and windy due to the crappy weather. Anyways, I go out onto the porch and shoo the pigeons buddies away from the net so they wouldn't get in (one almost 'fell' into our porch but I managed to scare him away from the hole in time). So I'm out on the porch with a big blue sheet trying to corner the pigeon who is terrified and pooping EVERYWHERE. I almost get him cornered when the unthinkable happens!

The bird launches himself at my head! I think he was just trying to get around me, but it scared the crap out of me. Keep in mind, that I am outside on a 5th floor porch doing this with people walking below me in the parking lot and too nearby shops. Anyways, the bird flies at my head and I SCREAM and dance around the porch. This scares the bird because I'm flapping around the scary blue sheet so he keeps flying around me. So I ended up yelling "noooo nooo nooo...get away get away...eeeeeeeeeee!" and throw myself back into the apartment. (NO LAUGHING TO ME FOR A WEEK! (you may laugh amongst yourselves though)).

At this point in time, someone rings my door buzzer. Turns out, Mihara-san called the landlord and she sent someone to deal with the pigeon problem. So I show him the stupid bird and he grabs another crappy sheet and uses it and a discarded broom to catch the bird. He then bows to me and I thank him profusly and bow and bow and bow. Then he just asks if he can discard the sheet for me and I say yes. So he takes the bird wrapped in the sheet and disappears with it. Huh. I have no idea what he did with the bird. I hope he...uh...humanely killed it or something.

I hate pigeons.

Oyaji
"Oyaji" means middleage man but carries a negative conotation. It's not a nice term. You would never say it to someone's face, but it's not really as strong as a slur. Anyways, this is about middle-aged Japanese men. Not all of them, just two of them that I don't like so they get labelled with this negative term.

Anyways, I have encountered two of these such fellows. Men who are both around my parents age or above. They both want to learn English better, but NOT from me.

The first one I met about a year ago when I started teaching at Enya Elementary. He's the homeroom teacher for one of the 6th grade classes. I have complained about him many times before. How he let's his kids run roughshod over me and never helps maintain control and actively undermines my lessons at every time. I know I've complained about him before, but never really WHY he's like this. I will get to that in a minute.

The second man I met last Thursday. I've started teaching an adult class on Thursday evenings at Kisuki and last Thursday was my first class. He's an older man and about 60 years old. He was very terse and rude to me. He would interupt me and ask me insulting questions in an insulting tone. Like how old I was, how old my parents where, wether I went to university of just a college (college is a 2 year institue and uni a 4 year, in Japan and most places really, but in America, we tend to use college to describe the four years of education after highschool). He was really rude and upset when James (32 year old male, fluent in Japanese, and owner of the school) told him that I would be the one teaching the classes, not James.

You see, the se two men have the same problem with me. Basically, that I'm a young, foreign female, far below them in experience and age (not status, it's not like THAT). The problem comes from the fact that I am way more knowledgable than them in English (something they both want to learn) and in a position of authority over them as a teacher or English. This makes them uncomfortable and a little embarassed. This causes them to behave rudely around me. It's a horrible thing, really. I try to understand it. Not all older men behave this way around me, but when I get this attitude, it really upsets me and hurts my feelings.

I discussed this with James, since it's my student behaving this way towards me and he agrees that we will wait and see what happens, but we both hope that this guy will just leave and not take the class anymore. Otherwise, James will politely ask him to leave, or something.

Anyways, that attitude still sucks.

Japanese Drivers and Cell Phones
I hear people complaining all the time about people who drive while talking on their cell phones (I am guilty of this, so I don't complain that loudly about it). Japan doesn't really have this problem. People really don't like to drive and talk on the phone at the same. If they need to make a call, they find a little spot to pull off the road and make their call there. It seems like a good idea, right?

Well, it's not! That only works when the driver is making a call. What about when they are receiving a call? Hmmm? I swear to Bob, if they get a call, they hit the breaks and pull off to the side of the road and talk there. Which doesn't seem so bad, except that most of the time, there is not any room for them to pull over. So sometimes, it just means that the park with their tire on the white line and the rest of the car sticking in the lane. If another car is coming, well though toenails for the person behind them! They will have to wait until they can pull around. It's idiotic and so dangerous! They pull off to the side everywhere. On curves, on one lane roads, in the middle of busy traffic. And they SLAM on their breaks and stop suddenly to do it.

It's so moronic. I would vastly prefer the people yakking while driving. At least they are a little more predictable. Grrr...stupid drivers.

Allergies and Stress = Headaches
Because the winter was so mild (excluding the surprise flurries of today and yesterday), the Japanese plants have started blooming early. This sucks because I get allergies in Japan. I don't get allergies in America! I am fine around cut grass, golden rod, and all the other billion allergies that people seem to suffer from in America. But in Japan, it gives me headaches! Boo! It also makes me sniffly and dries me out and I hate it.

I also am a bit stressed out right now. Thinking about dealing with all the stuff we will have to deal with in the next few months is stressful. Dealing with the end of the school year is surprisingly not as easy as I thought it would be. Having to deal with the English school and wondering if it's going to fail or not is kinda bugging me. And everything. I stress out really easy. Drives Chris crazy I think. Because he's so relaxed and I'm so tense. Anyways, stress causes insomnia and headaches.

So this past week I have been really headachey and sleepy and maybe even a little cranky. Boo for that. I do have some pills that help, but I can really only take them if I don't have anything to do since one is a muscle relaxer and it tends to make me saggy.

Conclusion
So thats my big pile of fussing. It's my journal, so my prerogative to post anything I want to. So hah!

I promise the next time will be much more interesting and with pictures! OooOooOooOoo....