• The Week #280

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    • ๐Ÿ›น Leo and I skated both days on the weekend. And for 5 minutes after school on Monday. While he is frustrated that he can't ollie yet, he is getting better control over the board. I expect he'll smoke me at skating in a month or two time. Still the dream of riding a half-pipe together persists. Unfortunately it rained on Sunday, so his skate class was cancelled.
    • ๐Ÿ‘€ Last week when we went to the beach the wind blew some sand into my eye. Usually you wash it and at most the next morning at the latest you're better. It wasn't the case for me this week. My eye felt like it was getting a bit better each day until it didn't and, being American, I am (still) not in the habit of just going to the doctor. I went. And it turned out there was a tiny piece of plastic or something hooked itself into my eye. 30 seconds with some anestheticย  eye drops andย  scraping of my eyeball the doc got it released. Instantly my eye felt better. Microplastics, the gift that keep on giving.
    • ๐Ÿฅ” Since teaching Leo how to make instant mash potatoes and him writing down his recipe, I feel like he's gained a super power. When he's hungry and or has a craving, he just gets on with it and makes them. The apple doesn't fall far from the tree.

  • The Week #279

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    • ๐Ÿ–๏ธ We had the first of long weekends in November. Despite it cooling down, we decided to visit the beach with Sophie, the popup tent and some coffee.ย  I've resolved to get some decent pegs that can hold in not just grass at the park as the thing nearly blew over (but it still provided shelter).
      Coffee with Fuji
    • ๐Ÿ›น While at the beach we had the idea of walking down to the skate shop directly connected to skate park. I had been thinking off-and-on for about a year about getting back into either skating and or blading, so I was quite keen see what the selection was like.
      Part of the selection

      Absolutely massive selection of decks and trucks. Larger than any of the skate shops I visited as a kid. Leo had mentioned wanting to get a skateboard a couple of times and I am keen to find another physical activity we can do together. I also think learning to skate will be good for building one's frustration tolerance up. And that it's a sport that has a large degree of freedom will be good for him (unlike, say, baseball).

      Which is to say, we got Leo a complete (early Christmas present) and paid for entry into the skatepark. Watching the kids (and adults!) shred it on the pipes and ramps was really great. So great that we went back the next day and I bought got a complete for me and we skated for 3 hours. I now have a new life goal to ride the pipe next to the ocean. ( Also what a fantastic place to learn to skate. And the fact that skate parks exist today generally. And to have parents that will take you to the skate park. What a lucky kid.)
      Flat area of the park
    • ๐ŸŽง The only unfortunate happening of the week was that while we were at the beach Yumi's AirPods left the case somewhere. We had a bit of hope because they showed up on FindMy 2 days in a row, and despite our best efforts looking for them, we could not find them. It will cost almost as much as a new pair to get replacement buds... maybe it's worth getting wired headphones...

  • Checkin to ้ต ๆฒผๆตทๆตœๅ…ฌๅœ’ ใ‚นใ‚ฑใƒผใƒˆใƒ‘ใƒผใ‚ฏ

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    in Fujisawa, Kanagawa, Japan

  • The Week #278

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    • ๐Ÿ“š We made a visit to our local Yokohama city library and I think I want to make it part of our weekly routine. There is a English books corner in the kids section which is nice (though I think we'll read them it in no time). It's amazing the transformation of people by place, incuding boyo. While he didn't suddenly sit down and start reading heaps of books, his mind seemed to open up towards reading. In some ways, we're clones of each other, me and Leo. In others he's entirely different.ย  I was always stuck in books, organized a library in my room, and read the most number of books in my class at his age.
    • ๐Ÿ‰ One of the reasons why this could be is the format of a physical book. When you're struggling reading a book it can be quite discouraging. Turning each page you see how little progress you're making. Realizing this I experimented by putting the Kindle app (where we had a Dragon Ball manga sample) on his iPad and Leo sat down and read the entire 33 pages. Success!

      Building on this, I've taken an ancient iPad Mini that's been sitting around discharged and loaded some manga into the Books app. This will become Leo's e-reader for now and I hope it will enable him to enjoy reading more. I also started loading kids books on to my Kindle so we can read them at night before bed. Surprisingly, it's the first time he's actually listened to chapter books in English when I've tried to read them. I think it's the format. We shall see if a new routine and an easier way to read without the discouraging affordances get him over the reader hump.
      Captain Underpants

  • Checkin to ๅ—่›ฎๅฑ‹ ๆน˜ๅ—ๅฐๅบ—

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    in Fujisawa, Kanagawa, Japan
    Refilling my coffee stock
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