oh...yeah...by the way...i'm back...you know...in Japan.....

so, it's been brought to my attention that i sort of came back to japan a little over a week ago and i seem to have neglected telling you about this/letting you know what we did/sharing the fun we had.

yeah.

sorry about that.

after the last post, the boys and i were going great guns and our schedule got wicked busy.

(but, wicked in a really great way!)
we went back to denver...met friends and family again...had some great food and some awesome beer....
then flew to seattle to meet more friends
and had some more great food (mmmmm sushi!!)...
even did some sightseeing.
**quack quack quack**
(^-^)
in seattle, we stayed with a friend of mine from university...after we graduated, we kept in touch for a bit
and then we sort of "lost" each other.
thanks to the internet and its wonderful 'social networking system',
we found each other again....after 25 years!
("hi, terri!!")
aaaannnd....the proverbial 'icing on our vacation cake', was the
meeting of three people i have loved and appreciated for many years, here in the blogging world.
yep.....Mrs. G....GinaAgainandAgain...and Bad Mom.
What a great afternoon that was!!!

one of the most interesting and yet, not so surprising (when you really think about it) things was that
meeting Terri after such a long time...meeting face-to-face those blogging Goddesses....seeing my friend Ken, after almost 12 years....and spending time with our good friend Kim, after almost 7 years....
not. one. time. did it feel, i don't know, uncomfortable.
you know?
like sometimes when you meet up with someone you haven't seen for awhile, the first few moments are weird.
sort of like , "so....hmmmm...how are you?"
and you're looking at the clock, praying to the 'powers that be' that time would hurry up.
yeah...
that didn't happen....not one time.
even with the friends meeting for the very first time.
THAT....was awesome.


so....to borrow an idea from yet another blogging sistah
(at whose house i do plan on camping out at someday in the near future...count on it!!),
i'm going to do a bit of a
'photo dump' of pictures taken during the last of our trip.
(or was it 'picture purge'? i forget which one she used....)
in order for me to be really lazy to save time, there will be no explanations....if you have a question,
please, ask and i'll try to give you an answer!!!
mahalo, on that.
so...here we go....

~~~southeastern colorado~~~

*no, that's not a real knife...just dorky, yet very lovable, nephew!  

~~denver~~

~~seattle~~

*and, yes...that would be heidi...and jenn...and janet...on sticks...'cause we love 'em*

the other day in class, i was explaining to my students that, when they go on trips overseas, they go to see things...to
visit popular touristy/full of history kind of sites.
me?
i go to see people.
i love my people.
(^-^)
if we happen to do some sightseeing, then that is just
extra special something-to-do with friends.

and yeah...that last picture?
totally an album cover.
you know...if i ever have an album.

have a super week, everyone.
it's monday morning here and the sun is shining and it looks to be a
most
superb kind of day.
hope yours is, too.
you know....superb-like!!

"taken to the mat" by the thought of ice cream.....

....and not just any ice cream....homemade ice cream.

tonight after dinner, the k-man reminded me about a place here in nagasaki that i have yet to visit.  it's a restaurant that has milk shakes as one of its specialties.

and no, these are not milk shakes in the traditional sense of the american milk shake that you can get at your favorite hamburger joint or drive-in.

no. the nagasaki milk shake (i think there is even a song about it!!) is made by hand, using a whisk and a bowl that is sitting in ice (from what i can gather by the descriptions i have been given).  the ingredients...eggs, milk, cream, vanilla.... are carefully whisked in the bowl for each customer.

yes. each customer.  these milk shakes are made, one at a time.....after they are ordered....not dipped from a huge container that has been sitting in the freezer for Lord only knows how long.

no.....this is truly freshness at its very best.

as the k-man was telling me about this and how he thought we needed to go and have one....i was suddenly hit by a memory that literally, took my breath away.

the last few weeks have been strange...emotionally strange.

not sure if it's because i didn't go to the states this year for the second year in a row...or if it's because i've been a bit melancholy (for want of a better word) with this whole "i've been here for 20 years" thing that i've been doing a lot of thinking about....whatever the reason, i've been on a bit of an emotion roller coaster. 

 it's not anything to worry about, just something i have to work through.

anyway....there we were, sitting at the kitchen table, the k-man telling me about this place, the boys laughing about something they were watching on tv while they were eating their shaved ices...and it hit me.

a memory.

the sound of blocks of ice hitting a sidewalk.

(actually, the guy next door was crushing cans or something, but still.....)

yeah.

ice.

on the sidewalk.

when i was little, i spent a lot of time with my granny and grandpa.

i loved being at their house....i probably spent more time there than i did at my actual home.

granny had an extra freezer in the room off the kitchen....in the weeks getting closer to summer, she would slowly fill the freezer with milk cartons that had been rinsed out and filled with water.

i don't think she ever threw away an empty milk carton....they would all be saved for making ice.

the ice....was for making ice cream.

though this was almost 45 years ago, the freezer they had was not one you had to turn by hand...

(when i grew older i always thought one of those would have been so much fun!!)...

no, we had a fancy-schmancy electric one.

as granny would get the ingredients ready to make the "soup"

...grandpa would be on the back porch, dropping those milk cartons full of ice...breaking the blocks into little pieces to fit around the bucket in the ice cream maker.

see the counter in my granny's kitchen?

(yeah, that's me...and my mom)

i can remember sitting up there while she put all the ingredients into her big, yellow (with the black flowers or lines or something) glass mixing bowl.  i can also remember being a bit jumpy, listening to the sounds of grandpa dropping those blocks of ice (he was a very tall man with a very strong arm!).  but granny would just pat my arm and say, "he's almost done."

she would carefully pour it all into the canister and put in the paddle.

she would carry it out to grandpa (when we got older, that was a grandkid's job) and the ice cream making was now in his hands.

he would fill crushed ice in around the canister, that had been placed a wooden bucket.

he would then put rock salt around on the ice "to make it melt so the ice cream freezes".

(for a long time, i had a hard time understanding that concept, but soon...didn't really worry about it too much!!)

and then....after making sure the motor was on  correctly, one of us kids would plug her in and....

the waiting would begin.

when the ice began to melt, there was a little hole that cold water used to come out of on the wooden bucket...i remember sticking my finger in that hole and even though grandpa would say "don't put that nasty water in your mouth...it tastes terrible", i would, indeed, put my finger in my mouth to taste the water...and yes, it was terrible...but i had to do it. i really did.

after a very, very long time...almost forever!! while, the motor would falter a bit....and then.....stop.

the ice cream was done.

oh....such a joyous sound, that silent ice cream maker had!!!

grandpa would bring the canister into the house...and then the game of "who gets to eat the paddle" would begin.  oh, how i loved it when i was the only one there when they made ice cream...that meant i could eat what was on the paddle and i didn't have to fight anyone for it!!!

granny would pull out the paddle and put it on a plate that we never big enough to hold the paddle so you had to eat fast, because if you didn't, ice cream would melt all over the counter.

i love that ice cream.

sometimes, there is just nothing better than a bowl of homemade vanilla ice cream

to make all bad things go away.

there were a few occasions that we had fresh peaches, either from granny's tree or from the produce stand that was south of town.

later....someone got the brainy idea to

put in a couple smashed up candy bars that we all enjoyed eating. 

oh yeah.

totally yummilicious!!!

i know that i can get an ice cream maker (of sorts) here.....i have granny's recipe and i can get all the ingredients needed (except that particular candy bar..i may have to ad lib on that one!!).

it just won't all be the same....for me.  but....i have decided that i will look into buying an ice cream maker.  maybe the memories we make for the boys won't be the same as my memories, but...that's okay.  it's the making of the memories that is important.

****************

i wish for you all, today, a memory....one that makes you smile,

maybe even shed a tear or two.

and then. may you make a new memory or two with someone

who is with you today.

happy sunday, everyone.

**all photos were borrowed, lovingly, from Google Images**