Pictures, as promised

Here are some pictures of our time in the U.S. Tubing in Wisconsin and touristing in S.D. Can't get that Mt. Rushmore picture to turn right side up though, not sure why.

That Mt. Fuji climb is sneaking up on me. Hope I'm ready.

Safe at Home

An hour and a half ride to the airport, an eleven and a half hour flight, two hour bus ride to Tokyo and a 15 minute taxi ride to our apartment. At the end of it all is home, sweet home. By far the worst leg of the journey is the vomit-inducing ride from Narita airport into Tokyo. Ask anybody who has made the trip, they'll concur. Not exactly sure why that is, maybe after an eleven hour flight you are just ready to be done, maybe it's the stop and go traffic going into the big city or any number of things that conspire to make that part so difficult. At any rate, not so fun but over with for this trip anyway.

So now I sit at 4 in the morning updating my blog. The kids and I are up, have been for about 30 minutes but awake for much longer. I anticipate a few more mornings like this before we get adjusted back to Tokyo time. Probably more for me than for the kids though. I did make them say they'll take a nap this afternoon though but it remains to be seen if that really happens. I'm sure I'll be able to nap, not so sure about them.

I was hoping to take advantage of waking so early and get out for an early morning run before the heat of the day gets too bad. No such luck. Already 79 degrees with 83% humidity. Yuck.

Second thing Cole did when we got home (after hugging mommy) was to go find his baseball glove. He seems to have been inspired by watching his cousin Mac play a baseball tournament when we were in SD. I'm sure we'll be out playing catch later today.

The Expat Summer Vacation

We are now experiencing the typical expatriate summer vacation. Cole, Kaori and I are in the U.S. visiting family and friends while Robyn has returned to Tokyo to work. Many foreigners return to their home countries for weeks and months during the summer while the working spouse either works in the office back in their home country, takes vacation and/or returns to Tokyo much earlier. This makes for a transient summer vacation and lots of time apart as a family.

I have to say I enjoy being in the U.S. but we all miss Robyn very much.

On Wisconsin!

We have made it to the U.S. Nothing exciting on this flight which is the way we like it. No sick kids all over my clothes or using up several many barf bags. Just a little Nintendo DS, movie watching and sleeping. Not as much sleeping for the parents but that's okay.

We've been trying to change our body clocks. Cole and Kaori seemed to do that on the first day, good for them. Robyn and I are taking a little longer. A few boring, sleepless hours in the early AM. Oh well, a nap in the afternoon makes up for that. So far we are lounging in our vacation time. Swimming, boating and eating. For me it's much easier to run here than it was in the quagmire called Tokyo's summer.

AZ