Kramer

I learned from my mom that Kramer, the Hunnicutt family dog, passed away this week. I don't remember precisely how old he is, but somewhere in the range of 12-14 years. He had a good life I figure, and he shall be missed.

Anyway, while writing this I recalled three great Kramer moments.

1) When a turtle found its way into our yard. I learned that day that Kramer hated turtles, or perhaps it was that Kramer hated being helpless. It hid inside its shell and Kramer couldn't do a thing about it. He barked viciously for an hour or so. Eventually I picked up the turtle and took it to the woods.

2) When, upon seeing a squirrel in a tree, Kramer dashed into the screen porch of my house, and leaped through the screen and broke it. He didn't get the squirrel. He did fall about 15 fifteen since the screen porch is high above the ground. Luckily, no damage.

3) When he did the exact same thing a week later. But this time, he realized his mistake at the last moment and turned around and tried to stop. He and I made eye contact for a moment. I could see the regret in his eyes, but he had too much momentum to stop and he slipped through the hole he had made the week before and fell again. Once again, he was fine.

Hiking

Just had a busy weekend.

On Saturday we had a birthday party followed by a night of gaming for my friend Travis. I will remember it as "the night with three cakes." As a group we bought one cake, and then one woman didn't know about the group cake and brought stuff to make cakes. She made one, then offered to make another, and in the late hours of our game, we took her up on her offer.

The following day, five of us went hiking on the west side of Shimokita, up a mountain called Nuidoshiyama (I think). It was very scenic. It was a revisit to a hike I did nearly three years ago when I first came to Japan.



For Christmas I got this cool cooking stove called Jetboil, and I had my first chance to use it while on an actual hike. We drank mate at the top.



and here is a picture of the tiny town of Ushitaki, which we stopped by on the way to meet a friend before the hiking trip.



It was a fun day, and after all that I went to a student concert. I was worried I would be sleepy after the hike, but the music was good and it kept me up. Among others, they played theme of the Godfather, which was the highlight of the night. And then halfway through they had a drawing based on numbers on our tickets, and Satoko and I won a little gift bag with a candle holder and other little prizes. Good times.

Google Mutsu

This blog is not quite dead! Recently Google Earth has updated their maps, and now if you look up Mutsu, Japan, you can see the city clearly. Here is a picture of my apartment:



Here is the school where I work:



There must have been some kind of event at the school, since there are cars parked along the sports' fields. I find it mysterious that the cars are mostly white, probably covered with snow, but yet there is little snow on the ground...

Speaking of Google and maps, has anyone seen their new "street view" function at maps.google.com? It's cool and scary.