Campai!

Yes indeedy.
Yesterday was another long day of meetings and information sessions at JAXA - but it was absolutely wonderfully nice outside (meaning no rain and considerably less clouds and...get this...sunshine!). The capper to all of it was the "social" event we would have at the end of the night. Woohoo, good fun!

After work I ended up coming home, changing and starting to watch my first fall semester class (awesome). After 15 minutes of that gem, I got a phone call from my friend Kieth, asking if he could use my bottle opener for a frosty beverage he had. I said "Sure, c'mon up!" I left the door to my room ajar roughly halfway and continued to "watch" class at my desk here. My room doorbell rang (a sweet, polite little melody) and I said "C'mon in!" No one came in. So I finally turned around and noticed no one was in the doorway. Weird. I got out of my chair, went to the door. What should I notice, but an empty flower vase sitting in the hallway, in front of my door! No sooner had I entered the hallway-doorway interchange, when I saw a beautiful bouquet of flowers propped up against the opposite hallway wall on the floor! Hmmmm...what the *bleep*?

I looked down the hallway to my left and what do I see?? Kieth and Todd poking their heads around the corner with huge grins on their faces (like the VonTrapp family "cuckoo clock" scene in The Sound of Music). I think I said "Super Gey"...at least those two jokers say I did, I can't remember everything...and then they came down the hallway to explain the scene. Charlie contacted Todd who worked with Kieth to get me some flowers (and later, a fruity girl drink) for our anniversary!! Awwwwwwww, so sweet!! They were gorgeous and made even more special because my friends (Kieth especially) worked his buns off trying to find, negotiate and buy both the flowers and the vase (such a great story). Those guys are the coolest - and my husband is the bomb for doing the coordination :) I love the flowers and love my dude (Sir Charles, as I call him today)!!

After that bright, sunny (MUCHLY needed, thank you very much) kick-in-the-pants to my day, I stopped pretending to watch school and went to Tito's for a quick drink (gross Scotch on the rocks - whaaaaat?!) and then our group boarded a small bus for the social event of the evening.

There were about 40 of us at this thing, 1/2 japanese, 1/2 American (1 canadian). We got to eat at another typical sit-down-on-the-floor restaurant with a huge spread of food (I mean HUGE) including everything from mini-corndogs (Mama liiiiiiiiike) to raw fish of many kinds to teriyaki chicken. It was good. Reeeeeeeeeeeeal good. The beer, sake and sho-chu were flowing freely and the group of us ate, drank, "Campai!"-ed and mingled a lot. It was quite fun!

Once we left the restaurant, we headed to a local Karaoke joint and whooped it up - mind you, our group reduced in half by now. I sang an impromptu duet with one of the JAXA flight controllers (Ito-san?) and now the name of the song eludes me. We were great though. Absolutely wonderful. Like beautiful songbirds singing sweet, natural melodies. *Bliss!*

Most everyone got to sing something and it was tons of fun. People were jumping around banging tambourines all over the place, walking on tables, shouting SO loudly into the microphones and dancing around like goofballs. It was a blast!! Sooner rather than later (midnight), they said our time had ended and we had to leave the karaoke behind. A quick stop at a sho-chu bar (myself, Tito, Rosie, Parrish) later, and we were all headed home for the night. Rosie rode home on his awesome bicycle and Todd and I hoofed it back to the hotel in the rain.

What a great way to end the day!!

Sho-Chu! Sho-Chu! Hai-Hai-Hai!