Brad left this morning for another business trip to the States. He's currently enroute. By the time I wake up tomorrow he should have arrived in Baltimore. He'll spend about a week in Maryland and then he heads to Hawaii for the last part of his business trip. A week from tomorrow I'll hop on a plane for Honolulu and meet him there. After one day in Honolulu, we'll spend about five days on the island of Kauai. I've never been to any of the Hawaiian islands and look forward to this new adventure.

So for the next week it'll be just me and Ginger rattling around in the apaato. With Brad on his business trip, and Taffy gone, this place seems especially lonely and quiet. I keep thinking I hear Taffy padding down the hallway. I miss having her curl up near the kitchen doorway as I prepare meals. I keep thinking it's time to go for our walk in the park. I actually walked through Arisugawa park today and it felt so sad. That place holds so many memories of Taffy for me.

Our sweet puppy passed away today. The arthritis in her rear leg had become so bad that she could barely walk. Though she must have been experiencing such pain and frustration she never lost her sweet disposition. When we saw how she struggled just to walk across the room we realized it was time to have her put down. We called our vet, Dr. Tanabe, who came over right away. Dr. Tanabe tended to Taffy with great respect and affection. As he gave her the injection that put her to sleep, Brad and I cradled her in our arms. Time of death was 9:52 a.m. Dr. Tanabe made arrangements for a cremation service to come and pick Taffy up. Around 11 a.m. a gentleman from Saint Springs arrived at our door with a cardboard coffin and flowers for Taffy. After Taffy was placed in the coffin and the lid closed he put his hands together as if in prayer and bowed deeply over the coffin. He said he would be back at 6 p.m.

Precisely at 6 p.m. our doorbell rang. It was the gentleman from Saint Springs. He was accompanied by another man. Both of them wore suits and ties. They came to bring us Taffy's remains. Taffy's ashes were placed in a plain white ceramic jar with a sealed lid. The jar is enclosed in a fabric bag of white material with a pattern of silver threads. The bag is drawn shut with an elaborate bow of silken white cord. We are amazed at how big and heavy the jar is.

Though we are still reeling from the loss of Taffy we can't stop to marvel at the grace and ceremony with which the Japanese handled this sad occasion.

It snowed again today! It only lasted an hour or two before turning into rain, but this winter we've seen more snow in Tokyo than the past two winters.

Finally beginning to feel better. That's 'cause I finally broke down and went to the doctor. Diagnosis: bronchitis and sinusitus. I've been on antibiotics for about a week now and seem to be on the road to recovery. One thing I won't miss about Tokyo: I seem to get sick more often here. And it also seems to take longer to get well. I've spoken with many other westerners who have the same experience. I'm not sure what the Japanese take on this is, though. Guess if they've grown up in Tokyo they have nothing else to compare it with. Although you do see an awful lot of Japanese people walking around wearing masks.

Today is my Mother's birthday. She would have been 80 years old. It's hard for me to imagine her at that age. In my memories of her she is full of youthful vitality with a mischievious gleam in her eye.

Happy Birthday, Mom. I love and miss you.

Whoa. That nasty cold I had turned out to be a particularly nasty strain of flu. It has knocked both Brad and I off our feet. On Tuesday, I felt like I was among the walking dead: fever alternating with chills and a temperature near 101F. Since then, the flu has had its ups and downs and I'm hoping it's just about run its course. I'm beginning to feel human again. Brad is still feeling pretty bad; I think that's because he keeps going in to work. I keep telling him to stay home and rest, but he says if he does that he gets bored!

Yesterday we went in search of another antiques market. We'd read there would be one at Odaiba but when we got there, there was no antiques market. But it was a beautiful day so we enjoyed walking along Tokyo's beach, browsing through the myriad shops of Decks and Aqua City and having a delicious lunch at Monsoon, a Thai restaurant. I'm not that crazy about Odaiba, too much tacky glitz for my taste . . . my favorite part of going there is the ride on the monorail, Yurikamome. It offers such a spectacular view of the city skyline.

Today I woke up feeling really sick with a nasty cold. While Brad went off to a shrine sale in the morning, I stayed home and nursed my cold. After lunch, I felt better and ventured out. I ended up visiting five shrines today in Minato-ku, all of which are dedicated to one of the shichifukujin. I need to visit three more to complete my tour, and, as it so happens, to fill my temple book. I'm wonderiing if I should bother to start another temple book. We've only got about five more months to go in Tokyo, but there is a good chance we'll visit some interesting shrines and temples during that time that we haven't been to yet. The shrines I went to today were very small, neighborhood shrines, but on closer inspection really quite fascinating.

The Minato Monthly announced that there would be a Lion Dance (shishimai) performed at Shiba Dai Jingu on Saturday. It promised to be a spectacular sight, but we were disappointed when we showed up at the shrine only to find out that there would be no shishimai this year.

Today we went to Suitengu, a shrine near Nihombashi. They were celebrating the first festival of the year. It was a small festival with a couple of food booths and the usual lucky charms and amulets for sale. The shrine itself was quite beautiful, but was unfortunately wedged up against some ugly contemporary buildings. (A common sight in Tokyo.) The shrine grounds were populated with some curious statuary: a kappa (mischievous water spirit), a shiba dog and her puppy (both brass heads were worn shiny from people rubbing them) and a fierce looking dragon that served as a fountain spout. There were also three anchors enshrined on the grounds. It seems this is one of the shrines dedicated to the Seven Gods of Good Fortune (shichifukijin); this one in particular is dedicated to the boat that they sail in. During the New Year holiday, many people like to make visits to seven shrines, each of which is dedicated to one of the shichifukijin. I guess sometimes they visit eight shrines, as the boat they sail in is also counted for a visit. We stopped in at two other shichifukujin shrines near Suitengu, but did not visit all seven.

We spent much of Saturday going from one department store to another trying to take advantage of the New Year's clearance sales. We managed to pick up a few bowls which will go towards the set of Japanese dinnerware we'd like to have before we leave Japan.

New Year's festivities are winding down and Tokyo will be returning to normal schedules tomorrow.

Today I went to Hamarikyu Garden where there were lots of New Year's festivities going on. Hamarikyu is the site of a former shogun estate. It's a large, multi-featured park and just about any time of the year there is a different kind of flower blooming. There's a three hundred year old pine tree and a tea house on an island in the middle of a pond. Today it was very cold and there was hail mixed with big puffy snowflakes.

Here are some of the activities I participated in today:

• I drank (free) sake out of a cup made from bamboo; the sake was from a barrel opening ceremony traditionally held during the New Year holiday.
  
• Saw craftsman making traditional items from the Edo period
  
• Saw a kitemaking demo and watched as little kids and adults alike tried to fly their kites in the snow
  
• Watched as people played various traditional New Year's games:
  
  • Hanetsuki, an Edo-period version of badminton played with battledore and shuttlecocks
    
  • top spinning
    
  • walking on stilts made of bamboo
    
  • Kendama, a kind of wooden mallet with cup-like indentations. A wooden ball is attached to the mallet by a string. The object is to manipulate the ball into the indentation, using only one hand.
  
  
• Watched a strange performance by an even stranger man dressed as a Samurai.
  Two of his tricks:
  
  • He pierced himself with a needle and then extracted it with his sword (blood was drawn!)
    
  • He selected a woman from the audience, placed a daikon (large carrot-shaped radish) on her wrist, blindfolded himself, then sliced through the daikon with his sword while leaving the woman unscathed.
    
  • Saw a falconry demonstration. This was quite interesting. Trained hawks and falcons flew from trainer to trainer; then they flew over the heads of spectators and back to their trainer; then high into the trees above and back to the trainer. It was such a thrill to see these birds up close and to be able to watch their graceful flight. But then, the show stopper nearly made me lose my lunch. They released live pigeons in the air as the hawks swooped and caught the hapless birds in flight and devoured them on the spot.
    
    Tomorrow we hope to catch even more New Year's festivities . . . if the weather cooperates. It has been raining steadily since dinner time. A cold nasty rain. Hope it clears up by tomorrow.

According to Japanese belief, what you dream on the night of January 2 will decide your fortune for the rest of the year. That first dream of the year is called hatsuyume.
Hatsuyume.net explains:
"Since New Year's Day is a day for quiet celebration, and people don't start returning to their daily routines until the second day, the hatsuyume is usually the dream you have on the night of January 2. The best dreams are said to include Mount Fuji, hawks or eggplants, probably because they deal with great heights -- Fujisan because it's the tallest mountain, hawks because they fly high in the air, and eggplant because its price used to be very expensive."

I believe I dream every night. Often my dreams are vivid and detailed. I know I dreamt last night, but I can't remember it at all. Maybe it's better that way. Would rather not know what's in store.

I put away all the Christmas decorations today. All but Vickie's handmade snowmen -- I'll keep them up through the winter. I really hate taking down the Christmas decos. Nothing is sadder than a naked Christmas tree, ready for disposal.

It is freakin' cold today and the wind has been fierce.

Blogger wouldn't let me make a second entry on New Year's Day . . . guess the server was overloaded with all the New Year's entries. Anyhow this is what I wanted to say:

We went to Zojoji (yester)day . . . that's three years in a row we've gone there on New Year's Day. The usual food booths were there: tako yaki (octopus fritters), yaki soba (fried noodles), okonomiyaki(savory pancakes), sweet bean and cream cakes, grilled corn on the cob. This year one vendor was selling roasted potatoes with butter. Mmmmm they were tasty. And of course there was the bonfire to burn last year's charms and amulets -- a way of casting out all the bad luck they had accumulated through the past year. I got one of those fortunes on a long strip of paper. Luckily available in English. And lucky again, as it was a good fortune. And we saw the usual performance by the trained monkey. This year's monkey was particularly entertaining. He had a way of standing straight up with his arms by his side that was very disarming. I caught a few pics of him that I think turned out pretty good.

Brad made a delicious New Year's Day dinner: grilled pork tenderloin, sauerkraut and homemade spaetzle.

One big disappointment. My nengajo did not arrive (yester)day. I sent one to Brad and one to the critters. They were supposed to have been delivered on New Year's Day. I can't imagine what happened to them. Perhaps they got stuck in the regular mail. I think that's supposed to be bad luck. :-( Actually, now that I think about it, it's bad luck if they are delivered before New Year's Day. I think it's okay if they come a few days late. Whew.