The Pedicure by the Pond

AM

Least: At 9:05am I woke to my alarm thinking about what halloween costume I should wear. This outrageous thought was provoked by my school's obsession with the commerical possibilities of Halloween and other hyper-American celebrations like Thanksgiving. Despite all the staff's hoopla, it is clear that the idiotic dress-up is to increase sales to children because they are the biggest and longest running cash-cow. I'm thinking something minimal, like a silly hat to minimise my regret and humiliation.


Most: At 11:20am, I dragged myself out of the house for a long overdue walk in the park. Being later in the day, most of the early morning cast had left, leaving only the drunks, some mother and child duos and the odd fisherman. In particular two old men caught my eye. One was taking photographs of ducks with his massive telephoto lense. The amazing thing though, was the the ducks seemed to be cooperating with his hobby. For nearly an hour, about a dozen ducks bobbed obediently for the camera. The second guy was on the other side of the lake and giving himself a rather disgusting pedicure. By my last lap around the park, he was carefully preening his nails and cuticles. Thank-you Mandai Ike.

PM

Least: Just after 12:20pm, I sprung downstairs on a mission to by supermarket sushi. I had felt so revived by my walk around the lake, that I nearly skipped down each flight of steps. Unfortunately, on the last flight, I leapt a little too vigorously and slammed my skull into the ceiling of the stairwell. My brain and eyes rattled for about a minute afterwards, and by the time I began pedalling my bike, I was in a dreamy state of giddiness. Although I didn't collapse in the bank queue, I've had a headache that has persisted until thirteen minutes before tomorrow's AM. According to the internet I may have a mild concussion.

Most: After 7:10am, I began a dreaded one way conversation with a drunkard. The amazing thing was that once he began rambling about the ills of his life, he couldn't stop. He was like a drunk in an American sit-com and lamented all the things that seemed to happen to him, rather than think about what he might've done to annoy others. He said a theme of his life was people wanting to fight him in bars. He didn't think it strange that the inicidents had him and booze as a common demoninator and in fact blamed it on his charisma. Incredibly, despite sometimes actually smelling like booze, he has never been fired - but I suose drunkeness is not really looked down upon in Japan. Annoying but, nevertheless more interesting that stuffing tissues.