5:09 p.m. June starts today. But it's exceptionally cold... Didn't think I'd wear a raised fabric parka in June, though it's too cold to stay in short sleeves so guess that can't be helped.

Am not sure whether this usnusual weather has effected in some way, but it transpired that last year's Yasuda Kinen winner, Showa Modern is going to retire. Her jockey seems to have tweeted the news on Twitter. The horse has been met by a losing streak after he'd won Yasuda Kinen however, I thought he was taking off in the last couple of races and I'm sorry to see him go. Looks like the grade one title extracted a high price.

The End

Caterpillar

4:11 p.m. I've got a walk-in meeting from seven this evening. I was expecting something like this would happen some time in the future, but not today. Was going to drop by the library to sign out another book, though that would have to wait now...

Wonder why some libraries still stick to short opening hours, while others are getting back to normal. They say they're reducing opening hours to save electricity but if that's so, why not seek some other ways of operating it? For example, they could try something like online sign out. Choose a book and sign out via online, while the llibrary staff would be limited to the least to send off the books via post service or similar delivery service. Surely, they can raise enough budget to cover the delivering fees if they close the facility temporarily, by saving electricity that eventually would have been wasted on air conditioning, lighting, etc., etc. Think it's about time for an innovation.

The End

Caterpillar

2:49 p.m. The temperature is gradually getting back to normal, and the particular stickiness of the rainy season also seems to be coming back, though it's still not as humid as it should be.

Well, the slightly cool weather might be good for mothers-to-be. One of my client is pregnant and her due date is June 14th. That's only about ten days away. Haven't seen her since May, and have been wondering how she might be doing. I've thought it must be an unimaginably hard work to deliver a baby in such humid weather as the Japanese Tsuyu (rainiy season), not to mention the pain and all.

Have no idea what it must feel like to deliver a baby since have never done it myself before, but I hope she's doing OK. Wishing for her safe delivery.

The End

Caterpillar

2:10 p.m. Was thinking of visiting Obaba today after work. But it's FFAAAAAAAARRR! It takes about an hour and a good forty minutes from the nearest station from the offfice... Think I'll take a look at the time table.

2:14 p.m. Daunting, really. Especially when there aren't so many expresses. The few ones that seem to be closest to my convenience, still either leaves too early or too late. Too late, because the visiting hours are from 11:00 a.m. to 8:00 p.m. Am not sure if I can leave office before six, so if I leave here at six, that would get me to the hospital station at... 7:40. Must also consider the walk from the station to the hospital, which merely leaves me approximately thirteen minutes before the visiting hours finish.

Should I put it off? Have a feeling that I'll never go again if I put it off today, though.

The End

Caterpillar

11:39 a.m. I was just leaving the office when I suddenly remembered that I had to return a book to a library on the way, and that I hadn't included the time for it in my unwilling attempt to visit Obaba. I tried my best to get over the extension trip to the library as quick as I could in order to catch an exspress train to Tsurumaki Onsen, the nearest station to Obaba's hospital but in vain. Eventually, I had to give up the visit because I figured there was no way to get there before seven-fifty. OK. Maybe next week.

11:38 p.m. Fixing tomorrow's lunch. Mr.N-jima, Cow and I all lost the Yasuda Kinen, since none of us had bet on neither Real Impact (winner) or Smile Jack (3rd place) and Apapane had sunk into sixth place. But Cow has won the final race. So the three of us all won a race this spring season. Guess that's an improvement.

The End

Caterpillar

1:50 p.m. The temperature has gone up to twenty-seven degrees today. It's hot. It's like the rainy season has been shoved away and summer has come a month early, but I've got to stay alert. Must not forget that the rainy season has just begun with at least a whole month and a half to go. Must not drop our guards before the JMA (Japan Meteorological Agency) announces the end of the rainy season.

Have just heard on the radio that just because the rainy season has set in earlier than usual, it doesn't mean it ends earlier than usual. Very discouraging. I was hoping it would end earlier than usual... Then we'd probably still be in the gloomy weather of the rainy season when the Takaraduka Kinen, final spring grade one race will be run on June 26th.

The End

Caterpillar

2:26 p.m. The N-jima project hasn't progressed an inch since yesterday. The deadline has been set and reset for June 10th, that's this Friday, and I'm supposed to send all the data by then however, I've become weary of producing data files that I haven't even touched them yet today. Have still got two more files to finish on my own, but don't feel like starting at all.

2:33 p.m. Cow was in charge of making the remaining couple of files, and I was secretly relieved to get rid of the work, but he's just told me that there are exactly four files which he cannot complete on his own. So I hadn't got rid of them... I will be occupied with other work on Thursday, which leaves me only today and tomorrow to finish up six more data files. Plus, there will be error corrections to be made, some data to be checked and modified. How am I supposed to finish all that in just two days? They're asking me too much.

The End

Caterpillar

2:24 p.m. While I have been driven to make data files for Mr. N-jima, the stock of Teva sports sandals seem to be getting less and less. I was going to buy two pairs at an online outlet shop, but as I checked it out again yesterday, they had apparently sold out my size except for one color which I wasn't intending to buy. It would be too true to be funny, if I couldn't get a pair after all that I've gone through, searching for a shop that still carried Teva sandals, applying for a credit card and obtaining one.

Have worried something like this might happen, though I never expected it actually would. Why is it that the things I want always seem to disappear from this world?

The End

Caterpillar

1:45 p.m. Powerful ladies seem to be the trend not only in our human society but also in the race horse world. Just to name afew, Vodka winning the Japanese Derby is still fresh in our memory, while many thoroughbreds have been defeated by Buena Vista or Apapane. And the local horse racing society don't seem to be an exception. I've just read the news that Clave Secreta, a 2-year-old fillie, has won her second crown with the Tokyo Derby at Ohi race tracks, for the firs time in twenty-two years since Rosita.

2:02 p.m. Have just checked the video of the race. Hmmm. Regarding that she was made to travel the outside, she must be able to run a longer distance which means she's got stamina. The record wasn't so remarkable, though. So I can't tell if she's really good or not. But she would usrely make the Japan Cup Dirt in autumn more interesting.

The End

Caterpillar

4:22 p.m. Have just sent the last data file with email. Done. Finally FINIIIIISSHHED! Am not perfectly satisfied with my work for there were still some things I could've done to improve it, if I had more time and energy to tackle it however, I am tired of editing data files especially when it's not my main line of business.

4:43 p.m. Oh, no. The person in charge has sent back my email saying that a trouble has come up when he deleted a file as I instructed him in my mail. Sending reply with a new file in a hurry.

5:03 p.m. More than fifteen minutes have passed since I sent my last email and he hasn't replied... What, has he gone home already?

The End

Caterpillar

12:10 p.m. Apparently, the person in charge hadn't gone home yet, and after exchanging some email back and forth, it was confirmed that my part of the job was over... for now, at least. Well, in case if any trouble comes up, then I would have to work on it again, but unless something like that happens, it's finished.

Having been freed from the load of unfamiliar work and its deadline, I put into action something that has been botehring me for some time; buy Teva sports sandals.

I had some minor troubles when entering credit card numbers because I didn't know which number on my card I was supposed to punch in (it's my first card ever, as well as my first time shopping online with it!), and when entering my phone numbers since I didn't know it should be entered with a country code and, without hyphens, when you're ordering from overseas. But was able to place an order alright, for the confirmation email has arrived shortly after my order. Yesss!

The End

Caterpillar

2:20 p.m. It's a quiet Sunday in a while and I'm relishing it. Mmmm, how nice it is to stay up late on Saturday night! How good it feels to sleep until noon! How comforting it is to not have to rush about worrying that I might not make it on time!

5:41 p.m. I should start working, though. I need to catch up on my work that I've been pushing aside while struggling with the N-jima project. But I don't feel like doing it. I want to go on savoring my free time forever... No, no, no. Think of the consequence. If I don't start now, then it's very likely that I conveniently forget about it until it's too late. Must start now.

The End

Caterpillar

2:08 p.m. Have been checking my email impatiently since last Friday, the day that I bought my Teva sports sandals. And as I checked it again a short while ago, I found that a mail had arrived in my mailbox. It was from Sierra Trading Post, the online shopping site, so I click-opened it and read a line I've been waiting for all weekend, "Your order has been shipped." Yesss!

I remember reading that a typical oversee shipping would take fifteen business days, so regarding that the mail was dated June 10th, my sandals are expected to arrive by July 1st. Yippeee! Surely, that would make it in time before onset of a full-fledged summer heat.

The End

Caterpillar

3:11 p.m. As most of you already know, terrestrial digital broadcasting service is starting from July 24th. However, my TV still isn't digitalized yet because there's nothing wrong with it so far. The digital TV anntenna has been attached, thanks to Tono's sudden change of mind, but not my TV. I've been torn between getting a new TV with a digital tuner and getting just the tuner and, after a good pondering (as usual), I decided to get myself a HDD recorder with a digital TV tuner. The idea of getting a new TV while the present one is still working was unacceptable after all.

4:01 p.m. Have placed an order at Amazon and paid 14,170 yen at a nearby convenience store. Feel I'm spending too much this month, though the expenditure for the sandals and the HDD recorder couldn't have been avoided. Besides, I still got the Takarazuka Kinen to win some money back.

The End

Caterpillar

2:09 p.m. Have just watched "Happy Days" on You Tube and I'm feeling great. I was browsing through the Net when it suddenly came to me to search for some American TV dramas. "Happy Days" was a TV drama I used to watch when I was living in the States, and I gained a large part of my English by watching the recap after school. Those were the good old days and I've always wanted to see the drama again to visit some happy memories. A while ago, I searched on You Tube in hopes that I might find "Happy Days" uploaded though unfortunately I couldn't at the time.

Oh, how it brought back all the good moments! Richie (played by Ron Howard, now the world famous, award-winning movie director) was so young! It's like seeing a long lost friend again. Today must be my lucky day since I was able to find the movie after all this time.

The End

Caterpillar

2:14 p.m. Cow has told me that he gets a hiccup whenever he eats a chunk of something dry. He said he'd always had hiccups when he ate a cold and dry sandwiches, a chunk of Yaki-imo (baked sweet potatoes), cooked rice gone cold without anything to drink, thinking it natural and everybody else must be getting hiccups in the same situation.

I told him that it was the first time I'd ever heard of such a thing, not to mention that I didn't get hiccups in that way. Wonder if there are people like Cow? And why that happens. But I'm running out of time so think I'll search later. More details will be coming up tomorrow, hopefully.

The End

Caterpillar

2:18 p.m. Oh, yeah. The hiccups. Think I'll go search a bit.

2:33 p.m. I found a question submitted at Yahoo! Chiebukuro, asking what causes hiccups, since that person gets hiccups whenever food gets stuck in the throat. So there WAS someone like Cow. Good news, Cow.

2:50 p.m. According to the answer selected as lsquo;Best Answer,’ the hiccups seem to start with stimuli applied by swallowing hot or spicy food, laughing acutley, coughing, excessive ingestion of alcohol or spice, sometimes even without any such cause. The hiccups you get when a chunk of food gets stuck in your throat is said to prevent food from getting into your lungs.

3:08 p.m. Cow seems to be convinced. Good.

The End

Caterpillar

2:39 p.m. Now I'm the one getting the hiccups. Don't know why... Don't remember stucking any food in my throat. And I've got cold, too, which I didn't want to have. Perhaps I ought to be grateful though, because it's a Saturday, not Monday or Wednesday. Yes, let's look at the bright side.

2:48 p.m. But what then, is the bright side of a stuffed nose? Sore throat and a blurred head? As a matter of fact, I have been nearly half sleeping all morning. There don't seem to be a bright side about my condition in that sense.

2:52 p.m. As I was realizing my poor physical condition, I noticed that I wasn't hiccupping any more. That's a new discovery. Concentrating on something else can stop hiccups!

The End

Caterpillar

5:01 p.m. Am not feeling so good. Think I might have slight fever. And my nose is starting to scrape as usual, because of too much blowing. I thought I had enough rest since I was able to sleep earlier than most weekdays last night, very much comforted, with my new HDD recorder set to record the TV drama broadcasted in the early slots of Sunday mornings. It's brilliant. Now I wouldn't have to stay up late to watch foreign dramas, and what's better is that the recorder has a digital tuner with the sound-multiplex system, so now I can watch all the dramas in English! Until the HDD recorder was connected, I had to settle for Japanese dubbed versions, for my analog TV, cheap as it was, had no such system.

5:18 p.m. Just hold on a second, now. I gotta blow my nose again.

5:19 p.m. There. A little better, though my nose is sore. Wish I had one of those incredibly soft tissue paper like "Hana-Serebu," but it's too expensive for gobbling up and although JoOusama buys a box occasionally, she makes sure the box of premium tissue paper does not leave her room.

The End

Caterpillar

3:46 p.m. Late yesterday afternoon, a postman has delivered a cardbord box. Yessss! The Teva sports sandals have arrived! From U.S.A.!

Have opened the package and confirmed the contents. Two pairs of sandals, exactly what I've been waiting for! Despite the days required for delivery on Sierra Trading Post's site which said one to three weeks for oversees, the package arrived in ten days since the order was placed, and that made me think they were doing a decent job. Taspo support center must have a lot to learn from them.

Have worn a pair to work today, and realized the design was slightly different from the one that I had. The new pair had thinner soles and, maybe it's just my imagination, but I feel like the soles are less flexible... Oh, well, I'm satisfied as long as I've got my new pairs. After all, I've been trying to get one for years now.

The End

Caterpillar

3:07 p.m. Yuck. Still suffering from alternate waves of stuffed nose and runny nose. Am also having trouble popping my ears. Oh, I hate it when I can't pop my ears. Added to my bad condition, it's got hot today and I can hardly bear to stay in my jeans already sticky with sweat. Wish I'd worn a tank-top and half pants.

3:14 p.m. But I think businessmen must be feeling much worse wearing suits in this heat. I deeply sympathize with them, really. The government has been encouraging &quo;super-cool-biz," a casual style of dressing, as a part of energy-conserving campaign which might be a ray of hope to such people however, I think aloha shirts and jeans cannot be accepted as formal outfit for business scenes, no matter how hot. They're too casual. Instead, I suggest Yukata for summer business wear. The clothing fabric must be innovated to get over the extreme heat of recent years, though I'm sure they are much cooler than wearing jeans and, they will look ethnic to foreign eyes which I think would avoid seeming too casual.

The End

Caterpillar

4:55 p.m. The temperature has shot up to thirty-two degrees today. That's ninety degrees Fahrenheit. It's hot and I don't know what I'm writing. My head feels heavy and I've started to drit off...

5:15 p.m. Wonder if drowsiness has anything to do with heat. I mean, do you get especiallu sleepy in heat? Or is it simply because I am lacking sleep? Perhaps I get sleepy because I sweat a lot in heat?

The End

Caterpillar

12:32 p.m. Am fighting sleepiness again. From this time of day already? Am not sure how I should get over today.

12:50 p.m. I did a little searching as usual and found out to my horror, that getting extremely sleepy when it's hot, could be a symptom of heat stroke. It seems to be that when the temperature within the brain rises too much, our brain alerts us by giving out signs such as dizziness, nauseousness and sleepiness.

1:32 p.m. Cow has mercifully turned on the air conditioner. Thank God.

The End

Caterpillar

2:29 p.m. My God, it's even hotter today. How could such heat follow day after day when the rainy season hasn't been over yet? But it's not just the heat that attacks us working hard to save electricity. The true enemy of Japanese summer is the humidity. Because of the high humidity, our sweat won't evaporate like it should in order to cool down our bodies, resulting in serious heat strokes which sometimes even cost us our lives.

Fortunately, rain is expected tomorrow in Tokyo and accordingly, the temperature is supposed to drop down five degrees to twent-six. That's a relief. Like I said, the rainy season is yet to be over.

The End

Caterpillar

12:15 p.m. Despite the weather forecast, it was sunnny and hot when I got up around seven this morning. So I decided myself, to wear a tank-top again, but now it's cloudy and getting cooler. Should have worn a T-shirt...

12:38 p.m. So far it hasn't rained yet around this office, though have brought a folding umbrella just in case it rained in the afternoon. The reason I am so concerened about weather, in fact have been concerened all week, is because tomorrow we're having the last grade one race of the spring season, and the weather would effect the track condition, which would automatically effect the result of the race and the depth of my pocket.

The End

Caterpillar

11:30 p.m. Have been back from our usual Izakaya meeting after grade one races. Takarazuka-kinen, the last grade one race of this spring season has finished with a runaway of Earnestly, who was the sixth favored of sixteen horses. I was hoping To The Glory would win the race since I'd bought a trifecta wheel keying him for the first place however, the recent heat seems to have got him and he sank in thirteenth place. His condition wasn't good, I suppose. But I got lucky. My trio keying Eishin Flash had both Earnestly and Buena on the wheel! I won again! Three wins in one season is good enough for me.

As they say, all goes well that ends well. I'm very much satisfied with my spring season results.

The End

Caterpillar

4:28 p.m. Cow has been bothering me about how the invoice we're sending to Mr.N-jima's should look. Apparently, he's a little nervous because he's never made or sent an invoice to someone before. Though personally, I don't care much about what it looks as long as it says how much we're asking them to pay correctly.

4:44 p.m. Now that Cow's finished with the invoice, he has kindly been giving me advice to keep the "Murmur" short. I was going to write about yesterday's post race meeting with Mr. N-jima, but guess I might as well write it tomorrow since the boss is urging me.

The End

Caterpillar

3:27 p.m. Have been out to the post office. The sun is scorching and I felt like I was a roast chicken in an oven. How could we possibly save electricity in such heat?

3:30 p.m. Oh, yeah, about the post race meeting. We were looking back on the grade one winners of the past decade and the losses we made, but unfortunately, we couldn't recall some of the horses exactly. It's been a while since we've started horse racing and, as the years pile up together with our age, our memory has been failing us. Seeing me and Mr. N-jima struggle with the horse names, Cow, always the one with suggestions (and claims), said we ought to bring in a lap-top and hold a post season meeting at the end of every season. With the help of Shochu, I agreed to this on the spot, turning down his question of ‘can we get Internet connection in this Izakaya?’ Now that I'm quite sober, am not sure if this is actually possible...

The End

Caterpillar

4:04 p.m. The temperature has gone up to 35 degrees today. That's ninety-five in Fahrenheit. How could this be? What happened to the rain? I thought we were still in hte rainy season?

Have been stopped by a woman wearing black tops and bottoms with a black golf cap pulled down low, as I was going out of the station and heading home. I froze and stood there full of suspicion, who would stop me around here? As the woman took off her cap to reveal her face that has apparently increased its lines over the years, I felt a sense of old memory rushing back and... POP!

She was one of the staff from the child care center I used to hang out. Gee, I never expected to see her again like this. We stood talking for about half an hour bringing back the old days, updating the information on who's doiong what, who got married or who has how many kids. It's been over twenty years since we'd last met and, thinking this might go on till morning, I asked her if she'd like to go out for a dinner some time.

"Sure, but let's wait till we get over this heat," said she. Right. I agree.

The End

Caterpillar

3:00 p.m. A little while ago, I heard a radio show host talk about this body powder he'd found when he went to Thailand. It seems to contain some menthol which cools the skin surface and prevents heat rash and, according to the show host, his visit to Thailand turned out to be pretty comfortable after he'd started applying the body powder. I must get that. I've already raised prickly heat around my neck in the heat of the past couple of days.

3:16 p.m. As usual, I went searching right away, though I couldn't quite catch the product's name the show host had said on the radio. And I discovered there were a couple of online shopping sites where they handle the same kind of body powder, though it may not be exactly the same as the one the show host had used. I also found an Asian supermarket where I can get one in Shinjuku.

3:20 p.m. Am determined to get one.

The End

Caterpillar