4:12 p.m. A beautiful day, but can't shake off the thought of Gold Ship. Will he perform well or will he not?

5:02 p.m. No, No, I can't waste all day being obsessed by the slim chance of Gold Ship performing well. I have to move on. Okay. I'll just cover his name and think which horse would win.

The End

Caterpillar

12:25 p.m. All right, I got it. Here's my call for tomorrow's Tennno-sho.

I decided to key Sounds of Earth and Kizuna for my trifecta and buy a wheel with Gold Ship, Curren Mirotic, Hokko Brave, Win Variation and Admire Deus.

Towards the end of this week, I came to think that I could be underestimating Kizuna's strength, because he hasn't been performing as good as before in the previous two races. But as I considered his results carefully, I started to think this could be the consequence of his injury. After all, it took three races to win a grade one race after a bone fracture even for a great horse like Grass Wonder. Additionally, I might buy an exacta with Gold Ship for first place and Curren Mirotic, Kizuna and Souns of Earth on second place, just for safe keeping.

The End

Caterpillar

10:46 p.m. Arrrrrgh! No, not Fame Game! I had an exacta of Gold Ship and Curren Mirotic, not Gold Ship and Fame Game!

I've been longing for Gold Ship to draw an inner barrier because I'd thought that he would focus better on the race if he started from an inner barrier, just like he did when he won Kikka-sho. But I wasn't so sure. That's why I'd keyed Gold Ship on my insurance exacta and not my trifectta wheel. I'm happy for the horse that he'd finally won Tennno-sho in his third try, though I just can't figure out why. And I need to make this clear as Gold Ship would probably be running in Takaraduka Kinen again. Thankfully, we're having consecutive holidays. I might be able to spare some time on it.

The End

Caterpillar

5:44 p.m. Since I can spare some time in chunks during the holidays, I'd made my plans last week for some of the things that needed to be done. If I carried out my plan, at least those things will be finished by the time these holidays will be over.

I've already finished cleaning my down jackets, heating carpet cover and put them all away, so today it was time to clean the bottom section of my closet. I got rid of a lot of things including a leather bag I used to carry to school and a five-year-old can of beer (how did it land in my closet, I just can't remember). So far I've been executing my mission as scheduled.

The End

Caterpillar

10:14 p.m. I haven't finished all that was planned for today, but that couldn't be helped as I've been taking care of other things.

I knew I had to start getting ready for work since tomorrow would be the last of my holidays, still I enjoyed watching Danchi Tomo-o that accidentally came on TV when I turned it on. Oh, I love that character.

The End

Caterpillar

7:31 p.m. As I was checking out the articles on netkeiba.com, I realized a headline containing the horse name, Eishin Hikari. Mr. N-jima had asked me about Eishin Hikari, come to think of it. But the link to the article had a lock mark at the top, meaning that it was for paid-members only. No worries, there are other ways to find out about what the horse and its crew has been up to lately. I searched by the horse's name and opened the horse's BBS.

It turns out that the horse was entered in Miyako-Oji Stakes, the main race at Kyoto tracks on May 16th, Saturday. Going back the BBS a bit, I found out that his rider is going to be Yutaka Take! Many of the comments on the BBS mentioned Silence Suzuka's name which I wasn't surprised to hear. It's almost impossible to not link Eishin Hikari to Silence Suzuka, after seeing his sensational win in Ireland Trophy last October and then, given that Take is going to be his new rider.

The End

Caterpillar

3:59 p.m. Lisa Allpress is going to ride in Japan from this weekend.

According to JRA, she has been allowed a short-term permit to ride from 9th, May to 31st, July. It seems to be her second time coming to Japan, though unfortunately I haven't seen her in races yet.

Lisa is from New Zealand, born on 20th, May, 1975. She won a grade one race (Challenge Stakes) in New Zealand in 2012, and she's won 123 races out of 947 in the 2012 / 2013 season which earned her a third place in the leading jockey rankings. Lisa has been here before, previously in 2002 when she won 4 races out of 65.

Female jockeys in Japan are very rare, and they have less opportunities to ride compared to male jockeys. So I'm looking forward to seeing her ride and, of course, win!

The End

Caterpillar

4:33 p.m. The barrier draw for NHK Mile Cup has been announced.

I haven't made my calls yet, though I think you all must be concerened about Albiano. The two-kilogram lighter weight is tempting, yes, but I can't be sure about her performance after she's won a tough race in Flower's Cup with a twelve-kilogram weight loss.

Still, she might win as there has been some off time after her previous race.

The End

Caterpillar

12:42 p.m. Unfortunately, I haven't had enough time to finish up my call for NHK Mile Cup.

But so far, I'm thinking of keying either Avenir Marche or Albiano. I need to scrutinize the competitors on my wheel, though currently I've got Musee Sultan, Youngman Power, Nishino Rush, Arma Waioli and possibly Grand Silk left.

The End

Caterpillar

7:13 p.m. I've keyed Albiano on the first place of my trifecta wheel and bought it with all the horses that came within 7th place, except for Clarity Sky.

And I am not going to waste this experience when there's going to be two more mile-distance G1s on Tokyo turf. The first of the two, coming up this weekend on Sunday 17th, is Victoria Mile.

The End

Caterpillar

2:27 p.m. Living in an insecure modern world, we are bound by password locks and PIN numbers to protect our privacy. And there are times when you just can't remember those PIN numbers or passcodes you've set earlier yourself.

As I tried to log in to my router control pannel a couple of days ago, I realized I was facing this situation. Oh, no.

But when I racked my brains staring a hole into the log in page, it suddenly came to me! It feels great when you recall those forgotten passwords, really!

The End

Caterpillar

4:41 p.m. A client of mine has been having some trouble making numbers line up vertically on a Word document.

Since Japanese characters require 2 bytes for each whereas English alphabets and numbers need only 1 byte, problems occer when you use Japanese and numbers mixed in a document. Especially when it's something like a financial report, in which you want the numbers all lined up vertically, to make it easier for the readers. The simple solution is to make the file on Excel not Word, but I've thrown the whole question to Cow beacuse I had other things to take care of.

Cow has been struggling for a while, though it seems he has found the solution and now he wants to demonstrate it to me. Okay, I'll listen and watch. I understand how good it feels when you've solved a difficult puzzle or, when you've finally reached the right answer to a math problem after struggling for hours.

The End

Caterpillar

5:01 p.m. I went to the nearest retailshop from my office yesterday, to check out some smartphone devices. I went thorugh a path along the cannal nearby, because I'd thought it was the shortest way to get there and I met a group of spot-billed ducklings!

Recalling that I had dropped my iPad mini and cracked its front pannel only a month ago, I hesitated a bit but eventually took it out to take some photos. Unfortunately, it was getting dark and there was some distance, so the ducklings got mingled with the waterplants on my photos.

Although I got hit by the pouring rain last night and the lower half of me got drenched, I went home happy and satisfied apart from my wet clothes and sneakers. After all, you don't get to see spot-billed ducklings so often when you're living in Tokyo.

The End

Caterpillar

4:18 p.m. As I tore a leaf from a cabbage this morning, I discovered a slug underneath the leaf I've torn off.

Tearing a leaf off a cabage or lettuce to find a slug or worm has been a common scene when I was a young child. That's why we came to wash vegetables thoroughly under running water before using them in cooking, here in Japan. But they'd disappeared in the past twenty or thirty years, perhaps because of the pesticides or, because of the high-pressure washing the farmers use today.

The sight of the bewildered and tensed up slug made me feel a bit sorry for the little creature. We are both creatures living on the same planet, sharing preference of food, just different in size, appearance and power. The little creature is only trying to live its own life, just like me. And the cabbage it chose to live out its life, just happened to land in my hands. I felt like it would be too selfish to take away the slug's life. I opened the kitchen door, got outside and let it down on the saxifrage-covered ground. I thought the slug deserved a chance to live.

The End

Caterpillar

3:14 p.m. On my way to the station from my house, I noticed some green round blobs on the limbs of a tree, sticking out over the road. Ah, plums! The plum trees are bearing fruit already.

The barrier draws for Victoria Mile has been announced to reveal that Nuovo Record has drawn the outer post, number 15. It might not be a problem if she goes up in the front, but seems risky to me.

I don't know whether my devotion to this race will bear fruit like the plums, but I sure hope so because I have a hunch it's going to go wild.

The End

Caterpillar

2:59 p.m. It's been very difficult, but here's my call for Victoria Mile.

Red Reveur is my key horse, and the other horses on the wheel would probably be; Dia de la Madre, Meisho Mambo, Cafe Brilliant, Smart Layer, Arma Divine, Nuovo Record and Shonan Pandra.

I want to cut out Cafe Brilliant, Smart Layer or Arma Divine, though I haven't decided which horse to cross out. Perhaps all?

The End

Caterpillar

9:43 p.m. Oh man, I thought it might be a wild race, but not this wild.

As it turned out, the payout for trifecta amounted to 20,705,810 Yen (for 100 Yen)! Unbelievable. It's probably the highest payout in all the past G1 races, as far as I can remember! And no 4-year-olds came within third place while I' ve bought mostly 4-year-olds. Unbelievable.

The End

Caterpillar

1:47 p.m. Well, Victoria Mile ended with a huge payout and I couldn't win it. But that couldn't be helped. That's why the payout became enormous.

I'd rather keep my expectations realistic, put this one behind and focus on winning the Japanese Oaks.

The End

Caterpillar

3:21 p.m. Cow has been suffering stuffed nose for a while. It seems he's been even having trouble sleeping, which made him finally go to a clinic, although reluctantly.

It transpired that he had allergic nasal polyps in one of his nostrils. Well, at least now we know what caused the conjunction. He's been prescribed some medicine, but if his breathing doesn't improve he might possibly need surgical removal of the polyps.

Hope it gets better soon, Cow really, I do. And cheer up because you don't have those polyps sticking out of your nose.

The End

Caterpillar

4:45 p.m. Yesterday I read the news announced by au, one of the major Japanese mobile carriers, that they were releasing a new model of Kyocera Torque series, Torque G-02.

It has a higher spec than Kyocera S301, the device I was cosidering, built more tough. The only thing I'm worried is whether it can handle lte and wcdma after the sim lock has been cleared. If all goes well, I can use it with mvno sims which means I can cut the running cost.

The End

Caterpillar

5:07 p.m. The barrier draws for Japanese Oaks has been announced, but I haven't had the chance to take a close look at it.

One thing I know is that Let's Go Donki won't win. She might come in second or third, but it's less likely for her to win. Well, I can't say anything concrete though, until I scruitnize the barrier draw and the past results of each horse.

The End

Caterpillar

3:57 p.m. Some years back, there was a trend among comparatively well off homes to grow blueberries in their gardens. I thought the hot and humid summer in Tokyo wouldn't be an ideal environment for growing blueberries, though that didn't seem to dampen their appetite for getting on the trend.

This morning I passed by a nearby house with a blueberry bush by the entrance. The blueberry was bearing fruit and I discovered for the first time, that blueberries were actually red(!) before they got ripe. Hmmm... as they say, living is learning.

My bet for Japanese Oaks, coming up tomorrow!

The End

Caterpillar

12:51 p.m. So here's my call for Japanese Oaks.

My key horse is Mickey Queen, and am going to buy a wheel with Let's Go Donki, Maximum de Paris, Kokorono Ai, Queen's Ring, Rouge Buck and perhaps Not Formal, especially if the track condition gets soft, depending on the amount of rainfall tomorrow.

The biggest concern might be whether Rouge Buck would fight back and win or not, though I'm not trusting her so much this time, considering her performance in Ohkasho. That is, unless the track becomes very soft or the race flows in high lap. Those are the two conditions Rouge Buck can take advantage of. Still, I'm being suspicious because her training after she'd returned to her stable has been lukewarm as far as I can tell.

The End

Caterpillar

9:51 p.m. As I've mentioned earlier, I was suspicious about Rouge Buck. I thought she would either win or sink below fourth place, but I was going to buy an exacta with Mickey Queen in the first place and Rouge Buck in second.

And somehow it slipped out from my exacta. Ouch!

The End

Caterpillar

3:24 p.m. So I've lost Japanese Oaks in such a clumsy way.

But that's that, the past rests in the past. Luckily, Japanese D'erby is going to be run on the same track in the same distance. Let's just accept the loss as it is, analyze what I did wrong, and try to improve my performance for the coming D'erby. Let's move on to a brighter future.

The End

Caterpillar

5:00 p.m. Have bought poor Cow a pack of nasal straps.

Wasn't sure if it'd work, but thought he should try it anyway. It seems his breathing comes slightly easier while wearing those straps, so my detour was worth it, I guess. Though unfortunately, his polyps don't seem to be vanishing despite the medication. That means he has to cut them off surgically. Too bad.

The End

Caterpillar

4:17 p.m. Tokyo's temperature has hit 30 degrees Celsius as of this afternoon. Feels like we've skipped the rainy season to suddenly have summer already.

Papa Cow has taken out the fan while Cow has cleaned the filters and turned on the air conditioner for the first time this year.

I was beginning to worry that we might have missed the rainy season this year, which would lead to serious water shortage in summer. But it has been announced that Okinawa has entered the rainy season, so it would probably come up during next month. Most people including myself don't like the humid stickiness during the rainy season, though we still need it to supply us enough water during the hot summer season. Ironic really, but I guess that's life.

The End

Caterpillar

5:37 p.m. The barrier draw for Japanese D'erby has been announced and I realize it's already Thursday!

Haven't done anything yet though the weekend is approaching, approaching quite quickly. I get panic-stricken and start worrying that Duramente might even win the race.

I need to stay calm. A cool head is what I need to win the race. Come to think of it, I hadn't done much by Thursday last week before Japanese Oaks. But isn't that why I had to wrap up my call in a mad rush and eventually lost the race? Aaaaaarrrrrgh! No, no, calm down and relax. I've still got a couple more days.

The End

Caterpillar

4:26 p.m. As I dropped by a coffee shop to focus on the barrier list of Japanese D'erby, I heard a pair of male voices, probably students from a nearby universtiy, practicing for a job interview.

The two young men sitting at a table behind me were role playing, asking and answering questions to each other. It went something like this: "Have you ever experienced a setback? If you have, what was it?" "Yes, I've had anterior cruciate ligament rupture and meniscal damage in high school where I was a member of the rugby team. That was my biggest setback." "And how did you contribute to the team after your injury?" "How? Contribute? What do you mean contribute?" "Well, don't you think it's better to give them an impression that you didn't just give up because of the injury?" "Oh, yeah, yeah. But I didn't actually contribute to the team since I couldn't play."

I nearly burst out laughing hearing them argue over what to say in their coming job interview. Not to mention I got too distracted that I never got past Danon Major with the barrier the list.

The End

Caterpillar

12:48 p.m. I met a shiba dog on my way to work this morning and became friends with him. He was a friendly little soul, flattening his ears and wagging his tail as if might come off, once he smelled me and knew that I wasn't anything harmful. Mmm... he has some sort of healing power since I feel real good.

As for my calling for Japanese D'erby, haven't decided yet thanks to the also undecided weather forecast together with my lack of time and concentration. But here are the horses that has currently survived my scrutiny: Satono Rasen, Reve Mistral, Musee Alien, Satono Crown, Adam's Bridge, Real Steal, Duramente, Spirits Minoru and Kitasan Black. I should mention that I chose these horses on the premise that it would rain tomorrow, and that we would have a soft track condition.

If it turns out to be sunny after all just like last week, I believe that wouldn't be good news to Musee Alien, Adam's Bridge or Spirits Minoru, unless it becomes a high-lapped power race, as they probably prefer a soft track condition where there are naturally gaps between the horses. Duramente, I'm rather reluctant to buy as he might have damage from Satsukisho. My key horse can be either Satono Crown or Real Steel, though I'm a bit worried about Real Steel, having the fatigue toll up on him. Think I'll decide after I've checked if he's had any weight loss.

The End

Caterpillar

10:29 p.m. I owe my apology to Duramente.

He was one of the toughest horse I'd seen in the past couple of years.

The End

Caterpillar