Bits and pieces

- Happy New Year everyone!!! May 2009 be a fabulous year!

- My year-end trip home to the US turned out to be more complicated than I thought... I was looking forward to 14 hours in Honolulu, but the weather was so bad in Seattle that a gate agent recommended I fly standby to Seattle ASAP and not risk getting stuck. So I flew standby to Seattle, but unfortunately I couldn't get any flights out of Seattle to my final destination. A friend from college put me up for the night (a lifesaver!) and early the next morning I went back to the airport to find an absolute MADHOUSE. Security lines of more than 90 mins long just to get in the airport (backed up to the parking lot!), crazed people (understandably) who wanted out of the airport after some of them had spent three days waiting for cancelled flights, etc. And unfortunately the NWA staff in the US were *nothing* like the friendly, helpful gate agents at Narita who really went above and beyond. I am definitely going to write a letter to NWA to compliment their Narita staff!

- My trip home was good, but I was sooooooo tired. I had a lot of fun, though!!!

- Work since I have been back has been....well...work.

- R and I did a major clutter cleanout this weekend, and now our apartment is finally shaping up! The living room is so clean it feels a little like sitting in someone else's apartment! But now the real challenge is to keep it this clean.

- Today a professor at Chuo University was stabbed to death. Awful. This professor was actually a client of R's, and R just met with him last week. He said this professor was an incredibly warm, friendly, and kind man, and he is shocked that something like this happened. I feel sorry for this man's family. How awful.