Cleaning like a House-elf

SATURDAY, AUGUST 28

Slept in any my headache was better. I was glad but it was still ridiculously hot. II did two loads of laundry and hung them to dry while I worked on my shopping list for the day.

Ended up chatting with quite a few people. It is unfortunate that my free weekends are also the only time I really have to talk with people from home. While chatting, I hung my laundry to dry, eventually hung it in my closet, did dishes, made pancakes, and removed ice/snow build up from my freezer. The latermost being quite enjoyable on a hot day.

I had an interesting chat with Matthew about relationship, expectations, and ideals.

Let me tell you about my toilet paper. I told Lonn about my toilet paper today. My first toilet paper was single ply (like the kind they have in dorm bathrooms) and had no sheets. If I wanted to tear it, I ripped it against the metal edge of the toilet paper holder, which may be what it's for. My new rolls do have tear marks. However, interestingly, the sheets are about 2.5 times longer than those in America, which tend to be more squarish. My toilet paper also has little pink cartoon characters on it: pink koala, pink hippo, pink lion, pink zebra, pink kangaroo and joey, pink monkey... Adorable!

In the evening I hit up the hyaku-yen (the second word in Japanese being pronounced “en”) shop. I first browsed around briefly to look at their purses, but none struck my fancy. I'm in the market as my old one broke my first day in town. At the hyaku-yen shop, I bought a mop handle and mop attachment-thingy. They didn't have mop heads like I'm used to, but this one lets you put a cloth in, like a swiffer. Only, you can then wash and reuse the cloth. I made a gamble and guessed correctly that some of the cleaning cloths my coworkers had left me my first day would fit Perfect! Also, because I hadn't found a use for them yet.

I also picked up a notepad, and a bunch of hangers. My god, I have spent a small fortune on hangers! These hangers clip all the way around my laundry rod so I don't have to worry about the laundry flying off. They also have clips on them so you actually clip the clothes TO the hanger. As I'm on the second story, I have been worrying about my clothes flying off in the wind (which is sometimes intense) into the bushes of my neighbors below. These fancy hangers, however, were 100 yen a piece, which, I suppose isn't bad, but I've been spoiled by the wire ones, which are merely 10 yen each in a 10 pack. But, I figure I'll be doing laundry again at least once before going home (more like weekly) so they'll get used plenty.

Oh, and I forgot to mention this yesterday. When your coworkers want to check to see if the internet is working. Sometimes typing in the name of your hometown in google image search is NOT the right idea. Oh, lordy. There were big, white domes alright, but not the kind I was expecting.