Overview: I've been in Japan for over 10 years. This is my personal blog, covering a mixed bag of topics including Japan, my family, the web, programming, ESL and the occasional rant about politics and the media.

My JapanSoc profile lists all the social networks I belong to, so you can connect with me from there. Check out my Lifestream, too!


02
Aug 09

Ramsay Ramblings 2009-08-02

Renewing my visa

After being told it was too late to apply for permanent residency a few months ago, I recently tried to apply for a renewal of my spouse visa. Typical of me, I didn’t take half the documentation I needed so was sent home with instructions to gather the rest. Surprisingly, this time I was told to submit both my spouse and permanent residency applications together so I’m filling out all the forms, including a “please let me stay” letter to the Ministry of Justice and a hand-drawn map to my house (real maps aren’t acceptable!).

Upcoming nose operation

Breathing through my nose has become increasingly difficult over the last couple of years and finally the doctor recommended an operation instead of sending me away with more ineffective medicine. Such operations run in my family, so it doesn’t come as a surprise. No details yet, but I’m having an X-ray this week and will find out more then.

New project, Hotaru CMS

I was a huge contributor to Social Web CMS, the platform that runs JapanSoc.com, but have decided to build my own system instead of constantly modifying something I’ve never been altogether happy with. My new project is Hotaru CMS, which means “Firefly” Content Management System. It’s still early, but I expect it will quickly catch up with the likes of Pligg and offer a far more flexible plugin and theme system (more akin to Wordpress). I’m currently looking for people interested in helping out, so let me know if that’s you.

Rikuto to start nursery school

Ricky starts nursery school next week. For four days a week, he’ll join about seven other children in the nursery school at my wife’s hospital. It’s set up especially for hospital employees and the staff there seem very nice indeed. The children are from 1 to 3 years old (Ricky just turned 2) and they look like a lovely bunch of friends for our son. Incidentally, they are having a dads-only event in late August. Should be interesting!

My broken toe

Remember my broken big toe? Well it’s been a whole year since I broke it and I have a new nail replacing the old one. That means the old nail is yellow and kind of hanging off and it looks really gross.

Wrap-up

That wraps up this edition of Ramsay Ramblings, the first post on this lovely new Wordpress theme I’m using called Cleanr. Big text for my bad eyes!


12
Jun 09

Rikuto and Daddy Go Digging

Look what we did today!

Rikuto and Dad on a digger 1

And a bit closer…

Rikuto and Dad on a digger (close up)

Big thanks to the kind staff at Kakamigahara Caterpillar for letting two odd looking blokes waltz in off the street and request a demonstration. They even gave us a little digger to attach to my mobile phone. It’s got a movable diggy bit and zooms forward when you pull it back, making it the perfect companion for Ricky’s Choro-Q police car and fire engine:

Caterpillar accessory and Choro-Q cars

For those of you into Japanese toys, do you Choro-Q or Tomica?

Back to the subject of diggers, One of Rikuto’s books has a picture of the Hitachi EX8000 ultra-large excavator, one of the world’s biggest diggers. I wonder if they’d let us sit on it?

Hitachi EX8000


01
Jun 09

Rikuto’s First Time at the Beach

I can’t believe it’s been two months since I last posted on the Long Countdown. I even missed the last Japan Blog Matsuri about Favorite Places in Japan, which was a shame because this place would certainly qualify:

A beach in Shimoda, Shizuoka prefecture

This is one of many beautiful, sandy beaches at the foot of Shizuoka prefecture’s Izu Peninsula. We went down there in Golden Week, and it was Rikuto’s first time ever to see the sea and play in the sand.

About to enter the water

Ricky wasn’t scared at all of the crashing waves… in fact, he quite enjoyed splashing around in the water.

Rikuto plays in the sea for the first time

You can tell by his trousers in the last part of the video below that he got wet to the waist when he inevitably fell on his bum as one wave caught him by surprise.

We had a great time, thanks to the beautiful weather and wonderful hosts at EigoHomestay.com.

If you’re wondering where I’ve been for the last two months, I’ve actually been very active on the net, most recently blogging on the JapanSoc blog and BloggerTools.net. I’ve also racked up over a thousand posts on Twitter if you’d like to follow me there.