Happy new year! 明けましておめでとうございます！

Right then, I've finally got an internet connection in my new apartment, so hopefully I'll be updating this thing a little more often. Is anyone actually still reading? If so, you have my sincere thanks...

To summarize my current state of play, for the lazy/indolent: I am living in my very own apartment in Nagoya (Tenpa-ku). Currently very minimalist (i.e. I haven't bought much furniture yet). I work in Nisshin (just outside of Nagoya) proofreading and translating owner's manuals for Toyota.

I'm just back from visiting friends & fam in the UK for Christmas. Very nice to see everyone. Flight back was slightly problematic, in that the co-pilot of my connecting flight was suddenly taken ill (at least that's the airline's story, resulting in me having to spend a night in Helsinki. However, BA/Finnair put us all up in the airport Hilton, which was really very nice indeed. Helsinki was a bit on the brisk side though (about -5c during the daytime). The next day I could only get a filght to Osaka which meant getting back to Nagoya via several trains, which I particularly enjoyed because I hadn't slept at all on the 10 hour flight from Helsinki. Oh I do like to moan. Still, back now. And jetlagged...I slept 12 hours last night, hehe...

First day back at work today...I was a little scared as I felt like I'd forgotten most/all of my Japanese...struggled through somehow though, hehe. The morning was taken up with a new year's conference, held in a conference centre right out in the middle of nowhere (if you don't believe me, check the satellite view...fields aplenty!).

Well, off to bed I think...(jetlag)