Dave and I had breakfast at an Allston diner called Grecian Yearning. We yearned for eggs, and there was only one place to go. Afterwards, we yearned for skin care products so we went to Newbury street, a big shopping drag, and went to Kiehls and Lush. Dave bought Jany, his wife, a lovely present of lots of relaxing and fragrant soaps and bath bubbles. I bought bubble bath. Now I have to clean my tub.
Marty's Liquors - the landmark par excellence of my corner of Allston. Personally, I buy my wine at Trader Joe's. I also buy my coffee and all my biodegradable cleaning products there. Because, you see, my refraining from using Tide, Palmolive and Windex really makes a big difference in the environment and will reverse global warming. Oh, wait! Global warming is just a theory! I can relax!
And no dinner at Richard and Barbara's is complete without Barbara! Here she is, smiling at me from her chair.
My uncle Richard, surrounded by fine china and bottles. He volunteers for the ACLU now that he's retired.
Here's the fabulous Frank, fantastic father. Fearless, friendly and forebearing, he forgets furballs. We went to Ikea a couple of weeks ago. He was astonished by the variety and the prices. I was astonished by how few people there were on a Friday morning and by how tasty the meatballs were.
Here's Dave, first houseguest, in fact, first non-immediate family visitor to my house. He was here to do curating and we had a great time walking around and eating delicious things. Here we're at Richard and Barbara's house, where chicken cacciatore was served. Luckily the chicken needed no curating, so all Dave had to do was enjoy the meal. Can you curate a chicken? You can marinate it...
Here's Michael. Remember Michael? This party is in his honor. He may give me his bookcases, which I obviously need, if you've seen the photos of my very bare apt. Actually, what I truly need are chairs. I have to get some before Dave comes so he can have somewhere to sit.
Here, I'm crushing Miyabi using her brother.
Here I am, shiny, pale, and blotchy, with the two tiny Sugas.
This is Mr. Suga and Miyabi.
This is Izumi, one of the hosts of the party, with Junnosuke and Miyabi, the children of Mr. Suga. Izumi appears in the sumo suit earlier in the blog.
This is Hiromu again, here with my friend Koji Suga. Mr. Suga is a visiting scholar who's been at the Reischauer Institute since last winter. He studies Shinto in Taiwan and Korea, and is a Shinto priest himself. He and I have been doing language exchange since he came, and he's been a huge help with my mangy nun article, checking my understanding of edicts and pointing me to good articles. He has two adorable children and an adorable wife, who could not make it to the party, unfortunately.
Believe it or not, I do take pictures of things besides apartment features and name plaques on doors. This is me and Hiromu, a grad student in history at Harvard, at a farewell party for Michael, also a history grad student. He got a job at a university in Sapporo, the main city of Hokkaido, the northernmost island of Japan. Beer fans will recognize the name. Notice my new glasses and shiny, shiny face.
Here you get an idea of how much (or how little) counter space I have. You also get a good view of my tea kettle, donated to me by the charming David Odo, who is apparently visiting Boston next week! Yay!
One nice thing about having such a ridiculously narrow kitchen is that it's easy to mop the floor. It also keeps me from spending too much time cooking or from buying too much at the supermarket.
This is my living room. Here, we have the indefatigable Smedvik, table extraordinaire. The green background drawing is by Maki, my neighbor in the dorms at Tsukuba. The blue-cushioned armchair from Somerville is in there too. Some of you might also recognize the curtains from 112th st. I'm not one of those irresponsible consumers who thinks she should buy new curtains after ten years or so -- they're perfectly good!!!
Here's my bedroom in Allston. Notice that it's cleaner than the Somerville one.
