Nothing really remotely related to the lyrics, except the hardenbergia has bloomed beautifully and I am loving the dainty violet flowers popping up in the garden. And I am even happier because I grew the flowers from seed, which is an accomplishment I had never imagined possible (despite its mundaneness), and one that brings immense delight. Work is a little bit crazy at the moment, and I am also supposed to be studying, so I have little time on my hands. Added to that, the new fiscal year starts today and for the next 12 months I will be serving…
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The fickle spring weather gods afforded me another day of cycling this morning, which allowed me to get out on the bike and take more photos of the cherry blossoms as they near their peak bloom. I got to head out on my bike on the usual morning route I take, and was rewarded with an essentially people-free view of some beautiful cherry trees in almost full bloom and looking pretty, well, cherry ripe! Areas less exposed to the sun are still to fully flower. Today’s forecast is for cloudy weather, and the rest of the week will be the…
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Cherry blossoms have started to bloom in Tokyo’s suburbs. For the most part, flowers have yet to reach peak bloom along my most-traversed part of the Tama River. But in some of the areas where the flowers are at their best, the view is lovely. It was a bonus to be able to see them in flower this morning as I had presumed the entire weekend to be a washout. It rained incessantly yesterday. It gave me time to do some much-needed study for work, which is paying me to take the course I’m doing. I should be putting in…
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After an interminably long wait, it finally got warm this week, prompting me to spring into action. It was hard to believe that just last week Tokyo got blasted with heavy snow. Short sleeves and shorts were the watchword, even for typically well-covered types such as Mrs. Kangaeroo. Even though she notoriously feels that anything under 35 degrees Celsius is cold, even Mrs. Kangaeroo was walking around on Friday night in short sleeves due to the delightfully warm weather. My aches and pains eased a little with the warmth, too, which made it a bit easier to be mobile. It…
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Blessed by sublime weather, I got to experience the delight of helping out a canicross–canine cross country–and spent the day being surrounded by literally hundreds of doggos, thse glorious little angels without wings. They were taking part in Dog Marathon 2025 Shonan Beach Canicross on Tsujido Beach in Fujisawa, Kanagawa Prefecture. There were four different races with owners running together with their pooches (at least in theory, as slogging it out on the beach is pretty touch work, even if you’ve got four legs, as would prove to be the case for many dogs). It was an absolute delight, though,…
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With the onset of spring, I finally took action and planted seeds in the hope of bringing more, longer-lasting flowers into the Aussie garden we call Kangaeroo Corner. I planted some banksia, grevillea and eucalypts, using a variety of different methods. I put seeds into growth pods in three types of planter box. Two of these were to be lit 24 hours, and the other left to get light when it could. Two were also soaked in water, and the third wettened, but essentially to remain dry. The seeds are supposed to sprout anywhere from one to three weeks from…
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After months of being covered up to ward off the cold, I spent the morning removing the insulating materials draped over our jacaranda tree, unleashing the tree beneath the bright spring sunshine in the hope that we will get a full blooming tree by the early summer. It was good to crack open the tree again after months of a huge bag dominating the garden and being an eysore for the neighborhood. In theory, covering the tree in insulation material over the winter will make it more likely to bloom in the summer. Our jacaranda bloomed in the first year…
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Spring in Tokyo is always a delight for me, particularly as I age and the cold makes it harder to get active and the winter seems to linger endlessly, but sometimes it’s hard to see the silver lining in the clouds and today is a case in point. I’ve got meetings all day today, so I got up early to head off on a quick ride to give myself some spark, but it was pouring rain. With my wet weather bike with disc brakes and thicker tires stolen, I don’t have an option to ride on days like today. So,…
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Having lived in Japan for decades, it’s suddenly strange to see the country become what seems to be the global flavor the month, particularly when it comes to the phenomenal interest in akiya, one of the millions of empty homes throughout the country. All of the photos in this post are of akiya on sale for less than 1 million yen, which is about A$10,000 at the time of writing, picked up off a site at random. Akiya has become a well-known word globally as people have become attracted by the prospect of owning real estate for a fraction of…
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As the tiny yellow blossoms slowly starting to open on the wattle trees in our garden are showing, spring is gradually inching closer to realization, but it can never happen fast enough. Cold seems to linger for an inordinately long time at the end of every winter, especially as I advance further into old age and the chill’s effects deepen. But that’s usually because I expect too much of March, having the false impression of it being a month where things warm up despite decades of experience proving that to be the contrary. One highlight of March for me, though,…