Hello there.

As I just turned 33 (the best age I was told recently) I thought I would write a blog, firstly to see if it was still switched on (not sure of the expiry dates on these things) and secondly to make my wife happy as she has been asking me to update it for a while. But more importantly, I wanted to actually write down a few things about what has been happening in the past few months.

I think I last updated the blog in June 2009 (doesn't time fly by!) and said that I wanted to start writing regularly again and also challenged myself to be able to run 20k by the end of the year. Sadly, I failed in both respects, and I am not sure which one was the most unrealistic, but in regards to the jogging, the most I ever managed in one go was 12k. Anyway, I still run regulary and am still in pretty good shape.

Well, so much has happened in the past year I am not sure where to start. Our marriage is probably the best place. Mariko and I finally tied the knot on 25th September 2009 at Meiji Shrine in Tokyo, with our parents and close relatives in attendance, followed by a reception the next day the Hotel New Otani in central Tokyo, attended by our familes, past and present co-workers, and friends. I wore traditional Japanese kimono (hakama) in both the ceremony and reception which was a great experience and overall thought it was pretty comfortable. Mariko wore the traditional all white kimono (shiromuku) and then in the reception wore a beautiful blueish coloured kimono (a gift from her Mum) and then changed into a wedding dress which she had made. All in all those couple of days were so amazing it would be hard to repeat them, with everything going to plan and the weather being very kind to us.

About a month later, we took Mariko`s parents (going overseas for the first time!) with us to England for a couple of weeks and had a marriage blessing at my local church, followed by a "wedding breakfast" at an elegant 16th century ivy clad mansion just outside Sheffield on 7th November, followed by a few days in the Cotswolds and then in Oxford before we came back to Japan. Again, what struck us was how lucky we were with the weather. After arriving in London on 3rd November to grey and rainy skys which continued up to the 6th, we were astonished to find that the 7th was probably the best day it could have been - not a cloud in the sky! I will never forget driving down the M1 in our wedding car sipping champage thinking things couldnt get much better that this!

After getting back down to work for a month or so, we then spent New Years with Mariko`s parents in Shikoku and then decided it was time to buy some property so we bought an apartment right next to Oyamadai Station in Setagaya Ward in Tokyo at the end of March. Giving up our top floor apartment near Toritsu Daigaku was hard but the two of us had outgrown in and wanted some more space and somewhere we could call our own. The new place is less than 2 mins wallk from the train station so its extremely convenient. We also recently bought a car which we are starting to get used to having. Last of the big spenders you might say but we are actually taking advantage of our lending power and low interest loans for once!

As people usually do on birthdays and when anniversaries are approaching, I was thinking back to last year when my parents arrived here in Japan for our marriage celebrations. I remember standing in the hotel lobby of the New Otani patiently waiting for their airport limousine bus to arrive so I could greet them all after so long. My parents, Grandma, brother and his fiancee came together and it was so great to welcome them all to Japan at the same time. Amazingly, my Dad managed to walk straight past me without recognising me (as I was significanly slimmer than the last time he saw me) and then I was informed that their luggage hadn't managed to make it along with them, hence the urgent shopping trip to find some clothes for Dad and my brother before my low key stag party later that evening. Uniqlo came to our rescue and a good time was had by all!

We had figured that it would be a good idea to take a little trip over my birthday (21st Sept) and enjoy some time together before we got ultra busy with the wedding preparation towards the end of the week, so Mariko and I had arranged a one night stay at a Japanese Inn (ryokan) in Izu Peninsula, usually a couple of hours drive from Tokyo. So we hired this 8 seater car and set off. I wont say too much about the trip other than as soon as we got on the expressway we were at a standstill and we probably spent as much time sitting in the car in a fixed position on the road or moving very slowly due to the volume of traffic as we did outside the car. In hindsight, it probably wasnt the best idea to have gone to such a place on a national holiday weekend but you never expect it to be so busy for so long! Although we enjoyed the scenery and the ryokan (food, bath and room) was great, I think the games of eye-spy we played in the car were more fun!!! Won't be doing that again in a while!

Speaking of trips, we have decided to take our long awaited honeymoon (15 months overdue to be exact) in New Zealand at the end of this year and have arranged a fabulous looking itinerary with the help of a travel agent in New Zealand. I've never been to New Zealand and Mariko has only been once, but we have some good Kiwi friends and we both really wanted to go and see it for ourselves. We are going to be visiting North and South Islands, staying in some great places and hopefully eating a lot of great food!. Going over Christmas and New Year has it plus and minus points but I think overall we are going to have a great time. I will state for the record however, that no bungy jumping has been included in the itinerary thus far, and that is the way it is going to stay. Unfortunately, I just dont have the stomach for it to be honest!

So I will close today but just telling you about the weather here in Tokyo. It been an exceptionally long summer and on yesterday's news they said that we had 71 days where the temperature was over 30 degrees Celcius between 9th May to 22 September. Thats about 75% of the time, and a number of those days up to or above 35 degrees. It really has been hot. Finally, today, although it was rainy, I could finally feel a bit of colder air and it felt good. The weather forecaster said it looks like a colder than normal winter this year which would figure because we just had a warmer than usual (if not ever) summer. We will soon find out.

Until the next time, and have a good evening.