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July 23, 2016: Tokyo in 2016? Maaaaaybe!

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July 23, 2016: Tokyo In 2016? Maaaaaybe!

To quote Dark Matter’s SIX (Episode 103): “Fresh starts for all of us, right?”

Right!  With the real estate market blazing here in Vancouver, Akemi has been not so subtly suggesting it might be time to cash out.  And she does have a point.  As much as I love my house, I’ve calculated that we only use about 30% of the living place.  The remaining 70% is very attractive storage.  It never bothered me before but, strange as it sounds, he house feels A LOT emptier now that Jelly is gone.  The prospect of moving has grown increasingly attractive, especially over the last few days.

So, if I was to move, what would be my options?  Another place in Vancouver? What would be the point?  Toronto?  Too cold.  L.A.?  Too cool.  Tokyo? Maaaaaybe.  An extended stay in Tokyo would finally afford me the opportunity to perfect my Japanese (and, by perfect, I mean learn) and pursue some other interests – chiefly, a couple of Japanese food-themed shows I’ve been batting around.  I’ve gone so far as to do the math (I’d be comfortable for the next 25 years before having to find work), check out condos – AND, most importantly, check out the country’s laws on pet travel (following a 24 hour quarantine period, the kids would be free and clear!).  Daikanyama strikes me as a great doggy neighborhood – and less than an hour out from Yokohama, another potential home base.

July 23, 2016: Tokyo In 2016? Maaaaaybe!

I’m planning our annual Japan trip for September – Osaka and Tokyo – and will scope out some other neighbourhoods as well.  Now that I’ve gotten the hang of this Periscope thing, I’m going to try offering up live updates while I’m there. Maybe a live tour of the Tsukiji Market one morning and a visit to Star Bar another night.  Join me in a visit to Gyoza Stadium or watch me work my way through the entire Jean-Paul Hevin chocolate dessert offerings at Roppongi Midtown.  It’ll be like you’ll be traveling with me – or, possibly, moving with me!

July 23, 2016: Tokyo In 2016? Maaaaaybe!

But first things first.  I’ve got to get the dogs healthy.  Bubba went in for his annual physical today.  Failing hearing, cataracts, and his teeth are slowly deserting him. Sometimes, I forget he’s 13.  Lulu, meanwhile, had her endoscopy today.  We get the results in a couple of days!

So, how are you all doing?  What’s new?  Moving anywhere new?

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31 responses

  1. glowyzoey Avatar
    glowyzoey

    I’m sure you and Akemi and the dogs will be very happy in Tokyo. Can you produce DM from there, though? What if it gets picked up? I sure hope Lulu’s test results are good.

    Got the first Swiss Chard out of my garden and had it for supper. I grew it! Quite an accomplishment from a former apartment dweller. *beams* Some of my garden is in containers and some is in two small patches of actual garden-type ground. Go me. The carrots, cucumbers, bok choy, and beans aren’t quite ready yet. Soon. 😀

    Reply
  2. maggiemayday Avatar
    maggiemayday

    Tokyo would be a blast as a home base; and I do love parts of Yokohama. But honestly, living in Japan damaged my lungs badly between the polluted air and the damp, mildewy summers. I didn’t even know I had asthma until I’d spent nine years in a tiny pre-war house, and we stirred up the dust and mold when packing out. Scary, the base even sent an ambulance because I was wheezing so audibly.

    If I had the resources, I’d have a lovely Utah mountain home away from the valley pollution, perhaps something small for winter in San Diego or Hawaii, and take extended stays in larger cities at my leisure. You bet I’d have an assistant and/or staff. My cats would need a nanny.

    But I will probably live in this little Utah box house until I can no longer navigate the ups and downs, then get sent to assisted living to moulder away. It ain’t pretty, but it is probable.

    Sorry about that. Anytime I have seen doctors, I just get morose.

    Reply
  3. Sparrow_hawk Avatar
    Sparrow_hawk

    So… is there going to be a guest room in this hypothetical Japanese abode? Just wondering.

    Reply
  4. Sparrow_hawk Avatar
    Sparrow_hawk

    No moving plans at the moment for me. The Chicago suburbs are still a pretty good home base. But I’m hoping to do more traveling! And maybe retire early and travel even more!!!!!!

    Hey, a girl can dream.

    I hope Lulu gets a clean bill of health and starts feeling better soon.

    Reply
  5. shyone65 Avatar
    shyone65

    Moving to Japan,perhaps a new agent is there something your not telling us? Hope the pups get to feeling better

    Reply
  6. Ponytail Avatar
    Ponytail

    As long as they have blog service, I don’t care where you go. Just remember, we have to “live” there too. All the places you mentioned sound great, especially Tokyo. But you aren’t going anywhere mister man! You have a show to create, write, produce for all your number one fans! When Dark Matter ends, then lets move to Tokyo and start fresh.

    Can’t wait for you to go to Tokyo again. That is a beautiful place.

    The air conditioner man (kid) left about an hour ago. My air conditioning went out about dinner time. Not good when you are living in a 100 degree Texas summer. I don’t care what it cost just get it working again. And “the kid” did. He’s my hero.

    @ glowyzoey – Congratulations on your garden. I know the feeling of growing your first one. My first garden was so beautiful because I had flowers mixed in with all the veggies. Everyone was amazed when they saw it.

    Reply
  7. Tom Gardiner (@Thogar) Avatar
    Tom Gardiner (@Thogar)

    I’m pretty sure I’m going to stay in my tiny spec home until I die. I like the idea of moving, but I also like the idea of this house being paid off. Maybe I’ll just take more vacations instead. I may know a guy who might be living in Japan the wife and I could crash with. I can cook. It’s mostly Cajun cuisine. We got a deal or what?

    Reply
  8. Kathode Avatar
    Kathode

    Why do the endoscopy results take so long? With humans, you pretty much find out right away whether things are all clear in there, directly from the person who was scoping you. Hope the news is informative and actionable!

    Reply
  9. JeffW Avatar
    JeffW

    When is your Tokyo trip in September? I finally nailed down my Savannah trip to the weekend of September 12th. Y’all are welcome to join us on the way to Tokyo. 😉

    As for where I’d move to, well Savannah is the obvious choice! The climate is agreeable (to me anyway), housing is affordable, the people are friendly, and they have crabs! (I’m talking about the seafood kind of crabs not people with crabs).

    The only things stopping me are the job and the transitioning to college kids of mine. Still it helps to have goals even if they’re presently unobtainable. Retirement there is a strong possibility…we want to get out of Illinois.

    I hope both Lulu and Bubba feel better soon and have a great (house hunting) trip to Tokyo!

    Reply
  10. shaneac1 Avatar
    shaneac1

    Well as usual it’s hot as hell here in Phoenix nothing else new. Just hot hot and more hot.😈♨🔥😥

    Reply
  11. archersangel Avatar
    archersangel

    another thing to consider before moving to another country is what kind of regulations they have in regards to pets. for example, here is what japan requires.
    http://www.pettravel.com/immigration/japan.cfm

    Reply
  12. Ganymede Avatar
    Ganymede

    Just curious, Mr. Math… Did you number-crunch before or after the Canadian Dollar went into FREEFALL..? And, I hope you’ve also spoken with a TAX Lawyer..? [#justsaying…]
    Perhaps, you should ease into it slowly and try Hawaii for a while instead. LOTS of Japanese spoken. Expensive food. Better beaches. Snow on the Big Island, if you’re needing a taste of “home”… Halfway between your Family and Her’s… FEWER EARTHQUAKES… You could learn to surf.
    😀

    Reply
  13. carol Avatar
    carol

    Not moving anywhere yet, although my dream is still to retire someone close to the water..I live on a island so the lure of the sea is never far away.

    Would love to live in Vancouver but sadly the prohibitive housing prices exclude us, and this is coming from someone who lives in the London & South East of England area, where housing too is very expensive…sadly nothing on the scale that Vancouver seems to have nowadays…my family moved away from the city and into the interior many years ago as they found the “urbanisation” too much to bear….nothing like the unspoiled country they found and were delighted with when they emigrated to BC in the early 50’s .

    Guess I’ll have to just keep those savings building for the vacations we try and take whenever we can..

    Reply
  14. Randomness Avatar
    Randomness

    I bet you could easily get a publishing deal if you moved to Tokyo. That’s if you decided to go along the book writing route. Plenty of non Japanese authors are out there.

    Reply
  15. Airelle Avatar
    Airelle

    I hope you find your happy happy place and if its Tokyo, go for it. 😉 Thanks for keeping us in the loop. ~~ Big squishy hugs to Lulu and Bubba..~~

    Reply
  16. Sparrow_hawk Avatar
    Sparrow_hawk

    @Kathode: The doctor/vet can tell you if they see polyps, inflammation or a mass. But if they took a biopsy, it takes a couple of days for the sample to be processed and reviewed. And if they took a sample for cultures or parasite identification, it would also take some time. It takes time whether you are a dog or a human.

    Reply
  17. jimfromjersey Avatar
    jimfromjersey

    I’m sure you will be [i]very[/i] happy in Tokyo. You’ve been considering the move for years, after all.

    I would LOVE to move. We’ve been talking about it for years. We absolutely hate NJ. The cost of living is through the roof. It’s overpopulated. Traffic sucks.

    I’m considering eastern PA or northern DE so I can stay at my employer, as we have branches in NJ, PA, DE, MD and VA. But overall still undecided. And we pretty much have to wait until my father in law passes (as morbid as that sounds). He’s in failing health and my wife doesn’t want to go anywhere until that happens.

    Thanks for the Lulu update. =) And looking forward to episode 7!

    Reply
  18. FargateOne Avatar
    FargateOne

    on attend le prochain épisode de Dark Matter.

    Reply
  19. DP Avatar
    DP

    This early in the race, TWO is winning the “who is the biggest psychopath?” contest, but it doesn’t feel like it…which means she’s successfully manipulating my feelings…which just adds to her marks in the psychopath column.

    –

    Not moving anytime soon. We’d have an opportunity to eventually move into a much better school district, which is sorely needed, if we were willing to take on a home that’s been in my husband’s family. I’m not sure we could afford to live there regarding other living costs.

    If I were going to move into a neighborhood with a higher economic class, it wouldn’t be that one. It is ruled by a scary “garden club” *shiver*. I’m lower class and socially inept enough that I really think the club could be dangerous to me. My mother-in-law was able to hold them off at only 47 years of shunning and gossip, but I think my traits would leave me a more vulnerable target.

    Reply
  20. Tam Dixon Avatar
    Tam Dixon

    No moving until retirement for us! Then we will head to Florida. Yep, we are a cliché. 😉

    A condo in Japan would be a wonderful idea! You’ve been talking about living there for years. You only live once, right?

    If DM is a success, then you could have a condo in Toronto too. Some issues I could be the dogs and the mula. What kind of laws does Japan have to transport the pups there? You don’t want to be in the same mess as Johnnie Depp.

    If mula is a problem, you could go in with someone else to buy the condos and take turns. Or you could rent them out, when not in use and just have them in your name. Lots of possibilities! You could always quiz the accountant.

    Prayers for Lulu!

    Ponytail: I believe that whoever invented air conditioning should have their own national holiday!

    glowyzoey: Yum! My one tomato plant died. 🙁

    Reply
  21. DALLAS MARSHALL (@MrsTigercat) Avatar
    DALLAS MARSHALL (@MrsTigercat)

    …ooooor you could stay in Vancouver until after the dogs have gone to Heaven, then after you’ve moved to wherever get new puppies and start all over. Why put old dogs through the stresses of an overseas trip and relocation? Better to let them live their remaining years where they are comfortable and familiar. And, as Ponytail said, you’ve got a show to produce where you are at for a few more years.

    Reply
  22. Bailey Avatar
    Bailey

    Stargate been berry berry good to you?

    Reply
  23. Phil Avatar
    Phil

    I’d suggest the UK, we need some decent writers ovfer here.

    Reply
  24. Ponytail Avatar
    Ponytail

    I see on Twitter there is a picture of the other android (Ruby Rose) with a half dressed ONE. I’m thinking…. ut oh, is she going to be the revenge model?

    Reply
  25. gforce Avatar
    gforce

    I’m back down off the mountain and everything went well.

    Tokyo is a long way to go for me to visit!! 🙂

    Reply
  26. luis811 Avatar
    luis811

    Ijust retired from my Government job Joe my wife and I have been to Vancouver a few times she like it there she got in touch with her Asian friends. She wants to take a trip to check out the real estate.

    Reply
  27. kabra Avatar
    kabra

    Sorry to hear about the doggie issues. Hugs to them both, I can imagine the house is quiet. After we lost our cockatiel (17 years ago) the house was really really quiet. Since then we were blessed with a Quaker Parrot and loud as evah!
    So Tokyo. Didn’t you just establish Canadian residency for Akemi? So now we will have to convince Japan to let you live there. You trust us? Oh by the way the the dog sympathy cards of Aspen and Max keep selling. Jelly’s card was just recently put up for selling, trying to market that.

    Reply
  28. Tio Zeviar Avatar
    Tio Zeviar

    My vote is a move out, over my way, and find a new house with a nice big yard for PUG sanctuary!!!

    Reply
  29. Duptiang Avatar
    Duptiang

    Boy it seems not a good time for dogs. Even my Mom’s dog is having troubles. With a period of lethargy and loss of casual routine, she changed his diet. Shortly afterword the little guy suffered what was a sever allergic reaction causing difficulty breathing. Yesterday, I visited my barber who has a little scotty that will come and say hello as I or other customers enter the shop. He just sat quietly under the chairs and I hardly know Buno was there.
    Living in a house or condo is such a personal choice. The apartment is fine, but I miss my driveway my washer/drier, hanging a picture any where and the basement. My standard of living has decreased since moving to Chicago. I had to use my mom’s drive way to change out the rear struts on my car. Japan is a lovely place to visit, but as I was waking down the streets of Toronto I felt cramped and claustrophobic with all the housing. But Akemi has a good point.
    As you mentioned you might be using LA as a point of exit to Tokyo. You can get direct to downtown quickly via Hanida but you do depart and arrive later in the day.

    Reply
  30. slhope Avatar
    slhope

    IT’s good you’ve checked the requirements for taking the dogs to Japan. But I would also double check on bringing them back, in case you need to, say, move to Toronto for six months again, or something.

    Reply
  31. PBMom Avatar
    PBMom

    Squishy, squishy Bubba and Lulu. I hope the endoscopy results turn up okay.

    What’s up with me/us? Oh my God it would be a book. But here is the immediately two-week short version: We have contractors coming to give us samples of flooring options for the house. Our floor got damaged by a Sears outsourced repairman coming to fix our washer. This little renovation is going to be very tricky with Patrick as it will mean no access to places and well, he ain’t going to like that at all. We are asking them to wait until he gets back to school August 17. Today is Patrick’s last day of school. He is off until Aug 17. I have him all day tomorrow (Jeff is going to the Astros baseball game tomorrow night). As of this moment, I have zero clients on Friday but Patrick the whole day. Friday afternoon we have a contractor coming out to give us an estimate on power washing the outside of the house (including the brick), paint the non-bricked areas, power-wash the walkway, driveway, back patio, and decking around the pool. Saturday morning at 9 am we have another contractor coming to give us an estimate on the same job. Last weekend, we bought the dining room furniture of a neighbor who was moving and they helped get it over here and in the house; we gave away our 20-year-old Kincaid dining room table and chairs that were structural sound but got the Patrick treatment over the years that needs sanding down and refinishing and it will be like new. Turned out to be a family with a child with autism and I now have a new friend. Lovely family. The new stuff looks great. I overdid it and suffered horribly for it on Sunday and Monday. My insurance company will not pay for any of the physical therapy that was ordered since March and I’m going to have to battle with them. That will have to wait until Aug 17. No way I can be on the phone trying to work through this with Patrick screaming “eh” every time he wants something. Jeff informed me that he will have to go back to New Orleans for business Sunday afternoon through Tuesday evening so I will not only have FT Patrick care, but he will have to go to work with me, including a 6 a.m. dog walk. He is going to not like that a lot. Since my PT appointments for August were cancelled because of all this, it made my schedule lighten up a bit. I told Jeff that in order to be able to care for Patrick those days and because he is going out on Thursday night, I get Friday from the time he gets home until Sunday the time before he leaves to take care of me. He agreed to that. I have two pet sits on Saturday so that won’t be bad. Patrick has a doctor appointment for a physical for school. Of course during these two weeks I need to work with him every minute I can so he doesn’t lose any skills which is not good for someone who needs to be in bed. Then we have our monthly paperwork that is due to the state early next week to summarize Patrick’s care for the month of July. Care notes that are 3 pages long, medication sheets, fire drill reports, etc.

    I did take Boomer in for a recheck of his heartworms and if they are all dead and they are. Those nasty worms are dead. No struvite crystals in his urine but his pH is high so they gave me three courses of action we could take and I’m opting for some cranberry supplements.

    The saddest part about the last month or so have been all the fur-baby clients who have died. Some of them were shocking; some of them I knew their time was coming and had the opportunity to say goodbye to them personally; some I know were coming but didn’t get to say goodbye personally, and some I found out were very ill and then died shortly thereafter. My heart hurts from all the sadness. So Lulu and Bubba must be okay. That’s an order.

    Reply

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