NO CAMERA

I CAN'T BELIEVE i headed off without my camera or phone yesterday.  still, it meant i really looked at everything live instead of through a lens.   rene's really busy in the new shop and spent yesterday with large hired power jackhammers etc. and one friend, breaking up the old concrete and tiled floor in the building.  a long and dusty day for him.  sayaka and i took bikes and headed off to rene's one day a week visit to the little english language school that rob cust runs here.  i was cal's partner for the day while we sang songs like 'if you're happy and you know it clap your hands'.   cal's very young for this and i spent most of the hour trying to get him to sit in one spot, but it's good for him to be
spending some time with little kids.  
we rode around osaka all day, visiting the ceramics museum which had an wonderful exhibition of beautiful vases and plates from the collections of european palaces.  Had lunch near the canal, it's surprising how much western food is here now, things like schnitzel and hamburgers - all the western stuff i would never eat.  Rene says it's more and more common, what a shame when Japanese food is so good.
After a day of riding in a city following sayaka, and keeping an eye on cal i was 'spent' by the time we got home. a quiet night, i had a really early night and now in the morning my back is a bit sore, probably from all the riding. still, i'll get used to that, it'll be good for me.

sayaka had her phone and snapped away all day

 

am i looking a little tense?

while most of the ceramics

were behind glass three big ones 

(one at the right) were sitting on 

the floor and cal was on the 

loose - a bit hairy.

we're sitting in front of a huge

photo of a room in one of the

palaces,  almost wallpapered

in gorgeous blue and white

ceramics, from tiny to huge

and jawdroppingly gorgeous

the night i arrived, this kind of japanese food is really good, hope it doesn't disappear  - i was just listening to an article on ABC radio about the takeover of hamburgers and western food and the program dropped out, i missed the whole thing.