slacktitude — so yeah, even when i make a desultory attempt at a desultory post, getting around to posting it is just, uh, something… i mean, i was gonna post it, & then, i dunno, i got distracted or something… but if i had posted it, it would’ve gone something like this…
holy crap — but it’s cold today (i.e. last sunday)… i’m currently wearing my tracky dacks & a couple of jumpers & sitting in front of as many heating devices as i can turn on without tripping the circuit breaker & yeah, i’m still freezing… snow was predicted for yesterday, although it never actually turned up… & it’s not as yet snowing today, but did i mention how insanely cold it is?
soba — we made a family excursion to sumie’s uncle’s soba restaurant last (saturday) night… it’s off in the middle of nakano somewhere, maybe a ten minute bus ride from the station… had some brilliant food & a fun night, although i must admit my continuing inability to converse in japanese is getting more & more irritating… i mean, i don’t necessarily wanna philosophise, but just to be able to contribute something more than (what i hope comes across as) mute affability would be nice…
back in the approximate present — car shopping. is kinda fun. actually, car shopping is all kindsa fun. (making a decision about what car to buy is marginally less fun, but the actual shopping is hard to beat.) we went car yard crawling all over this megausedcarlot in odaiba yesterday, then followed that up with a visit to the giant toyota showroom… (& then i bought some stuff at the sporting goods store because, well, it was there…) of course, there’s a serious reconciliation of preferences & tastes in the offing, but so far that’s fun as well… off the list at the moment — any kind of daihatsu & any kind of giant 4wD thingy… fortunately this leaves quite a bit of scope…
also definitely out — tiny, weirdly shaped turborockets (file under daihatsu) with lots of plastic fins & scoops & stuff… possibly in, at the moment, are the honda mobilo spike, which is boxy but good (the one we looked at had automatic sliding doors), & the toyota sienta, which is less boxy & possibly marginally less good in terms of having maybe a slightly less space efficient interior…
considerably less boxy — australian readers may recognise the honda fit (aka jazz) which is currently leading in the sensible stakes… anyone interested in betting on the likely outcome should be advised that car shopping is at a very early stage & almost everything looks interesting & shiny… except, perhaps, for one or two models whose names escape me but which received a serious going over with the ugly stick at some point in the design process…
vantastic — despite my past preference for small cars, i had to be literally dragged out of the toyota voxy (don’t forget that V is pronounced as B in japanese), which is like a giant space van… but it has this totally cool kinda double floor, with heaps of room for bikes & people &… well, i guess we’re not getting one, so i should wind my enthusiam down a few notches…
about that leit motif — so yeah, i’m not sure if it’s simply a reaction to the nissan cube also featuring on the list of cars we definitely won’t be buying, but i seem to have some kinda mad attraction to the whole box on wheels thing at the moment…
