1 day left

the question of the day: if you read this, you must comment.

If you had 1 day left to live, what would you do?

mine would involve, france, elvis, and cake.

seriously fun weekend

i love a good 3 day weekend! even thought its so hard to go back after no work for 3 days!

heres what i did: (pics will come eventually, they are all on rach's camera)

friday:

i woke up at 6. left at 7. met my friend at 8 at the race registration area. hung at at mcdonalds drinking coffee for a couple of hours before our race. ran 10 km. i helped my friend (she just started running this year, and i am her running coach) she rocked. she busted out a 58 minute 10km!!! yeah for her! then i headed back to the apt to clean and get stuff ready for the 14 people who were coming over for thanksgiving.

everyone came. so much fun. seriously some of my favorite people in japan were there! such great times. good food. my japanese grandparents came over, my favorite family-with the 3 kids came, tomoko, midori, kanako, and rexy. so much fun! we played some intense games of uno!

saturday i got up, ran 17.5 miles. i found a huge huge huge cemetary park and ran all around it and all over kasugai (when you run for almost 3 hours, you can see a lot of a town) then i came back, showered, relaxed and then headed to my second thanksgiving party of the weekend.

it was nice. the food was amazingly good. fun people. played apples to apples. then i came home

sunday, i went to church, then after we had lunch and then i headed out to sujung and jessicas place. helped cook a bit (mostly talked and washed dishes) we had a great dinner and lots of laughs. rc for life. then we watched a korean drama. it was kinda late, but thankfully, rexy boy drove me home.

this morning, i woke up on the wrong side of the futon. i was in a bad mood. i didnt even like hanging out with myself. so i procrastinated doing everything. finally i took the garbage out and was gonna head to the gym, when i couldnt find my bike. ugh, i thought to myself, its at the bike parking (since rexy drove me home, and i didnt come back by train) so i just went back upstairs to my appartment, angry and frustrated and in an even worse mood. so i took out my bible. i spent an hour or so just clarning my head and talking to the big man upstairs. then i went out ofr a run, ended it at the station, got my bike, and then i was a lettle better, but still it was a monday. so i showered, went tot work and by the time i came home, i was much better.

tonight rach and i had our bible study. it was good. just what i needed. now im just gonna head off to bed and hope for a better morning....i have to run 11 miles. ugh. hahah it was easier to do in the summer when i didnt just want to stay all cozy in my bed....oh well... only a few months...

nothing to say.

im hungry. tomorrow i have a busy morning.

a have a 3 day weekend coming up!

im off to bed.

apply within

fun weekend. interesting weekend. saturday i woke up, ran an easy 6 miles, then met my old roomie for some lunch with some american guy. she was very insistant for me to join her on this lunch rendez vouz, so i accepted and soon found out why. hes a single 47 year old american guy. who, in my opinion, had a crush on my 25 year old friend. so i helped her put an end to that one. life rough when you have hot friends and you have to protect them. if you need protecting, apply within

saturday night was awesome. i bought cheese, wine, and bread. surprised my roommate and another friend by having an inpromptu chica nite. we had the best girls night of non stress, no drama. just talking and laughing and enjoying good food and wine. so much fun. i will be doing it again soon. if interested, apply within.

today i hung out with friends. after church we went to a cafe and talked about stocks and retirement options. (i am serious about this retirement thing and i am looking for a financial planner. apply within.

i like guys who smell good. if you smell good, apply within.

ibigawa marathon

I am a marathon runner. my training has paid off! i had a personal best! i shaved 11 minutes off my best time. (my previous best time was 3 years ago-columbus marathon- at 4:26) well say hello to a speedy 4 hours and 15 minutes!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! YEAH! no walking. no pain. no lack of energy! i felt great. i finished strong and even had minimal pain after the finish. even monday and tuesday, i was up jumping and playing with the little kids.

so today i was back to running. i ran an easy 4 miles and felt great. i actually was having pains frm not exercizing for 3 days!

so back to training. 3 months till the tokyo marathon. 1 week till nagoya 10km.

rachael is a beast at boggle. she doesnt count my made up words. for a better acct of our lives, read her blog at www.losemyway.wordpress.com

the week is almost over! yes!

i love the post man. the same one keeps delievering our packages, and i have had the honor or answering the door. he's about 65, he smiles real big when the door opens, and says "hi! Good morning!" (in english) smiles. then he fumbles around for the pen for me to sign. then after he is finished, he jollily says "goodbye!"

ok off to wash the dishes!

tomorrow!

tomorrow is ibigawa marathon! today i did a big fat nothing. it was boring. no plans. it was not fun, but oh well, hopefully ill run well due to resting. i dont have very high hopes for this race as it climbs 700 meters abouve sea level a few times. hahah i havent trained on any hills. oh well

i need to be positive and optimistic. yeah jen. tomorrow is the big race. you can wear your pink running tank and run around for 4+ hours. im so gonna win. maybe out of the cateogory of 24 year old american girls named Jen.

by the way, its been twice now in the past week or so that i have been talking to rachael and told her something about me being 23, to which she responds "youre not 23, youre 24" i say "oh crap!"

i bought multivitamins today.

i watched a movie today

i watched greys anatomy today

my phone bill has been cheaper for the past 2 months... i dont know why, but ill take it! whoohoooo!



ok off to do last minute preparations for the race.

retirement

most days of the week, i live the life of a retiree(until i leave for work) I wake up at 6, i eat breakfast, i clean a bit (sometimes), i run and go tot he gym, where i hang out with all my retired friends and chat about the weather and alligators. then i come home, eat lunch and then my retirement for the day is over. my point is, i rarely see people my age during the week (excluding rachael)

so today when i was out for my early morning run around the park(which is usually filled with the older population of jpaan walking their dogs) i was shocked to get to the park and see approximatly 50, 20-30 year old men out running. WHAT? WHY? its Thursday. it was 8ish. why werent they working? what were they doing? at first i thought college students, however some didnt fall into that age cateogory. next idea? sports team? but some didnt fall into that cateogory. after that i gave up. a little weird. i never see young men running. i never see people my age! weird morning.

so after i ran, i headed to the gym to do my senior citizen stretch class.

feliz navidad...in october?

i put up my christmas tree on october 30th. i love my little tree. the snowman's name in pedro cecil.

halloween at the english school

halloween at the english school consisted of me wearing a jack-o-lantern costume and playing games with the kiddies. it was a fun week, and a nice break from the normal class activities. the kid in the angel picture made me laugh. in fact he's the opposite of his costume.

the picture below of the high school kids wearing wigs and hats wrote these stories. they each had to write one sentence and pass. this was a HOOT!

Once upon a time.
There was a giant spider.
One day, he slept.
Suddenly he started to dance.
The dance was very scary.
But it was cute.
So people liked him.


Once upon a time.
There was an old man
He was very small
He is very kind man
But he was dead.
His family were very sad.
Family buried out his coffin.
But he moved and shouted in his coffin


Once upon a time.
There was a scary vampire.
He ate people a lot in Japan and America.
Once day he went to china.
Next year he came back to Japan.
Ten days ago he went to Australia and ate some people there.
Three days ago he went to China to sight see.

Once upon a time
There was a pink ghost
One day he killed people in a town
He ate people
and he ate animal
These days, he ate insect.
And he ate other ghosts.
He changed his color.
The color was green.

more hiking in magome!

here are my pics from magome. the other ones i put up a few weeks ago were ones from my friends camera. enjoy!

fall days with friends!

on sundays, after church i always eat out with friends.









on wednesdays, i have kanako no hi. (kanako day) we play at the park or hang out









my friend elizabeth came to visit for about 10 days. she was here when i first came, and we got to be good friends. i am hoping she will come back to japan!

ok, so ill do an update or 10....

so my my told me that she sponsored me for my race this weekend, so i owe it to her to write a blog. if you did sponsor me, please let me know since apparently it doesnt show up on the website.

anyways, here are some pictures and updates.


rachael in japan. these are the pics from when she first arrived!