Dec 17 1903, Kitty Hawk, North Carolina, was the first 4 manned flights by the Wright Brothers over a short distance. Today you can hang glide it! 🛫📷
Dec 16, 1890 (M23) marks the start of phone service between Tokyo and Yokohama with 155 and 44 phones respectively. The 7 female operators (with 2 males on night shift) could connect you for 240K JPY in today’s money. 🇯🇵📞
Destruction of the ancestral “jikka” home under tarps, 2019. 📷🇯🇵
A program in place since 1906 in Japan, Dec 15-25 marks the period during which you can post a 年賀状 “nengajo” postcard for Jan 1 arrival. 🇯🇵🏣📷
Empty Tokyo restaurant. 📷⏳
Maru the Shiba came back from day care and the staff who drove him said he and other Shibas hadn’t pooped. A border collie friend kept running up like “hey! Whatcha doing!? Any good smells there?” causing poopus interruptus. 😂🐕
Dec 13 marks the formal start in Japan of 正月事始め(shougatsu-goto-hajime) when the Big Tidy activities start and it’s off to the mountains to get 門松 (kadomatsu) materials. 🎍🇯🇵
Bean bun boogie, Shinbashi Tokyo. 📷🧆
Alien traffic safety mascot approaches. 📷👽
Dec 11 is International Mountain Day, a day to think on our impact on vital mountain ecosystems. I wish I was hiking today! 🏔️📷
Scaffolding went up before the old “jikka“ ancestral home was torn down. Four years ago already! 📷🏡
Yesterday our 大掃除 “ohsouji” or “Big Tidy” task was replacing the ugly brown mats we’d laid downstairs with nice wood-like flooring. Took all day & was really hard, but looks good & we can use the heated floor. 💦
8000 US $ per hour?! Wow.
This weekend is 大掃除 “ohsouji” or the “Big Tidy” as I like to call it, where the nooks and crannies get so clean even Marie Kondo blushes. If you’re not in Japan, do you do this? 📷🇯🇵🧽🧹
Udagawa Yu-sui-chi is a little nature conservation area near a park we take Maru the Shiba to almost daily. You can’t go down into it but you can peer at it to see birds. 📷🦆
Dec 9 is International Anti-Corruption Day. Corruption follows and causes conflict globally, and is inherently undemocratic. It’s worth your thoughts and fight! 🤛
Snaps of a Hillman in Higashi Azabu, 2016.
Japan marks Dec 8 as “Start of the Pacific War Day” although we don’t really hear about it that much. May all those who died at Pearl Harbor and after, rest in peace. 😔
RIP Norman Lear whose work shaped my childhood. 101! Such influence; a life well lived. 🖤🤍
Dec 7 is World Kamishibai Day! It’s the art of telling a story to children while showing cards mounted in a box, popularized in Japan in the 1930s. Have you seen it or something similar? 🇯🇵👩👩👧👦