Wednesday In Japan, Osaka Tower

Osaka, Japan
One of my favorite cities.
Tokyo is beautiful very cosmopolitan but rather correct alpha+world city.
While Osaka is more down to earth super friendly, fun, exciting urban city.
Osaka is known for "good eating" and the saying "kuidaore" or eat till you drop was made up to describe Osakan's love of good food and I would add fun !
Of the many towers in cities all over Japan, I love the Osaka Tower the best.

But if I moved to Japan even with my love of Osaka, I would live in Mitaka.
I love this beautiful city but the draw for me it is the home of the Ghibli Museum.
Totoro forever !
Even though I would miss the Hanshin Tigers Baseball team.



View of Osaka Tower
Very famous for the neon lights, one side has advertisements and on the other side is public service announcements
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Fugu, literally name river pig or blowfish signs
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I have to keep myself from ripping down one of these signs
and smuggeling it on the plane probably just steps ahead of the police.
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Takoyaki stand, yes please
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Street view with great signage.
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Underneath the Osaka Tower.
It has a tiny but the best Takoyaki stand.
Takoyaki is a ball shaped snack made of batter and filled with a piece of tako (octopus)
Comes on is paper dish with a toothpick for eating,
covered in Bonito (tuna) flakes and green onions.
Perfect street food.

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Here is your pretty for Wednesday
One of my favorite street views of the Osaka Tower.

tako. . . parsnip
music. . . Follow Bliss,  John Hackett/Moodi Drury

Thank to Daughter and Japanese son for these fabulous photos.

parley view parsnip... part 2

October 27, 1993
Part 2
We did finally get out of town and the children and I did not have to run into the ocean.
We stayed a week in a friends rental till we found one of our own.
Halloween was 4 days after the fire.  A friend had us over for Trick and Treating at her neighborhood.  But it was so hot that I ended up holding the costumes.
Christmas was coming up fast. We found a rental and tried to settled in.
We had nothing, no beds to sleep in, tables and chairs to have dinners on, no where to do homework let alone supplies and no clothes or shoes. Nothing to cook with or even eat the dinner on.
Setting up a home for 5 people as fast as one can is surreal and IKEA became my new best friend.

I was trying to find more photos of the fire but while looking for them, I found fabulous photos of the children running , laughing and have fun.
 Maybe the Gods were trying to tell me something.

What is very strange, funny or weird is still to this day, after 20 years,  I will reach for or go looking for something I know I have and then remember, goodness
I lost that in the fire.
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What is strange (?) is that when the fire devoured my home it stopped.
My back yard, and the canyon didn't burn, while others did.
The  Fire Department said later that the only reason the fire didn't burn down the city (although it burned to the back of the Fire Department) was the winds.
The winds dropped long enough to let the ocean breeze come back in and let the firefighters make a stand.

 The gate I designed for the entry garden.
It is hanging on the pool equipment  house in my back yard.
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Question...
What do you do when you have nothing and need everything ?

Well if your me you take your daughter and find a Scottie Puppy.
Life is better when you have small bundle of love.
We named her Kirby after the vacuum cleaner, because everything on the floor was hers.
She became our first Little Square Black Dog.

 

We loved her and she loved us back !

Life is indeed lovely.

vacuum. . . parsnip

music. . . Breathe,  Alexi Murdoch

parley view parsnip... October 27 1993

20 Years ago Sunday, my home burned down in Laguna Beach, California.

My son blogged (sleepytako on my sidebar) about the fire from his point of view. Many of the photos are borrowed from him and The Orange County Register.

1993 seems to be the first "big" year that everything and nature went crazy in California.  Orange County and LA had fires and two months later Los Angles had the huge Northridge Earthquake. That year the fall and early winter was not beautiful.

In the Fall the Santa Anna winds blow down from the desert, pass Palm Springs and zoom through the mountain passes into Southern California with a vengeance. The winds are fierce, hot and dry.  And that Fall they were especially dry, pricking the skin and burning the eyes with their heat. Suffocating heat. Heat that make you dizzy and your senses on edge.
Today major fires seem to be just something you see on the news everyday, but in 1993 the major fire was not such a daily accourance as it is now. And diffidently not fires that march across the land leaving a swatch of destruction, attacking populated areas taking some homes while leaving others.

On October 27, 1993 some idiot crazy hateful stupid  person (?) decided to start a fire at the beginning of Laguna Canyon. Then the winds started and it was all over after that.

 Our home made the from page of may papers in the U.S. alonge with many around the world.
My home is the third from the white home on the right, that was left standing (it was made like a bunker but sustained damage  also. There where other homes just down the street on both sides of my home that survived. 

 The fire swept down the canyon and jumped the Laguna Canyon road and roared up our hill and then crowned, raining fire down on us, a horrifing rain.

 Across the hill from our hill.

This is what it looks like when your home is on fire.

 This is my home. A beautiful canyon view and city view and  then straight to the ocean laid out like a blanket of blue every day.
All the news people like to broadcast from my home, even the Governor was interviewed there.  Because beside the fireplace that was left standing like many other homes, we had a two walls and a windows of my daughter's bedroom plus a fence.  We never knew who we would find broadcasting in front of our home on any given day. Yea us.

What the fire looked like fron the beach. My home and hillside is to the right not in the photo.
As we were evacuating we were all bumper to bumper driving south on Pacific Coast Highway.
We could see the fire running down the hillside towards us, I remember telling the the children to stay together and run to the ocean if it reach us.

More photos and aftermath of the fire tomorrow.
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And just because I can here is your pretty to start the week.

On a much happier note, Elizabeth of the wonderful blog, My Life By Buster and About NY made these fabulous, soft beautiful hats for a sale.
Since I could not just zoom over to NY, as much as I would have liked too, I asked if could I buy some.
As you see,  yes was the answer. She only asked for a donation for a favorite cause.
I have several that I donated to, mostly animal ones but also UNICEF. After much thought
I will make a donation to the unicefusa.org Syrian Children's Relief Effort.

Beautiful hats ! The colors are very much like the colors of the desert. Mesquite, Paloverde trees, cactus and their bloom. Sage plants and the water in the creeks and rivers
the sky, clouds and sun at sunset.

remembering . . . parsnip
music. . . Bittersweet Memory,  Blue Merle

Square Dog Friday... Soccer

                      Friday ! Best day of the week if your a Little Square Black Dog.
                                                      We are playing soccer today.
                                     

                                                            Let the game begin

                                                                      yert
                                                                        .

                                                     oh no thehamish has the ball
                                                                       .

                                              and Watson springs into action
                                                                      .
                     

                                                                 yea Watson  !
                                                                          ,
                                             

                                                            chhhhhhhharge 
                                                                       .

                                                    running attack from the front
                                                                     .

                                                          Watson is on the defense  !
                                                                       .

                                              Wait,  is that a yellow flag play ?
                                                                        .

                                                           who has the ball ?
                                                                        .

                                                  it is a battle on the field of play
                                                                      .

                                      Scooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooore
                                                                    .
                                          awwwwwwwww the game is over.
                                                chkikin' strip all around !

                                                       goal. . . parsnip
                                                 music. . .  1 2 3 4,  Feist

                                                ........................................
                            and just because I can here is your pretty for the weekend
                                 a crazy photo looking up into the sun from the pool
                                                                     .

 

It truly is a lovely day.

Right after I took these photos thehamish was diagnosed with Horners Syndrome
His right eye is now about half the size of his left eye because of a lack of adrenalin  to that eye.
There is no treatment other than keeping a watch on his eye and making sure it keeps producing tears. It may get better we just have to wait and see. These are the same eyes that two years ago had lens replacment.
Dr. Watson who looks so happy and bouncy here had one of his episodes. He stopped eating and was very lethargic. 
We had to take him to the vet for an IV but since I will not leave him at the vet alone, it is to stressful for him, he received a "camel pack" They put the IV solution subcutaneous  into the area around his neck. When he comes home he looks like a Lion because his neck is all puffed up. These IV are filled with all sorts of meds and usually he feels better by the end of the day and even starts to eat a little.
It has been a few weird days.  Yert !

Wednesday In Japan. . . Ekiben

Number five on my favorite list of life in Japan is Ekiben, train food.
I have posted several times about my love of train food.
Railway boxed meals are specific type of a bento meal.  They are sold at train stations
and on the train itself. They are made up of food especially from what region you are traveling in.
Fabulous packaging, wonderful presentation and terrific food.
You can eat and drink on the trains in Japan.
Everyone is polite, no drunks and no one tosses their trash on the floor like in America.
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Let the tasty begin.
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le sigh, I miss Japan.
All photos today are from my Japanese son sleepytko.
I am usually eating  !

Yikes ! forgot to post the mid-week pretty but with packaging this fabulous 
I think it is OK.

bento. . . parsnip
music. . . Over The Sky,  hitomi