On this Saturday & Sunday, my family stayed at a lodge in a campsite.

I've never visited such a camping area in my life... Oh, wait, I visited such a place 'only once' for an open-air school (Rinkan Gakko) when I was a junior high school student.
I'm not an I-really-love-an-outdoor-life kinda person. If I have no choice but to camp, I guess I don't look like a "happy camper". I'd rather stay at a luxurious hotel and enjoy delicious cuisine... Oh, don't get me wrong, I'm not a person who wastes too much money on luxuries.

(FYI: happy camper means someone who seems to be happy with their situation, accoring to LONGMAN Dictionary.)

On the other hand, my husband longs for camping. Actually, he bought a BIG tent on impulse in our newly-married days about a decade ago.
However, I was reluctant to go camping then. We didn't go out camping after all. Now I come to think of it, I feel so guilty about it. Sad to say, he left his tent in his closet. It's just a useless possesion now.
Sorry, honey, I was too selfish then.

I'll talk about our stay at a lodge a few days later. See ya!


I'm participating in ranking.

I'd really appreciate it if you could vote for this blog, which cheers me up so much!

As I said before, my husband doesn't drink. I think there are several advantages to me in having a husband who doesn't drink.

Advantage 1:
We don't have to spend a lot of money on alcoholic drinks.
I've heard those expressions such as "spend money like a drunken sailor" or "spend money like water". We don't behave like that. So economical!

Advantage 2:
I don't have to make some Otsumamis, that is to say, some snacks to go with the beer. I guess it is so hard for wives to think what to serve as Otsumamis every night. I don't have to worry about it. Oh, we both love boiled Edamame, though. For us, it is not a Otsumami but one of side dishes at dinner.

Advantage 3:
He won't be arrested as a drunken driver. Since drinking-driving causes a very serious traffic accident, the police is cracking down on drunken drivers. I don't want my husband to be arrested, to injure someone, and to get injured, of course. Drive carefully & safely, honey!

Advantage 4:
Last but not least...
I don't have to be bothered with common mistakes drinkers often make. Some people get really drunk and do something stupid. For instance, they fall asleep on a couch at a train station. They touch woman's body in the train. They hit on [or make a move on] attractive young subordinates in their office drinking party...

Oh, I just realized I might be jealous of young, no, YOUNGER women. Since I can't get younger, all I can do is keep making effors to make me more attractive. (So hard!)
Oh, before I forget, sweetie, if you say, "I was so drunk that night. I don't remember what I did with her there," I will never ever accept such a transparent excuse.

Basically I don't drink. My husband doesn't drink, either. We don't like alcoholic drinks so much. I might say that we are not good at liquor.

When we went on our honeymoon, at a chic bar in a famous hotel, we ordered two glasses of Evian water. I vividly remember that the waiter drew his brows together in a frown...

If you open the fridge in our house, you can't find any alcoholic drinks, such as beer or wine. All you can find there are some cartons of apple juice & coffee milk. (I really love coffee milk, by the way.)
Cooking liquor is the only alcoholic drink in our kitchen. Heavy drinkers can't spend half a day in our house, I guess.

I've never seen my husband so drunk. If he drinks a little, he becomes red-faced quickly. Since his colleagues all know he doesn't drink, they don't force him to drink at after-hours drinking parties. Besides, he is no longer a naive rookie in his office. He can refuse to take anything he doesn't like.

There are several advantages to me in having a husband who doesn't drink.
I'll talk about this next time.

My son asked me the other day, "What kind of job does Dad do as 残業? I guess he serves as like a 日直... Or, he might be ordered to stay late at the office by his president （社長さん） in order to correct his erros in his work. It's like we are said to stay late in the classroom after school （放課後、残される） when we make some mistakes in the drill in calculation or Kanji characters."

He thinks and imagines in his own way. He doesn't know his Dad's work precisely. So all he can do is to imagine like this.

I'd like companies to be opened at least once a year to employees' families. By doing this, employees' sons & daughters will be able to know what their parents' jobs are like, how hard their parents work in their office. Then, children will respect their parents more and feel proud of them.

I hope my son & daughter think their Dad is so cool. I want them to know the fact that their Dad works so hard in order to support his family and to make it happy.

I can say to my children proudly, "You guys are so happy to have him as your father." Well, I have to try to be as good a parent as him. You'll see.

"Why does Dad come home late every night?" my son asked the other day. I said, "Because he has to work overtime. And sometimes he has to attend some after-hours drinking parties. Especially in June & July, when his company makes changes in the staff （異動の時期である）, they have a lot of those parties."
"Oh, I know those things. In short, Dad comes home late because of 残業 & 飲み会, right?" my son replied with a triumphant smile.
"Exactly! You know those work-related words very well!" I said a little bit exaggeratedly.

"I have a question, Mom. What kind of job does he do as 残業? I guess he serves as... like a 日直. You know, I sometimes come home late when I have to work as a 日直 at school. I have to erase & clean the blackboard in the classroom, I have to check if there's no one in the room and lock the door with the key. I go to the teachers' room and hand the key to my teacher. And then, it's time to say, "Mission accomplished!" Maybe my Dad does the same thing I do... Or..."

He seemed to have another thought. Let's talk about it later in this weekend.

I don't want to use 'grammatically-correct but unnatural' English. I just love & adore 'natural' English. What should I do to make my English more natural? I know one and only way is to expose myself to a LOT of natural English.

I wanna watch as many American movies as possible! I wanna read many American novels. Actually, I started to read a famous novel in English a few weeks ago, but I haven't read even half of it...

Oh, it's already in the middle of July. Summer vacation is just around the corner. It will become more difficult to find my own time. I feel a little bit tired. That might be a sign that I'm scared of taking care of my children all day long, from early morning until late at night, in summer holidays. I can imagine they will say, "It's no fun staying at home. Let's go somewhere." "It's too hot. I wanna eat some shaved ice." They are so demanding. Just the thought of it makes me dizzy...

I'm not ready to knock the door into summer just yet. I want summer to come as slowly as possible, or to pass by like the wind.

In the Japanese language, I like reading and writing in the same way. While in English, I prefer reading to writing. Why?

BECAUSE... when I write something in English, I have to face many faults and mistakes of my own. I have to search for appropriate expression in some dictionaries many times. It takes a lot of time, y'know. I sometimes think it would take forever to complete my writing.
I feel as if I got lost in the wood, where you can't find people who can speak Japanese. The more getting lost, the more I feel scared.

I love learning & using English, of course. While having a good relationship with English, I feel so satisfied and proud of myself. But when I have no idea what to write here in English, I feel depressed... I say something nagative once in a while, don't worry about it.

On the other hand, when I read something in English, I don't have to feel such fears. I just have to read and understand "right & proper" English. Even if I find some mistakes in native-speakers' English, I can say those expressions are 'natural'. If I make some mistakes in English, they are nothing more than mistakes for native English-speakers. That's the difference!

Well, it's really hard to get a good command of English like a native English-speaker.

My husband & son have been waiting for this moment for a long, long time. The beetle came back home at last! They found one male beetle in the case and they started to search for other beetles in the sand. They digged & digged... And they found one, two, three... After all, they found 4 beetles in the case on that Saturday. 4 beetles! It's like FAB4 (Fabulous four), The Beatles... oh, no, in this case, they are "The Beetles."
The Beetles consisted of two males and two females. What a good balance! We can expect them to create more prosperity in the future.

Since last Saturday, we've found one beetle after another. Right now, there are 13 beetles in the case. Thirteen beetles! My husband might have a talent for breeding beetles. (He always says he wants to be a beetle breeder after retirement, by the way.)

My husband said, "We need a much larger case! We need more sand & jelly!" He doesn't care if taking care of beetles costs him a fortune. That is true love. I'm so glad that he have something he can really get into also in this summer. I'm so sure those fabulous beetles will give us a lot of good memories. So I hope those beetles will live as long as possible.
Be fit and stay healthy, カブオ（male beetles）＆カブコ（female beetles）！

On last Saturday, my husband and son were looking into the case of beetles on the hallway in my house. Then my son cried, "He revived!" I went downstairs and saw what happened. There were one tiny beetle in the case. The beetle was male. He had a little beautifully shaped horn.

Last year, we kept a lot of beetles at home. My husband & son were really enjoying taking care of them. My husband bought some special sand (leaf mold) and nutritious jelly made for beetles. Every time he went home, first of all, before saying hi to me, he checked if all beetles were fine. He was like a boy. Well, I think everyone should have something to live for. If he feels so happy, I'm happy, too.

At the end of last summer, all of the beetles died. My son cried loudly. We buried them in the ground of our yard. We deeply thanked them for entertaining us during the summer.

But that is not the end. Fortunately, they left some treasure behind. They laid lots of eggs into the sand in the case. My husband & son were so careful to keep the sand moist between the fall and the spring. They sprayed some water on the sand every day.

...And at last, the beetle came back home!

I wanna stay here and talk about beetles more, but I gotta get back to my household chores. See ya!