Pschyic Dog?

I suffer from insomnia.  I've suffered for years but the past 6 months or so it has been
getting worse!  I go to bed at about 11pm and fall asleep only to wake a couple of hours
later and then unable to sleep again.  I have to get up at 5am to make breakfast and lunch box for Hannah.  So most nights I only get about 2 hours sleep.  That meant the next day I am tired
and rather miserable. Plus getting up at 5am makes my day very long as my working
hours are usually afternoon and evening, I feel like I'm starting to work when everybody
else is winding down for the day.  To help me get through work I try to take a nap. I find a half hour to an hour nap really helps. But the dog won't let me sleep!  Before I go upstairs the dog is
quiet, if I'm reading up there or cleaning the dog is quiet.  As soon as I get comfortable and
start to doze off the dog starts to yap.  If this happened once or twice then I would think it's
a coincidence but it happens every single time.  It feels like the dog knows I want to sleep and
doesn't want me too!  She barks or yaps at other times but she really isn't a noisy dog but this
is driving me crazy!

The cats are also driving me crazy.  The white cat doesn't like to use the liter tray. He walks around making this awful noise, so we have to scope and run with him.  The problem is that he is the
biggest of the cats, weighing about 4kgs!  The other morning I had to run upstairs 3 times to
grab him,  now my back and arms are really painful, but they are still cute!

Christopher and Fred

Alan

Steve and Mama

Steve on my printer

David with his head stuck in the cat carrier!

Going in Circles

I was hoping that the visit to the care home this morning would answer all the questions
I have but seems like getting my mother in law a place is going to be a lot harder
than I thought. We have to talk to another care worker, then maybe back to the welfare department
at the city hall and then who knows!  One thing that is worrying me is that there is no
guarantee that she will get a place, what to do then. I can't take of her and she is in
no condition to go home by herself!

More pleasant things... Hannah came third in a prefecture wide English test.  I am
so happy. She struggled so much in junior high school and I was worried that high
school would be the same but she seems to be doing okay.

Hannah with her certificate and medal.

Also Alan, our black cat is back home and back to being the boss!  He came back yesterday
and spent the past 24 hours just crying.  Nothing we did would calm him down, poor David
stayed up all night with him.  He has calmed down now, hope he sleeps tonight!

This is picture of poor Steve, you can see that his ear has been bitten, that was Alan's doing!

Too Much To Deal With

Life seems to go in cycles of being really busy and totally stressed to times where
nothing happens at all and I get bored! Not sure which one I prefer!
This past week has been hectic and stressful. My mother in law is still in hospital.
Even after months of tests the doctors aren't sure what is wrong. I think it's just a
case of her body slowing down, she is 81 after all!  But she isn't sick enough to warrant
a hospital bed, but she is not well enough to go home. So we are looking for care home
for her.  But money is the problem. Care homes in Japan are very expensive. Because of
the aging population the government pushes families to take care of the elderly at home.
To do this they make the care homes very expensive.  For us taking care of my mother in
law at home is not a choice. she is verbally and emotionally abusive.  So last week David
and I did the rounds of talking to social workers, finally accessing mother in law's pension,
paying off some of the hospital bill.  According to the social worker the city can make up the
money for the care home if the pension is not enough.  My worry is if we have buy
personal items for my mother in law, such as nappies, toothpaste, shampoo etc it gets to
be a lot. The past few months we have been buying her nappies and doing her laundry
which has come to over 100 pounds a month. That may sound like not a lot but that 100 o
pounds is what I should be saving for Hannah to go to university!

Then just to add to the stress the black kitten got sick.  He stopped eating and was having
a hard time going to the toilet.  I thought he was just constipated.  This morning David
and Christopher took him to the vets, turns out that he had kidney failure. Apparently the
food we were giving him caused kidney stones so we have to change the food or the
other cats will get sick.  The cat has to stay in the vets for a few days, I have no idea how we
are going to pay for this.

Poor Alan is in hospital

Another Earthquake

Yesterday we had another earthquake.   Here it was very small, just a one on the scale.
The house shuddered, which woke me up, I had gone to lie down with an awful
headache. My headache was so bad that I didn't panic!
But I am getting worried, there have been a lot of earthquakes in Kyushu this past
month, according to one web site there have been 6 in the past 30 days.  We have
felt 2 of them, the epi center was in the same area.  I am wondering if these smaller
ones are leading up to a bigger event.  This leads to my next question, should I prepare
an emergency kit and if so what should put in it!  I know in earthquake prone areas
an emergency kit is recommended, but I always wondered if it was worth the trouble.
If you are away from the house when the quake hits you aren't going to be able to get the kit
and if you are at home would you remember it.  So I will have to think about it!

The cats are driving me crazy.  They have two modes, chasing and fighting or sleeping.
Also in the past week one peed on my bed and on my coat.  And another peed when
I was holding it!  Good job they are cute otherwise I would get really angry!

New Year!

Half way through January and I have had enough of this year!
Our New Year celebrations were very quiet.  Good food, daft TV and the kids playing on
the new game system.  Managed to get some deep cleaning done, as always lots of
things to be thrown out.  I was helping in Christopher's room, he had clothes from
when he was in elementary school.  All I could think was why haven't these things
been thrown away before.
One of my lovely students bought a cake for Mikey's and Christopher's birthday.  That
was very nice of her.  Of course they got nice birthday dinners.
So that is the good stuff.  The bad.....on January 3rd we had an earthquake.  Here wasn't
too bad but still scary.  Who knows if we will get more or bigger ones.  The epi center was
closer this time, not a nice feeling.
My mother in law is still in hospital and we are expected to pay for her medical bills.  Also
we have to buy adult nappies for her and other things that she needs.  I have no idea how I am
supposed to pay for that.  I am just getting by.  Just to add to my stress a lot of students suddenly quit.
So income has gone down but expenses have gone up!
Then last night I could smell gas.   I came downstairs to see if the gas cooker had been left on.
That woke the cats, they woke David.  He came down saying that he could also smell gas.
So at 2am we called the gas emergency hot line.  They sent a gas engineer, he checked everything
but couldn't find a leak anywhere.  I opened all the windows downstairs and in the bedroom, of
course last night was the first real cold night that we have had this winter!
Things have to get better, don't they?

Cute cats to finish!

2018

Every year a kanji (the Chinese characters that are used in Japanese writing) is chosen to
represent the year.  This year the chosen kanji was the kanji for disaster. Japan was hit by so many natural disasters.   From a volcano that erupted near a ski resort, to earthquakes, typhoons and
rain that caused flood and landslides.  Plus the heat wave that saw some cities with a temperature of 41C.  It was a hard year.
Also on a personal level 2018 has been hard.  Started out okay, Christopher graduated from college, but is still looking for a job!  Hannah got into the high school she tried for.  But after that it was
all down hill.  MIL's sister died.  A few weeks later our neighbor died.  Mikey found her outside of her house and called the ambulance.   Then I was diagnosed with breast cancer and had a mastectomy. Spent a week in hospital.  My recovery was during the heat wave of summer, I always
have a hard time in summer but this year was the worst!  Then MIL was rushed into hospital in September, where she still is!  The doctors have no idea what's wrong with her.  I have no way getting her pension so all the bills are coming to me!
So I hope that 2019 is better,  I need to make money, pay bills.  Sort out MIL's situation.  Hope that
Christopher can get a job soon and that Hannah keeps up her study at school.
Here's wishing my readers a happy 2019.

Christmas 2018

I managed to pull myself out of my funk and get Christmas done for my kids.
We had great food. watched movies and had presents.  Not as much as before but everybody got
what they wanted or needed!
Christmas Eve we did party food.  David made pizza from scratch, I did a quiche. we had
sandwiches and sushi!  Lots of desserts as well, trifle. chocolate cake and mince pies!

Christmas Eve food

We took some rather strange photos!

With the kids

Turtle Cat

Mikey was out most of the day, came back and ate cake!

Christmas morning was nice and quiet.  So different to the years of kids shouting and getting
all excited about the presents!  I got up late, well about 8am, Hannah and Christopher were
already down stairs, eating trifle for breakfast!  I gave them their presents, I didn't want to leave
things out because the cats would attack!  Hannah got some DVDs that she asked for and a CD, also some lovely PJs!  The boys got clothes that they needed.  I got a Nintendo switch for everybody to
play on!  David bought books for everybody.  I'm enjoying mine but it feels strange to read a real
book as I usually read on my kindle!
Dinner was nice. Roast chicken and all the trimmings.  I have lamb but miscalculated the cooking
time in the slow cooker, we will have it today!

Hannah with her DVDs and CD

Christopher figuring out the Nintendo Switch

I had to go to the hospital to take my MIL her clean laundry and pick up her dirty stuff.  This is a
weekly thing now!  It depresses me so much going there, these old people are in pain and being kept alive by so much medicine and procedures, but they aren't really living, just lying around in a
hospital.  When I think about the kind of life my MIL had, always on the go, always working.  My husband said that some seasons she would work for 24 hours with out sleep.  To go from that to being confined to bed must be hard and sad.  The hard part is that her mind is still clear, just her body
is not good! I think she misses being at home, she told Mikey she just wants to go home, that made
me cry!
Still Christmas was good and I had a nice time. I realized that it isn't about presents and Christmas trees, those are nice, but having a laugh with my kids, watching a movie together, just having time
to relax together without worrying about work or school, that is Christmas.
I hope all my readers have had wonderful holidays however you celebrated!