Dinner out and houses.

Last night I took my family out for dinner. Helped the old lady over all the ice sheets outside the front door and into the car, then helped the man-on-crutches over the ice and into the car!
Sapporo's crazy weather gave us spring and flooded roads on Friday. Then Saturday it was Minus 3 and ice sheets.
We only went to our local yakitori restaurant, 5 minutes from the house. But it was essential to use the car.
I needed to have a dinner out of the house. I really wanted to eat meat and mochi-bacon...and other unhealthy things. I wanted to give Yujiro a break from cooking. I wanted to give Okaasan a change of scene.
It was a delicious dinner. Okaasan drank Nihonshu liqour and got a little tipsy(!!!), Yujiro drank 4 or 5 beers...I drank soft drinks as the driver - but we all enjoyed it. After an hour or so we went home again, but it was good to get out of the house.

Apparently Okaasan's younger brother has died. Yujiro called his older brother in Osaka to see if he will go to the funeral on her behalf. Okaasan doesn't seem too bothered. Not very close I guess. I'm an only child and maybe I have a too-rosy picture of family relations: I am always surprised when siblings are not so close.

House hunting. He and I talked a lot more. I kind of agree that maybe we can find better than the house we saw last week. He went online and actually found two more places much closer - one is only two blocks away from our present home!
I think we are going to tell the Minami-Hiragishi house owners that we are interested, but that the price is a bit too much for only a home - and see if they will reduce it. Meanwhile keep looking.
Looking at estate agent websites you really FEEL Japan's population is in sharp decline. So many empty homes. I think we can find somewhere. Patience!

By the way - dear readers - Friday I met Tokiko (she suggested this Blog in the first place), and she is super-busy translating it all into Japanese! One day we'll try and find a way of putting both English and Japanese on this Blog. I know many of my students are reading this (Hi artist Takako! Hi Tamiko! Hi manga-drawing Youko!) and having Japanese might help.