The last three hours I've spent going through our Japan photos, re-orienting what seems like half of them (and we're talking in the area of 1500 photos) and slotting them into their individual folders. This has involved lots of questions like "what was the shrine we visited immediately after Osaka Castle?" and "I wasn't there--are you SURE this is Kamakura?" But now, at last, they are all done and organized and ready to burn onto DVDs to hand out to all our tripmates.

Next, to swap out all the Princess Tutu trading cards from their card sheets so I can put the Kuuga trading cards in their place. Because my card sheets at home are made for three-hole binders, and the Kuuga cards have a four-hole binder....

Today we are theoretically doing Akihabara v.1.0 (so named because I'm waiting until sandpanther rejoins our party before purchasing a Japanese electronic dictionary, as she has purchased one recently and thus has researched available models and can tell me which has what advantages.

Very much like the place we're staying (Ryokan Kangetsu, less than five minutes' walk from Chidoricho station). It doesn't hurt that the local set of restaurants are open late and have *excellent* food.

Am most befuddled by the apparent lack of Ultraman Moebius doujinshi. Finally found a store that had an "Ultraman Series" section... and they were all Gaia.

Anyhow, off to see if everyone is done with breakfast and ready to go....

For everyone going to the Yumekoubou Studio, which is most all of our group, the reservations have been made!

"Thank you for communication.

We heard your reservation in Arashiyama studio from 10:00 of April 4.

In addition, we heard the plan that you hoped for.

If there is the increase and decrease in your number of people, please tell us.

You can choose a maiko or a geiko on that day.

We look forward to that we can meet you.

Thank you."

Well, Wonderful Husband and I did the annual ickiness that are Federal and State taxes. And we owe far more than we'd like to, but not, thank goodness, more than we can afford. We're both going to be seeing about dropping rather a lot more into our 401Ks this year as well as perhaps increasing the amount taken out of each paycheck toward taxes, as it's rather less of an unpleasant shock to never have the money to begin with than to have to give the government a lump sum or two each spring.

I also finally pulled out the rubbing alcohol and Q-tips and attacked my keyboard. The keys are so lovely and white again, and with nice speakers and a niftier monitor it almost seems like a brand-new computer! Now I just need to find the DVD-Rs and figure out how to transfer files to Wonderful Husband's computer so I can use his DVD burner and clear off space.

We had our third wedding anniversary on Friday and went out to the Orange County Mining Company, where I used to work, for dinner. The food was good and a number of the staff I knew are still there. We didn't exchange cards or gifts or flowers or anything this year for the simple reason that Wonderful Husband had only gotten back the night before and we really didn't have much of a clue for what to get each other. So we decided to rain-check that part of the idea. While he was up north at his training session, he purchased the vouchers for our train passes for the Japan trip in two months. Amusingly his parents sent us some yen for an anniversary gift, to be used on the trip. ^_^ In considering the things I think I'd like to buy while there, though, I'm starting to wonder if the ~$600 discretionary income I'll have set aside by then is going to be enough. Japanese DVDs, even used, are expensive. Guess I need to whittle my list down a bit.