Last Day of School

Last day of school.  I have one child euphoric and bouncing off the walls with excitement, and one child glum and really sad that the year is over.  Both kids love school, love their teachers, love their friends, and are having totally different reactions to the end of the year.

I did tell them that both of them were having normal feelings, and that seem to help make the once feeling sad feel a bit better -- it's always comforting to have your feelings validated.

I am finally almost myself after my broken arm.  Healing is rough.  I broke my foot in two places (metatarsal) almost 6 years ago, and the healing was no big deal.  Not that much pain, and I had two little kids, aged 1 and 3, and yet it was a walk (limp) in the park compared to this elbow thing.  At any rate, after a LONG plateau of only 95 - 100 degrees of bend, I now have 150-160 degrees, and I am no longer in much pain.  I am using it as much as I can, and it is so much better.  I feel normal, although I do ache like crazy today from all the effort and craziness of yesterday and all the stuff I was carrying around.  

Today is (another) rainy day.  A good day to knit.  A good day to knit my friend Rosemary's Verdigris mitts in a bright orange color with my friend Jun's (tricoquelicot) hand-dyed yarn.

Colorway Calendula, Tricoquelicot's Laine Claude II:

A new project

I'm going to start a new project -- cleaning and arranging my new craft room. A whole room, just for me!
Apparently, though, the message wasn't quite straight, as I'm finding boxes of other things in there, too -- wrapping paper (okay, I guess it makes sense) to kid's crafting items, to kid's paint sets, which is where I draw the line. Playdough, too. No playdough allowed.
I am sorting my stash -- fabric in lovely boxes on the top shelf, and yarn in the lovely drawer bins stacking in the closet. I am organizing by weight. I had to go out and buy more bins today. (Love that Muji store!)

What have I learned during this organization?

1. Anyone who has just learned to knit a single faux fur scarf should not be allowed to purchase yarn again until they knit something else. I have 3 bags of faux fur kind of yarn, and they will never be used by me.

2. Just because it's on sale doesn't mean you should buy it. Enough said.

3. I have a drawer full of lace yarn. I have knit only two things in real laceweight. I am using this as inspiration.

4. Sock yarn rocks. It just does. Three drawers and counting of sock yarn.

5. I have WAY more DK weight than I thought I had. This is interesting to me. Why, I don't know. I guess I thought I was more a worsted/aran kind of gal.

6. I have a lot of Koigu KPPPM. I have only knit one thing (a pair of socks for my son) from KPPPM, because I think it's just too beautiful to use. The rest I just like to look at.

7. I need to figure out what to do with all of the 'fancy' yarn. Aack. Perhaps a hammock for the kids' stuffed animals!

Driving again!

Today I drove.  It was a big deal.  It was not painful, and I felt fine.  My first stop after leaving school was to J-Mart (a home center kind of store), where I went straight to the plants, and bought plants and pots to re-pot them in -- a raspberry bush, blackberry bush, and a little mulberry bush (now we can dance around it!).  Also several strawberries, some tomatoes, and basil.  A couple of impatiens, and a really big dahlia that is the color of DIC In Vino Veritas.  I am all kinds of pleased with myself, as I've been wanting to do this for months, and I finally had a chance.  I just hope that the raspberries and blackberries will ripen while we are still in Tokyo.  

I had acupuncture today, which seems to help with the pain.  At least until I turned around a few minutes ago and whacked my arm into a table.  Then it didn't seem to matter so much.  : )

Knitting is coming along nicely.  I need a new project.  Something cheerful and fun.  Something lace.  Oh, wait, that's right -- I've convinced 5 other people in Tokyo, some of them novice knitters, to all do a February Lady Sweater KAL with me.  I also convinced them all to do it in DIC Classy, while I am using Berroco Ultra Alpaca (knitting from stash).  We are going to have lots of pretty sweaters to wear during rainy season this summer.  

I don't normally.....

Broken elbow -- obviously, it's going to hurt, but who knew that the pain was just beginning?? The bone has healed well, looks great on an x-ray, and those titanium screws are pretty spiffy. I was told that the elbow joint would likely 'freeze' and that it would be difficult and exceptionally painful to regain mobility. (And it has been just that.)

So, yes, it is healing great, and yes, it stills hurts, and I can sure tell you when it's going to rain. (It's not going to rain tomorrow.)

I don't normally whine and moan or suddenly weep at the thought of pain, but I've been doing a lot of it, up until last Saturday, when I suddenly started feeling a tiny bit more myself.

During the time I flew to the US to have the surgery to pin my elbow, our family moved house within Tokyo, one of our cats died, my daughter turned 9, my visa to live in Japan expired, in addition to regular stuff like getting taxes done, school, kids' activities, etc.

In the 4 weeks I've been back, life has been calm and relaxed. Still boxes everywhere, but I just don't mind too much. I can't move them, and they make wonderful tables for my knitting projects!

I was a bit down in the dumps with all the rain last week, and I decided to put some color in my life.  Etsy to the rescue! (I don't normally shop like that, but boy, those beautiful bright colors really caught me.)

I don't normally go for orange -- but this is just beyond gorgeous. Her yarns are stunning to work with. Laine Claude yarn from Tricoquelicot.  This actually glows and shimmers; the cell phone camera does not come close to doing it justice.


And this project bag called out to me -- and look how amazingly well it matches my current sock project!! (Sock is Brigit worked in DIC Smooshy Punky Fuschia) Project bag from Blue Tulips.  There are so many really cute designs, and they are really reasonable.  I don't normally use a project bag other than a ziplock or a zippered pocket thing, but I like this.


And then a little something from Amazon -- because I really really need another sock book. I do.  I DO normally buy lots of books, so perhaps I am getting back to normal.
Forgive the really bad pictures -- taken with my cell phone, because I'm sitting in my recliner with my feet up, and there wouldn't be any pictures otherwise.

Quilt Show?

Back to school, back to business! I finally remembered to enter the Tokyo International Great Quilt Festival with the Dragon Quilt that we made for the school auction in 2007. The entrance form was due today, and I sent it off yesterday, after going out in the rain to get the photos developed for the submission, and then to the post office, walking about 2 miles in the rain. And I'm not a big fan of walking in the rain.



I've been a busy knitter, too. Mostly socks, but I finished my mom's sweater (no pic yet!)

Fetching, with my own mods:



And more to come....

Socks and a haircut!

I'm knitting away at socks -- I've finished quite a few since my last post of the pretty pink socks. Here are Cookie A's Monkeys in progress -- pattern from www.knitty.com, and they are in Socks that Rock color Algae mediumweight -- fun socks, a bit tight on my wide feet, but I think they'll stretch a bit with wear.



I also made Cookie A's Baudelaire, also from Knitty, and also from Socks that Rock mediumweight, colorway Ms. LaRock. Love them!


I also made my son a pair of socks and mittens from (guess what? yes!) Socks that Rock, heavyweight, colorway Space Dust. This skein was purchased based on the name, and the fact that turquoise and orange are both present.





I'm not sure I ever posted a finished picture of the pink ones: Here they are, pattern based on Sensational Socks feather and fan, using Cherry Cordial of Yarntini.


And the haircut? It's AWESOME. I'm loving it. Well over half my hair was cut (it was getting rather long), and now it's layered, frames my face nicely, and is SO much lighter!

Fish, Fish, Fish, Fish, Fish, Fish

Have you seen this children's video?
"Fish, fish, fish, fish, fish."
"No, fish, fish, fish, fish, fish, fish."

A prize (virtual prize, that is) to whoever can name that show.

Our day could have been called:
Fish, Fish, FISH FISH FISHFISHFISHFISH!

We went for a little fishing trip on Saipan, a four hour tour (slightly different from Gilligan's Island, so we felt safe that we wouldn't end up on a deserted island.)

BTW, the literary enthusiast in me would like to point out that while the three words "four hour tour" all end in -our, none of them rhyme with another.

Did I mention the fish? There were fish, and lots of them. We started with 4 lures in the water, and quickly dropped that to two lures, since we had a lot of simultaneous reeling going on, and there were hundreds of yards of fishing line to be re-strung with lots of pounds of fish fighting on the other end.

Another side note: when I was learning about how to teach reading, my instructor showed us this word: GHOTI.

Can you sound it out? GHOTI.

GH is the "f" sound in laugh.
O is the "i" sound from women.
TI is the "sh" sound from action.

It's pronounced FISH. Obviously, laughing women in action are fishing, and that's what I was doing -- laughing hysterically while my muscles were screaming, as fish after fish fought to get on our lines.

So, are you still reading? Ready to see the fish picture? That's what you're really here for, I know.

Here's me and my dad, holding up two of our 13 mahi-mahis, also known as El Dorado, I'm told. He also caught a rainbow runner. We ate them for dinner, prepared as sashimi, grilled, tempura, and poached in white wine. It was amazing.

Show and Tell

Happy New Year!

It's been a busy fall, busy holiday season, and well, just busy.

A little show and tell: first the tell. In December I finished several knitting projects, worked on a quilt, caught 14 very large fish with 3 family members (I reeled in 4 or 5 mahi-mahi by myself!), and oh, what was that last thing...?

Give me a minute to think....

OH, YEAH! My shodo calligraphy was exhibited in the brand new National Art Center Tokyo museum!!!

That would be THIS museum:


Another view:

My work hanging, picture of me and my sensei:

Someone also wrote a very generous article about my shodo calligraphy in a magazine this month. The author was gracious and kind, and she did a very nice job on the article making me look good. I've reached the "apprentice teacher level," which is the rank before full-fledged teacher, but I'm not going to be making that jump for a good while, if ever.

(Vocabulary: shodo = the way of the brush, as it were. It's Japanese calligraphy, and I study the sosho form, doing mostly kana work, although I've done some all-kanji poems and some short kanjis as well.)

It's kind of a shame to blur that set of pics with fish pictures, or knitting or quilting pictures, so I'll save those for another post. Truly, the fish pics need their very own post. I'm as proud of them as I could be.

Where are we all hiding?

In knit blog land, there are a lot of blogs that have gone quiet this summer...some entries just shorter, some never updating (like mine).

Wonder where we are?

We are on Ravelry.

Go now and get on the waiting list. It's awesome. Take the screen tour.

I've been spending so much time on it -- it's so much easier to upload pictures and such on there, that I'm really contemplating ditching the blog altogether. (Gasp!) I'm not the only one.


The Finished Calorimetry made of Fjord



My toe-up socks on Magic Loop made from Yarntini's Cherry Cordial variegated



The Knit One Crochet Too Cabaret Scarf

Ravelry!

I love Ravelry.

Wait -- I REALLY love Ravelry.

I love Ravelry so much that I've spent most of the last month's 'online time' updating my stash on the Ravelry site. I've barely blogged. I've been photographing new yarn purchases, uploading them into Flickr, and putting in all my books, FOs, UFOs, etc.

I believe the big opening to many folks is happening very soon, so get in line and get ready to be wowed.

So, in the real world (i.e. not virtual), I'm back in Tokyo (a whole 24 hours now), and I've unpacked most of the bags. I have put all the newly purchased yarn in ziplock bags, and stuffed it all in the big TV cabinet (that no longer has a TV). It is now full, and I've imposed a 'no purchase rule' on myself. (I've heard from reputable sources that sock yarn is not counted in these rules.)

While in Minnesota, I purchased enough yarn, patterns, and books to keep me knitting for a few years. As a matter of fact, I entered a lovely yarn store while on vacation, and fondled many lovely things, yet BOUGHT NOTHING but a gauge and needle thingy. My husband seemed impressed at my restraint, and I honestly told him that he should be very afraid if he saw such restraint because it meant that even I now believed that I had too much yarn. Incredible, I know.

Must sleep -- jet lag makes me cranky.

Back from the lake

Back from the lake -- about a 3.5 hour drive for some people, I hear, but I've never done it that fast. Today was a personal record for me in the incredible length of time it took to get home. 12 and a half hours. Yep. Something to be proud of. And I went the speed limit the whole time I was driving -- no traffic jams, really. Here's how I frittered away the day:


9:00 am -- vacate cabin.
10:00 am -- give up waiting in line at freakishly crowded diner, go to coffee shop and buy latte and the two day-old cinnamon buns they have left
11:00am -- finally leave Walker, MN
11:20 am -- swerve wildly to avoid a head-on collision with a truck towing a boat that had been tail-gating a car that decided to stop suddenly to make a turn (why, why, why would anyone swerve INTO ONCOMING TRAFFIC ON A HIGHWAY to avoid rear-ending someone instead of swerving onto the shoulder?) Thankfully, ALL cars in both directions had quick wits and there was no accident.
12 noon -- Lunch in Baxter -- subsequent yarn shopping! Stash enhancement: 3 patterns, and 7 skeins of merino-alpaca blend and one Mountain Colors (same shade as the 7 skeins I bought in the same store on the way UP north 1 week earlier)
2:00 pm Leave Baxter
3:00 pm Get gas and snacks near St. Cloud, MN.
4:00 pm (?) arrive at Albertville Outlet Mall
6:00 pm -- stay indoors at mall due to thunderstorm/tornado warnings (not that we were planning on leaving anyway)
8:00 pm Leave Albertville Outlet Mall

All I gotta say is, the COACH store at this outlet mall had WAY better prices that the outlet store in Gotemba in Japan -- WAY better. Everything else I bought at the outlet mall was for the kids' school clothes.

9:00 pm -- arrive in suburban MSP, hitting the edge of the big thunderstorm
9:30 pm -- arrive home, unpack car

I get home, there's a leak in the garage in the corner where my car and stuff are, and I had to spend an hour moving boxes and throwing stuff away that has water damage (apparently there was a lot of rain today). Luckily, most of the stuff was not really important, so I don't feel like I've lost anything but time.

Speaking of losing time, it's 1:19am, and time for me to have been sleeping for hours by now!

Bridge down?

The last 24 hours have been a bit surreal. The 35W bridge is down, as the entire world knows. There are a lot of bridges in Minneapolis. I even drove over the Mississippi River 4 times (on 2 different bridges) on August 2nd, hours before the 35W bridge collapse. Quick calls all around assured us that our friends and relatives were not on the bridge, and we are thankful, yet stunned. I keep thinking about the families who escaped, who are injured, or who have missing. I think of the bravery of the divers in that muck -- what a mess.

I had taken the safety and security of the roads here for granted. Now each bridge I drive over or under (and there are a lot of them) I take a little more notice.

Hug your loved ones again today.

Ravenclaw? No surprise there

So, I stayed away from the internet and tweens on Saturday, and only got to read my book at 11 pm on Sunday. I finished it at 5:30am on Monday morning, and had to wake up to take the kids to swimming lessons at 7:30.

Now I kind of knew that I shouldn't have stayed up that late. I'm really too old to be doing that. I obviously have no willpower. I will tell nothing of plot or anything, but I did think that while some of the vocabulary was stretched a bit at times, I enjoyed the book, and found all the ends tied up nicely.

I found the Sorting Hat quiz on Annie Modesitt's blog, and it put me in Ravenclaw. (I could have guessed that -- probably everyone who knows me would have put me there.)

I'm off to go buy some milk in the 90-something degree heat of Minneapolis. It's hot out there, baby.

The sorting hat says that I belong in Ravenclaw!

<

Said Ravenclaw, "We'll teach those whose intelligence is surest."

Ravenclaw students tend to be clever, witty, intelligent, and knowledgeable.
Notable residents include Cho Chang and Padma Patil (objects of Harry and Ron's affections), and Luna Lovegood (daughter of The Quibbler magazine's editor).

Take the most scientific Harry Potter
Quiz ever created.

Get Sorted Now!

A Contest!

A contest for Victorian Lace and a skein of lace weight! Shelley Kang aka The Heathen Housewife is offering this contest, but you must be QUICK and enter by Friday July 20 before Shelley puts her kids to bed (I love that)!

Of course, if I am lucky enough to have lurkers that go enter *and* mention my blog or me, apparently I will get an extra chance. Love that.

Go now -- right here

Shelley is even offering to dye it to the winner's specifications. Sweet.

Go now. You have only 20 hours left.

Long ago (and far away)

Long ago, to save myself from some Kitchener stitch, I began some toe-up socks. I ripped out 66 stitches around and tried 88. I ripped out 88 and tried 77. I went with 77, then went too far, and ripped back so that I could have a heel in my socks. I made the heel (on blind faith), and got this far:



I think I'm liking it, and after this pic was taken I switched from zeros to ones, and I believe it will now allow my foot through the ankle portion. I kind of like the magic loop, but I'm not completely convinced yet.

Other things now OFF the needles! Swimming lesson time is a great time for me to sit and watch the kids and knit simple things. This scarf is beaded kidsilk haze at each end, and a very soft marled merino that I got in Tokyo. I did it in a simple feather and fan pattern. The ladies at the Rowan store in Tokyo gave me the pattern, and I only messed with it a little (!).


Then I also got a simple fancy fun thing from Knit Happens, and made this "Cabaret scarf." I am sure I never would have bought it in person, but I think it's growing on me. It is also finished.


I've begun another scarf with Knit One Crochet Two Jam fancy yarn, and while I am really not a big fan of the actual fancy yarns so much, I am enjoying the beauty of the colors as it comes out. The color blending is beautiful. You'll have to trust me on that, because right now there is a cold one waiting for me downstairs.



See ya later!

Pictures at last!

There has been a new development here at Tokyo Stitches (in Minnesota): the loss of two baby teeth!


The first was lost in the x-ray line at Narita Airport last Sunday -- the second of the top two was lost tonight, about 3 seconds after being tucked in, when she accidentally knocked her hand against her mouth and it fell out! Ta-da!

The Tooth Fairy has been notified.

Another delight (at least for me) was the arrival of the Sock Fairy, aka Blue Moon Fiber Arts:
Behold my lovely skeins of Socks that Rock. I've been wanting these for months. The colors are so beautiful I want to cry. As always, the colors are more more more in person. Imagine them a touch darker, and much more vivid and alive. They are soft. They are wonderful. I'm in love, and I don't know which one to knit first.

A really fun touch was the sticker they put in my box.
I feel like I'm part of the club now. I might even try to stick in on my blog somehow.

So back to the Minnesota Sky I love -- since I keep raving about it, here's a picture from my fantastic window, with the pinkish evening sky. It's not the best picture, but I wanted to highlight the light outside, not the window and wall inside. Don't you LOVE my window?
Let the record show that this picture was taken at exactly 9:09 pm Central Daylight Time. I love that it's still light out at 9pm.

The kids' room has a great window as well -- and a sun/moon on their ocean/beach fantasy wall. Since we can't paint the walls in our apartment in Tokyo, I went wild here!

Busy in SummerLand

We are loving Summer in Minnesota. Did I mention the blue blue skies and the flirty white clouds? The most beautiful skies in the world -- or at least some of them. (There are a lot of beautiful skies out in the world.) My apologies to those in some areas (like the Pacific NW perhaps) where gray and clouds are the norm.

Part of the fun of Minnesota is that the natives live large during the summer, knowing that it is brief and wonderful, and the days are long. They are walking, jogging, playing croquet, sitting at outdoor cafes, doing outdoor sports, and have a really fun time enjoying the summer. All too soon they will be putting on layers and watching the cold front move down from the Canadian Rockies straight over the Dakotas to Minnesota. Everyone is so happy and cheerful. I love it.

Pictures soon -- if you are walking around Minneapolis, St. Paul, or the southwest suburbs and see a woman knitting pink and chocolate colored socks -- say hi. It's me.

Life in Minnesota

Blue skies, freaky monsoon rains that start and end in a flash, green grass, smiling people -- I'm HOME!

I was greeted the evening of my arrival (driving jet-lagged in a rental car) by a darkening sky. My brother and I were grabbing some tacos to go, leave the Chipotle Grill and big raindrops are falling. By the time we get to his car, the rain is falling so heavy and fast (with pings of hail, too!) that if I had not been on a bridge with no shoulder I would have pulled over due to lack of visibility. Of course, 10 minutes later it was over, but it was pretty wild there!

The 11-hour plane ride was uneventful -- the best kind of trip. The kids were well-behaved, lined up patiently in each line they had to line up in, even when they had had only 90 minutes of sleep and it was 2am Tokyo time. The flight was a bit early, the bags came off right away, and we made it out to the arrivals area very quickly. (The speed of getting from baggage out to the arrivals area was due to a very kind flight attendant who took pity on me, with two dragging young children, each holding something (doll and stuffed dog) and pulling their suitcases, and I had 4 huge duffels on two carts, and I was walking back and forth between the carts pushing them and trying to get the kids to keep moving forward.... You can imagine.)

None of us slept much on the plane -- we've been here 2 days now, and we still haven't slept much.

Knitting on the plane? Surprisingly, even though I had two projects with me, I was busy attempting to feed the kids, get their crayons, books, snacks, etc, that I never was able to bring out my knitting, and then they turned the cabin lights off. I didn't get a single stitch in.

I *did* knit from 2am to 4am Monday morning, and for an hour this wee-am morning, so I think I've made up the time! And I've been knitting each morning during the kids' swimming lessons -- just need to be careful of where I sit, so that I don't end up getting chlorine on my socks!

More later -- we are swimming, biking, and falling asleep on the floor after eating just a few bites of dinner. (Actually, that was just one of us. I fell asleep on the sofa after finishing my dinner.)

Going to sleep now -- 9:32pm. I sure as &"'# hope I can sleep more than 2 hours tonight. I want to find knitting stores tomorrow!

Waiting for courage

While I've been waiting for the courage to rip out my lovely sock and re-start it (??!!), I've been trying to amuse myself with other things. I found an interesting Japanese book that had an amusing tank top in it that was all basically a mesh thing. I decided to try it for my daughter, who was excited about the idea. Unfortunately, I think I hate it. I have started twice, and I am just not enamored with the color, the ribbon, whatever. I'm using a size 15 needle, and I think it's going to take too long.



So I started a plain blue cotton hat for my son. About halfway through, I wonder why I'm doing it -- he doesn't need a cotton hat, and I'm not sure he wants one. He's a willing participant to the trying-on-thing, though, and I ask him if he'd like something on it, like a stripe in a fun color. "I want horsies on it," he responds, as he walks out of the room. (Remember the race car vest? He has an extremely vivid imagination of what I can put on knitted items because of it.)

Since I can't put horsies on a bulky cotton hat (without sewing patches on, making the whole thing a huge horse head, or something else), I put down the hat.

Next I picked up a small ball of Rowan cotton glace that I got a year ago to make into delicate lace washclothes. (The pattern actually calls for linen, it's the pattern that The Yarnery in St. Paul contributed to Knitter's Stash.) It amused me enough to keep me going, and let me not think about the lovely sock that I'd be ripping out soon.



It's nice, isn't it? Not too demanding, just friendly, quick start, quick finish, and you get to play with a new lace stitch. This one is the lacy vine.

Update: Morning brings courage. I ripped out the hat, the sock, and began both again. The sock is looking and fitting better, and the hat is cast on (smaller needles this time).

This is my last morning of peace for 2 months -- summer school/camp ends tomorrow with performances, then flying home, then weeks of swimming lessons at 8:15am for the kids. I'm going to go knit.

Tokyo Cost of Living

Today I'm going to share with you a little fun called "How Much Could One Raspberry Really Cost?"

Here's my grocery list for "just a couple things" I picked up today:

Orange juice, 1 liter -- $1.50
6 liters of milk, (i.e. about 3 half-gallons) -- $8.50 total
8 yogurts -- $8.50 total
2 tiny yogurt 4-packs -- $4.00
1/2 loaf of graham bread -- $2.20
4 bananas -- $2.20
6 bagels -- $7.20

Okay, expensive, but not crazy, right? Here comes the kicker:

Bing Cherries, 1 pint -- $11.00
Raspberries, 1/2 pint -- $10.00

I counted the cherries in that container -- 60 of them. After you add the tax of 5% on everything, EACH cherry costs 19 cents. Raspberries are a slightly better bargain -- there's about 70 of them, and that makes EACH raspberry 15 cents. Of course, if you go by weight the cherries are the better deal, even after pitting them.

So, my little trip to get just fruit, bread, and milk for 3 days is over $55.00 US. (Insert gasp here.) The berries will last through breakfast, the cherries through to the end of the day. Then back to the store for more fresh fruit. (Peaches are 2 for $18.00 right now. We're passing on those for a while.)

By the way?? This is the regular grocery store. Not the high-falutin'-gotta-wear-your-diamond-tiara-to-go-shopping one. Not the "we supply fruit to the emperor" one. Not the one that stocks the square melons for $80 - 200 US ("that's just wrong," as my brother would say), it's Just a Grocery Store.

Don't ask about the time I bought a mango without looking at the price tag -- there was a basket of $8.00 mangos, and a basket of $9.00 mangos, and a basket of mangos that looked the BEST, but did not have a price tag on the basket. Reason: each single mango had a price tag, a whopping $28.00 US. I found out when I got home. It *was* an exceptionally good mango. (The other, less expensive mangos were from Mexico and the Philippines, and the super expensive little one was from the southern islands in Japan.)

I'm a lot more careful about reaching into the fruit basket now.