It's Thursday night, 1/13, but in Los Angeles it's Wednesday

Braille on the beer can. Braille on the beer can.

Tonight I left work at 8pm. Officially I work from 11-7 but today I had a class at 5 -- and afterwards (it ended at 6:40) we were all chatting about this and that and I was on the Japanese IKEA website and boom, I realized it was time to go home. I went to the grocery store and got some sushi (just like Whole Foods but more for your $!), came home and watched AN EDUCATION. I've seen it a few times before but I felt like relaxing into the performances and so I did. I also got a kick out of watching Rosamund Pike's again (she plays the daft blond that befriends Jenny's character). I interviewed her this summer on the set of THE BIG YEAR while working as a field producer and actually got to direct her doing improv. Whether or not the bit I directed makes it to the DVD is anyone's guess..but it was a cool realization: the last time I saw that movie I was laughing at and loving her performance and this time I thought to myself: "oh, there's Rosamund!"

Class was really great today. I tried some new things with music and pronunciation...using a song to get the class to work on their pronunciation -- to sing it aloud, and then having the recite the same text without and melody. We used Queen's "I want to ride my bicycle! I want to ride my bike. I want to ride my bicycle..." The difference between them saying it cold and then after they sang it was amazingly clear -- the music really helped them relax and run the words together more naturally. We also hammered out the difference between "R" and "L" -- commonly hard for Japanese speakers of English. "R" doesn't require you touch your tongue to the roof of your mouth and "L" does. We did that a lot -- playing with different words and contrasting vowel sounds. I also played the free association word game as a warm up, going around in a circle and letting the person to your left (or right) be the catalyst for whatever word pops into your head. It was funny -- Wakako (who joins every class and translates what I cannot manage in Japanese) was generally translating what I said, even when I said something in Japanese. At one point I turned to her and said "what" because it was the first word that popped into my head and she started to translate what Yoshi (to my left) had said. I laughed and explained that for this game, she was off the hook and was under no obligation to translate anything.

Yoshi is cast in the Japanese version of Les Mis and Yukine is a working stage actress. Koichi san also works at the school so I have known him in the office, but it was a strong class as all of them really got the improv/status idea with no problem. I find myself watching them commit and imagining a character they could play, a scene I could shoot, etc. It really is amazing to watch actors do what they do. Because you get the feeling, that familiar feeling, that it's all they want to be doing. There is no anxiety or awkwardness. Instead there is freedom in being removed from yourself. I'm probably projecting my own experience, but there it is.

It's freezing cold these days so I was very happy for the gift I received yesterday from Kawabata san -- a beautiful Cecil McBee white fur jacket, with a silk lining and white leather zipper. It's really something. I have nothing like it and it fits me well. It's so warm and although I felt like a bit of a glamour girl, in my white beret and white fur jacket and heels at the grocery store tonight, I thought: "why not?"

Brought gifts for everyone this morning. Gave Nao and Wakako a necklace and earring set that I made before leaving LA. It really fit both of them...in Japanese you'd say: "ni atteru." The guys got incense holders, incense and sweets. Everyone was yorokobu (happy).

Wakako also makes jewelry (I've discovered) and she is already sending me links to Tokyo's flea markets. Tokyo's flea markets! O lord I'm gonna need a steamer to ship all my finds home by sea!