Tag: family

I was over Heather Armstrong‘s site catching on the current wackiness in her life and her post Of Lima Beans and Pickle Juice cracked me up. More to the point, it reminded me of my own family’s last encounter with the dreaded lima bean.

This was probably about six, maybe 7, years ago. I was having dinner with my folks. Mom had just finished setting the food on the table and was about to take her chair; when Dad dishes himself up some of the mixed vegetables. While dishing the vegetables; he makes a comment –sounding rather excited as he does so– that there are lima beans in the vegetables.

Mom shudders in disgust and finishes sitting down. Dad looks at her somewhat puzzled.

I’m going to stop this narrative momentarily to point something out about my father that was truly amazing to me. That would be his memory. He never forgot anybody’s name and would frequently remember small details from conversations he had with them years ago. He was an active member of the local Masconic lodge and for their ceremonies/ritual; he would memorize the entire thing and do it without resorting to any kind of reference. As I understand it that’s expected of the local Masons but is still something that not all of them are able to do.

Myself, I have to carry a PDA in order to keep track of my own phone numbers and my fiance remembers the names of my cousins better than I do.

Back to the story….

Still looking puzzled, Dad asked “what’s wrong?”

With a mixture of disgust and a hint of confusion on her face; Mom said “I hate lima beans.”

Dad was just floored by this. “You hate lima beans?!? Huh, I never knew that!”

At that point, Mom gave Dad a look that said he was treading on thin ice and which made me glad that I’d just stayed on the sidelines of this conversation. Then she said “In all the years that we’ve been married; have I ever cooked lima beans for you before?”

He sat there for a moment, casting his mind back through all the meals over the years. Finally he looked up at her with a smile and said “No, I don’t believe you have.”

Mom just kept looking at him.

Eventually, Dad had the grace to say “Ah” and we were able to continue on with the meal. The remainder of the meal was uneventful and I couldn’t say what else we were eating that night; but I’ll never forget that moment.

Homestay Day 2
We slept fairly late and then R & M made us brunch. A massive salad with tomatoes and onion, eggs, sausage, fatty ham patties and fresh fruit. After we lazily ate breakfast, they took us to a nearby beach. M-san warned us first that the water was very dirty but we had no better ideas on where we would have liked to go, so it was off to the beach. The whole area was filthy; actually, it was the first time I’d seen so much litter laying on the ground. And water level was really low, so there was something like a 100 yards of mud between the normal beach and the water line. Still, there was a strong breeze coming off the water and the smell of the sea was much like I remember from visiting the ocean back when I lived in North Carolina. So it was very pleasant. Then as we were leaving, R-san bought us some Japanese style ice-cream. Basically it like a slushie, shaved ice topped with flavored syrup but they also added in some cream. It was delicious!
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Homestay, day 1
We got ourselves checked out of the hotel this morning and I found that calls to the US must be around $1/minute, as I’d called Ariesna a couple of times and hadn’t spoken all that long but the bill was rather high. After we were all checked out, we walked down to the language school. It was extremely hot out and there wasn’t a lot of shade. I noticed K was having problems, so I carried her bag for her to the school. Once we were there, one of the teachers brought us some drinks and snacks, but the A/C wasn’t working all that well and we were still frying.
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Today, we went to see the animation exhibit at Museum of Contempary Art Tokyo (MOT). It was a good exhibit but our translator was using a quiet voice while there were animated bits blasting out their music and voices, making her hard to hear. The exhibit covered Japanese animation from it’s very beginnings1 to the present day. Again for the most part, cameras were forbidden but towards the end of the exhibit they had a mock up of Lupin’s car from Castle of Cagliostro which they did allow you to take pictures of (but no flash allowed). In that same area, they also had some of the pre-production art and key-frame art from Porco Rosso, which was so damn cool! 😀
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