So the summer has ended. This time it doesn't seem to come back again soon. 7:00 Somebody must have visited the grave. Yellow flowers had been already offered in front of the tomb stone on which our family name was engraved as "○○家". Lili…

5:50, Saturday. As the sun rises and begins to color dull orange the east sky over the beige building, more songs of birds can be heard. But, listen hard, in the background of the merry soprano chirp, there is a gut-resonating bass noise e…

6:00 I woke up this morning with a to-do list in mind. After breakfast, I have to pack my things up for the 3 day trip. Then I will make reservation for two seats on a shinkan-sen train leaving Shin Yokohama around 9 am today for Shin Osak…

6:30, 23C, Autumn is clearly in the morning air. Feel happy for finding no words to describe the sky now, other than chaotic beauty. Any description is so cheap but I can't help. This summer is ending. Clouds in all colors and shapes are f…

6:40, Clouds in all kinds, dynamism governs the sky. The typhoon is coming closer and has brought this moisture in. Good, we could use a little more rain. The magnolia tree, which my mom got planted in front of the gate last year and had b…

6:40, Woke up in a daze. Feel cottony in my head. The sunshine feels too intense this morning... Went to bed 2:00 a.m., I remember. In the midnight, I was cooking curry for today's supper, my three-weekly routine and the very least I can d…

6:30, Look up at the east sky and autumn clouds are hovering. Altocumulus, in meteorological term. Before I know, the season is changing. The temperature is forgiving 25C. The sunshine has dropped its sharpest fang. The air carries some co…

6:20, Drizzling. Foggy. A kilometer visibility, possibly. How different this morning is from yesterday's and from other mornings that have ever existed. Every morning is new. We tend to think the opposite. Our days are rather uneventful, d…

6:10, Like a song in a minor key, my mood swings low and never floats. The sky is dark. Rain is falling on the city. It blurs the distant buildings towering as if in another world. The rain is tapping on the roof. I close my eyes and liste…

6:30, The day has started already. Bustle is back. The town is regaining vitality after a long break for both the dead and alive. Obon(お盆) has passed quietly. Everything looks different now. "If the doors of perception were cleansed ever…

1:16 p.m. The doors closed. The diesel engine kicked in. The train shuddered once and started to move at last, slowly, carefully gaining speed and trundled out of the platform. Having been through boring private houses, now the one-box loc…

2:00 p.m. The beach is eerily quiet. There is something surreal about the place. Hazy. As clear as the view of the beach is, with strong sunshine generously pouring onto the sand and all, where's the sea? I squint and strain my eyes, and t…

6:15, Following the sweltering heat of yesterday, today is predicted almost sauna-like. The temperature has climbed up to 29 degrees already with the humidity as high as 80 %. What's this? It's not as though Tokyo is in a tropical rain for…

6:10 The day has started with 28 degrees Celsius air. Sticky. No wind. The sun is not welcome but already here. Over the T-shirt it begins nibbling at my shoulders. This is summer. Here is a picture of a summer. It looks very old... It IS …

6:00, Something is different about this morning. Perhaps quietness of a weekend. Clouds look layered in white and gray all over the sky with glowing breaks here and there. Dull wind blowing in the balcony is saturated with moisture as if t…

6:10, Black thunderclouds fill out the south east sky. Wasn't I awoken by the drumming sound of a downpour? Was it just in a dream? The newly mowed lawn is moist with morning dew, sending out the scent of summer; thick and stuffy yet bount…

5:20 Still dark, or should I say it's already light? The day has broken. Yet the sun is still behind the beige colored building that's soaring up in the east sky. 25 degrees Celsius. The air is pregnant with a heat ahead of us. The dog day…

6:30, First sun in a week or so. A black cat walks across the garden. Funny to see an animal other than our pet dog Coo-chan there. While she was alive, she would never let a stranger, man or cat, enter the garden. Once, she bit a gardener…

6:30 Dark Saturday morning. My watering the garden might call for rain. Soil turned blackish under trees. I am going to have an annual medical checkup first thing in this morning. Oh, I must return an overdue book to the library after that…

7:00, Slept longer a bit. Cloudy again. Wet ground. It seems the rain front is back and has brought torrential rain in Korean Peninsula. Many fatalities are reported as it caused floods and landslides. Yet in North Korea, even the number o…

6:40, It rained... of all the days! Yesterday we watered the garden. From far distance, if I listen very carefully, the low sound of a train echoes through the town. So low that it sounds almost like a vibration that could rattle window pa…

6:40, cloudier, wet ground. Rained? 26 degrees Celsius. No wind. Muggy. This summer started early and hot. But the typhoon seems to have changed the weather thereafter from unbearable to more bearable one. That's good. A sudden breeze caus…

7:00, Cloudy. Somehow got up in a bit of a stupor. Cool air seems to stay above Kanto area for some time since the typhoon. About a month has passed since the summer solstice. The summer is around us and we expect sweltering days of August…

6:30, 25.5C, Sunny Monday morning. Still cool for a midsummer day. A glass of iced coffee is the thing for a morning like this. Out in the balcony sitting on the top step of the wooden stairs, I sip the bitter awakener looking down the who…

6:30, 24 degrees Celsius. Cool outdoor air is coming in. But the glaring sun is back and so should be the dog day. Look down on the street out of the window and see garbage scattered. A crow is a suspect.My wife says garbage is collected e…

7:00 Another cool morning. 20 degrees Celsius. Cloudy. Traffic noise is coming in through open windows. In hot days, I remember, they were closed and it was very quiet in the house. Every window in our house has triple panes. I chose "trip…

6:45 It's like autumn... 19C. Fine. No wind. Crisp air. Masses of puffy, white clouds floating here and there in the blue sky. Cumulus. They call it. The typhoon is gone. A brief break in the spell of sweltering days. Hope this will last f…

6:30. 20 degree C. Chilly. The typhoon finally has brought with it enough rain to wet the ground under leafy trees in my garden. Still raining a little. A strange typhoon it was. It came from the south, hit Shikoku, and now, as if to bounc…

Rain. But less than we expected of a typhoon. With a speed of a bike, it still hangs around off Kii peninsula. It brought a rainfall of over 1000mm to Shikoku within a couple of days, an amount equivalent to the 10 year's precipitation in …

Plants look different today. Refreshed and greener than green. Long waited rain at last!!! The typhoon is forecasted to head north for Shikoku for a while and then take a sudden right turn to go along the Tokai coast line, coming closer to…