Canada, Surgery and Backups

If you’re wondering what exactly happened with my last past where I talked about my Canada trip and visit to the doctor then fear not, you’re not just imagining that it’s vanished into the mists of time and crevice between the internet’s seat cushions. Some background changes to my hosting meant that my poor backup routines finally came back to bite me and meant that I lost my last post as well as numerous other posts that I had transferred over from another site.

A few weeks back I decided to try and streamline all the domains and sites I was no longer using to try and rather focus on this site keep all my writing, etc in one place. The more I thought about it, the more apparent it became that by spreading myself so thin I was less likely to actually write!

So after some thought I’ve managed to whittle down my online presence to these three places:

• This very blog! Here you’ll find near everything about me, my life and whatever else might be on my mind.
• My Medium articles. Here you’ll probably find more of what I think about teaching and living in Japan. Less cruft and more substance hopefully!

Recently I also had to make a quick trip through to a local clinic to have an epidermal cyst removed from my head. Not the most wonderful of experiences as you may have guessed. It certainly didn’t help me any to hear him cutting into my head as I was laying there! Thankfully though it was soon over and I’ve already had my stitches out. Of course this does mean that from now on people might think I’m some sort of pirate with my scar!

Another recent event was the first NagaYes event of the year that I helped organise along with the two other block leaders. Each year there are four regional events held by each of the regional blocks and these events are organised and hosted by the region’s block leaders. Seeing as Nagano is one of the most geographically larger prefectures in Japan these NagaYes events are a way to get ALTs to meet ALTs from other areas and to be able to sample local traditions, foods and just have some fun!

This year our event was focused around a theme of pears and apples as the town we had chosen to host it in is famous for both fruits. We spent many sleepless nights trying to think of as many activities as we could that involved either apples or pears in any way. Surprisingly we actually managed to come up with a plenty of games and then from there we managed to contact a local apple farm that was kind enough to help us set everything up in time for a horde of Nagano ALTs to arrive and pit their wits against our fiendish series of games and intellectual challenges! Overall the event and the day itself was a huge success and I’m really proud of the work we managed to put into organizing it.

So that should should just about cover everything I’ve managed to get up to in the last month and a bit. sorry for the fact that my last update vanished into the ether but hopefully next time I’ll the foresight to properly back up my posts properly before I make any major behind the scenes changes.