Autumn in America

 

Taking a break from Japan, and visiting the States during my favorite season is a great way to refresh. I've been loving the crisp autumn weather, changing leaves, and the excuse to bake cute Halloween treats.

A trip to Shaake's Pumpkin Patch is a treasured fall tradition in our house, as is carving jack-o-lanterns.

 

 

Hiking at Weston Bend State Park is another favorite activity when the leaves change color.

 

 

Autumn in KC- so lovely.

 

Fall 秋

 

Today, it happened. The vending machines switched over to having hot drinks. I've been waiting for this day for a few weeks, and was so excited to see the warm yuzu, hot coffee, and cans of  corn soup in the vending machine as I waited for the train home. The weather turned a bit cooler as well, so it truly feels like the beginning of autumn. Other signs of fall are in the air as well, including cosmos in front of one of the local restaurants.

 

Convenience stores and groceries have carried autumn foods for a few weeks now, including yakuguri (roasted chestnut) flavored chocolates.

 

Kaki, or persimmon, are in season

 

 

Baskin Robbins has Halloween themed ice cream sundaes. I had mine with pumpkin ice cream.

 

 

And finally, fall flavored beers are available.

 

Halloween Streetcar

 

I spent most of today working on research at the Diet Library. As per usual, it was exhausting and rewarding work, but I did have a few moments of unexpected joy in my day. The first one was while sifting through magazines from the 1910s and 20s, searching for images, when I came across a recipe for a Mt. Fuji jello mold and landscape of fruit circa 1924. Admittedly, it was challenging to not laugh out loud at the image, and in retrospect I regret not spending the extra 10 yen to print it out for posterity. It will just have to live on in my memory and in the library collections. My second moment was boarding the street car on my way home. To my surprise, it was decorated for Halloween! Being 7 p.m., it was a bit crowded and tough to get a good photo, but you get the idea from the above cell phone snapshot. It seems that select street cars are decorated for the month of October. Both moments were a nice reminder to take delight in the small things, and to find joy in unexpected places.

Trick-or-treat

 Hard to believe this was two weeks ago.... Trick-or-treating this year was great fun, despite the munchkin's initial hesitancy to put on his costume. Once we got going, it was great. We like to do the Brookside business trick-or-treat, lots of kids and the businesses are close together, so there's a high reward for one's efforts. We received many compliments on our homemade Thomas the Tank Engine costume- which admittedly was constructed late into the night on October 30. Now, 14 days later the candy stash is nearly depleted, and we're looking forward to concocting ideas for next year. Happy (late) Halloween!

Halloween Hooplah

 This past weekend we had a small Halloween get-together complete with karaoke, pumpkin painting, snacks, and decorations. I think we had as much fun preparing for the party as we did with our friends- stringing lights and fake cobwebs, making up funny names for the snacks, finding the amazing goth tablecloth pictured above at Target. I recycled an old high school formal and dressed as a flapper, Joe was a Classified Document. Our guests included Mrs. Mia Wallace (a la Pulp Fiction), Tobias and Lindsay Funke (a la Arrested Development), Rosie the Riveter, and Minerva, as well as some non-costumed pals.

 The buffet included Waldo Witches Brew (white wine sangria punch), Mummies Toes (cheese puffs), Dried Bat Wings (preztel flats), Witches Fingers (dried peas), Troll Toenails (peppitas), and a Bloody Mary Bar, which included Vampire's Kiss (the Bloody Mary base), Frankenstein Fingers (celery sticks), Goblin's Eyeballs (olives), Cat's Tongue (peppers), and Owl's Brains (mini pickles).

 We also had Beware Brownies and Reese's Pieces. Some of the mini-pumpkins we painted are below. Happy Halloween!

Jack-o-lanterns

Pumpkins from patch to porch.

Much like our apple excursion a few weeks ago resulted in apple cakes and snacks, our pumpkin patch outing took the veggies from farm to home. We visited Shaake's Pumpkin Patch near Lawrence on a chilly day a few weeks ago- perfect fall weather- overcast and cold enough to warrant hot apple cider. Each year we go here for our pumpkins and enjoy the hay rides, farm animals, and pumpkin picking. Sadly, we've had a warm front this week, so when we carved our pumpkins on Sunday it was humid and not even cool enough for sweatshirts. Today was even hot (in the 80s, more gross climate change weather), so I'm worried about the jack-o-lanterns rotting in the heat. Hopefully the weather forecast is correct, and tomorrow will be the last day of this icky weather. In any case, we had a great time out at the farm, and an even better time carving our jack-o-lanterns.

 This is an annual tradition for us. Joe and I have been carving pumpkins for over a decade, and we always get into the spirit- Halloween music, hot apple cider (with a shot of rum, of course), snacks, it's truly an event. This year I went for a witchy Hello Kitty, and he went for Jack Skellington. We collaborated on little man's with a traditional face that he helped design with the assistance of the Disney Junior pumpkin decorating game. In addition to the jack-o-lanterns that will grace our front porch for the next week, we also have roasted pumpkin seeds to snack on for the next few days. Happy Halloween!

Universal Studios Japan ユニバーサルスタジオジャパン

-
It was a tough week. There was alot of rain, I was sick, U.S. news is not very cheery, the Hanshin Tigers baseball game that we had tickets for was cancelled (due to rain), and we've been thinking about some pretty big questions lately, so things have been a little stressful. What are two foreigners to do? Engage in some good ol' escapist American fun and head to a theme park! We spent Saturday at Universal Studios Japan, about 2 hours away in Osaka.
-
-
The JR train takes guests right up to the entrance of the City Walk. The station is called 'Universal City'. Here's Joe on the City Walk, which has lots of restaurants and shops.
-
-
At the gates of the park.
-
-
We went on the Jurassic Park ride first.
-

-
Our second attraction was Backdraft, which is a show that describes the special effects of the movie. The dialog was in Japanese, but we caught enough to get it, and the effects didn't need transation. In line we saw this sign, which cracked us up.
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
Being at Universal was a little bit like taking a day trip to the U.S. The signs were all in English and the props were in English, so for example in the New York area the sewer covers said NY Waterworks. It was nice to have a mental break from language for the day. We also enjoyed eating lots of American-style food. For lunch it was Fish and Chips in an Irish pub-themed restaurant.
-
-
After lunch we went on the Spiderman ride, probably our favorite of the day.
-
-
Next was Back to the Future.
-
-
We took a break to enjoy the beautiful weather and have some gelatto in the mid-afternoon.
-


-
After our gelatto break we ran into the Halloween parade. Here's the Sesame Street float. Note the American flag in the background.
-
-
Hello Kitty float!!
-
-
We walked over to the Land of Oz, as we had to give a shout out to our former Kansas home.
-
-
Joe on the Yellow Brick Road.
-
-
A munchkin trying to decide on green tea or soda.
-



-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
On our way to the Hollywood Dream roller coaster Joe had a run in with a stormtrooper.
-
-
Evening at the park. We just came from the Hollywood Dream coaster, our second favorite ride, and are on our way to the Termanator show.
-
-
After Termanator we came across the Blues Brothers!
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
We stopped by the Hello Kitty shop for a bit at the end of the day.
-


-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
Kitty topiary.
-

-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
Some things were completely not the same as the U.S. Universal. This photo shows the souvenir snacks from Jaws- dried curry flavored ika (squid).
-

-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
To complete our theme day we had dinner at Hard Rock Cafe on the citywalk. This was amazing because they had a veggieburger! The last veggieburger either one of us had was on our last night in the U.S. We also ate some tasty nachos, complete with pinto beans (not easy to find here) and really good salsa.
-
-
To finish off the meal- pumpkin pie.
-
-
At the station on our way home. The trains running to Universal are themed on the exterior.
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
A photo of our puri-kura. This is a popular activity in Japan (especially amongst high schoolers) where you take photos in a booth and add different themed characters, writing, or icons.
-
Our day was exactly what we needed, relaxing and fun, a little bit of escapism. We had beautiful weather for our "day in America" and ate lots of tasty food, probably more than I eat in two regular days in Japan. This was Joe's first trip to a Universal park, and he enjoyed it alot. I've been to Universal Hollywood, and this was quite different. From the reviews I read online Universal Japan and Universal Orlando are very similar. We didn't have quite enough time to see everything in one day, but we hit all of the rides and shows that we wanted to. Definitely a great day!