Japan - Days 58-60

This weekend wasn't quite as good as I'd been hoping, but still not too bad on the whole
On Saturday, I was really looking forward to going out to Hot Stuff/Staff in the evening, so I was restless for most of the day. [Edit: I can't believe I forgot the first thing I did in the morning - I met one of the people from my lab at 9am, checked if the mice from Friday had mated (involving checking if the male deposited a plug in the female by sticking tweezers up the females'... yeah), separating out young male and female mice so they couldn't mate uncontrolledly, and finally... murder! O.O The male mice we separated out were experimentally useless to us, so, while the girl from my lab killed one to show me how, I disposed of the other two. The method is easy - grab their tail, grab their neck tightly just at the base of the skull, pinch and pull until you feel the neck dislocate. One mouse turned and bit a hole in my glove because I wasn't fast enough, and the second one still looked like it was breathing, though apparently it was just spasm. Still, I guess video games ARE desensitising me - it didn't freak me out as much as I'd imagined it would. My friends think I'm psycho now lol]. I invited some people to join me in going to Tsukuba Centre to buy my bookcase, and so while I was waiting for them to get ready, I cycled around and around to kill time. Anyway, as I had to carry my bookcase back, we opted for walking rather than cycling (one of my other friends tried to take a bookcase back on his bike, ended up walking anyway), but it was a nice warm, sunny day so I didn't mind. We had a quick lunch in Mister Donut, then proceeded to Seibu, where my friend directed me to the bookshelves. As it transpires, the one he bought was meant to be a shoe case, although it was a pretty decent size. Plus, it only cost around 650 yen! To put that in perspective, I then bought some Pokémon stickers for my DS - they cost about 200 yen. By the time we got back to Oikoshi, my arms were about ready to drop off from carrying the huge flatpack bookcase (which I occasionally held like a massive machinegun XD), so I dropped it off in my room, then went to the combini with my friends for a bit of lunch, then my friend came over with his screwdriver and helped me construct the bookcase, which took about 20 minutes. I then proceeded to unpack my suitcase into it, so I could stuff it under my desk, leaving my room looking rather tidier and a bit roomier than it did before. I then hung out with my friend for a bit, before we were meant to meet some friends. As it transpired, another of our friends was planning on going to the same gyoza restaurant as us, with a few more people, about 30 minutes after we originally planned to meet up, so we all decided to meet and go together. I did get a little upset when I ended up on a table of all the people I knew less well, while all my friends were on the next table, but still, it was a fun night, though we had to wait for what seemed like an eternity for our gyoza to arrive. It was sooo tasty though :-D After the meal, a few of us waited around outside the combini with a few drinks, waiting for the rest of our friends to show up. When they didn't after an hour or two, we decided to just head to the bar anyway. We nearly ended up losing two of our party, as one of my other friends took us a way we'd never gone before, but we finally made it there safe and sound. Hot Stuff was definitely emptier than it was last time, so we all sat around the middle table with our drinks (I ordered a Long Island ice tea first, out of habit) and played 'Never have I ever'. Basically, you go around the circle saying 'Never have I ever...' followed by something you've never done (usually), then the ones who HAVE done it take a drink. Once someone drinks 5 times (counted on your fingers), they have to double drink, then triple drink after the next 5, etc.. Things start off fairly innocent, then escalate to dirty stuff and targeting specific people. We played it at Oikoshi once before, but I couldn't remember whether you drank when you HAD or HADN'T done something, so one of my friends was under the illusion that I'd had sex in public before XD I soon set him straight once I found out ^^' We played this for a few hours, getting into our second drinks (mine was a White Russian - vodka and milk - which was actually pretty good), then thirds. Now, this is where I made the same mistake as a few weeks back. I had a second White Russian, which, after a few sips, made me feel sick. I wretched a few times in the toilet, luckily not bringing anything up, then decided it was best that I cycled home; it was about 3am by this time. I managed to get home safely, and on the way back I even had the strength to stop at the combini and buy myself two pizza-pan - one for that night, and one for the next morning. I then went home, ate my pizza-pan and promptly fell asleep. Now, what I discovered later was that, after I left, the others stayed at the bar for a few more hours, then moved down to Gold Rush, and the part that upset me most - they went to Cybex and did karaoke for 4 hours! Still, I guess there's always next time
On Sunday, I set my alarm for 10.30 and woke up feeling a little woozy, but still not hungover, thankfully. I texted Jen about shopping, then we met up and got the train to Iias, where she bought some cat ears for Halloween, and we looked around for a little while before taking the train back to Tsukuba Centre, where she did her groceries and I got some lunch. We got back to Ichinoya, where my bike was parked, and Jen asked if I wanted to accompany her to the lab while she skated there (basically - she wanted me to go with her). This didn't take too long, so I was soon on my way back home. One of my friends had mentioned everyone going for Chinese that night, but as he was ill, I decided to make a contingency - dinner at Ichinoya cafeteria. However, all but one friend bailed, so she invited someone else and the 3 of us met up at Ichinoya. This was where I discovered what had happened the night before after I left, so that put a bit of a downer on my mood, but still, it was nice to hang out. That night it rained pretty heavily, so I got the bus to and from Ichinoya, and wore a t-shirt, my Heroes hoodie, my blue fleece jacket AND my waterproof coat. I felt a little overdressed, but it seemed to do the trick :-) When I got back, I wrote the script for my Japanese presentation in a few days' time, then went to sleep
Today, I woke up pretty tired. Two people were giving their scientific paper presentations today, so by the time they finished I was nearly asleep. In the lab, I set up the repeat of my Western Blot, then decided to try texting my old Japanese teacher. My brother arrived in Japan on Saturday, but neither me nor my parents had heard from him, so I wanted to make sure they landed okay. However, even after Japanese class (which was okay, nothing really interesting happened there), he hadn't replied, so I went online on one of the lab computers and searched for the phone number of the school he's homestaying at. Once I found it, I called them up to ask if they'd made it there okay. I discovered that they had, but then the lady on the phone said something that I didn't understand, so when I said that my Japanese still wasn't great, she put me on the line to one of the English teachers ^^' I ended up talking to her for a few minutes explaining that I just wanted to make sure my brother had arrived safely (in a mix of English and Japanese by this point). In the lab department, I got my Western blot to the blocking step, where it was safe to leave it overnight, so I then zipped back to my room to dump my bag, then back to join the others for kaiwa club. Today we ate at a place called Gasuto, which is basically an American-style restaurant. I had a burger with cheese on the inside of it, along with some rice, corn soup and a couple of potatoey things. It was pretty tasty :-) Afterwards, one of my friends asked if I could show her the way to the post office so she could pick up a parcel, so while she was paying for her meal, and I was waiting around, I ran across the car park to Book Off to see if they had Pokémon Special 3 in the 105 yen section. Bad news - they didn't have Pokéspe 3. Good news - they DID have Pokéspe 19 XD I know I'm now buying them out of order, but it was less than £1 for a manga :-D Result! Once everyone was ready to go, we took the cycle ride along to the post office, then back around to the dorms, in the rain, and as I wanted to protect my new manga with my hoodie, I was cycling in my t-shirt. I maintain, however, that whereas I'd be able to recover from a cold, a book wouldn't recover from getting wet
[Edit: Forgot this the first time around - I stopped in the 100 yen store after my friend left, and I bought a small box of mochi (I had the munchies lol), and there was a long hair on the counter when the lady was putting the mochi through. She apologised and brushed the hair away, and I assumed it to be mine ^^' Then she said it was a blonde hair, which I hadn't noticed, and said it was from another customer, so we had a bit of a laugh about that XD]
Anyways, that's about it from me for today. I discovered an e-mail from my brother when I got back, so I was pretty pleased about that - it sounds like he's having a good time :-D Tomorrow should be another regular day, I really must study for my kanji test though :-( Until next time, nighty night :-)