Weber Q 220 Grillin'

I bought my first grill earlier this summer and I've realized that I have a long way to go. I've already downloaded a pretty cool app for my iPhone: On the Grill. It wasn't free, but it seemed like a fair enough deal for the information and feature set.

Review of the Q Grill: My Grill (Weber Q Grill)

Indirect Grilling:

Cooking indirect on the Q is a simple task there is several different set-ups that can be used you, once you understand the basic method you can come up with different ways to meet your requirements. The basic method is to place a doubled over sheet of foil on the grill ensuring that you have an air gap between the edge of the foil and the sides of the Q of at least 1” on the long side and 1 ½” – 2 “ on the short sides. Then place a roasting trivet or a wire rack on the foil, which sits at least 3/4” above the foil, providing an air gap between the foil and the food being cooked. article

Makin' Dessert for Penn State Tailgate Tomorrow

Hyunjoo and I stayed up late tonight so that I could bring in my favorite blueberry cheesecake desserts tomorrow for lunch. There's a huge tailgate party going on in the Keller Building on campus to celebrate Penn State's upcoming football game on Saturday. Hyunjoo and I even have plans on going to the stadium tomorrow night to catch the pre-game action. Hopefully Joe-Pa will sing for us!

Is it really the weekend?

I've sorta lost track of the days. The upside to being jobless. That's about it. I'm ready to get working again. Anyone wanna give me a job (that I'm looking for)?
:-)

Still working on getting more applications out. They're taking quite a long time. The current one requires me to write an essay addressing a number of points. It'll be good for eventual interviews, but it's a lot of work. Applying for positions over the internet isn't as straight forward as sending in a resume and cover letter. It's pretty cool actually to see what different schools are doing to hire folks. I just hope I start getting a few hits.


We put a deposit on a 2008 Honda Fit Sport as of yesterday morning. We'll have to wait for it to arrive. It could be up to a month! It didn't seem like too long at first, but it's starting to sink in. Hopefully it'll be much sooner and I was reassured that it might very well be. We'll just have to wait and see at this point.

We had a real nice evening over at Scott's (my brother-in-law) brother's house last night. They live only about a 5 min drive from here. They have a beautiful place right on one of the local golf courses. We had a fantastic Korean meal and eventually made plans to meet up again this evening. Us guys even decided that we'll look for tickets to the Ultimate Fighting Championship fight coming up soon. That is if we can even buy tickets.

Hanging around Mt. Fuji after the hike

We spend a few days at an awesome hostel in after we hiked Mt. Fuji. It was a great time to relax, if even for a couple of days.
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Takin Tokyo by storm

Today is my brother's (and mother) birthday... Happy Birthday!

Lee and Elise landed in Tokyo without a hitch a couple of days ago and we've been having a great time kicking around.

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This morning we went to the Tsukiji Fish Market for a killer breakfast. We've never had such a fanastic morning meal (besides all the home cooked ones from mom).

We'll be heading out for a special dinner for Lee in a little while.

Tomorrow, we head off for Mt. Fuji. Keep your fingers crossed fo us. A typhoon just swept through here and the weather is still a bit cloudy. We're hoping the rains stay clear for our summit attempt.

The plan is that we'll hike tomorrow to the 8th station and then sleep for a few hours before hitting the summit early on the 18th of July.

Wish us luck!

Goodbye

The KIT and KTC staff threw Yasuko, Hyunjoo, and I a farewell party since we'll all be leaving before the next term begins. It was a really cool gathering since both entire-staffs rarely get together.
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Warning: Cultural Rant

The more you try to ignore something that bothers you...
It's widely known that it's perfectly polite to loudly slurp your noodles here in Japan. Yakisoba is a favorite, perhaps as common as a peanut butter sandwich in America (at least when I was growing up). They're noodles that are gently fried in a heavy sauce that is perhaps based on soy sauce. It's a strong smell and is often accentuated with pickled ginger, and other garnishes. Now, I love yakisoba when I'm in the mood for it.

Part two of this story is that about 16 teachers share an office about 30 feet by 40 feet. So there's a teacher ever 7.5 x 10 feet in this room. We live with all kinds of intrusions into personal space. It's one of the most difficult daily challenges we have to learn to live with here.

Today, I wanna scream. The slurping and heavy lingering odor of those noodles is about to make me walk over and throw those noodles out the window. I wonder what that Japanese teacher would do?

Thankfully, in the time it took for me to red-line and then script out this poorly written narrative, the offender has finished his noodles that prove to be the "gift-that-keeps-on-givin'". In another hour or so, the smell should dissipate.

School Dinners

Here are some pix from the last couple of school functions we've had.

Taking our guest, Jayoung, to Higashiyama

Hyunjoo's friend, Jayoung, was just visiting for a week from Seoul. We headed for the hills, well actually the Geisha district near the Utatsuyama Hills and had a great day walking around and even went for an okonomiyaki dinner afterwards.

Strange newness from Pizza Hut

Wasn't too bad, but I don't think we'll be ordering this one again. A little too greasy and not enough "pizza".

SPAM Musubi

Here's an interesting one: I found SPAM musubi at the neighborhood convenience store. Now, I don't know where the first SPAM musubi was created, but I doubt it was here in Japan. I was having them in Hawaii before I was in high school. Yeah, haha. All you haoles are laughin... and I ain't gotta defend SPAM to the likes of you! But to put SPAM into historical perspective, the soon-to-be Americans living in what you call paradise back in the 40's had to make do during the war in ways the rest of the country didn't. Lots of stuff had to get shipped to Hawaii and not at the top of the list was beef and poultry. So Hawaiians had to make do with the rations they had: SPAM and Vienna sausage. Those products became apart of the diet and might be regarded as a hotdog is at Fenway. So yeah, I eat SPAM and I'm proud of it. I might not eat it often, or even occasionally... you could call it a "once-in-a-blue-moon" treat that reminds me of a home in Hawaii. Until recently we had to make all of our own SPAM musubi, but looks like things have changed... a little for the better.

KIT BBQ

Hyunjoo's office had a welcome party for Casey and Chieko, KIT's two newest teachers. We had yakiniku out on the patio with a full spread of beef, veggies, squid, salad and even a bundle of yakisoba. I was stuffed to the gills!

Pain in the Bun!

You'd probably be surprised. It's hard to make a hamburger here in Japan. Buns for hamburgers are very rare in these parts and if you find them, they're often mixed in with other types of buns or have weird things in them. We got lucky!

Flying Pig to the rescue!

Here's a million dollar idea that I missed out on... taking Costco online for foreigners around Japan. These guys were thinking. You place an order through an ingeniously designed site that has you buying to fill up boxes to keep you shipping costs down. Then they go to Costco's and buy your stuff then ship it to your doorstep. It's not cheap, they don't have a huge selection of stuff, but they do offer a great service and it is a great convenience. Where else can you get 3 KG of spicy cheese sauce for your nachos?

Yakitori

Got lazy lastnight and decided it was time to go out for some yakitori!