Ashes, Ashes

OK- so first of all... a little bit of blog housekeeping-

1) I just realized that the picture links on the top of this page expired, so I updated them. Please please PLEASE inform me in the future if you notice that they expired. I have -no idea- how long those links had been like that. *sigh*

2) I was told that my blog doesn't allow comments? I don't know. At first I thought that maybe the problem was that I accidentally made it so anonymous posters couldn't post comments. I checked and I already had it correctly. If you -still- can't comment here on this site, maybe it's because a pop up blocker is not allowing for the comment box to come up. :S If you have trouble commenting LET. ME. KNOW. If it's broken, I am NOT doing that on purpose.

3) Sorry this is rather late this week. I had a topic but then I got distracted by another topic. I STILL don't know exactly what this blog will be about.

OK, let's move on with the blog entry itself...

The new school year started here in Japan and I have to say that I like it so far. There is a real fresh new feel to it. I think I would've felt a lot better about last year if I were there from the beginning. This time, it really feels like my year- maybe last years left a little bit too much like it still belonged to my predecessor?

The weather had improved A LOT. I went to the city today wearing a shirt, jeans, and a light sweater and was actually feeling overheated. It was rather nice.

Sakurajima, the volcano, erupted the other day. Ashes traveled all the way to Ijuin town. I just walked to the store and I felt ashes getting into my eyes and my lungs even began to hurt.

Naturally, this didn't stop me from walking to the other side of the building and drawing in the ashes that had landed on my car at that point. You can KIND of see it.



And here is Ijuin with ash-y air.



The next morning, I had ashes all over my windshield. So, I used my windshield wipers and windshield wiper fluid (I can't remember what it's called now- haha) to be able to see better.



Yeah, I know it doesn't really look much different from much of California during the big fires last summer, but just knowing that it's from a volcano is pretty neat!

The volcano ash-y air even smells different! (Yes, I know that explains why my lungs started to hurt so quickly, because I was standing there SMELLING the air for so long.)

Anyway, I do plan to write a blog about neat touristy places in the area. Just... meh... why talk about that when you can talk about your air being polluted with volcanic ashes instead?