Winding down without winding up

Here I sit on the cusp of 2006 and the years chores are almost completely done. The only major thing left for me to do is to finally get the last car load of stuff out of my old office at the university. That happens tomorrow, the 31st.

My dear wife has penned her last New Years card and I have dutifully mailed them all. The kids are in bed, and well, there is a sense of completeness to it all-no, more like relief.

I will really sigh in relief once the moving is finished tomorrow.

We do not celebrate the New Year in the customary Japanese way here at our house, and my wife is not killing herself to make all the special New Years foods that look so beautiful but frankly speaking, taste pretty darned awful.
We don't visit her parents or other relatives on the 1st either, and of course we have no need to go to the Shinto shrine to pray to the pagan gods for luck either.

So it looks to be about 4 or 5 days of serious laziness!

I think Shakespeare would have termed us as "slug-o-beds" for the upcoming holidays.

It is quite liberating to NOT have to jump through all of these cultural hoops while in Japan.
Also, driving around town during the New Year holiday is a real treat....no traffic hardly, and seeing the streets for the most part traffic-less, well, it is almost eerie (in a good way!).

Down time (IE: not being so busy) in Japan is a rare thing, so I plan to enjoy it. I am looking forward to ONE thing, however....

The big event: WVU is playing Georgia in the Sugar Bowl!