It's always an adventure negotiating the back blocks of Japan with narry an idea, inspiration or plan! Once again taking advantage of the ridiculous good value that is the Japan Rail Pass, this time we're going to try to find our way in and around the nooks and crannies of Kyushu with a five day unlimited pass that can take us anywhere on the island that steel tracks will go! The Shinkansen is included as are all limited express trains and a few novelty/quirky ones at that: we just need to find the time this week to do a vague sort of plan of attack.

Budget Asian airlines don't often drop from the sky, so we're hoping this record will hold just a little longer. Despite all their efforts to trade us up in terms of hotels, rental cars, luggage weights and even meals and snacks, we've resisted all overtures and have the basic no-frills 7 kg carry-on, legs cramped onto the seat in front, middle of the plane cattle call. Who cares for a few hours? Not us!

We're leaving at the crack of dawn on Sunday, flying to Fukuoka, catching a taxi to the train station, changing our vouchers for a rail pass, booking some tickets on the limited express to Nagasaki, then catching the tram from the station to the hotel before meeting up with Mark and Himiko. That's the plan as best laid! We'll wine and dine and sight-see with them for the remainder of the day and that night before trundling off in another train, destination unknown, on Monday morning. Our mission is then to train-hop around the island, staying at little ryokan (inns) in tiny towns and cities dotted around the southernmost of Japan's great island system. It will be a further blast for me following on from my 30th anniversary tour last Christmas: I remember getting covered up in the hot, massaging sands of Beppu and eating a mixed seafood grill on the seashore more than those three decades ago!

In preparation for the big trip we've been doing exactly nothing! Consumed with the demands of work, where we've negotiated a very heavy grading burden lately along with the vagaries of a new unit on Shakespeare, we've been content to flop, quite unceremoniously, on the lounge on the weekends recovering before the working week rolls around again. My enervating man-flu hasn't helped matters and the most I could manage was a wander down to Lutetia to get some sandwiches on the weekend, even accepting Cassy's offer to walk and get some takeaway pizza from the incomparable Pizzeria Oggi for our Saturday night dinner.

While I sneaked into an early bed on Friday night to tend my heavy chest, Cass went out to Sherry's place for the latest installment of her Book Club. From all reports they had a great time and as usual, wined and dined impressively and found out all the latest and greatest about each others lives and loved ones, with a touch of salacious scandal dolloped in to the mix if you please!

While in the flight and accommodation booking mode, we made some bookings for the Sunshine Coast to meet up again with Ross and Ainsley this July. They conveniently plonked their school holidays in a quiet period between football games and we're looking forward to the annual festivities already. Speaking of football, it would be remiss of us not to mention the mighty resurgent Knights: two from two to start the season.....it's looking very promising!

Must away! I'm reading the impressively written Manhattan Beach by Jennifer Egan, while Cass is, with much sadness, slowly eking out the final pleasures that Kinsey Milhone will bring to us in Sue Grafton's ultimate alphabet mystery, Y is for Yesterday.
Photos: inflatable toys on car roofs, money fans and outdoor shots, notably of cherry blossoms which we hope to see in full bloom in Japan come next week. Last photo: Spirit Week is upon us and my homeroom kids decided to dress as "teachers"....not bad!

Virg'n Mary, that irreverent sisterhood, is well over 14 years old now, and this week we've been anticipating they may not be with us for too much longer. Virg has been tentative and timid with her food attack practices for some time, but this last week saw Mary pretty much shut up shop as well in terms of food intake. As much as they despise the outing, we bundled them into their blue transport cages and off to the vet we went.

Virg has turned from our 'lil fatty', all plump and cuddly with a tummy that hung down low and comically swayed side to side as she walked or ran,  into a husk of her former self. Her spine is delineated and protruding, her haunches sunken and her once proud stomach just a vestige of its past glory. She has progressively got thinner, but it wasn't such an emergency as she has continued to eat her previously favoured dry food with great alacrity at times, even if with lesser volume.

Mary on the other hand, has always maintained both her appetite and her weight, although eating more furtively away from our prying eyes. When she decided to basically stop eating a week or so back, we were prompted into emergency action.

The vets are wonderful and also well aware of the ferocity of these little spitfires when they are being forced into something they don't want to do. They got some official weights then sedated each of the girls in turn in order to withdraw enough blood to get all the relevant tests done. It was excruciating watching the little buggers panting away in a semi-coma while their tiny veins were mined for blood. It came very slowly and at an extremely limited volume, but eventually they got what they needed. While still "out of it" they x-rayed each one in turn to check for intestinal issues which might not show up in the blood work.

As it turned out, we discovered the next day that their old issue of dis-functioning kidneys had reared its head again. As they weren't eating their medicated kidney food and we couldn't force them to drink, the alternatives presented included us administering daily sub-cutaneous liquid injections to each of them, or injecting liquid into their mouths each day! With these two? No way!

Our immediate concern was to get them to eat: we reasoned that this was the first priority, and this would hopefully lead to them drinking more as well, once their appetite was stimulated. We've religiously fed them only dried medicated food for their entire lives: it was the vet's advice and we stuck to it. They used to love their "hardies"! Anyway, we changed to "wet" food as an experiment, and so far, so good. They wolfed down the first batch with a fever not seen since the last opening of a bottle of Peck's Anchovette. They have had various installments since, and already we are imaging them slightly plumper. At least they won't starve to death it seems!

We're very realistic and realize they won't be with us forever, but we're stoked they are not going to waste away like Belsen horrors before our very eyes. Our weekend was pretty much consumed with cat ministrations of one kind or another and grading of hundreds of essays between us. I was also unlucky enough to fall victim to some kind of body-aching flu which kept me pretty much confined to the couch on Sunday and struggling at school today.

Not much in the way of photos as I didn't take any of the medical procedures! A quirky set-up on a taxi driver's dash on my way home Friday night, well-fed girls basking in the sunshine, and some of us, at least, are eating like kings!!

If we didn't already know (which we did), it was driven home to us this past week quite strongly: Taiwanese people resent paying any extra dollar for goods and services that is not entirely warranted, explicable and well telegraphed. The great Taiwanese TPapocalypse is a great example of this phenomenon!

Unbeknown to us, when we were at the supermarket last week, we should have bought some toilet paper. In fact, Cass even had a pack in her hand then put it back thinking we already had enough to carry. Little did we know that not only our local supermarket, but every shop the length and breadth of Taiwan has been stripped, fleeced and denuded of paper ever since that time. Apparently a world wide shortage of pulp paper has led to a price increase, and in the minds of the populace this is either unwarranted, inexplicable or poorly communicated, hence the panic buying: apparently, people have been exiting stores with trolleys stacked six feet high with TP.....all to save a few bucks!

Even though it is extremely amusing (I did post on Facebook a link to the article with the quip, "I nearly shit myself when I read this, then thought better of it"), it is vaguely annoying as well. I'd hate to see what would happen if something like water became scarce and rationed...scary!

We tried a new local Indian restaurant on Saturday night, Moksha, and it had a relaxed ambiance and fine food. It is situated just opposite the huge SOGO departmet store near our place, so it's very convenient to get to and is also right next door to another of our favorites, Pino the pizza restaurant. We choose relatively conservatively as it was our first visit, but the menu is extensive and different, with many chef's specialties, and specialties from the region of India they come from. Mine was spicy, yet slightly less salty than I expected....perhaps an acquired taste? Despite this, the meal was first class and we vowed to re-visit soon.

Meanwhile, Cass bought a short, wool skirt at Uniqlo and tried it on in store but one of those annoying security discs proved to be placed at an awkward point right where she was doing it up. As it turned out, it was too tight, so we decided to visit another store the next day down in the Zhongshan district, partly to change the skirt and partly to take advantage of the, unusually of late, stellar weather.

The area is characterized as being just before the Taipei main station stop and leads into that area with a bevy of restaurants, galleries and specialty clothing stores. For this reason, it's usually abuzz with people out shopping or dining or just taking in the sights and sounds, yet today it was curiously quiet. We guesssed that it is a combination of factors: the 2/28 holiday and lantern festival holidays were almost back-to-back this year, so some might have combined this with the weekend to give themselves an extended break out of the city.

We came back via the Zhishan district and while Cass traded up her skirt (the other store didn't have any), I relaxed in the garden on a slab of granite which overlooked a manicured garden with carefully tended vegetables. It's a strange little oasis nestled among all the high-rises, but a lovely area in the big city to sit, contemplate and relax on a sunny day.

I neglected to mention why we had a rather low-key weekend: Cass and I were both out on Friday night drinking, eating and socializing with different groups. I was with Wal and Shaun, and Cass joined her "Bookies" group for a night of fine fare at Darby's place and we both caught up on all the latest, news, intrigue and gossip!

I need to catch up with Cassy's reading....she's read a pile of books since I last commented or updated our reading links above. Photos: more and more Australian products are creeping on to shelves or promotions, the TP runout, Zhongshan and the MRT, and bucolic scenes in the concrete jungle.