Post-contract traveling

This morning I had several thoughts, but by the time I arrived at school I could only really remember one. It snowed last night, about six inches, and it’s supposed to snow on and off this whole week without getting warm. Which means, I might actually have a white Christmas. I was trying to remember the last time I had a white Christmas—maybe one of those two times in Virginia, but before that I was probably in elementary school. I think in Russia I only had a white New Years’. Not that I really care about a white Christmas, as it will probably end up being a completely normal working day. I might go to the bar if someone will come with me or if I’m feeling particularly lonely like I was last year. It does look like I will have a decent lunch unlike last year—some kind of mayo tofu stir fry.

This weekend was another sacrificed to Stardew Valley. I did get ramen with Big D, went shopping, did some laundry, and even mixed up some cookie batter. But on the whole it was very unproductive. At this point in the game though, I only have three people to befriend and four objects to find, aside from which the game is pretty much just harvesting, selling, and expanding, so not very demanding. I’m thinking that after today or tomorrow I will probably just play casually.

I bought a game called Astroneers which looks really cool, but the frame rate is so low on my computer that it’s unplayable. I decided to keep it regardless with the idea that I will get a new computer before long. My current one turned four years old a few weeks ago. I decided that I will buy a new one after I secure a job at home.

Relevant to that, I’m thinking about buying my flight ticket as it looks like the prices might be going up. The earliest I would have to leave would be on Tuesday, March 24^th, but since the eikaiwa teachers have to work that day and I’m sure that they won’t have to leave until Wednesday, I should be okay to stay that long too. But where would I go? Kyoto is probably where I should go the most, but it’s really busy at that time and I’m not really interested. I haven’t been to the Kansai area at all, but there isn’t anything in particular that I want to see.

It looks like the cheapest ticket price is $680, and the soonest I could get that price would be on Monday the 30^th, which was when I was thinking about leaving anyway. I think ideally I would take my bike by train to the Kansai area, bike across Shikoku, and then finish in Hiroshima. If I did that though, I would only have three, maybe four days to travel and then sell my bike, which would be quite tight. On the other hand, if I can’t do biking, I don’t know what I would do between Wednesday and Monday. Actually, I could probably stay in Shiojiri or do local trips until Friday and then take a weekend trip somewhere (Takasaki, Karuizawa, or Yamanashi would all be fine), which would be chill. In conclusion, I need to work out where and when I’m going to sell my bike, which determines whether my plan is feasible or not. If I do the biking trip and end up behind schedule, I’ll just take the train to make up the difference.