It’s hard to believe, but I’ve been back in California for a week already. During the past seven days, I’ve had some time to reflect upon things here a bit. Here are a random assortment of thoughts:

• Jet lag — I still have it. I’m sleepy all day long, but when I lie down in my bed at night I can’t fall asleep. It’s frustrating and I really need to hurry up and adjust my sleep schedule already.
• Brrr — It’s so frickin’ cold. For some reason, my parent’s home in California is colder than my apartment in Tokyo. I’m freezing all the time here and my mom keeps telling me to put on a sweater.
• Vroom — Driving is fun. I hadn’t driven for the past nine months, so it’s exciting (but at the same time, I feel lazy for driving everywhere).
• Make the voices stop! — It’s weird being able to overhear other people’s conversations. In Japan, I usually have to make an effort to keep up with what people are saying in Japanese, so it’s easy to block out conversations taking place around me. Here, I don’t have the luxury of doing that and have realized that people are having pretty banal conversations out there.
• Wide load — Americans are kinda big, eh? I don’t just mean the seriously obese ones either; everyone seems to have a bit more pudge than I’m used to. Or maybe I’m just a skinny, pencil neck loser. Anyhow, when did wearing low-rise jeans with shirts that barely reach past the navel come into style? That roll-of-fat-hanging-over-the-pants look certainly isn’t very flattering.
• White sneaks — Have middle-aged white guys always worn white running shoes with jeans? Am I some day going to wake up with an overwhelming desire to buy all-white Reebok shoes to wear with some Levi 501’s? My God, I hope not.
• “Do you have this in medium?” — It’s great being able to talk to salespeople in English. Back in Tokyo I can make simple inquiries in Japanese, but anything more than that requires more effort than it’s worth. That said, however. . .
• “What do you want?” — Many salesclerks here are impolite. I haven’t seen too many that are overtly rude, but the disinterested attitude and the lack of eye contact leave much to be desired. I hate to break it to you, but working at the mall doesn’t make you cool.
• Supermarket — Holy crap, supermarkets here have everything! A trip to Safeway is like a visit to an amusement park. I must look like an idiot wandering through the aisles with a slack-jawed expression of wonder on my face.
• VH1 — Wow, when did VH1 start showing entertaining programming? The last time I watched it, it was like the Michael Bolton and Celine Dion channel. Do they even show music videos anymore?

Anyway, as you can see, my time here hasn’t exactly been put to use in a very productive way, but hey, what do you expect? I’m on vacation.