And There was Fish

SO. Here I am at last. I've come crawling back to you, dear readers. I have somethings that I have need to get off my chest and, well, you're here and, uh, listening? Gah, never mind. Skipping the intro; let's jump into the plot.
Of late I have been cooking a lot more than I have in the past. Now finding a restaurant with the food you like is a challenge. Finding the kind of food you want to cook with entirely different brands and unknown features PLUS everything written in a foreign language... yeeaaah. For me though, it hasn't proved to be too great an ordeal. Sure, I can't tell soy sauce from teriyaki, but at least I can tell the difference between pork and chicken. Conditions being what they are, I have yet to go beyond the simple level of cooking while I am here. That may or may not be a barrier I mean to breach. In the mean time, I content myself with stir-fry and rice with an egg cooked in. Appetizing and healthy in one good meal. I can live with that. As an addendum to this spiel, let me say something obvious. Japanese love rice. Their words for breakfast, lunch and dinner all contain the word for it. Simple grocery stores have Cost Co.-esque bags of it. It's cheap, it's available and, for any one one a budget, it beats instant ramen.
Last weekend, I made a trip out to Osaka with a Japanese friend to see the aquarium there. I won't go over much of the details. It struck my as a basic aquarium. Settings for the Arctic, river and sea creatures. One huge tank, filled with sharks, whale sharks, rays, what else was there? Oh, right. Penguins and dolphins, seals and otters. If it lives in the water and people want to see it, it was probably there. Now, the aquarium was built adjacent to this shopping center that also had a giant ferris wheel. And when I say giant, I'm not kidding. It is one hundred and twelve meters tall, which roughly equates to 370 feet, and it takes fifteen minutes to go around from start to finish. The aquarium offers a deal to those who want to see fish and what the world looks like from up there. It's only a hundred yen off, but hey, a penny saved, right? My companion had coerced me into getting into a clear box, one which you could see through at any angle. The line for it is a bit more time consuming because they're only four on the whole wheel, and since each box takes fifteen minutes to get around, well, you do the math.
Now, let me say this. I do not like heights. That's not to say i'm absolutely terrified of them buuut... when you find yourself precariously perched on a ledge and look down... Now, imagine that, but in a box, suspended near four hundred feet in the air, and even the floor is transparent. Yaaaay... I survived with my pride in tact. My friend whined a bit more than me but nothing about the whole affair left either of us embarrassed. A good trip all in all, I should say.
That is all I can think to put down for the moment. I have a couple of things that need attending to, but I have more to say for sure. Check back some time Wednesday or Thursday as I should have another post up but until then.