Doing IT for the 5 of the 6 years I've been in Japan; I can speak pretty well. Enough to work in an office, but my reading is slow and painful.

I'm intermediate at the moment; I can say and write some pretty complex stuff :

"that mail distribution has failed to deliver, recipients are returning mails, I will investigate !"

Though sometimes in regular conversation I forget common words like "dinosaur" or "hammer" or "shoelace" so have to resort to things like "ummm the rope you use to tie shoes" or "the big lizards from long ago" making me sound a bit odd...

Trees talking to each other, waiting.

Very ominous wind swept trees overhead.

Pattern shifting bark on a tree.

It was a particularly harsh cold winters day today. As work was winding up for Christmas I've been franticlly busy, so I went to a more secluded park at lunchtime for a snooze. It had only felt like yesterday I went to the same park in the balmy summer heat for a similar reason. (Not that I like to make a habit of spending my lunch hours snoozing in public parks I hope you understand).Though with today's rest, I couldn't sleep, it was far too cold, there were too many crows squabbling over garbage and the park had an isolated, haunted feel about it. The trees in this park have a fascinating bark texture and pattern; slivers, grays, blacks and dark greens, just looking at the bark long enough and you could see a million and one different shapes and patterns emerge. I always think in colder weather everyday things gain mass, the trees didn't look like wood but grizzled pieces of iron. The park has a small 土俵 (どひょう - Arena) and I pictured for a bit the trees were old men muttering to each other waiting for wrestlers that would never turn up in weather as cold as this.

That was an extended winter blues haiku I *think*