Can't remember when I last wrote in here. Was it last week?

Anyway, you'll be interested to know that last week at the academy I was asked to review some vocabulary words with one of my classes. I don't often see this class, in fact I think I've only seen them one other time, maybe twice at the most, so I don't know them very well. But I was asked to help them learn how to pronounce these relatively new, to them, words.
So I was given the list and was reading through it to make sure that I could pronounce them when I came across a strange word. This word is easy to pronounce and is known to all English speakers I imagine but is one that you really wouldn't expect on a list of vocab words. This list included words like experience, collection, importance, symathized, and many other common and multi-sylabic words. But right smack in the middle of all these legitamite words was the word poop. Now, I have nothing against the word itself but it's rather strange when you are asked to say this word so that the class can repeat in unison. I was just glad no one asked me to explain what it meant.

Other than that, schools go pretty normally these days--if it can be said that there is anything normal about my schedule. Today I was called at 745am and told that there was something special going on and told that I didn't have to be there until 1020am. So I took my time getting ready, cleaned the place up a bit, and headed out in light rain at about 950.
When I got to school I had no idea which classes I would be teaching as no teachers came to tell me anything. So before my first class and then between classes I simply sat at my desk and waited for somebody to come and tell me something. Not much else you can do when you aren't sure which teacher you'll be with. As it happened, for all four classes I had today I was told what I would be doing in that class as the bell was ringing to start that class. Sure gives me a lot of time to get my thoughts together but as I've grown used to this I can't say I care too much. I come to this school not knowing what I'll be doing, the teachers don't have adequate time to inform me much of anything, and most of the students don't seem to care about learning anything anyway. It's a great situation in which all of us probably wish we were somewhere else.
Don't get me wrong though. The teachers are nice people, some of the students are fun, and there are great moments with laughter sometimes. Anyway, I have very mixed emotions on my days at Tokai.

Saturday I went to the hospital. I can hear the gasps now. "Oh my god, what is wrong with our favorite writer and explorer?" "Is he long for this world?" "Oh, how I wish I had told him how much he means to me!"
Ok, enough of all that.
You'll be pleased to now that the doctor did not give me six months to live. He didn't even give me 6 years to live. In fact, he didn't mention it which says to me that I might be around forever.
What he did give me though was a hole in my wrist. For a month or two now I have been keeping my eye on this rather strange bump I had on the inside of the left wrist. Right where I'd cut myself if I wished to take an early leave of this world and decided to do it that way. This bump was about half and inch long and about a quarter inch wide. It was under the skin, stable--in that I couldn't move it when I moved the skin--and kinda hard. It didn't hurt and for the month I was watching it it didn't seem to be growing so I wasn't too worried about it, but I did wonder about it.
So after mentioning it to Amy and Dilek, they decided that I should get it checked out. So Dilek, an excellent speaker of the language of this country, said she'd go with me to help me out. So Saturday we all went and the doctor explained that he thought it was something called a "ganglion cyst." He explained it was harmless and nothing to worry about. But to be sure of it, he said, he could stab into it with a needle and extract some of its contents.
Now, as Dilek and I were going to the hospital to simply make an appointment I wasn't mentally prepared to be stabbed and hestated a bit when he asked if I wanted to do it. The nurse laughed at my hesitation as did the doctor and Dilek. But it seemed a good time to get it over with so I went with it.
So I lied down on the bed and gave them my arm. As the nurse cleaned the area to be attacked I wondered about a local anesthetic when the doctor said and Dilek translated, "This is going to hurt a bit."
And it did. It wasn't unbearable but it did hurt. There were moments where I could hardly feel a thing other than pressure and there were moments were it hurt pretty bad. At one point the doctor said in English "No pain?" with rising intonation and I answered, "Nope, there's pain."
So after about a minute with a needle in my wrist I was turned loose and he showed me and Dilek what he had sucked out. It was a clear liquid with just a slight red tint. At this point he was showing it to us in the syringe but then he did something which I think kinda grossed both me and Dilek out. He grabbed a pan and from distance of about a foot pushed the liquid out of the syringe so that it oozed out of the needle and dropped into the pan. The consistency of the stuff was like a really thick snot and it hung from the end of the needle for a moment before it dropped into the pan. Dilek kinda laughed, "Oh, man, I didn't need to see that."
So that was that and the doctore explained that all was ok.
Only it wasn't ok. For some reason I was feeling sick. I'm still not sure what happened but as the doctor was asking us if we had any questions I felt the blood rush out of me head and started to get dizzy. Somehow I managed to not fall over and get out to the waiting room but as I was walking I was feeling that I wasn't going to make it. So I sat next to Amy and immediately she and Dilek realized I wasn't ok.
I think that a combination of factors were at play here: I'd had a few the night before and stayed up late, I hadn't eaten breakfast and had drank only coffee in the morning, and then all of this at the hospital. Anyway, I felt I would be ok if I could just rest and get something to drink so Amy ran down and got me a sports drink out of a vending machine (gotta love this country for the vending machines) and within about five minutes I was feeling well enough to walk down to the third floor to pay the fee.
In the end all is well and I only have a small bandage I'm supposed to wear for a week. And on top of all that I only had to pay about $10 for the whole experience. The Japanese health care system is a good one and as an employee of the country I am privy to it.
So, no cancer for me and I will live to write a little more for you.