A brick kiln

Tetsu and I had an "educational" outing yesterday.  I wonder if I've got my facts right.

A couple of hours' drive from us is a place called the Nogi Town Circular Brick Kiln.  It was built in 1881 and designed by a German engineer named Freidrich Hoffman.  The last three years have been spent reinforcing the structure and it has become one of Japan's Important Cultural Assets.  It is a 16 chamber kiln and produced 220,000 bricks every 23 days.  As of last year it is open to the public for sightseeing.

There were originally two kilns but one collapsed in the Great Earthquake in 1923.  This one has been preserved as closely as possible to its original state meaning that bricks were removed and replaced in the same order, the chimney is slightly tilted though now structurally secure.  Inside the kiln, four chambers have been internally reinforced while the other 12 now have steel structures and joints strengthening the ceilings and walls and arches.

Considering the cost of restoring the kiln, the 30 minute guided tour was only a dollar.  I guess it is pretty far out from anything else interesting in the area so there are not many tourists... Tetsu (and the other 6 people there for the same tour) read about the kiln in yesterday morning's newspaper.

First we were each handed a helmet.

 And then led to the kiln itself.

 I found the doors and arches and the brick laying fascinating.  This is my type of outing!

Of course the original chimney didn't have the steel support...  It is amazing it survived two major earthquakes!  (1923 and 2011)  I thought the support so artistic against the brick!

As an aside...  This Nogi Brick Kiln was also given the title of "Lovers Sanctuary"...  with which various structures around Japan that have survived more than 100 years are titled...  Supposedly lovers visit with the hope of having a long lasting relationship... Okay...  We were supposed to stand under the heart but that would have been much too embarrassing for us...

Back to the kiln.

This is what the chambers without visible reinforcement now look like.  Each door from the outside led to each chamber and the chambers would be temporarily walled off (they are connected in this photo).  One chamber held 14000 bricks and burning coals would be dropped down through the holes in the ceiling.

The chambers would be sealed off depending on which chamber was being fired (two at a time) and to pre-heat or cool adjacent chambers.

And vents directed the flow of heat and smoke.

And here is the inside of one of those vents....  That's why I was down on the ground.  Tetsu says I looked like a cat investigating a mouse-hole.

This is the way the visible structure support is in the rest of the chambers.

"CLUNK"  This was why the helmets were necessary!  Beware of steel beams!

Next we went upstairs to where laborers carried coals all day and night.

There were rails on both the inside and outside curves of the kiln and the platform we stood on moved along the rails so that workers could open up the coal holes and drop in coal from above.

 And one of the coal holes up close.

Sorry... me again.

I found the whole structure so beautiful.

After the tour, Tetsu and I wandered through the kiln a second time.

I guess other people find the kiln rather lovely too because there were numerous posters of famous people and groups posed with the brick background or standing in the doorways.  Tetsu is pointing to one of the doorways (Chamber 6) where an Asian pop group made a well known publicity shoot.  I assure you the pop group's photo turned out better than mine.  (They had the better model?)

Clunk again.

 All in all, a very interesting morning!

I doubt that any of my friends, Japanese or otherwise, have ever visited the Nogi Brick Kiln.  I guess you have to like bricks to appreciate it...

Nature "beautiful"?

Let's see...  How much nature do you want today? 

Before I get to the photos I've taken, I have to apologize to four or five people who left comments yesterday about Choco.  I accidentally deleted all of the comments from yesterday with one slip of a finger and though I've searched the Help section, there seems to be no way to bring the comments back.

I love dew drops.  Or maybe the leaves decorate themselves.  I just love the way the moisture dots the rims of the leaves in the early morning.

Dew on another wild flower.

Not all is particularly beautiful though it depends on the eye of the beholder...  I picked up a pure white feather when at the crosswalk this morning.  It probably belonged to a heron.  I popped the feather into my uniform pocket.  Pretty soon a group of children came flapping and chasing about because... heaven forbid, one boy had a bug on his hat and none of the other kids were brave enough to pick it off.

Oh, for heaven's sake... it is just a bug.  And a rather pretty one at that.

I picked it off the boy's hat and put it on my pocket.  The gasps and looks of horror I got from the children!  Touching a bug!

It gets worse...

A few minutes later I noticed a small tree near the crosswalk waving about.  Hmm...

A bit of a closer look and...

"SNAKE!  SNAKE!  Look there's a snake in the tree!"

That sent another group of children running to the school grounds.  I'm not too wild about snakes in trees either.  I know enough to keep my eyes on the ground for fear of stepping on one but I hadn't been aware that they were hanging over my head too!

Okay...  Scroll through this quickly if you do not like snakes!

As I say...  I watch where my feet step and near a river there was a "beautiful" snake skin.  A L-O-N-G- snake!  Choco seems to realize it is not a living snake as she can walk by it but she gave it a leery look each time we walked by it today.

One time when the kids were still little, I found a snake skin like this one and thinking that it might prompt an educational discussion I brought it home and put it on the entryway counter.  Tetsu, who hates snakes, was SOOO angry with me and made me promise never to bring home another one.  I've left this one by the river but I still think some child interested in science might like it...

And back to the generally accepted "beautiful" nature.  There is a field of wild flowers near the school.

 Definitely this type of nature is more soothing to look at!
 

Choco on the sofa

Here is proof that we are not very consistent doggy parents.

Choco is not allowed up on the sofa.  She ignores that rule if we are out of the room though and scampers back to the floor when Tetsu or I come into the room.

Saturday morning Tetsu INVITED Choco to join him on the sofa.  This is called seventh heaven for the dog.

Tetsu looks pretty happy too.  And instead of frowning on the cross messages he was giving her, I laughed and took their photo.  This is why Choco has never learned very much under our care...

Paw prints

I am slowly machine quilting the Dogs in Sweaters quilt.  I have no idea if I am ruining this quilt or putting it together into something cute.

The idea is cute...  But can I do it or not?  That is the question.

I remembered that I had once quilted cat paws in the border of a quilt... on a smallish scale.  I checked the Internet about dog and cat paws and determined there isn't a great difference (like no extra toes or something).  Anyway I will be lucky if my paws look like something more than blobs!

My idea was to first quilt in paw prints up and down the white sides of the quilt...  One strip each.  And I even made a quilting pattern by drawing one paw print on a piece of paper, stacking a lot of sheets under it and then sewing through it all in the unthreaded machine.  Yeah!  Lots of paw prints.

Next I laid the prints out in a row which was uninteresting.  So I added a bit more random movement.  And then I tried chalk pouncing the pattern onto the fabric...  which was unsuccessful.  My pink chalk didn't show up well, it brushed off before I got to the next motif etc.

Okay...  Maybe I can free hand quilt the paw prints... I did it freehand on the small border a few years ago.  I tried that too and those attempts were disasters!  I have a feeling I'll have to rip out a few of those beginning free hand paw prints and do them over.   This is what I mean when I wonder if I am just ruining a quilt!

Breathe deeply and think of another way...

I used a sharp pencil to "dot" around the "foot pad" of the pattern.  It makes an odd shape but at least gives me a idea of a direction and approximate placement of toes...  The paper pattern is in the foreground.  On the right hand side is just the foot pad shape penciled in.  In the back is the paw print just finished by the machine.

Here is another view...  two paw prints finished.  I was getting a hang of making toes by this point.

So now I have numerous paw prints meandering up and down and then back up the sides of the quilt.  I wonder if that will be enough quilting in the whole thing...  It is definitely not as dense as overall quilting but it will keep the sandwich from moving.

As I say... I may have to go back and redo a few of those paws but unless I get any other bright ideas (or suggestions from blog friends) I am heading into the final stretch.

The dogs have been quilted down already.  Does this need more quilting?

Going to the movies

Yesterday on a whim I called Marlene and asked her if she wanted to go to the movies.  We've never been to the movies together before and I had heard that Beauty and the Beast is at the local movie theater.  I doubted very much that Tetsu would go to see Beauty and the Beast with me and instead of going alone I called Marlene.

Yep, Marlene was up for it so I picked her up and we headed into town.  Marlene pointed out that Wednesday (the day before) was actually Women's Day with a discount.  I pointed out that we both now qualify as seniors so we already get the discount.  Should we be happy or sad about this fact?

At the automated booth we struggled through the Japanese to get to the digital page for buying the tickets when... oh dear...  Beauty and the Beast is showing in Japanese!  Of course we wanted to watch it in English!  But the only English showing was at 6:30 in the evening, not great for our day's plans...  We decided to check out other movies.

Hmmm...  Let's forgo looking at the Japanese movies.  We can always go see those with our husbands...  What else non-Japanese is available.  We looked at the posters and found a couple non-Japanese movies.  I checked the Internet for the story lines.  No...  We don't want to see racing cars on ice.  (I can't remember what the title of that was).  No...  We don't want to do Science Fiction.  It took us awhile to find the Internet summary for the movie titled Message on the Japanese poster as the title had been changed from Arrival, the original title...  The Japanese film industry does that occasionally.

How about this one?  Oops...  We almost bought tickets for a french movie.  Wouldn't that have been great...  Trying to watch a french movie with Japanese subtitles which neither of us are so great at reading!

So...  We went back to Beauty and the Beast... in Japanese, sigh...  At least we know the story line and have heard all the songs before IN ENGLISH!

The movie was nice... it probably would have been better hearing Emma Watson sing.

(picture from the Internet)

Marlene and I did enjoy sharing a box of popcorn and a candy bar while we watched! 

New screens

It is warming up around here (though today it is rainy) and the mosquitoes are starting to come out.  Choco is getting her heart worm medicine and Frontline (we have ticks too).  I will put up bug repellent disks in the cat house and near Choco's house.  For humans we may go the mosquito repellent incense route (traditional Japanese style) or the plug into the wall insect repellent gadget...

And when I opened the windows to let in some cool air this week, I noticed that there were a couple holes that the mosquitoes would just love to discover... so yesterday I went about repairing the screens.

This is one job that Tetsu doesn't believe is possible to do oneself but at least with that chore I am quite that handy-person.  I discovered that with the correct dollar-store tool and the proper materials, that I can change a screen in about 10 minutes.  By the way, I like black screens as the dark color DOESN'T interfere with the outside view.

I did the first screen out in the driveway but crawling around on the pavement was too hard on the knees this year (I could do it last year...)  For the second screen I came into the house.  Same difference as the screen goes.

Ta-da!  My bedroom window and my kitchen window have two new screens. 

 The view from the bedroom is just forest.

 The view from the kitchen is the road leading to the rice fields.

With the normally fogged glass window open the dog walkers coming down this road can see me cooking in the evenings... but I occasionally wave to people and I love my view.

I hope I've succeeded in keeping the mosquitoes at bay!