I am not a zombie but I may be a man.

Speaking of zombies--has the motherf-ing apocalypse come to America, or what? I try to read the news as much as possible (and to kill the time honestly) and between the pandemic pandemonium and the emotional economic effusion, it seems like I am going to step off the plane into the apocalypse. It is enough to make anyone other than me question their decision to return from a small island nation with a history of pandemic exemption (re-1918). To be fair, they mostly just close their borders. That is a lot easier when you are an island the size of Japan with a...ah, let us say, more docile population than America. Also, more hypochondriacal. I swear, it has been mentioned every single day here in teacher's meetings as an actual item in the agenda. I also get emails from my supervisor about it. Seriously--every time it is mentioned, every Japanese person in the room sneaks a glance at me as if it reads 'AMERICAN, THEREFORE POSSIBLY ENDEMIC SWINE DISEASE LOOK THE FUCK OUT!!!!!!!' on my forehead. Or...maybe, considering today's concerned questions, they are feeling sorry for me. Something along the lines of 'Oh, poor Keito. She and her family are going to die real soon.'

On a far less serious note, I am looking pretty good these days. I am a bit less fat (don't start, Kat) and a bit more fit. And not just because I nearly killed three people on an 11km ぐらい hike up a mountain (? Not if you are west coast person...) yesterday. However, it is the swimming everyday that is really changing my body....and maybe not in the most attractively feminine way. When I was training for the marathon and running 15-20 miles a day, my body changed in definite ways. Now that I am swimming this often, I am seeing some real weird changes, too. Most notably, my arms. I am now going to give you a completely unflexed view of my upper arm/neck area:

WTH is going on up there? I also took a flexed photo, but I don't want to post it, because it seriously makes me look like a body builder. And I don't want hermaphroditic Lady Gaga-esque rumors circulating among the 50 people who read this blog (whoo! 50! I know you are just here for pictures of my disheveled bed in the background.)
Here is another thing bothering me--my new JTE (for those of you with no background in the Japanese school system--everyone gets bizarrely shuffled around nearly every school trimester and could end up teaching anywhere and anything from one term to the next.) has decided that whenever I correct her pronunciation she can say the following: "Oh, well, maybe in America they say that, but in England don't they say it like me?" To whit, I say: "Um, I suppose it is possible, but I truly doubt it." And I have visions of teaching the children the cockney accent. I don't speak with a strong American accent anyhow. Even if I did though, I would not be disposed to believing the English speak so disparately from the Americans as to render their words close to unrecognizable to us. To my English readers out there though, just in case I am wrong, please email me if you really do pronounce braille as 'braru.' I might be wrong.