Japanese Surgeon's Daily Life

My Bed 3

　　My bed was delivered yesterday. I tried to lie on the various beds in the furniture store the other day and I selected this, a little hard one with a simple frame. The frame hasn't drawers and there is a space under the bed. The reason why I chose this frame was for the robotic cleaner, Roomba, to work smoothly. As I expected, the Roomba came to move smoothly in my room.
　　The hardness of the mattress was a nice fit for me. I was able to get a good sleep last night. It was very easy to get up from the bed. It would be helpful when I get older to avoid accidents from orthostatic hypotension.
　　However, I have one thing to solve. I wonder where I can put my things around my bed. I can buy bedside tables, but I would sometimes drop my things from the table being half asleep, but anyway, I should have had my bed much earlier.

(Vocabulary)
being half asleep 寝ぼけて

5th Anniversary

　　Matsuyama Century Lions Club, which I belong to, marked its 5th anniversary today, and its members, including me, got together and enjoyed dinner in a famous Chinese restaurant. Under the present situation of the pandemic, we didn't invite any guests but we spent a happy time, feeling that something is missing on the other hand. The restaurant was careful to strictly observe all the rules against the pandemic, and we had to put an end to the party in 2 hours. However, the Tokyo Olympics is just around the corner, and I feel that something good is coming up.

Patrol of the Blast Furnace

　　I conduct the workplace patrol as one of my tasks. I take on the health care management of several business units now and I patrolled a casting workshop last night. It has some blast furnaces which are driven by electricity in the nighttime as the electricity's cost is lower in the nighttime than in the daytime.
　　The employees throw metals of various sizes into the furnace using the ceiling cranes. It was very interesting to see the metals melting gradually. On the other hand, I realized how hard their work was. Even with the doors of the workshop open to take fresh night air in, the temperature around the employees who operate the furnaces was considerably high. Some workers, who remove the foreign matter floating on the surface of the melted metal, wore protection suits which prevent the workers from the heat and getting burns by the splash of melted metal. The WBGT meter indicated the extremely dangerous score.
　　By the company rules, I wasn't allowed to take pictures of the workshop and I'm sorry not to upload pictures in this entry.

(Vocabulary)
blast furnace 高炉, 溶鉱炉
matter [U](専門) 物質; [U](専門) 膿(うみ), 目やに
organic/vegetable/waste/solid matter 有機物［植物質，老廃物，固形物］

English as Means

　　The Japanese media keep quiet about the origin of the Wuhan virus. It's very weird. They might be under the influence of the Chinese Communist Party. I often check international news sites, like the BBC, FOX, CNN, Frankfurter Allgemeine if I have time. In those media, the recent hottest topics are about the origin of the virus, while the Japanese media ignore them. I don't feel so much difficulty in reading news items and I really and deeply realize that I was lucky to have learned English. I can get various information from all over the world.

 

Weaning Ceremony

　　My wife flew into Tokyo this morning leaving me at home. If I can, I'd like to follow her, but I wasn't able to make my work schedule adjustments. Our first granddaughter was born in March, and she turned 100 days. There's a tradition to hold a weaning ceremony called "Okuizome" in Japanese at about 100 days after her birth. It celebrates the end of feeding milk and the start of eating the same food as adults, though actually milk feeding continues along with mushy pulpy food.
　　Sea bream, prawns, rice boiled with red beans, ,,,those are foods which are believed to be auspicious. They are laid out just before the baby, and each of them are touched to her lips. It's just a ritual, but our granddaughter is stepping one after another on the way of growth. This is our sheer joy.

(Vocabulary)
wean〈赤ん坊・動物の子〉 を離乳させる
wean sb off/from sth ＜人＞に＜…＞を徐々にやめさせる
She wanted to wean him off junk food. 彼女は彼がジャンクフードを食べるのを徐々にやめさせたかった．
be weaned on sth 幼いころから＜…＞に慣れ親しむ
the generation that was weaned on TV 幼いころからテレビに慣れ親しんだ世代
mushy どろどろした, (粥(かゆ)のように) 柔らかい
pulpy 〈食べ物などが〉 軟らかな, どろどろの

Indian Spicy Curry

　　My wife is out now attending the weaning ceremony of our first grandchild. It's the chance I was waiting for. For what? It's spicy Indian Curry day! I decided to have dinner in a nearby Indian restaurant. My wife doesn't like spicy foods, but I love those. We can't go along with this point, so today is my day.

Vaccination Leave

　　I got a vaccination yesterday. I have a general fatigue today. I'm not febrile, but I feel weary anyway. I have a regular appetite luckily and finished breakfast as usual. Then I began reading "Into the Wild", but stopped due to listlessness. I've spent meaningless hours on the sofa until noon. I did almost nothing, but I got hungry. I watched two movies on Netflix in the afternoon over a light snack. I don't like spending time like these, but I had no other way to kill time. Today was the day of no advancement.

(Vocabulary)
listless (疲れて) やる気のない, 無気力な
meaningless 意味のない, 無益な

Inoculation

　　I got the 2nd shot of the vaccination against the Wuhan virus today. As I received an e-mail from the company to inform the employees of the vaccination leave, I took a day-off tomorrow in advance. When I got the injection, I didn't feel so much pain, but as it's getting dark, my left shoulder, the deltoid muscle to be precise, started to be sore. Even turning over in bed is difficult due to the pain. It was a nice judgement to take a day-off tomorrow.

(Vocabulary)
sore (傷・かぶれなどで) 痛い ひりひりする, (筋肉痛などで) 痛い
sore eyes 痛む目

 

Care of My Parents

　　Today was taken for the care of my parents.
　　My mother has a serious dementia and is receiving good care in a nursing facility. A physician regularly visits the facility and takes care of inhabitants. As my mother broke her eyeglasses accidentally the other day, my brother and I took her to an eye doctor for the examination and the prescription of the eyeglasses. What she talks about was ambiguous and it was not easy to check her eyesight, but finally I got the prescription of her eyeglasses.
　　Then we took her to another facility in which my father is admitted. He is bedridden, but his cognitive ability is still maintained. Due to the pandemic, they weren't allowed to see each other face to face and their meeting was via iPad. Their meeting was after an interval of more than 6 months. To our grief, my mother didn't remember my father. Her symptom is called "mottled dementia". "Mottled" means, two phases of the normal and impaired cognition vary from time to time. The moment when she saw her husband would be in the impaired cognition phase. Her attitude would disappoint my father. My brother and I thought that it was our fault to take her to my father's facility.
　　After I sent her to her nursery home, I dropped in at my regular optician and asked to make her glasses from the prescription.

(Vocabulary)
mottled dementia まだら痴呆

 

Morning Meeting at a Manufacturing Scene

　　One of my tasks as an occupational doctor is the patrol of workplaces. Some of them are offices for paperwork, others are for manual labors. I usually patrol workplaces between 10 to 15:00 hours, but I did it early morning today, as I'd like to see how the morning meeting is in the manual labor workplaces. Their work hours are from 8 to 16:45 including 45 minutes' lunch break. Just at 8:00 o'clock, the radio gymnastics started. I'm not sure, but this gymnastics would be Japan's distinctive custom. The scene where I was was a crane manufacturing workshop and the leader gave a short briefing about the task of the day, then the attendees started brainstorming about possible accidents. I admired their efforts to avoid industrial injuries.
　　I don't remember when exactly, but 5 or 6 years ago, when I got on board the Diamond Princess, there was a gymnastics option in the tourist attraction early in the morning. During the exercises, the radio gymnastics abruptly started. Some Americans were surprised to see the Japanese do gymnastics in the same way, saying "Are all of you the same tour group?" No, Japanese people learn radio gymnastics during compulsory education. This might become a mark indicating that he/she has grown up in Japan.

 

Kitchen Car

　　The sales in the kitchen car is getting popular in Japan. Under the pandemic of coronavirus, getting together in the bad-ventilated space became strictly restricted. Consequently, taking food out became preferable. The following pictures show a kitchen car and a flame in it. It is of a famous grilled chicken chain. I'll take their food for today's lunch.

My Bed 2

　　This entry is continued from the previous entry. I occupy one room in my house as my private room, but when I sleep, I move to another room, which is designed in a Japanese traditional style. My futon is laid out in this room. Fundamentally the futon must be folded and put into the closet every morning and it is laid out every evening. This make the room enabled to be used for other purposes than the bedroom. In my case, however, I leave it as it is. My wife hates this condition. She awfully loves cleanliness. My daughters are for her and completely against me. They seemed to keep me off from the Japanese style room no matter what.
　　I came to buy a bed in the long run and the bed is set to be placed in my private room. My wife and I visited a furniture shop, which has overwhelmingly lots of beds. I didn't decide which to buy, and proposed to get back and come again later, but my wife didn't allow me to retreat. When the salesperson knew the reason why I unwillingly had to buy a bed, she looked so happy with my story. Anyway I bought one and it will be delivered on 26th. I'll show you my bed later.

 

No Stock

　　I've sometimes written about a wine importer based in Osaka. A sales person of the company, whose main purpose is to find a new market in my hometown, drops in at my house about twice a year while he is in my hometown to sell wines to me. I'm a good customer for him over recent years. However, he wasn't able to come to my house this spring due to the restriction from the pandemic. Consequently, my wine stock ran out. As you may agree with me, you can't know the taste of wines by its labels or prices. That's why I make it a rule to get wines from him after tasting.
　　There's no other way and I got some bottles of wine at a nearby department store. The following picture shows one of them, which is produced in Kofu in Japan. It was not bad, but not the best for me. Finally I ordered the same wines online as I bought last time from my salesman.

https://kumo.typepad.jp/weblog/2020/11/wine-tasting-.html

 

Fun Driving

　　Today was a day-off and I went out for a drive to a restaurant located in the mountainous area. It was about an hour drive from my house. My car has no engines and is driven by electricity, which means the inside is very quiet. You can even hear the birds' sound during driving. Additionally, the car-driving assisted by its autopilot function was unspeakably comfortable.

My Bed 1

　　I've never used my own bed whole in my life. Are you surprised? When I stay at a hotel, I use it naturally, but I've never owned one myself. That doesn't mean I hate a bed and I'd rather like it than otherwise. The reason is very simple. A futon, Japanese traditional bedding, is usually laid out directly on the tatami mats. If I explain this condition with the western items, the surface of the bed and the floor will be at the same level. This make it possible to put my things around me when I'm on my futon. For example, books which I'm reading and my table lamp stand on my right side and a tissue box, a small waste basket, and a memo pad and something to write with on the left, and sometimes, drinks at the top to avoid spilling by my rolling over.
　　Imagine the scene. My wife says, "You are sleeping in the center of the garbage." My daughters also say that ironically. However, this situation is very handy to me. I can reach them anytime when I need to. You might think that I leave them as they are for a long time, but no. I move all those things around me onto the futon every Monday morning before work for my robotic cleaner. It automatically works at 18:00 hours every Monday just before my coming back. Don't you think it's wonderful?

(Vocabulary)
bedding (集合的に) 寝具; (動物が寝るための) 寝床, 敷きわら

Tokyo Olympics

　　Do you know about what you call the lost 1940 Tokyo Olympics? This year falls on the 2600th year from the foundation of Japan. Japan seemed to have been in the midst of joy, but in vain. The reason why this Olympics was withdrawn was the conflict against China. China launched their first-ever atomic bomb experiment on the opening day of the 1964 Tokyo Olympics. Then the Wuhan virus this time. I have no words to express the cruelty of the Chinese Communist Party, thinking of what they are doing to the Tibetans, Mongolians, Uighur people, and other minority groups.
　　I hope the 2020 Tokyo Olympics would be held this year even in the condition of the restricted version. I'm dreaming that people of the future will assess it like it was the start of the rebirth of the new world.