I’m off to Japan. Now. Soon. In the lounge at the airport fulfilling my basic requirement. Consume twice my bodyweight in food and coffee before getting on the plane. And then we’re Tokyo-bound. It’s a pilgrimage. I’m going to the place where my Sony Walkman was born in 1979 and my Suzuki 185. And although we travel regularly to far and exotic places, I’m really excited about Japan. And I don’t know why. Sushi, if I’m honest, I can take or leave. Though I’ll probably be taking a bit more than I’m leaving in the next couple of weeks. But its the toilets that really excite me. You hear so much about toilets that wash, dry and powder you, that caress you warmly and lovingly, that are so amazing, so wonderful, so… so Japanese, that the act of merely taking a piss can leave you in a heavenly, revitalised, invigorated place for the rest of the day. They sort out your yin from your yang and leave you in heightened feng shui.

Mel is looking forward to feeling ‘tall’ as she calls it. Elevated from her normally minuscule 5 foot (nearly)1 by the diminutive average of the indigenous peoples, she’s hoping to ‘tower’. In relative terms.

You travel round Japan on ‘bullet trains’. It’s what you do. I’ll keep you posted. We’re going to Kyoto (anagram of Tokyo; its like the town planners back in 1643 were only given 5 letters to choose from, and one of them was a repeat). And we’re going to Hiroshima. Which I find exceptionally exciting and I’ve rented a Geiger counter just in case.

But I have to leave Lila. For 2 whole weeks. And that’s the painful bit really. I’ll bring her back her first Samurai sword. Unless someone else buys her one in the meantime.

And I’m also away for the last 2 weeks of the football season. Almost as painful. 8 hours ahead, Tuesday’s Ajax match played at 4 in the morning Tokyo time. But amazingly, having lost so abysmally to West Ham on Saturday, Spurs have yet again dodged another bullet (train). Because Arsenal managed to lose again, heavily, appallingly, unconvincingly, morale-shatteringly and… ok, badly. 3 losses to ‘lower’ teams in 8 days. What is known, in Tottenham, as ‘the dream’. Then Chelsea and Man United had the inevitable and prayed for draw, leaving us still 3rd.

Sayonara

A xxxx