みなさんこんにちは！

暖かかった春も終わり暑さも感じるようになってきましたが、このまま夏！

というわけにはいきません。そう、今年も梅雨の時期がやってきました。

四季の変化で景色が変わっていくのは日本の良いところだと思っていますが、

恵みの雨が降るということで大切な時期とはわかっているのですが、どうも

この梅雨の時期は苦手です。空もどんよりして気持ちも沈んでしまいそうです。

しかし、子供たちはやっと始まった学校で疲れているにもかかわらずハローズにも

元気にやってきてくれます。僕たち講師もその元気さに負けずに一緒に学んでいきたいと

思います！

学校が再開されて約10日ほどがたったのではないでしょうか。

コロナの感染拡大にともない中断や延期になっていたスポーツイベントも

無観客の状態ではありますが順に始まりますね。

ヨーロッパではすでにサッカーが始まっている国もあり

日本人選手もすでにぷれーしているようです。

サッカー好きの僕としては

待ちに待ったサッカーが再開ということで

うれしい限りです。

みなさんこんにちは！

休校が解除され、ハローズの通常授業も再開して一週間が経ちました。久しぶりにみなさんに会えて、授業ができてすごく楽しかったです！

みなさんはこの新しい生活様式に慣れてきましたか？学校に行けるようになったとはいえ、今までとは全く違いますよね。人との距離を保つ、マスクを常にする、外に出たら消毒する、そういったことが当たり前ですよね。

以前と真逆になったのは食べ物のシェアに対する考え方だと思います。例えば友だちと飲み物の回し飲みや、鍋を囲むのを嫌がる人がいますよね。人が使った箸が出し入れされた鍋を食べるなんて無理！という人。今までは、すごく潔癖症な人だなと思っていましたし、どちらかと言えばマイノリティ(自分の感覚ですが…)だと思っていましたが、今は全くもって反対で、鍋なんて進んでしたくないですよね。それが普通の感覚になりました。

潔癖症（と思われていた）人たちの考え方が当たり前になりました。

今まで通りの生活に戻ることはないと言われています。まだまだたくさんこの新しい世界で慣れなきゃいけないことが僕にはありそうです。

I love my laptop. It was a graduation gift from my parents, back in 2016. It’s my first computer with an SSD, plus it has half a terabyte of storage – twice as much as my previous computer. This laptop was one of my favorite companions post graduation and accompanied me through good times and bad. I customized her liberally, rebuilt my entire file storage system, learned new skills, and generally enjoyed spending time messing about and living life. So you can imagine how distraught I was when the battery capacity started collapsing.

It started in February. The battery’s endurance suddenly decreased. I certainly couldn’t go around without the power cord on me anymore, which was annoying, but not a catastrophic loss. The battery capacity decreased from three hours to one, which is still bearable if inconvenient. Still, I knew there was a problem and that I’d need to replace it. This isn’t my first laptop, nor is it the first battery I’ve had to replace.

However, I was unable to find an appropriate replacement battery on Japanese sites. That was okay, though! Because my parents were coming to visit in March, so if I ordered it on an American site, I could get cheap shipping, and then my parents would bring it over when they visited. And, even better, my dad, who’s an IT guy, could do the actual replacing.

Things soon went awry, however. Because corona shut down all travel in March. So my parents never arrived. And the battery I’d bought sat unused in my parents’ living room. Shipping restrictions disallowed them from sending it to me themselves, so it would continue to sit in the meantime. We figured that was okay, though. My current battery wasn’t a catastrophic loss yet; if I moderated my computer usage, I should be able to stretch it until I visited home in August.

We didn’t make it to August. After a single session trying out Zoom on my laptop, the damage became catastrophic. It wasn’t going to last until August. Nobody was visiting me from America anytime soon; I wasn’t going back to America anytime soon; and shipping companies refused to ship the already purchased battery. My family couldn’t ship it themselves, but we’d bought it online, so clearly companies could. Meaning the only way I was getting that battery to Japan was by buying yet another one and having it shipped here directly for an exorbitant cost. Plus, y’know, the cost of re-buying the battery.

Third time’s the charm, I guess, because I was able to re-buy the battery from a different company that DID offer shipping to Japan. The price of shipping was almost three times that of the battery, but it arrived pretty quickly!

Of course, then I had a whole new problem: installing it.

The previous plans involved my dad doing it. He’s good at that sort of thing, and the last time my battery failed, he did the install. However, now I had a battery and no dad. So what to do?

I seriously considered taking my computer to a repairman and paying who knows how much to have him do the work. However, sinking even more money into this project wasn’t appealing. I also considered asking one of my tech-savvy coworkers to do it and paying him for his work, but everybody was very busy with Zoom and I didn’t want to impose on their time. So I decided it was time to start adulting and replace the battery myself.

My dad was kind enough to send a YouTube video of a guy explaining the entire process step by step. It seemed feasible, but I was missing a screwdriver. I sank even more money into this whole endeavor to buy one of the correct size. And then one Saturday morning, I sat down and opened up my laptop. The battery replacement was straightforward and not difficult at all. Additionally, with my computer opened up, it was the perfect opportunity to clean out any dust or other debris that had gotten inside the casing. Then I closed her up, and cleaned the keyboard, screen, and ports from the outside. She was beautiful.

And moreover, she turned on. And charged! After all that turbulence, the adventure ended happily.

みなさん、こんにちは。

最近ぐんと気温が上がってきて、

車の乗り降りで汗をかくようになりました。

これまでいろいろな楽器を演奏する人に会ってきましたが、

ピッコロをメインで吹いているという人に今まで会ったことがありません。

みなさんはどうでしょうか？

ところで、私はライフワークとして植物を育てるのが好きです。動物や昆虫など生物の飼育も好きです。

今日写真におさめた２つのものの英語を紹介してみたいと思います。

ひとつはパクチーです。

パクチーは英語では”coriander”です。

もうひとつはおたまじゃくし。

おたまじゃくしは”tadpole”と言います。

おたまじゃくしは川に行って素手で捕まえてきました。

コリアンダーはとっても簡単に育てられますが買おうとすると売っている場所を探さなければなりません。

エスニック料理やパスタなどに添えるとおいしいです。そしてビタミンCも豊富に含んでいるらしいです。

ただ、食べ合わせを間違えるとカメムシの匂いを連想させますので気を付けましょう！！それでは！