Heaven & Hell

Less than 24 hours after returning from Hokkaido & Aomori, the mental and physical top of the world, I've descended into one of Dante's icy hells.

My first night back in town I was driving in the rain to a friend's house for dinner. On the way, a Toyota Crown stopped suddenly in front of me; I hit the brakes, and skid into it.

The driver jumped out of the bruised car, stormed up to my door, and proceeded to yell at me in incomprehensible Japanese as I asked him if everybody was all right. The only bright side of the situation was the shock on his face when he realized I was a foreigner; then he started yelling again.

To complicate matters worse, there's been a miscommunication with my insurance company. Evidentially, they still have me insured for a car I threw away over eight months ago. Because of this conundrum, they're telling me I can't use my insurance policy.

Now, I have an irate Japanese redneck pretending he hurt his hip in the accident calling me several times a day demanding he get compensated for his car and hospital bills and a Japanese auto insurance company who I've been paying money to for three years telling me they're not gonna cover me.

If that's not enough, I had to teach twenty-eight English lessons last week as my penance for taking time off to go to Hokkaido and Aomori.

Dear God... have mercy on a poor soul that just got back from vacation and looked down for a split second to turn the Stones up on his car stereo.