Rain, Rain Stay Away!

Hello everyone. We are gearing up for our games this weekend. It's been a busy week, trying to fit in some personal time and sightseeing with our practice schedule, which is demanding.

I just got back from the stadium for set-up and practice. We normally use two fields other than our stadium for practice, so we had to be there really early today to set-up the stadium for the teams' official practices today. Four teams play at three sites every weekend, so this is our only weekend to host this year.

We are playing at Edogawa Baseball Stadium, so we set up fences and benches for the conversion to a softball field. Unfortunately the forecast is for rain tomorrow, so that may change our schedule. We are supposed to play one game at 1:00 on both Saturday and Sunday, but we may have to play Monday if we get rained out tomorrow. It seems like it's been a long time since our first game (almost two weeks), so I'm anxious to play & hoping it doesn't rain.

We haven't had much time for anything other than practice during the past two weeks, but we have had a little time off. I was able to go to a local pro baseball game with our interpreter Miyako, catcher Natalie, her friend Kylie and my boyfriend Sean. We were at Meiji Jingu Stadium to see the Yomiuri Giants play the Tokyo Yakult Swallows. It was a lot of fun, and interesting to see another sport played in Japan. Even though the Swallows were the home team, the Giants are located just across town, so both had many fans in attendance. Final Score: Swallows 6, Giants 2.

I also found time to make a trip to Asakusa, which is located on the other side of Tokyo from us. It is well known for a large temple called Senso-ji. There were many shops selling pottery, pictures, boxed sweets and snacks, fabrics and other souvenirs. I'm hoping to do some more sightseeing next week, since we may have a couple days off, depending on the weather this weekend. We have one more 2 week break between games, but after that we will have games every weekend.

Ok, well, it's time to run to dinner. I have to say that the food has been amazing since I've been here. Everything has been really good, and thankfully the portions are small. We practice to much that I really don't think it makes a difference anyway. I stay pretty active!

Thanks for reading. Will let you know how the weekend goes. Hope the rain stays away!

Angela