arakawa riverview

Thank goodness

Was studying on Sunday, as I am wont to do and as mentioned in last week’s post. Also mentioned in the post last week was that I am getting a little worried as I couldn’t find the angle to hang the dissertation on. Well, that is now past tense as yesterday, luckily, finally, I got my epiphany, that moment of insight where suddenly you can see the form, see the structure, see what it is you are going to do and, more importantly, just how you are going to be able to do it. I’m just a tad relieved by this, as you may have guessed, as I was getting quite worried about the whole dissertation thing. I won’t bore you with the details as I am sure that you are not really that interested and am hoping that I might write something more interesting soon (not sure if I can help with that one this week, I’m afraid), but suffice it to say that, after having come through the other side, I can look back and think that it is so obvious that how on earth could I miss it? But I did, for quite a while, but no longer – now I can see where to go, what research needs to be done, who I need to research and what sort of thing to ask them. Phew!

Otherwise it was a quiet week. The boss was away on hols, which was good, but it meant that the MD came to me with questions, rather than the boss. This is not good as the MD is thick, doesn’t listen, speaks without thinking, says yes to the CE and no to everyone else and is generally crap and for whom nothing is ever her fault. And no, I don’t like her either. Luckily she only came to me with one question over the budget, for which I gave her the correct answer, which she didn’t like, then realised there was no way around what I told her so appropriated my answer as her own idea and told the CE. No response yet from the CE but if he doesn’t like what he hears you can be sure that the answer will be appropriated back to me with alacrity. But the boss is back now so the deflector shield is back in operation.

In the news it seems another of the royals is going to have a baby. This is interesting for me only the sense of the succession, which I may have mentioned over the recent weeks. As you know currently only men may become head of state of Japan i.e. Emperor (obviously as a woman cannot be Emperor only Empress, but currently that cannot happen was what I meant). This is an issue as there are no male children ready after the current crown prince accedes the throne – he only has a daughter, princess Akiko, and that one was hard enough to come by, if the tabloids are to be read. Anyway the Kool Kid has proposed changing the law to allow women the top job, for which the country has become divided – most people think it is a good idea, whilst a bunch of bigoted, misogynistic old farts who happen to be vocal and quite powerful (including members of the royal family) disagree. Anyway it was announced last week that another member of the royal family is now preggers, I think it is the wife of one of the crown prince’s brothers, perhaps. So now everyone, including the Kool Kid, has said ‘whoa there, maybe we have been a bit hasty in saying we’ll change the constitution as the couple might have a boy’. That the princess is only 6 weeks pregnant (i.e. in prime ‘problem’ territory) seems not to have occurred to anyone. Also, no one seems to have asked the crown prince his views on his daughter being bumped out of the way, or indeed if it is constitutionally possible, seeing as the unborn prince/princess-ling is not in direct, oldest male heir to the throne lineage thing. And of course it might be a girl anyway.

But hey, Japan was trying to take another step into the 20th century, so you have to give them credit for that.

Anyway, here are some photos of the youngster, who is in fine fettle indeed.

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