Great mail day!

    I was excited to see my mailbox full of personal mail today. (Plus one of my favorite magazines) No bill either. Score.

      I got 4 Postcrossing cards:

    This is a picture from the historic village of Shirakawa-go in Japan. It is located in a mounrainous region of Japan and was said to be cut off from the rest of the world for a long time. These villages subsisted on the cultivation of mulberry trees and the rearing of silkworms. Check out the thatched roofs. I think this is located in the Chubu region of Japan. The village is a UNESCO world heritage site- and I collect UNESCO cards. :) Thanks Yuki! As a huge bonus, her stamp was the Kanazawa-jo Castle, which is also a UNESCO site. Awesome. 

    Yuki also wrote about the Yoshida brothers, who are shamisen players. Here is a video of them from YouTube. I love all the music samples that Postcrossers send me. The Yoshida brothers are Yuki's favorite musicians. I have heard lots of shamisen music, but have never heard the shamisen play music that is not traditional music. Very cool.

Speaking of Japan:

    Welcome to the Tanabata Festival, which will take place in Miyagi August 6-8. It looks so colorful! Check this page out. Akko, if you're reading, have you ever been to this festival? Apparently it is tradition to write wished on paper strips and hang them from the bamboo. Maybe I'm nosy, but I would love to wander around and read the wishes. :) Thank you for the beautiful card Mimiko!

Off to the Philippines!

  In addition to the cool panda card (I've never seen a panda that was not black and white), Mao told me about El Gamma Penumbra. They performed on Asia's Got Talent and Mao says that they show a lot about Philippine culture. Watch this performance. It is beautiful!

     The last card I got was from the UK:

    One more musician for you to check out! Will Pound. He's on the harmonica. I loved this band and this set. Timmy has done some folk dancing in music this year and he loves it. He was excited to hear this too. 

   Another Goodreads win:

    Another nerd alert. This book is called "Thinking About Video Games" by David S. Heineman. This book includes interviews with people across the gaming industry about various topics. It includes information on game development, game studies, and the past, present and future of video games. I'm often the mom that doesn't let my kids play games that other kids their age are playing. I've read some fascinating/horrifying neuroscience about how the brain (especially in young men) processes certain types of games so I'm curious to read the perspectives of and studies done by more people. Gaming is not a topic I usually read about so I suspect I will learn a lot.

Quick mail catchup

   The mailbox has been quite dismal lately. I have gotten a few good things but the package from Finland got lost and I'm still waiting for other things. I have also been a bit behind on my writing. I'm hoping that this post will be a kick in the pants for me.
     These 2 were outgoing cards. 1 was for a woman in Germany and the 2nd was to a student of mine who just participated in a fencing competition. I also sent a letter out to both Chemobuddies.

    I have had a few interesting pieces of incoming mail. I won another cool book from Goodreads. This one is called "The Mystery Writers of America Cookbook" edited by Kate White. In addition to having some yummy recipes (I tried Louise Penny's Madame Benoit's Tourtiere tonight.), it has some beautiful pictures and the book is textured in a cool way.

    Another great letter and stationary from Neil in the UK!

 A letter from Tseganesh, my sponsor child in Ethiopia. I also tried to get a nice picture of a letter from Angie but I couldn't seem to get a picture that didn't show at least part of our addresses.

      I was doing pretty well with my mail log but I have fallen a bit behind. I will try to catch up tonight.
      Have you been getting anything good in the mail lately?

My first fan mail

    I decided to send a letter to Nathan Fillion. He is an actor who plays the lead in Castle. He has also acted in Joss Whedon's Firefly series, Dr. Horrible's Sing-along Blog and quite a few other things. Anyone who knows me should know that fame isn't really hugely important to me. If you are in a position where you are known by millions of people, great, I'm happy for you. However, character is more important to me. I wrote to him because he has a reputation for being a kind and charitable guy. I follow him on twitter, he also has a great sense of humor.  I'll let you know if I hear anything back.
      Today I got some happy mail from 2 new Lettermo friends- Evi in Germany and Julie in the UK. Check out the Alice in Wonderland stamp. I also met Terri through her blog. Nice meeting you!

    In other news, February school vacation is almost over and I'm looking forward to going back and seeing all the students. Some of them traveled so I am excited to hear about their trips. (Israel, Sweden, Bahamas, Florida, etc. Surely not as exciting as Cape Cod. ha ha)  I am also looking forward to making dinner for my friend Diana tonight. It will be nice to relax and chat before having to go back to my crazy schedule. (No complaints about the schedule, I'd rather be busy and laugh every day.) 

     Hope you are having a great day too.