First snow and new Visa

Well we've finally got some snow here.  Not much,  maybe a couple inches but that's usually all we get here in Karuizawa anyway.  I am finding that I enjoy shoveling snow lately.  I think it is because it reminds me of being back in Canada. All this snow and Christmas hooplah is kind out making me homesick lately.  Luckily I have beer and my games to make me feel like I'm home so that's good. 

The other week my wife and I made a trip to Nagano City to renew my spousal visa.  It's hard to believe that in two weeks I will have been in Japan for a whole year. Time never went by this fast in Canada that is for sure.  Along the way we stopped at one of my favourite stores; Book-off.  It's a discount store for used manga,  books,  cds,  dvds and games.  I always seem to find some old gems that I couldn't in Canada.  
We also stopped by a temple where we went into a very dark hallway under ground and had to search for a door knob on the wall.  If you touch it means good luck for you.  It wasn't that hard to find what with the line up of tourists ahead of us,  but it was still fun to wander in the pitch blackness. 
On our walk back to the train station we also passed by the 1998 Nagano Olympic torch and a little podium they set up.  I couldn't resist posing. 

Curling tournament

Well,  the big news this week is that I decided to join the IAK  curling team this season. It's strange for me because the only previous experience I have had with curling is switching the channel and saying,  "where is the hockey game?".
But now I'm on a team of players with at least some experience,  although there are other beginners.  Thankfully I am not the only one bringing the team down.
We also missed the beginners league by a few months so we are in a competitive league this time around. Our first match was a 9-0 loss.  I feel better about it after finding out one of their players was a former junior curling champion for all of Japan in 2012.
So once I figured that out,  I decided that we needed to do some practicing.  So far we (Asuka and I) have had two practice sessions and I am getting slightly better,  though I have yet to understand how to correctly estimate how much power to use and I still haven't gotten my balance together for sliding across the ice.  I'm so wobbly still! 
Our next game is Tuesday night and I'm not sure but I think it might be against last year's Nagano championship team. 
Never enough practice.