Fair Game summary

Plot synopsis reviews of Fair Game(A Promising Man (and About Time, Too) synopsis)

When they were at school, Harriet Grey always felt like 'a dinosaur made out of toilet rolls' at the side of her perfect classmate Nina. More than a decade on, and four years since they last saw one another, Harriet sees Nina and her perfect looking date in the street and realizes that nothing has changed.

Unable to bear the thought of a face to face encounter with Nina, Harriet pretends to be absorbed in looking in a shop window and that's how a couple of minutes later she meets John Mackenzie, Nina's date. The two of them get talking and circumstances contrive to cause them to meet again. Against her better judgement, Harriet finds herself falling head over heels in love with John, but how does he feel about her?

*bloke= guy

manky 1.inferior, worthless, 2.dirty and unpleasant

combat; ここでは多分combat boots

drizzly 霧雨の降る

date; 《米国口語》 デートの相手

contrive;  Deliberately created rather than arising naturally or spontaneously.

have~in towを連れて

　コヴェント・ガーデンはロンドンの中心地にあるショッピング・エリア。たくさんのお店が集まっていて、観光客に大人気の場所。オードリー・ヘップバーンが主演した映画「マイ・フェア・レディー」のロケ地としても有名。a popular shopping and tourist site, and with the Royal Opera House,

2016 summer trip to my birth place again

I went to visit the grave of my parents in Toyama on the 21th of Augsut.

With my family. This time without Hiroo.

I could stay at Yamanaka Onsen in Ishikawa with my sister for the first time in my life.

Really happy!

1. On July 12^th,Clara stayed alone at home. My son, his fiancé Miku and I went to the café Couwa and I liked one dish called “oso-zai(small dishes or side dishes) plate ” (cold cream soup of edamame, brown rice). Carrot fry, Japanese omlet with grated radish, seasoned winter water melon and molokheia, something like a Ratatouille and so on.

2. Before Sunset - 'A Waltz for a Night' by Julie Delphy

Coactor ; Ethan Hawk

I like her singing and guitar-playing so much. I would like to play the guitar as beautifully and impressively as she. My dream. The performance doesn’t have to be well or perfect.

3. The picture of Dorian Gray by Oscar Wilde in English. I enjoy reading it lying on the sofa. There are Japanese annotations(explanations) at the end of the book and they are very helpful.

happy things

Happy things I have experienced in the recent weeks. 2016

1. On the 21th and 22th of May(which were Saturday and Sunday), we stayed at the HaroHaro-Inn in Nasu. This is the second stay. The food in the restaurant is delicious and the rooms are clean and comfortable. The staffs of the Inn are gentle and kind.

However, there was a problem. At midnight, when my husband and I were trying to cover the futon with a sheet, Clara came and wet it. She was very happily excited. She seldom has such accidents at home. We had to pay 4200 yen for its cleaning muatsu- futon.

2. On the next day, we happened to go to the bakery café; Penny Lane.

The patio (terrace) was spacious, covered with young leaves, without mosquitoes. It was still not at all too warm. We could enjoy the lunch in a miraculously ideal condition. Very different from Iris, Clara was waiting, lying on the floor like a clever seeing-eye-dog(guide dog).

3. We rode a gondola to the gondora mount top station and enjoyed the fresh cool air, the view of the mountains and beautiful white goyo-tsutsuji(azalea əz éɪljə).

Happy things I have experienced in the recent weeks. 2016

1.　April 27^th was our young guitar teacher’s birthday.　I baked chocolate cupcakes for the members(4, including me) and the teacher and brought them with the green tea pot and paper cups to the class.

We celebrated his birthday, singing the familiar song;”Happy Birthday to you! ”He was very glad about that and two elderly men and Mrs. S(with whom I went to the café after the lesson several times) were also eating them with big smiles.

2. We could remove the most part of the roots of the vine of the planting area in front of the door. I am very sorry and sad that the google map photo shows the front part of our house surrounded with tangling vines.

3. I finished reading two books. “Delicassy”(In Japanese:”ナタリー”)by David Foenkinos and ”Eugine Onegin”(エフゲニー・オネーギン) by Alexander Pushkin. I sensed the delicate sense of French people which I admire and someday I’d like to watch the DVD-film, which David Foenkinos himself produced. Mrs.C(one of the students in the German class) introduced a TV program of the Hamburger Ballet dance in NHK BS. It was Tatiana(the original work is Alexander Pushkin’s “Eugine Onegine”)directed by John Neumeier(He won the Kyoto-Prize last year. Mr.C was a member of the KyotoPrize selection committee).I was not that interested in it at first, but I was fascinated by the dancer playing Onegin and stopped watching the program. I wanted to see it after reading the original story. Now I am ready to watch the ballet dance. 

Natalie *Delicassy*

Delicacy by  David  Foenkinos 2016/0510

Natalie is a  graceful and  young  beautiful  woman. Some  day François  asks her to  go to a cafe  together,  which was the  first time  for him to do  that. He had  never  inclined to  do that. But  Natalie  walking on  the street  fascinated  him to do  so...

Natalie is a  kind of  a woman, who  lives her  life without  unuseful  attention(distraction).  But she said  "oui" .

Natalie's and  her friend's  delicassy is  the beautiful  and important  theme.

Willpower Instinct

I tend to procrastinate often what to do.

I tend to fail very often to do what to do. I know that it is one of my many weak points.

I read "The Willpower Instinct" by Kelly McGonigal for the second time. In this book, I found something encouraging to me. She says, "many people treat themselves as they are still small children. You criticize and scold yourselves whenever you procrastinate something. " You are so lazy! ... You cannot be reliable, trustworthy…”

If you think that the key to have more willpower is that you should be more strict and harder on yourself, you're wrong ... The Study after study shows that self-criticism is combined with less motivation and poorer self-discipline. It (self-criticism) also leads to depression ....

Being hard on yourself leads  you to the self-abandonment. (If you are on a diet, and eat randomly or accidentally too much, you will probably be disappointed and have the feeling of self-abandonment and you will eat more and more ...) In contrast, compassion - supportive and friendly - with more motivation and better self-discipline combined. "

I think that I'll forgive myself, and I’ll give myself more encouraging words.