Finally I have somewhat reliable wifi again! :)

I've made it to the States for a two month-long vacation, and I couldn't access anything well.

BTW — if anyone wants to travel, don't do the Haneda – Narita layover. Haneda is in Tokyo, while Narita is in Chiba (even though people call it “Tokyo Narita”, it's really not in Tokyo), and it takes over an hour to travel between the two airports. If your flight's delayed (not that mine was), it can be rather painful.

I enjoyed my flight from Narita to San Francisco. JAL was wonderful, with great cabin attendants and an awesome selection of movies and games. My trip from SFO to Phoenix, however, wasn't as good. I was shocked at how dingy and filthy the U.S. Airways check-in counter was. Trash and crumpled paper littered the floor, and the U.S. Airways agents (there were only two) never smiled, didn't say anything more than they absolutely had to to check us in for our flight… didn't even speak decent English! Compare that to the JAL terminal in Narita, where JAL had over twenty uniformed multilingual agents helping passengers. The JAL agents were friendly, courteous and helpful. (And yes, JAL's terminal literally sparkled.)

Note to self: avoid U.S. Airways.

Also I finally got my Samsung NC10. I upgraded the RAM to 2GB, so now it runs faster than my main laptop. Absolutely love it. And the keyboard is super-comfy, which is my main consideration. I don't care for chiclet keyboards, so the NC10 is just right for me. And did I tell you it's a cute pink? And it's light & it does everything I want it to do — Word, OneNote, Excel, web surfing & email and iTunes. The NC10's battery lasts about 6-7 hours, depending on what you're doing. An excellent machine. I highly recommend it.

BTW — after I got my NC10, Hero Material and I went to the Grand Canyon. Absolutely gorgeous. I love the ruggedness of the place as well as the interesting sediment layers. We got to see condors and a few other birds flying around us. They didn't seem interested in eating squirrels, which was good because many of them reminded me of Buttercup (one of my female hamsters), mostly because they were such beggars. LOL.

Anyway, I'm going to cut this post short now. Have a great Sunday!