Curse, be gone

My first 2.5 weeks in Tokyo: neverending cold, stomach flu/food poisoning, 3 earthquakes, tropical storm, 15+ hour work days becoming the norm and laptop meltdown. OMG, I think someone here but a hex on me and I would like for it to be lifted.

I feel so frustrated (mostly about my laptop failure and Japanese IT companies' refusal to fix it because it is American) that I really want to just go home and cry until I feel better but work hours are so nuts that by the time I get home around 1 or 2 am, I barely have time to un-fry my brain with 15 minutes of TV before crashing.

My favorite part of each day is walking into my lovely modern apartment, which is cleaned from corner to corner every Tuesday and Saturday. It was so nice yesterday to come home and find all the dirty dishes that I'd piled up in the sink cleaned and put away, all my towels refreshed, all the hair on my bathroom floor removed, my bed made with new sheets, and the whole house shining spic and span when I had left it considerably less so. I love serviced apartments! Unfortunately I will have to leave my current home next weekend since it was only a temporary arrangement and I can't afford to live there if I have to pay for it. I'm moving to another serviced apartment, but this one is older and not as bright and shiny and modern and luxe. I made the decision to go with the cheapest decent apartment I could find, especially in light of the recent computer mishap, which I'm sure will cost me another grand or so to fix or replace (the quote I got to simply extract the data on the hard drive, without fixing anything, was $450. Japanese IT companies refuse to FIX my computer because it's American. I say that's racist! Luckily El Hombre found a place for me that specializes in dealing with ex-pats (i.e. THEY SPEAK ENGLISH!!) and foreign computers so I pray they will be able to diagnose and fix my computer this weekend).

What I find insane about my job is that people call me at MIDNIGHT expecting me to be in my office and pick up the phone! WTF?!

Oh Tokyo, how does thee annoy me, let me count the ways. But number one peeve for sure: the utter inefficiency of the bureaucracy. I could go on with numerous examples of how UTTERLY inefficient the bureaucracy is and how the stringent abiding by stupid-ass "rules" makes things utterly annoying, but I don't feel like it. Let me just say that I wasted two hours one day going to the post office to pick something up that was addressed to me and I showed them my passport, alien registration card and another piece of mail addressed to me at my address but they would not give me my mail because they said I needed the notice that came announcing the piece of mail but I threw that notice away because I thought it was an ad so instead they made me schedule an appointment for me to be home when they can deliver the certified mail in person and I tried to explain that it is very hard for me to be home during the hours that mailmen work because I have to work many hours at the office so then they made me schedule a three hour window on Saturday morning where I must be home so they can deliver the mail which I have to receive and sign for in person but what I want to know is why couldn't they just GIVE me the damn thing (they even showed it to me, had me look at it and verify that it was what I was waiting for) when they CLEARLY know I am who I say I am and I had multiple IDs confirming that and CLEARLY I was not trying to steal someone else's mail. But that's just the "policy" of the Japan Post, and no one here ever breaks the rules! DOWN WITH THE RULES. Omg, I'm turning into an anarchist. But this city will do that to you.