Ups and Downs

Up: I got my new fiber optic internet service this week!
Down: I've spent two long nights trying to configure it, and it seems to be about as slow as ADSL... plus it looks like I'll no longer be able to receive incoming international calls. :(
Up?: I've ... gotten lots of Japanese reading practice trying to configure the system?

Up: The weather has been cooling off lately. Yay! I can finally walk around outdoors without being constantly drenched in sweat!
Down: I heard my first Christmas song in the shopping mall today on the way home from work. CHRISTMAS!!!! The song was "Santa Claus is Coming to Town" in case you were wondering.
Up?: Now I can stop complaining about the fact that Halloween decorations have been up since the end of August?

I don't have a third up-down-up pattern for today, but I did have a "Dylan moment" on the way home from work. I was sitting down on the train, sleep-deprived as usual, and I saw a poster for an LPGA tournament (evidently the Ladies' Professional Golf Association, as I would later retrospectively infer from the many pictures of ladies playing golf on the poster). The way it registered in my head, of course, and which seemed completely reasonable at the time, was that LPGA must be the Japanese branch of the Role Playing Game Association! Only later did I realize the alternative explanation...