Laundry

A week or two ago was the end of the rainy season. Over the course of a month and a half there wasn't so much as two full days of sunny weather and most days were overcast and/or raining for at least a little while. I don't have a dryer, so I have to hang my clothes outside on a sunny day to dry them.* Each morning when I got up for work at 6:30 I had to guess whether or not it would be sunny later so I could hang my clothes out to dry. I was about 1 in 6 or 7 in guessing the correct weather.

Anyway, by the time the rainy season ended I had accumulated a large backlog of clothes to launder. I'm on vacation now and it's extremely hot and sunny, so I've gone about clearing this pile gradually. My last load got washed with an unexpected guest:


It's hard to see, but it's in about the middle of the picture, between the white sheet and the light blue towel. Here's a closer look:


This beetle was about 3 inches, not so big by Japanese bug standards. I have no idea how or why it went in the laundry machine, but I made sure to wash everything again. It seemed completely intact when I threw it out and is still lying on the ground where I threw it. Still, it's the largest bug near my apartment so far, though there was a mukade living in one of my tomato plants earlier.

*I could have gone down to a laundromat to dry clothes, but it seemed pretty busy with everyone else's laundry. Plus it costs about 100 yen for 8-10 minutes of drying.