If I hadn't been to that Elvis Costello in Sydney at the end of January, I wouldn't be writing this in early December.
Costello, many years ago, came up with the concept of the Spectacular Spinning Songbook, toured briefly with it in the late eighties and then revised the methodology, which almost guarantees the audience a substantially different show each night, in the Noughties.
I'd enjoyed Sydney so much that I announced, on my return, that next time he brought The Wheel back to Australia I was going to all the shows.
Fast forward six months or so and I was sitting in an apartment at Aquarius in Cairns checking my email when a posting announced Costello would be playing four Songbook shows in Japan in December.
Significantly, it was right at the time when we were in overseas traveller mode, and the presence of Madam's sister and niece had brought us to Cairns.
So I'd blame them if blame wasn't too strong a word. It was more a case of the penny dropping, and having allies on hand to push the idea forward.
I told The Sister about the four shows, three of them on successive nights in Tokyo, and suggested they might be doable, flying from Cairns. She agreed, Madam was persuaded, and here I am tapping this out in a hotel room in Cairns at five-thirty in the morning.
It's actually Day Two of the trip, having driven up from Bowen on Wednesday, and the plane leaves in just under seven hours. I could well have started this a couple of days ago, but I was in the throes of finishing the Travelogue for our second Tasmanian odyssey, and, anyway, I knew that early risers need something to do when further sleep is ruled out of the question.
So, having explained the basic why, we turn our attention to the where, which breeds an interesting set of destinations under the particular circumstances, which in turn requires further explanation.
So we start with the four concerts, three on successive nights in the Roppongi district of Tokyo (Wednesday, Thursday, Friday) followed by a fourth in Osaka on the Sunday.
That brings the rail pass issue to the fore, with the key question being whether to buy the seven day or fourteen day version. The flight from Cairns deposits us at Kansai International, and the rail journey has to start in Kobe or Osaka.
Given the seasonal factors, with the last show being on December 15, we need to make the Tokyo > Osaka leg on the 14th the final leg of the rail trip. We've only been back from Tasmania for a month, so a fortnight on the road, or rather the rail, in Japan is too long, so the rail pass goes for seven days.
And if we'd opted for the fortnight on the railways we'd have to leave a week earlier, which would have ruled out the Leonard Cohen concert in Townsville last Thursday.
That seven day spell runs from Sunday to Saturday, with the flight in arriving on Thursday evening, and Thursday night spent in Kobe. Booking the train tickets for the week takes a chunk out of a morning or afternoon, so that takes care of Friday, with certain other logistical factors needing to be attended to, and on Saturday we move to wherever the train leg of the journey kicks off.
So where do we go?
To look at that side of things you focus your attention on the other end of the rail leg and work backwards.
We want to be in Tokyo early on Wednesday afternoon so we can book in and scope out the route between the hotel and the theatre, so whatever we do on Wednesday morning needs to be done somewhere around the capital.
Kamakura isn't that far south of Yokohama, which in turn abuts the south of the Tokyo conurbation, and our friend The Interpreter lives in Yokohama. That means dinner with The Interpreter on Tuesday night, which in turn translates to an overnight stay in Yokohama.
So we've got Sunday and Monday nights to look at, and a rail route that ends in Yokohama to nut out.
The concert side of things is Hughesy's part of the trip, so those days and nights leading up to Yokohama are Madam's reward for doing the organising. She loves the onsen experience, it's coming into winter, and there are any number of options, but the best seem to involve hot springs, mountains and snow, so that's where we're headed.
One night in Matsumoto, the other up in Niigata, both in onsen resorts, which in turn means Japanese banquets, probably served in the privacy of the room.
If that looks reasonably straightforward, it is still the result of extensive research, with most possibilities investigated and worked over with a fine tooth comb.
So it's Thursday as fly over day, Friday for sorting out tickets and such. Saturday should be an easy day, with a transfer to the northern side of Osaka in the afternoon.
Sunday morning has the transfer to ShinOsaka, and a transfer from there to Nagoya along familiar territory. We've been up and down that section of track every other time we've been in the country, and there isn't much choice about it. You're talking the main Tokaido line that links Osaka and Tokyo.
From Nagoya, we're also on a track we've covered before, but this time we're travelling in the opposite direction. Last time around we did Nagano > Nagoya, a spectacular run through the autumn mountains. This time, with winter on the way in, we won't get the coloured leaves, but the scenery should still be spectacular.
And Hughesy can keep track of things through the new, camera equipped iPad, which has taken over the Travelogue role. I'm anticipating a much richer visual record this time around.
But we're not actually going all the way to Nagano. Matsumoto is half an hour or so down the line from the city that hosted the Winter Olympics, and when we alight we'll be heading to Matsumoto Castle, one of Japan's Top Three Castles.
Japan's big on Top Threes and such, and this visit will mean we've been to all the castles.
After the castle, it's off to the onsen, and the Japanese banquet.
Monday's much the same, though the rail leg involves a couple of changes that might seem to require split second timing, but given the punctuality of the rail services we should be right.
Monday ends in Niigata, another go at the hot springs and the banquet, and Tuesday brings us down through Tokyo to Yokohama.
Wednesday morning has been set aside for temple and shrine viewing at Kamakura before we head back to Tokyo for the first of the Costello triple-header.
Thursday has visits to art galleries and viewing platforms in Roppongi pencilled in before Hughesy takes himself to the Costello show, and on Friday we'll take a look at the Imperial Palace before I toddle off for a third go.
Given the nature of the concerts there's a slight possibility that Hughesy might be grabbed and hauled on stage to spin the wheel, but I'm not holding my breath. Night One and Osaka are probably the most likely ones since we'll be there as a couple, but I guess hairy foreigners might attract attention on the other two.
I suspect, however, that I'm in the wrong demographic and probably the wrong gender, but you never know. Maybe I'll get to request Beyond Belief, what with living next door to the Great Barrier Reef and all.
Saturday will be the zoom down the Tokaido line on the Shinkansen day, followed by the final concert on Sunday. In between we're having lunch with The Sister and The Rowdy Niece, before transferring to Kyoto for more temple and shrine viewing on Monday and Tuesday.
Wednesday afternoon will see us back in Kobe, ready to prepare for the return flight, which arrives in Cairns around sparrow fart on Friday morning.
The experience last time around suggests driving back to Bowen that day is not a good idea, so we'll overnight in Mission Beach and take our time getting there, stopping off for a pie at the Mourilyan Bakery along the way.
On Saturday, it’s either breakfast at the accommodation or brunch at the Vivia cafe in Cardwell, followed by the run through Townsville back to the Little House of Concrete in time to prepare for the silly end of the silly season.
That, in a nutshell, is the plan. How it pans out forms the content of the next eighteen entries.
