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February 27, 2007
Juice & Jerks
Juice: The past few days, I've been on a MISSION to find a place that sells Nantucket Nectars Orange Mango juice. Every time Don and I go to the Oasis hot tub place, we always get two orange mangos, so it's become kind of a ritual thing. Sit in hot tub = drink orange mango. So now that we're getting our own hot tub, we still want to drink the orange mangos. I've been driving around to SEVERAL places including Costco to find this drink. Of all places, I couldn't believe Costco didn't have it. BUT, I finally had some success. I went to the Farmer Jack near my office and found they had 26 bottles of it and you know what? I bought every single one they had. HAHA! Checkout lady must've thought I was nuts. It'll be interesting to see how often they get stocked up. Next time I see they have, I'm gonna buy 'em out clean again. HA!
Jerks: I'm really beginning to despise going to karate class. I love what I'm learning, but it's becoming increasingly frustrating because I'm stuck every single class working with one particular person who just drives me nuts. First of all, he has some physical limitations which prevent him from performing certain moves, but even considering those limitations, he sucks at karate anyway! Then, he's gotta go and act like a know-it-all.
Just because we're the same rank, I get paired with him every time and it doesn't matter if we're doing two-person work or just going through kata. In fact, when we do kata, I try to stop and work certain moves out in hopes that he'll just keep going so that we aren't doing it together anymore. But he always stops and waits for me to catch up. THEN he tries to tell me I'm doing something wrong when he doesn't even know the kata as well as I do! I mean, I don't know everything, but I know more than him. I'm not saying I'm perfect--far from it, but I practice harder and I'm just better at it.
Don always gives his "Listen, remember and do" speech (which I love). He says, to learn something like martial arts, you have to listen to the teacher, remember what he told you and do it thousands of times in order to get good. I always take that to heart. But not this jerk. He listens, but he doesn't remember, and therefore, he can't do it. He actually had the gall last week to tell me I was doing something wrong in a kata he hadn't even finished learning, but that I'd had for months.
His problem, I think, is that he's jealous of the fact that I'm better at karate than him. It pisses him off that every time he tries to find some fault with my karate, Don is good enough to prove me right. I mean, how could I not be better when I'm way more flexible, I remember things better than him and actually do what I'm told. Not to mention I'm married to the one of THE best teachers there are at AMAS! Whenever I have a problem, I ask myself WWDD? What Would Don Do? How would he perform that? If I don't know, I ask him. Why? Because I know it's how Mr. Scott would want to see it done. In fact, whenever junior students ask me for help, I tell them, "well, here's how Don does it." I tell them, "When in doubt, ask Don!"
I only go to karate twice a week because the other classes aren't very good and I love spending time doing Iaido. So when I go, I try to make my time there as productive as I can. But I'll tell you...this guy is SERIOUSLY making me think of not going. He always does stuff wrong, tries to tell me I'M wrong, and has NO sense of personal space (he's always crowding me cause he can't figure out where he's really supposed to be). The problem is, I'm up for another test and I need that time to practice to get my next rank. My life goal is to at least get my Shodan (first degree black belt). But if things like this keep happening to me, I don't know what I'm going to do!
Posted by Amy at 07:00 PM | Comments (4)
February 21, 2007
Sicker than a Dog
Ok, I know I've been slacking on updating my blog, even after I said I'd try to post more. But honestly, I don't have that much to talk about. My life really isn't that eventful. The only thing that's really happened lately is that Don bought a hot tub (ok, worth a little talking about) and I got sick.
So Don and I went into the hot tub store, I thought, to just look around and before I knew it, he was signing the papers! I couldn't believe how fast it happened! The landscaping guys are supposed to be building our deck soon and the hot tub will be delivered and when it does, it'll be PURE heaven!!!
Sunday, I got so sick I thought I was going to have to go to the hospital. I woke up Sunday night at 2am and, well, to keep this clean, I had stuff coming out both ends. It was the stomach flu. I had stomach pains like you wouldn't believe and I was laying on the bathroom floor writhing around. I was so close to waking up Don to ask him to take me to the hospital. But I guess I figured if I could ride it out just a little while, I'd get over the worst part--which lasted about 2 1/2 hours. I finally got back to bed when the pain subsided enough for me to get a little sleep, but I was back in the bathroom an hour and a half later. GOD I wanted to die!!
I think the part that sucked the most was having to throw up. It was so bad, I nearly threw my back out and I couldn't take any pain medicine for it because I wouldn't have been able to keep it down anyway. So I just had to wait till the nausea subsided. Thankfully it did a few hours later--at least enough for me to keep the Advils down. But whenever I get nauseous, I have to keep cool or else it makes me feel worse, so I was having to balance not being chilled with not being too hot under the covers--I hate being cold anyway, but if I got too hot, the stomach pains would get worse. Seemed like such a difficult balance to keep while feeling so awful. And even when the worst was over, I still had a 100.2 degree fever & chills, but nothing a little Tylenol couldn't break.
Needless to say, I had to call in sick but luckily, it only lasted about 24 hours. But even Tuesday, when I went back to work, it was hard to get through the day because I was so exhausted. Plus my apetite is still diminished--though that's probably a good thing. Seems I caught it from someone who came into the dojo a couple days after he had gotten over it. It's how I caught it the last time. They're all better, but I still catch it. UGH. But today, I feel like myself again. Rested and healthy. Thank goodness!
Posted by Amy at 08:00 PM | Comments (1)
February 07, 2007
Gabriel's Home!!
YAAAYYYY!!! My baby kitty is home once again! I missed having him here so much that I was so excited to get him home. He started cooing and purring with such excitement at being home. And he kept looking up at me meowing, "Mommy! Mommy! I'm home! I'm home!! YAAYY!"
I thought he'd be angry for a week that he'd been left at the vet, cut open and not allowed to leave. But he was so happy to get out of there, he's back to his old self, except he's a little more affectionate and quite a bit less grumpy towards me and Don than he was.
I had to take him back to the vet today during lunch for them to check his calcium levels once more and he was complaining all the way to the vet. I think he thought I was going to leave him there again. But I kept assuring him that I wouldn't and that I'd be right there with him the whole time, which I was. I could tell he was glad about that.
So tomorrow, I'll be working at home and I can stay with him. Probably a good thing to get him settled back at home after his surgery. I'll have to take him back once more in a couple weeks to get his stitches taken out. But after that, he should be right as rain!
Posted by Amy at 11:23 PM | Comments (0)
February 06, 2007
Catching Up
Wow, I just realized I haven't posted since late January. My apologies for being a slacker. It's just that I've been so incredibly busy lately.
Last Saturday, we had our Iaido test. Don, Pam and I all got promoted 2 ranks instead of one. We went from rokokyu (6th kyu) up to yankyu (4th kyu). I think we all performed quite admirably. I also think Pam and I are extremely well-suited to Iaido since it's an art of elegance, so it probably comes easier to women (in general). So because of that test, I've been really concentrating on practicing hard. We all enjoyed a great Chinese dinner at Emerald City though. Mom and Dad came to the test, then joined us for dinner. I think they were impressed by what they saw since they'd never seen anything like that before. Plus my friends really enjoyed meeting Mom & Dad.
Yesterday was the first time I'd come back to class since the test and I learned a new kata. I think I impressed Sensei because I seemed to pick it up very fast; though it was very similar to a kata I'd learned previously. I skipped class on Monday. I had fully planned on going, but I had a really rough day at work and even came home early. I was kind of upset that day, feeling overwhelmed and frustrated, so I spent the entire evening relaxing in bed. I even debated whether I should go up until the time I would have had to leave. Ah well. The thing that really sucks about missing class is everytime I do that, I miss a new kata. I don't like falling behind at all.
Anyway, so work's been really demanding lately and it's been tough keeping up. But I'm doing as best I can. We'll see how it goes in the next week or two. Unfortunately, the stress has re-activated my ulcer. Ugh.
On top of that, Gabriel had to go in for surgery this week. Don and I suddenly noticed he'd been losing a lot of weight. Seems like just this past summer, he was a lard ball of 18 pounds (his normal weight is just over 11 pounds). I weighed him recently on our home scale and he was only about 10 pounds! I was hoping it was just that he'd been more active and didn't have to compete with Hideous (who's a pig). But we took him to the vet and it turns out he had an overactive thyroid. They gave us 3 options: medication (every day), surgery to remove the thyroid, or a radioactive injection. Well, Gabe would hate me if I forced a pill down his throat every day and the radioactive injection was $1300, so surgery was our best option. They took him in Monday and removed both thyroid glands. They had to keep him for a few days to monitor his calcium levels since the surgery can put the parathyroid glands at risk--those glands regulate calcium levels. If the calcium gets too high, that's bad. But he's been in the hospital for a few days and no abnormal levels of calcium so I can take him home today. Don and I have been visiting him and he's been VERY cranky, more so than normal. The woman I spoke to on the phone says he's very melodramatic and just all-around extremely unhappy. But when he sees us, he nearly faints with joy. When I saw him yesterday, he was purring even through his constant growling. Poor thing!!! He's got an incision about 3-4 inches long down his neck and they made him wear one of those funny-looking space collars while he was there. I can't wait to take him home! My baby!!!
Anyway, Don went out and bought us a hot tub! WOW!! We'd been spending a lot of time over at the Oasis Hot Tub Gardens and I think he finally had to have one himself. It'll be really nice cause we can share it with Nick & Pam, and Greg & Sue, especially after our nightly workouts. Plus, the tub is pretty top of the line, so we'll use little to no chlorine (I hate smelling like that) and we can set the temp to whatever we want. It's gonna be so nice! But we'll have to wait to get it cause Don wants to expand the deck out more before they deliver. I can't wait! Wish we could have it now, since the temps have only been in the single digits (even in the negatives) with windchills at about 15-20 below zero! UGH! TOO COLD!!!
So now, I have to get ready to test for Karate. Don's been bugging me to practice, which I've been as much as I can, but I was focusing on my iaido. Now that that's out of the way, I can work a little harder on Karate.
Also, Dad's finally off chemo. He's still bald, but he's so cute that way! I know he's really embarrassed and self-conscious about it; he keeps a hat on at all times. But I think he looks so good. I'm just glad he's done with it though. I think once he grows his hair back, he'll be back to his normal self. GO DAD!! And Mom's been great taking care of him. She seems to be so much better with her pacemaker than in past years! What a relief!
But now you see how busy I've been. It's been crazy and I don't foresee it letting up in the short-term. We'll just have to see. I'll try to keep you all posted. So until then...later!
Posted by Amy at 10:25 PM | Comments (1)