tournament

hello there! it's been a while!

my martial arts school is hosting a tournament this weekend and since i'm on the committee, most of my time has been taken up with meetings and planning. we've been working on this project since january, so i'm looking forward to it being completed.

in addition to gathering all of the competitor information and creating the divisions for each category, i also made the t-shirt design:

i had a chance to practice my illustrator skills, which was challenging, but fun!

i'll be taking a break from blogging until the beginning of may, since i just can't seem to keep up with everything else that's been going on. looking forward to talking to you then!

the big news....

thanks everyone for the well wishes regarding the accident. it's nice to know that you all care :)

remember when i said i had some big news? well, i didn't forget about it. drumroll please..........

we are moving to:

OKINAWA!! map source

after the initial shock of the news wore off, i starting thinking of a gazillion questions.
from big ones: "where are we going to live?"
to little ones: "do we need power converters for our stuff?" "can we drink tap water?"

there were some sad realizations: "family & friends will be so far away"
and some happy ones: "i can learn Japanese" "cool Japanese paper everywhere!!"

and then i thought of all the stuff that needs to get done between now & the move...cleaning out & packing the house, figuring out what goes into storage, how to manage tama press....

have any of you experienced a big move? do you have suggestions on how to make this less overwhelming?

car "accident"

why do people call them "accidents" anyway? usually the crash is due to someone being careless.

last week, hubby & i were minding our own business in our SUV, stopped at a stop light behind a line of other cars. then, CRUNCH. an old rusted car slammed into the back of our car - we estimate he was going 30mph. no warning, no screeching brakes, just a hard hit.

hubby checks to see if i'm okay, then gets out to talk to the guy, telling him we are going to call the police. through the back window, i could see steam rising from the hood of his vehicle. hubby snaps a bunch of pictures then gets back into our car & tells me that the guy "preferred if we didn't call the police." hmm. i'm pretty shaken up, trying not to cry, while fumbling with my phone to call 911. the operator answers and i explain the situation & our location.

we move out of the way of traffic and make sure the guy follows us into a parking lot as we wait. then he approaches our car and is fumbling with his pockets....and we wonder for a split second, does he have a weapon? so hubby tells him to go back to his car & wait for the police (a couple of times). so he does...and then he starts driving away!!!

back on the phone with the operator, we follow him for a bit, give the operator all of the info we can, then pull over and wait for the police. they also send an ambulance because at this point, my neck is hurting pretty good along with hubby's back.

the ambulance arrives in 2 minutes and they check hubby & i out....then put a neck collar on me, slide me onto a board, & whisk me away. the paramedic told me it may seem like overkill, but better to be safe than sorry when possible neck injuries are involved. so i went on my first ambulance ride. when we arrived at the hospital, i was taken to a room...i felt like i was on grey's anatomy or something. so weird. the doc had me get a couple of x-rays and everything was okay.

hubby & my parents met us there and hubby got checked out & was okay too. the doc said we would feel like we had played rugby for a couple of days. a week later, i'm not quite normal, but much much better. i'm amazed that i was that sore.

as for the other driver, the police caught up with him & he was arrested for a number of charges. he had filed a false report saying that someone had stolen his car - fortunately, the pictures taken at the scene proved otherwise. his criminal past is quite lengthy and includes a number of things, including a DUI & assault convictions.

i know things could be so much worse right now. i'm so thankful that we are okay, that we were in a big car, that our pups weren't in the car with us, that our insurance is handling everything, that my family came to the hospital to make sure we were okay. i keep replaying the whole thing over & over in my head. i'm jumpy when i'm driving, but also much more aware of my surroundings.

be careful out there...

dog update

last week i found this dog and took her to animal control - so her owners would find her. and it took all week. i checked the animal control website everyday to see if she had been picked up. finally, friday night, her listing was gone.

then the dog that lives behind us started barking like crazy - an annoyance that has persisted for over a year.

coincidence? i think not.

i didn't know what the dog behind looked like, other than it was small & fluffy & loud. so i tried to get a better view from the upstairs window...and i'm 90% sure that the pup i found is one & the same. kind of ironic, don't you think?

this time when i heard the barking though, i didn't get pissed. i was relieved. and glad that she got home safely. because she was pretty sweet for the short amount of time i cared for her.