Aims, I'm with whomever it was that suggested spiral maple or honey ham. Easy and nummy.

ION, it's gorgeous here and I love my mom, but I wanna come home.

What's wrong with letting the machine get it, I wonder?

I know it's a way of dealing with evil telemarketers, but I had a sort of a scare a few years back, and I so my number's hidden and unlisted and all that jazz. The paranoia/irritation-driven requirements suck.

Tried training today. I didn't do it all, and my head does hurt, but I expected that. There's just no way to tell how much I can do without testing. I figured a long weekend was a good time to try.

I am planning on trying to take the brown belt no matter how much or little training I can get in between now and then. It's three sessions of mandatory workshop before the test. I understand I might not make it through day 1, and that's just how it'll be. Or I'll make it through the workshop and not be able to start/complete the test itself. Or I will finish the test and fail.

Or I could finish the test and pass. All these things are possibilities. I just need to know how to slant the probabilities in my favour.

Looks like my sparring is decent, but I'm certainly not giving anyone an opportunity to hit me in the head between now and then, and maybe even not then, if I can get away with it. My reflexes are slow, but I have a fair amount of the technical stuff still accessible.

Huh. That was supposed to be a paragraph max. Thinky thinky.

I got my gifts from India! The knife is the funnest -- it's got a floral pattern painted on the hilt and scabbard, and then it's this foot long sharp curved blade inside. Too cool. Also included was a salwar kameez I'll be too chicken to wear out, and a skirt and wrap I will be able to use without feeling like a poseur. Wait--does using the word poseur instead of poser make you one automatically?

Yes.

What? It had been two hours, and no one else answered.

You're very kind, Perkins.

I'm at the carwash, paying a brazilian dollars (that looks wrong) to have my car detailed. Sadly, it needs the extra attention. I've gotten anal about the engine and let the rest of it slide. The guy next to me is bitching about the $2 SUV surcharge. "Like they're big or something." I wonder why he got his, then?

I got the mix CD from the boy back home. It's filled with melancholy love songs and Lucious Jackson and good stuff busting out at the seams.

Took the edge off my own suffocating blues.

I'm sitting in my Mom's new condo, which is very quiet, and somewhat homey-feeling on account of all the familiar furniture arranged in different ways than ever before. I think she will be happy here, even if it's a little strange to her. ::crosses fingers::

You're very kind, Perkins.

I try, ita, I try.

I re-killed the thread.

I hope Santa doesn't bring me coal because of this.

Perkins, I did that drive just this summer. Aside from that one big rock formation, it's pretty eh. Although, I made a side trip off to the Big House ruins, which was interesting. And about 110 in the shade, that day....

There's also the ostrich ranch....

Perkins, I don't think you killed it -- it's just MIA, not many people online tonight!