8/25/11 Yellow Belt

I worked late tonight, and picked Julian up from Kung Fu on my way home. I got there JUST in time to see him awarded his new yellow belt!


He takes his new responsibility very seriously.


The sifus have a very goofy side to them though! Julian brings that out in people.


I picked him up sweaty and tired. And now he wants to go for his green belt. Good Kung Fu! I'm proud of him, he's doing great, and I made sure to tell him many times.

8/25/11

8/23/11 Homework again

Tonight, Julian had to write one sentence that starts with each letter in the phrase "School Days," like, S - School is a great place to learn history. This is always hard for kids to do, and especially hard when they're being distracted by a cute little sister, and when they're very distractable to begin with.

Julian sat in the kitchen while I made dinner, so I could talk to him, give him ideas, keep him on target, and spell words for him (if he uses a dictionary it takes him forever). But Katrina kept playing with him, talking to him, starting games -- I told her again and again to leave him alone, but he just couldn't concentrate with her there.

Finally I had to kick her out, and she stormed out saying, "I'm NEVER going to help you cook AGAIN, Mom!"

This is one of the consequences of homework that I absolutely hate and resent. She's right. Well, not that she'll never help me, but that tonight, we couldn't just be together and I couldn't give her little jobs like fetching or stirring things, because I had to be helping Julian with his homework. What a loss.

8/23/11

8/22/2011 The New Boss

Whoo boy, do I have some re-learning to do. Today I had my first gaffe with the new boss, first day. GOOD JOB!

The new boss scheduled a meeting for tomorrow morning, but I have an appointment so I can't make the meeting -- but I hadn't put the appointment in my online calendar, OOPS.

You know why? My old boss, Mr. Horrible, never bothered to check peoples' calendars and just scheduled meetings whenever he felt like it. So we've all gotten out of the habit of religiously updating our calendars because it never mattered. (Mr H also almost always rescheduled the meeting several times and was almost always late.)

I'm going to have to get back into some normal habits -- I'm not used to having a boss who knows how to use a calendar -- let alone understands technical things and can actually evaluate my work. Major mindshift, and not a moment too soon!

8/22/2011

8/21/2011 Race thru the redwoods

Dave and I ran Race Thru the Redwoods today!

This is a 10K race in a lovely state park in the Santa Cruz Mountains. I was proud of Dave, he's not a runner and was only trained to 1 mile on a treadmill, yet he ran 80% of it and came in at 1:11:48, which is about a 11-1/2 minutes per mile.

My time was 58:49, and I was 7th in my age group (45-49) out of a field of 45. Ironically, I had a competitive age group -- had I been in the 35-39 or the 40-44 age group, my time would have put me in the top 5! I placed 179 overall out of 700.

This was a beautiful course, with a very steep uphill for about half a mile. I insisted on running the whole uphill, though most runners walked it -- then passed me again on the downhills! Still, the whole experience was tons of fun and I can't wait to do it again next year.

8/21/11