Saturday, February 05, 2011

Birthdays, Travels, Shrines and Doctors

I do try to keep this blog current for the benefit of our grown kids, parents and friends who live far from us. I print it weekly to send to family and I really should say something about the last two weeks. LOL I "faked" an entry by posting photos of the train adventure before I left home. ::snort::  The past two weeks can be summed up fairly quickly: 


I had a birthday. Mike and the kids celebrated it on Sunday as I had studies and Mike had a base wide exercise (as in war games not P90) in which to participate.  I see a theme of self-care in these gifts....relaxation, jewelry, chocolate and  hobbies....they did good, didn't they? 



 Mike thinks my sea glass jewelry is ready to go to the next level. 


I spent 3 days traveling to Tokyo, exploring the New Sanno, meeting with Tokyo area PWOC Peeps, and such. Juliet, Asia Region VP, and I also went out on our OWN for a sightseeing trip. We wanted to see if the time we're planning to give the ladies during conference will be enough for them to go see "something". We also wanted to see how hard it would be for those totally unfamiliar with Tokyo to find their way around. We did fine.  The running joke on the regional board is that I break a pair of reading glasses every time we meet.....this  is the pair I broke not 10 min after seeing Juliet. 

Discovered Banana Hot Cocoa on the trip...yum. 

Welcome sign at Ueno Station

Myself and Juliet

Incense of prayers....something to ponder and pray about




I was discreet and was not the only one videoing....the routine is to throw money, clap, bow, pray, bow....and there was no bell here to ring....all very sad when you the crowds putting their faith in this.....We speak to nations, be free! 

I was really happy to do so well with the subways and trains. It was a blessing to have 3 hours to visit with Mary before she went to the states to be with her father for his surgery.  She was an encouragement. I brought these ninja hoods back for the boys.....I got one for Jared figuring he'll use it in a human video. 


When I got home I had a bit of an adventure trying to get the taxi driver to my home. He told me repeatedly this was not a Japanese address. LOL  We had company that night and the next day was busy and into Sunday. 


This week began with doctor appointments and Bible Studies.  Then came the accident..... I spent Thursday and Friday on base. Jared and I had appointments and it was easier to go in and stay as we are currently a one car family.  The kids at home did AMAZINGLY well with the work I'd laid out for them, Jared got a LOT more done being in a quiet chapel all day and I got much done on various speaking engagements I have coming up as well as the planning the local PWOC retreat. 

Arielle and Nolan crushed our "iron fortified" cereal, used a magnet and attracted iron....ew. 

I had a cholesterol check this week. I'm thrilled with the lost weight and exercise that my blood pressure is down to 117/78....lower than "junior's". ::snort::  The amazing thing was my cholesterol number. Even with all the weight loss and such, my cholesterol was 300 when they checked three months ago. It's 199 now. I mentioned I could try to go off and maintain again and was told absolutely not. Seems I've aged enough now to be in the bracket where heart attacks are the number one killer for women and he felt having my cholesterol that high for this many years is bad, bad, bad.....so I'll take the pills. It did an amazing job of bringing the numbers down.  I hope to be mid-range or low range in 3 more months. 


One last funny of the week....when I was meeting with Mr. Kobiyashi about a location for our retreat he insisted I needed to give him a "laugh estimate" by a week before our retreat. I had him repeat it several times, had no clue why he needed a laugh estimate but wrote it down. Annette, our wonderful Wing Chaplain's wife, was also in the meeting. She leaned over and said, "I think he means a rough estimate!" ::snort:: I figured he wanted to know when to laugh during the weekend. LOL 


Choosing Joy!
©2010 D.R.G.
~Coram Deo~
Living all of life before the face of God...

4 comments:

Anonymous said...

Sis: Funny..laugh estimate.. :):) I was thinking he wanted to know just how loud you would all be when laughing. :) Glad to hear your various numbers are down.... hang in there babe........ As Grandma S. use to say over and over.."don't get old, it ain't what it's cracked up to be." An ordinary saying but now Dad/I know full well what she was talking about....... Hey we are doing better also. love/prayers - Mom T.

Kristine said...

What, no picture of the foreignstyle chamber-pot?

Ooh, great find of ninja hoods for the boys!

WONDERFUL about your cholesterol. Robert's was almost 500 a year ago. The first meds gave him some kind of problem, but the second meds have worked. His latest results came back yesterday, 197. I guess you'll both be around for a while longer!

Paula said...

When I taught English in Japan our students always had trouble with "r" and "l" --they just can't differentiate the sounds. Apparently if our brains aren't exposed to certain sounds when we are young, we can literally lose the ability to hear those sounds. It doesn't help that both "l" and "r" sounds are transliterated with the same katakana.
I've had fun catching up on your blog--I stole a few minutes today from the endless task of organizing the house. I haven't read blogs for several weeks.

Cynthia said...

Curious how much you've lost now since the last time we chatted. You probably don't want to post that online, but send me an email... and I'll send you my update.