Today Tasha and I went down to Goofy Ridge to visit her family. While we were sitting around, Tasha’s dad mentioned that he got a new crossbow and he asked if I would like to fire it. Of course I would! After some struggle drawing the 175 lb string, my first shot was slightly off-center […]

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I am happy to report that my cousin’s wedding went very well, and now our family is happily bigger. Everything went along very smoothly, the weather was great, and much fun was had by all. I had the honor of being John’s best man, however I had a significantly harder time writing the speech this […]

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This week was a good set of workouts here in Pekin. It started out as a very successful kyu rank exam and was followed by a great workout on basics, sparring and kata. It was especially fun because Sensei Hartman had each black belt teach 10 minutes on a Heian kata of their choice. I […]

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We received news that our rabbit The Cheat died yesterday. He had been ill recently due to his diet, but appeared to be on the mend over the last few weeks. Unfortunately, rabbits aren’t the most robust critters in the world, but I feel like we did all we could for him. I feel especially […]

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Tonight I head back to the Pekin dojo to work out. I am told there is even a belt test going on! After the workout we are heading out to Steak and Shake and then I am off to hang out at my cousin’s house, hence the pre-blogging! Things are going fine here, it is […]

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After 12 hours of sleep, I feel like myself again. Dad and I spent the morning watching some woodworking shows on TV. I brought my Somogyi video to show him more about my guitarbuilding hobby andI think he enjoyed it. Now we are waiting for Tasha’s Mom so we can go to dinner with her. […]

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I am pleased to report that we arrived to Pekin on time and the bachelor party went off without a hitch. We had giant steaks, I came out $70 ahead from the casino, and the remainder of the bachelor party lasted until around 6 am. I had to be up for my nephew Ethan’s baptism […]

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By the time this posts, I will be back in Illinois and on my way to my cousin’s bachelor party.  I will be leaving straight from the airport to head to my parents house, then from there directly to check in at the hotel and on to dinner at Alexander’s Steakhouse.  Then it’s on to […]

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Tonight’s workout was pretty straightforward… simple punching and kicking combinations (with some body shifting thrown in for good measure) and kata.  We did Heian Yondan multiple times and then moved on to Unsu.  Unsu was broken into parts to help us focus on particular segments of the kata, and I can now get through the […]

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Today I got a really significant part of our application at work finished up and ready for release with the rest of our development team.  It was a big milestone and we’re all pretty relieved that it is complete.  I finished up my contribution just minutes before it was time to head out to the […]

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