Happy Monday! It's a short week here- Thursday begins Japanese "Golden Week", where we have 5 national holidays over the space of a week. Officially, we have off on Thursday (Green Day... I guess like Earth Day, but not), then next Monday (Constitution Day), Tuesday (Some holiday...), and Wednesday (Children's Day). This being Japan, we unfortunately do NOT have this Friday off, which is a bit inconvenient. I'll be taking that day out of my vacation time, because I am off to Malyasia on Thursday! Yep- its a little far from Northern Japan. Tom had a change in work plans which made it supremely inconvenient for him to fly back from Kuala Lumpur this Thursday (the original plan) before a new meeting in Thailand next week. So.... he got his office to pay to fly me to Malaysia for the week, instead. Actually, only about 5 days... but I'm still really amazed! I know next to nothing about Malaysia- only what I've picked up in chats with him (he goes regularly) and from the movie "Entrapment" (ha!). I know it will be HOT. I promise to take loads of pictures.

With all the last minute details to work through last week (I'm flying out of Osaka, so needed to find somewhere to stay between here and there so I can get to the airport on time... got a hotel in Nagoya), I haven't had a heck of a lot else going on. We've had some excellent weather and I've been taking advantage of it by running, blading, walking, and weeding everyday after school. Ah... here come all those ugly, tall green things to crud up my yard!! The tulips were fun but they've about finished so now I have to figure out how to "deal" with my yard without it strangling me before I leave.

Nothing new on the job front. Still no real idea what I'll be doing come August. More likely than not, I'll still be teaching English- since that's what my visa is for I figure its probably the easiest bet- especially since I'll be applying from out of town. I was really dragging my feet on this... but hey, I've got the experience and figure since I want to teach anyhow- it can't hurt to get even more experience. Hopefully I can take more classes in my free time to apply to entering an education program when I go home. Some day I really DO want to dump this English teaching gig!! (><) (that's a Japanese icon for a cross-eyed face... just FYI). If anyone has any connections out there they'd like to toss my way I'm open to any and all suggestions!