A Whirlwind Weekend
This past weekend was unbelievably full. I’m not complaining. I had a lot of fun, and I wouldn’t have missed one minute of any one thing that I did. But it did underscore for me how very important it is to plan ahead if you want to maintain your sanity.
We prepared for our weekend on Wednesday and Thursday night, which was a good thing, because the timeline filled up really fast. We knew that there was a camping trip for Number One Son, a karate tournament for Number Two Son and me, and a couple of get-togethers with old friends for me. I’d also agreed to keep my nephew so his parents could go out, and to tape the confirmation class for Number One Son. So we packed for camping and got our gis ready, charged all the batteries and prepared the video setup for both the tournament and the class, and sliced vegetables for snacking on during the tournament.
Friday night, I had dinner with an in-town friend whom I haven’t seen in years. We went to Ryu, my neighbourhood steak and sushi place. My younger son was with us, but I bribed him with unlimited GameBoy play, so he was quiet and good and didn’t get too restless. I haven’t been to Ryu in a while, as I’m trying to follow both my budget and my low-carb diet plan.
But I decided to splurge just a bit. I’m glad, because Ryu has added some new rolls! The Spicy Cilantro roll was the only new one we tried … the other one I want to try was $12 … I’ll go try that one for lunch some karate day. Maybe as a reward when I lose ten more pounds.
We went back to my house after eating, and had a lovely conversation that ran the gamut from latch-hooked rugs to home remodels to special needs kids to budget woes. It was great, and I was sorry when the evening had to end.
Saturday morning, my son and I scurried around cleaning the kitchen and living room before running out to a karate tournament. We spent most of the day at the tournament, where we and ten other people from two of our system’s schools competed against martial artists from all over the Memphis metropolitan area. We did quite well. Our school members earned enough points to rank us fourth in the school competition — no school trophy for Sensei, but we’ll get him one yet. (He’s not worried about the “bling” anyway. He just wants us to do our best and have fun.)
Interestingly, our school almost swept the Women’s Kata division — all five of us placed in our kata competitions, taking first and third in the Women’s Brown, Red, and Black Belt division, and first, second, and third in the Women’s Intermediate (orange through purple belts) division. Some of our younger competitors did very well, too, with a couple of first-time competitors walking off with first-place trophies in kata and sparring. There were a few disappointments, of course, as some of the kids did not place. But overall it was a very good day.
That evening, an out-0f-town friend I haven’t seen in many years came over for dinner; it was nice to sit down over a nice bowl of homemade vegetable soup with savoury low-carb “crackers” and just chat. And feed my nephew, as this was the night his parents had their special date. The only sad point of the evening was that my chocolate pots de creme totally refused to set, so we had to have a Plan B dessert … it was okay, but it wasn’t what I wanted. And it was kind of embarrassing to have my dessert fail after I’d talked about how good it would be.
Sunday morning, I woke with a migraine. But I’d arranged to videotape the confirmation class for my older son, who was off on a camping trip. So my younger son and I headed off to church for the Sunday School hour. We left after Sunday School, ran a couple of “on the way home” errands, and landed at home for a quiet afternoon of movies, chores, and video-editing (confirmation class and karate tournament). And rest. My headache finally went away late in the afternoon, about an hour before Number One Son got home from his camping trip.
All in all, it was a good, productive, and fun weekend. And a very busy one. I’m not sure we could have pulled it all off if we hadn’t planned ahead.