3rd and 4th Quartly Updates

[judai]

You know, if it weren't for this thing I would never know what everyone is up to. Fortunately the holiday's are coming and hopefully be able to stop being a recluse for a bit. Anyway, I've come to the decision that my life is boring enough that I figure I'll just store up all of the miscellaneous crap that's happened to me and update once or twice a quarter. Hopefully this will also help me ease my occasional feelings of guilt for not posting, but I doubt it.

So, here we go:

July:

After having my dreams of being a G-man dashed I refocused my efforts on training for my upcoming belt test. Fortunately for me all my hard work paid off and I was able to pass my 3rd degree test late in the month up in New York.

Nothing really exciting comes from this, I just get to put another stripe on my belt and now get to wear a nifty blue uniform.

On my way to my test in New York I was able to stop and visit my Cousin and his family in Connecticut. He has three kids, a pair of twins that just turned 3 and a baby that was born in late June. I don't get to see my extended family all that much so it was really good to just relax and bond with my younger cousins.

August, September:

Applied for a couple of new jobs during this time, but got shot down each time.

Yeah, can't really think of anything else for these months. I'll get back to you on this if I do.

October:

I was able to promote one of my students, from my old school, to Black Belt at the beginning of the month. I may bitch and gripe about teaching sometimes, but all of the time and work becomes worth it when I get to do this. Too bad it doesn't happen often enough.

SAIC had an IPO and is now a publicly traded company. I want everyone to go out and by stock in SAI so the price will rise and make the shares I own more valuable :P

November:

I traveled up to South Bend, Indiana the week before Thanksgiving to see the Notre Dame/Army football game. One of my friends is a obsessive ND fan, so myself and others bought him tickets to the game for his birthday.

Notre Dame won big, but I have to admit I wasn't too impressed. The crowd just didn't seem to have the same energy as a college game here in Texas, even if they have more people in attendance. On the other hand the campus is absolutely gorgeous and it's amazing to see the number of people that actually showed up to watch a game.

The Thanksgiving holidays brought the yearly visit from my Aunt and Uncle, and as always it was good to see them.

Was able to play a couple rounds of golf over the holidays and played like crap.

I'm jumping on the advanced degree band wagon as well. I recently submitted my applications for grad school to A&M, UH, Rice, and UT.