Snow...and LOTS of it

As you know, on the 11th the Twin Cities got a LOT of snow. In about an 18 hour time frame it got between 15-20 inches of snow, depending on where in the metro you were. It resulted in two snow days for me off of work (which has no happened in the four years I have been up there)

So, here's my tutorial - How to move your car in 18 inches of snow:

1st step: Walk out to the car without getting too much snow in your shoes.
2nd step: Try to find your car in the heaps of snow.


3rd step: Assess the situation in front of you and realize, "Yup, that's a lot of snow!"

4th step: After identifying your car and approaching you, you realize you must remove 18 inches of snow to get the shovel out of the trunk (Thank you again, Lily, for telling me to get that when I first moved to MN)

5th step: Once you got the shovel out, you realize you should have packed a snow blower in the trunk instead.
6th step: You realize there's melting snow already in your shoes, so the logical thing is to first make a path way around the car to avoid further snow in the shoes.

7th step: Start on the top and use the shovel to remove heaps of snow.

(Half of the windshield cleaned)

8th-12th step: Well you finally get the car cleaned off enough to be able to attempt to drive it to a new spot where it wont get ticketed that night as they plow the streets. Ah, but now that you've freed the car, you need a new place to park it. If you're lucky, you'll get one of the three limited alley parking spots that are safe to park in. Oh, but wait, no so fast, you can't move it that easily! You must clean out the parking space, which probably hasn't had a vehicle in it for about two hours...yes more shoveling! Well once you get that cleared out, you ask the kind neighbor who is also out with his snow blower to borrow his trash can to save the spot you just spent time digging out. You walk back around the block to your car and hope you removed enough snow in front of your car to get you into the trenches of the street. And now matter how much shoveling you do, you realize you don't have the energy to shovel the whole street, which is what is needed for your car to move in nearly two feet of snow. Back and forth...Drive and reverse, and drive and reverse, you keep rocking the car to get it to move inches at a time. And then a truck start to turn down the street facing you. There's not room for the two of you to go down the street, and you're stuck blocking half of the street with your stuck car. But here, for once, Minnesota Nice comes in handy, and the gentleman ask you if you'd like a pull out on to the main street (about 150 feet). You can't turn down an opportunity like that and thank him for his help when you get to the main street and remember what it's like to have traction again!

Whatever step we are now: You finally are able to park your car in to the spot you had cleared. due to the tight fit though, you have to do some fancy turning and park your car in backwards.

(You're considerate enough to at least shovel out a path way next to your car from the apartment door to the alley so that your fellow apartment-mates will have a place to walk)

(Half of that is the snow you had to shovel around to get a parking spot for you car)

To Uncle David

As you know, one of the ways I like to remember people are by the things they taught us. I think I do this because it’s one of the best ways to keep the honor, memory and stories of the person alive. And over the past week, I’ve had time to think about what Uncle David had taught me, and I realized he helped give me one of my best qualities: Work hard in a sane way. Most say, “word hard” or “be a hard worker.” However, I think most forget to say what Uncle David taught me from an early age, “Keep your sanity while working hard.”

Here’s a story to exemplify what I mean: When I was in middle school, we put up the retaining wall in our back yard. We had a number of people over helping us. And as I recall, it was a hot day with lots of heavy lifting, shoveling, etc. Uncle David was over to help. While some were furiously working with little to no breaks, Uncle David would pull me aside and have me take a break with him. I remember him essentially saying, “Don’t over work yourself; the wall will get done. Some have their way of working hardcore, non-stop till the job is done, but it’s not worth the wear and tear and on the mind and body.” And in more recent years, when we were painting Great-Grandma’s house, he took the same approach.

There’s no doubt that Uncle David was a hard worker, and did quality work to be proud of. But I think he was able to do that quality of work because he understood the importance of balance in doing things, working hard and keeping one’s sanity as well. I know when I’m in the middle of big work loads, I often think about what Uncle taught me, and take a break when needed. Not only do I keep my sanity, but you go back to the task refreshed and ready to take it on.

As I alluded to, another thing Uncle David taught me was to do quality work that you could be proud of. Sure there’s more than one way to solve a problem, some ways being easier than others. It’s alright to pick the easy way, as long as you don’t sacrifice quality or doing a thorough job.

Uncle also taught me to be socially considerate. When we were younger, and would see some of our Guro cousins basically once a year on New Years, Uncle David tried to make sure Ann and I, who were shy, were included in their games and activities. On the same coin, he also reinforced the importance of helping out the family. Uncle David was always willing to use his skills help family members with their house work.

And, in an funny way, Uncle David also stressed the importance of going to church, in a somewhat subliminal way. He would take Kumi and Kenji to Sunday school almost every week when we younger. Uncle would back in his truck under one of the trees, and read the Sunday newspaper while we were in Sunday school. And though he may not have sat in a pew, if you would have asked, he would have said, “Yup I went to church today.” But the fact that he would regularly take them to church, put in the time, patience and effort to bring them, still speaks a lot I think. (I could go into some discussion comparing the communion of the Trinity and the communion of the family, but I’ll spare that for some other time.)

And last, but not least, Uncle David taught me not to be scared of wrapping Christmas gifts in obscure things with masking tape. I have a collection in fact of some of his unique wrapping ideas, and they will always be treasured now.

I really wished I could have thanked Uncle David in person for all the lessons and memories, but I’m sure he now knows.

Thank you, Uncle David, for all that you did!

Holiday Season

Well, we got about four inches of snow between yesterday afternoon and early this morning. And so tonight they called a snow emergency to plow the streets. Last night when I made it home from work, which took four times the normal time, I grabbed a parking space in the ally so I dont have to worry about the snow emergency that I figured they would call. And I didn’t feel like loosing the great parking space I nabbed last night so I didn’t do much today. I did some chores and cleaning around the apartment, otherwise I’ve been sitting around watching tv. I did go out though and get some exercise scrapping off my car and shoveling snow from around it.

I finally started feeling better from the “sinus infection” I had just in time for Thanksgiving. And I don’t know if I really had a “sinus infection” but that is what one of my doctor friends diagnosed me with over the phone. It only bothered me for three weeks. And while I didn’t have sinus problems per se, I did have a throbbing headache whenever I wasn’t on Tylenol. And I didn’t wan to stay on Tylenol unless I absolutely needed to go out and do something because I didn’t want to end up with Tylenol withdraw headaches when I was better. So I suffered through what I could, but it was miserable! Glad to say I haven’t needed to take Tylenol in over a week now!

Oh yes, I did go shopping the day after Thanksgiving. I went with Chris and a couple of his coworkers to the outlet malls…at midnight. The outlets actually opened at 10pm. By the time we got there at midnight, the parking lots were full and we had to park in over flow lots at one of the local schools. But they had over flow lots at a number of different places with shuttle buses running. (The shuttle bus driver said they had been running from 8pm of Thanksgiving night and were going to be running through most of Friday.) And it is an outdoor outlet mall (all the doors to the different stores open to the outside like at Folsom)…so you can imagine the fun of shopping when it’s -2 outside and windy! But Minnesotans are hardy and enjoy it, and they enjoy their black Friday deals. The Coach line was about an hour wait outside! We didn’t need anything, at Coach thankfully.

Tidbit by Thomas:

Incase you are stumped by what Thomas may want for Christmas, here’s a couple ideas:

• Gift certificates for Amazon, Michaels, and Target are handy (I recently discovered that Target does offer some good produce and food for descent prices)
• I have the two butsudans still and one of these days/years I’d like to be able to get the two side scrolls for them of Shinran and Rennyo. http://stores.buddhistbookstore.com/Detail.bok?no=60 ($50 can be steep, but if you wanted to specifically contribute money towards them, you can tell me.)
• I still collect stamps and coins, but I haven’t had a chance to really get any recently cause of my fixed/negative income…But here’s some of the sheets/panes I find interesting. (I have linked some of them to the post office store in case you want to see)
  
• (Early TV Memories)
• (Sunday Funnies)
• (Vancouver 2010 Olympics)
• State Flags (They came out in different sets)
• I dont think it has gift certificates, but if you wanted to designate a monetary gifts towards Ancestry.com, that would be useful too (paying quarterly is $50, paying monthly is $20)
  
• Green stuff is always useful too as it is always the right size, always the right color, and will always help me survive!

Two weeks till I'm home for Christmas break!

Sights and Sounds of the Season

Corn Maze

At the beginning of October, a few of us went corn mazing at Sever's Corn Maze. In it they have a scavenger hunt where you find different plaques. Basically, they give you a card with the map on it and location of these plaques with Viking facts, since this year's maze was celebrating the 50th season of the team. When you found one with particular picture on it, your marked the plaque on your map. I think it took us just under an hour to navigate our way through it. You can see the huge maze at http://severscornmaze.com/about.php?mazesection=currentmaze

First Snow of the Year

I'm sure a lot of you have seen the last couple of days on the news that Minnesota got its first snow fall of the season! (Couple days ago it was in the 60's!) There was about 6" that fell yesterday in my part of the Cities. Some places in the Cities got nearly a foot of snow. It was a particularly extra wet snow and thus really slushy. It's suppose to get warm again this week in the 40's so this snow will probably not last long.

Front of my apartment building

One of the bushes next to my apartment building

Snow falls everywhere
At the intersection around the block from me, this is the fun of driving in winter.

The carOh and the "Sounds" part of the blog title that you might be wondering about? Well yes, we can hear the snow plows working again. There's nothing like the metal of the plow scrapping against the pavement of the road.


This past week I've also been fighting a cold/flu of some sort. Little kids are just a germ factory! I'm still not 100%, but slowly getting better it seems.

Im still working on ancestry.com to work on the holes in my genealogy research. It's a great website and resource. I wish I had subscribed at the time for the 12 months discount instead of the 3 months discount. I thought I'd be done in three months, but that is far from the case! I hope to be finishing up work on Matsui side soon. But once you scrape the surface, you have to dig a well to get all the information!

Tidbit by Thomas: While I am an A's fan first, and probably a Twin's fan over the Giants, I guess the Giants were destined, for different reasons, to be World Series Champs. But one of the reasons I think is because they had Auntie Kiyoka cheering them on from nirvana this year! I'm sure she was proud of them!

Sound of Music

So my co-worker (another tutor) said today when I walked in today, "Oh I'm sure you're excited to get home and watch the 'Sound of Music' on Opera today." She thought she was joking when she said that. She was surprised when I responded, "I know, I saw that on a commercial and can't wait to see it since it's favorite all time movie!" (I should have showed her my iphone with a special folder for the Sound of Music's soundtrack.) Yes, I actually saw a commercial for it last night and i even wrote myself a note so I would NOT forget! Thankfully, the kids I had at the end of the day, were not there, so I got home just in time to watch Opera. (For the record, it's probably the first time I've watched a full episode of Opera in about 10 years.)

As for the new job, I've learned I am not made to be a full time grade school teacher or middle school teacher! I'm glad I'm only part time and getting paid for it. Germs, dirty hands, little kids that can't sit still, teenagers that don't care, yada yada is not my cup of tea. On the bright side, the kids in the middle, 5th graders, seem to be eager sponges that want to learn. And it's amazing the power that a simple sticker has over 2nd graders!

Tidbits by Thomas: To connect those to paragraphs - "Climb every mountain, Ford every stream, Follow every rainbow, Till you find your dream."

Thomas? Working? What?

I apologize for my hiatus…There wasn’t much to report on…but the rumor mill has started up again…

Yes, the rumors are true! Thomas is again officially part time employed! I will be a contracted tutor at an inner city parochial grade school in Minneapolis. I will be tutoring kid ranging from 2^nd grade to 8^th grade in reading and math. Though it’s only four hours a day in the afternoon, I will be making enough to pay my bills and still have enough for food and gas at the end of the month. I was offered the job at the end of last week and started today. Today I had mainly middle school kids; the interesting part will be the 2nd graders and other grade school kids later in the week (groups have anywhere from 1-5 kid(s); and are either 30 mins to an hour long). While I’m used to teenager, I’ve never really worked with younger kids. Thankfully the company has good resources and pre-made lesson plans.

I’ll still be active at the high school though. I’ll still be on the tutoring list there for morning jobs, and still plan on attending sporting events, theater events, and campus ministry events to keep involved at the community there and keep supporting the kids there. I told them they won’t be able to get rid of me that easily.

Minnesota has been experiencing abnormally high temperatures the past few weeks; we are on track from the second warmest October on record. Just a couple weeks ago, we were in the mid-80s! (Last year at the same time, we had already had a few inches of snow!) Saw the forecast for the next week on the news, and looks like we will be around 60 here for highs. But at nights we can definitely notice cooler temperatures…Yes, I’m dreading what is to come….

So here are some more MN state fair pictures from last month…

Minnesota version of Hot-Dog-On-A-Stick is "Ponto Pup." I think had one of those on each of my three visits to the Fair.

I think I posted a picture of this two years ago...Oodles of Noodles. "Spaghetti & Meatball Dinner On a Stick" and "S'mores on a Stick." (No, I didnt get to try it.)

Yes, the one on the left center says "Teriyaki Ostrich"

One aisle of the PACKED food building!

My friend Chris, who took theology classes at St. Thomas with me. St. Thomas has a booth in the education building. They hand out bags each year, that are coveted and so only handed out at certain times.

Chris and I with the Spam guy. (You can see my coveted purple St. Thomas bag in my hand.)(Yes, I picked up international Spam again for musubi)

You can even find Snoopy and Woodstock at the fair!

The mascot of the MN Fair. (The equivalent of the golden bear mascot for the CA fair)

Corn on the cob is a VERY popular food at the fair. There's a booth that sells ONLY corn on the cob. It comes slightly buttered; throw on on salt and pepper and it taste wonderful.

Do giant stuffed pigs make giant stuffed piglets?

We stayed for the fireworks that night.

On the way out, how could I not take a picture of the train shop? I thought that was dad driving the train, but apparently it wasnt...

Summer pictures (Part 1)

Charlie's annual "Bash" (June 2010; Siren, WI)

I promise you, this person was 100% sober when they parked their car in the ditch.

Tommy resting before dinner for a full night of adventures.

Tommy and Tom

The annual woofle ball tournament. Two additional rules: Everone bats with their opposite side, and you always have to have a drink in hand.

Cousins at Auntie Kiyoka's memorial service

Charlie and I at the Minnesota Fair

More fair pictures to come...

Wisdom from our elders....

Last weekend, Ancestry .com had a special to allow anyone to view their immigration records for free. So I took advantage of it and tried to find as many of my great-grandparents and great-great-grandparents that I could, along with some other relatives. They had boat/passenger records and naturalization records available.

Kinue Iwasa on the passenger list from the Persia Maru on May 16, 1917

Well then of course they send an email a couple of days later saying they were offering a discount deal for membership 20% off, so I took my pennies in and took advantage of that so now I have the membership to do even more research. I’m looking forward to finally finishing and updating my genealogy records as much as I can. And this will give me something else to do with my time.


Look forward to summer pictures being posted later in the week…

Tidbits by Thomas: When I was in Sacramento in July, I went to see my friends’ (Jimmy and Brandon) grandma, Mama Choncha. On the way out of her house we were talking about how substituting was. She told me to keep the kids in line. I told her I would try to. She responded back with a quote I still have not forgotten, “If you’re going to try, you might as well succeed.”

My Speech about Auntie Kiyoka

Auntie Kiyoka was like a grandma figure to my sister and I. We could tell you about Auntie who watched us during the summers. Or about Auntie who loved the San Francisco Giants and Sacramento Kings. Or about Auntie who loved watching TV soaps and who I would gossip with about Young and the Restless. However, Id rather tell you about Auntie the passionate Gardener. She may have planted countless seeds outside, however she also planted other types of seeds…The seeds of life long lessons.

The first life lesson she planted was “do not fight with your sibling.” I couldn’t tell you how many hours of bickering Auntie had to put up with between my sister and I, but it seemed like she always had a way of dealing with it. Eventually, we learned life was more enjoyable with less fighting and more appreciativeness.

The second life lesson she planted was “enjoy sushi.” The best part about auntie watching us was the musubi rolls she would make with us at lunch. Simple rice, salt and nori. She was the first to teach me how to roll sushi. This was the beginning to my love for sushi and for cooking. In college I made hundreds of sushi rolls because of what Auntie had taught me all those many years earlier.

The third life lesson is best described in a garden analogy: Grow pumpkins; and the bigger the pumpkin the better. Growing up, I never understood why people bought pumpkins at Halloween, when they could just go to somewhere like Auntie’s house and get them for free. All sizes…regular pumpkins, large pumpkins and huge pumpkins. After nurturing them from seed to pumpkin, she would freely share them with us, and other nieces and nephews. So another way of wording this lesson would be: use your talents and gifts, and to turn them into bigger and better things that you can share with others.

The fourth life lesson she planted was “think outside the box.” Auntie trained my sister and I to be great rummi-tile players. Sure it’s easy to place tiles down in color or numerical order. However, Auntie taught us to take it to another level. To play your tiles, dismantle the sets already in play, rearrange them in a whole new order. And there’s tiles that don’t fit? Well keep reworking them…Keep rearranging them…don’t give up. Alas they finally fall into place, usually. Im certain this laid the foundation to help me think abstractly, think outside the box, make connections in various situations, and find other ways to the end.

Finally the fifth life lesson she planted was “keep learning.” Closely intertwined with the last lesson, she wanted us to learn and receiving a good education. I will forever be grateful for these and other lessons she taught us, and even more grateful for the support she gave us in our own educational pursuits.

So during her life Auntie planted many seeds, literally and figuratively, and they were cared for to maturity. Upon reflection, it is clear to me she watered her garden of life lessons with “Gratitude.” Whether it was teaching us to be grateful for what you have, including siblings, or in offering the first scoop of rice in the butsudan before making sushi, or sharing meals and resources with loved ones, or in giving an education. Gratitude flows through all those situations. Giving gratitude and humbly receiving it - that is what flowed through her life. And gratitude is what we gave back to her, and what we will continue to give back to her.

California Pictures

Obon 2010
Obon pretty much turned in to a Guro Family reunion. All the Sacramento Guro families were were well represented. But it was also Great Grandma Matsui's Hatsubon, so I was out there dancing for her.

Going away lunch with Br. Dat
Many of you have met Br. Dat, or know of him. He taught at CBHS while Ann and I was there. He recently got the chance to go teach in Thailand for a few years, so we were lucky enough to meet up with him the day before he left at the Spaghetti Factory in Concord.

Couple pictures from Kobata-Iwasa Family Bowling Tournament after party

Family Luncheon at Kumi's House

Grandpa and Auntie Bernice's Birthday at Kamnon

Mom and I at the State Fair
I wasn't home last year for the California State Fair, but I always enjoy going. Mom and I went through all of the building and had a good time. And as normal, our day ended with a bag of kettle corn.

I promise to try and make weekly updates again...so stay tuned...