Stuff Other Than Japan

Before I continue on about my adventures in Japan, I simply wanted to do a brain dump of all the happenings since last November.

Let's see... There are two really big items, I suppose. The rest is filler.

First off, I lost my first close relative. My grandfather, to be more specific, on my American side. Given that my father was never really close with his parents, he formed a sort of barrier between us, preventing us from ever really, truly being close. That, coupled with the fact that they live on the opposite coast, meant that we rarely ever saw each other. In fact, that last time I saw my American grandparents was over 10 years ago. Sure, I talked to them on the phone every Christmas/Thanksgiving or so, wrote the occasional letter to let them know how I was, etc but I never went to visit them. And now it's too late to see my grandfather, Lord of the Thumbz. He was 89 years old and died a relatively painless death, so I guess that's all really one can ask for at the end of things. In fact, I consider myself lucky that I hadn't lost anyone until now. I simply wish I knew more about him than what my father has told me.

It was a bit numbing, at first, when I heard about my grandfather's passing. It was a matter of days before I had to head out to another trip to Japan, so I spent a good portion of that trip in a bit of a daze. Might've been the beer, but I'm pretty sure that wasn't it.

To that end, my brother and I will likely be heading out to South Carolina to see our grandmother sometime next month. She's alone now, and I just want to make sure she's doing okay. She's in good health, which is good, but I don't think she'd be willing to move out to the west coast, where the majority of our family is, simply because she's old fashioned. I hope everything is alright with her.

I've dealt with that and sorted out my feelings on that whole incident, so I'd rather not dwell. Now, onto better things! I got promoted! Sorta hinted at it in the last post with the mentioning of my new boss, but I've been moved into the corporate department of my company, and I believe my official title is "CEO's Bitch." I swear, I'm his garbage disposal. Anything he doesn't know what to do with, he throws at me. But, I get to travel to more areas now (London!!) and make a lot more money, and am involved in a lot more areas of the company, so it's a good thing. Spreading myself a little too thin, though. Not sure how much longer I can keep that up. Figure I better do it while I'm young!

That's all for today. A bit busy, so yeah. Ciao.