A Normal Post... :-)

It was really fun to recount the story of my mom and aunt's trip over the last several entries, and I had some more adventures last month that I will talk about starting next entry. But this time, I want to make a regular entry.

Well most of the people that are reading this already know, but it looks like I am going to be a dad! Of course we have had an idea this will happen for the last 2 or so months, but I wanted to wait out the first 3 months before really announcing it. Well at the 3 month (or is it 4- I am a little confused actually) checkup it looks like everything is proceeding as expected and Ritsy is indeed still bearing child. Wow! I am going to be a papa... I think it is still a bit surreal to me right now but it is starting to sink in!

Well what does that mean for me then? Ritsy will be able to take a year's maternity leave but will make a greatly reduced salary, so the two of us definitely need to build up our savings before then. While I had worked hard to make my schedule easier on myself in this year, I now have to step back into the fray a bit and work a little extra. So, I am working Mondays again for now and will probably take a few strange classes that I might not have before. I can live with that and should be able to have a little bit saved by time we have the baby. Ritsy should have a bit saved too, thanks to Bonus time coming up.

It looks like I might have to cancel plans for returning back to Canada this year though! That really sucks, I could use a little dose of Vancouver right about now. I had been planning to take the trip during Obon so that I wouldn't have to disrupt my schedule, but that would have meant that the trip would be a bit expensive, well that renders the trip basically improbable. That makes the recent visits from my mother, aunt and Scott more valuable to me, at least I did get a bit of a taste of home this spring!

Right now, I still have a bit I need to learn about the pregnancy process in general and how it works in the Japanese system. I will start my research soon!

Well either way, it is a new, exciting and welcome experience!

Thanks to the miracle of photoshop and an old picture of my sister and nephew Mac (sorry Tracey!) I have created a picture showing what our baby might look like. Cute eh?
One more bit of news- this coming Monday is my wife's birthday and I had already planned to take her out to dinner on Sunday. On Tuesday one of my students- Satomi was nice enough to give us a couple of tickets to see the soccer team Jubilo play on Sunday afternoon. That should be a fun day! I was really touched by my students thoughtfulness!

Okay next up.... Tokyo Times...