Opposite Weekends, a.k.a I Really Like Being Busy

So, last weekend I did very little. Well, let me clarify, I had very little to do. I cleaned my room and thought too much.

This Weekend was great because I was so busy. Friday, Saturday and Sunday nights combined I was only able to get 5 hours of sleep (I just had a 5 hour nap to recover). So, in standard fashion, let me give you all the chonological run down of the weekend.

Thursday: Ok, time for a little background. Takaya, Sung Eun and I had, in total, invited 20 people to come to Karaoke. There was a little bit of an issue with having enough cars (it took a long time to round up enough cars, by the way, thanks to everyone who came!). However, a larger issue existed. Takaya had told me that the Karaoke shop was called "Ururara". As hard as I looked, I could not find it on the phone book or on google. I even tried searching using Hangul and Katakana. Nothing. Finally, on Friday night I called up Ralph and together we drove to Sacramento to look for the Karaoke shop in what I guess is Sacramento's Korean neighborhood. Of course, no trip down Folsom road would be complete without a stop at Hana Market, my favorite Korean store.
Ralph had the brilliant idea to ask the people who worked in the supermarket where the Karaoke place was, and sure enough, they told us it was about a block away.
It was then that I understood. "Rurulala" can easily become "Ururara" if you are Japanese and not being very careful with your pronunciation. Oops. I shoud have known. Anyway, we went inside and made reservations for 20 on Saturday. Afterwards, feeling a bit hungry, Ralph and I stopped by a restaurant for some Bi Bim Bap.
I believe that this was Ralph's first exposure to Korean food. From what I could gather, he was impressed.
Then it was off to Ralph's house to pick up a heater.
Friday: I woke up Friday morning and spent all day writing a paper that was due at 5. After 5 I went to the MST office hours that I promised I would have, but since no one came even though they said they would, I was quite bored and sad.
Well, when I got home Kira and Ryan came and picked me up and we went to see Macbeth. It was by far the best rendition of Macbeth that I have ever seen. Even though Macbeth was female, the actor did such a great job that you forgot she was not a medieval Scottish tyrant.
Even though Macbeth is my least favorite Shakespeare play, I enjoyed it. I think the reason I do not like Macbeth is the fact that I never feel any connection or sympathy for Macbeth. What I liked about this version is it emphasized the prophecy (which is really well worded) rather than the insanity (which is always overdone).
Saturday:I have signed up for a Teaching English as a Foreign Language course . I really want to become a good teacher. I was worried that this class was going to be an 18 hour waste of time every weekend, but, aside from being locked outside of the classroom in 40 degree weather for an hour on our first day (shown below), so far it has been great. It is not boring, I learn something new and useful every 5 minutes, my classmates all seem to be good people, and the instructor is very, very good. I doubt that the certificate I receive from this course will be worth very much, but the knowledge will be very useful.
Well, my TEFL class went from 9-6, and afterwards I immediately drove back to Davis and began to prepare for Karaoke. Here are Sung Eun and Tazuko waiting with me in Game Stop for everyone else to show up.
It was just after I took that picture that Ralph called me and told me Ed'd's car would not start. This was very bad news. Even though Kira had been kind enough to loan me her car (thank you Kira!), Drake was comming (thank you Drake!), and Ralph was taking my car (thank you Ralph!) I would still have only 11 seats for 15 passengers. It was then that a very welcome mistake was realized: Takaya had forgotten to call 5 people who he had invited to tell them the gathering place and time. Sad to leave our friends, but relieved that we did not have to stack people in the back of the car, we set off.

Everything else from the night went wonderfully, I thought. I would have liked to have been able to talk to people more, but conversation is basically impossible in a Karaoke booth. Oh, well. Here we are in the booth at Karaoke.
My first song was "Cryin'" by Areosmith. Not a good choice for the first song. Lindsey, Sung Eun and Soh-Hyun sang the most songs in the beginning, including a Korean song in which the English chorus was "I love you long time", which made the jaws of most of the Americans in the booth drop to the floor in embarrassed amazement. We never explained our surprise, although we probably should.
Lindsey, Soh-Hyun and Sung Eun.
Tazuko and Tomoko on the left, searching for a song for themselves. Koki, Lindsey and Soh-Hyun on the right.
Tomoko and Tazuko singing their song. And dancing, might I add.
Me and Drake butchering "Lean on Me".
Ralph looks for a song.
The Mic.
The Crew.
We'll have to do that again sometime.

Sunday consisted of more class, followed by the Star Wars RPG that Rick, Sean, Diego, Ralph and I play on Sundays. For those of you who do not know about our game, think of it as our "Poker Night".

I have two conclusions from this weekend. 1) I am getting better at manageing my time. 2) If you were to open a Karaoke shop in Davis, you would make so much money.