"One thing at a time"

One of the blessing we have in our lives is that we all love music as a family.....None of us are proficient in any stretch of an imagination but we all enjoy it. I personally have to have true professional performance experience once in a while to feel alive. I am very excited to know that I have tickets bought for James Galway's flute concert in New Orleans shortly.....Can't wait. I think I was quite spoiled in that I grew up in a city where Galway or Rampal appeared regularly. If one was not there one year, another one was... Vienna boys choir was another one that I remember visiting my city frequently. Berlin Phil, Bernstein, Perlman were all very familiar names growing up, although we could not afford these famous performers' concerts that often. Out of my mother's tight budget, she took us to "real" concerts, performed by Nagoya or Tokyo philharmonic orchestra type thing. It was a major sacrifice but she believed that it enriched us. I always remember t...

Cold icicles that hang over the roof appeared as though my house was weeping. So were all the plants out side of my home. As much as I enjoyed seeing the beautifully sculpted icy art pieces, something left me with a bit of sadness reminding me of those moments that I wished that my tears would freeze. A preventable series of errors left my father brain dead and it led to subsequent death. It was interesting to find an article on Mortality, Morbidity section of the Agency of Health Care Research and Qualify website today that depicts a case reminiscent of my father's case. Except that this case described how the patient was resuscitated successfully thanks to the emergency bedside tracheostomy. That was a luxury my father was not provided for even though he begged for it before he lost his consciousness, due mostly to the inadequately prepared physician on call. He had no idea that someone who could not perform this tracheostomy would be on call the night he endured 8 hour surger...

As I write this, Erik is tackling yet another new music that is quite difficult, I wont' lie, I would just look at it and close the book... We don't know yet, if this piece is too difficult for him at this point but he would tell us.... When a new piece is in front of him, occasionally he is overwhelmed and it becomes a teary session. I think he is tired at the end of the day, too. But he had so much fun putting a lamp we purchased today and also a shelf to use in one of our closets. Now, he moved on to the hymn arrangement for Easter that he found last week. This one is out of an advance level hymn arrangement book but not nearly as complex as the classical piece he is facing giving him some much needed room to breathe. Closets are actually a notoriously forgotten spaces in the homes. There is SO much space wasted in many closets, I admit, at least in my own experience in the 17 yrs that I owned a home at various places... The fact that I have never invested enough for wise ...

My muscle is SORE, I over did it.... What did I over do? When I was screwing a nail in the wall, it hit something,, and I had to really put some force.. I could not get it in all the way on my own and I had to ask Sven to finish it. My house REALLY needed deep, deep cleaning. Since last fall, my involvement with the Japanese health care organizations and educational establishments has completely absorbed me with its demand and I let things go.. Quite a bit of it,, I am slowly working toward restoring my house one room at a time. I worked on my bedroom and master bath last week and I put Erik's room back in shape over the weekend with his help and input. Now, I have my office to tackle as well as the bedroom next to erik's room that was called, "music room" at one point... Sure, if funding is not an issue, I would hire someone to redesign the entire kitchen and complete the surface work on the floor etc but I am not a millionaire. While I was moving things around a...

Erik hopped in the car when I picked him up from school and excitedly informed me that he won the first place in geography section of the social studies fair and that he is advancing to the regional...OK that is great... He came home with another thing today... His science teacher asked him about literary rally that host students to compete in various subject... .his science teacher chose Erik to compete in Biology... and this competition covers areas that has not been covered in science class yet ant that he needs to read and study extra to get ready for this competition,,,, and his math teacher included Erik in the 4 students from Cedar Creek who will compete at Math Count competition,,,,,I have no clue about these things....... SO, he is tied up on so many saturdays for these competitions.... But Erik said, he wants to do it. I dont'. I am working in Nashville for some if those weekend,,,, like the one for the Biology.... Erik said, I want you to be in town for Piano Competition...