Breaking News
I got into JET!! Woo Hoo!

(big sigh of relief)

Heeere's whats going on.
I'm still waiting to hear back from JET. From what I understand, it should be coming via mail/email anyday now. That's the name of the game here, hurry up and wait. They ought to call it the Japan Patience Building Program, cause that's all I've gotten out of it so far. Even after I hear about possible acceptance, I still have to wait to hear from them about placement. It gets a little ridiculous after a while and it's starting to eat away at my nerves.

I recently heard that three girls from my high school class are getting married. You know you are getting older when your peers start getting hitched. It was definitely a strange feeling to hear about them. To be honest, I feel weird even typing about marriage at all. As for the girls, I say good for them, although from my perspective it's tough because every time someone gets married, that dating pool starts to shrink a little bit more you know? I thought the trend was to marry later these days, but maybe not.

North Carolina finally started their lottery today with scratch-off tickets. I'm glad NC got the lotto, I always thought it was kind of backwards that all the other East Coast states had one but NC didn't. That said, now that it's here I probably won't play it as much as I thought. I work too hard for my money to just toss it away like that. But as a little fun here and there, well I suppose that can't be too bad.

I blame Chris Turner and Capcom for my current gaming addiction, Resident Evil 4. Man, that game is awesome. I'll spare you the details but it's about the most intense experience you'll get in any type of entertainment. Capcom deserves blame for making the game, and Chris because he keeps egging me on with stories of epic boss battles and infinite rocket launchers. I had a rough go of it tonight, died a whole bunch of times. It's all due to the hordes of axe-throwing zombies. Maybe they're the ones who have my JET acceptance letter?

Call it the World Yakyu Classic
Congratulations Team Japan on winning the inagural World Baseball Classic. It was cool to see Japan win, and some NPB stars get some shine in the US. I think Ichiro should have been MVP, he was the driving force for Japan and had some huge plays in the final against Cuba. It was interesting to see him show some passion for once, although unfortunately his statements have been misconstrued and taken out of context (I believe). Also, congratulations to Oh-san, another achievement in a long and storied career. Just make sure to write Team Mexico a big thank you note, ok?

Well, as for my weekend, I worked just about as much as possible. My assistant mgr. was on vacation to Hilton Head, so me and the store mgr. had to cover the whole weekend between us. 12-close Thursday, open-close Friday, open-8pm Saturday, open-close Sunday. Phew! That's a lot just to type.

And now, no more sports-related posts, I promise.

Happy Birthday to Me (Late Edition)
Monday the 6th was my birthday. Here's how I will remember it:

-First of all, Fox gave me a great birthday present by showing back-to-back new episodes of 24. And they killed Edgar, too! OMG

-Charlotte awarded NASCAR Hall of Fame. Well, this one sure seemed like a no-brainer seeing how so many drivers and teams are based in this area. But by drawing out the process and having a five city competition, NASCAR was able to get millions in public money from Charlotte to put the Hall here. Good Work Guys!

-Kirby Puckett died. Growing up, Kirby Puckett was my unstoppable sports hero. His 1991 World Series performance is the stuff legends are made of. I know I'm not the only kid that grew up idolizing the guy. Unfortunately, after he retired a bunch of not-so-nice stories about lewd behavior and domestic abuse started to pop up. These allegations really stunned me, since I grew up thinking he was such a great guy. It's too bad, but I'll remember him as one of the first athletes to betray my trust and make me realize all my public heroes might not be so great in private.

Then, on March 7th, the Barry Bonds steriod allegations hit the fan. Basically, a new book is coming out that supports all our worst suspicions of Barry doping it up to reach home run records. If you haven't read the book excerpt from Sports Illustrated, all I can say is it isn't pretty. Barry now becomes the doper of the sports world, even more than Jose Canseco, Marion Jones or even Ben Johnson. Add to the fact that he was an unlikeable asshole to begin with and I predict Selig will make him retire before he can surpass Babe Ruth's 714 Home Runs.

And one more thing... did you see Canada beat the USA 8-6 in the World Baseball Classic? Add to that South Korea's upset over Japan and this is already turning into a very interesting tournament.

Sports Talk Radio 490 AM WFRO
Ah, Screw it. I'll be honest, I lost all desire to type up the press conference or having anything to do with college basketball after Charlotte's heartbreaking loss to GW today. That is the kind of loss that really rips your heart out and stomps on it several times. That's how the team has been this year though, never seem to be able to put away the big games... they've got one last chance to salvage the season by taking the A-10 tournament. Anyone care to take the odds of that one happening?

Also, I want to point out that I love the concept of the World Baseball Classic and hope that it is a wild success. I love the internationalization of baseball and I think it's currently one of the best things going for the sport. I think playing for national pride makes for great compeition, and who wouldn't want to see the US face off against Japan or the Dominican Republic? And besides, how often do you see new events like these pop up? All the established championships, like World Cup, Olympics, pro sports titles etc. have all been around for decades. Sure, the opening rounds will have some lopsided scores, but hopefully the second round will produce some classic games at near-postseason level intensity.

Fantastic Damage
After another long stretch of work, I finally got a day off today. It was real nice and warm too, so I got to do stuff like wash my car and go kick the soccer ball around, little things that I haven't been able to do in a while. You know, the whole sunshine, fresh air thing. I just don't want it to get too hot, because I haven't fixed the A/C in my car yet from last year. Still, today was in fact pretty nice and I could get used to this routine.

What was also pretty nice was, I got hooked up with a press pass to the Charlotte/Dusquene game last night. So yes, I did in fact get to sit at the press table right at center court. If that's not the best seat in the house, I don't know what is. I also got to indulge in the free pregame meal (sweet potatoes were delicious) and postgame press conference. Now, Dusquene came into Charlotte with only 3 wins the entire season, so this wasn't really a hot ticket. But still getting to do all that stuff was pretty cool. And if I go to Japan, this could be my last basketball game for quite some time. As for the press conference, I did get a recording of Bobby Lutz's and Curtis Wither's comments, if I get bored enough I might type them up on here sometime soon.

So, sounds like everything's been going pretty nice recently, right? Not so fast. Turns out, this girl I like already had a boyfriend. Who is a big basketball player. On a Division 1 college team. That's currently in the top 25. Hmm. I'd say it looks like I might have misjudged that situation just a little bit.

JET Interview Status: Completed.
Finally, the time had come. I was finally sitting in the Japanese consulate in Atlanta, waiting for my interview to begin. I went over all the questions they may ask, my answers. I thought about all the events that occured since I'd last been to Japan a year and a half ago. JET would be my ticket back to Japan. Now, I just had to rock this interview. No pressure, right? So anyway, how did it go?

Pretty well, I think overall. I was interviewed for about 15 minutes by a panel of 3 people, one a Japan expert, and two former JETs. Early questions included What was the toughest part of studying abroad in Japan, and Why did I think Japanese politics were interesting. Not too bad so far, and the questions were a good chance for me to flex my knowledge of Japan. Japanese pro baseball even came up in the conversation. Then, I was given some more situational questions, like what would I do in x situation. I was still pretty prepared for these, and I think I gave mostly good answers.

Then they asked me to teach a quick lesson about African Americans. Yay, something open ended. They said, you could use anything in the room but I decided to play it safe and use the whiteboard. I tried to keep it visual, drawing a map of Africa and the USA, spelling out all the tough words, etc. But I'm still concerned that I talked to fast and used to complicated words. I don't think that sabotaged the interview though. Then they gave me the opportunity to ask questions, and they said I has asked good questions and had to think about them for a second, which is a good sign.

So I was pretty relaxed and confident, and I think everything in general went pretty well. I was wearing my power tie, so that helped. The interview questions certainly could have been much harder IMO. Now, concerns. I wished I had simplified my sample lesson more, and somehow displayed my Japanese language skills. Also, hopefully the girl from the embassy didn't think I was being too pushy, I was just trying to be real friednly, honest.

Anyways, I sure hope I get this job. Working at the mall has been pretty lame recently, so that certainly raises the stakes. I really don't know if I can sell shoes for another year.

V-Day
So what do you think I spent my Valentine's Day doing? Smooching up next to a loved one? Nope! How about working open to close (10-9) at the mall. And with opening and closing duties, it's really more like a 9:30-9:30 shift. Fantastic.

But that's neither here nor there. The big news is, I leave tomorrow for the JET interview on Thursday. I'm going to Atlanta straight from work. I thought I'd be nervous, but the truth is I'm excited. I've only been out of the Charlotte metro area once since I started work (trip to Hickory), and even something like staying at a hotel is pretty exciting to me. Plus, I will finally get to do the interview, which is something I've only been waiting about 8 months for. I guess I'm as prepared as I'll ever be. Just got to rip this one up and hopefully I'll be on my way back to Japan before I know it.

Ganbarimashou!

Just call me Professor Frohman
This morning, I woke up and felt like I was about to do something foolish. Now, I feel that way every day, but today in particular because I had agreed to teach a class at UNCC for my old professor Dr. Piazza. Sure, it's just one class period of an intro course, and it's pretty basic material, but I'd never done anything like it before so I was feeling pretty nervous just for that.

So after a little introduction, there I am in front of about 15 students, teaching a class about the beginning of the Cold War. "Today, we're going to talk about the Truman Doctrine"! Try to contain your exctiement. Being in front of the students, on the other side so to speak was a strange sensation. Like I said, a new feeling for me. But overall everything went pretty smoothly. Prof. said I did well, had a good speaking voice, etc. Probably my biggest problem was writing on a chalkboard. It looks worse than chickenscratch.

So I managed to do it without freaking out. Is it something I want to do the rest of my life? Well, just based on one class it's got to be better than selling shoes at least. And It's true though, most of the students looked like zombies and were probably half-comatose through class. Hmm, I was never like that as a student was I?

In other news, I finally decided to get my act together and set up my Xbox Live account. Me and Sammy used to play Live all the time back in college instead of studying. Good Memories. Anyways, my "Gamertag" is OatmealLegend. Halo 2 and PGR2 players of the world, watch out!

JET Update Plus more
I've got good news to report on the JET front. I got an interview at the Japanese consulate in Atlanta on February 16th, at 11am. As this is the next big step in the application process, I'm plenty nervous but excited as well. I've sure been waiting for this long enough it seems. Now I just need to get ready. I know they will ask me to pretend like I'm teaching a class, so I definitely need to be prepped for that one. I've been thinking about keeping it pretty simple, sticking with something like basic geographical features or the solar system. Whatever I choose, I have to do it well because this will obviously have a huge impact on if I can go or not.

Other than that, I've been relaxing these last couple of days off from work; somehow I ended up scheduled for nine straight days or something like that so I'm enjoying every free minute that I have. So I took a lot of naps, went to see Syriana (good), picked up some games at Wal-Mart, caught up on my magazine reading, etc. Its been good times, but the party ends tomorrow. My sales numbers have been pretty slack (especially before last week) so I've definitely been feeling the pressure from my bosses to hit all my marks. We've also been moving out our fall stuff and getting new spring styles in, so there has been a ton of stock work to do as well. Just another day at the mall.