Fourth of July Weekend

Three girls' kendo contestants... from another school.

Well, you've already heard what went on last Friday night as we celebrated our nation's Declaration of Independence.

Saturday I had to be up and off to "school" for the city sports tournament. I had great ambitions of seeing sports at at least three locations, but after driving, waiting, watching, waiting, watching, driving, waiting, watching and watching, it was time to go home. So I only made it to two locales, and three sports: softball, kendo and boys' basketball.

Girls' softball.
The 1nensei had to stand and watch, without even a uniform.

The girls' softball won by a landslide. Kendo... I don't know. I didn't watch that long and I have absolutely no understanding of the rules and scoring. Basketball: one school lost all three games, the other school won two and lost the third.

And that was my day. I got home thoroughly exhausted from doing nothing but sitting around and sweating all day.

Jorge, Lulu, me, Aki and Lil P

On Sunday we had a little BBQ here at Chez Howell, attended by most of the core folk. We ate (anticuchos, brats, yakinikku, takoyaki and mac and cheese!), we drank, we threw a real football, we did math homework, popped party poppers, waded (or, in the case of Nigel, fully immersed ourselves) in the kiddie pool and escaped the brief thunderstorm under my metal carport.

Natalie, Paul, Anna, Aki and Bill

Nigel, Lulu, me, Aki and Anna

Bill and Michael
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Good night. Sleep tight. Don't let the giant spiders bite...

The spider I originally found in the silverware drainer. When I went to bed, s/he was up by the ceiling. The next morning, not to be found. Sorry, no scale for this one. I wasn't trying to get my fingers near it. Let's just say it was big enough for me to ascertain that it was the kind of spider they model giant killer spiders after in the movies.

And now for the close-up:

Yes, that's my flash reflecting off its giant spider eye.