Good/Bad Week

I've had a really great week career wise, pretty terrible week kung fu wise. My temporary commute eats up a lot of my spare time so I need to re think my schedule. I'm trying to "do" my old schedule, really need to come up with a different plan of action to get things done for this next month or so. I did manage to come up with a vegetarian meal plan for the next week and make a few meals ahead today for crazy nights. The kids and Adrien are on board for a month of no meat. We did this last year and this time around is not as intimidating, we've incorporated a lot of the new meatless meals we tried last time around into our weekly plan. The kids actually get excited to have teriyaki tofu- I never thought I'd see the day!

I am absolutely loving my practicum site! It's a huge practice with both large and small animal services. I know this sounds terrible but I really like blood and guts surgeries and procedures and in large animal there is a lot of both. Awesome. Just can't talk about my day at the dinner table! Last week I saw the smallest/ youngest animal I've seen under anesthetic. A 2 week old Karelian Bear dog was under to correct a birth defect, my first ever neonatal surgery, really neat. SCARS brings a lot of their rescues to the clinic as well, there were 6 in this week, makes me so glad that we are supporting them with our Pandamonium. Hopefully I will make it home in time this week to see you all on the mats.

Mlong Kuen

I have to admit something. It's been over a year since I've been a black belt and I still don't know Mlong Kuen. I'm embarrassed by this and it's even made me dread going to black belt class in case we go through it. I will learn most of it and then I wouldn't practice it and it would be gone. Now that I'm spending more time thinking about it I'm finding it so hard to retain the moves in my head, almost like the first time I learned a form. I hope that it was a case of there just wasn't enough room in my head at the present moment for more information! Publicly admitting this is also supposed to be a kick in the pants to learn it already! 

Cane is coming along alright. So far I'm trying to learn the block/strike set and get comfortable with the cane. I'm struggling with coming up with my own original form, I'm hoping learning more about the cane as a weapon and some practical uses will help get the ideas going. 

I graduated yesterday! It's hard to believe it's over, just one exam this summer to become certified and that's it! I was awarded a scholarship from the Edmonton Association of Small Animal Veterinarians for academic performance and aptitude in practical labs. I know that I would have put the effort in no matter what so this is really free money, so I'm happy to donate this $500 to our Pandamonium fund. I'm really excited about the team effort going into it this year and that I will be able to be there this year. 

thhhbbbt!

I knew that the beginning of my I Ho Chaun year and the end of school were close together when I signed up. I was worried that I would be spread too thin... and that's exactly what's happening. I feel like my year should have started with a bang, in previous UBBT years the beginning was always the easiest for me, it was easy to be motivated and driven especially at the start, but this year has started out feeling like a squeak instead.
I am just not able to put in the hours to my training that I would like to. In these final weeks of school I have been doing more traveling to off campus sites to complete my large animal skills and assessments and of course the tests, always the tests! It's the tests that keep my feeling like I am chained to my desk with my eyelids propped open with toothpicks staring at my books.
I am unsure what my practicum hours are right now so I'm worried about missing classes for the 6 weeks I will be there- I will be commuting to and from Westlock everyday. I haven't been able to make the first 2 meetings! Basically I feel stressed that I'm falling behind and I've had such a slow start, I feel a bit like dead weight on the team right now.
I know this will pass, I just wish it would happen sooner!

So close!

On March 22nd I will be done school. Everyone keeps saying "Can you believe there's only 2 weeks left?" Honestly my answer is no, I really can't. It's hard to believe the end is so close, it really doesn't feel like it, I feel like the time is going by so slowly. Sometimes during a lecture I feel that I really can't sit there for another second. Or in the morning when my alarm goes off and it feels like the middle of the night I think I would throw away all my education up until now just to sleep until I wasn't tired anymore. I feel constantly under pressure. I feel WEARY. I know I'm not the only one- we all experience this at some point.
I felt something similar to this coming up to my black belt grading day, not so much the weariness but the I can't believe this is actually happening part. I feel that going through the grading day taught me a lot about perseverance, because that is one of the biggest part of making it through that day, or it was for me. I know that right now I have to take each moment as it comes and try not to think about the one after that. Be in the moment and keep putting one foot in front of the other, eventually I'll get there!

Acts of kindness or not?

I was thinking about acts of kindness a few times this week and whether they count if they are done sort of begrudgingly. There is a spot in my commute from school where there are only 2 lanes of traffic. One lane is always backed way up with people waiting to merge onto the Yellowhead. There are so many times that someone zooms past everyone in the other lane and then signals to get in at the front of the line- blocking the other lane while doing so. Every fiber of my being tells me "we are NOT under ANY circumstances, letting this guy in!" It's really a matter of principle! I really feel like by letting this person in I'm losing in some way, or enabling them to keep doing it again. Of course there are the poor people stuck behind this guy so I guess by letting them in it could be an act of kindness to those drivers, but still if I let him in and I'm saying "your an idiot" to them in my head do I count it?
A garbage bag in the alley a few houses down from me was ripped open last week and there was nasty garbage all over the alley. I walk my dog that way 3 times a day and he would always manage to eat some of this grossness. At first I figured that the owners of the garbage didn't know it was ripped open, but then as new bags showed up I realized they had no plans to clean it up. Working in a vet clinic I see the effects of dogs with "garbage guts" and couldn't stand to know my dog managed to eat some every time we passed. I bit the bullet and went to clean it up. The entire time I was cleaning I was cursing these people, and the fact that the majority of the garbage was cigarette butts, greasy take out and rotting chicken bits didn't help. Was this really an act of kindness or does that fact that I got no satisfaction out of doing it cancel it out? Do I just need to work on my own enlightenment? Hmmm. What do you guys think?