Ippon!

What a long, intensive weekend!

Kim and I drove to San Antonio Friday night to volunteer at the USA Judo National Jr. Olympics. We were scheduled to be technical officials (e.g., timers, scorekeepers, etc.) with some other friends from Houston.

We left town about 7pm and made it to the hotel around 10:30 or 11. Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince accompanied us on the trip to refresh our memory for the Deathly Hallows.

We got up at 6 am, had breakfast and made it to the coliseum by 8. We got settled in at our mat and proceeded to officiate approximately 179 matches in 9 hours. I was scorekeeper for most of the time. While not quite as intensive of a position as match timekeeper, I still had to pay attention at all times. I'd give myself about a 95%, or a little higher, rating on determining the correct score from the referee's calls. Sometimes it's tough to figure which competitor got the score since I don't play judo. We were the last of the 5 mats to finish their matches for the day.

After breaking for the day, we agreed to meet up on the River Walk for dinner with the rest of the crew. Texas Land & Cattle was our destination. Kim and I had been sitting down for too long, so we did some walking around the River Walk before dinner. Unfortunately, we forgot to mark in our minds where we parked the truck. I mentioned marking the spot in a GPS unit, but we did not have one with us. This would come back to haunt us.

Dinner was cool, a great bunch of folks. They overcooked my steak. It arrived well done and I prefer them medium. Oh well, it kept me from eating too much.

Dinner done, we made our way back to the truck. And kept walking. And kept walking. And kept walking. We could not spot the parking garage in which we'd left the truck.

After an hour and a half, we found a garage employee at another garage and asked him for help. Questioning us, he was able to determine which garage we were likely parked in. He pointed it out to us, about 2 blocks away. We walked over and then ran up the nine flights of stairs to find our fabulous vehicle waiting for us, wondering where we'd been.

We made it back to the hotel and collapsed.

Up at 6am again Sunday and off to breakfast. Back to the coliseum. 54 more matches to keep score for.

The only really interesting one was one that was decided by Hansoku-make. One of the girls had 4 Shidos called against her and her opponent was, therefore, awarded the match. That was the only scoring in the match.

Last match ended and we bolted for the door. 4 hours, or so, later we were back at home being joyfully greeted by the dogs.

We walked the dogs and picked up my copy of Deathly Hallows from the library. We listened as a massive thunderstorm moved through, causing us to lose power a couple of times. I actually disconnected my computer, and I rarely do that.