happy birthday mom!!

Hey all.. realized its been a little while
Things are still going well. A little bummed this week cause i hate missing mum's birthday! But since I am 13 hours ahead of eveyone else I defiinitely was the first to wish her happy birthday.. sorry matt.
anyway. I had a great weekend. There is a huge Brazilian population here in Toyama.. i think the largest in Japan. anyway, that means that in Takaoka.. a city next to mine, they have this great Brazilian restaurant. Which also allows JETs to host parties... but a new Japanese laws means that the restaurant can't have parties anymore.. to bad.. so this weekend they hosted a huge final party. It was great, dancing all night with other JET's and english teachers from the area. I really had a blast.

Thats about it.. things have been quiet at school because its mid-terms... they had tests friday, sat, mon, tues.. and the 2nd and 3rd years still have tests today. so other then writing an oral communications listening test.. i don't have much going on. Well other than having to grade all of those listening tests.. 230 to be exact... the multiple choice and t/f parts were easy... it was grading the essays that sucked.. it litterally took me about 9 hours to get through them all. Luckily I get to grade at the office and don't have to take papers home with me.
But I'm done now. I'm hoping that when classes start back up I will be taking a more active role.

Lets see what else is new.... oh.. kind of strange.. but I came into the office one day last week and was handed my recontracting papers! Yikes! I've only been here 2 months and already they are handing me paper work asking if I want to stay a second year. Luckily I don't have to actually turn the paper work in until February.. but they would rather I did it sooner.
so far it looks like I will stay a second year, but I'm not making any firm decisions until after the new year. Although, lets face it.. I would totally regret it if I didn't stay longer.. from all I hear and see, the 2nd year is definitely better. Who knows.. still up in the air about it all.

Well thats all thats really new in my life. Hope everything is going well back home. feel free to drop me an email! I don't have any big trips coming up but do have a halloween party for some little kids, an english elementary school day camp, and the big JET halloween party coming up.. so I'll have those pics up as I take them.

Love

Lissie