Sue and I intended to move the end of November, but because our house sold so fast and the new owners must take possession Oct 29th, we found ourselves scrambling to determine which of our four floors of furniture and other things we collected during 40+ years we would take with us and what we had to sell or give away. We thought the list was pretty well set until the moving company "estimator" showed up and hit us with a bill that was almost as much as selling price for my first house, purchased in 1962! Back to the drawing board. Things that I wanted, Sue didn't and yes, many things Sue had planned to take were not on my favorite list. So after compromising, we ended up with a huge amount of items that had to be gotten rid of within a few days. I put together a simple website and took lots of digital pictures which are now part of that website. Honestly, we haven't the foggiest idea what these things are worth. We had a hard time determining where many of them actually came from or when. If you would like to own something, please email me and if you think the price is too high. . . make an offer. The dining room set is probably the most expensive piece of furniture Sue and I purchased together. In 1972 it cost us over $3000 and I'm sure would cost over $10,000 today. Most of the other things were purchased at auctions or given to us. I'll keep lowering the price on a daily basis until an item has been sold or until we decide to add it to our "take it to Florida" list.

Following the Mass Challenge, a parent suggested to us that we should not use a parent or teacher as an official in a division, where that person's child/student is competing in that division. Seems like a pretty logical rule, but most karate tournaments today don't have this rule. Jay Salhanick, our Rules Administrator, listen to all the suggestions and decided to modify the rules. From now on, a parent will not be able to officiate in a division where his child is competing and a teacher may not officiate in a division where his student is competing.

Although this problem with officials just reared its head at the Mass Challenge, it has been a problem for quite a few years. The big tournaments. . . you know, the ones with a 1000+ competitors. . . charge big bucks and will put anyone claiming to be a black belt, into the ring. there are no real certification programs, such as the ones used by the AAU and other organizations hoping to get into the Olympics one day. Officials in these organizations take great pride in their certification and spend quite a lot of money travelling around the world for training and to be part of these tournaments. We've seen the quality of these officials in our adult Uechi World Championships where I've brought in outside officials from these organizations to run our matches. My goal for the junior series was to have it officiated by trained and certified officials, something that I was unable to do with the adult division, using Uechi officials. Things began well, but volunteers seemed to dwindle with time. At the Mass Challenge, we barely had enough officials to hold the tournament. The question remains. . . How do we motivate more people to get involved? A couple of suggestions came up and were voted down by the officials themselves. One solution was to pay them for expenses. Most felt that they were more than happy to volunteer their time and felt it was somewhat of an insult to have to pay them to show up. Although it was voted down, it certainly remains an option. I suggested months ago that bigger dojo should field a team of officials, consisting of three officials and two volunteers who would act as time keeper and score keeper. Teams at a dojo could work within the dojo, running mini tournaments or even an "inner" dojo event. They would learn to work together and could be certified as a team. With 10 dojos participating, we would have more than enough officials to run any of our events, with a couple of backup teams to replace teams where necessary. And contrary to popular belief, you need not be a sixty degree black belt or even a black belt to be an official. All you need to be is someone who is fair and has good eyes. Interested in helping out? Please contact us and we will show you how to help build your dojo official's team.