These days good news keeps creeping in, making me feel really positive about this year. Looking back over the last couple of months, bad news has been low and manageable while good news offsets any disappointments caused by small upsets.

Here’s a re-cap of the things both big and small that have me singing a happy song.

K and I are getting married in March and everything seems to be working out well. We were concerned about the dress and tuxedo rental because the rental fee was for four nights only and we wouldn’t be able to return them until 12 days later. We were quoted a 100,000-yen extension fee for the additional days. We wondered if we could send the clothes back by courier and hopefully save on the rental extension fee but it looked like the cost of sending the clothes plus the additional days it would take for them to reach Japan from New Zealand and go through customs would make the overall cost almost the same as just paying the extension fee. Sunday we went to the store and as we discussed this with the clerk she said she would just check with the store’s owner, who happened to be in the office that day. The clerk came out a couple of minutes later and told us we could pay just 20,000 yen for the additional days. That was unbelievable! We were going to save 80,000 yen. Forget about the courier. Sending the clothes back would cost more than 20,000 yen. The only drawback is that we have to carry the extra suitcase with us around. But saving that much money makes up for it.

Also, I was looking for a nice place to book our wedding night. I checked a rather fancy and expensive inn near our church in New Zealand. The room I liked was quoted on the website as going for $295 NZ a night. I figured that was pretty darn expensive but with the additional service they provided, the location and the overall appearance of the room and building it would be worth it for our wedding night. I requested a reservation on-line. The request was accepted, but for $240 NZ! Again, we get to save some money.

Two weeks ago I was looking over my expenses for January and saw I had two health insurance payments of 17,000 yen due this month, plus a residents’ tax payment of 30,000 yen. I was hoping to put 80,000 yen into savings but with 64,000 yen due to the city government there was not going to be much left. I was disappointed, but an hour later one of my managers called and said the school accountant was in and was calculating our tax returns. Apparently we had been dinged for way too much income tax last year and so I could get 70,000 yen back with my pay that very day. Savings problem solved!

I already mentioned about my four-piece article getting accepted by the weekly English study paper and now all four pieces have been published. I have been promised 88,000 yen (before tax deduction) and I hope that will be coming soon. I also mentioned how the article about my parents’ garden will be run in that gardening magazine in July. I expect somewhere between 30,000 yen to 50,000 yen for that, possibly more, depending on how many pages they give it and how many photographs they use. On top of that, I plan to visit my photo stock agency in February to drop off my photos from 2007 and today they asked me to choose 20 photos that they will feature in their monthly on-line gallery in March. It doesn’t equate instant cash but it does mean that my work will be the main feature of the month. I am also still waiting for the payment for one calendar too.

I submitted an article to a magazine in Canada. The editor told me they could definitely see using that article, possibly in the next year or so (it’s a quarterly magazine) and he said he really liked my photographs. It’s not as good as a definite yes but it sounds promising.

Today I got the remainder of my pay for December. The manager is always behind in calculating my pay so I get 250,000 yen on payday and the rest a week or two later. I get paid a salary but since I always have overtime I always come home with more than my monthly rate, even after taxes. When we have a week’s holiday as we did at the end of December and the beginning of January I don’t have any overtime and so my pay goes down a little. I wasn’t expecting much, maybe an extra 5,000 yen or so. But I got an additional 25,947 yen. I guess even with the week off at the end of the month I still had enough overtime to make my payment for December the highest yet since I started working here.

I feel things are really going well this year so far. Good luck is around me and I have to keep giving thanks to the powers that be.

On Monday, K and I are going to the doctor together because she is going for a monthly check-up and having an ultra sound. She had it last time too and saw our baby moving about. I want to see it too so I am going along. This is really exciting.

I hope the good fortune continues to stick with us this year. I am encouraged to attempt a few more things that I have been putting off until now. This is the year to create opportunities!

In case anyone is asking:

100 yen = approx. $0.94US, $0.97CND, $1.25NZD

using www.xe.com/ucc/ as of the date of this post.