Took mike / casascius up on his offer, and so its been 100% a breath of fresh air. Scary but somehow I thought accepting a digital scan of a personal check of a stranger on the internet to be the same or less risk than going to all the effort of getting that last $500 out of my mtgox account held in Japan.

Anyway A++++ on casascius what a stand up guy he is!  Really saved me a lot of hassle here.  Thanks