cold as a motha

cyn and i are hashing over the latest hollywood gossip. and the whole hk edis*n chen thing. did you see the pics? scan-do-licious.

my ass is typing with some froze-ass fingers because stupid shanghai went and dropped back down into the 30s this week. about this i am quite salty. there's nothing meaner than weather that goes from icicle to semi-balmy and then back to icicle. in our world, we call that 'so not right.'

i came from my new level 3 putonghua class. it was alright. at least its only twice a week and only 2 hours a day this time around. i had the foresight to run to paul's (as i always have the wisdom to do before class) and purchase copious amounts of overpriced bread. the effin' regular baguette just increased from rmb 14 to 18. jerks. i gnawed on an olive-embedded baguette for a snack whilst walking from the west tower to the east. it's only a matter of a 45-second commute, but i managed to consume about half the baguette. the closer i got to my classroom, the bigger the hunks were that i tore off, and the less i chewed them. i wonder sometimes if my intestines aren't poked full of holes.

alright. i'm cold and have to get up early tomorrow. i hope the goddamn rats or whatever it is that lives in my walls and kept me up with squeaking and scratching last night has the common sense to make noise downstairs for the neighbors and not me. this will be the 5th night in a row without decent r.e.m. and mankind may plummet because of it.

over and out.

dreams

i dreamt last night that one of my eyes fell out and so i carried it around in a tea cup, looking for a doctor.

the night before i dreamt i saw an ex and his hair was overgrown and shaggy and his eyelids had fallen and were droopy.

what's with the presence of eyes in dreams?

dan shui lu

happy v day

for my general amusement -


whatd u guys have for dinner
sister: er
pigsfeet and hair
chicken
cabbage
me: did dad buy mom the requisite see's candy in the old heart box?
pigs feet and hair?!
sounds delish
sister: you know the faat choy or whatever that is usually in jai?
it was actually pretty good
me: yeah i know
i like that stuff
sister: dad didn't get shit for
mom, not even the sees
me: dang
cold, man, cold
sister: i know
mom got desserts at la farine
me: you can tell him i said that
sister: dad says he's become an orthodox hindu that disapproves of valentines day
me: lmao
wtf
he's hella random
why do hindu disapprove of valentine's day
sister: too risque
me: it can be conservative love day
sister: hehe
btw, your cat is hells of fat

latest cat update

sister: kvgbkvbkvb (from scarlett who's on my lap)
me: hi scarly
whats she up to
sister: oh sleeping under the library chair in the
living room again. and sharpening her claws on the under side of the chair!
I caught her the other day on her back with all 4 claws in the chair!
me: lol
the usual
sister: yup
me: i am thinking about taking her to denver
sister: please do!
me: i hope she doesn't freak out again
sister: shes rubbing her face on the monitor
me: yeah
she'll bat the cursor, too, if she sees it
sister: mom will be pleased
she says, get away from me, you! to her all the time
me: lol
yeah, poor scarly
no one plays with her
she's a brat
sister: dad says it sounds like a fantastic idea, she will love the snow
me: lol
i'm going to teach her to board

wednesday surfing

there are people as ridiculous as me -

http://www.apartmenttherapy.com/la/inspiration/streamlining-the-medicine-cabinet-042601

two wheels

for christmas, trevor proved what a good listener he is and presented men with a bicycle. i had been going on one day about how much i wanted one, especially since steph has one and we can go riding around the city. it has, since then, been sitting on the first floor of my building, gathering dust. it's lovely, actually, if i'm allowed to say that about a bicycle. i loved it upon sight - pearl white with green detailing, a happy reincarnation of my snowboard in bicycle form. like most bicycles here, it's a one-gear beach cruiser. just my speed - i can drive any manual transmission, but give me gears on a bike and i freeze up.

i had been stalling about riding it - something was always wrong. too cold, snow on the ground, i don't know the roads well enough, something. i was super excited to try, but also scared. i have a thing with bikes, some weird nervous chickenshit craziness. i remember as a kid riding around all the time, tearing up and down the joint like my ass was on fire. more recently i'm a nervous wreck and i guess two disastrous vacations expeditions involving mountain biking haven't really helped to alleviate that.

long intro aside, i finally got into the saddle this afternoon. and, drumroll... it was lots of fun, actually. a bit annoying because there are several big streets around me that bikes aren't allowed on, so i had to figure out some roundabout way to get to jiu guang for some grocery shopping. i tried riding on the sidewalks for a bit, but if you've ever tried walking - let alone riding a bike - on a sidewalk in urban china, well, it's not the best way to alleviate fears. the next concern was theft - my bike is shiny new and white. it literally gleams next to the other stacks of bikes standing by. trevor bought a couple of locks, but they're really more of a deterrent and anyway i'm just a big worrywart.

the impetus behind the bike riding arrived in the form of a fitness plan. i was cruising around on yahoo and somehow landed in the yahoo health section, and started idly reading the various articles and blogs about fitness and nutrition. (all of this as a method of procrastination for studying chinese.) lots of this at this time of year because of those resolutions, i expect, but also the reality is that most people that live in china carry a bit more weight than they do at home so i'm always aware of how crappy my fitness level is these days. it's hard to buy the nonfat yadda yadda or the flax seed this and that here, and most chinese food is oil city. i don't run outside because we are all concerned here about the repercussions of running outdoors in a highly polluted area. when i first arrived, i lost a ton of weight pretty quickly, but that was due to the non-sitting-all day, no-car change of status that my life underwent. i'm now back to the sitting-all-day business, and my gut reflects it. ew. i also took this free diet/fitness assessment where your diet is analyzed not only for calories + fat, but also for your nutrition. i'm think about my diet here a lot because i know how i am - the easiest thing for me to get is new york deli sandwiches (MONSTER MEAT sized, no less, because it would just be too much for me to consider eating in moderation) for lunch, and something fast at night since i get home so late. recently it's been these dried japanese noodles that i can't stop eating. my diet is abhorrent. i bought a big costco bag of raw almonds for snacks, but i also space out meals with crackers and those rice seaweed triangles from family mart. i'm a fast food junkie these days. if it's not ready in under 10 minutes, fuck it!

anyway, i do the yoga classes during the week, but every little bit helps, right?

p.s. the point of this entry was supposed to revolve around a conquering-my-fears theme but it really is turning into c's diet gripes. sorry.

snow 2008

so those of you outside of china were probably hearing about all of the severe weather that was hitting china the week before and of cny. i've heard that it may snow on occasion here, but it's pretty rare and never sticks.

here are some photos of the snow (from the week before cny) coming down outside of my office, which is located on the bund. the bund area is a stretch of buildings on the huangpu river where a lot of the ritzy boutiques, restaurants, and clubs are located. it's kind of annoying - especially if you work there - but the buildings are heritage architecture and are quite pretty.




out the front window looking at #3 bund



out the back window where some of the smaller buildings (residences) hide behind the grander bund structures

asymptomatic

t left today for his chinese new year trip to guiyang. he spent a year or so down there during his block of years here, and it proved a defining time for him. he has a good friend down there and spends the time with the friend and the friend's family. when asked to describe guiyang, he usually says something like, 'its the capital of the poorest province in china' to which i usually interject some smartass comment about how he beelined for the poorest area whereas i would run far far away from anything that sounded that grim. but he loves it down there, has a great time, and that's that.

recovery from over 2 weeks of having couple-time is in-process. because its still the cny holiday and my friends have literally all fled the country, i'm in no mood to venture out. it would just be more of the same. my holiday consisted of watching 'rome,' cooking, eating, and taking walks with t. the longest time we spent apart for these 5 days was yesterday afternoon when i took a yoga class and he met his buddy for meat sticks and beers. i think we would make most people vomit, including myself.

last night must have been some specific day in the new year where it is auspicious to blow up all of the explosives you can get your hands on. the warfare started at dusk and heavy artillery fire did not cease until about 10 this morning. those of you who live here know what i'm talking about - you can't really describe it because verbal accounts don't even come close. i would say it sounded like a battle, but i don't think any military on this planet would have the luxury of using ammunition like firecrackers are used here.

a few days before the actual new years day, our friends all gathered to watch a member of the social circler, anthony, in his annual tradition of blowing shit up. he spent 1200 rmb on fireworks this year. i thought they were bringing in cases of beer, but they were 12-packs or 18-packs of rockets, and giant wheels of firecrackers laced together. these are not the measly little bottle rockets we get at home, these mothers were loud, powerful, and housed together so you need only light one wick on a case to set off about 12 rockets. it was pretty awesome, actually. a bit concerning knowing how many knuckleheads there are out there and how completely unregulated it is, but fun nevertheless.

i dropped a short video in here for your enjoyment. this was last night from my bedroom window. unfortunately i didn't think to film during midnight, when it honestly sounded like we were in the middle of an air raid, but this does pretty well to demonstrate what was going on all around. mind you, i live in one of the most densely populated areas in the city, so these are blowing up in between apartment buildings in narrow lanes that cars can't even squeeze through.

and me, incredulous

i have been accused, more than one or two times, that i speak condescendingly, that i am patronizing and arrogant. my usual response (mentally) is that i can't help it if everyone around me is stupid. sometimes i'm not kidding, sometimes i am. i don't necessarily think that everyone is dumb, but i do think that most people suffer from not-paying-attention-itis, which gets complicated when i am and i expect that you were, as well, so when i go on to start a lively discussion about what just happened, or what happened three hours ago, or what happened six months ago, i am frustrated when met with blank stares.

this is quite frustrating.

i also usually remember, verbatim, what so-and-so said during an argument or conversation. it really doesn't matter to me if the conversation was three years ago or three minutes ago; usually if i remember a conversation, i remember it and that's that. so it puzzles me when people aren't the same way, or worse, they start arguing in contradiction to what they were arguing about previously. i don't understand how you can have an opinion about something to the point where you are representing one side of a debate, and next time 'round you suddenly do the 'ol switcheroo and are on the other. that doesn't work in my world. does not compute.

i have also never really understood mainstream feminism (this is going somewhere, i promise. bear with me). i studied feminism in college, and found it baffling and alienating because of the rage and divisiveness in the rhetoric. it seemed unreasonable and self-limiting. this may be why i make a damn poor activist. i remember one girl in a social movements class, taunting some guy who didn't understand some point or another about cesar chavez, but making it a gender-based taunt. something about him being a man and life being so easy because of it. it seemed unnecessary, forced, and honestly a bit beside the point. to be filled with that much rage about him being a guy and being somewhat lame didn't fulfill a purpose. moreover, cesar chavez was a man. so what the fuck?

that said (wait for it...), i am finding that the older i am, and the more experience i have with interacting with the opposite sex, that i am starting to draw broad conclusions about the simplicity and somewhat low-IQ behavior of most dudes. sorry, guys, it blows my mind as well. i actually found myself on the verge of shouting, 'what you don't know could fill a book!' i am turning into that girl in my lecture.

seriously, tho. i am met with behaviors that make me want to beat my face against the wall and make those 'donk donk donk' noises. the gender divide just gets wider and wider the older i get. is it me? i know i had a hard time accepting that i was a girl for maybe the first 25 years of my life, but that was mostly because i had and have a thing about emotions, and expressing them, unless it included rage or ego. emotions were for girls, so count me out. but the older i get, the more i learn about guile, and the more i associate it with females, and the more i understand that guys don't have a goddamned clue. you could club them over the head with the reason that their ex-girlfriends thought for 11 months that they would be getting back together and still get the blank stare. some even have the nerve to argue.

pshh. please. i am surrounded by fools.