i should be in an igloo

my ass is cold.

why is it that in beijing, which is anywhere from 20 - 40 degrees colder than here, i feel warm and snuggly and honestly frequently sweaty. why, people. i swore after moving out of that victorian in SF that i would never live in another old building... and yet here i am. i wake up and i can see my breath everywhere in the house. these goddamned high ceilings are lovely and all but right now i would take 8 footers over these visually appealing rafters any day.

some people live and learn. i am beginning to suspect that i just live.

i went to the hospital today to get the 'ol eyes looked at. eye, anyway. some weird pressure and feeling like the muscles connecting my eyeball to my head was pulled, if that makes any sense. what i thought was eye strain in my left eye turned out to be a corneal infection in both eyes. nice. i read all this shit about it online afterwards - now i'm getting all paranoid - but the doctor said it was caused by either wearing my contacts too much or too much computer work.

proof that work is toxic!

it was my first hospital experience in the city. i went to the huashan 'worldwide medical center' or some craziness, rumored to be the best hospital in the city. the foreigner clinic looked like a hotel lobby - heavy brocade-inspired carpeting, a rose in a cut-glass vase on small polished-wood side tables next to arm chairs. that hushed lobby feeling. at any rate, it went well - a thousand times better than the hospital in foshan that scared me - the nurse and doctor seemed fine, everything was super clean. the doctor actually had the worst english out of everyone there; the young nurse and various receptionist / pharmacist / cashier people were impressive. i kept following the wrong person, tho, because once the ubiquitous nurse be-hatted, greenish uniform-wearing girl currently handling me would turn around, three more would swarm into my visual field and they all looked the damn same. i kept having to get scooped up by the right person after following the wrong girl.

i've got my shins positioned in front of this heater like it's a fireplace, with the relatively ineffective wall unit blowing behind me. with the drafts blowing here and there and everywhere, i can't tell if it being on is helping at all. i've got burning hot shins and the rest of me is cold.