And then I found 5 dollars!: Banalities

Showing posts with label Banalities. Show all posts

Friday, March 20, 2009

Saturday, March 07, 2009

Impressive

Apple trees must be really strong. And I mean, really strong. I had to tote 9 fuji apples home with me last night, and it was a pain. I guess it's not really that heavy, and if I could have carried them in my arms it wouldn't have been so bad. But it was a situation where they were all in the same plastic bags and the handles mutilated my hand.

Thursday, February 26, 2009

Back up, now

Had the bright idea just now of putting copies of my picture files onto my little hard drive, even though they already get backed up through the little program... just in case I wanted to access them directly... aaand ended up deciding to delete most of the originals anyways. So basically if I ever lose this thing, years of my life will be going with it.

As I was doing this though, I discovered that I'm missing... all of my pre-Shanghai pictures from my '05 China trip, and Kim & Teddy's wedding pictures. And probably other random things along the way. I have no idea why I'd be missing those China pictures, but I'm assuming they're on my other external drive somewhere back home. The wedding pictures are a bit trickier since I don't think I had time to back any of those up before I left for Baotou. They should exist on a CD in my box of China stuff, so hopefully I can pull them off of that when I get home. The problem is, a lot of these things were entrusted to my desktop, which my mother proceeded to run into the ground for her own nefarious ends. That computer's a swamp now and anything that was on it is long gone. I'd thought that everything had been duplicated onto the other drive, but... yeah, guess there wasn't much depth to my thinking.

Meanwhile, my little drive gets more and more cluttered, but I managed to free up a lot of space just now by deleting all those photos. Actually, most of them are just chilling out in my recycle bin right now. All I permanently deleted was a bunch of fireworks videos that I just HAD to take at Disneyland (yeah...) and gave myself 2 gigs more of space, which is nice because I've been downloading music like the craziest person ever.

Monday, February 09, 2009

On closed doors

Apparently I don't exert enough force when trying out doorknobs on strange doors, and tend to conclude that they're locked when they really aren't. Recent manifestation: the door that stood between me and heat/hot water. It wasn't locked today and it wasn't locked two days ago. Sigh.

(and... it's not the first time)

Wednesday, December 17, 2008

Maybe I'm addicted to caffeine again?

I should actually be working on my plan for my project in the spring, but I just spent a few hours editing something for the cardiovascular hospital (and i do mean a few hours), so I'd like to take a breather. I'm surprisingly not into being awake right now, even though it's not yet 11:30 (though, ideally, I'd be in bed within half an hour from now), and I also took the opportunity to pass out for about 3 hours after lunch. I can explain that part though. I got a bit of a headache this morning that I exacerbated by making the 20-25 minute walk home for lunch. I thought it would be nice to get some fresh air and sun and exercise since I'd likely be spending the rest of the day cooped up with various tasks, but did not account for very cold wind. By the time I got up to the apartment, I was feeling all kinds of unpleasant sensations.

I have been wondering a bit about the state of my body recently. As far as I know, I'm eating well, sleeping all right (certainly not as much as I'd like... usually about 5-7 hours a night, 8 on the weekends). But sometimes I'll be walking and... I go out of phase with my body for a moment. It's unsettling, like I lose signal from my limbs for a second or so and just have to wait to get it back again. At those times my arms and legs go all wobbly and my head takes on a gelatinous quality while my vision loses a bit of distinction. Totally weird. I don't think I'm sick. Besides, the illness I had a couple weeks ago was all sinuses and didn't even give me a headache. I'd guess maybe it's stress, but I'm kind of in a state of denial about all my work right now. Not that I don't know that I should be doing it, and not that I'm not doing it (though slowly for lack of looming deadlines) but just... I'm unnaturally cheerful and inexplicably willing to play hours of Free Cell.

Couple other things to talk about. What were they...?

Tuesday, December 09, 2008

Blathering about culture speech

What that whole thing was supposed to segue into was a scratch sheet for this dumb speech I have to give tomorrow. Like I said, I remembered it last night right as I was settling in to watch some Dex before bed. I cussed a bunch, regretted the whole situation, and groaned both inwardly and outwardly, but actually I think I just felt really guilty for having forgotten and not worked on it at all. So what's going down is that tomorrow afternoon I'm going to be set loose in an auditorium of up to 100 students (likely less) to give a speech for culture month. I've been asked to talk about "college life in America." Apparently, there's a teacher from New Zealand (blogger insists that this is spelled wrong. why must it make me doubt myself?) who will be giving a simultaneous talk on Western lit. Um, ok dude. So... what on earth am I going to say to them?

I suppose I'd like to talk about the whole getting-into-college process. I plan on going somewhat into the "infinite possibilities" spiel, but also want to be... sensitive about it because this is a vocational college and they sort of don't have those there, or at least that's what I've been getting. I'm obviously going to talk a bit about my own experiences, but I don't really want this to turn into one big "well, when I was in college" tale, because there is no random discovery of money at the end of it to make it of particular interest. Also, isn't that a bit pedantic? I guess I could talk a bit about the pluralization of college. Pluralization? Popularization? Populization? That last one doesn't make it through spell-check. But then neither do any contractions or, for that matter "New Zealand." What makes college culture in the US? It's the freedom of exploration right? We're safe to go just about as far out there as we want in terms of research and expression. It's like being in a biosphere on another planet. OH SHIT THAT'S WHAT MY DREAM WAS ABOUT THIS AFTERNOON. Man, that was suuuch a weird dream. You're so far away from the things that troubled you before you went, and you're not quite into the things that will trouble you once you leave. It's about discovering the world and yourself. And to do that, you need your professors, your libraries, your quiet places, and your fellow students. What dominated my college experience? Late nights. God, how many nights weren't late nights? I had late nights enjoying company, laughing and playing and whatever. And lots of really intense nights working like a mofo. I had so much more energy in college to devote to stuff like that, and a lot of enthusiasm (well, and also plain old-fashioned fear). Yeah, late nights working. I just... recall so many. But few specifics. Also dominating-- extracurricular... stuff. Getting involved in lots of stuff. Getting to know what I liked and didn't like about being in groups. Meeting tons of new people and working with them on... stuff. Haha.

Oh wait I can shower now. Brb.

It seems to me all of a sudden that maybe this is best continued not on blogger. Not that it would necessarily be any more productive in any other medium, but I want more ease of mobility.

I want futuristic touch screens!

Inner tickings

What I'd really like to do now is shower (like, I'd really really like to shower), but as there are reporters here interviewing Mrs. L, I guess I should be prudent and hold off on that.

My mind hasn't really recovered yet from last week. I'm no longer sick, I don't think. In any case, I'm not snotting up as much anymore, and when I do have to blow my nose, the product is no longer neon enough to grab my attention. Sunday night I took Tylenol cold nighttime medication and basically had to come home yesterday afternoon to sleep the rest of it out of my system for about 4 hours. Or 5? Funny I can't recall. What's troublesome of course is that I can't seem to get things in order. It's like some sort of bizarre manifestation of ptsd. I keep making lists of things I have to do, and it's gotten longer within the past hour or so just while I was at dinner. Write an article about the TCSVA and donate it to Nov's blog. Write two new statements of purpose for UM, preferably before I board my flight on the 22nd. Write a speech for the college's cultural festival to be given tomorrow afternoon (obviously I've gotta get on that one). Ponder the menu for this year's Christmas feast. Shop and purchase gifts online (based on their website Express really doesn't seem like it wants my money at all). Pick a topic for Harvard's silly analysis essay. Draw out a plan for a weekly kid's activity day for the springtime, to be presented to the secretary before I leave next Friday. File Berk's DCRP supplemental form before the 15th. Start thinking about what I'm going to tell the SD people when my interview eventually rolls around. Write a "why you should extend my visa" essay for the authorities. Respond to e-mails.

You know, those kinds of things. Without an applications deadline looming close, it's hard for me to apportion my time. I was doing pretty well before the great brain sewage backup of 3/4/5 weeks ago... whenever it was that I started working on the SD application. What I have now is the illusion of respite, and I really need to fight this. It's just sad because I haven't had much of a chance to get to know this town, and there's some new friends here that I should really be spending more time with, and honestly there's some volunteer stuff that I haven't been able to commit myself to, because I've been hunkered down with these apps. Because I want to dual degree at UM, I think I need to specialize my SPs some more, and that's going to take time if not a fresh start. And both are due at the same time. But between now and then is the stress of travel and then the holidays. And I can't really work up to the deadline this time, because not a week after comes Harvard, who wants customized everything, then not a week after that, several other schools on the same day. Daaaaang my adrenaline just went up.

Oh, another thing: pay my cell phone bill!

Last night I suddenly remembered that I had this speech thing tomorrow and I flipped. At the time I was also just being generally upset about the fact that I'd have to teach this morning. Like I told someone earlier today, it's my least favorite part of the week. I don't mean the actual teaching part. I don't think I really mind being in the classroom, hanging out with the students, talking and so on... but everything leading up to that is just torture for me. When that occurred to me last night, vividly, I changed my gchat status to "I don't think I'm a very good person." The point was not to fish for responses like "oh no you're not," of which, thanks, I got a few. The point was that I really just felt like a shitty person. Why don't I like teaching anymore? I... can't explain really, because the explanation doesn't match like... the fury of the emotion that I actually feel when I think about it. It's just a matter of, I didn't want to do that anymore. I expected that I'd have to a little bit while I was here, because oddly that's my area of expertise, but that wasn't what I wanted to spend all my time doing. And yet somehow I've been forced by etiquette into a situation where most of my volunteer commitment is teaching. It's also not as though I spend much time in lesson preparation. Then I'd really be annoyed and probably for a better reason. No, I decided that I don't mind doing this for peanuts if no one expected more than an organized chat session from me. I got very irate a couple months ago during a coversation with Nov about the inclusion/execution of English language education in the system here, and I realized that it's not something that I want any formal part of anymore. I don't mind tutoring. Despite having turned down several tutoring requests (I could possibly be rolling in the dough right now, but then I wouldn't have been able to complete my applications or maintain a real semblance of mental stability), I enjoy it, because it gives me a chance to really focus on someone. You know, I've always sort of functioned better one-on-one. If I'm going to put any amount of effort into helping someone, I want that person to be putting at least as much into helping themselves. And I feel like a jerk for saying this, but I don't get that kind of cooperation as the kind of teacher I am. It's not that I don't feel like teachers have a responsibility to cultivate that, but for a casual oral English teacher? Good freakin luck. Don't get me wrong either. I've had some really great students and some very successful classes. But it's just not that time of my life right now, where I have that sort of patience to devote to classes and classes of people who may or may not care. I did it for a year, and I may very well do it again, but now? Now's me-time.

Which is a problem. I've been getting to know me-time pretty well over the past two years, and while it's very empowering sometimes, I look back on it and feel just plain selfish, and in a bad way. I feel lazy or withholding or overly demanding. I realize a lot of times when I ask to be left alone or elect to stay indoors working while other people go out to shop or eat, I'm doing myself a huge favor. That's how I've been able to stay on schedule so far for these apps. But that's easy to forget. I mean, if you recall, the weekend before last I never left the building. When I finally did, the construction site outside had made so much progress that I might have been Rip Van Winkle. That's only a minor exaggeration.

Today I was listening to Mrs. L tell more of her stories. And every day you hear people telling stories about her and her generosity or whatever. And I think, man, I am not like that at all right now. I wish I could give more freely of my time. After all, that's the very reason I'm even here. But after rationalizing everything into pros and cons, I find that I'm still conserving a lot for myself. I'm sure my friends would come to my defense and say that it's all for good reason. But... the truth is that things are very lame right now. And add on top of that how I want so very badly to back out of all my teaching obligations. I am so not a good person right now.

I'll be glad when January is up. I mean, assuming that everything goes according to plan and I don't screw up my essays too badly. As disappointing as the fall was (and, let's face it, it always is), I'm looking forward to the spring and can't wait for the summer. Assuming that at least one school says "yeah, ok, why not" I'll be good to go. There's some things in the works and I had them listed then reneged at the last second because I didn't want to jinx myself. I don't mind talking about it in person though, so I can do that with anyone that I haven't already told.

I've been watching the second season of Dexter. I was doing it as sort of a calming-down ritual before I moved to the dorm, but picked it up again this weekend to feel like I had some free time to throw around. The simple idea of being able to actually sit down and watch an hour-long show over the internet is very therapeutic. This afternoon though I found myself identifying with him a little bit. Like... when I think too much about myself and what I want, things tend to get a little rough. Haha, that's as far as the comparison really goes. Beyond that, it's just me thinking how it's easier when I don't explicitly have to worry about myself. I used to do it instinctively and use more of the active part of my brain to deal with other stuff (totally made it up just now). Recently though, I've just been focusing on myself so much that it makes me very uncomfortable. So I'll be glad when I don't have to do that anymore. I feel like right now though, I'd better keep doing it until all the more urgent priorities are taken care of. Surprisingly, I owe it to a lot of people right now to do a good job on these apps. I feel like I've sort of been letting them down with the first few, but we'll see.

This post is getting too long.

Sunday, October 19, 2008

Pfffft. I started the morning by being productive and then spent it all looking at old stuff and reading poems online. None of the other ones I wrote that year are any good, so I shall instead share this one that I just read on the Poetry 180 website.

After Years
Ted Kooser

Today, from a distance, I saw you
walking away, and without a sound
the glittering face of a glacier
slid into the sea. An ancient oak
fell in the Cumberlands, holding only
a handful of leaves, and an old woman
scattering corn to her chickens looked up
for an instant. At the other side
of the galaxy, a star thirty-five times
the size of our own sun exploded
and vanished, leaving a small green spot
on the astronomer's retina
as he stood on the great open dome
of my heart with no one to tell.

More relevant things to come, I promise! I'll get down to work after lunch :)

Nostalgia

The google search turned up one or two things of interest, but also revealed that one can no longer find the pastel plant still-life I did in 11th grade or the crappy poem I submitted to Sam's website so that she'd have participants just by typing my name into a search engine. That may be for the best. And I went to flip through the crappy poetry I wrote as a sophomore for a creative writing class and discovered that none of it is on this computer. After a search through the piles of old webmail that I had forwarded to my new address before the Cornell system locked us out, I found it. And it's embarrassing, but you know... why the heck not? Oh GEEZ.

Hitchhiker

On the way from point A to point B
I discovered a bashful little stowaway,
A miracle and a chance meeting,
A grasshopper on my dashboard.
I discovered the bashful little stowaway,
Sitting demurely on top of my stereo,
A grasshopper on my dashboard,
Politely enduring my taste in loud music.
Sitting demurely atop the stereo,
He eyed the messy passenger seat with obvious indifference,
Politely enduring my exceptionally loud music,
As a vortex billowed outside the open windows.
He eyed the messy passenger seat with indifference,
And I wondered if he was as worried as I was
About the vortex billowing beyond the open windows,
If he were the daredevil type.
I wondered if he was as worried as I was,
I’d never want a guest to go flying out the window,
Even if he were the daredevil type,
Especially one so accepting of the hectic state of my car.
I’d never want my guest to go flying out the window
Before we reached our destination,
And he modestly accepts me with my hectic car.
I marveled at the bonds between strangers.

Before we’d reached a destination,
On the way from point A to point B,
I marveled at the random bond between strangers,
A miracle, and a chance meeting.

Saturday, February 02, 2008

Where am I?

So, there have been a few developments recently. While there is still a bit of existential angst in my life, I've decided to grab pretty much everything by the balls and see where that leaves me (hopefully not trampled to death in a gutter somewhere, fingers crossed). Next Monday I start in my new position as library assistant at the WAC. Now, why the title is "assistant" I'm not really sure, since I would basically be the be-all-end-all in terms of who's in charge of the library, if you don't count my superiors, who really just approve stuff and don't have anything to do with the library's day to day functions. Of course, it is only a 20-hr a week gig, and apparently I won't have enough actual library work to keep me occupied all of those hours. So... But anyways, I get paid! And that gives me legitimate impetus to begin searching for an apartment. I was trying to put it off until at least Monday, when I have full use of the library's internet, but I inadvertently started yesterday. Yeah, it's as overwhelming as I thought it would be. I decided to try to get in with a bunch of housemates, since that brings rent down to my level of affordability, but it all depends on how likable I actually am. I e-mailed my two top choices so far, and I'm going to think about the others a little bit. The issue is that I want to wait a week to see where I stand for this job I just applied for and really really want. And also, I'm not interested in moving IMMEDIATELY. Late-feb/early-mar is about the time-frame I'm looking at. And also... dude... it's just a commitment. I mean, DUDE.

So that's where I am right now. gawd that was uninteresting.

Saturday, January 12, 2008

Found: awesome tv show and lover in a former life

The title for this post was originally going to be simply "found," but I figured I could dodge some ridicule this way. It's actually about LOST, that show that I used to watch and find myself watching again. What happened was that my harddrive was glutted after getting topped off with all the music I got over the holidays, so I was looking for ways that I could bear that would free up a few gigs. And then I realized that I had half of season 3 sitting on there in hefty mp4 format, and then I watched an episode and remembered that it was good. Also, considering how lame my life is now and how I'm constantly looking for entertainment with minimal effort to be expended by myself, well... one thing led to another and I finished the series and I really just need more.

Anyways, I know this subject is kind of boring, but I realized it's probably important for me to get this thing going again, since I'd never forgive myself later if I just let the precious momentos (siiiigh, it's a neologism, ok?) of my youth slip away without a fight.

And perhaps it seems boring at first until I disclose the abundance of vivid dreams I've had the past couple days (though I can't remember them in full, so it might remain boring for you, sorry). Last night, especially, after I finished the season, I kept waking myself up because I was trying to dream up season 4 and I dream-justified it as "not wanting to spoil anything." Also dreamt last night: terrifying car ride with my dad in my new car, on our way to arthur's birthday party, arthur's birthday party and some pretty weird guests, then party game in which teams build their miniature "dream garden" by bartering for found items. For example, you'd walk up to someone and ask for a lake and they might give you a small chunk of blue felt.

Hopefully this is the start of a beautiful new thing as I add some digital umami to my life as it is.

That is all.

Monday, August 27, 2007

Some credit, please

Upon arriving home, I have discovered that it's somehow become so much easier to use someone else's credit card to pay for random shit. I feel like fool. At CVS, at Border's, you know, I just stand there waiting for the credit card slip, ready to dive for the pen to show that "oh yeah, this customer's with it" but actually no, they don't need me to do that anymore. Not that the old way really did that much for security in the end anyways... for years I signed with a signature that in no way resembled the one appearing on the back of my card, but seriously. Damn.

Thursday, July 05, 2007

The last 2 days

Apologies to my future self (and anyone who happens to care whether I update or not) for my delinquency. You know how it is when lots of smaller significant things happen and you don't want to write about all of it because you think you might be sitting in front of the computer a long time and somehow cheapening the actual experience with poor diction. I might as well mention a few things though. I don't know when people start showing up here to start using the computer, so we'll see how far I get.

So that "last thoughts" entry didn't work out at all, for the obvious reason that I didn't want to spend my last day in Baotou sitting in our sweltering apartment just blogging about it. Would you believe that I wasn't packing up until the last minute this time around? That isn't to say that things weren't hectic though or borderline dramatic even. The greatest obstacle, and a number of people have noticed my rants about this, was the disappearance of running water from my life. I've been doing anticipatory loads of laundry for weeks, and was systematically storing everything in my suitcases as I went. The weather got wet and chilly just before Chen's visit, causing me to break out a few heavier articles, but things were going more or less efficiently. Until Monday. I got up at 6:30 to put an early end to all the laundry business, and managed to wash the vast majority of everything, but then spent the rest of the morning at the children's home. I was back and ready to dig in again at about 3 in the afternoon, at which point I managed to dampen what remained of my dirty clothes with just enough water for things to be really difficult before never having water again. Ting shui isn't the rarest occurrence around there, and often will just result when one of the upstairs households uses the shower or something. Typically if they actually just shut the water off, it's back within hours at the most. So I spent pretty much the rest of the day going back and forth, checking the status of the shower, and subsequently cursing the heavens above.

No water has a lot of other consequences too. Water is an integral component in the operation of flush toilets. To wash your hands, you traditionally need water. And really, just forget about showering and all the other trappings of personal hygiene. For a while, the toilet situation was workable. Just hold it for a few hours as water trickles into the tank, and complete one satisfying flush cycle before hoping that you won't have to pee again anytime soon. Then, for post-potty handwashing, take advantage of the tiny 5-second jet that spews out of the faucet (also once every couple hours) and remove residual suds with baby wipes. And that worked fine for a while, and I still sustained the hope that our water would, at some point, return.

Packing went smoothly enough, though I did get very gross and dusty in the process. Even as my luggage filled, it seemed there was still plenty of just plain crap sitting around EVERYWHERE.

But I went off to Alice's house for dinner with her family, and when we all came back, there was still no water. Flushing became hit-or-miss. Around 11, we took our toothbrushes and biked back over to her apartment so that we could at least wash up a bit before bed. Her mom said that if water didn't come back the next morning that I could finish my laundry there.

Got up early the next day, came comfortably close to being finished, then called up Alice's dad about borrowing their machine only to discover that they no longer had water either. In fact, most of Baotou reported that there was no water. Well, most as in everyone Alice and I talked to. As the day went on, lower floors got water back... The fruit guy had his usual bucket of water on the sidewalk... other signs like that... but for us on the 5th floor, well... the toilet had quit flushing altogether. The situation still hadn't resolved itself by the time I left, and all I could really do was apologize for not having been able to do the dishes or clear the toilet of its... contents.

I hadn't showered in two days, which while bearable, was undesirable in the Baotou heat/dust.

As for the laundry, it wasn't clean and it wasn't dry. So that all went into random plastic bags to be dealt with here. The problem was that my Cornell sweatshirt actually managed to bleed all over my other things while they were sitting in the washing machine (it bled like a wounded animal), so... that was a nice discovery.

But anyway, I was at a stopping point at about 3... maybe earlier, and was pretty much just this bundle of nervous energy. You know like when you can't stop moving at all and nothing can calm you down. I was extremely aware of the heat and stuffiness, and also of the toilet being the way it was. So, in my final hours, I took my book and my ipod and went out for a stroll.

I got through a few pages of Lolita then had to stop. I couldn't really calm myself down. It had started after lunch time-- I had lunch with Dave at a Muslim noodle shop, as kind of a book-end to our first solo meal back in February-- and on the way back just got to thinking about being home and about being in Beijing, and doing something new at last. It got my blood circulating and I went off like a runaway train. But more like a sentient runaway train that suddenly realizes that it has no track. So I closed my book and began walking. The idea was to go to the fruit stand, but the fruit guy was across the street. As an alternative, I started walking towards the training center. It seemed like a place I should visit "one last time." The campus was really pleasant and quiet. Still on kind of an internal rampage though.

On my way back, YJ was back on his side of the street. So we talked until Alice came home and I had to get back to crunch time.

I already miss him a lot. You really don't expect in this day and age to meet someone that you can never see or communicate with again. But that's what happened in this case. There is absolutely no practical way for us to keep in touch at all, and slim is an optimistic way of describing our chances of ever running into each other again. I dunno, I have really strong yuanfen with some people sometimes, so I guess we'll see. But it's all just very sad and poignant.

There was actually some drama on Monday night that I'm not going to get into here, but it's a really... interesting story.

Getting to Beijing was another thing entirely, and I'll have to talk about it separately. I need to go check out my phone options. Trying to decide if I should just recharge my Baotou number or just forget it and replace it with a Beijing sim.

I'm ok though, if a bit itchy, and I showered twice last night!

Monday, May 28, 2007

actually a really short entry about laundry that was hard for me to title so this is it

Laundry day again. But this time it's a SPECIAL laundry day. Today I am washing all the clothes to be packed in my suitcase not to be unpacked until I've reached the landlocked shores of the big OH. Kind of exciting, though I still hate doing laundry here. I'd considered outsourcing this particular load, but the skinflint in me won over. I spend a lot of random money this month... on a hard disk, a dress, and coffee, so...

There's lots to say about this past weekend I guess, so I'll go ahead and start new posts for those.

Monday, February 05, 2007

I've been places -or- Moldy news

And that's the reason that I haven't been able to update this at all. I did make one attempt at an internet cafe in Jishou that was finally able to even connect to blogger, but there was some error at the end of it all, and I basically just stopped trying after that.

Anyways, I am back in Baotou now... arrived yesterday just before noon, and I'm ready to tell all about the rollicking good times I had all over the place. Errr... to be narrower in my description, I'm not ready to tell *at this moment* because my attention span says no, but I'm psyching myself up for it. I've been keeping tabs along the way of all the things I've wanted to note, and hopefully I'll be able to recount everything in some detail. Just not today! Instead, I'm going to list a, uh, table of contents, because I'm most definitely going to be doing this piecemeal. Sort of to make things easier to swallow and also so that I don't build up a psychological barrier to updating.

Just so this particular post doesn't get classified just as one of those stupid frank "I've got a blog" entries, I'll introduce the new situation with my refrigerator. Our fridge was unplugged while I was gone, presumably to save energy, but when I opened it yesterday, I discovered that much of its interior surface area is covered in mold. Quite smelly mold. Mold akin to bread mold, fortunately, so it doesn't appear slimy or orange or anything like that. Also there is an egg in there, which makes me very uneasy. I went out to the store today and bought some cleaning cloths, a kitchen cleaner that's hopefully anti-bacterial, and what I assume is an odor neutralizer for the aftermath. Actually, I tried to communicate to one of the sales ladies that I needed something to clean my fridge because it molded, and she insisted that there's no cleaning solution I can use because you put food in there, and that I should just wipe it with water. Well, maybe soap and water might be effective enough for SOME (okay, maybe most) people, but I personally want the peace of mind that all microorganisms in that fridge expired in a storm of chemicals. Sales ladies have this tendency to give me doubtable information about... everything. It makes it harder for me to trust. Anyways, I bought some things I thought might work, and also have an antiseptic that I use with my laundry that I was thinking about splashing in there too.

I then decided that I didn't want to do that today either, so I'm psyching myself up for that as well.

Tomorrow will be such a full day!

Wednesday, December 20, 2006

8 seconds

Right now I have the most incredible hiccups. I can't even remember the last time I had the hiccups. These come with a periodicity of about 8 seconds and are really... fierce. Here's a fear I've had for many years: that I would be like that one guy with the world record and go on hiccupping for years.

Anyways, I explained the Mr. and Mrs. Smith love triangle to some of my students today. They didn't know who Jennifer Aniston was (the name anyway).

Oh! The Glory commercial just played! It's for men's clothing and it's definitely the closing score.

Yeah, honestly that's it.

Ok, ok, I've got one.

So I saw this on an ESL teacher forum last month, or like, 2 months ago. Or something.

What do you call a deer with no eyes?

Think about it.

Anyways, I've been listening to songs from Evita (the movie) and am toootally enamored of Antonio Banderas. Mostly his voice. Though now I'm really confused, because I went to imdb to figure out what movies he's been in, and it seems like I've only seen Evita and The Mask of Zorro. So like... how did I know who he was? Because I did. Something's not connecting here...

So, since my last entry, I've gotten rid of most of my anxiety. My Sunday class brightened up for two fun participatory lessons, but is now back to its slack, inattentive roots. It's so draining to teach them. The last lesson I had with them was like having blood taken for 2 hours. I won't deny that I'm fond of these kids, but do you know what would make me fonder? If they learned something from my classes, which I don't think they do. Anyways, the two classes we had that went well involved planning a 2 week vacation on a budget and movie creation where they had to come up with short scripts and premises. The group of 3 guys got into it and ended up portraying the murder of Jay Chou by one of their female classmates. It seemed a little mean at first because the idea is that she worships him and is excited to finally meet him in Milan. He says she's ugly, so she poisons him. But the girl didn't seem very offended, and the boy had an interesting falsetto. So... The other group did a heist story... only not really. A guy's brother was wrongly thrown into prison, so he robbed a bank with the intention of getting thrown into prison too so that they two of them could break out together. I think. Anyways, I could think of a lot of ways to go about getting someone out of prison that don't involve commencing your own criminal record, but whatevs. It seemed like it'd be a good movie anyway.

What movies did the other class come up with? Well, one of them, in which the girls dominated, did what was essentially a condensed Korean teledrama. Childhood friends go to college together, and the girl loves the guy but the guy doesn't love her and then he mysteriously disappears from the plot so that a new guy can win her heart by having wine spilled on him during a blackout at a party. Obviously the second relationship blossoms out of the ensuing animosity they feel for each other. The other group was less convicted, but they did come up with some interesting ideas. At first they were going to start with a commercial for glasses. Which is not what the assignment called for. Then it came down to a pair of magic glasses that let you see ghosts or magic creatures or something. Then it morphed into a fairytale-ish thing where a boy goes to live with his grandmother and gets into all sorts of accidents. Turns out there's an elf following him around and changing out his class speeches for girlie magazines and so on until he finds a pair of glasses that let him catch the elf. But the elf sneaks out again, steals the glasses, and continues his "sabotage." I think it's a good idea!

Did you get the answer yet?
What do you call a deer with no eyes?
No idear!
Now, what do you call a deer with no eyes and no legs?

I've settled into a kind of pattern for the Training Center classes... we go out of a book called Speak Naturally, a conversation guide from the 80s (very apparent in yesterday's class when the characters in the book started discussing the inflation, the reckless spending of Democrats, and the failing auto industry). The first half of class is pretty boring repeat after me stuff, but it's weird... I actually feel like it's important to do it. But then the 2nd half they go through the cued dialogues, which are pretty much the best part of the book, which is pretty sparse in itself, and I go around troubleshooting and stuff. I dunno, I think it's pretty fun. Attendance has dwindled to about half of the original number, with some people randomly coming and going. And it's like "whoa, I didn't know you were still coming." It's nice to have the smaller class though.

The current lesson for the high school is a pick-me-up. The last set of lessons was REALLY boring for me. I sort of lost my way with them, I think. I felt soooo unfun, which isn't cool. It's like, I try to give them lots of interesting new vocab to practice with, but they don't wanna... A lot of them don't take notes either.

My "boss" back in the US has given me something of an assignment. I'm supposed to do a report on teaching high schoolers? Something along those lines, and it's very exciting. I like assignments. Now, I realize that after all of my past tantrums and breakdowns, it's a little unconvincing, but I love writing papers! I imagine it's a lot like what doing drugs is like. Maybe... the opposite of what doing drugs is like. But the result is the same.

So partially because of that, and partially because it only seems right, I've asked to attend the students' English classes just to see what they're like. Mr. Yuan set me up with 3 classes, and I went to the first two last week. The 3rd years were nearing 2000 completed multiple choice questions in preparation for the entrance exams and the 1st years were reading newspaper-like things very similar to the ones we had in elementary school that taught us about Earth Day and stuff. It's like... their knowledge appears fairly advanced. It was really helpful for me in trying to structure my classes. Not that we have many more before the break, but you know. I think I'll be back next semester. The experience also sort of told me that Russ's class is a biiig step down the ladder for the kids. I mean, I had that idea to begin with, but... anyways, we're almost done.

It's not winter yet. Not officially for 2 days, right? It's real cold here though. It's interesting-- the ice here is like, 3-dimensional. It looks like gak, like someone threw water down and if froze immediately. It's pretty cool. The black ice on the street isn't as slippery as you'd think either. Mostly it's covered with dust and dirt so it's just like walking on the ground. People still really like to dump their water outside though, especially at the roots of trees. So there are layers of ice several inches thick between the edge of the sidewalk and the dirt holding each tree in place. It seems like it wouldn't be good for the trees, but they're standing their ground.

Last Friday we couldn't get a taxi and so my toes were frozen and unresponsive by the time we got on the bus. It was annoying, so I suggested that we have dinner at Pizza Hut. Oh! Which reminds me. I have something that I'm pretty sure none of you have: A Pizza Hut planner/calendar with a leather cover (fake? real? who knows?) with the Pizza Hut logo stamped into it, and the logo on every page (the waitress showed us that specifically). The back has coupons and the front has all the dialing codes for major cities and a listing of the holidays. All for Y6 with our meal! I dunno, I thought it was an all right deal.

What do you call a deer with no eyes and no legs?
Still no idear!

Ok, well... I think I will go now and possibly continue reading Jurassic Park, which is still pretty good and actually a bit more comprehensible after all these years. Seems much shorter. You know, I can actually remember where I was when I read all these parts? I was with my parents at Virginia Beach, and we'd been seated in a restaurant when I got to the part about the aviary, which I remembered being way more exciting than it was this time through.

Saturday, November 25, 2006

Yay day

I look forward to Saturdays, despite knowing that I'll actually have to get up early on Saturdays. Saturday is not my day off: at 10, a little girl named Betsy comes over for a one-on-one class that, originally, was supposed to last no more than 1.5 hours. Now it's 2 or a little over. At 7:30, I have a 2-hour private class with what is now 8 high schoolers (previously 6) and one of their mothers, who is a cool lady who sits by and helps some of the less advanced students WITHOUT INTERFERING (which therefore means she's cool).

These two classes are not only a pleasure to teach, but they're soooo easy! Betsy's class was sort of a surprise when it started, you know, I wasn't expecting her to start coming over so soon. But that was 2 weeks ago, and she is such an enthusiastic student that just about everything goes over well. Her lessons are easy to plan because she's very good at learning. As for my evening class, the students are amazing. Some of them pick up real quick, and most of them have the guts to stop me and ask questions. Also, their curiosity comes out better than that of my other students, so we always have something interesting to talk about. And we get along well and have laughs. Most importantly though, I can always expect them to do what I asked the week before as "homework" (since it's fundamentally optional), and also to follow along and complete each section of the actual class. So planning for them is a breeze-- I'm already ahead like 3 weeks. Well, two now I guess.

Anyways, I was just short of breathing fire when I woke up this morning... I'd had some dream where some activity wasn't being accomplished efficiently, and so every time it was attempted wrong, I'd try to rearrange myself in bed. But like, I sleep in a sleeping bag, and so all night I had this sensation that I was trapped, and like, so on. I opened my eyes just before my alarm went off at 7:45 and was like "holy shit, I'm tired." Just then, my alarm rang, and I actually wanted to cry. Got up though, and had class. Betsy is really cute, and has pretty good manners during class, so it like, wasn't a strain or anything. We read stories online, pick up some vocab, and then make Go Fish cards. It's an interesting challenge for me when she decides that she wants to make a card out of a verb or adjective. "Spy" as a verb was hard today, but I ended up just making it "spyglass" cuz you can still get the point.

Afterwards, she and her mom invited Alice and I to Haide Hanbao for lunch. Hanbao means "hamburger," so yeah, it's the closest thing to McDonald's. They also serve Chinese fast food there, a la Mark Pi's, Hong Kong, and Peace. For the parents, I guess, cuz the kids love hamburgers. By the way, "hamburger," as a term, is more distorted here than it is in the States, because it can also refer to chicken sandwiches. Basically, anything on a hamburger bun is a hamburger. For your reference. I ordered a beef hamburger, and got the equivalent of a Big Mac. The meat patties here are... thin. And uniform. Spam-ish in appearance. But taste ok. You'd probably need at least 3 patties to equal one quarter-pounder, so I guess the double-decker burger I got wasn't all that much more food. But you know, I can eat a hamburger and be done-- throw in an extra layer of bun, and I'm very done. Add fries, and you'll have to slow down. There was once a time when I would have sat down to an x-treme junior bacon cheeseburger showdown or two, but those days are past, for now at least. I can pig out, but usually to the note of an extenuating circumstance or two. What I'm getting at is that the mother (one of Alice's... high school (?) teachers) tried to order me a bowl of rice, essentially a food-court Chinese restaurant combo, and when I said no, ordered an extra chicken sandwich just in case. I didn't even manage to finish the first thing, and when they saw it, they asked me if I was afraid of getting fat.

It was a really fun morning. I mean, the weather was dismal, cold, and snowy (at last!), but that doesn't really matter to someone like me, whose essential functions take place indoors. In the cab on the way there, Betsy was trying to explain something about a speaking competition she wanted to enter, but got stuck on the words. Even the driver chimed in and told her to think about it slowly. We had two female cab drivers today, and both of them were quite willing to chat it up with Betsy's mom. Pleasant! With her mom or her cousins (who I taught once at the beginning of my stay here), she's like an anime character. And she is so clever, to the point where Alice and I spent a lot of time laughing at her comments or antics. I think her mom's trying to convince her to come stay Friday nights with us, and I'm not sure what I think about that, but at least it's an excuse to avoid having to accept unwanted dinner invitations.

I then caught up on sleep this afternoon.

My evening class now comprises 8 students. There's a boy who was in my Sunday class, but couldn't attend it anymore because it conflicts with a math class his parents are making him take. So, I invited him to come on Saturday instead. Frankly, any student from that class would do better for themselves in this one. But anyway, when he found out about this second class, he seemed really excited. Like... more excited than I was expecting. I understand that the students are tired from all their excessive learning (SO excessive in this country), but he really did seem to prefer napping and being otherwise distracted while I'm teaching over actually paying attention. I liked him though because when he did work, he did good work. But anyways, apparently he's a big fan of my class, and sort of shocked me with that information. The other Saturday students all seem to know each other very well, and there are only two other kids from his school (who are probably younger than him), but he came in with confidence today, and gave an awesome presentation about foreign cars, and I'm pretty sure that once he gets a hang of the... well, borderline cult-ish stuff we do on Saturdays, he'll be all good.

Another student from my Sunday class, the only other one who's got the initiative to actually e-mail me, has taken to telling me how much she enjoys my class. This girl is one of my favorite students, but I can't help but wonder where this is coming from. The Sunday class really just amounts to a big cracker barrel, where the students come and gossip and make fun of each other the whole entire time, in Chinese. If I could take each of them and shake them, sometimes I think I would. I like them. But daaaaaaamn. I'm not their English teacher, I'm their Chinese-American babysitter. They dynamic is way different from the one on Saturday. I often feel like we don't accomplish much in that class and it drives me nuts! Still, it does feel nice to know that she at least appreciates me. She says that they think of me, as a friend as well as a teacher, though this Thanksgiving, she also added "sister" to that list of relationships. And I was like... "oh." So I'm that older sister that nobody listens to *although they should.* I think knowing that actually makes it more frustrating.

Friday night, it was raining. Because of that one experience when we couldn't find a taxi in the rain, Russ and I accepted a ride from Mr. Ding. Mr. Ding, for his part, just sort of walked out of his office with the keys and had us follow him, so... it just sort of happened that way. On the road, though, he asked us where we wanted to go. I think it probably still would have been impolite to ask to go home, and maybe Russ felt that too. So he suggested dinner, though neither of us had really planned on it, and I wasn't all that hungry (and had to pee), and neither of us knew where to go. So we went back to the Dings, where I met Mrs. Ding for the first time. We eventually settled on cheap chao cai, or like... food that comes in dishes rather than in a bowl with noodles. Cheap, cuz I'm way poor. On the way to the restaurant, I got to talk to Mrs. Ding, and she is a really nice lady. Sort of pretty too. I wondered briefly how this marriage had come about, but then stopped when I realized how mean that sort of was. Dinner was pretty good. Russ only knows how to say gong-bao-ji-ding (kung pao chicken), so we ordered that. They also ordered some... beef? And some potatoes. And glutinous rice cakes with red bean paste filling. It's too bad English doesn't have the words to make that sound more attractive. Also there was sweet potatoes soaked in carmelized sugar (which I actually spelled shuger just now, if you can believe it) that was starting to harden. So when you took a piece, it would trail these long sugary threads. Good, but having sweet things for 2/5 of the meal was maybe a bit much for me.

As we headed downstairs, Mr. Ding asked who was going to treat this time. I'd half expected this to happen, since Russ was the one who suggested it, but then it was sort of like... would we be treating the whole family? Sticky, because I think his wife was preparing to cook before we got to their apartment, but also the three of them outnumbered the two of us, and also Russ payed about $300 for the 3 of us the week before. Another issue was the fact that I only had my last 20 that I was willing to spend for the month, so... But Mrs. Ding let him have it, and told him that of course he shouldn't make us pay. I dunno, friendship with Mr. Ding is not the easiest thing for me because it always comes down to money for him. He always brings up money. He also has kind of a frustrating personality, but anyway. His wife is cool.

So that lands me here, at the cusp of Sunday, which is definitely not yay day. I passed a lot of the last couple days watching Youtube clips of male figure skating competitions, and have pretty much exhausted that entertainment venue, so... I guess feel free to send me your online Christmas shopping. I'll find that perfect jacket or pair of shoes that your loved one would be thrilled to own. Or maybe I'll just try. In any case, I know a lot of places with quirky gift ideas, so bring it.

Thursday, November 23, 2006

Is it rude to ask someone's age?

Yo, I hope not. So the new teacher we're expecting in January... I've been really looking forward to his arrival. I haven't mentioned Russ in a while, but I seem to have crossed the line at last and am finally able to treat him amiably. This is good news, because he's a very good man, just... he used to be a little frustrating to me. Anyways, we got news of the newcomer a while ago, when Russ was still planning on leaving. He's recently changed his mind though, so it sounds like there will be 3 of us here after all. I got a glimpse of his letter of recommendation, and it made him sound pretty impressive. Additionally, I was told that he was only 24 years old. Not only fresh meat, but young blood! All right, this evening has been too much about pork, sorry. Uumm, but yeah, I was really hoping for someone that I could relate to... more. But now this person's age is in like, limbo. Apparently there are two people who applied who have the same name, one of whom is older and the other is younger. We're all (as in, all 5 of us even remotely involved in this conjecture, though Alice and I are the only ones who really seem confused) sure that the young one is the one meant to come. But in a message I got recently, he alleged that he was a 12 year old in a 53 year old's body. And I'm like... that's not something you say unless your body is 53 years old, unless maybe you're... prematurely balding, arthritic, or otherwise... well, disabled or something. Or maybe you smoked. A lot. I don't know! We even took the average of those two ages and that's like 32.5. Then, when Alice and I asked Russ what he knew, he said that he'd heard that this person is about 30. I'll hopefully know for sure shortly, and you can bet that I will share that information immediately, whether it's socially appropriate or not.

Wednesday, November 22, 2006

Know what's hard?

Doing dishes in the semi-dark, and I know, because I do it like every night. The light bulb in the sink portion of the kitchen blew out a few weeks ago, and I personally have no idea where to begin fixing it, and Alice has made no suggestions, so we live with it. Frankly, we use a lot less electricity this way. The only thing is that after cooking lunch or dinner, we're generally too rushed or lazy to wash anything right away, and so the dishes sit in the sink until night falls. Completely. If they're in the left half of the sink, I'm cozy enough to leave them until the morning. But if they're in the right side, the side I use to brush my teeth, I do them, often around midnight, by the light of the room next door. It's not hard because of any physical duress that I have to undergo, but rather because you can't do the job as well because, you know, you can't see the food. I'm a pretty thorough dishwasher regardless (always have been... I'm really the only person that I truly trust to handwash things really well, no offense), but... anyways, it's dark.