Happy B-Day

Happy birthday to my daughter Maddie who turns 3 today. We enjoyed cake this morning for breakfast, it was a bit of homemade deliciousness. Jacob, my son, turns 1 tomorrow, so happy early birthday to him. He enjoyed his first piece of cake ever this morning also, it was quite the scene (although I'm not sure he liked it).

Dog Jam

I was in Beijing last August and we were driving to the client location, which was located outside the 5th ring road, not too far from the Olympic Stadium. We got off the 5th ring road and went onto one of the back roads to avoid traffic. All the sudden, the two cars that were in front of came to a stop; similar to what you would see in a real traffic jam. Well from my backseat I could not see the issue, no accidents, in fact no other cars on the road, so what's the hold up. I noticed the other cars maneuver around something, and as we approached I saw it. Yes folks, this was the first time that I had ever been stuck in a traffic jam...because dogs were having "relations" right in the middle of the freaking road!!!!! I mean there are places for that stuff to happen, but the middle of the road is just not right, not even for dogs. The funniest part about it was the group of dogs that surrounded the two going at it....made me wonder if human intelligence is really that far removed from dogs.

Stories from the Subway

Two quick stories from my recent adventures riding the subway:

What's that smell????
Deodorant is still not that common of a toiletry here in China, so you can imagine that when I ride the subway home after a day at work in the 90 degree heat, there are some odd smells that seem to waft from people (not too dissimilar from the wafting that comes from pepe le pew's tail). Even after you think that you have smelled some of the weirdest of body odors there always seems to be a time when the worst of the smells just hit you. As you might know, it is very loud to ride on a subway, and everyone is really really cramped into the car during the time going to work and going home from work. It appears that this gives certain people the freedom to let the gasses that have accumulated for the whole day to be released for all to enjoy. You know when you see someone yawn and it makes you yawn and then all the other people around you yawn, this is by far the worst part about the releasing of gas because it becomes like a bad chain reaction cause once one person has done it, it seems like it just is this never ending smell of people's flatulence on the subway. I learn more and more to then appreciate getting off the subway and enjoying the polluted air of Shanghai.

I don't even know you?
I am not sure that many Americans can imagine how crowded the subway is during the peak time. Granted I ride on Line 2, which isn't even the busiest line, but there are times when you stuffed in the subway pretty tight with no room to even move. It was at one of those times that the subway made its next stop, I thought to myself that there is no way anyone else can get on this train, but alas the 15 people standing to get in the door I was closest too, somehow found a way to get in. It was at this point that I had a guy kept backing more and more into me, as a reminder he was already "all up on" me, but I guess we were making room for the 15 additional people. He was able to squeeze his left leg in between my legs, imagine human Jenga. Now I am comfortable with my manhood, but this scene was too similar to that of a Mississippi Mudhound in heat, so yeah, it was very uncomfortable to basically have this guy's leg all up on my man area. Anyway, I have been able to avoid this uncomfortable situation by conveniently placing my back pack in front of me, thus eliminating the human Jenga session on the subway.

I have hit rock bottom

People say that an alcoholic has hit rock bottom when they are lying passed out with like 12 bottles of empty rubbing alcohol around them, or an overeater when they are passed out with a bunch of cheeseburger wrappers around them, or weird cat ladies when they are passed out with 43 dead cats in their refrigerator.

Well, I think I have hit my rock bottom when it comes to music listening. While I was not passed out anywhere, I can say that listening to Chinese Pop (Cpop) has corrupted me. I was in the car with a colleague of mine heading to a client (now this colleague liked to talk to herself, and you know when you have just met someone and they begin to talk to themselves and you think to yourself...sketchy, well that's another story all in itself), we had finished our small talk about getting to know each other and she asked me if I minded if she put on some music. Of course, I did not mind, she said, "It's the Backstreet Boys. They're my favorite...I love Rock n Roll." I will leave that last part alone as I think we can all identify the fallacy in that statement, nonetheless I said it was okay for the Backstreet Boys to be played. Little did I know that when the music started to I actually...gulp...enjoyed it. Yes in my mind I started to sing along with songs, and my body was doing one of those internal dances (not the kind when Mr. Doo Doo Brown is at your door). Let me repeat that, I enjoyed listening to the Backstreet Boys...I have certainly hit the rock bottom of music.

I'm Melting...Melting!!!!!

This past week has been pretty hot and humid here in Shanghai (at least 90F and very humid). As you might know I choose to walk home from the subway after work, which is about a 30 minute walk, needless to say in this heat and humidity I get home looking like I just jumped into a pool. Well yesterday Renee met me at the front gate of our apartment complex and we were walking back to our apartment, me looking wetter then ever, as we were passing by one of the outdoor playgrounds, we happened to meet a friend of ours from Singapore. Now for those of you that are not familiar with Singapore, it is small island not too far from the Philippines, basically the temperature there never goes below 70F, so they have an idea as to what hot is.

We stopped to have small chat with our friend and she said to Renee and I that it was "much cooler then yesterday." Now mind you, at this point I was looking like the Nazi guy did in Raiders of the Lost Ark after they opened the Ark of the Covenant (just without all the cool clay-mation effects), of course my first thought was, I am not sure I can tell the ½ degree difference and the 1% drop in humidity after 30 minutes of walking in my own butt sweat, but maybe she knows hot better then I do. Renee just replied with, "yes it is" and we moved on, me walking away looking like Swamp Thing...moral of the story, wear good pants that do not show off your butt sweat.

Better then the NFL??????

Okay okay, no there is truly nothing better then the NFL, I grew up on American Football so it is definitely close to my heart. Although the thought is going through my mind that RUGBY is a better sport then the NFL. It is only a thought, but I'm sure some people around the world would support the thought. I used to take the philosophy that since I am not innundated by US sports television that even the bad sports start to look good, but legitimately, Rugby is a really cool sport to watch (not sure I would play it...yet). First, it is commercial free, which is always a plus. Second these guy hit each other in basically the same manner as the NFL, just without any pads on. Third, all the guys on the team are physical freaks, whereas in the NFL you can have some guys that are either human blobs or guys like the kicker who is your everyday ordinary guy.

It has basically been 3 weeks in a row of watching Rugby on Saturday evenings and I think I'm hooked (this past weekends game where New Zealand came back with 2 trys in the final 5 minutes was awesome). In fact I am even looking forward to the Rugby World Cup that will be taking place this fall in France. Yes, the US has a team, but we are not that great. I will be cheering for my boys, but they play England and South Africa in the first group round, so they will most likely get their butts handed to them (England and South Africa are dominant along with New Zealand, France, and Austrailia). I know that NFL season will be in full swing, but there will be more Rugby coverage on my satellite here in China, so I might just have to follow Rugby closer (dare I say).

We'll see how I enjoy the World Cup, but right now Rugby is creeping up into my favorite sports, now in the top 4 behind NFL, College Basketball, College Football.

I'm not the only one drinking this....

The client took me out to lunch today. As I mentioned in my last post, today is The Dragon Boat Festival Holiday, so the restaurant provided us with some free wine. I took a sip of the wine and it actually tasted exactly like grape juice, but upon asking the client if it was grape juice, they replied that it is a very fruity wine. Nonetheless the stuff was good.

You might have heard that the sanitation in Chinese restaurants is not the best, and I can honestly say that I just look at the food and don't observe the surroundings (as they might not be the most appealing). I was so much enjoying the wine drink that I was drinking it slowly to enjoy, even to the point where I held it up once and took a look at the glass (as if I was some wine connoisseur). Upon looking into the glass I noticed there was something in there. As I brought the glass closer I noticed about 4 wings and then I finally identified it, there was a fly in my drink.

Now, I do not know that much about wines, so I thought for a moment that maybe this wine is like Tequila where there is worm in it for reasons that I don't know, so I thought maybe this bug was supposed to be in it. When I asked the client if this was okay, they looked at it and yelled for the waitress to come over, the words exchanged were basically that this was not acceptable and that we should not have to pay for certain things during the meal. So I guess that was the long way of saying, "No that is not okay." Anyway, I didn't lose my appetite, rather I just didn't drink any more of the wine juice. Too bad cause it was really good.