I feel all special...

Lovely Cassie wrote a blog post (at least partially) about me on her super-fantastic blog, A Normal Day.  It makes me feel all special.  Plus, she likes my iccint.  Gold stars for Cassie!

Cassie and I lead the kind of lives where it's possible for us to run into each other (and Carla!) on a glacier.  We can't forget that these lives are awesome.

x

I'm so iMbarrassed*.

The links didn't work in my last entry, which is an awful virtual faux pas, especially as I specifically mentioned the links.  So, here they are, even though you don't really need them.

This blog, which you may or may not be reading.
Another blog, which is written with Wordpress. [This link didn't work until Dave corrected me. Thanks, Dave.]
Some information on what happened at Tiananmen Square nearly 20 years ago.


*Have you noticed that everything's called iSomething these days?  i'M not iMagining iT, am i?  My iSP at home is called ihug, but it has been for years.  I hug.  Do you?

Censorwhatty?

This is by no means an explanation for my negligence of blogging duties, but I can't access Blogger right now. In order to even publish this, I had to use a proxy site to enable instant posting of emails to this blog (yes, I just linked to myself). [EDIT: Apparently that failed as well, so I'm using the proxy site to post this.  If there end up being three copies, that's why.]

I've had issues with accessing Wordpress blogs for a while now (thankfully I can usually see the one I actually post to, and yes, I just linked to myself again), and can only read them via an RSS reader. Now the same thing is happening with Blogger sites, and I can't view pictures (which is especially unhelpful for ... most of the blogs I keep up with). I gave up on seeing embedded videos ages ago.

YouTube has been unavailable in China for weeks now, and there's no sign of that changing any time soon.

It's a little less than two weeks until the 20th anniversary of the Tiananmen Square Massacre* (or 'Protest', if you prefer). Coincidence?

Meantime, I'm going to see pandas in Sichuan province next week (a little over a year after the earthquake hit there), and the week after, my mum is coming to visit. Yay! The weather is in the high 20s, and looking to get warmer. Thankfully M&S is here to supply clothes that fit me. And Jaffa Cakes.

 

Random cute craft picture.  Thanks, Dave.  I would like to make this.  

*I picked a BBC link that I can't see, so my apologies if it's not the best.  

Throwback to 2005

For whatever reason, I have just read a few posts from just after I started this blog, including a 'you're not from around here, are you?' story, and one that included some maths questions that I never posted the answers to (I'll put them in the comments, I guess).

Anyway, I came across the following excerpt from a random, sleep-deprivation-induced posting (I can't believe I worked regular 16 hour days. The things you do to get out of New Zealand. Err...I mean...it's a great place!):

"Today was day 1 of a 6 part series of mind-numbingly-boring-no-outlet-for-skiving data entry. Blah. I am so taking my own music in on Monday so I don't have to listen to the Classic Hits No Repeat Work Day. Since when has Coolio's Gangster's Paradise been a classic hit? Although hearing my middle-aged female supervisor singing along was kind of hilarious. There was also a farewell morning tea (I'll jump on the goodbye bandwagon for some free cake), and office antics which involved a Saffa squashing himself into a wheelie bin which then fell over. Eventually he managed to jump out and scare his target so much that she screamed and spilled her coffee all over his farewell card. Comedy."

I think I remember which very temporary assignment this was, but I have absolutely no recollection of the cake, or the wheelie bin incident. Brains are weird.

Speaking of literacy...

I'm really glad that the vast majority of my friends who choose to maintain some kind of web presence are literate and write quite compelling observations of their everyday lives and the world at large.


I'm relying solidly on Google Reader at the moment to keep up with them, but I've genuinely been enjoying learning more about various friends and their lives around the world this way.


I'm going to list these solely by location, because otherwise compartmentalising them is too much of a burden for me! If you're not listed here...maybe you should be posting more often!


I highly recommend all of these blogs (dammit, I was trying so hard to avoid that word), but for a lot of different reasons, so give one or two a go.


Canada / Victoria : Just a Normal Day [will be linked in the sidebar as soon as it lets me/I remember about it again]


China / Hangzhou : Below Heaven is Hangzhou [Same as above]

China / Wuhan : Packers to Pandas

Hong Kong SAR / Sha Tin: new territories

Hong Kong SAR / Sha Tin: Mandarin Orange You Glad I Have A Blog?

UK / Brighton: davers dot org

USA / Baltimore : Josephine Henneberry

You can't argue with numbers...

...they tell me I am a total slacker.

What the hell. I'm bumping it up to 17 before it becomes 2009.

I may have actually been a 'blogger' in 2006. How bizarre.

Stretchy

In the grand tradition of not doing what I'm supposed to be doing, I've changed the layout of my blog so that it makes better use of the space in your browser. No more annoyingly blank left sidebar for you!

I've also updated some blog links in my sidebar, and they will appear in order of whoever bothered to update the most recently. Good for them, they deserve the glory.

New Year's Resolutions

Usually at this time of year I will at least have attempted a Christmas post or copied and pasted some of my Christmas email in a thin attempt to update the world on my goings on.  I at the least managed to get that email out, even if it was extremely last-minute (my usual style, so at least I'm being consistent). 

If I am to sum up the year succinctly, I would have to say that it's been interesting, challenging, lonely, strangely rewarding, and always Asian.  As usual, I've met some great people, although not as many as most years (and in some cases I haven't actually met them), and I've taken the plunge with a full time job.  I like the place where I live and the people I work with, but there's definitely room for improvement in several areas of my life.  All of these involve me trying to find some self-motivation, so let's hope there's some floating around here somewhere. 

In the lead up to Christmas I got really busy at work (even more so because we don't get a holiday for it in China), and a bit worried that I wouldn't be able to find reasonable plans with which to ensure people that I was occupied with.  One of my sisters came to visit for a while, which was wonderful, and thankfully I was able to impose upon a lovely almost-stranger and had a fantastic Christmas break in Wuhan in central China.  Now I have no plans for New Year's Eve, but a wander around town and a night in sounds kind of nice.  I have my apartment to myself a the moment (even though the empty room is costing me), and I'm enjoying it a fair bit.  I'm promising myself that I'll stop listening to the Christmas music soon, though. 

I am currently typing on the AlphaSmart 3000 that arrived in the mail today (along with a spare dryer part that means I can dry my clothes quickly, and some oh-so-slightly belated Christmas presents that I love), and I hope that it will somehow help me with this motivation/distraction problem that plagues me on a regular basis.  What is an AlphaSmart 3000, you may ask.  Well, it's what I like to call a '90s retrofuturistic word-processing keyboard.  It's also made of green-blue semi-transparent plastic, so it really doesn't get much better.  In a nutshell, I can type almost as much as I want without having to worry about power cords, boot-up time, or the deadly distraction of the internet.  I'm in bed right now, and when I'm ready to go to sleep, I just have to hit the on/off button (no save necessary), or just let it switch itself off in ten minutes.  I hope that it will help me with a lot of the writing that I've been telling myself I need to do (paid and unpaid), and at the least might help me keep up with my correspondence.  I may be laying an awful lot of pressure on less than a kilo's worth of glorified calculator, but every little bit helps, surely?  I'm also going to take it in to the ridiculously-long, somewhat-pointless meetings I have to attend, and annoy people with my incessant clickity-click as I do other work but pretend to take notes.  Awesome plan, if I do say so myself.  And if none of that works, it makes a handy peripheral keyboard for my laptop.

So, my resolutions involve somehow improving my social life, work habits, and language education, but I think it all boils down to being brave and just getting stuff done.  I can do stuff.  Right?

Blogging at lunchtime is fun

It started getting cold about a week before Hallowe'en, which is something I'd kind of been looking forward to.  And when I say cold, I mean it dipped below 20 degrees (Celcius), not that it's gotten actually cold yet.  But it will, no doubt.  Hopefully I will be able to purchase some swanky rain/snow boots before the weather really starts to turn.  In the meantime, I get to wear all my fun cold-weather accessories, and I'm enjoying it because I don't have to wear them yet.  I'm not sure how I will feel when I am wearing everything I own in order to keep warm.

I haven't actually managed to get all my stuff home yet (I've still got a couple of boxes of stuff that I shipped from HK sitting in my office), but I've been progressively taking things home with me over the last couple of weeks.  Just about all my clothes have made it home (and the maid ironed stuff for me today, woohoo), and the big box is nearly empty.  I can't believe I actually have semi-full closets (I have two in my room; sweet). 

Workwise, things are going pretty well, I guess.  I'm still not entirely sure what I'm supposed to be doing, but we have a couple of projects coming up where I actually have to produce things, so I should be busy enough over the next couple of months at least.  I'm teaching about 12 of my colleagues English, which is fun, and I'm in charge of an intern who I won't comment on in case he ever finds this blog.  Meantime, if anyone wants to move to Shanghai, or knows anyone who does, we are looking for people who have excellent written and spoken English skills, preferably with some kind of teaching background or qualification.  Let me know!

In general news, things are okay.  I have been incredibly unmotivated to teach myself Mandarin, which I feel guilty about on a daily basis.  I have picked up a little bit (probably through osmosis), but really need to get on to active learning.  As it's been getting colder, I've picked up the crochet hooks again, so put in your orders for winter warmth by Wendy.  I'm not freaking out too much about the full timeyness of my life, yet, but the thought of not being able to take holidays when I want to still makes my throat close up a little bit.  I'm just thinking about the money.  Yay, money!

Scotland Photos

I've been meaning to post links to my photos from last Autumn but it was so much effort uploading them that I never got around to it.  So finally, here they are!

 

Scotland Autumn 2006 - Knockengorroch, Pirate Party, Toga Party, Letter Party, Skye, Hallowe'en.

 

Edinburgh November 2006 - Guy Fawkes, Quiz Nights, Farkins' Last Pub Crawl, Christmas Lights, Ceilidh, Box Wars Party, Wendy's Leaving Drinks.

 

You still have to sign in to see them.  Sorry!

 

I've linked these in my sidebar, and have also put a link to my Farcebook page in there as well.

 

Hooray for being (slightly more) up to date!

Sidebar Updates

I realised the other day that somehow I don't have a link to Michelle's Travelpod on my page.  As we're like, BFFs and all, it was weird.  Like, OMG. 

 

So I did a mini update on my sidebar and have added links to the following pages:

 

Michelle Bond - globetrotter, information management specialist, future international pyrotechnics consultant.

 

Carol Humber - Self-confessed geek extraordinaire!

 

Updated: Kathleen Broderick (soon to be Rogers) - USA Breast Cancer Research Fundraiser.

 

Kiwi FM - All Kiwi, all the time.

 

[Although the intentions are true, all acronyms in this post are said in a most sarcastic tone - although pronounced in a very accurate Valley Girl accent]