tsongyoubing

let's see. a couple of things.
-got up early this morning to go to yoga, but when i got there, no one was there. the door was locked and no one was home.. soo i decided to be semi-productive and hit the breakfast stand and go to the bank before my outside class. i'm $1200US richer which makes me feel good.
yumm danbing in the morning. it's like an unsweetened crepe with egg on one side and then they douse it with garlicy, syrupy soy sauce.

went to my outside class this afternoon and taught a lesson on money. i really enjoy those kids. they speak minimal chinese, are always polite, and say hello, goodbye and thank you without prompting.
after my regular class tonight i went to read for a bit at the coffee shop. i told bruce, the guy from the hospital, i'd be at the coffee shop from 9 to 10 but then i got a text from him around 930 asking where i was. i said at the coffee shop with the dog.. turns out he was at another coffee shop with a dog :P so he met up with me and we chatted for an hour or so. it was a breath of fresh air to talk to someone new and i feel better about staying here if i can make more friends.

is it everything you hoped it'd be?

well this morning i slept until 10:59 and i was supposed to be at chinese with jerry at 11, so i didn't make it. then dawn and i had plans to go to the bank at 1, but bobo called me at 12:30 and asked if i wanted to go to Costco with her, so dawn and i ended up going there with her and jaime instead.

costco in taipei is just like costco in austin except the noodle section is way bigger here. but they still have the frozen foods and meat and giant containers of everything. our problem was that none of us thought we could eat six packages-worth of whatever we wanted. i ended up buying pesto, these pretzel things, and tazo tea that fajjy used to buy me. it is delicious. especially brambleberry. it comes with brambleberry, peach tea, black tea and green tea.

this afternoon i steamed green beans with 2 cloves of garlic and some butter and they were sooo tasty. i don't usually like green beans but they tasted just like gram or maj made them. then tonight i used the leftover green beans and leftover pork tenderloin, potatoes, carrots and onions from yesterday to make shepherd's pie. i topped it with mashed potatoes and cheese from gram and spanky and it was really, really good.

this is steve and i a minute ago. i'm glad it's cold enough for me to wear my flannel jammies again.
when i got home tonight, i had a card under my door. check out the envelope.
keith said he saw it and it was calling my name :P

i'm going to go see if leslie's banana bread is done and try to rally the troops to watch another episode of Rome. Top chef starts tonight!

itchy

See more funny videos and Music Videos at Today's Big Thing.

that video is pretty entertaining.

if you're in a video watching mood, i also highly recommend this:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GhrNjMgmrds&eurl=http://dorothysurrenders.blogspot.com/
it's the most convincing, human argument i've heard on that topic

i smell like pork tenderloin and it is lovely. i baked it with onions, potatoes and carrots and it smelled sooo good and i stood in front of the oven for a couple of minutes to get warm and it also infused me with pork tenderloin smell. it tasted pretty good but i should have let the onions get more burnt. burnt onions are a million times tastier than normal ones.

i have to get in bed soon but there was one memorable moment this morning when i went to teach jaime's class for an hour. we read 2 books that spanky sent me and played heads up seven up and musical chairs. while kids were moving around, this little girl came up to me and said 'megan, can you spell extraterrestrial? and i said yes i can. she said "do it." so i did. and then she said "you can also add an 's' to the end of that if you want."' she goes to a fancy cram school. i was impressed.
time to go to sleep before the rain stops. night!

a cat named tiger and a dog named spot

happy birthday keith!

i think i can do today in 11 words. chinese, pumpkin soup (counts as 1), potential language exchange, class, pashmina, long commute, shower, Rome.

jerry and i went to chinese and now we can say numbers up to the 100 millions. they group things in terms of 10,000 which is kind of confusing. 100,000 is actually '10 10 thousands'. but we got it after a bit. then we went to latini's to eat some delicious soup. while i was doing my chinese homework, this woman tried to ask if i could talk to her in english once a week for 2 or 3 hours. we found a time and then she said 'i'll let you think about it' instead of committing to anything, which is so asian, as dan and justin and i agreed.

the weather is still pretty chilly with all of this rain. we had been in the high 80s and now we're in the low 70s and it feels pretty chilly and damp. i bought a pretty gray variegated pashmina for $6 on the street tonight. i can hear majjy telling me that if your upper body and neck are warm, the rest of you will be warm.

tomorrow morning i'm going to speak english with jaime's class at seven forty AM so i'm hopping into bed early tonight. goodnight all.

surrending to gravity and the unknown

tiramisu is on the menu at latini's now ;) it was pretty tasty today after chinese. linda is a really good teacher. i always look forward to our class.

well it's been rainy since saturday morning and the weather has cooled down a good 10 degrees C which is really more like 15 (or something) F. i wore my favorite shirt to celebrate the cold weather. i had been saving it for this occasion. and alex, or someone, even commented that i looked especially fall-ish today. you can't really see in this picture but it has really cute ruffles on the collar and ends of the sleeves.

josh and i went to bobo's for dinner tonight. meghan's vietnamese boyfriend and his friend made vietnamese food for all of us. it was pretty good. she tried to set me up with his friend.. but he doesn't speak any english and he knows about as much chinese as i know.. so.. i don't think that will work out.
anyway joyce and jaime and i had a bunch of fun. i drew all sorts of things that joyce ordered me to draw, and we played uno. it was nice to cuddle up with both of them. i like how little kids will just sit down with you and cuddle while you're chatting or watching tv.

then i came home and made another batch of the pumpkin chocolate chip cookies. leslie made banana bread and it smelled really good in the kitchen. people were coming out of their rooms one by one to see what was going on :P everyone really liked the cookies last time so they were excited to see them again.

a bunch of us just watched the first episode of Rome. i had never heard of it, but it was pretty good. and i chatted with gram and spanky and then mom and dad so i'm all caught up and ready for bed. :)

the dizzy rooster

today at da chu was pretty funny. i went over after my 2 kindy classes this morning and i was sitting for a minute, writing my lesson plan, and mr. wang walks in, soaking wet in his rain jacket (it was raining 'cat and dog' as mr. kuo pointed out) with a take out container in hand. he sets it down in front of me and says 'italy mien' which is 'italian noodles'. i told them a while ago that i don't like taiwanese/chinese food, i like italian. so he brought me spaghetti with meat sauce :)
then mr. kuo asked if i had tried a fruit that looked like a fig to me, and he cut it open and handed me both halves and a spoon and it turns out it was passionfruit, which i looove. the seeds are connected by a little neck thingy and then you just scoop them out once you've disconnected them. so that was cool. i order lots of passionfruit drinks but i didn't know what the actual fruit looked like.
and mrs. chan gave me salted, dried 'golden orange' tea and it had a dried mandarin orange floating in it. it was super salty but i drank it anyway. and she's been giving me this really oily toast lately. i need to think of some little gift to give them for all of their kindness.

went to the rib place with alan, natalie, steve and noe tonight. ribs are so tasty every couple of months. expensive, but super worth it. noe and i split a rack. steve was super nice and drove me on his scooter even though he didn't have a rain poncho or a visor on his helmet. he was soaking wet when we got there. steve is so nice. he does a whole lot for me.

steve, noe, josh and i went to a bar down the street tonight for a change of scenery and we just got home. i took a shower and then i figured out that the texas football game is on right now. it's halftime. i'm trying pretty hard to stay awake. 3am is past my witching hour.

cozy and cold

i forgot to tell you that i brought ladyfingers to dan from latini's on saturday and he made me a little batch of tiramisu this week. he has lots of coffee stuff on his menu, but no dessert, which is a shame because i loooove tiramisu. anyway i went during the lunch rush right before i had class, and these women next to me were eyeing me as i ate it and they asked if it was on the menu and dan had to explain that it was really just for me because i requested it :P

class was fun today. all week, i've brought in colored paper and colored pencils and crayons that gram and spanky sent and we've been drawing things and labeling. today i had to teach a lesson on colors so it was especially appropriate. each kid drew a person and then colored and labeled their clothes with 'purple shirt, blue shorts, pink socks, yellow sneakers' or whatever. it was fun and it's a nice change to have them do something hands on. and it makes me feel more like myself and less like a pretend teacher.

the doorman at bobo's apartment complex calls me 'beautiful girl'. that doesn't get old. it's good to be blonde in taiwan.