Finally, I'm Not Hacking Up Green Slime

I was sick for about a week and a half, up until this past weekend. Finally, my cough has subsided. I had a hard time last week, dealing with classrooms full of screaming kids, with no energy and a feverish constitution. It was incredibly hard to sleep because I was so uncomfortable. But now I feel like a million bucks again.

Because of my condition, I mostly stayed in all week, eating miso soup and kim-chi dumplings every night, finishing up the book I am reading, catching up on television shows from the states and watching Alfred Hitchcock movies from a collection I borrowed from a friend. I LOVE Alfred Hitchcock. I just recently watched "The Lady Vanishes" and was floored as usual. No one else ever made movies like him.

I went out to eat last night with a friend, to a place I had never been before, an "American Style Chinese Food" restaurant. It was delicious. I haven't been going out to eat very much because I never know how to order anything, and I never know what is in anything I am ordering. I mean, I am fairly adventurous but it gets old not knowing what you are going to be eating and paying for all the time. There are some places where I know what to get but I don't want to eat there all the time, and I'm not going to eat at Outback Steakhouse or TGIFridays, or any of the other American chains here. I would just feel so cheesy. Plus I save much more money eating at home. But the Chinese food last night was great. We ordered stuff like Kung Pao and Cashew chicken, saddled with monstrous bottles of Tsingtao. It was a nice sunday night out.

I am kind of enjoying being reclusive lately. Especially after having spent the majority of the past several years being fairly involved in always being around a crew of friends and partying and always being out somewhere. Nowadays, I am perfectly fine staying home and reading every night, seeing no one else for twelve hours until work the next day. The past several years were so chaotic and filled to the brim with experiences and different people and crazy situations that it is very nice to just sit and listen to all Celtic radio online and doing hatha yoga on the floor. Plus, I am living by myself for the first time since 2004, which is SOOO NICE. I am basking in it.

The weather is really great now. Its usually about 65 degrees and usually sunny. It still smells like sewage and rotting eggs half the time when walking the streets, but I'm getting used to that. On Friday night I was about to cross a street and was standing over a grate, and this powerful torrent of rotten egg and sewage smelling air rushed upwards, enveloping me, and I almost puked and fell over. It even made my soul feel dirty.

Well, its time to put my pants on and get ready for work. I've got a three day weekend next weekend and I think I'm going to go out to the country and visit some temples, maybe stay at one or two of them. I think they let you stay if you promise to wash the dishes for a couple days or whatever. It sounds like a good idea right now.

Happy Trails!