You may be some Arabic writer or whatever. I’m not even American, I just run my site (What’s On Xiamen) on one. It’s a personal project, I don’t get rich or make much, if anything, on it. Leave my site the fuck alone. Goddamn it.
All I can say is… holy fuck.
- went to listen to Ellen and Runar at My Living Room (The House, My Living Room… Xiamen businesses are all about confusing names)
- went for a game of pool (I was keeping Neil company, I’m not really into pool) at The Londoner
- crafted
- had dinner at Rustica (Tony’s)
- met up with Georgie and Gary at Havana (sangria and mojitos were consumed)
- moved on to The Londoner (Xiamen nightlife is so unpredictable)
- shopped a bit with the Chongs (new pair of jeans and some games)
- had dinner at a great Anhui place (and ate ang zao* duck! I’ve never eaten ang zao anything outside of home before!)
- walked home in the rain
- finished watching Red Dwarf season three
* Ang zao is a paste for stewing pork, chicken, etcetera. It’s fermented rice and something else, it’s red in colour and has a distinctive taste.
Wow. Lots to do. Craft swaps, magazine to publish, paper to write.
I’m getting a lot of spam on my Yahoo! mail account for “nude Angelina Jolie” pictures. I saw her nipple in Hackers. That’s all I needed to see, personally. It was pink. So there.
The counterfeit crochet project — this is hilarious.
Menstruation Is Fast Becoming Optional. Wow. I dunno.
I’m reading and looking at the pictures of people protesting The Da Vinci Code — really, are they completely insane?
It’s a film, based on a novel. A story. It’s not real. Maybe the conspiracy theories are real, but it is not fact. It’s a really good thriller, he wove real-world theories with his story and put it all together really well. Only a complete idiot would read this NOVEL and think it was a reference book. But maybe that’s what the Catholic church is afraid of.
My blog is worth $23,146.14.
How much is your blog worth?
According to Leapfish.com, “It has been determined based on search results that this name may be extensively valuable beyond the scope of the LeapFish.com domain analysis tool.” The domain serialdeviant.org is worth $83,544!
And, on this Business Opportunities Weblog, this here online journal-y thing is worth $23,146.14.
So, if I sold the domain, then the contents of my weblog (man, it’s gotta be a real weirdo who’d want to buy it), I would make $106,690.14. Not bad, eh. Too bad it’s all just something fun with which to entertain.
Maybe now someone I know will think it’s a brilliant idea to buy domain names and sell them on for a great profit. I don’t know who’ll tell him that idea has been done. (This is a private joke for Jane and Neil.)
- had dinner at Rustica (but everyone calls it Tony’s because it’s Tony’s)
- then had a hot chocolate at Javaromas
- met up with TuTu at The Londoner for his very belated birthday drinks
- continued making stuff for the Sweat Shoppe Swap
- had dinner at Wuyi Barbecue with the Chongs
- went for a hardcore massage (hardcore as in it hurts)
- played a little pool (man, I suck at pool)
- watched The Da Vinci Code at the cinema (in English!! I was a little disappointed with the dumbed down ending, but I loved the special effects — I want them to make Angels and Demons, that one rocks)
- did not go to the Buddha Bar thing at the Sofitel (I wouldn’t pay a cover at home to listen to music I’m not into, so I won’t here)
- ran into Jackson on the way home and he came upstairs for a cup of tea)
- had breakfast / lunch / dinner at Relax Cafe
- went for coffee at SPR (after a quick shop at Carrefour)
- went to The House to meet Kristie (then went to the wine bar with her)
When a kitten is very attached to you and just wants to be around, it can be rather entertaining. Here is the Cat Burrito™, a special preparation just for you.
We’d used this towel when we gave her her first real bath — Clairol Herbal Essences shampoo, mind you — and after the towel dried the cat quite liked lying on it. So we can get it to do pretty much anything when it’s lying on the towel. Or to do nothing, as the case may be.
Cat burrito, originally uploaded by Andrea See.
In trying to sort through, format and re-load my static archives, I’ve pinpointed the day (well, I wrote it the day after) I met Neil. Not that he’s mentioned in the post, since he was just a strange drunk Scottish bloke in a kilt at the time. (Also, what a pile of pish I wrote. No, I’m not a fan of dance music, but I LOVE Fatboy Slim. Always have.)
The wee kitten is better, I think. Our neighbour says it now poos and is starting to clean itself. I bought it some kitten food and try to spend some time cuddling it every day. Its hind legs are stronger now, but its front legs are still somewhat useless.
Hopefully it will regain use of its front legs, and we can find it a good, loving home. Anyone reading this in Xiamen and wants a beautiful, affectionate kitten?
Update: we’ve brought the kitten upstairs so it can eat and rest and recuperate in peace. Really, does anyone in Xiamen want to adopt this sweetheart?
I admit it. I have horrid eating habits. If Neil isn’t around to nag me, I would probably die of starvation sitting at my computer. Neil and I had decided to walk over to Sun Dance for me to have a bowl of soup and homemade bread late yesterday afternoon, because it was only a few hours to dinnertime and we’d made plans with friends, so I couldn’t spoil my appetite. And on the way to Sun Dance, we saw this:
It was barely moving, only meowing a little and it seemed to only be able to move its head.
(People who really know me know how much I love animals — all animals, pretty much — and how much I really love cats. I was raised to not ignore an animal in distress.)
Neil and I had agreed a long time ago that we wouldn’t have a pet while we’re in China, because of quarantine issues when we leave (quarantining pets, not ourselves). Our neighbour who runs a little shop downstairs, however, adores cats. So I lifted the kitten, which looked about two months old and there wasn’t a mother in sight, onto my hands, trying to make sure its entire body was supported, and carried it back to our apartment complex. The kitten meowed some more, but it didn’t struggle, it was completely limp.
This was the point where my lower lip should’ve started wobbling but I was too busy making sure I didn’t drop the cat.
Our cat lady friend hand fed the kitten a little fish and rice (it wouldn’t take any water or milk — a starving cat is picky?) and then we put it in a box with egg cartons as a lining, and when we got back an hour or so later, it was asleep, a little curled up even. It looked a little more normal and less at death’s door.
We’re going to head downstairs later to check on the sweet little thing, and chat to the lady about who’s going to care for it. Hopefully the kitty will survive the next few days and get strong and healthy again. If the lady can’t or won’t take in this little refugee (she already has another cat who is apparently being courted by our neighbourhood tom*), we’ll need to find a home for it.
I really hope it’s okay.
* The tom picks on the young female cats, he doesn’t go for the ones he’s loved and left before. He’s a grizzled white bear of a feline (what an image) — not very attractive, but obviously thinks he’s the shit. I guess he’s a typical male in China. Heehee.
Mullets galore! Watching St Elmo’s Fire last night was a real treat. The last time I watched the film was probably in the late 80s, and having picked up the DVD a few weeks ago, am now shocked to realise that the film is just over twenty years old. Two decades, people.
Naturally, my perspective has changed since watching the film the first time. I was a kid then, probably in primary school, blindly absorbing all this American culture without knowing I was doing it at all. All I knew was my older sister was right into these Brat Pack films and her magazines said these people were super cool, and I wanted to be cool, too. My understanding of the movie was incredibly shallow.
(Ooh! They’re smooching. How naughty. Whoa! They’re rolling around. Woo-hoo! Heeheehee.)
So it was with great anticipation that I settled down to watch St Elmo’s Fire last night, hoping for a new understanding of the film and its characters. (Sounds like pretentious pish. I was hoping that the version I saw way back when was censored like The Breakfast Club*, and watching it uncensored would clear things up for me.)
St Elmo’s Fire, according to the Billy character (Rob Lowe), is an imaginary flame / patron saint sailors used to guide them through a storm. Near the end of the film, he tells Jules (Demi Moore), that all her troubles are like St Elmo’s fire, i.e. COMPLETELY IMAGINARY. And they make that the title of the film. The angst, the emotion, the youths trying to find their way, all the while thinking they’re grown up when really they’re not, it’s all crap, it’s nonsense, it’ll vanish like smoke.
It’s kind of true, yeah. A couple of things hit me while I was watching these actors, who are all now comfortably (but not necessarily gracefully) in their 40s. One, I am now significantly older than the characters they played, and two, the age of 22 is close enough behind me that I can compare how I felt with their cinematic drama. And I can identify with it, even though my 20s were spent in the 90s (all these numbers). You’re grown up, but you aren’t at all. You should know what you want to do with your life, or at least have an inkling, but you have no idea.
Also, if you’re in your early 20s and you’re guffawing at the trials and tribulations of Kirbo, Kevin, Alec, Billy, Wendy, Jules, and Leslie, don’t. You’re just like them. I was just like them (and probably still am, at least a little). Coming of age films, these Brat Packer flicks, yeah, they’re a little silly and hokey, but they’re real (in a sense). And I love watching them. Next I need to find a copy of The Breakfast Club, The Outsiders, Pretty in Pink, etc. ad infinitum.
* In the Singapore 80s television version, they were running around in the school hallway for no reason, then got all goofy in the library. It was only after I saw my rented copy in Australia that I got to see them smoking pot. And it all made sense.
This study suggests that male and female homosexuals’ brains respond differently to sex hormones than their heterosexual peers. (Title reference to depression is a private joke.)