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i know you’re watching

Stretched tight.

Mmmm hmmm internet.

I smell it on the horizon… wafting over from afar in scented waves.  Slightly coastal, faintly deep-fried, with a dash of burning rope and a hint of recent thunderstorms.  It’s vacation in Florida, and the smell is just the precursor to the faint strains of fiddle music, slow drawl and electric guitar that’ll begin to wend their way around my head as we fly 40,000ft over Birmingham and begin our final descent.

Monday when I got back to work after a week overseas, I went downstairs to the Starbucks for my morning coffee and was ecstatic to see they are already brewing Christmas Blend.  Man I love me some Starbucks Christmas Blend.  Maybe it has something to do with the fact that, at work, the Starbucks is free… at least for the brewed, non-fancy, stuff; but I’m down there before 8am for the first mug and back around 3pm for an afternoon refresh (not “refresh” in the sense that it takes me from 8am to 3pm to drink my morning’s cup… however).  Sometimes I think about how good I have it at work… that place, despite being my prison, is aaaallll-right sometimes.

Switching gears.

A good buddy of mine recently uprooted his family and moved to Taiwan.  Unwilling, however, to give up American TV (presumably because it’s just so good) he instead bought a neat little modern-age wonder-device called a Slingbox that allows him to transmit a TV feed from anywhere in the world to anywhere else in the world.  So long as you’ve got TV service wherever the Slingbox lives, you’ve got that same TV service wherever you may roam.  In this case, the Slingbox was installed at our place.  It’s in the closet, it has a dedicated HD DVR receiver and my buddy graciously supplements my cable bill to cover the costs (as well as sponsoring me to the highest speed boadband package to assure the bandwidth required for high-definition streaming is available).

When the Slingbox is active, meaning my buddy and/or his wife are halfway across the world watching TV from the receiver in our closet, there’s a little upside-down U-shaped series of LEDs that pulses, chasing one another from end to end.  Sometimes, early morning here, I’ll walk by the open closet while it’s still dark and I’ll be able to see that light pulsing on the shelf, casting a flickering red light a small ways out into the hallway.  Every once in a while it pulls me in and I’ll stand there watching the thing pulse for a few seconds, knowing.  Watching the LEDs snake their way around that U-shape sometimes feels like second-degree voyeurism or something.  Somewhere, thousands of miles away, someone is watching TV that’s originating from my closet.  At that exact moment.

I know you’re watching… you can’t hide.

Goodnight.

Posted on

so i think i might puke

It's zen.

Hold on.  Slow down.  Let’s take a breath and blog.

Our schedule this week is about to give me a nervous breakdown, y’all.  Tonight Sharaun dragged me to the So You Think You Can Dance live show.  Let me tell you, that’s four hours of my life (counting transit to and from) that I’ll never get back.  Tomorrow I’ve got Keaton as Sharaun’s at volleyball.  Wednesday night we’re doing a pre-Thanksgiving Thanksgiving-style meal with a big group of friends from church.   Thursday night we’re doing a pre-Thanksgiving Thanksgiving-style meal with a big group of friends from not-church.  Friday night we’ll have to pack for the sunrise flight to Florida the next day.

Oh, and the flooring guys will be here tearing the place up the whole time.

Meanwhile, I think we’ve found the only possible solution to the Thanksgiving flight problem I mentioned yesterday.  Well, not truly a solution, as we still haven’t managed to change our flights – the costs are just too high to do so.  But we are able to do same-day standby for free on a slightly earlier itinerary.  It’s by no means a guarantee, but it’s about the best we can ask for without auctioning off the farm.  We need three seats on each leg, and right now there are nine left.  So… maybe it’s more like an outside chance… but it’s what we have.  Here’s hoping.

Goodnight.

Posted on

better late than never

Late is better than just writing.

Back from the other side of the Earth (if this side is your side, leastways), and not long here before we have to hit the road again this weekend for the Thanksgiving week in Florida.

Yeah, our trip to Florida. Turns out there as some fairly major complications with our itinerary. Apparently, the communication wires got crossed and Sharaun’s family thought we were set to arrive on Friday, whereas we’ve always been scheduled to come in Saturday. Unfortunately, with them thinking we’d be there a day earlier, her brother and newly-wed sister-in-law had scheduled a fancy late reception bash for their wedding earlier this year – inviting all the family and basically scheduling it around our visit home. Thing is, they scheduled it for Saturday evening at 6pm and our flight doesn’t get in until Saturday evening at 6pm. Since the airport is about an hour from where the party will be going down, this means that, even if we can find a ride (all the family will be at the reception), we’ll be at least an hour and a half late. Sigh…

This news really has Sharaun bummed. Like… really, really bummed. I can understand why, I mean the whole crew thinks we’ll be there and now we won’t. It was only Saturday night that the issue dawned on us, reviewing arrival times and dates. I did my best to look for a way out, or around, the problem. We called the airline but our tickets aren’t “full fare” (when you pay two grand to go anywhere in the continental US, I’d argue that should, by default, be considered “full fare”) and are completely not refundable or transferable. Just for the luxury of changing them we’d be socked with a $450 charge, not to mention any difference in fare to the new tickets – and, of course, everything available for Thanksgiving week at this point is more than dear. We looked for other flights we could take and just “skip out” on the outbound part of our round trip, but the airline assured us they’d cancel us out of the return trip if we tried.

So, after all the trying, it looks like we’re stuck. I mean, maybe we’ll be able to get there late… and maybe folks’ll still be around… and maybe it won’t be that bad… but I know it’s really under Sharaun’s skin and I don’t blame her. Stupid airlines really are stacked against the consumer, in my opinion. And after all the dough I’ve poured into them going home and elsewhere around the globe. Better late than never, in the end though.

And, maybe not quite on par with Sharaun’s frustration about the reception mixup is my own frustration over our spotty time at home since Mexico. I mean, not that I can really complain, since the time has been (and will continue to be) broken up by all sorts of fun things – but having onesy-twosey days at home here and there between travels is really detrimental to “getting things done.” Just not enough time to finish fixing the things I need to fix… and it frustrates me to continually come home to undone work. Again, no room to complain in honesty… but it’s been busy enough lately that it’s just gotten to me. Just too much unfinished. Even this week before we leave, every night is booked with something or other and any time I could’ve used to tool around the house is already pre-assigned to something else. So it goes.

OK, enough whining. I’ll have to save the cheer for another entry though, ’cause I’m done for tonight. Until tomorrow, love ya.

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the sleepless workdrink blur

Loosey Goosey.

Last full day in Taiwan dawned rainy and gray again.

I set the alarm for 6am, which turned out to be about an hour earlier than I really needed to roust and ready myself.  For some reason though, instead of going back to bed I grabbed my book and read for a while in Pat’s living room.  I should have gone back to bed; the previous night’s soirée didn’t wrap up with me on the doorstep until fairly late.  OK… not Taiwan-late, by any means, but US-late for sure.  Anyway, sleep is rare commodity in Asia… I’ll take what I can get.

The driver comes by the apartment tomorrow ’round 8am to take me to the airport.  The thing about doing the Asia-to-America route is that you effectively go back in time over the course of the seemingly infinitely-long air trip.  Not this time for me, as United took away the direct Taipei-to-San Francisco flight and you have to make a stopover in Tokyo.  It’s OK; I know the terminal there and there’s a place that has some good curry noodles with this spicy pork.  The wireless elusive, but there’s a payphone I can call Sharaun from and the chairs are three-long before a divider bar so you can do a full kicked-back relax mode.

When I called Sharaun on the walk to work this morning, she let Keaton answer the phone with a huge, “Hi Daddy!!”  Oh, such a heartwarming phrase!  Almost brings a tear to the eye when you hear it!  My conversation was mostly with her instead of Sharaun, which was fine by me by far.  She was watching Dora, and wondered what I was doing (“Walking to work in the rain,” I said).  She was also excited that I’d be home soon (although my feeling of “soon” when applied to leaving is a little skewed compared to their feeling of “soon” when applied to my arrival), and told me she’d come with Mommy to get me at the airport.  Nonetheless, it was good to talk to both of them.

I know I have three paragraphs here and precious little actually said, at least that I’ve not said already this week, but I think I’m satisfied.

Talk to you next week back in the good old US-of-A.  Goodnight.

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cisterns, stanchions, & meade

Rivulets.Hey there…  guess what?  I actually had some time today to both do work and write a little bit.  Meetings at work were productive again, just didn’t last all day.  It’s better that way.

Let’s write some blog.

Sitting now in Henry’s Bar, Taipei Taiwan.  Haven’t been here in years but the place hasn’t changed a lick.  Even the same people working here.  It was a cloudy sometimes-rainy day today, but the weather stayed cool enough that walking around outside on the way to and from lunch (which, by the by, was delicious) was pleasant.  Walking around Taipei offers one something of the same kind of “big city” feel that traipsing around Manhattan would – the people, the traffic, the buildings looming on every side – it’s a very metropolitan experience and I enjoy it; makes me feel “grown up” and full of business (nod to Pat’s similar thoughts here).

Over the past few months Sharaun and I have done a fair bit of solo traveling. Her to Florida a couple times for a friend’s wedding, me to Oregon, China, and Taiwan. During these times apart we’ve sort of developed a habit of sending each other pictures via cellphone – well, the one at home with Keaton sends pictures to the traveler, at least. Overseas this week, I’ve really enjoyed getting pictures of Sharaun and Keaton from back home. And, even though they make a bit more pointed my missing my family, I find myself going back and looking at them on my phone at various points during the day. In fact, this week’s volley from Sharaun was good enough that I wanted to share. Here, then, are the pictures Sharaun and Keaton sent along to make my time away feel not so far way. Enjoy.

[nggallery id=35]

Well that’s about it for today methinks.  Not much more time, not much more I haven’t already mentioned.

Goodnight.

Posted on

CEO of the ROC

Resurrected.

Ni hao internet.

Somehow it feels like I’ve been over here for more than a week already.  Touched down in Taipei yesterday evening after the short two hour direct flight from Shanghai.  The direct flight is relatively new, whereas previously you’d have to stop in Hong Kong.  “One country, two systems,” or somesuch.  Here in the ROC, I’m staying at Pat & Cynthia’s place.  It’s brand new, plush, more than comfortably sized and quite well-appointed.  Found my way back to the place alone last night when they turned in for the night about an hour earlier than I did; wandering the once-familiar streets of Taipei again.

The week’s activities are a tad less work-centric than the time in Shanghai – at least I hope so.  Meetings blocking out the mornings today and tomorrow (which is like yesterday and today, or something, for the US readers… it’s confusing),  but the afternoons and evenings are fairly open.  Rough plans have been sketched out: karaoke; shopping for some cheap computer hardware (need a webcam to Skype with family back in Florida – Keaton wants to video-chat with her cousin Hobson); many dinners and lunches consisting of delicious foodstuffs.  Y’know, the standard Taiwan stuff.

This morning on the walk to work we stopped at a little roadside eatery for a “local breakfast.”  Having come from the $30 hotel buffet in Shanghai, the sub-100NT tab was quite a difference.  And the food was, arguably, better than the Shanghai Hilton fare.  I like all the walking in this city… and I’ve written about it somewhere before (I’ll just link to the blog’s entire “Taiwan” category here, rather than try to find the exact entries).  This morning the weather was particularly mild, bright, and clear (even moreso compared to the dingy particulate-laden Shanghai ozone) and, being the first one awake in the house, I stepped out onto Pat and Cynthia’s little patio and just street-gazed for a while.

Goodnight folks.  Until the next day in Asia.  Love you.

Posted on

busy streets & busy days

Hack hack hack

Hi from the other side of the Earth, internet.  I miss my family.  Sharaun e-mails me pictures and it makes me miss them more.

Shanghai is pretty much like I remember it.  Even though it’s been quite a while since I’ve been here, it looks roughly the same – although the seemingly never-ending construction and population influx means things look even more crowded and dense, if possible.  I swear it seems like this city sprawls as much as it crowds, both growing outward and becoming thicker inside.  The streets teem with people; people walking, riding bikes, scooters, cars, trucks, buses – all of it a quivering ball of loosely organized chaos.  The people are as hospitable as ever, and the food is always delicious.

On the plane over I started feeling some sinus & respiratory discomfort – as I often do when flying, the tight space and recycled air, perhaps – but it’s gotten worse since being here and is annoying.  I have a sporadic cough and my nose is stuffed up.  Nothing major, no fever or anything, more like allergies or a reaction to the rough air and tight spaces.  Makes for a scratchy voice and sniffles though, and the occasional swimming head.  A guy at the hotel had some generic Wal Mart cold medicine he carried over from the states, so I popped one of those this morning in hopes the decongestant component will offer a little relief later today.  Either way, I’ll maintain.

I took some iPhone pictures throughout the first couple days (funny how, the more often you’ve been somewhere, you tend to be less and less picture crazy).  They’re not the highest quality images, but I had some time this morning so I uploaded a few for your enjoyment.  Check them out below:

[nggallery id=34]

Tomorrow I’ll work a half-day and then take the short flight to Taiwan to finish out the week there.  I canceled the hotel and will be staying with friends while in town, so am excited to spend some time at their new place and bumming around the city with them.

And there’s been work too.  In fact, the work I’ve ended up doing has proven really valuable to me.  Likely this tells me that I should get out here more often.  I’ve been cloistered in a room with the same five other managers now for going on sixteen hours but the output from our sessions makes me proud.  I guess sometimes there’s no real substitute for locking yourselves up and hammering on problems until you end up with a solution.

In summary, then: China is busy; went shopping and ate crazy Asian food; worked hard.

Goodnight.