September: Where's my iPod?

That brings me mostly up-to-date. September is not apt to be much better for me, work-wise, so I can't promise that I'll be much more prompt this month than I was last. (Actually, I should not have much freelance work, so my evenings will at least be more free...)

Last Wednesday, Apple announced its new iPods, which came just in time for me. I started looking for a new one about two weeks ago and quickly discovered that there weren't many left in Hong Kong. A quick check with Brad revealed that the new iPods were due to be announced soon. When I bought my current iPod in early 2005, I bought it one week before they released a new model, with more features at the same price as I had just paid, so at least I dodged that bullet this time.

But now I'm stuck waiting for the new models to make it to Hong Kong. Some of them are in, but not the one I want. I hate being the fanboy who rolls up to the Apple store every day asking if the new iPods are in yet, but the truth is, my old iPod is lurching towards death, each day getting a bit worse. I've been told the new ones will be in Monday, but I was also told they'd be in Saturday, so....

August: Mahjong

Also in August, we sort of learned how to play mahjong. Mahjong is a very popular game in Hong Kong; you can often hear tiles clacking when you walk the streets, especially on the weekends.

So one evening when we having dinner with some Chinese friends, they decided to teach us.


I can't really say that I learned how to play mahjong. It's like baseball in that while you can quickly understand the basics, there are so many complexities to the game that you'll have to play it over and over and over again before you really start to get it. I mean, I now know the basic rules to mahjong, but if I hadn't had an assistant, I never would have been able to play the game.

We did learn the Chinese character for "fat choy."

August: Singapore

Also in August, we both went to Singapore. This must have been Shelly's 20th trip there, but it was my first. Unfortunately, I was there for just over a day, so I didn't have much opportunity to see much of the city. (I had an oh-so-wonderful schedule of leaving Hong Kong at 8 pm on Wednesday and leaving Singapore at 8:15 am on Friday. It was a terrible way to visit Singapore.)

I was in Singapore for a day for an interview and a few meetings with law firms around the city. In between the meetings, I was able to see a few things, eat some Kenny Rogers chicken and some great Indian food for dinner.


It was rainy much of the day, so I spent more free time than I would have liked to in shopping malls. But I did make sure I visited Singapore's famous Raffles Hotel. I wandered briefly through the lobby and shot a few photos and then wandered back out. I'm sure the rooms are fantastic, based on the lobby and the grounds.

My meetings did give me lots of opportunity to view Singapore from tall buildings.


In the foreground is a tiny part of old Singapore, on both sides of the river. The government and courts are on the far side, and old houses -- now converted mostly to restaurants -- on the near side. Also on the far side, you'll see one of the oldest cricket grounds in Asia -- it's right up there with Hong Kong's. The flying-saucer-like building on the left is the Supreme Court building. After my afternoon meetings, I walked along the river and had dinner. Then, I went back to my room and worked, and then got up really, really early for my flight home.


In such a short visit, it's hard to really report on a city. Singapore has very clean air -- a great change from Hong Kong -- and nice, wide streets, which result in much better traffic flow than Hong Kong has. But I really do prefer old cities, and Singapore is definitely a new city, which makes Hong Kong preferable for me.

August: The Simpsons Movie

My plan was to try to back-date everything to the date it happened, but that's just too much hassle, I'm so far behind. So instead, I'll use this week to post some of what we've been up to for the past month.

One of the highlights of the past month -- for me, at least -- had to be The Simpsons Movie, which try as I might, I could not convince Shelly to see with me. My brother-in-law Jim had better luck convincing Lisa to see the movie, but Lisa was only slightly more enthusiastic about the movie than Shelly would have been.

I did convince Shelly to play around one evening and make avatars on The Simpsons Movie website.


I'm not sure I quite like the nose and mouth on mine, but my wife insists it's accurate. I managed to lose the password to her avatar, so I re-created it without her, but I think I was quite kind in re-creation.

One of us is a hottie. :-)

The Cat Who Eats with a Spork

No, not ours. But it will give Fat Choy and I something to do when Shelly's gone.

Too. Much. Writing.

My brother asked me a good question recently. I had written to him, telling him that I generally produce somewhere in the neighbourhood of 10,000 words a month for the magazine I write for. His response:

Do the 10,000 words per month have to form coherent stories? Or is it strictly a word count?

After this month, I find that to be a particularly good question, because my output this month has been not doubled, but nearly trebled. Late this afternoon I wrote my 28,374th word of the month. And by “of the month,” I really mean “of the past two weeks.” My work has consisted of four chapters of an annual legal directory we publish, four separate stories for the magazine and a massive news section for the same magazine. (I’ve produced well over half the magazine’s content this month, which is – and hopefully shall remain – an aberration.)

It’s little surprise, then, that I haven’t blogged in three weeks. When Brad complained that his RSS feeds weren’t showing new posts, I offered to send him a draft of my chapter on corporate law firms in Vietnam, which he promptly declined.

Smart boy, that Brad. The Laos chapter is much shorter.

***

My day got off to a roaring start this morning.

Shelly is in the US right now, first visiting family and then doing some work, and the cat is feeling her absence. Shelly usually wakes up sometime between 5 and 6, though lately she has been waking up even earlier.

So, at 4:30 this morning, Fat Choy decided it was time to get up. She was very persuasive with her arguments. Or maybe it was that she was very loud. Or maybe it was her repeated head-butts to my face. After finally giving in, I was up at 5 and couldn’t go back to sleep. (I don’t remember the last time I was up at 5, but it must have been to fly somewhere. It almost certainly wasn’t because I *wanted* to be.)

What this boils down to is that, after I put the dishes away, brought in the laundry, hung out more laundry, surfed the Internet, etc., etc., etc., it was 6:30. So I went to work. The No. 1 bus from Happy Valley is very empty at that time of day, which is exactly what Shelly has been telling me.

Oh, and the cat? As I was sitting at my computer at 5:15, she curled up on the sofa and went back to sleep.

***

This evening I’m in the process of updating the blog. You’ll see a couple of things back-dated to the approximate date they actually occurred. I know that mass updates aren’t really appreciated, but I’m sure there is some reason I haven’t been blogging lately.

Oh, yeah. It has something to do with those 28,374 words. Anyone want to read my chapter on Cambodia?