圣诞快乐 To All, And To All A Good Night!

I was scheduled to teach today - Christmas Eve - because in China, they've got a word for Christmas:

Thursday.
(Note: Their actual word for Christmas is 圣诞节 [shengdanjie])

My 3 Freshmen writing classes arrived, as usual, ready to buckle down and - in the vernacular of my little sister - "Do Work." But, being as it was the last class of the semester, and I was in the holiday spirit (read: lazy, tired, at-wits'-end), I opted to show them a movie... don't worry, kids, we've already reviewed extensively for the final.

Alas, I've misplaced my copy of The Muppet Christmas Carol - and so was forced to revert to an alternate choice. Out of both respect for my (few) male students' pride, as well as my own, my other Christmas-y movie: Love Actually, was completely out of the question. What, then, would foot the bill....?

I'd read last night that the Chinese government was preparing a pair of its Destroyer battleships (A-12, Hit!) to set sail for the Gulf of Aden, and join the ever-expanding international task force amassing there to "Do Glorious Battle" with the Somalian pirates lurking there. With this in mind, I opted for the clear choice:

Pirates of the Caribbean, of course! What could be better than a movie glorifying piracy for a country preparing to combat foreign piracy while acting as a shelter for, arguably, the largest source of information and technological piracy in the world?? Even after 5 months here, the irony is still not lost on me...

* * *

Nancy's officially gone. Blah. And yes, it sucks. She flew out for New York at the ass-crack of dawn on Tuesday, and I've yet to hear from her.... of course, the enormous flight time and time differential, coupled with communication difficulties (damn the SIM cards), it's not surprising. Just depressing.

I'm making my pell-mell plans for the holiday now. There's the possibility I could hitch up with Aaron - though his plans seem fairly... unformed, as well, which is discouraging. Nancy tried to pawn me off on some of our mutual friends with travel plans. One couple in particular is planning on going to Thailand (which I've always thought of as a place to go if you were single), and she was tell my sob-story to them before I cut in and said "no thanks." They were willing to let me come with them.... but I don't think anyone would begrudge me not wanting to me the awkward, last minute, quasi-unwanted third-wheel on anyone's travel arangements. In all likelyhood, I'll get up to Hangzhou, and perhaps Shanghai and/or Nanjing. None of that sounds particularly appealing, though... go figure.

The night before she left, Nancy and I went to the Taj Mahal retaurant a few blocks away and had a semi-impromptu early Christmas. She had bought me a bottle of nice cologne, and an enormous stuffed bear ("to take her place while she was gone"). I brought along a 2 page letter from me, and a pair of small stuffed monkeys I found at a toy shop. One monkey for me, and one for her in NYC. She liked it :)

And yes, the bear is very cuddly to sleep next to. Doesn't generate near the body heat, though... so I'm afraid it'll have to be a short-term affair.

(CS)WC Out.

Everybody knows it sucks to grow up