toolings

I used to have a thing against the French. I remember realizing one day that I had visited France more than any other country and being completely horrified. I no longer have a huge problem with France, but I did get a similar appalling feeling the other day when it occurred to me that I have now lived in China longer than any other country. Except America of course.

A couple years ago I had a family holiday in upstate New York. It was at one of those resort-type places where there is a set schedule of activities, like in Dirty Dancing. Anyway, it was as exciting as family vacations can be. All I really remember from it was some game involving a racquet and net that wasn't ping-pong or tennis and I didn't play it anyway b/c I had too much of an attitude, some misunderstanding concerning a massage, expensive phone calls, and a lot of scrabble. Oh, and apparently toolings is a word.

Anyway, I relive that vacation every day. I play a version of scrabble with my Korean kids. We wrote a bunch of letters on pieces of paper. Only they get to choose 20 letters each, and everyone can see each other's pieces, and you can swap letters with other people. Which should make this the easiest game in the world, but some problems still arise. I try to keep it challenging by only taking 10 letters for myself and not swapping. So I end up with a lot of Zs, Qs, and Xes. Also I have to pick specific letters to make a word from to keep the game spreading and prevent it from bunching in one corner. And the word has to be long and easy enough (so toolings is out of the question.) But it's all right. They seem to like it. I'm personally never going to play scrabble again, but that's just what I got out of it.

I went to this really cool bar last night. You need to know a secret combination to get in the door, and once inside it's fucking amazing. I was drinking from test tubes all night. I woke up this morning a bit hung over, which isn't unusual. If I didn't work with children I'd be drunk all the time. Anyway, I put on my sunglasses and headphones as I do every day. I walked outside and felt a bit off only to realize it was raining. When you live in your own little world you forget about the outside.