but another to mean it from the heart

i am so ready to go to school tomorrow. three days off is pushing the limits of free time in taoyuan. a bunch of us spent three hours at debbie's this evening, chatting and drinking coffee. it was fun to see jaime and joyce. joyce seems like she grows a few inches every time i see her. she sat with me for about 10 minutes and then she was done. maybe i can find some babies to hold in DC. (i was watching a set of new twins in austin once a week just to reach my baby holding quota).that's me and hayley. she is so big now! walking and sort of talking.

when i was leaving debbie's, i ran into a woman who moved to taoyuan a couple of months ago. turns out she's from houston. it was really nice to hear an honest-to-goodness texan accent, even though my family and i don't have it. it just felt like home. it was funny because she was at debbie's while we were and when she walked by, she set off the mom sensor in my brain. her hair and jewelry and shirt looked a lot like my mom. it made me jump.
i'm chatting with maj on her new iphone. she's sitting on the porch at the lake. fajjy sent me a picture of ripley all tired out from chasing deer, apparently. a week and a half until i see puptown!

p.s. check out the woohoo! report. it's a site with all good news. this commencement speech is the best.

"And here’s the deal: Forget that this task of planet-saving is not possible in the time required. Don’t be put off by people who know what is not possible. Do what needs to be done, and check to see if it was impossible only after you are done."

p.s. no accidents moment of the day:
during the tru blood marathon of 2009, we were talking about food that comes from the south like po' boys and ho cakes, and everyone thought ho cakes had a funny name and not many people knew what they were, and we talked about them for probably 30 minutes on and off throughout the day. then i made it the title of my blog that night. so tonight i'm watching top chef masters episode 8 and what is art smith using as the buns for his burgers in this challenge? ho cakes.
it's a small thing but it's a big thing.

AAAND i was perusing the internet tonight and in the process of following a bunch of random links ended up on this kid's site and he walked from florida to DC to raise awareness about homeless children. now he's collected all of these letters and he wants to get them to president obama. and DUUHHH i'll be in the mail room for 4 months! so i messaged him to see if i could help.

my american boy

can you believe it's the end of july already? three weeks from today, i'll be on a plane to the US! to say that i'm thrilled is an understatement. it all feels so right.
(this weekend was the first/only time ripley has been in the back of the truck. you can see the happiness. she loves to go for rides, but i think this took it to a whole new level.
speaking of puppies, one of my favorite girls, angela, is getting a new puppy tonight and she offered me one. the "mom dog" has 3.)

for nowww though, i'm trying to enjoy the last few weeks in taiwan. my body freaked when i decided to limit myself to one cup of tea a day and i've been feeling sooo thirsty that i figured to heck with it. if i spend an extra $30 in tea this month, it'll be worth it.

tonight was the first time i've had to tell a class i'm leaving them. this class isn't one of my favs and i don't think they're super crazy about me, but they were pretty shocked. i told them about my job and they thought it was preeeettty cool. two more weeks with them.

the kuo's were funny tonight. i brought 3 cups of green tea; one for me and one for each of them. when i was at the tea shop, i thought 'should i get an extra just in case amanda is there? noo, she doesn't get off until 7 so i won't see her, and mr. wang and mr. chen haven't come on a weekday in months.' so i get there and mr. kuo and mr. wang are sitting there, drunk as skunks, and mr. wang is wondering where his tea is. whoops!
mr. kuo said i could marry his son if i was interested, and mrs. chan showed me her pumpkin plants, growing by the side of their house in a big pile of broken up concrete and glass, that have sprouted thumb-sized pumpkins.

best story of all!
we had a review day in my little kid class that can't read, can't remember any QA's, can't sound out words. i reviewed 'ae', 'ee', 'oa' and 'ow' words, got them reading, and then told them to look in their little story book for words with those phonics. these kids usually don't give a hoot about phonics, but today they were screaming 'megan! deer! tree! boat! road!' and running up to me with their books, pointing at words. i really could have cried, i was so proud of them. some of them would find a word with the right letters and point to it, but they forgot that they knew how to read it now. watching the lightbulb light up over their head as they sounded it out was aaaamazing.

free and easy down the road i go

i think i've finally reached a point that i don't feel homesick at all anymore. who ever thought that the girl who cried every day for the first week would say that! i do miss hanging out at the lake and seeing the fam, but hoooopefully i'll see them in another month and get to do all of that summery stuff. the lake is probably the biggest thing. the lake and my queen sized bed with millions of pillows.
well there's one girl in my second class, coco, who i don't know what to do about. her sister is older so all of her books are already written in. lots of times, she just won't participate. today she was supposed to ask a question and she knows if she just stands there long enough, we'll tell her to sit down. last time i held up the class until she did something, she just started bawling. it's times like those that a little training would come in handy.
that class was pretty cute tonight when i told them i was going to thailand for 2 weeks. at first they were kind of disappointed, but then we decided i could ride elephants, swim in the ocean, and eat lots of thai food (which ryan says is disgusting). they said they want to see lots of pictures of elephants when i get back. 5 days!
dawn left for thailand today. she was eating a mango and she noticed some little white things and we think they were maggots. OMGGG. dena, dawn and i inspected it for about 5 minutes before we decided they were definitely worms. then dawn got sick. it was gross. i made her some tea and disposed of the partially eaten, wormy mango for her.

p.s. rattlesnake in chinese - xiang wei she

laptops don't grow on trees

"you know how pizza hut has personal pan pizza's? well taiwan gave you a personal pan earthquake." -my brother jeff

i think there was an earthquake only in my room today. i was sitting on my bed and i hear CRAAACK. at first, i didn't notice anything. but when i walked out and walked back in, i saw that half of my room had cracked in half.
you may or may not have to click on these pictures to fully appreciate the cracks.
also, things have been moving in odd ways. right now my ethernet cord is waving back and forth like a foot in either direction for no apparent reason. and earlier my door almost closed all the way and then it just slowly opened all the way again. ..i can see how that might not sound crazy to you, but you'll have to take my word for it.
i'm going to go chat with maj and jeffy on skype.

p.s. this is classic cute/confused ripley with some texas hail a few weeks ago
AND how awesome does this movie look? love norah ephron.

also.. twbf emailed me today to say..
I just say that I wanna go to lie down in the big park on friday lunch time ...I wanna to resupply more energy from sunshine and soft wind ..I have mony many things want to tell you,but I don't know how to speak to you ..

friday lunch time can you go big park with me ?

have more smile, you will get more beautiful

what could it be?

happy birthday ripley

this is ripley in her happy birthday life vest so she can swim with us at the lake.. it looks like that may not have been her birthday wish.

let in the brilliant light of morning

i have no pictures of my own today so i've interspersed pictures from some of the blogs i love as i think they capture the essence of each and why they keep me clicking day after day.

well it was a disappointing day at mr. kuo's restaurant today. mr. wang and mr. whatever were soooo drunk that they were more or less comatose with their heads on their folded arms on the table. i guess i've known for a while that they were alcoholics, but it's never gotten to that point before. it's sad that anyone chooses to waste their life like that when there are so many ways you could better serve yourself and other people.
[this is from if it's hip, it's here. today's post is about an artist, federico uribe, who makes art out of found objects, pencils and shoelaces and shoes, like this swan he made for Puma, completely out of shoes].

today lesley told us that she's leaving taiwan in the first week of march. she decided she's been here long enough and it's time to do something new. i'm bummed that all of my favorite people have moved out or will be leaving within a month. i was just starting to get to know and really enjoy lesley's company. (i know i spelled her name 'leslie' a few days ago but it's confirmed leslEY).
[david lebovitz is an american baker living in paris. he's a professional blogger and he can get a little full of himself, but he really loves baking and his recipes look good.]

classes were good today. i taught my first class how to use a dictionary. much more complicated than you would think. the whole concept of the first word, last word, alphabetical order thing was lost on them. they don't have the alphabet drilled into them in order. i had them find 10 different words and i think the majority of them fully understood it by the end, but we were touch and go for a while.
[design crisis is written by a few women from austin and it's well-written and has lots of interesting pictures and design ideas.i like that they update often. that ceiling was done by an austin design group using paint and lots and lots of tape!]

in my second class we did the QA 'what do people do on valentine's day?' their answers were 'buy/make chocolate, buy flowers, make valentines, go to a romantic restaurant, eat conversation hearts, and my coteacher's addition: sit at home and cry'.
[salt and chocolate is written by a woman who lives in california and it's about her craft and food projects. she has young kids and she does lots of creative activities with them. how easy does that cookie cutter stenciled pillow look? but who thinks of stuff like that?]

lesley and i are planning a trip to the philippines or thailand before she leaves at the end of february and i'm getting excited! it's around $200 to fly round trip to either place. should be fun.

p.s. check out the picture my mom sent of ripley sleeping on my pillow. she's slept with her head on a pillow since she was a puppy.

we wish you a merry christmas

christmas! here's what happened at tapadero drive.

the white presents before they were touched. we always start with these.


aftermath.
majjy got a new christmas tree shirt
jammies #1. jammies 2007
jammies 2.
jammies 3. and matt wearing his new guei shan jr. high shirt with guei shan elementary jacket
matt slept on that couch from 10am until 5pm today

we spent literally all day watching the 'little people, big world' marathon on TLC. a solid 6 or 8 hours of it.
jeffy in guei shan elementary uniform with school bag from my school
jeffy got a fancy guitar stand
we got these creepy masks in our stockings.
jeff wore his for most of the day. it made you shudder to look at him, it was so creepy
ripley needed a little butt skirt trim
it was hilarious.
roast beef, creamed spinach, cauliflower au gratin andd potatoes. delicioussss.

merry christmas! thank everyone for everything. hope yours was just as merry

the [day]/night before christmas

took a family trip to el lago this afternoon.
this is the view from the porch. it was such a pretty day.
ripley loves to be at the lake.

get this-- it was so hot out today that we were eating popsicles on the porch. we actually went home because it was too hot to sit out on the porch in the sun after a while.

maj hasn't taken this silly santa hat off all week.






we went to the melting pot tonight for dinner. mannn it was so tasty but now we're all grumbling in pain from being so full. we took matt's girlfriend, janette, as tradition dictates.







time for bed before santa visits. i might have one more glass of wine before bed. i have the hardest time falling asleep on christmas eve!