Snake

For Christmas my brother and sister-in-law got me a Wacom Bamboo drawing tablet. I went to a how-to-draw cartoons site and found this snake. So I drew it. I think I did okay considering I hardly know how to draw.

Expanding the ol' horizons

I was in Chapters this evening, thinking about how great magazines are. There are so many! It seems like there's one per interest, no matter how obscure. I reckoned that reading them might give great insight into different types of humans. They might help me expand my horizons.

So my plan is to read one magazine in a new subject area each week or two. I'm starting with 'Horse & Rider' and moving on to 'Heritage Railway' afterwards.

Yes, soon I'll be able to shoot the bull with horse enthusiasts, but that's not all. This reading plan will hopefully lead to new hobbies and interests. One day I hope to find it hard to find time to blog. I'll be too busy being enthusiastic about steam trains or another fine topic.

Photograph of horses by Trevor Lowe (http://www.flickr.com/people/72659237@N00/).

Cupcake

Yesterday I purchased an iPhone at the ol' mall. I went into the store with a status level of 20/100 and when I got out, I was up to 80/100. Girls started noticing me. Guys started walking around me instead of doing that thing where they slam you with their shoulder when passing. It felt great.

People aged 50+ kept treating me the same, however, so I went to Zellers and bought some long johns. I'm wearing them right now for the first time and once I step outside I think the 50+ contingent will treat me with respect.

That cupcake was the first picture I took with my phone. It was delicious.

segment

There's a new segment in this blog called: That's technology!

That's technology!

A guy at work showed me his camera a couple of weeks ago. Here's how it works: you point it at someone, it detects where the person's face is and puts a square around it, you click the button to take the shot, and the camera waits for the person to smile before it takes the shot. That's technology!

Regular blog again

This guy really knows how to make it happen: this one

To the left there's a view from my apartment window. That can't be good for the ol' lungs. There have been worse days than that for smog, but there have been a lot of ones better than that too.

hot toddy

H. Workman is playing the Jack Singer in March. Sign me up, but I'm kind of disappointed that the Mount Royal and UofC concerts are over. You could get up close and personal. Also, the new song on his website isn't doing it for me.

I'm trying to get rid of my cold by taxing my liver. It's worked before.

My brother was here in Beijing for the last week. It was action packed. We walked so much that our dogs were constantly barking, we saw a fantastic wall, we ate duck. He got me into paying more attention to Chinese characters, and it's helped a lot. I know three characters so far.

L-dopa

Here comes the science

I'm increasing the level of dopamine (the gunk that gives you pleasure and motivates you) in my brain right now by having a bottle of fine Belgian beer called Duvel. It's kind of gross because it has 8.5% alcohol. After doing some research I've decided that my brain doesn't create or pick up enough dopamine, so I compensate by eating too much or by drinking DC, which is a source of phenylalanine (which either turns into dopamine or causes more to be released or something).

Obese people have fewer dopamine receptors. That might be why they overeat -- to make up for it, since eating will give you some dopa-pleasure. Exercise can also increase the amount of dopamine released and/or the number of receptors.

I guess what this all amounts to is that a) you should exercise if you're fat and b) alcohol is a pleasurable thing to drink.

Here comes the ladybar

Last weekend a couple of coworkers and I decided to check out one of the bar districts of the 'jing, and I don't know where we went wrong but it was a bad scene. We wanted some action, but it was mainly quiet bars with people listening to bad singers playing guitar. So after a while we thought we'd cave in and head to a ladybar.

We didn't know what a ladybar is. The bars hire girls to follow guys around and lead them in, so we let them lead us down a dark street and into one.

I assumed it would be a strip club, and even though I find them kind of yucky and uncomfortable, I figured it would at least be something interesting to do. I was wrong. The first thing you do after sitting down is choose from a line of ladies. I kind of wanted to get out, but the two other guys chose their ladies and so I did too.

This story kind of gets boring from here on out -- you know me, it's not going to go anywhere naughty. The ladies sat up against us, we had reasonably-priced beer, we were forced to buy the ladies unreasonably-priced drinks (which smelled very unalcoholic), and there was a big communication gap. I treated my lady to all the Chinese that I know ("I like to read!" and other useful phrases) and she treated me to all the Chinese that she knows, which is a lot.

Hi.

Ginger beef

I don't know how they block sites, but there's a way around it. I haven't tried it yet. And, if the gov't is reading: I WILL NEVER TRY IT.

This Chinese version of blogger won't let me upload pictures. I'll have to link to one:

bugs

I saw those bugs for sale at a food market on Saturday night. There were a hundred stalls of food. I'm pretty lucky I didn't become a Yes Man when I got to China, because the guy I was with suggested that he'd eat a scorpion if I ate a cricket. Then again... that's a good trade-off. What was I thinking? Poor little baby can't handle a little cricket in trade for watching a coworker eat a scorpion?

Anyway, I really like it here. Good place.