Autumn Tactics

This installments "Theme song"

Is "Autumn tactics" by Chicane

So many of you have noticed that I haven't been blogging weekly anymore.

Mostly I don't want to bore you to death with my mundane stories.  Otherwise, its been going fast.

The strange thing is, its the first of September, and the start of Autumn is here.  Leaves are falling, its upper 60s at night and  pleasantly cool and dry!

My weekends have been busier recently,  the expat guy that I bought the furniture from, Jason, has pulled me into his circle.  I have met many other expats through him, and have started to meet lots more people.  Otherwise, its just been normal, trips to Metro, grocery shopping, etc.  I went out for Italian last Saturday night, and then caught some of the A&M/Rice game, and Sunday after church, went with a large group to a northwestern Chinese place in Marina center, (also an upscale shopping place).

Last week, my clothes dryer came in!  Most people in China dont use clothes dryers, but if those of you have dried towels in the sun, you can appreciate what it feels like to use 400 grit sandpaper to dry yourself with.  I was able to get one for a great price and I'm so happy to have soft towels, sheets and socks.  The things we take for granted.

I also finally passed my driving exam!  You need 90% or higher to get it, and I had to take it three times.  Mostly because of 'lost in translation" and strange chinese driving laws.  For example, in China, when a car is rolling out of control on a hill, you must put your seat all the way back, unbuckle and get on the floorboard and hug the steering column....Or Jump out of the car if you know its going to flip over.  My favorite is for the driver to crouch into the  fetal position and holding your knees, and turning to the side in the event of a head on collision.

Work has been crazy, but its starting to slow down.  I've attached a photo of what we build in case you were curious.  The office is kind of sparse, so I've purchased some carpets and stuff to quell the echo and warm the office up some. Taobao has been great for finding these things on a budget/or at a very reasonable price.

Kody is doing good, enjoying the cooler weather and enjoying our three walks a day.  I've been buying his dog food online on Taobao, which has been great for getting stuff.  Amazon and Ebay rolled into one. 

I guess the big news is, my sister and her family are planning on coming to China over thanksgiving!  I'm very excited to hear this, and have started to find ways to get things I need to make a traditional turkey day.  This holiday will be a tough one, as its my first Thanksgiving ever, away from my Moms wonderful Thanksgiving party.

I'm looking forward to coming back over Christmas.  The worst part of being here is being away from all my friends.

Thats all I have to report.  I hope you guys are all well.

Much peace and love!

Just figured I'd send my weekly update of being in China.

So, most of you guys know that I got Kody out of customs last week. That was a huge relief in itself!  The first few days, I couldn't get more than 5' away from Kody.  He stayed very close to me.  He's better now, and enjoying the wood floors (they stay nice and cool).  High rise life doesn't really seem to affect him that much, He's been sleeping on the couch or the carpeted front door mat when I get home.

The house is coming together nicely.  The AC in the bedroom was repaired on Tuesday, so now its nice and cool when I sleep at night.  I hired an A-yi (auntie) to clean the House every saturday.  Until I get to know her more, I'm only having her come around when I'm home.  Really theres not much of a mess thats made, other than the Kody fur on the wood floors.  I'm keeping my eyes peeled for any expats moving home, so I can snag a deal on their furniture.  The rental property furniture isnt exactly of the best quality.

Work is going ok, though there's lots of stuff to get cleaned up, folks that were supposed to be assigned here were living in other cities and coming in every 4-6 weeks, and that wasn't really cutting it.    I'm starting to meet more of the staff and see how things operate.  Not always the most efficient or the best way to do it, but the wheels of progress grind slowly.

I have found most of the Target/Walmart type stores already close by, and the Farmer's Market, which is pretty much walking distance from my place.  I did actually go visit the Wal Mart on Saturday, and its pretty much  like the Walmart in the US.  Meager quality stuff at meager prices.  I have been on the hunt for a toilet mat.  Nobodys heard of one here. Afterwards, I went and had my car hand washed, Vacuumed and new wiper blades installed.  The cost? 55 rmb (less than 10 dollars).  The Farmers Market is the place to go for the meats, and fresh fruits and veggies.  I really enjoyed it, its very much like the Farmers mkt in houston where each stand is operated by a different owner. 

This past Sunday, I went with a co-worker into downtown to attend the Qingdao International Christian Fellowship.  This is a church service thats non-denominational and allows anyone that holds a foreign passport.  The service was ok, but we were late, so we missed some of the beginning.  I will return next week to check it out again.  Afterwards, we went to HiSense shopping center (which is like the Galleria).  This was high fashion, and upscale.  They had a Swaorvski crystal store, all the expensive boutique clothing stores, that you find in the high rent districts.   Wouldn't you know it? They had a toilet mat here.  I paid...40 dollars for it, but its the nicest toilet mat you've ever seen.  I'll pick one up for the other bathroom when I'm in Houston at Christmas time! This center is 4 stories tall, the basement is a food court and grocery store.The grocery store pretty much has everything that you would find in a typical Chinese grocery store, with the exception that its more like a supermarket, air conditioned, well lit, and clean.  On top of that, they have LOTS of expat products.  Cheese, Cake mix, tomato sauce, breads, jell-o etc.  Anything that you may need, they probably have.  You may pay 4X the cost for it (Betty Crocker cake mix was 5 dollars), but when you're 8000 miles away, you'll probably be willing to pay for it.

Sunday evening, I had some co-workers over for dinner.  I made Spaghetti, sauce from scratch.  The house still smells wonderful from all of it!

Thats all I really have to report.  I'm keeping myself sane by downloading TV shows from Itunes.  Right now I'm working through Arrested Development, COPS (2012 season), The office (season 2), and CHiPs ( the motorcycle cop show from the 70s).  I found a gym close to my house, walking distance actually.  They have spin every night, and are pretty nicely outfitted.  The cost is a little higher than I expected, but I must factor in how close to my home that it is.

Checking in...

Well it's been a while hasn't it? I guess I'll dust the cobwebs off the old blog and say something.

The first day of summer is here and is in full effect. And boy is it hot outside.

Well, whats been going on since I last posted?

Hmm, well, lots of stuff really.

I have had some major changes and events occur.

My grandfather passed away.
I thought about moving closer into town next to some friends from church but ended up staying.
My new Taurus SHO came in.
I installed slate tile into my bathroom myself.
I had a "God in my face" moment.

Most of my friends know that I'm still pretty 'young' in my spiritual journey. I'm not a perfect Christian, nor do I have all the answers.

A few months back I had a "God in my face" experience. Too many times, little things happen, and we attribute them to coincidences or something unremarkable enough to not even give a second thought to why they happen. This event was one that I would have never imagined would happen in a million years. And it was really an experience to show me that God is in my life. He is around, and he does things on his timetable. Not anyone else's.

My good friend Gary, once said to me, "If you want to hear God laugh, tell him your plans for the day." This has rang true many times in my life.

So now, where do I go from here? I don't really know.

Life in the past three months has been a series of events of ups and downs. And all of this, is part of Gods plan for me. Sometimes I wish I could see the schedule, or have a peek at the plans, but I know, or at least hope, that in due time, it will be revealed to me.

The end result will be an awesome thing, so I just need to have faith that God will show me when he's ready to.

Journaling has been helpful, but I know in the end I need to spend more time praying and asking God to show me his will.

Adios amigos!

New Years resolutions

Okay so its been a while since I updated my blog and I have been meaning to but really have had nothing to blog about.

Well, for those of you who keep up with me, many know that I had a buddy move in earlier this year, he rented a room in the house and kept his dog in the back yard. Well, I got along with "Tom" just fine, but his dog, who is a 1 year old 100 lb bloodhound, was a different story. Totally unsocialized and crazy. I didn't want that dog coming inside, so a pen was built in the back yard, which the dog promptly dug up and destroyed the grass. I turned the other cheek, since Tom was indeed paying rent. I told Tom that the dog could come in during inclement weather (really cold, rainstorm etc) as long as he was given a bath first. Tom has quite a social schedule and was never really home in the evenings. So the dog stayed in his pen for probably 23 hours a day. On the nights Tom came home late, he would toss dog food out the back door and go to bed.

Now, where am I going with this? Well, last weekend, Tom moved out on Sunday, mysteriously. No Goodbye, no GFY, no see you later. Just gone. I got home and went and looked out the back porch, and the 'dog pen'/mud hole was missing all the cattle panel fencing. The T-Posts were still there (thanks Jackass), and the wood was still there. Missing was the dog house, and rubber mat and his BBQ Pit. This is strange, I went to his bedroom. Everything that was his was missing. Then into the bathroom. Totally cleaned out. I called three times, no answer from him.

Immediately, I started thinking "What did I do?" but I caught myself. I made phone calls to friends from church, and in my support network. They all had the same answer. "Its not you. Its about Tom. You did nothing, This is all about him." So after calming down about the situation, I went to bed, and the next day, arrived at the office to find a "Dear John" letter in my email. Basically stating that he wanted to move out because It wasnt fair to me because I didnt want the dog inside, and wasnt fair to the dog because he was in the mud. Well, Good luck with that buddy. So I know, this was Toms way of avoiding any kind of confrontation or situation that would have arisen. Personally I couldn't see the situation getting out of control, but who knows.

So, I talked to a good friend that night, who usually calls me out on my thinking patterns/errors. I was really upset and agitated at him because I told him that I planned on "letting go" of the situation. He pointed out to me (much to my chagrin), that I way too often let people take advantage of me. And I was thinking to myself, "What the hell is this guy talking about? I dont let people take advantage of me!" Well, less than 24 hours later, this statement would fufill itself.

To be continued.....

Fall is in the air

Well Fall is starting to peek its way in. For the first time in many years, I feel like I haven't 'dipped' into my annual funk that I usually get into when we get the first cold snap.

This time of year marks an odd point in my life, once a year. The same time that I was laid off from the first job out of school, and my spiritual journey and finding out who I really was. Don't get me wrong, we never went to church as kids, not because we didn't believe in God, my parents just never went. When I got to A&M, I started attending church with friends, and I felt so much more complete, a good 'balance' if you will.

It wasn't until late 2001 when I really started feeling something else, something that I hadn't experienced, maybe ever. And in the most turbulent chapters of my life, serenity.

Last week, our pastor had an excellent talk about 'waking up' and God being there, finding him there with arms wide open, and for me, it was a very moving talk.

You can listen to it here.... Check out the 10/10/2009 talk.

So today, as I write this post, I look back at my life today, all my friends, all my family, my church family, and life in general, I have to smile. Sometimes its so easily to be discouraged. In my 30s, thirty lbs overweight, single, working a job that tests me every day, and walking this journey, but I'm not alone. He is there. Thats one thing I know I don't do enough, I don't trust in God, and know that he has great plans for me. I perpetually try to drive the bus, and I know I just need to sit back and let God drive.

Sorry for the 'heavy' post, just had to get that out there. To end in the words of singer Gary Allan, "Life ain't always beautiful, but it's a beautiful ride."

Life on Autopilot

Ever feel like you're on autopilot? I realized for the past few weeks, that everything has been really going well.

I'm trying to maintain a "conscious contact" with God throughout the day, giving stuff to him that I can't handle. Its working well for me. I'm much happier at work (even happier when I leave), and everything is copasetic. This week, I just feel like everything is the same over and over. Go to work, go home, go to mens group, go to church, work on cars, etc. I look back at this month, and I've done LOTS of stuff. Had Dim Sum with friends, worked in the yard, harvested watermelons from my garden, went and visited friends I haven't seen in forever, helped at church, saw my grandpa. The list goes on. Maybe next week will be better eh?

I have lots of friends that I talk to now and then, but a lot of them are married and have families now, and can't hang out anymore. I do have a few handful of married friends who are allowed to get away for a while and go hang out and do stuff with, but its sad to see the loss of those friends that are under obligations of a family now. Maybe I'll understand one day.

On the romantic side of things, theres not much to report. I had a few dates with a girl my friends set me up with, but she's got a LOT of baggage, more than I care to deal with. Don't get me wrong, I've had my share in the past, and I have had LOTS of grace extended to me, but I had to realize that it was her, not me, that had issues. So, I moved on, once again. I can remember last year at this time, was Hurricane Ike. I was in a relationship that my friends warned me was not a good idea, yet I pursued it anyway. 3 days with the same person and no power can really show ones true colors.

Anyway, I have made amends, licked my wounds, seen my therapist, and I feel like I'm ready....but for what? Ready for another relationship? Ready for life?

Maybe the right answer is, whatever God has in store for me.

Movie Review: Knowing, and random mumblings..

Just FYI, if you're going to see the movie, there are spoilers in this post, so you may not want to read.

So I usually dont like the "End of the world" type doomsday movies, but my friend and his wife were visiting from out of town, and she had rented "Knowing" with Nicholas Cage. I had seen the previews, and decided that I wasn't going to watch it, in the theater or when it came out on DVD.

Well, we watched it Saturday night, and it really left me feeling discombobulated and out of sorts when it was over. Basically in the movie, a girl in 1950 is summoned by voices to write down a bunch of numbers, instead of drawing a picture to put in the time capsule, she has page of numbers written all over it. Later she disappears from the dedication of the time capsule, and they find her in the basement of the school in a closet scratching numbers into the door, continuing from what she drew on the paper earlier.

Fast forward to present day, Nicholas Cage's son attends the same school, where the anniversary of the time capsule is due, and they open it, giving all the kids pictures of the drawings that were drawn in 1950. Cage's son gets the girls drawing with the random numbers on it, then he starts to hear all these whispering voices, and sees a man in the shadows. The movie goes on and Cage finds the drawing, and starts looking at it while drinking, and discovers the numbers are dates of major catastrophes, and also show the number of people that die. Cage is drinking, mourning the loss of his wife, who died in one of the tragedies of the paper. Theres also another set of numbers that they can't figure out what they're for, Cages colleagues at MIT scoff at his theory. Later they discover that the other numbers are Latitude and Longitude (he refers to them as GPS coordinates) of where the next death occurs.

I'm skipping a bit, but later, Cage discovers the last tragedy shows a date and "EE" which later means "Everyone else" or the world. Cage finds out that the Sun is going to Flare and scorch the Earth, and everyone dies. Cage and the Girls daughter try to escape to caves, but Cage later discovers the Coordinates of where they need to go are etched to the door of the closet of the school. While all this is happening, Cage's kid and the granddaughter of the girl from the time capsule get kidnapped by the man from the shadows, and Cage finds them, the men turn out to be aliens, who are "taking only the ones who are called" away from earth, to save them and let them start again new. Cage and his son walk towards the UFO, and the alien tells the boy that only he can go, not Dad. The next scene is Cage saying goodbye to his son and boarding theUFO, with hundreds of others of UFOs leaving earth, Cage falls to the floor in grief, and wakes up later, then Cage goes to his parents house, which he is estranged from, and it shows him hugging his family as the world is hit with a huge flare from the sun and the earth burns down. Later it shows Cage's son and the granddaughter of the girl that wrote the numbers in an Adam and Eve type setting, fields of grain and an Apple tree, and the world is pure again.

So anyway, there are several annoyances I have with this film. One, I can't see why any parent, in their right mind would give their kid to an alien who is promising some kind of safe place to be, because the world is ending, its just inplausible to me. I guess the main thing is the movie had a larger impact on me than I realized, leaving me feeling like everything that we do here while we're on earth is futile, and that the world will end etc. I've fought battles in my life, long and short, and I guess I let the movie get the better of my emotions.

I checked in with a few people today, and one of them, a close friend left me with this gem:

"God is in control. He's got your back, he loves you, and wants the best for you. He walks with you every minute. Dump the fear and embrace faith."

This left me feeling a lot better, because more often than not, I feel like I let fear control me, and as far as I feel that I have come in my spiritual journey, sometimes I get frustrated that I still can get into those 'pockets' of fear.

Another good friend reminded me "Its just a movie". Which is true. I guess I need to be more cognizant and draw the line there a little better.

At the end of the day, this movie did have one thing for me, and that's to be appreciative of my support network of friends and the ability to let go of the fear sometimes and let someone else upstairs drive the bus now and then.