Turning 50 in "The Jing"

Well, here it is 50 trips around the sun! My body is telling me that I can't do the things I used to do, but my mind says "Aw come one, give it a try!" which certainly explains my knee injury! ;-)

There was a big celebration last weekend between three of us friends who all had June birthdays. We celebrated on the rooftop of a place named "Obiwan" (yep after the character in "Star Wars"), it's located in a place called HouHai about 30min from my apartment. We had the place to ourselves, well and about 25 of our friends, for about 4 hours and it was a good time.

Here's a photo of the three of us.

That's Scott to my right and Aaron to my left.

This is a shot of me, my friend Phil, and my Deutsche friends Kathrin and Peter.

I quietly celebrated my real b-day last night, over dinner, with Kathin and peter at a nice German restaurant named "Schindler's Anlegestelle" (Their Sauerbraten and red cabbage is awesome!)

Not missing an opportunity to make connections, this is yours truly and Josie (one of the managers of the place)

It truly was a grand night with good people, conversation, music, and drink. I can't think of a better way to celebrate a 1/2 a century here on earth, other than the fact the Lightnin wasn't there! (To qoute "3rd Eye Blind": "I've never been so alone, and I've never been so alive!")

My actual birthday is today. I celebrated in a rather lay-back fashion by cooking myself some spaghetti with a basic meat sauce. (sorry no photos yet 'cause it's still cooking).

It's a bit of a bummer because it's cloudy, foggy, humid, and cool yet again today! This is a bit unusual for this part of the world, it should normally be hot, dry, and sunny right now. I mean come on, I was hoping to catch a few rays out on my balcony today. Oh well you can't have everything, and besides I've got some good music on and the place has the smell of oregano, basil, thyme, rosemary, tomatoes, onions, and garlic (hungry yet?).

A Day at the Beach

We were fortunate enough to have a company off-site meeting at a place called Nai Dai He. The first nightt was a bit of entertainment followed the next day with meetings, but hey it was still at the beach!

We had a nice 4 hour bus ride to get there, and it took several hours later for me to get the feeling back in my feet. The day and 1/2 that we were there the weather was uncharacteristically cold, windy, and foggy, as you can tell by the following photos.

The view from the hotel room

A few shots of the fishing boats, probably catching our dinner

The view a bit closer to the waves

At the end of the day yesterday we boarded the buses for the log trip back to "The Jing". It was raining when we got back, and we were all pretty tired. I lugged my overstuffed backpack up to the apartment, unpacked, ate a light snack and hit the bed pretty much worn out from the trip.

All in all it was a pretty good experience.

Breast Fest (Not What You Think )

Hi

All- Lightnin Here Again-

I know I have your attention after the last post, right?

Okay, back to Breast Fest! On Saturday, STEB took me and Thunders new bike on a charity run. This years run was to benefit a mother of five who recently found out she has cancer. We started at The Best Damn Bar in Miamaitown, Ohio. There were about 75 bikes and it was a beautiful day! We left around 1:00 PM and headed out to Indian Creek, in Reilly. When we arrived there they had burgers, brats and hot dogs ready and waiting on the grill for us! Our next stop was a place called the Kiatta Club in Okeana. Again the grill was fired up and smelling great. The third stop is our stomping grounds; a great little place called Dew Drop Inn, Cleves, OH. This is where Thunder and I go to hang out and meet friends. The last stop of the day was at McDog's in Colrain. We were greeted again with the grill, cheese coney's and pizza. There were door prizes, split the pot and numerous drawings going on. We won a gift pack for Taco's hope chest! It was now about 6:00 PM and the clouds were moving in quickly! A few of us decided it was time to "go west". Unfotunately we didn't make this decision quite soon enough. One of us wanted to leave earlier but others didn't (right STEB?) So needless to say it was a rather soggy ride back, but I behaved myself, as I've been told "there is no whining on the back of a bike" and there wasn't! But we all had a great time and thank you STEB for taking me and thank you Thunder for letting us use your bike!

So, now I'm going to try my hand at posting pics so we'll see how it goes!

Back in Beijing

All, I'm sorry I've been a bit slack on the posts for awhile, but believe it or not I actually have a job to do over here and since they're paying the bills I sort of felt obligated to get things done. In the world of global commerce you have to cover all the time zones, and for us that usually means working from 7AM (to get our work done) until 9-10PM to connect with Europe and the US to satisfy their needs. That plus the brief trip back to the States sort of caused a bit of interruption to my blogging time.

So anyway I'm back and ready to post again!

I screwed up my knee (one of the dangers of "Growing older, but not up") and so I've been working from home these past 2 days. This has given me the opportunity to catch a photo of a definite oddity in Beijing weather.

This is not smog it is real fog! We actually have enough humidity in the air in daytime to cause a fog!

I'm also going on a company off-site to the sea side at Nan Dai He, so I'll try to capture some photos of that and post about it.

Well that's all the time I have for now, lunch break is over, so I'll try to get back into a routine and keep you updated with what's happening in the "Jing"!

Tasty Treat at Thunder and Lightnin's

Hi all,

Its Lightnin! I tried a new recipe and STEB and Taco were the guinea pigs. It was chipotle salmon burgers with mango, pineapple, cilantro mayonaise and broccoli and cauliflower salad, and avacado halves. Served with a nice merlot. Not too much else to say except that it was delicious! FC and Jackie, you would be impressed and might want this recipe. STEB and I are trying to improve our eating habits (ya know, turning 40 and all) ;-)

Father's Day 2008

It's Father's Day and I thought I'd take some time out of my busy routine to pay tribute to a few father's out there!





This is one of our own knuckle heads who has turned out to be one of the best father's. He keeps our grandson occupied, which is not an easy task.


Happy Father's Day Mike!


















I think you all know this knuckle head, but he also happens to be a great father, and friend!





Happy Father's Day FC!















Here's a couple of Father's Helping us celebrate our anniversary this past year.

Scott is in the orange shirt on the right, and STEB is on the left with a ball cap on (his son is in the stripes next to me).

Happy Father's Day guy's!









Of course I had to get into the picture too. even though this is a grandfather pose here! He and I are always the first one's up in the morning.

I got my Father's day gift a couple of days early when SPC Dude called to let us know he was out of Kuwait and back in Germany!

(Go ahead and make fun of those pants, but keep in mind that they are official KC Chiefs sleepwear!)







The before and after pictures from when my Mother and Father traveled to our new land in Florida to help get the weeds under control. I'm sure they are completely out of control again since I've been out of the country.













My father was 79 in these photos and he was helping me cut weeds, haul brush, and treat the fence! He'll be 80 this August and I'll have to wish him a really long distance happy birthday this year.

Happy Father's Day Dad!












Uncle E - I didn't have any photos of you or I would have posted one! Happy Father's Day!





I hate to do this, but I'm going to end on a sad note today.





Lightnin's father passed away this last year and this is the first Father's day she has spent without him. She's trying to cope with her loss which isn't easy because they were so close!



She's constantly catching herself thinking of calling him to tell him what's been going on, like her visiting me in China, my coming home from China for a visit, SPC Dude getting back to Germany, etc.




I don't think anyone can ever get over the loss of their father, but they just learn how to cope with it!





To all of you other fathers out there: Happy Father's Day!

The Greatest Invention Ever!

To all of you who read my posts I just want to apologize for taking the past couple of weeks off. I've been extremely busy at work, with presentations for the upper management, and also had to start preparing to come back home for the first time.



I'm finally home again!
I arrived late in the evening this past Friday. The trip wasn't too bad until I actually arrived in Cincinnati. We landed about 20 minutes early, but then made up for that by sitting on the runway for an hour waiting for an open gate. It seems the severe weather in Minnesota was causing delays, and our gate was blocked.



Anyway, during my layover in Japan I found what has got to be the greatest invention EVER!



Check this out:

That's right, it's an automatic beer dispenser!

You place the glass on the holder and hit a button and the machine tilts the glass to the proper angle and starts dispensing the beer. As the glass fills the machine levels the glass back out to give just the right amount of head to the serving!



I went back several times just to make sure it gave a proper pour every time! ;-)