Lazy Weekend

After going out an partying like rockstars last Friday night, our weekend was pretty tame. Bob and I worked/recovered all day Saturday. And by that I mean that we woke up at noon and then worked very very slowly while watching more Battle Star Galactica. I know, we're super lame, but it was very relaxing.

We ordered in that night and had blah food from Organic Kitchen. To be fair I think it might have been my selection that was blah, and we'll likely give the place another chance.

Sunday I made us leave the house for brunch. We found the most Mexican restaurant in Shanghai and had Mexican brunch. It was actually pretty good. It was all you can eat, and there was a Mariachi Band playing covers of Simon and Garfunkel and the Beatles, which was weird but okay. And we participated in the all you can drink Margarita special, because, well how could we not? I liked the place a lot and took some pictures that will be going up on the food blog. The place was called Mi Tierra and there were a bunch of pictures from Gone With The Wind on the walls. I don't know what Gone With The Wind has to do with Mexican food, but it didn't ruin my experience.

I spent the rest of the day cleaning up the house in preparation for Richard's arrival. Bob was amazingly helpful and cleaned up the living room. My office is currently our dining room table, but other than that everything looks great. Richard got in around 7pm and was pretty tired. He was coming to stay with us after a short visit with his brother in Singapore, where they were apparently party animals! He told us he didn't go to bed until 5am that morning, ew.

Richard got settled in and then I took him for a walk around our neighborhood to help him get his bearings. We picked up some drinks and ordered in from a Mediterranean place that does wonderful slow cooked vegetables stuffed with minced beef and rice. It's kind of like a vegetable that's been stuffed with meatloaf, but it's delicious. We got a variety of hummus and things and then we all hung out for a while until bed.

Today Richard and Bob went into the office early and I did my usual routine of waiting until Bob left to get up and putter about. I took care of all my Mochi stuff and then did some research on the Expo. I've picked out the pavilions I'm going to go see, and I plan on starting tomorrow. The weather has been great the past couple of days and is suppose to be just as great tomorrow so I'm going to brave the EXPO!

My list is as follows: (obviously not everything will be done tomorrow)

- Afghanistan Pavilion

-Syria Pavilion

-Uzbekistan Pavilion (Their national celebration day is August 31st, the day I'm going.)

-Democratic Republic of the Congo Pavilion

-Mauritania Pavilion

-Zimbabwe Pavilion

-Romania Pavilion

-Nepal Pavilion

-Denmark Pavilion (They brought in the Little Mermaid statue, so I have to go see it.)

If you want to look at the pavilion descriptions you can check them out here. There are soooo many and everything I've read says pick the ones you want to see because just wandering around will kill your soul slowly. You'll notice that I didn't put the US Pavilion or the China Pavilion on there. I did that on purpose. The US one didn't really look very good and the China Pavilion will be up for longer than the Expo. I will likely add another European Country or two to the list but as of now I feel pretty good about my choices. Let me know if you've heard anything wonderful about other pavilions. I will of course take many many many pictures and post them for everyone to see.

I think tonight we're going to go out to a place called Xibo (pronounced she-bow). I found a write up about it the other day, and they cook with a lot of pumpkin which I think is delicious, so I thought we should try it.

Loves and kisses,

Margaret

Today's Mission: Buy an electric fan.

We recently discovered that the air conditioning in the guest room doesn't work. We were going to get it fixed, our good friend Eric who helps us translate everything is currently in the hospital due to appendicitis, but it just didn't happen. We have our awesome co-worker, Richard, coming out to stay with us for a little while starting Sunday night, so I thought he'd want tobe comfortable and not swelter to death in the guest room. Until now the AC not working hasn't been an issue because I just keep the door open and things work out perfectly. (I use our guest room as my office.

Anyway, I went to the massive Japanese mall downtown because I knew they'd definitely have one, and it's easily accessible via the metro here. So I walked to the metro station in my new shoes, they're super cute, I got them just the other day for about $12US. On a side note, the weather was great today, it was still pretty warm, but it cooled down enough for me to wear my jeans with out wanting to die AND my hair has gotten just long enough to pull it back in a ponytail, finally. I hate when it's sticky outside and I can't keep my hair off of me.

So I stopped by the milk tea place in the mall first, because I can't help myself, I love bubble tea. My mom and dad know this as Bowba, because that's what I introduced it to them as, and my friend Kelsea introduced it to me like that. It's a sweet drink with tapioca balls in it. It's delicious. More about the milk tea on the food blog. I got my self a regular milk tea with small tapioca balls, called sago, and then went for a wander before going to buy the fan.

There was a 9 Ball Pool Tournament going on in the center of the mall, which was weird. There were all these blue topped pool tables out together in the rotunda and it was being broadcast, or at least I assume it was being broadcast because there was a television crew there filming a woman who was talking/gesturing to the pool tables.

I did some more wandering around and took some more pictures of the fashion I saw in the stores. I was yelled at by one woman that pictures were not allowed. I asked why and she just looked at me, so I took some more. :P My thought was, what if I was trying to decide to buy the outfit and I needed someone else to give me their opinion. Silly sales lady, it's not like there was a flash on the camera. The clothes weren't even that cool, as you can see to the left.

Finally I wandered over to where the fans were. I was able to gesture to the sales lady that I needed a medium sized fan, and that it needed to oscillate. She showed me a couple that fit my description and I picked a lovely blue one. So now when Richard comes to stay he won't swelter to death at night. We also recently got a nice new mattress for the guest room, so if anyone wants to visit it's all ready for you.

We're thinking about going out for Sushi tonight. Hopefully it won't be pouring buckets of rain on us tonight like it was last night. We're thinking of checking out a place called Haiku, it's got pretty good reviews on the different sites we look at, well, that I look at, when trying to decide where and what to do.

As far as work goes, I've been handling coin approvals for games, traffic share ad approvals (those are the free ads the developers can use), and just handling support as usual. Bob just helped me install all the Adobe Programs on my computer so I can work on my Flash game and then get it up and running. I plan on making video tutorials of how to use the Mochi APIs. I'm excited!

I also have the RosettaStone program installed on my computer so I can start working on my Mandarin. I've been bad and haven't started yet, but I already know how to count and do some minor things which have been super helpful. I'm going to have to start setting aside time everyday to work on my Mandarin though, I want to be able to run about the city on my own and order food without wondering if it's going to be dog. So I guess learning food words should be my first priority. :)

I should probably take another look at the support queue, and do some picking up around the house. Look for the report of tonight's food excitement on the food blog.

Loves and kisses,

Margaret (and Bob)

When lazy, order in!

Bob and I have been enjoying the rainy evenings in Shanghai, mostly because it makes things cooler for at least a little while, but we certainly don't want to be out in the rain. Yeh, we're lame like that. So instead of braving the rain we've been using the most awesome food delivery service in Shanghai, it's called Sherpa! (You can check out their website here: www.sherpa.com.cn) They have lots of different restaurants that you can order in from, featuring a wide variety of cuisines. This evening while it was storming like crazy we ordered in some of the best gourmet burgers ever! I mean, even better than I think I've had in the US.

We ordered from a place called Gourmet Cafe. And of course we ordered after thinking about it for a long while, so by the time the food actually got here we scarfed it down with out me taking a picture, but don't worry, I'm sure we'll order from there again and then there will be a Food Blog post. It was that good. Bob had a burger that was rolled in peppercorns which was pretty amazing. It also had chedder cheese and crispy bacon. I had a burger with blue cheese, bacon and jalapenos. We also were little piggies and ordered Milkshakes! I had an apple strudel milkshake, which was AMAZING! And Bob had a chocolate coffee kahlua milkshake. I thought mine was better, it tasted just like a real apple strudel. And to top everything off we had sweet potato wedges. I'm telling you this food was amazing.

We enjoyed our meal while watching some of Battle Star Galactica. We "purchased" the series the other evening while we were in Gubei, the Korean area of Shanghai. Bob's already seen the series but I haven't, so we have 4 fun filled seasons to watch. So far I'm liking it, and I'm kinda glad that I didn't see it while it was actually airing, because now I can watch it whenever I want! Woot!

All right, it's getting close to our bedtime so I think I'll start getting ready.

Loves and kisses,

M

Hello World!

Hi Mamacita and Mama I! I started to realize I was bombarding Facebook with all my randomness, and while I know you both probably love it, I think that people are going to start de-friending me. :P

Like the little description at the top right of the page says, this is my virtual diary of everything going on. I've already promised myself to do an update once a day at least, usually around my lunch time, because that's when I update my food blog. Obviously the food blog will continue, but everything else and all the fun plans and extra things will go on this blog.

So welcome to my virtual world! Bob and I miss you and the rest of the families a whole bunch and wish you were here to enjoy all the fun and excitement!

xoxo- Margaret (and Bob)