A good day in "The City"

Imagine this... 5 days or more of wonderful, warm weather. The sun shining and the temperatures picnic perfect... then you say good night and wake up to FREEZING COLD! Now you would think this would put the normal southerner out of sorts, but nope, even though I personally don't like windy cold weather the day was very good. Part of that is because Matt is home from a 4 day excursion and I got to sleep late, but most of that has to do with out outing. We went to a big market to look for a doll house - which there are none of - and other goodies for Christmas. Everyone was in such a good mood. I think it has something to do with the weather... which is the irony of it all. I'd say 99% of the folks in this city did not enjoy our warm streak. It is against their nature to take off layers of clothes to be comfortable... so they just sweated through the beautiful weather and I think it made most of them miserable. But today, it was a lot colder and they were finally comfortable for the first time in a week so they were happy. The streets were crowded for a Monday and so was the market, but everyone was in a good mood. You just gotta love it.

The other really great thing that happened today was that I found a fleece, a hooded sweatshirt, and a sweater that fit my big ole pregnant self. There is this one shop that has pieces of clothing from a factory someplace... most of the items are things going to Wal-Mart or some cheap clothing store, but every once in a while you find something special. Today, it wasn't anything special, but it was exactly what I needed. So I got the above mentioned articles of clothing, Matt got a fleece and 2 shirts and Gracie got a zip up fleece too. All for the amazing price of about $35. Now I won't freeze : ) Oh, and this is about the only shop, or at least the only one we have found, that sells clothes that fit us. Guess that is because they jumped ship on their way to America and landed in a Chinese five and dime.

I spent the rest of the afternoon with Tina, my very pregnant Chinese girlfriend. She helped me order some food for Thanksgiving off the Chinese ebay (Taobao). Poor Tina, She has enjoyed Thanksgiving dinner with us before and was lamenting that she won't be able to this year, that is unless her little one hangs out a week + late. When I left her house I rode the bus home across town... usually a 30-40 minute ride, but tonight there was a big accident and traffic jam in the major intersection just before our district... so it took me about 1 hour and 20 minutes to get home. That was ok. The lady next to me was nice and we chatted. I would have gotten off the bus with the rest of the folks and walked except that it had started raining and I was still a good 2 miles from home. You know, now that I think about it, not one person complained about the traffic or the wait. That is a first! Yep, definitely the weather change. Cold, windy and rainy made for a great day in the Chang.