Thanksgiving was fun and lively. Jeremy cooked two 20 pound turkeys and a ham. We had 35 people over. I spent most of my time with the children. It was especially nice to see Jane and George. Marty made a very long and amusing toast. We had so much food leftover, we could have fed another 35 with our leftovers. It’s too bad because all of us are leaving this house very soon. Maybe Donald can eat some of it.
Author: Doris
Yesterday we took the train to DC. Donald picked us up from the train station and we talked for the 1.5 hours it took for us to get home through the horrendous DC rush hour traffic. Had a nice homemade meal and slept early and well. For breakfast we went to Starbucks and Dunkin Donuts and now we are planning dinner!
On Sunday, we got up early, early and had a nice family get together at 4 am. We had brunch with a bunch of people affiliated with IBM and IEEE and went on a tour of the new performing arts center designed by Gehery. Today Jeremy went to Princeton, we went to Toys R Us and bought a boat and tonight had dinner with Satia who works at IBM.
We made it to New York! Vince slept the whole way. It was interesting to switch from Chinese back to English. It is nice to be in the Martin household again.
Jeremy came home early to pack for tomorrow. I’m very moody these, I think going home is causing some reverse culture shock. I am excited. We moved Luther the fish downstairs to the realtor’s office for the next two weeks. Spent the afternoon watching Legally Blonde. I’m starting to like the DVD issues of movies. I like listening to the director’s comments and the extra scenes and stuff like that. It’s really just my addiction to celebrity gossip. Jeremy still has a bit of his stomach bug and Vince has had a bloodshot eye for the past few days that I’m hoping will clear up soon. If not, we’ll see a doc in the US.
Today is my mother’s birthday! Happy birthday Mom 
I’m glad I will be seeing you soon! I found someone else in Taiwan who has breastfed their babies. Woo hoo! This woman in my yoga class has breastfed her children both for 1 year each. The class is still facinated by my breastfeeding. Everyone here gets the shot to stop their milk production right away after giving birth. They are afraid of their breasts shrinking and sagging. I figure if ever I get tired of the way my boobs are, I’ll pay a plastic surgeon to lift them for me. Today I met a man from Kashmir in yoga class who said that all Americans were snotty, unpleasant and arrogant. He’s been in Taiwan selling all these beautiful scarves, I saw one that the yoga teacher bought which was one of the less expensive ones. But some he was selling for $6000 NT ($180 US) were absolutely beautiful, hand stiched and knotted.
Eating leftovers to try and leave the fridge empty for our 2 week vacation. I rented Harry Potter and I’m listening to it in Chinese with English subtitles. I’m hoping to pick up some key words this way… I tried to listen to it in just Chinese with Chinese subtitles, but it was too hard.
Well, it looks like we might sell the house. Got a resonable offer today so hopefully it will stick. We’ll just have to wait and see. I’m not really holding my breath because so many things might happen between now and closing. What am I talking about? We haven’t even entered the option phase. Whatever. I got all nostalgic about our time in Austin, very homesick today.
I made coq au vin with the 2/3 bottle of red wine left over from yesterday’s dinner. First time for me, eating purple chicken. Ha ha. The wind really picked up today, actually kind of chilly. The yoga teacher today told me that I shouldn’t run anymore or drink cold sodas. Sigh.
We had a lasagne dinner tonight and we played to a full house! Leah, Ms. Liu, Mr. Lin, Helen, her nephew, Droopy and Man-Fai all came over and we had a great time. Dinner was over quickly, but it was really nice to have everyone over. We had salad, bread, butter, cheese, wine. We had a Dunkin Hines cake with frosting out of a can which actually was pretty terrible, so sweet. We made it because we were feeling sentimental, but really we should have made a cake from scratch. We are really limited by our oven space. Our ovens are getting crumbier and crummier.