So today Vincie is sick. We went to the doctor and he’s received a diagnosis of croup. A bit of a dry cough, low fever, sneezing, and general grumpyness. We got some medication that they mix together into a powder concoction. When we are ready to give it to him, we mix the powder with a yellow liquid and give it to him. He seems cheerful for a sick baby. Mr. Hung helped me hold Vince down while I gave him the dropperful of medicine. We had salmon and mashed potatoes for dinner which were especially yummy. Salmon I finally got from the RT Mart and potatoes we got from Costco in Taipei.

Went to yoga, where the teacher commented again about the size of my boobs. I explained, that yes, I was still nursing an 8 month old and no, my enlarged boobs don’t hurt. I met Delia, a South African who is teaching English in Hsinchu and plans to be here until next June at least. She has found a Chinese boyfriend and is quite happy. We went out to dinner with Yuru, one of Jeremy’s coworkers who is very sweet. We went to a seafood restaurant and she ordered and excellent set of dishes! Yum.

Went to Miako’s house today for tea and lunch! She was very, very sweet. Cute little treats from Mitsukoshi, breads and teas. Then lunch was curry and salmon. Wendy and Lucia were there also. Laura is being cared for at the Holland Village day care center and today was her first 3 hour day! Vince apparently was remarkable in the sense that he didn’t fuss too much. Hmmm…

Saturday, we drove to Taipei and camped out with the Smiths. Asuka and Carrie were pretty busy taking care of their ailing cat, feeding it and soothing it. Eppie is getting (or got) surgery on Sunday to have a feeding tube placed in his neck so that the food can be directly placed in his stomach. We went with the Smiths to their parent/teacher conference and played on the playground with Mattie and Dakota. Then we went to Subway for lunch. The remarkable thing this time with visiting Taipei was how remarkably like America it was. The TAS was completely English (of course) and the Subway, the Babalooo ice cream store was all English friendly. Even the want ads posted on the street had English. We hadn’t seen so many white people in ages! I said that we didn’t have to go to America anymore, we just had to hang out in Tien Mu in Taipei. We drove up to Yangming San and walked a while, climbed quite a bit and had a nice view of the mountains of Taipei. Then we went back to the Smiths and had a dinner of pizza and they went out and we put the kids to bed and watched the Father of the Bride. Sunday we shopped at Costo, and some American markets. We are planning on making lasagna for Ms. Liu and Helen this weekend.

We had a delicious hot pot with Ms. Liu and Helen. Turns out that Helen changed her Chinese name last November. I couldn’t believe that she changed her name. Apparently, an astrologer told her that the old name was no good and that the new name will insure prosperity in business and in love! Crazy. Also went to Zephyn’s 2nd birthday party in the lobby downstairs. Gave some M and Ms in a Japanese box.

So my Chinese lessons are taking a more serious twist. I’m tackling the grammer sections of my textbook, not only just reading the passages at the front of each chapter. Mr. Hung is a very good teacher, he makes me practice even when I don’t want to which is quite often these days. Jeremy went to Tainan today on a bus with a bunch of his coworkers to see the UMC fab down there. Also today, there was a kid who got hit by one of the nursery school buses in Holland Village. It was a bit scary hearing the ambulance and such. Inside the apartment complex, there aren’t too many cars compared with the regular street, so people just let their kids run around, but there are still some buses and cars. I think the kid was on his bike and both he and the driver weren’t looking out for each other. I hope he is OK.

OK, so things are weird here. AMD management is going wacky. I don’t want to put too much in my web log because Jeremy says it’s a BIG SECRET. Whatever. Let’s just say that our future plans are uncertain. I tried to buy pork from the wet market pork vendor but I wasn’t brave enough. They have slabs of pork on the table and I’m not sure which one I want and do I have to buy the whole slab? It’s all very strange.

Worked out for 15 minutes, cancelled my Chinese class, saw a dog be tormented by a guy on a scooter, had a woman talk about me in Chinese in front of me to her friend who was having a conversation with me in Chinese. But everything ended on a good note! Ms. Liu says that next week Droopy’s parents are going to America and we might get to take care of Droopy at night next week! And Vince went to sleep at 9 pm tonight!

I went to yoga class with some Japanese women I met a little while ago. The yoga class was *nothing* like the ones I’ve been to in the US. First of all, there is chatting throughout the class, who has the best hairdresser, how Japanese ladies have the palest skin and the nicest language. Also, the teacher has a militaristic, drill seargent-like voice, none of this “relax into the pose, breath deeply, slowly” etc. from the teacher. Also gone was my natural advantage of being more flexible than the average American. The class did pose after pose of very complicated spine twisting poses! There was a 70 year old lady doing all this stuff beautifully right next to me. There was foot massages by walking over them, etc. Yeow! Also, I’m learning English from my Chinese/English children’s program. Did you know that DDR is Dance Dance Revolution?