que pasa

Woke up this morning to sound of drilling going on at 830am.  Mind you, on a saturday morning.  Happens on sunday mornings too.  Been like that for the past month.  It's the weekend, can't I sleep in?!?!?  Surely people should have some respect for weekends.  Start at 11am at least, sigh.

Couldn't ignore it.  Rolled out of bed.  Did tons of laundry and then went to work.  Been working every night and weekend for goodness knows how long.  Intray piling up faster than I can clear.  It's probably better that the drilling woke me to get me going.

Was at cell group today.  I was rather out of it as Papa seemed to be drawing my attention to something else from what the speaker was saying.  Felt that my priorities are quite out of whack.  How did things turn out like this?  I don't know if I can make the necessary adjustments.  But I got the message.

We had (belated) thanksgiving dinner and hung out after that, which was really fantastic actually.  Seriously good laughs.   I will miss them when they've gone home for christmas.  I'm so thankful for them.

Wonder if there will be drilling tomorrow morning.  Maybe don't need to set alarm anymore. 

For once as part of my work I actually get to test games.  I always thought that would be cool.  Except that I seem to have to do this after office hours because that's when most of the players come in to play.

I'm trying to find out more about teenage/kid virtual worlds.  Like Club Penguin, Habbo in the states.  In China, like Club Mole and Club Fish. 

The concept with these virtual worlds is that you enter them as an avatar, and then you just walk around exploring the various scenes available, play games (either vs the system or against another player) to earn points/currency, pick up treasure chests, and then use the game currency to enhance your gaming experience.  Not quite the same as MMORPGs because these are non-violent, the target age group is 7-15.

I spent 4 hours playing Club Mole and Club Fish this weekend.  With exception of the fact that they're in Cfinese and it takes me longer to figure out how to play games and do things, I actually enjoyed it.  Somewhat addictive actually.  These virtual get updated with new content/games and upgraded with new functions regularly. 

If you guys ever have the time, and want to know what I will be preoccupied with from now on, go check them out.  They're great for time-killers too.  Besides, I could really use extra feedback.  Thanks!

So as I mentioned yesterday, my mom came over to visit last weekend. It was really good to have her around, even better than I expected.

She was really understanding about the fact that I put in long hours to get work done, and even have to work on weekends at home.  To make things more comfortable, she even rearranged my furniture so that I would have a proper place to do my work.  She encouraged me to finish whatever work I had to do over the weekend so that I wouldn't have that sinking feeling come Monday morning.

We also went shopping together - it was the first shopping trip I did since coming to Shanghai - and did some sightseeing in a touristy place so that she could pick up some souvenirs.  Even went grocery shopping to beef up supplies in my apartment so that I would not be lacking food when too hungry or too lazy to go out (especially since it is getting cold).  She made me eat multivites every day - something that I had stopped doing.  She even made 2 homecooked meals with my crockpot and pathetic kitchenware.

But what I really enjoyed was the fact that for the first time I can remember in my life, that being together for such an extended period of time, I didn't have any irritable moods, we had many good laughs and I was able to show her this part of my life that she had never seen before.  Growing up, I was rather spoilt and often had squabbles with her.  I think I've alluded before that it's only being away from home for extended periods of time that helps me to grow.  And the recent years have been especially good for growing me up.

It's a pity it took so long to get to this point.  But I'm glad that we've reached this stage finally. 

I realize that I'm not likely to blog as frequently anymore.  My new job doesn't seem to allow much time or left over energy to blog.  I could ramble but I would prefer to write properly.  Then I also realize that you folks who are still reading this blog (I think I'm back down to 4 readers lol) probably aren't expecting essays anyway.

Remember I mentioned I had a friend in prison before?  I just found out that the last 3 letters I wrote never reached my friend.  Apparently the letters were rejected.  Reasons were not given. Had my friend's dad not emailed me, I would not have known that all this while my friend had heard nothing from me.  Ok fine, so I did use some colored paper, so I did put some teddy bear stickers and so I did write about the sights I saw while traveling in July, and stuff that was happening in Beijing in August and Shanghai in September.  I'm thinking that these could all be reasons why the letters were rejected. So when my mom came over to visit this weekend just past, I scribbled a short note for her to mail when she got home.  It takes me time over a few weeks to write a letter, but I just wanted my friend to know that I really meant to keep in touch.

Which is what made me think about blogging actually.  I figure that I should make effort to post a little bit here and there.  Some news is better than no news isn't it? 

I have to admit I've been so out of keeping in touch (I'm barely keeping up with personal emails) that when I spent some time this evening catching up on my friends' blogs, it struck me that everybody's lives seems to be moving on, except mine.  I seem to be in this warp hole called "work". 

It is getting really cold here in Shanghai and my fingers feel like they're freezing as I type this.  I will write another day about how work has been, since it's pretty much been my whole life since I got here.  I hope you are well.