ruining good songs by pointing obvious grammar mistakes.
Victim: “Chasing Cars” by Snow Patrol
Lyric: “If I lay here
If I just lay here
would you lie with me and just forget the world?”
Um, you mean “lie”? Unless the first two uses are in past tense and the last is in the present tense…which would technically make sense, except not really, because the song is in present tense.
Look’s like I’m sick again. Or kind of sick anyway. It’s like a cough that never goes away completely (though I think I’ve got a good idea why). But I really should be taking better care of my body, honestly, I swear I have like the weakest immune system in the world, and the constantly fluctuating temperature here in the Philly/Jersey area doesn’t help things at all. But what’s done is done. The only things I can do now are: (1) drink lots of water, (2) eat more cough drops, (3) drink more water, (4) relax, and (5) go to sleep at a reasonable hour.
In the meantime, I’ll leave you with a song that I’ve been addicted to for the past week: Owl City – Fireflies [Remix ft. Drew32 & Jay Hussle]
It’s funny how it works: when you’re at school, you look forward to break, but when you’re at home for an extended period of time, you’re always itching to get back to campus. Although classes are only just starting up, I’ve been keeping myself busy with revamping the Lambda website, which I finished yesterday. Now I just have to fix some cross-browser compatibility issues with IE and Chrome. I also managed to reread The Da Vinci Code at home before break ended, and I was thinking about bringing The Count of Monte Cristo, but I decided against it because I figured it was way too long; once I start it, I would be very tempted to finish it within a couple days, and seeing as I have 9 o’clock class everyday, I need to get enough sleep on the weekdays.
I also got my guitar back from Peng a few days ago, and I’ve been doing some light practicing. I half expected by fingers to get calloused again, but so far, there haven’t been any signs of damage…let’s hope it stays that way. David and I have are also re-watching Death Note. We’ve got about 10 episodes left (and IMO past the best part), but overall, the anime is still one of my all-time favorites.
Wow, the last week seemed to fly by. We drove with another family to Florida on Christmas Day, spending the night in a hotel along the way, and boarded the boat at around 5:00pm the next day. We had gotten pretty lucky when we booked our tickets; although we originally booked a room with just an ocean view, we got upgraded to a suite with a balcony, which was really nice. The cruise boat itself, the Costa Atlantica, was magnificent. I had never been on a boat before, so I was pretty amazed by all the facilities that were available on board. From a casino to several theaters, to a modern gym and a miniature jogging track, the ship pretty much had everything. The whole place was like a miniature floating city.
We spent the week visiting four locations: Key West, the Grand Cayman, Roatan, and Cozumel. We usually docked in the morning and left in the afternoon, giving people a good 6 hours or so to explore each destination. Since I’m not a big fan of the beach, my favorite places were Cozumel, (a Mexican Island) and Key West, although jet skiing in the Grand Cayman was one of the funnest of most exhilarating experiences I’ve ever had. Nothing like holding down the throttle and going 50 mph on the open water (I’m surprised I didn’t fall off the boat, haha). Aside from that, I found the informational tours at Key West and Cozumel a lot more interesting than simply walking around in the sun. I didn’t realize that Key West had such a rich history, and I was equally impressed by Cozumel’s “Discover Mexico,” a tourist destination showcasing Mexico’s history through miniature and accurate models of some of its most significant structures and places (both modern and historic). The really cool part was seeing the “miniature” versions of the Temple of the Sun and the Aztec temples–the 50:1 models themselves were several meters across, giving us a good sense of just how massive these things are in real life.
When we weren’t off exploring our island destinations, we basically spent our time alternating between eating and playing cards (with Chinese people haha). I don’t think I’ve ever eaten that much food in the span of a week before, and I’ve never seen such a variety of meals among all the ship’s buffets and restaurants. It’s astounding to think that they can even fit and prepare that much food for two thousand people (not including the workers and the crew) over the course of a week and still have leftovers remaining. If I ever get the chance to, I’d love to take a tour of the lower decks just to see how a cruise ship manages to sustain itself on a voyage (lot’s of recycling, I imagine). I also didn’t get seasick like I thought I would. In fact, it was pretty smooth for the entirety of the cruise except for one night, and I still managed to get through it without vomiting.
But now that I’m back in New Jersey, I’m actually appreciating the cold weather. Call me crazy, but I’d much rather be in cold weather than in extremely hot weather. (The mild temperatures of Key West were perfect.) With a little over a week until school starts up again, I don’t really plan on doing anything besides eating, sleeping, reading (I’ve decided to reread The Da Vinci Code), watching movies, and playing PS3 (just ordered Metal Gear Solid 4 from Amazon Prime, haha).
So the power went out between 8:30 and 11:20 this morning. Luckily, I was asleep for most of that time, haha.
I’ve started running again this week, mainly to keep myself in shape, but also to “test” the air quality here in Beijing. Two weeks ago, after jogging for a short 10 minutes, I developed a sore throat during work the next day, but I suspect that may have been due to a cold that was going around the workplace.
This week, I’ve gone jogging twice so far, both times after dinner, and fortunately have not shown any negative side effects. In past years, I’ve heard rumors that Beijing’s air quality has had detrimental impacts on runners’ lung capacity, and while I do believe there is some truth to that, I also think that the story has been exaggerated. As the 2008 Summer Olympics has shown, despite Beijing’s reputation as a somewhat “dirty” city (but is it really worse than L.A. or London?), the air here is definitely clean enough to sustain strenuous athletic events such as the triathlon and the the marathon. For runners like myself who simply do it for the thrill and exercise, the pollution is even less of a problem, since we’re not going that fast/hard in the first place. That being said, it can’t hurt to use some judgement when exercising. Run either in the early morning or late afternoon, since that’s when air pollution and temperature are at their lowest levels (I’m assuming you’re not going for any midnight jogs or things of that nature). Also, drink plenty of water before and after exercising. And always stretch and cooldown before workouts. These are the basic guidelines that I like to stick to no matter where I am in the world, and they help me make the most of my workouts.
I’ve also been playing a lot of guitar lately. The song I’m learning right now is called 青花瓷 (Qing Hua Ci) by Jay Chou. I’ve gotten all the chords down…now for the the lyrics, which are, of course, in Chinese 
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