Poutine is back on the menu at FuBar

It's the goat milk guy and Mary (with muzzle) patrolling the streets of Taichung, giving away free samples of fresh-squeezed, raw, goat milk. Here he is on Soho Street outside of FuBar. We took a brochure but no milk.

Maybe we should have taken some. Those things are practically dragging the ground. Notice the concavity under the dark area of her spine. Garland, let's see you pun your comment without the word udder.

$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$

Next time you decide to see a movie at Mitsukoshi ( 新光三越 ) and want some popcorn and coke to go with it, be sure and buy it all downstairs at the outside ticket box. When purchasing your tickets, look for the sticker advertising an all-in-one package. Normal ticket prices are $240NT ($7.87 US ) but for $280 ( $8.46 US ) you can get your movie ticket, coke and popcorn. In the theater itself, coke and popcorn run for $150NT. Wow, aren't I just swell!

For J-Hole

Even Elvis agrees, Mary Tyler Moore's bossom is less than adequate. Doesn't make her less hot, J-Hole, it just means Red A's breasts are probably larger than hers in their prime.

Taichung is part of Iraq?

I come back to Taichung only to be stopped at a massive police checkpoint featuring Taichung's finest armed with M-16s.

Note to the Police: Frenchy left town loooong ago.

White (fungus) Power!

Just your ordinary can of white fungus, right? Nothing unseemly, except for the part about it being fungus for human consumption. But upon closer inspection - well, other-side-of-the-can inspection - you will see the truth. The official fungus sponsor of Taiwan's National Socialism Association.

Fired up for baseball! Part 1 American League

Although it's not 1985, I need to post George Bell on this site as he was just too great. I'm currently listening to Big Country and I'm tempted to call Karl so I can see his 80's dance one more time.

But in all seriousness, I wanted to post a picture of Toronto's new $126 million dollar man and I found this link.

Let's look ahead at the upcoming season.

The spending in the off season was exciting, lots of ridiculous spending by a lot of teams making J.P. Riccardi look like a genius for signing Burnett for $55 million. How will all this spending help the teams? Let's have a look.

The American League has lots of talent. I've spent some time reading some reviews and there are definately four stand out teams. No matter how much of a Blue Jay fan I am, I simply can't ignore the Yankees, Tigers, Angels and Red Sox. On paper, the Yankees have again the best batting order of any team in the AL but I have to admit there may be some question marks surrounding an aging starting rotation. I sincerely hope those question marks turn into exclamation marks of failure and The Rocket goes back to the NL where he belongs. If these two hopes hold true, I believe the Jays can challenge the Yankees for the wildcard spot as the Jays turn the same question marks into exclamation marks of excellence. Towers, Burnett and and Ohka have been great this past month.

The Red Sox on the other hand added Dice-K as a number three starter. I know spring training shouldn't relied on too much, but if he's the real deal, the Sox have a great rotation. Of course, I hope Schilling goes down to age, and Beckett goes on the DL again, but that would be wishful thinking on my part. They have a new line up and altough I'm still not convinced that J.D. Drew was worth all that money, Lugo makes a great leadoff man and Crisp will bounce back from a poor season. Ortiz and Ramirez will continue to score runs and after the three team royal rumble in the AL East, the Sox will come out on top.

With Detroit adding Sheffield to their line up, I just don't see how such a great team with five great young starters won't win the Central. The critics hold high favour for the Indians but sorry Dwayne, I can't see it. Maybe they all want a pat on the back for predicting a worst to first team, but it certainly won't be the Indians.

In the west, it will be a tight finish again, but the Angels have too many arms and too much bat. Altough Vlad has had 9 great seasons, I feel we have yet to see him at his best. If you buy into the Garrett Anderson hype and Mike Napoli is the catcher of the future, this team will score. An outstanding rotation combined with a solid bullpen should prove LAAA to be the best.

When I get a chance, i'll post my NL picks. I'd love to read about your predictions.

On a fantasy note, Bread, Rye, D-Wayne and Big El, good luck with the draft. Bread, I have to say, you have some bats. Wow! It could be your season.

Rye, I hope your gamble on Rios pays off!

Notes from Los Angeles

1. Wearing a Timberland sweatshirt can result in a woman in a hotel elevator asking "Do you work for Timberland?" Man, what if I was wearing a Lakers shirt?

2. In Taiwan when you say you want to go to the airport, the hotel staff assumes you mean the international airport. In Downey, the hotel staff assumes you mean Longbeach airport. As if LAX is only for space launches to Mars.

3. TV commercials in the US now include ads for medicine that show old men splashing water on each other. (They can do that now after they've started taking Flomax which shrinks their swollen prostrates.) You can watch the commercial here.

The rest of the ads are 90% GEICO ads or ad to consolidate your adjustable rate mortgage.

I return to the land of Taiwan tomorrow.

Texas music

One evening back in the day..

The infamous JW anal floss video resurfaces, exclusively on TWK. (nsfjm)

If that's not your thing then check out these Taiwanese dancers!

Woman tears out own cornea while removing contact lens

(From the Taiwan News - link to story above) Ouch! A Taiwanese woman did just that. Ripped it out. I've seen many Taiwanese girls and guys wearing colored contact lenses, but have not heard of what this woman had been wearing - iris enlarging lenses. They make the iris appear larger and shinier, a quality I did not know people strove for in their corneas.

After wearing the lenses for more than 10 hours with her eyes drying out, the lenses came out with a little extra attached to one of them. She will suffer from permanent vision damage. The product she was wearing was from Innova Vision called Big Eye (Go here and click on What's New -Big Eye to view).

Manning on SNL

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6Xa9tDZGVQc

Workin with wood

Reading through one of my most recent purchases, Ken E. Rogers' The Magnificent Mesquite, I kept returning to the section detailing the uses of mesquite, of which woodworking is a prominent one. Originally intending to find out more about the mesquite rockers built by Robert Hensarling, I found that he also hand-makes custom knives. The one pictured is the Hensarling Bowie #1. I don't know if it's very functional or just ornamental, but I really like the curly-things on the blade. Maybe someone with a bit more, or any, knowledge of desirable properties in knives could visit his website and drop a comment or two. Along with custom rockers and knives, he also gives 4 and 1 day seminars on rocker making. His shop is located in Uvalde, not far from my relatives in Medina, so I hope to stop by during my summer vacation.

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PIMP, B is not the highest possible grade (contrary to your public school experience). That would be A. As in the movie 300 gets an A. And not just any A, but a Freakin' A, bud!

World Gym should have had a booth outside selling memberships. And anyone who thinks that they just recruited a bunch a bodybuilders needs to think again. Go to the site, enter, Making of 300, Video Journals and select #3, Spartan Training. There you will see what the actors went through. #5, Stunt Work explains their military techniques.

And while you're at it, review some Chinese movie terms and go back again and lead the Taiwanese in some hoo-aah cheering.

new CV

This seems like a lead up to the finale, Chad Vader Episode 7

purple milkweed butterflies to get safe passage

This BBC story says that Taiwan is closing down a lane of a major highway and using nets and ultra violet lights in order to better facilitate the migration route of the Purple Milkweed Butterfly to its breeding grounds. The story doesn't say which highway or where, only that the butterflies are travelling from the south and need just 600 m of road space...

"Human beings need to coexist with the other species, even if they are tiny butterflies," Lee Thay-ming, of the National Freeway Bureau...

Gym location

That gym near the Costco mini-mart

Strictly Taichung

The registration deadline for the inaugural Goofy Group Wedding nears. This year's title is " Group Wedding Ceremony for Citizens and Public Staff•Athens European Romance in 2007." Here are some highlights:

• This year's theme : May Love and Fulfilled Destiny•Honey in Athens


• Everlasting memories : Mu Gui-Xin, Director of Civil Affairs Bureau, decorated as a European duck, stated that the Athenian romantic group wedding would blow the horn... throughout the whole year
  
• Wedding day orgy : ...and welcomed all intending couples to register for the romance in the Large Conference Room
  
• Authenticity : (a) classical Greek romantic wedding in a ‘Roman palace' in the Round Theater
  
• Gaiety : Couples dancing to palace horns and Mayor Hu dressed as Roman royalty

When he's not busy dressing up in a toga, Mayor Hu continues to battle the crime rate in Taichung with boldly redundant ploys such as (granting) gift certificates or books worth 1 thousand NT dollars to encourage police colleagues each time when they were found to actively concern themselves with those in need of assistance.

I wonder if this includes officers emptying their clip before handing over their firearms to criminals.

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Amcham Taichung's response to my query regarding the China Bowl :

No wonder they're registered as a service organization instead of a business one. No... that doesn't work either.

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Lastly, our friend, Malcolm Schreiber, started a blog for the sole purpose of detailing his latest trip to Thailand. Check out his account and photos here.

Hockey Playoff pool

Hockey Fans! We will be holding the 1st annual Fubar Hockey draft/auction on Tuesday April 10th at 9pm. Entry for this contest is $1000nt with many chances to win back your money!

If interested please let me know!

bizarre 300 trailer

This is probably how it really went down. 'BRUSH YOUR TEETH!'

By the same crew, but before the Chad Vader phenomenon, Darth Vader Taking A Bath. Featuring Yoda and the Emperor.

I kinda lost track of how of these there were. Chad Vader Episode 6 finds Chad beating the pavement looking for a new job...

mona hu?

I've been seeing this image of Taichung mayor Jason Hu superimposed on the Mona Lisa for months now...unfortunately I didn't get a chance to read the bottom or even shoot it, as you can see... it must be for the Art Museum on Wu Chuan and Ying Cai ... this was taken at the RT Mart on Zhong Ming... hope no one chokes on their dan bing.

Movies

Wow, 300 is really getting a lot of coverage on this blog. I have seen the movie. I guess it is based on a true story, but the real appeal of this movie comes from the director. He made Sin City. Wow, what a great movie! Now think......something along the lines of Sin City meets Troy only with non stop fighting! Wow!


Are you fired up? I was....I don't want to ruin it for anyone, but I'd give it a B.

Now, let's talk about another great couple of movies. Yesterday I watched two. Far better than 300 and probably more worthwhile. Now I know that there will be some people out there who point their fingers and try to rip apart the the theory behind the first movie. But why bother brother? A must see for the young and old. An Inconvenient Truth is a well thought out presentation of global warming. Simply put, an awakening truth to a reality which we shouldn't try to avoid. If you haven't seen it, watch it.

Which brings me to my next movie. I guess the order of these two movies is a little off. But simply put, watch this movie. A movie about the positive effects of smoking? You might guess from the title, but it's not. A movie about spinsters. People who are able to find an arguement about something so ridiculous that they are able to convince the general public that it's true or that there is no wrong doing being done. Remind you of anybody?
I'm sure everybody has met this person at some point of their careers or social life.

Watch these two movies, possibly in the same day if you have time. Watch Thank you for smoking first followed by An Inconvenient Truth. Think about them for a while, and draw your own conclusion, but if you really think that global warming is a pile of BS then perhaps you ought to think about a career in another field.

don't look to Hollywood for history lessons

I'm sure "300" is visually amazing and I am looking forward to seeing it. I love war movies. There are however concerns about its historical accuracy...

Here's a link to an interesting article about these historical inaccuracies and oversights ...

Sparta, Spandex and Disturbing Distortions of '300' by Ephraim Lytle

Here's an excerpt I thought was interesting...

"300's Persians are ahistorical monsters and freaks. Xerxes is eight feet tall, clad chiefly in body piercings and garishly made up, but not disfigured. No need – it is strongly implied Xerxes is homosexual which, in the moral universe of 300, qualifies him for special freakhood. This is ironic given that pederasty was an obligatory part of a Spartan's education. This was a frequent target of Athenian comedy, wherein the verb "to Spartanize" meant "to bugger." In 300, Greek pederasty is, naturally, Athenian."

The Iranians are especially upset about it. BBC story here.

BBQ Police

The Japs have started a Sushi police to ensure Sushi restaraunts accurately represent Japanese sophistication. And why can't J-Hole and I do this for Texas BBQ? I reckon we could certify BBQ joints all over the world, encouraging the values of zero vegetables, rare beef and merle haggard in any outpost.

On a different note, I will never trust the pink ladies again. Ever.

Hello Kitty Planes

If you aren't already sick of Hello Kitty, EVA Air plans to make sure you reach for that air sickness bag with their new Hello Kitty planes.



EVA repeated the livery theme inside the cabin by creating a Hello Kitty fantasy with sweet Hello Kitty paintings on the walls, and by outfitting flight attendants with Hello Kitty ribbons for their hair and Hello Kitty aprons. Passengers booked on EVA’s Hello Kitty Jet will get pink Hello Kitty boarding passes and luggage tags. Onboard, they will enjoy a series of inflight Hello Kitty service accessories, Hello Kitty meals, and have access to exclusive EVA Air Hello Kitty duty-free shopping. A special EVA Air Hello Kitty Web site has also been created in Chinese and Japanese languages at http://evakitty.evaair.com.

I will be in China and the USA for the next two weeks...so I will either not post anything (must be out eating tacos and drinking) or post a lot (must be bored off my azzzzz)

My personal goal of this trip is to bring back some Cholula.

Movie Time

There's no reason to stay at home fearing the cold, wind and rain anymore with short-sleeve weather here ( hopefully to stay ). Rip off your shirt, drag your woman along or get your buddy and slam a beer and go see 300. I haven't seen it yet, of course, but I will. But first we need to do a little work to impress our Taiwanese friends and/or significant other. Here is some of the Chinese I think and hope you will probably need to show off you linguistic skills.

Title: 300壯士：斯巴達的逆襲 - san1 bai3 zhuang4 shi4: si1 ba1 da2 di2 ni4 xi2
- ㄙㄢ ㄅㄞˇ ㄓㄨㄤˋ ㄕˋ:ㄙ ㄅㄚ ㄉㄚˊㄉㄧˊㄋㄧˋㄒㄧˊ
Terms: Sparta - 斯巴達 ; si1 ba1 da2 ; ㄙ ㄅㄚ ㄉㄚˊ
Persia - 波斯 ; bo1 si1; ㄅㄛ ㄙ
graphic novel - 繪本小說 ; hui4 ben3 xiao3 shuo1; ㄏㄨㄟˋ ㄅㄣˇ ㄒㄧㄠˇ ㄕㄨㄛ
pecs - 胸大肌 ; xiong1 da4 ji1 ; ㄒㄩㄥ ㄉㄚˋ ㄐㄧ
abs - 腹部肌肉 ; fu4 bu4 ji1 rou4 ; ㄈㄨˋ ㄅㄨˋ ㄐㄧ ㄖㄡˋ
behead - 斬首 ; zhan3 shou3 ; ㄓㄢˇ ㄕㄡˇ
warrior - 壯士 ; zhuang4 shi4 ; ㄓㄨㄤˋ ㄕˋ
(movie) trailer - 預告片 ; yu4 gao4 pian4 ; ㄩˋ ㄍㄠˋ ㄆㄧㄢˋ
surrender - 投降 ; tou2 xiang2 ; ㄊㄡˊ ㄒㄧㄤˊ
Phrase: " Spartans! Tonight we dine in Hell!" - 斯 巴 達 壯 士! 今 晚 我 們 將 在 冥 府 大 吃 大 喝 !
si1 ba1 da2 zhuang4 shi4 ! jin1 wan3 wo3 men5 jiang1 zai4 ming2 fu3 da4 chi1 da4 he1 !
ㄙ ㄅㄚ ㄉㄚˊㄓㄨㄤˋ ㄕˋ ! ㄐㄧㄣ ㄨㄢˇㄨㄛˇ ㄇㄣˊㄐㄧㄤ ㄗㄞˋ ㄇㄧㄥˊㄈㄨˇㄉㄚˋㄔ ㄉㄚˋㄏㄜ !

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Movie review of movie that I've actually seen - The new Casino Royale : Great! Loved it! Didn't think it was possible, but Larry Linville really nailed the Brit accent.

UNCLE SAM WANTS YOU!

Yes, even if you are a pasty-faced tranny-looking guy wearing lipstick. (NTTIAWWT)

p.s. hey, are they profiling me? Do they think that this photo is going to remind me of myself?

Taichung's Little India District

If you want to eat Indian food in Taichung, simply head on down to the section of Mei Tsun Rd. from Jong Gang Rd. to Bo Guan Rd.

Spice Shop I
Koh-I-Noor
Kebabish
Bollywood (Kebabish II)

and now..

Andrews.

Note for Pimp: Vicky from Kebabish wants to contact you about an e-mail from Michael.

While I like Indian food, I am really waiting for the MOFA to clear those Mexican taco trucks for import (along with requisite Mexican personnel.)

Just the Facts, Ma'am

from an interview with Al Gore:

Q: There's a lot of debate right now over the best way to communicate about global warming and get people motivated. Do you scare people or give them hope? What's the right mix?

Gore: I think the answer to that depends on where your audience's head is. In the United States of America, unfortunately we still live in a bubble of unreality. And the Category 5 denial is an enormous obstacle to any discussion of solutions. Nobody is interested in solutions if they don't think there's a problem. Given that starting point, I believe it is appropriate to have an over-representation of factual presentations on how dangerous it is, as a predicate for opening up the audience to listen to what the solutions are, and how hopeful it is that we are going to solve this crisis.

-----
I stole this from Opinion Journal.

Later in the interview he suggests nuclear power will not be the answer but cellulosic ethanol might be one. I wonder. Can we grow enough of the stuff to fuel all of the cars the world will have in the future? (Imagining 1 billion more vehicles as poor areas get richer.) I suspect nuclear power combined with an electric car would be the best option, especially because the nuclear power would also be used for normal electric output. Wind and solar power still depend on coal plants being fired up 24-7 in case its a windless overcast day. It would be nice to replace those coal plants because they are the top producers of greenhouse gases.

Favian-tech

Favian is an 8th-grade student at the school I teach at in Taichung, Taiwan. Having taught their class several times, never regularly, I discovered that the class had problems with the English language. Most did not recognize that English was a language, and those that did, did not realize that they were being taught English by us.

My colleague, the Commander, is now "in charge" of this class. As part of the unit on technology and gadgets, the Commander assigned them to go home and make a list of all machines and gadgets in their houses. Favian, who is rather large for his age, and his list stood head-and-shoulders above the others. Favian's list has two columns of 25 - maybe one for each of the universes he inhabits - with each entry in English and Chinese. There you will find nouns, verbs, adjectives, adverbs, exclamations and some 18th century English. Here is Favian's complete list in his own handwriting and below are a few excerpts.

• cell phone : high-tech
• yo-yo: low-tech
• the sun: Favian-tech
• TV : high-tech
• orange : Favian-tech
• aircraft carrier : high-tech
• different : Favian-tech
• f*ck : Favian-tech
• piss pot : low-tech
• yacht : high-tech
• America : Favian-tech
• Sabah : Favian-tech

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For all those who reside outside of Taiwan, please go here and read Michael Turton's letter to the Taipei Times. It's excellent in its portrayal of news concerning Taiwan. I don't know if it's laziness, antipathy, prejudice, ignorance or a combination of these that is responsible for this kind of reporting, but when looking at CNN's Asian bureaus, I'm sure laziness and ignorance play a part.

Cheap Siamese Catfish

Congratulations to Colorado's newest county agent, Hannibal Jim.

After months of toil and frustration Hannibal is now officially set to appraise your land, tractors and farm animals. While its definitely a sinecure, we're not sure that it can compete with being a cop in Taiwan.

Over 100 policemen with mental disorders are in service and cannot be fired or layed off, thanks to the Civil Servants Protection Law. As the policemen with mental problems are considered bombs that may go off anytime and anywhere, they therefore are not allowed to carry guns when on duty. At least, not until one killed himself and another killed his girlfriend while on duty. To prevent further tragedies, the National Police Agency prohibits them from carrying firearms and "monitors" them closely. But not closely enough to stop them from making a few extra bucks. One of the mentally-handicapped officers decided to pick up some scratch by driving in the lead of a funeral procession after charging the family $5,000 NT. No word as to if he collected overtime.

Women in Silhouette

An innocent google search for "Les Frenchies" turned up this little logo:

Doesn't it remind you of the Mudflap Girls you see on 18 wheelers?


In Taiwan we also have the KTV signs which feature a woman in silhouette draped inside a martini glass, but I could only find this image on-line:


Bonus image of a sexy blue pirate with a peg leg, if you are into that sort of thing (NTTIAWWT.)

Borat Sings

I think this is a clip from the Borat movie starring Sacha Baron Cohen... playing at a cowboy bar in Tucson, AZ, he gets the crowd to sing along to "Throw The Jew Down the Well"...

Bread, Frenchi, PIMP - does this help?

Notice that first you must sign in with your Google Account. Hotmail, Yahoo and your First National Bank account do not qualify. To do so you must enter your username of your Google Account, like the above, complete with @, and the stuff after it. Then you enter your password for the same Google Account. If that fails, find some cute computer geek or geekette to help you.

Thanks for Birthday Wishes All!!!!!

Yes , its true another year has come to pass and I am now officially within the senior citizen ranks, although yesterday when I attempted to receive a discount on bus fare , the woman driver seemed outraged that I was claiming senior citizenship at the age of 30.. I suppose I'll have to wait a couple more decades to reap the benefits.. Now in Ij's post he has me listed as a "supervisor of metals" , now being that metals are in fact inanimate heavy objects , I feel the need to explain that I actually supervise the "people" who are working with the metals, as oppsed to sitting in a room supervising the actual immobile piles of metals!! I have survived the winter without the loss of my balls , quite funny actually, spoke with jerry on the phone last night and he asked me how the weather was.. I replied , "much warmer , we hit zero degrees today" , he found that quite amusing and carried onto explain that the poor souls in Taiwan have been battling sub arctic +15 degree weather with a chilly wind!!! I feel for you all, truly!!! Now i must touch on a very heartbreaking subject... The Philadelphia Eagles.. Not only do they let Garcia go , pass up on Joe Horn , let Dominic Rhodes go to Oakland, no effort to obtain McGahee or any help for Westbrook, but alas what has their big offseason move been?? Yes , thats right be afraid N.F.L be very afraid for we have resigned the guy who holds the ball for the field goals as our back up quarter back!!!!!!!!!!! Looks like we are in store for another rough season!!! I choose not to use his name because I have erased it from my mind.. We had best sign Stallworth lose Reggie Brown and add Randy Moss , and pick up Jamal lewis!!! Tonight I am off to Toronto to celebrate the birthday with my brother and his cronies on a sleazy pub crawl including stops at the Imperial Pub and yes , The Zanzibar!!!!!!!!!! Debauchery should be on the menu, arrests?? perhaps, but they are all lawyers so we will be fine!! And being a supervisor of metals , if we are to be locked in a cell they can work on our bail and I will assure their safety by supervising the steel bars surrounding us!!! Pimp , I look forward to your return in the aummer, pick a team you want to see and a date and I will get my brothers firms seats right behind home, we will view the game as we should , like royalty!!!!!!! To everyone else miss you a bunch, enjoy and be good.. Oh some other notes , Happy Birthday to Bo who shares the same birthday as myself!!! Keep on truckin Old Fella, Congrats to Rye on his new baby, love the name although I thought we had discussed Greg as the next name??? Ill let it slide this time!! Talk to you all soon , and a reunion trip somewhere this year or next Chinese New Year must be done!! Take Care all , Frenchie!!

A birthday gift for Frenchie

How did a Canadia basher like myself miss this the day it came out?

Happy Birthday, Frenchie!

Who will be the first to defeat the Blogger log-in system: Frenchie, a supervisor of metals; Captain Beer, fashion coordinator for Rip Taylor; or Bread, soon-to-be barrister for Bambi and the Ents?

Kevlar's next project for me

This is for the Commander, who says the blog has gone to hell (Via Tim Blair).

Ivo & Burl have competition

for long baby names...(I am politely ignoring the uhhhh, character of their names.)

Announcing the arrival of a beautiful new baby boy at
St. Francis Health Center . . .

Urhines Kendall Icy Eight Special K

born to

Evelyn and Kendall

...Urhines is pronounced "Your Highness"

Rye, how are we supposed to pronounce "Blackwell?"

Tidbits

21 Point ( 21 點) is a Cantonese eatery featuring dim sum and Cantonese snacks. All food is cooked after ordering. My wife and I tried this the other day and found it good, but not great. However, as stated, nothing is pre-cooked and they have a good variety. Most dishes are steamed, but they also have baked and fried dishes as well as soup. I enjoyed the sticky-rice chicken steamed in lotus leaves. The meat balls and all shrimp items I ate were also good. For those things that I didn't really cotton to, there was some spicy yellow Chinese mustard to help it down - something that's pretty hard to find in restaurants in Taichung. It's pretty fast and moderately priced - a good change when you don't have the time to go to a proper dim sum restaurant. This is a good one-page overview and this is their own site where you can order online. They offer free delivery within the city with a surcharge for Taichung county.

The address is 台中市青海路一段10號, on the corner of Han Kou Road, Section 1 and Ching Hai Road, Section 1, about a block north of Tai Chung Gang Road.

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Congratulations to the Nazareth Swiftettes, who set a national record with their 18th state basketball title.

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Wes Welker, former Texas Tech star, has been traded from the Miami Dolphins to the New England Patriots. This puts me in a dilemma. I stopped caring about the Pats when they got rid of Pat the Patriot and replaced him with the swooshie wraith-like guy. I started actively disliking them when they began winning Super Bowls and everyone proclaimed Tom Brady the best QB ever ( never mind about the rest of the team or coach). He's very good, yes. The best? No. Great? Probably. But leave it at that. Now Wes is going to play for them and I can't root against a Tech boy, except against the Cowboys, and it's gonna be difficult to get used to. But, it does provide more incentive to get to the China Bowl in August. Has anybody arranged that yet?

Family Guy's History of Earth - Redneck Style (youtube video)

You've been warned

Genius with a sparkler. You might want to blur your screen before clicking on this.

Sundown 'n Nazareth

Saturday in Austin, two local girls basketball teams will play for the state championship.

In Class 1A Division I, Sundown will play Lindsay. Sundown is a town of about 1,500 situated a little southwest of Lubbock. I've been there several times to play their 9-hole golf course and usually manage to hit the oil well pump jack on hole #8 (or #9).

In Class 1A Division II, the Nazareth Swiftettes face off against the Garden City Lady Kats (Bearcats). The Swiftettes have already won 17 state championships, which an ESPN article claims is the most of any public school in the nation. My local TV station states that 18 is the true historic number needed. Nazareth is a tiny place of a little more than 300 people west of I-27 between Canyon and Plainview (the green arrow on the map).

Wright Thompson has an article for ESPN, "Hoops of Nazareth" which talks about the history of the town, the basketball program and its role in keeping the town alive. Interesting, but it comes off as being a little too bleak, striving for pathos. If anyone is from there or has friends or relatives there, I would like to know their opinion of the article. Otherwise, I must delegate my friend, The Red-Headed Stepchild, to go on a road trip and do some asking.

Don't know the teams' cheers, so just consider this some long distance rooting for Sundown and Nazareth.

Oh Canada!

I don't know about Oregonians or Montanans or Floridians or Californians or Lubbockians, er, Lubbockites, uh, people from Lubbock, but in the Great White North, this is the kind of girl we take home to mom. Or maybe dad

.

Birth of Baby Burl

Baby Burl was born last evening at 6:14 pm at Ren Ai Hospital in Da Li. It was a quick labour and we barely made it to the delivery room in time, not arriving till almost 6:00... for a play by play, you can read what I wrote early this morning on Honeybees, pics included...

Ivo and Burl met for the first time this morning... everybody is resting this afternoon after not much sleep last night...

We are slowly winning the war...

...I mean, the war to make the whole world drive on the right side of the road.

Check out this map where you can see there are a lot more countries defecting to right-side driving than the other way around.

Driving on the wrong side of the road (the left side) is weird, but you can adapt to it. The problem is the transition period when your reflexes cause you to flinch occasionally.

Question for Canadians: The map shows your country as being purple, and the key says this means that you "used to have mixed system, now drives on right." Could you explain that?

Why aren't there any countries still using a "mixed system?" You'd think Myanmar, North Korea or somewhere would still do so. I guess Taiwan sort of qualifies as a mixed system, i.e. the lane markers and dividers are optional only.

p.s. I am sure Rye will love the whole site...pretty fun stuff.