State Fair?

It's State Fair time in Minnesota, and while you may have deep fried pancake wrapped, bacon rolled hotdogs, we have some specialties of our own here in China. We wanted to share some photos from a recent annual festival we went to in Dali, China. It's just like the MN State Fair...kind of.

can demons possess scooters?

When I got off my electric scooter and tried to engage the alarm, there was only silence. It had been "losing it's voice" steadily over the last week, but now the voice was gone. That was a little unsettling considering the fact that i have already had one scooter stolen here. As it turns out, the alarm was the least of my problems last Wednesday.

When i came out of the store and hopped on the now silent scooter, a strange and funny thing happened. To be honest, it's only funny now as i look back on it. The only way to describe it is to have you picture a shiny blue mechanical bull in a bustling public parking lot with a confused 30 something white male on top as dozens of slightly amused Chinese people stare on. Yeah, that about sums it up. I am only partially kidding when i say that my scooter became demon possessed. I jumped off and backed away looking around as we all do in situations like this, scanning for a friendly sympathetic face. Then, without warning, the unmanned scooter began to rock back and forth as if taunting me, daring me to have another go-round. I cautiously inched forward and snatched the key thereby solving the problem...or so i thought. Imagine my surprise as the unmanned and now keyless scooter gyrated wildly adding bewilderment to my embarrassment.

I tried for the next several minutes to ride the scooter home. I am sure now i know how my mom felt sitting in the chevy chevette the first time she tried to drive a stick shift. Sorry for ever laughing at that, mom. Finally, when all attempts at driving failed, i was reduced to the ride of shame sitting atop the electric scooter, flinging both feet backward and working way too hard for every inch. I must say, most days I love my scooter. Last Wednesday was not one of them.

Business Class...the rest of the story

With the taste of chocolate drizzled strawberry cheesecake lingering in our mouths, we reluctantly disembarked the plane and made our way to the luggage hall where we quickly discovered the downside to our upgrade. As the last of the bags trickled off of the belt we saw a few familiar faces...the other poor saps who took the bait in Minneapolis. That family didn’t get any of their bags either. We had wondered about this scenario at the decision point, but the lure of the fully automated reclining seats was much too strong.

Thankfully, we had already planned to spend two nights in Shanghai on our way home, so waiting another 24 hours for our bags to come wasn’t too much of a disappointment. The only real drag was having to don our trans-pacific flight clothes again the next morning and endure the 97 degree Shanghai heat as we traipsed around the city. By the end of the day when we finally received the call from the airport that our bags had arrived, we contemplated sending our clothes to pick them up as they were now able to walk on their own. You’d think we would know by now to pack some extra necessary items in our carry-ons.

In the end, all of our bags arrived full of clean clothes and deodorant and we were happy and content again dreaming of the next upgrade which we would take in a heartbeat...if it ever comes.