here and there

Things I like here:

• paying for everything at 7/11. so easy. so nice. except it gets a little tricky when you can't speak chinese. i kind of just hand them a bunch of money and hope they're honest.
• going out to eat and spending $3 to get 15 vegetable dumplings and a bowl of noodles. it did help that we had our friends girlfriend speaks chinese. or ordering 5 items at the thai place, plus rice, plus a tiny dessert and paying $15
  
• not having people honk at other people all the time. most relaxed drivers ever over here. amazing how it looks "crazy" and "out of control" when you're not driving in it, but once you get out there, the cars/scooters are like ants... they just go with the flow
  
• going and buying housing stuff to put in our place that makes allison happy. (we're still working on having her not automatically pick up the first split pea colored thing she sees!)
• water bills that are $5. granted, you're not getting the cleanest/freshest water. but it is still nice.
• catching and releasing cockroaches. long story short. allison "kill it!" me "no, just move the whole bed to the side and i'll throw a box over it." done.
  
• getting multiple boxes of sandpaper-y kleenex when you fill up at the gas station that i never use
  
• spending $60 per month on gas instead of $360 when we were at home. amazing
  
• working at the same school as allison
  
• staring at other westerners because it is so rare to see them
  
• going out to eat. a lot. too cheap to pass up.
• buying electronics for cheap. they're made here, they better be cheap. (except apple. damn you apple)
  
• dear espn360, thank you for letting me watch the ucks lose to boise state. and then accepting their victory with pride and without any... oh wait. nevermind.
• skyping with people back home. especially video skype.
  
• hanging out with some of the other teachers here. they're pretty nice.
  
• light switches on the outside of a room. i mean, whose idea was it to put a light switch inside of a dark room? makes much more sense. and all the light switches have little green dots on them if they're off... so if it is dark, you can actually see where you need to be going to turn it on. genius.
• reading other people's blogs about living abroad: columbia, taiwan, used to live in taiwan, and kazakhstan are the ones i check out the most often... just because i know them. or have been looking at them the longest. if you're out there, leave us a comment so we can read about you too.
  
• paying way too much for good beer. seriously. just import some micro brew in bulk and charge less
  
  

what i'm looking forward to in portland:

• taco cart on se 84th and woodstock, vita, herbivore, sweet pea, food fight!, taco bell fire sauce, mexican food
  
• sidewalks
• humidity under 80%
• hub, deschutes, rogue
  
• watching football with my dad
  
• talking about wedding details with my brother (joke)
• playing wii with sister and her bf
  
• making food with mom
• being cold
• kicking tk's ass in anything
  
• buying allison a new computer
• flying from portland to taiwan and knowing what to expect

i probably missed a lot, but realized it'd been a few days since we posted, so wanted to get this out. hope all is well.