What a week...

This has been one of the fastest/longest/most stressful weeks on a long long time. To start things off, last Saturday, Tommy's mom called with really terrible news. His cousin's daughter, Bella, 14 mos. went in for emergency surgery on a brain tumor. Tommy is very close with his cousin, and this news just tore him up (as it would with any human with a heart)...so he made the quick decision to fly home and be with his family. (Not to get too gushy...but) I can say that his decision to drop everything (he had a business trip planned for the following week) and go be with his family made me love him even more...if that's even possible. I am so proud of him. Weird, but whatever.
So, with that news, and knowing that conditions would be about the same until Tuesday, when they went in to take the tumor out, I was just kind of this walking blob.
I had a very unsuccessful trip to the fabric market to pick up a khaki trench coat and new black peacoat. The trench coat wasn't ready, so she told me she'd have it delivered, and because of a miscommunication w/ the peacoat lady, she was going to remake it...so it wasn't ready either. I went home, sat around like a bum and watched movies all afternoon. Sunday, I spend the entire afternoon on the phone w/ the trench coat lady trying to track down my mis-delivered coat...They delivered it to the wrong apartment and couldn't track it down.
Monday was just a long day, but to my surprise, when I got home, my trench coat had finally made it to my doorstep!
Tuesday was long due to a "conference" with a parent (drinks and chatting-totally fun, but late late night)...
Wednesday and Thursday were both 1/2 days with parent conferences. I don't mind those so much, but they take a lot out of you, and I had to stay at work til 6 both nights...which to most people, no biggie, but getting to leave at 4 most days makes 6 seem really really late.
Then, Friday was a 1/2 day and trick-or-treat and carnival day. PLUS my after school arts and crafts club that lasts til 5...the trick-or-treating was so chaotic and unorganized, and the carnival was slightly better. I did, however, manage to convince 150+ students (age 3-10) that I accidentally killed Frankenstein, cut open his head, pull out his brains and eyeballs, and put them into some black, dark boxes...they thought it was cool, gross, and just crazy...AND I was a red lego block...which was great. Legos are an international hit!! (why wouldn't they be, right?)
On Friday, I went out with two of my colleagues, and that was great. Then Saturday was a bar opening that was 100 RMB (~$15) for all you can drink and eat til 12...and about 30 minutes into me being there, I fell down the stairs. sober. I had on very high heels and jeans that were about an inch too long. My jeans got caught under the heel as I was taking a step down, I rolled down about 9 stairs, spilling my drink everywhere, dropping my cell phone and landing in a puddle of said spilled drink...needless to say, those heels are going to be put away for a while, and I will have very strange bruises for the next week.

Luckily, today was a nice relaxing Sunday. I got a lot of work done, cleaned the apartment (took pictures of it (FINALLY), and posted them on facebook), and watched a couple movies. I am so ready for Tommy to be home tomorrow, and then a (hopefully) short month and a half later, and I'll be home for Christmas.

Time is flying by out here, and I'm just now starting to really take it in and see as much as I can before saying Zaijian to Shanghai. --Better late than never, right?

I hope everyone had a great halloween and has a good week ahead.

-Jen

Life Lately

So, things in Shanghai have stayed consistently busy lately, which is nice, because it's made time go by quickly. With 19 ESL students, I am constantly looking for new ways to approach teaching English to them, and it's proven to be just the challenge I was looking for. I sure do whine about it a lot, but, when I really sit back and think about it, it's the best thing for me. I am reminded time and time again just how patient I need to be, and that although I'm not seeing immediate results from the students, progress is being made. Friday felt like one of the best days I've had so far this school year (could've been the semi-overdose of caffiene from a grande coffee), but things seemed to click just right. I'm hoping this week will prove to go like Friday, and my new ideas will work better. As I learn new things about myself and my students, the year just seems to get better and better, and it had been flying by! I feel like I just started yesterday, but really, I've only got about 2 months left for this semester. Crazy!!!

In other news, I have been trying to get into running...it's been quite the battle...I have discovered that I am an excellent excuse maker...which isn't so great...BUT, I've been able to think through all of the excuses of why I don't want/need to get up, and then I finally guilt myself out of laying in bed. I know that a)I'm not going back to sleep anyway, b)Tommy will give me a hard time about being a lazy butt, and c)I will feel like a lazy butt...everyone I talk to that is a runner says that once you finally get into a groove, it's great...but I'm still in the VERY beginning stages, and the groove for me seems very very far down the line...but alas, I will keep it up and hopefully begin to really enjoy and be jumping out of bed to get going...so, runner friends, any advice or encouragement would be greatly appreciated! ;o)

Well, I'm about out of updates worth reading for today--I will try to be more regular with my updates, for those of you who actually do look forward to seeing my posts..