N: Chinese Acrobats

Jetlag has prevented the group of us from doing anything in the midafternoon to early evening.  Today we met up with some friends that teach in Beijing with our organization, had lunch at the Kro's Nest (killer pizza), took a nap, and then.....Chinese Acrobats!  

K and I saw them over three years ago when we first came to China.  We were in Beijing for a month and the acrobats were one of our cultural outings.  For less than 10 dollars a person we were entertained for over an hour.  Many of you have probably seen some of the things they do before: Ring Jumping, Tests of Strength, Tests of balance, Slight of Hand combined with dancing, Unicycle Head/Foot Bowl Juggling, Pole Climbing/Jumping, etc etc.  They have changed my life: I will now leave a room the same way they leave the stage.  I'll do my trick, land it, and then run off with an extended jazz hand.  Way cool.

We'll be doing a Hutong tour tomorrow and also hope to see the flag lowering at Tiananmen Square tomorrow evening.  After that, we're off to Yinchuan.

We couldn't take video during the performance, but I found a video of a ring performance that was almost identical to the one we saw tonight.  This is just part of the show.  Can you even imagine stuff like this for over an hour!  Best 10 dollars spent. ever.

N: A baby for all occasions

Made it to China!  Landed, jetlagging, and enjoying the chilly weather.  Shep and I got up at about 3:30A.M.  to get some playtime in.  I was already up so it wasn't an issue, K had already been hanging with him since 2:30.

My parents had gotten a new heater for the spa before we left for China and K and Shep tried it out.  Both nights we were there.  K is hoping for a water baby.  I think we got one. 

Spa Baby

Airplane Baby

Found my Piggies Baby

Waiting Baby

Dinner Baby

N: Departure

Wednesday
afternoon we are travelling to Rockwall to start our month(ish) long trip to
China.  Mom and Dad are coming with
us so we thought we would spend a night at their place, answer any final
burning questions, and help where we could as they packed.  Early Friday morning we’ll be on our
way!

We got some
decent feedback about what to get for video footage and we’ll try to get a
whole bunch so we can edit it all down to the good stuff.  Couple things to know about now and the
future:  we are still and will
remain with the same organization as we transition from university teaching to
full time language study.  They
take care of us and we feel like we get our (your) money’s worth.

I was
approved by insurance (lets hope it doesn’t change) for Medtronic Minimed’s Real Time Glucose Monitoring system. 
It is one of the most amazing changes to my diabetes management since I
got an insulin pump almost 10 years ago. 
I’ll write more about it later, I’ve only been using it about 5 days and
I am still working out the kinks. 
For the diabetics out there: my last A1c was 7.9, meaning I had an
average bloodsugar of about 177. 
Pretty disappointing.  My
goal for the next one is 6.9 (average BS of 144).

China is
quite the adventure and we’ll make sure to take lots of pictures and keep folks
updated as Dad tries Beijing Duck, mom visits the TerraCotta Warriors, and
Shepherd charms our Chinese friends (I’m sure he will charm strangers too).

Boo