Foreign to me

The last few weeks I've been staggering through my routine, a little shell-shocked by a crazy schedule, family upheavals, and the anticipation of my Chet moving to the Big Apple without me. I've been mopey and whiny and hitting the ice cream too hard. I recognize that when you don't have the direction, drive, or focus it takes to complete a stupid blog entry, it's time to get help. I thought tonight I would polish my rusty old html coding and complete multiple entries I let languish as unpublished drafts. Excuse a personal indulgence.



I came across an SD card of photos from the Hong Kong trip in March. I can't believe that was six months ago. It was pretty cool to see the sights of Hong Kong again in The Dark Knight. In filming, they had to cut a scene where Batman jumped into Victoria Harbor because of its polluted state. I found that Hong Kong was absolutely as polluted and disgusting as you would imagine from hearing that. I still don't believe that you can ever completely see the sun through the fog.

An interesting thing I learned in Hong Kong is that each finger on your left hand has an important meaning. A ring on your thumb means you are looking for a boyfriend or girlfriend. A ring on your pointer finger means you have a boyfriend or girlfriend. A ring on the middle finger means that you are engaged. A ring on the ring finger means you are married. A ring on the pinky means you are divorced or do not want a boy/girlfriend or do not want to get married.

Speaking of trips (in every sense of the word), I went on my first outta town trip with Chet's family. I got to go to San Antonio and see Gordo on tour with Shooter Jennings. That was one highlight of a fun weekend. Other highlights:

• Sea World
• Chet's iPhone getting stuck inside the door panel of his parents' car, having to stop at Dollar General in Big Spring to buy a screwdriver, dismantling the door to retrieve the phone, with me watching and laughing hysterically the whole time
• Hanging out with the niece and nephews
• Eating sushi on the ride home - my favorite was the "Heat Attack": spicy tuna and cream cheese inside a jalapeño - but we also got some flaming eel or something

Back in Lubbock, for Friday dinner, Chet and I tried a couple of spicy Indian entrees, Lamb Vindaloo and Paneer Tikka Masala. For dessert, I made Alton Brown's Indian Rice Pudding. It was such a cinch to make, I had it again today for breakfast. The only substitution I made was swapping ground cinnamon, cloves, and nutmeg for the ground cardamom. At $13.99 for a small jar of the cardamom, I figured I'd use what was on hand.