The Bad Half

I can divide my weekend into two parts, most of the time. One day is the bad half of the weekend, and one day is the good half of the weekend. The bad half is the day that I stay homework, and do homework. The good half of the weekend is the day that I get to go out and do things. When I actually get to be social. Today was the bad half of the weekend.

I didn't plan for today to be the bad half. In fact, I actually had plans for today to be the good half. A lot of my friends were planning on going to Taiwan Street to just mess around, and I had originally wanted to go. But when I woke up at 9 this morning, I was so lazy, that I couldn't convince myself to even shower, much less get dressed and go out. So I respectfully bowed out of the outing, and instead stayed inside and decided to write my essay, make flash cards, and do whatever homework I have.

It didn't exactly work out like I had thought that it was going to. Sure, I got a hundred characters of my essay done, and I made flash cards, but that was about all the use that I was today. I won't admit to anything else. I have to maintain my cool mysterious mystic, you know. Very important. :P

I went out for a quick lunch of zhou (which is basically rice soup. Better than I make it sound.) I got a cold mango one, that tastes like mango mochi. It's like eating the main meal and dessert at the same time. Not very filling, but at least it isn't greasy and oily like most Chinese food. So much better than a kick in the head at least. And I can't get it in America, so I'm happy.

I went to go see Jack today at 4. There was basically no one in the gym. No one to witness my humiliation at least. I'll take it. I was super tired when i get there, but I figured, it's better than not going at all. This time, he didn't push me to muscle loss. I'll take what I can get. My problem is, I think that Jack thinks I am in better shape than I actually am, because recently, I have started feeling really sick by about halfway through the work out. I think that the weights I am lifting are too heavy or something, who knows. I only have so much energy in reserve, before I use it all up and start feeling sick. I just told Jack that I was having stomach problems recently, and used that as my excuse. At least, I think that is why.

The problem with this is that I will feel sick, and everybody knows, that once your stomach starts feeling weird, you can't do anything. Much less work out. It feels horrible. So I feel bad for not being able to work out properly. And I feel guilty. I feel like Jack thinks worse of me. Seriously, I think I have a serious problem with neurosis. I think I need to start telling Jack to go easy on the weights. And the stretching. Bloody hell, I almost hit him today. The one that hurts the most is when you push your legs as far out as they can go. And he just kept pushing. OUCH. I can handle pain, sometimes, but not when it feels like he is going to rip my muscles in half. That is not a comfortable pain at all. I didn't hit him though. I think that he was a little disappointed in me today, but that's easy for him to say when all he does is stand there and watch me suffer. I think that he has a bit of a sadist streak in him. He wanted me to come back tomorrow and the next day as well. I haven't decided if I want to or not. I think that that just might kill me.

I was happy just to sit and go on the internet for an hour after I got back from the gym. I wanted to stop sweating before I jumped in the shower. I wish that this gym was the kind of gym where you can just lay on the ground when you are done. Unfortunately, not so much .

Tonight, I had one more fun thing on the agenda. I had to meet my language partner downtown, and then we were going to walk over to Houhai and hang out for a bit. But I have a fun story. Just as I was leaving my dorm building, and walking over to the road to get a taxi, a Chinese guy walked up to me and started talking to me. Do you remember the story that I told about the guy that interrupted me when I was practicing with my language partner, and then started saying that you can't trust Americans? Same guy. He apparently didn't recognize me. He asked me if I was American, and then told me that he wanted to be friends. I made excuses, saying that I had to be somewhere right now, and that I had a lot of homework to do tomorrow. Then he asked me if I had a boyfriend, and when I said that I already did, he left me alone immediately. Creeper. He didn't even have any front teeth. Obviously, I don't have a boyfriend, but hey, what he doesn't know won't hurt him. My imaginary boyfriend comes in handy in cases like these. Little white lies and all that...

I was a couple minutes late meeting Qiao Xue (Beijing traffic is horrible. There are people EVERYWHERE) but once I finally met up with her, it wasn't a long walk to get to Houhai. Houhai is actually a pretty fun place to be. It's a bunch of bars surrounding a huge lake. A lot of people go swimming in the lake, or rent boats to drive around. When it gets dark, the lights reflect onto the lake, and it is beautiful. I'm not a huge fan of drinking, but it was nice to walk around, and look at the lights, and talk to Qiao Xue. She is such an awesome person. She is 22, and a third year student here at the Beijing Language and Culture University. She is a native Beijing person, out of the dorms and back at home for the summer. It was a good night. I bought a couple of hand made note books, but this area is so expensive that it just isn't worth buying a whole lot. I don't want to go broke. There were some really pretty clothes that I was so tempted by. But on reflection, it is a good thing that I didn't buy them. Sure, they were pretty, but they had so many colors and sparkles that there is absolutely now way that I would ever be able to wear it. It would just be one of those things that I would hang in my closet, and show off to my friends on the hanger every once in a while.

More on Houhai though. There are a lot of foreigners there in the bars, so it is super expensive. One interesting thing about the Chinese bars are that if you just walk by, people who work at the bars will come out, and follow you, trying to convince you to come and sit in the bar. It's hard to convince them that you just want to keep walking. They are extremely persistent. One followed my friend and I for 5 minutes, trying to convince us to come and have a drink with us. He was not good looking enough, we decided.

And now, I am listening to Radio Rounds, trying to write down my day before I forget it. I know that my day might sound boring to you, but it was perfect for me. I did exactly what I wanted to do, and there is something insanely satisfying about that. I can go to bed happy tonight. How often do you get to say that?