Monday Quickies.

• Happy Dance!
• Keith Olbermann has a new job in Wuxi, China.
• The Eternal Shrug.  I am getting to that attitude when I look at the world, but this is probably because I am getting old and resigned to some things.  I also shrug because here I am in China watching what is happening from an outsider's vantage point.  China, being my in-law, I do have skin in the game, but still I will have to shrug if the dynastic change that eventually will happen, does happen to happen and I witness it.
• I avoid online chats as much as I can.  It just seems to be a waste of time.  If I chatted with every Chinese person who wanted to chat with me, I would never get anything done.  And the rare person who does wish to chat with me always seems to interrupt some train of thought I am on.  Still, I have to be polite, even to the jerks.  Thankfully most of the people I know aren't jerks, and I always feel ashamed of myself for not giving these fine people my full attention when they do chat with me.  And to be honest, my ways do cause me to be often lacking for company -- I don't have a socializing faucet that I can turn on and off when I desire -- I have to take the trickles when I can. 
• All that said, I did have an online conversation with a jerk yesterday.  As a rule, one should be wary of most English teachers in China -- they are here to screw the women, physically and mentally, and are avoiding something in their home countries - looking after children and responsibility and jail and debt.   In my case, I came to try something new.  I was avoiding a dull provincial life.  What I have ended up with is a wife and child -- a life that has turned out to be more provincial and routine that I bargained for.  But it keeps me moored.  I have no need for bucket lists.  I like being able to shrug.
• More about TKIC.
• Waking up.
• The pickers in my NFL playoff competition were 1-7 on the Packers-Bears game.  Only my brain predicted a Packers victory.