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LOUISVILLE, KENTUCKY — I need to acknowledge some milestones now. First, this month marks the fifth year I’ve kept this blog going, and today is my 55th (double-nickel!) birthday.
[In Chinese shorthand, the number 5 (wu) can stand for "I" or "me" (wo), so this post is really just all about me. Me me me.]
As I’ve said before, I started this exercise in self-expression (and self-promotion) as a lark, then I discovered I actually liked doing it. I can write about anything I bloody well please, so that’s really cool. And it seems people actually read it, which is even cooler.
Thanks to the wonders of social networking, I’ve been inundated with birthday wishes from literally all around the world (the US, China, Israel, and Pakistan, to name a few — and Australia – thanks, mate!). Quite a few of those wishes have come from students I taught ages ago, who still remember me fondly enough to shoot me quick Facebook comments. I am a very happy and fortunate man. Thanks, everyone!
On one birthday 25 years, I watched while the Shuttle Challenger exploded shortly after liftoff, killing its crew. Today, I am watching CNN cover the civil unrest in Egypt, which while tense seems to be far less fatal than one might expect. Historic events happen all the time, naturally, but today’s events (and the great time I am spending with my kids on my holiday here) will help me remember this day for a long, long time.
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JISHOU, HUNAN — A while ago, I linked this blog to my Facebook account. My posts here are automatically imported into my FB Notes. Once upon a time, I had another plugin that extracted comments to the imported Notes from FB back here. But it stopped working, and its developer gave up working on it.
But another developer stepped in to restore the functionality. Facebook Comments TNG works! I installed it just now, and it pulled comments from FB perfectly. Now, I may have to go through them and edit out duplicates, but that’s a minor irritation compared to having to manually copy-and-paste FB comments myself.
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JISHOU, HUNAN — We had a white New Year’s here. It started to snow yesterday and continued into today. The temperature is about 30°F. Here’s a photo — not too often you see snow on a palm tree.
 Palm tree. Snow. I'm so confused! I know this is small potatoes compared to what some of you guys in the USA have had. Even so, the inter-city buses are grounded, because of icy roads. Meanwhile, the taxi drivers are on strike, protesting a outrageously high boost in their monthly licensing fees. The only things running are the city buses and the trains.
Sort of like snow in Kentucky.
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JISHOU, HUNAN — First, the link. I can’t embed the video. Fuldans à lá Wheaton.
One of my students, Luo Ye (Ellie), sent one to me. (That’s her in the previous post, with icing all over her face, by the way.) A Swedish band, Fulkultur (Ugly Culture), created the site to market themselves and raise a bit of money. For $1, you can upload a mugshot and personalize the dancing body. For $5, you can get high quality downloads of their music, too.
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 Happy Christmas from China! JISHOU, HUNAN — This photo sums up my Christmas here. Hope you have some fun, too.
It’s Christmas Eve here. I just got back from a big faculty luncheon. Tonight was the annual Christmas show by our college students, and tomorrow I’m busy with other holiday gatherings. And we may have snow tonight.
I hope everyone has a wonderful Christmas, Kwanzaa, Festivus, Solstice or just a quiet time at home with someone you love, or like, or can at least put up with for a few hours. God Jul!
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JISHOU, HUNAN — I snapped this from my balcony window this morning around 6:50. It was misty here, as it is usually early in the day, but the moon looked so good hanging just above the mountains to the west that I grabbed my camera and squeezed off a few shots. These were two of the best.
 The full moon at winter solstice Technical details: Shot with a Nikon D60 with manual Nikkor 200 mm lens, ASA 400, f5.6, 1/100 sec
 Solstice moon over the hills Technical details: Shot with a Nikon D60 with Nikkor 18-55 AF-S DX lens, ASA 400, f5.6, 1/13 sec (braced against window frame)
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It’s today, at 6:38 PM EST (6:38 AM Wednesday my time). I hope you got a chance to see the lunar eclipse, because I’m on the wrong side of the world for it.
Just for the record, this is the shortest period of daylight in the northern hemisphere for the whole year. And the furthest south on the horizon that the sun will rise and set. Now the days will get longer, and the sun will move toward the north.
Good reason for a celebration! Have some glögg! It’s a traditional holiday punch in Sweden and the other north lands. The really old fashioned way to make it was to leave out the sugar, and instead drink the punch while holding a sugar cube in your teeth. At least, that’s how my grandpa did it. Sugar was expensive way back when.
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