h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

Prosaic version:- I slipped off a pavement.
Dramatic version,:- OOOOOHHHHH, IT HURTS, IT HURTS, IT HURTS.
Still in China, but now having probs with chinoise carton vertes, (red tape, y' know?)

So have you got a plaster cast on it?

I haven't managed to break any bones yet, no mean achievement as I'm terribly clumsy .

I hope I'm not suffering from by asking if the wedding is all organised?

No feet, but can't let fiancee see your email, as STILL HAVEN'T WRITTEN THAT DIVORCE LETTER!
weddings here very lo key, but the Reception takes ages to organise/pay for, and the Wedding photos are all done in a studio, aand can cost an arm and a leg. ( Me? I'll take the photos of H. and a stand in, and Photoshop myself in later).

Blimey, mate, you had better get a move on with the D word! Those wheels can grind pretty slowly.

Weddings are fortune where ever they are! Ours was a low key affair, with an evening party and I still don't know the exact cost, as H comes over pale and peculiar at the thought of what he could have spent the money on

It is not long till our third wedding anniversary, the time seems to have flown and either way it was money well spent and we both wonder why it took us 9 years to get around to it!

Have to find a husband for wife's older sister before we can marry, ( seriously!).
They take the family very seriously here, they even have specific words for the wife of your uncle on your mother's side, and probably her dog, assuming she hasn't eaten it, ( yes, they eat dog here, and about everything else that moves, and most of what doesn't).
3rd anniversary? You mere stripling, the first 25 years are the best!

Second time round, no stripling sadly, but sooooooooo much

Useless Hound (Boots) said she had dropped by your page. I gave her your U number as she is planning to do a TEFL and head east.

Having lived in Singapore, I knew about the eating thing, wich is why we had a and the neighbours kept their chained up at night.

I had also heard of the older sister having to marry first, but I thought that was a tradition that had died out. Obviously not! Have adverts been placed?

The planning for Xmas has begun here, the in-laws were asking us what we were planning to do at the beginning of the month! I hadn't even begun to think about it, then my younger brother started and has asked Dad down to his house. He still has young children so they love having Grandpa coming to see them. I have no idea if my two will even be conscious on Xmas day! No2 son may have moved out anyway before then. So I expect I will be holding a family gathering here at some point over the festive season, at tleast we won't have to worry about drinking and driving if eveyone comes here

If Christmas day is Monday - Thursday, I'll probably be working.
Anyway, without the atmosphere of drunken goodwill, bonhomie, and people being sick, it just doesn't feel like Christmas here.

I managed to accidentally unsubscribe from Useless Hound's thread so ask her to start a new one will you?

Will do, hootoo isn't behaving at all well lately which doesn't help.

Grey and misty this morning, but I think it is meant to brighten up later. We have still had very little rain, not enough to make any difference to the garden, it is still bone dry just an inch or two

down. Most of the leaves have come off our cherry tree, but the oaks around are still hanging onto their leaves. They are always the last to fall and prolong the leaf raking, we have this debate every year: to wait until all the leaves have fallen; or to try and sweep regualarly so that there is some semblance of tidiness.

The town's firework display was stupendous. There wasn't a bonfire as is deemed as environmentally harmful, so there was a beacon lighting ceremony instead. But the display made up for the lack of flames

I see that the Dome is to be transformed into a winter wonderland with ice rink, Xmas themed rides, circus etc. We might go and take a look as I haven't been to the Dome.

So are there no Chinese festivals to enliven winter? I remember the Festival of the Dead/Moon Festival as being a big occasion in Singapore but can't remember when it was.

Yes the Mid Autumn, ( Moon cake day) Festival, is quite big, lots of very expensive boxes of Moon cakes to give your friends, who must then keep their face by buying you some for the same price... But it ain't winter here, cold as 20 in the day, but I'm sitting in the Huang bar in a Hawiaan shirt, ( oops, quick check for trousers, yes, OK). Nobody here I know celebrates the old ways, in fact Nanning doesn't even have a big concert hall, or much public culture. To give you same idea, they had Richard Marx to the Folksong Festival...

Don't forget to tell Useless Hound to get back in touch, and tell her that the unsubscribing was down to my poorly thumb.

She has, it's the Hi Beanfoto thread on your page, I expect it has slipped down your convo list.

How's the search going for a groom for the older sister?

Apart from H continuing to w*rk 14 hours a day, 6 days a week, the only other drama here is the ongoing fight to stop a development of house on an area created from combining parts of several back gardens, with the demolition of the next-door-house-but-one. The last proposal was thrown out as it was thought 12 houses were too many, both for the area of land as well as local services. Now the developers have come back with a plan for 14!

That's the thread I accidentally unsubscribed from, and I don't know how to get it back, or am I just being befuddled. No husband on the horizon, I meet too few lao wai ( Foreign Friends to give it the quaint translation).
Planners?
Here the local government is building roads , they tell you one week, you're out the next, and it's rubble the day after, and the money you get back, is ...perfectly adequate, ( That's for the Man). Be thankful for planning permission, because it implies that sometimes there isn't! And Chinese ideas of adequate spacing between buildings is very different. Ever been down the Shambles in York?

Here's somebody else who is in China, not permanently but travels there rather a lot: U534396

Yep, I've been down the Shambles in York, but don't forget, I've lived in Singapore so I have seen Chinese building techniques in action. Just needed reminding of them! That bamboo scaffolding always looked so flimsy!

We have The Shambles in Guildford too, some of the town's last Medieval buildings survive there.

At last! After 7 attempts, I've got to the posting page.
Damn those pop ups is not even the Beeb exempt?
The bamboo scaffolding is probably the least flimsy part about Chinese buildings.
Been away from H2 a while, just doing I don't know what, I Come back, take ages to get in, and when I get there, it's this clunky.
Happy whatever. Christmas over here was subdued, phoned my kids and choked up.
Have to find a new job/apartment. Could do without it, but Chinese personnel management has still to reach the Dark Ages.
Still, I love bits of being in China still.

Christmas was a bit bitter/sweet in that No2 son moved out the Sunday before, so I was missing him, but he was still popping back and forth for more stuff and things. We still managed tohave a good tme though

It is the first time he has really left home, he didn't go to Uni so I had been used to him being around. But he and the g/f are very happily settling in and are so pleased at being together.

I presume you won't be celebrating the New Year for a few weeks yet? Is that a public holiday in China? I always feel that I should make and effort to celebrate, but quite frankly would be just as happy not to! H was supposed tobe organising something, but has left it too late. I'm not fussed as he gave up most of Boxing Day to building a new PC for me and I can play games again!

If my son was up to leaving the nest, I would make my ex sell it and buy something big, ( and that equates to English pokey), here.
01 01, ( and that's the Other way round from the Western 01 01), is a holiday here, and the proper Chinese New Year was 22nd of December, (12 22). The bash next month is the Spring Festival, ( and even here, it'll be far from Spring).
Confused?
Pity me, in Chinese there is often several ways to say exactly the same thing, ( in English there are at least different naunces). Why? Something to do with Face?
Was the air blue on Boxing Day, when the computer wouldn't boot for the 5th time? Did he cut himself on the casing?
Games eh?

One of the many amazing things about H is that he doesn't swear, goodness knows we give him enough provocation!

Generally the PC is going well, it ain't half fast, but I can't see my main drive with all the my stuff on it without ferckling through My Computer, selecting the drive etc. When H installed XP, it stuck itself on my second drive, apparently this is normal with XP if it 'sees' another OS. All to clever for it's own good!

Still no snow here, how can you have winter without snow? It isn't right.