official summer vacation

I feel like my summer has finally started, now that classes are over, grades are turned in, and all my good friends have moved home. The last couple weeks now have been a succession of naps, TV on DVD, and eating. My apartment looks like a moving explosion happened, since not only did I inherit various appliances and other goodies, but I also offered to hold some boxes for Jason and Julianne and send them later once they have jobs and more money. I am really enjoying the "new" toaster oven, George Foreman grill, and I'm probably going to break out the blender tomorrow. It's been kind of a dilemma on whether or not to unpack this stuff, since we may or may not be moving in a few weeks. All along this term, they'd been telling us that July would be moving month, but now that I ask if we can nail a date down since it IS July, they say "maybe late July". I'd rather them wait until August when I'm back from vacation, but you can only hit your head against that wall so many times. I should be packing and cleaning and vacation-planning...we're only 13 days out! It's a little scary to be that close, and I'm getting nervous about my capacity as ultimate trip planner and having to buy my train ticket to Beijing, especially. I might get an ex-student to help me.

Speaking of ex-students, tonight some guys from my favorite class--Thursday afternoon--took me out to dinner! Oh my goodness, we had so much fun! Technically theirs was the lowest level class, but the number of high-level speakers was very concentrated, and they were the ones who arranged this dinner, so there were no awkward misunderstandings. I taught them the word "tipsy", which they loved, and they made at least 10

toasts, with beer, but they didn't make me drink the whole glass-full like Chinese traditionally do. The restaurant was hotpot, and it's a famous chain in China called "Little Sheep" (translated, of course). This was real hotpot, where they put the bowl of flavored liquid on a burner in the middle of your table, and you order all different kinds of meat and vegetables which you then cook for yourself in the broth. We had a spicy side and a non-spicy side, and it was super-delicious. I wish hotpot would catch on in America! Then at the end of the meal, five of them walked me home through the park at twilight, where we

got to see lots of couples ballroom dancing and people flying epic kites. It was a really good time, but I crashed not long after we got back, so now I'm awake at 1:30 a.m.!

Around this time last night, I finished the second book in Stieg Larsson's trilogy, The Girl Who Played with Fire. I didn't think I'd be able to read a nearly-600 page book on an iPhone (that turns into 1300 little pages), but it was too good not to; it only took a week and a half, and sometime this weekend I'll probably go buy the third one because it was a cliffhanger ending.

I complained about the first book starting up too slowly, but that was not an issue with this one. It was fairly action-packed from the get-go, with much more graphic violence (I somehow managed to read the murder scenes right before falling asleep several nights)...well, I'll say that there was violence in the first novel also, but of a different nature. Like the first one, there is a web of characters to remember, but each of those characters plays a more important role in this book, so sometimes it was tough to remember all the connections. Lisbeth really is the focus of this book, and she is such an interesting character to read--she's not altogether likable, both to the reader and (especially) within the world of the novel, but I identify with some aspects of her character, like being independent. The climax of the novel tied so many loose endings up in such a way that it verged on hokey, but it's so well-written and the plot moves along so well that I can forgive that. I can't wait to see how the third novel ends all the drama, hopefully it will continue the trend of being even better than its predecessor.

I should probably get in bed now, gotta get my beauty rest before another lazy summer day!