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“I’m Okay,” she said, Coughing her lungs out…

I’m sitting here having a late lunch with a bite of egg and tomato in my mouth when all of a sudden, I have an alarming coughing fit. Like, “are you okay?” fit. Like, “oh my God, she’s been coughing for 20 seconds straight ohmygod maybe she’s choking” fit.

Sometimes this happens to me. Everything will be fine, then all of a sudden, I cough uncontrolably for several seconds. This time I had food in my mouth, and I was mildly concerned I’d inhale it and things would get REALLY exciting.

But, no. I think maybe it was the pepper I’d ground onto my eggs. I think maybe a small piece of it landed on my throat, and my throat said, “fuck that.”

One thing though, about having a coughing fit by myself is I didn’t have someone asking me, “do you want some water?” My mouth is frozen open, my lungs are heaving, there’s still food in my mouth, and you ask me if I want to take a sip of water like I’m some aristocrat? NO! I’ve NEVER understood the logic of asking someone in the middle of a coughing fit if they want water. I don’t understand how pouring water down someone’s throat will help scratch the annoying, ticklish ITCH of whatever triggered the coughing spasm.

And try it sometime. As you’re coughing yourself to death, pick up that glass of water, tilt your head back (ever try to cough while looking at the ceiling?) pour that water into your open mouth and see how that works. Willing to be you’ll be inhaling that water (super healthy, so I’ve heard) and simultaneously spraying it all over God’s creation.

AFTER I’m done with the coughing fit, THEN ask me if I want some water. But not during the spectacle. Unless, of course, you want to be sprayed with a mixture of water, phlegm, and partially chewed food.

Yes, I know this is my first post in a long time. Yes, there’s more to come. But I’ll never figure out why not posting for months increases my views, whereas when I post daily, I get crickets. I also hit a personal high with YouTube in December, where I posted nothing except snarky comments on other videos. My channel hit 10,000 views. Go figure.

And stay tuned.

YouTube: NowayLaowai

Instagram: Chinagrrrl7

Frustration and Fatigue

Couldn’t sleep a wink last night. And today was my Chinese lesson. I’m learning on an app called Anki. I have no idea how to use it, but apparently, that doesn’t matter to my teacher, because I suspect he likes to see me frustrated. It’s like taking flying lessons and the pilot takes you up to 30,000 feet and lets you take over the controls, but you have no idea what they do. Well, okay, it’s not THAT stressful, but still. If you are an instructor and you force your students to use an app, and you teach them nothing about it at the beginning, yet assign things to do on the app, I mean, WTF?

So yeah, wasn’t feeling super duper hunky dory today. It’s probably going to rain soon, I wish I weren’t sensitive to changes in the barometric pressure, but here I am. And today was appropriately gloomy, with enough clouds to make you want to stay in bed all day.

Soon, I’ll be able to dot that.

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Monday, Monday…

It was actually pretty good yesterday. Technology held up, got through stuff from the units, yada, yada, yada. Had pizza for dinner, ordered from Eleme. I finally broke down and ordered from Eleme (food delivery service) for the first time in YEARS last week, when I had a craving for pizza, but not enough to go out in cold weather for it. I felt like a lazy pig, but damn, that pizza was good.

And today’s pizza was good too.

Spent the evening grading papers. I’m almost done.

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Aw, Yeah!

Baopals is just like Taobao, but in English. I’ve had a hankering for American snacks, so I broke down and bought some caramel pretzels from MiniSo. Of course, they don’t come in the American size. We’re talking a bag containing three “snack-size” packages of pretzels.

They were good, but of course they weren’t enough.

Baopals to the rescue. I really wanted some decent cheese popcorn, so I bought some Cretors Chicago Mix. I’d rather have just the cheddar, but the caramel popcorn thrown in is a nice touch too. I got a notice from Baopals that it might take a while to come.

Or maybe I read the wrong thing. Because I got a text saying my orders came in. They included Campbell’s tomato soup, crackers, cocktail sauce, and (insert heavenly choir here) THE CHEDDAR CHEESE POPCORN!

I was very pleased and having two jumbo bags of cheddar cheese and caramel popcorn

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Hospital Visit！

Relax. Visiting a hospital in China doesn’t mean automatic bankruptcy. But of course, being an American, any time I have to visit a hospital, my heart rate jumps a bit.

In China, doctors don’t have the status U.S. physicians do. They also don’t have the same pay. But they do hang out at the hospital. None of these “Minute Clinics” or “RediMed” here.

The reason for the visit was because I swore I saw blood in my urine. I’d been feeling really tired for months now, but my blood sugar has been fine and I’ve been exercising on a daily basis. It could be just general depression, but whatever. I’ve been downing vitamins and B-12.

But I felt for a couple weeks, my urine looked… off. So I contacted a couple of colleagues who made a hospital appointment. Luckily it was my day off.

In China, you prepay when you visit a hospital. No, you really don’t know how much it’s going to cost. But you get a card; looks like an ordinary bank card, at the hospital. You stick it into what looks like an ATM, and put money on the card. I think they base it on what you are coming to the hospital for.

We started off at the gynecology department first. It’s not really related to urology, but I passed if they asked if I wanted an exam. My hysterectomy took everything out a while back, so I don’t have anything to worry about there. I felt I just needed a urinalysis to see if I had anything to worry about.

Turns out I didn’t. Everything was fine.

Stressful Evening

I’m making another effort at Chinese study. However, managing the tools my instructor wants me to use seems a huge effort. Electronic flashcards and recording my pronunciation (how do I know if I’m pronouncing it right?) seem too much to bear right now. It’s annoying when the study tools don’t make sense and involve technology.

So my Mexican dinner last night with a friend (also studying Chinese with the same instructor) was a pleasure. I was a bit hangry, so that made my burrito and chips and dips taste even better.

But I was tired and didn’t even think about posting last night. So I didn’t. At least I don’t think I did.