I'm sitting in our spare room helping Linda set up a spread sheet for her grades, trying to stay out of the way of our cleaning lady and waiting for 6:00 PM to roll around so we can go out to dinner with a friend of ours who was Linda's doctor while she was in the hospital. Sounds rough I know. Today I had a couple of retired gentleman over for a couple of hours of study and conversation. We had a young Chinese man come by to help us with skype. We now think it might be our microphone so we're going to try a new one. Then we went for a short ride to finally get Linda a pair of gloves that will keep her fingers warm while we are riding our bikes for more more than 10 minutes. We succeeded in getting her a nice pair of gloves that seem to be wind proof (if only I could read Chinese) and a hat that she liked ok until she realized it would go with one of her scarves as well as with her bright red coat. That made her very happy indeed and she likes the hat much more than when she bought it.

We read in the newspaper a couple of days ago that there is the beginnings of a movement to get people to wear bike helmet over here. Almost no one does. there is a Canadian teacher who is selling bike helmets to his students for 10 RMB (that's about $1.50). There are 70,000,002 bike riders in China (we're the 2). So if anyone wants to start a business in bike helmets in China, now is the time.

Now it is Thursday morning. We went to dinner last night with the doctor - Dr. Li. She took us to a Hot Pot Restaurant. What a treat. It was one of the best meals I've had in China and it was great fun, too. We put all this food in a pot of boiling broth in the middle of our table, let it cook, took it out and ate it. Some of the things we had were: beef (not Linda), sweet potatoes, spinach, bamboo shoots, cilantro, tofu, several kinds of mushrooms, lotus flower fruit, cabbage, and a kind of noodle that they cut at the table and then stretched out by flinging it in the air like a rope. It was quite a show. I am sorry to say I did not bring my camera so that evening will only live in word description. We do want to go back and take pictures. This is a chain restaurant that is known for its service. Their service is phenomenal. Every person who worked there looked like they were anxious to help, to get us what we need, to help us find our way, it really was impressive. There is also a lot of help at this restaurant, so there are people everywhere to be of service. We decided that night to go back with Dr. Li some time.
It was a great experience for us. The only problem was that I ate too much and now 8 hours later, I'm still not hungry. I must learn to pace myself here in China. People eat slower and for a longer time. I don't eat slower, I just eat for a longer time.