SUNDAY, 3/16/14

Today is a lazy day.  The weather is gorgeous.  Kids are out everywhere.  I’m doing a little work on US income tax, via Turbo Tax.  Later in the day, Judy heads over to Capita Mall to do a little shopping.  I make a trip to the Marriott for my swim.  When I get home, I place a delivery order for a pizza from Kro’s Nest.  There are lots of delivery options available around town.  Almost every restaurant has delivery in place.  Now that I have an online site that has our correct delivery address, it’s too easy.  We spend the evening watching more of season one of “Lost”, and enjoying a really good pizza.

MONDAY, 3/17/14

I’m so close to finishing our income tax, everything else comes to a halt.  I continue to work on deductions, trying to get to a point where maybe I won’t have to pay much more tax.  I don’t think there’s a refund in our future, but “tax owed” is coming down.

Our ayi, Lilly comes in today.  She mentions that the heat is off.  What she means is that the Beijing government has turned off all the heat in the city.  Because of our location, floor to ceiling windows that face the full sun most of the morning and early afternoon, we never had a problem with heat.  I actually had turned off all the radiators in the apartment back in November.  The sun, combined with heat radiating from apartments below us, kept us too warm most of the winter.  Most days, I had to open one or more windows to cool us down.

I get in my daily swim, and return to the apartment.  As I’m settling in to my chair to do a little computer work, I lose my balance, and fall comfortably into the chair.  However, a leg of the chair splits, and I end up looking at the ceiling, although still seated.  When Judy gets home, I make sure about which chair (colors, etc.) I need to buy.  I head out to IKEA to purchase a replacement.

As I walk into IKEA, I can’t help but think about all our previous visits.  We needed maps, and special instructions for the taxi drivers.  We didn’t know how to communicate and ask questions in the store.  We always struggled to figure out where to get the bigger items.  Checking out was sometimes confusing (again, a language issue).  Getting home was confusing because of the lack of a direct route.

Now, I can direct the taxi myself, I know where I’m going in the huge store.   I’ve figured out how to communicate at checkout, and I can verbally give directions to the taxi driver to get me home.  It’s such a different mentality than it used to be.  I used to dread a trip to IKEA.  Now, it’s as easy as going to the grocery store (which is also much easier than it used to be).