back in the land o' cleve

long absence i know... at home in california with mei, dad, lizie, and joe! had the best food and i am just a little plumper... happy ta! roasted chestnuts, swam in the pool, ran outside and sat in the hot tub! i need sunshine! sitting in front of my computer with frozen fingers and drinking hot tea to keep warm. our heat bill for last month was already $200!!! anybody else this bad? tricky question here... death by frostbite or by poverty? only three more weeks and i'll be back in california. and 5 more weeks to france! pics below from the break. more soon. hopefully with videos of my little bro dancing!

j trying not to laugh  

daddy! 

dad and lizie 

 

dinner with sarah and erich 

fly on the wall joey 

mah jong round 5 

lizie is the 4 time champ! 

happy mei 

mei cutting fresh persimmons! 

mei mei checking homemade cheese cake in the oven! 

me and mei thanksgiving morning... i just woke up! 

hoorah for my homemade sauna!

finished insulating the windows in my room and the sun room attached to my room- it is at least 10 degrees warmer! i hate to admit how easily satisfied i am but i am most definitely a happier person.

thursday bought my ticket to france! excited to see tous mes amis le 28 decembre! took some serious letting go to stop feeling guilty about the trip and just buy the ticket. friday was su's bday and we went to cheesecake factory to celebrate. yesterday made feuilletes de chevre chaud with basil and honey. mmm! today yoga with marni at 8 limbs- class on throat chakra. chanting to hanuman with harmonium accompaniment with serious body wring in between. i am alive!

Happy Birthday!!!

today was su's bday- 24! happy days for the year! 7 years now- don't know what i'll do next year!

Happy Birthday Su!

happy su and ta

mmm!

chocolate on our minds...

taller ta?

ran out of batteries so i don't have a picture to verify this... but i think i'm taller! one alexander technique lesson with helen hobbs and i am at full potential, height-wise.

new addition to the house is my little lemon pine.

last night? nighttown and the dublin lawyer with jill and her parents post mozart. !

madeleine's book 2 recital 

pre-blood test, post-anemia

with baruch!

iron ta!

for the first time in over 3 years my iron count was high enough to give blood the very first time! not borderline, no extra tests, no rejection!

recipe?

mini wheats + multi-vitamin + spinach salad + chili + homemade chinese beef stew = iron ta!

of course i did cut my finger with the bagel knife immediately afterwards to the great amusement of the red cross staff. was asked if i wanted to keep giving blood all day... heh. i got a bagel, a t-shirt, and i sold 10 candy bars for the leukemia and lymphoma society. not bad for a friday morn.

Heated bra aims to save the world!

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/asia-pacific/4420820.stm

not sure i am into this fuzzy model but catchy to think i could be saving the world by buying the right bra...

fijian ta

beautiful day- started off in the pool and ended in the bathtub. and just feeling good... no real reason. i did drink two liters of fiji water today...

watched this movie 'what the bleep do we know?' the other day. kind of turned off by the 80's after school education video music and the sub-par plot but intrigued by mention of an experiment on water in the fujiwara dam in Japan. they show slides of masaru emoto's research into human vibrational energy, thoughts, words, ideas, and sound as they affect the molecular structure of water. his slides compare water subjected to several hours of heavy metal vs. beethoven's pastoral symphony. other experiments show water blessed by bhuddist monks and water simply labeled with the words adolf hitler and/or love, etc. hokey? i want to sneak into the case labs at night and conduct my own experiment. was hanging out with my favorite gatsby tonight and he suggested we label bottles of water 'matt' and 'tash' and see which one crystallizes in a more beautiful way. heh. this experiment is going to require a little insider help from my sister lizie...

but. our bodies are over 70% water. so maybe fiji water does give me an advantage over erie drinkers of cleveland!

could also be yoga and swimming. could be valentino's with a fellow bloomsman. or homemade chai from my roomie Jill. or mac n' cheese with su and baruch. or seeing some of my favorite students today. need to figure out the recipe.

yoga + pengyo/amigos + teaching! + fiji water = happy ta?

water post beethovern pastoral 

water from a fountain in lourdes, france 

water from a polluted pool in central japan 

the same water after a prayer. maybe we should bless our food and wine...

water from the fujiwara dam 

qu gongyuan kan hongye

ran in a pack for the first time on saturday afternoon. elizabeth drove over to run with su, jill, and i in forest hills park. i love this kind of fall- more yellows than red, more crisp than cold. made me think of liang laoshi describing the red leaves in tianjin, and made me miss chinese class dearly.

Jill and Ta at the ruins in Pisac, outside of Cuzco, Peru. Only 23/24 years old here so you can't see as many wrinkles...