Last Full Weekend Until the End of the Summer...

I wanted to take this weekend pretty easy since it is my last full weekend until the end of the summer and last weekend was filled with the work conference and being sick!

My little faithful ipod died a few weeks ago and I have been missing not having it, especially at the gym. Through my trusty guidebook and the Internet I found the directions for closest Apple store in the city. When I got out of the subway I was introduced to what may be the craziest intersection in the entire world. No joke! Not only were there numerous lights but also police officers running around with whistles. I have never waited at an intersection with so many people before! I am taking more people and bicycles then there are going to Autzen Stadium people! It was nuts! I found the big mall I was looking for called The Village after a few wrong turns. It is this huge, beautiful mall with mostly outdoor halls. The building itself looks like something out of a futuristic movie, a happy futuristic movie. There were these awesome statue fans that blew a nice mist onto anyone nearby, which was lovely because it was so muggy yesterday. I found the Apple store pretty easily and a nice sales associate told me that my Ipod was indeed dead and not coming back. I upgraded to an Ipod that also play videos. I'm pretty excited about it.

There was an International grocery store in the complex where I bought flaxseed, vegetarian refried beans, taco shells, whole wheat pasta, Hunt's tomato sauce, and for the grand find, M and M's.

I spent the rest of the afternoon, early evening avoiding rush hour traffic by sipping on a blueberry smoothie and walking around looking through very posh stores. I found a restaurant called Fresh Elements. I had the best salad ever (with lettuce that I am use to because I'm having a hard time finding a lettuce that I really like at the grocery stores) and a glass of white wine. It was heavenly and nicely air conditioned. I got to come home and have a good Skype conversation with Annie!

Today, I went to what should have been my first Mandarin lesson, but when I got there, there was no teacher and no other students. A woman in the office asked me to wait, and a half an hour later, told me that the class had been canceled and there might be one on Friday. I was pretty disappointed. I had packed my The Office notebook and spent a long time on the subway to be bailed on. I came back to my part of town and ran a few errands.

This evening I got a pedicure in a little place across the street from work. I talked to two women who were also getting their nails done. One was a little older then me but had spent a long time studying English, and another was a twenty-year-old who has been studying English for a long time and is going away in late July to finish her Bachelors degree in Ireland. Very cool! I'll be going back there again!