This is Great.

Behind me on the Bart there is some guy picking up on a woman he's never met. It's fantastic. He's doing such a bad job. Wicked. He just said, "you look so mysterious" I gotta write this stuff down. If you read this don't come beat me up consider it constructive criticism. I'm a nosy bastard aren't I? I just hope the woman he's flirting with doesn't say, "Oh look he's writing down everything you say!" But I don't think she will. He's given her his business card. He's doing home loans and working on his Realtor’s license. Only some of the words are misspelled. That's great. I'm not the best spelling wiz by any shot just look around this site but I'm not publishing this for business. Or as a front to use when picking up on ladies. "I want to talk to you on the late night." She just took his cell number. I think she's trying to brush him off nicely. I haven't heard her give him her number. Ooh getting close there. She just said "I just beca.." wow "He just said I'm going to become the nicest guy you've ever met. I might even become your soul mate. I'm really feeling your vibe" That was too much for her, "You mind if I read my book now? You gonna just sit there and watch me read my book?" What a priceless way to end a conversation. That was so funny I'm not going to even pick on the white Rasta's sitting across from me. Not that there's anything wrong Caucasians who are actual Rastafarians (a very beautiful religion) but I don't think these folks are. It's the fact that they're both wearing coordinated Bob Marley/Tough Gong outfits. I love Bob Marley, His music was and still is fantastic. A little overly religious for me but Dang! fine fine tunes. I want to congratulate this woman on how smooth she was but I'm afraid she'll think I'm hitting on her as well. Got some paperwork I should have done over the weekend but didn't. Procrastinator! I should be catching up on it right now but I'm doing this instead. I've also got some code to write. Perhaps that's what I'll do when I stop. I don't have much battery life left so I can't really screw off and watch a movie. I'm working on my tones now (Well not this second but in the grand scheme.) I know this is sort of the backwards way to go about it but the pronunciation of the words is so subtle that I really wanted to get a handle on that first. So many of them are so similar that I have trouble distinguishing them from one another. I didn't want to try and learn tones at the same time. I learned the basic concept and I've always paid attention to them but I haven't been really religious about them. Haven't done any tone drills, multiple tone combinations, etc. I'm finally comfortable with my pronunciation, it's not great but I can tell the difference between chu and qu, (and I can tell someone else the difference.) I finally know how to say cai so it doesn't sound like zai. But when I do get the nerve to talk to Chinese they frequently have to ask me if I can write it down. My pronunciation is that bad. I work with a Japanese guy who's English is that bad but he can function just fine so it gives me hope that I wouldn't be run out of the streets of Beijing if I where stranded there alone with nothing but my Langenscheidt’s and the clothes on my back. Popped the Tones CD from the mandarin set I bought at Costco a couple months ago. It's got some good exercises, some catchy phrases that use all the tones in order, etc. I haven't even been all the way through it yet but I realize it's time. My vocab is getting decent I can recognize snippets of folk’s conversations and enough of movies to realize when the subtitles are just a little off or flat wrong. The Rasta's are falling asleep on one another. He's rubbing her head and she's got this great contented look on her face. I love seeing couples like that. Peaceful, obviously in love, wrapped in the warmth of one another’s company. Makes me think of my wife (who is right now either struggling with our kids or fast asleep in bed where I left her.) Makes me smile because I get a little of what they're feeling just by seeing them. Not like She's all lavishing him with affection and he's sitting there like a bump on a log but the gentle caress or just holding her in a way that shows he cares as much as she does. They look like they're headed to the airport. They'll need all the sleep they can get. K gotta date with Perl, she misses me when I'm gone. The smooth talker just passed on his way out of the train. He made the international call me sign and said, “lunch.” I couldn’t resist congratulating the woman on her show. She just gave me crap for not coming to her rescue. What can I say unless she was in mortal danger I’m a wussy. Plus it was just too much fun to listen too. I had to bite my tongue when he said soul mate. It still makes me chuckle. Just saw someone wearing one of those leather civil war style hats. I love those. Just because every once in a while you see some very straight looking Harley kinda guy running around in one and I love the idea that in this area more people are likely to think he’s gay than a biker. And that’s almost as good as someone running around with an Asian tattoo that they think means manly but really is more like fish bait or something great like that. That’s really why I’m learning Chinese. I’m waiting to see someone with a tattoo that says, “Stupid white dude.”