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“Everywhere unfortunately” wrote my 8th grade teacher – a hottie – on the blackboard in some sort of flirtatious way that was in hindsight inappropriate. And so I met a woman whose name is Rachel, who said “nice name” and sat down across from me and she looked at the prayer box pendant hanging from my neck and said, “I have one the same,” and then simultaneously we both said, “my sister gave it to me,” and then we stopped talking all together. Blue eyes met blue eyes and both of us said, “odd,” at the same time.

I was sitting in a Shanghai office building in a glass conference room when the government issued a mandatory go home now, there is typhoon coming, order and I watched from behind the glass as workers ran down the hall and towards the elevator. I turned to the people I was meeting with, one a Mickey Rourke look alike and asked calmly if we should be panicking at this point or not and all of them, ex-pats, said, “dunno.” Meanwhile, a furtive glance or two out the window showed mopeds, bikes as well as buses, sinking under the rising water in the streets.

Shopowners began sandbagging in front of their stores as water rose and started lapping the entrances.

The news was zilch, zero as the government censored any news about the typhoon on websites and television.

A little disconcerting, I might say.

As in all things in China there is a saying – where there is water there is riches – when a Chinese person found out I was from New Orleans – land of Katrina – and was now sitting as a target for Wipha – she said, “you are fortunate, lots of water.”

the other day a reporter called and was trying to find the way through a complicated issue – I said, let go of all the chatter and let the force guide you to the answer – he found it lickety split – and there you have it – the noise, the voices, the constant clanging in your head distracts from the way – let the universe guide you was my horoscope today – and then tonight, it was ladies’ night – we went out dancing and half way around the world from New Orleans, I was dancing to Sweet Home Alabama sung with a Chinese lilt and some pretty screwed up lyrics – but fun was had.

A day spent waiting for typhoon Wipha to do her thing again, and a full agenda of meetings where my every word had to be translated once, sometimes twice, and by the end of the day, I felt that much further away from my subject matter as I stared out the window at the wind blowing and the intermitten heavy rainfall. Driving along the roads where people went by on bikes with large umbrellas opened and balanced against the pouring rain, I felt that sense of isolation that comes when you are really operating on some sort of deficit of time and wherewithall.

The preview of coming attractions with floods, torrential rains, high winds by midnight was quiet when that was supposed to be the time we were bracing for the big one – it appears Wipha has skirted Shanghai and for the time being it’s a little quieter than usual because schools closed – and there is speculation we might be getting another bout coming through.

We dropped a female friend off at almost 3 this morning to walk home by herself. A city of 22 million and she fears no one. In my city of 250,000, we fear everyone and a women never walks alone at three o’clock in the morning.

One hour foot massage followed by a two-hour body massage. Float off the bed as if being held up by a strings – a bag of limp bones.

In China, a glass of water is served lukewarm. Very odd.

Speaking with this guy today about dating and he self-admittedly says he is horrible at relationships and then goes on to detail a recent past relationship where the woman came on to him stronger than he was expecting and they had sex by the third date, which was too soon for him. Turns out the woman was guided by an episode of Friends where the belief was that if you don’t have sex by the third date then the relationship is going nowhere. He naturally, was a little perplexed that his relationship was being orchestrated by a philosophy that came out of a sitcom.

Also, another discussion concludes there is this nebulous guy time – men operate on a clock so different from women it is like they are on another planet. What we consider to be a long time between this and that, they negotiate that time like aliens – so for us a day or two becomes a grave matter of consequence while they may not even be sure that time has passed between this and that. Really, men are a curiosity.