Not much to say right now. Shocking I know! We're back at school now. We had two prep days, Monday and Tuesday and the kids came back on Wednesday. It was all in all a good holiday. A much needed rest after the craziness of January. This weekend is pretty low key. We had a birthday party yesterday for one of the elementary teachers and there's another party tonight for one of our Winnipeg crew. By Winnipeg crew I'm referring to all the new teachers that came together from Winnipeg this year. We all flew together and have been pretty tight ever since. We're actually a bit of a subsect of our already small western community here in Clifford. The New Year's stuff is starting to wind down now. There are still a few fireworks every night. The decorations are still up. I've been procrastinating going out and taking pictures. I just haven't wanted to do much lately, I know I'm lazy! I did take a picture of my orange tree though, so that's something! Orange trees are basically the Chinese New Year's tree. I bought a fire pit this week. That's exciting. It's actually a coal cooking pit for outdoor wok cooking, but I'm going to use for hot dogs and marshmellows (if we can find them). One of the teachers was selling two for 25 RMB each ($3 CAD) so I figured why not?! Now I have an excuse to use my front patio. I actually pulled out the weeds and killed the ginormous spiders over the holiday (so not cool!) It was worth it though, because before I never even opened my patio doors out of fear what might be lurking in the vegetation. Now I can walk around freely, water my orange tree. I'll get some little folding chairs, have some of the crew over for a fire in the evenings, it'll be good times. Okay, I'm starting to talk like some of the other teachers now. It's freaking me out! Anywho. I really don't have anything exciting to write about so I'll stop rambling. Oh one more thing, I hooked up two sound systems in my apartment today! Not that they're really elaborate systems, just subwoofers and tweeters, but still. I bought a set of good speakers for my laptop, but it never had a stable home until now so I haven't really used them. Now I have a relatively permanent set up on my table so I have my computer hooked up so I can pump the tunes (wow that sounds ghetto-wannabe!). And even more exciting, when the teacher who was living with me for two weeks left to go home to Canada she left her awesome sound system for me, so then I was like, "that's great but what am I going to do with ANOTHER set of speakers when I hardly use the ones I have?" But a little brainwave later and my tv is jacked for watching movies! I'm realizing just how long it takes to settle into a place and the thought of leaving in four months is really sad! I'm just starting to get things the way I want them here in my apartment and I don't like thinking about having leave. So I won't. I've decided to keep living like this is home right up until I go to wring as many good memories as I can out of this place. Okay, so now I'm done. St. Patrick's Day is coming...14 more days! I bought green napkins already... : )