1. You must go to places where fishes hang out.
2. You must use the right bait to catch the fish you want.
3. There are times even when you are at the right place and using the right bait, you go home with nothing.
4. Other times, as soon as you catch your fish, you realize that you should let it go.
5. Sometimes, it is not until you get a fish home that you realize it stinks and you have to throw it away.
6. The wrong fish can make you sick.
7. There is always someone using bait that you would never use who always catches more and better fish. And even when you use their bait, often times it will not work for you.
8. Everyone has a story of "the one got away."
9. Some really lucky people go home with at least two fish!
10. Once you catch you a really good fish, you want to mount it.
My friend Katie, who is a local part-time English teacher and model here in China, came to visit me today at my apartment. We have a very good and playful relationship. She decided that she wanted to wrestle me. When I picked her on my shoulders, she pulled down my workout pants. Fortunately or unfortunately --depending upon one's perspective-- I was wearing underwear.
She later explained that in China when boys wrestle girls, the girls would de-pants the boys. The boys, being embarrassed, usually run away. I think Chinese boys are really stupid. I mean, I do not know about the rest of the world, but I like it when women pull my pants down. Usually something cool happens afterward. Granted, this time it did not but the thought was there.
So guys, if you think that there might be a possibility you may wrestle a Chinese woman, just be aware that they do go for the pants. While it is funny, it is a little disappointing if that is all they go for.
Last night, Shenyang was hit by a freezing ice storm. I awoke to find the entire city was covered in a frozen clear mold. I waited a bit in hopes some of the ice on the sidewalks would thaw enough to make walking around a bit less exciting. I decided to go to Beiling Park, a historical area with ancient structures and statues. I walked cautiously through the park because I respect the power of ice especially when it is where I am planning to walk, plus seeing all of the trees covered in ice was truly a beautiful site to behold.
I made it to the historical area of the park and paid the 30RMB admission to enter. The place was beautiful even though some of the ice was melting. Many of the dragon statues looked like they were either drooling or puking --I could not tell which. I had my camera along with several lenses, so I quickly snapped pictures as the frigid wind whipped around the park. At the same time, I was walking very carefully with all of the ice on the ground --it was extremely slippery. I decided to scale some icy stairs to the raised walkway surrounding the ancient buildings. Even though I had been to this place several times, this was the first time I had seen it with so much ice, so it was new to me.
After spending about 45 minutes in this area and taking some decent shots and avoiding falling, I decided it was time to depart and return home. I carefully descended the stairs and I thought I was fairly safe. I started to walk to the path to the exit when suddenly ice gave me the power of flying with my feet in front of me. I quickly thought with this new found power I could rule the world --if anyone ever disagreed with me I could just kick them in the face. I instantly became a sort of wacky Superman --the Flying Iceman! As quickly as these thoughts entered my head, just as quickly the Earth decided that I was not ready to have such powers and quickly grabbed me. For punishment of my evil thoughts, it also shot pain in my rear that went up to my neck, tweaked my knee and put a big lump on my elbow. I unleashed a few f-bombs to show my displeasure. Fortunately, no was around to see this display and hear my words.
I limped out slowly and carefully and followed the ice covered path to get out of the park. I caught a bus that took me close to home. On the way back I came to the conclusion that ice and gravity really do not mix.
For those who do not know, Pavlov was doing research on dogs. He noticed that the dogs would start salivating before the food actually arrived when there was another stimuli that typically arrived before it. The presence of the stimuli was enough for the desired behavior to take place even without the expected condition. While most people believe it was a bell was used as the stimuli, Pavlov's notes mentioned many various stimuli used throughout his research.
For some reason today, I was thinking of my former girlfriend Ivonne. Maybe it is just having too much time on my hands with me being "on vacation" but being a little too sick to do anything and it being too cold outside, but I have just been thinking of her. When she and I were together, she like many women always tried to get her significant other (aka me) to go shopping with her. Like most men, I do not shop unless it is for automobiles or electronic gear. For the most part, I know what I want to get so I go to the place where I can get it and I buy it and then I do something else. Simple. One time, Ivonne dragged me shopping with her. I felt like a little kid being dragged to church, knowing that it would take an incredible effort on my part to maintain my consciousness through what could possibly be an entire day of extreme boredom. I practiced all of my lines before leaving of "Oh, baby, you look wonderful." and "Oh, oh, sweetie, your butt is just incredible in those pants. You should buy them. Now!" and "That outfit is perfect on you! Let's buy it and leave!" Those lines did not work and I spent hours trying to act interested. She decided to reward me by taking me to a lingerie shop and modeling some outfits for me. Needless to say, I really enjoyed this portion of the shopping experience. I mean what guy would not like to have an attractive and petite Latin woman with the curves in the right place model lingerie for them? Very few, I can tell you that.
The next time she asked me to go shopping with her, I put up less resistance but was still did not looking forward to a long day wasted shopping. But she once again returned to the lingerie shop and once again modeled for me. And I really enjoyed that! This continued on for several weeks until I became conditioned to associate shopping with her with seeing her wearing lingerie. Anytime, she asked me to go shopping with her, an inspired and hearty "Yes" burst through my throat and I sped to her house to pick her up so we could go shopping. Over time, she decreased going to the lingerie shop until after a year, we never went there, but we always went shopping. And there I was, a modern homosapien version of Pavlov's dog, an Ivonne's dog -- merely thinking that my reward had to be coming soon. At least Pavlov fed his dog once in awhile.
Epilogue
Ivonne left me for some rich guy a few years ago. After four years, I went from being her dog to a rain dog -- after spending so much careful attention in marking my territory, a storm came and left me standing and watching from a doorway, wondering where in the hell it all went wrong.
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