Work

Memorial Day doesn't seem like a holiday to me, I suppose for Americans it's all about BBQs and the start of summer, but isn't it really like celebrating the death of veterans?

Mao Mao gave me monday off, but his office really has nothing but an imaginary workload anyhow. Most of the time I feel like he has an office registered in the US so he can prove he has a venture of some sort,to impress women.

My days are mostly made up of translating his friends' dissertations as favors, filing receipts of his meals, and fielding calls from his off-and-on again girlfriends. There is one girl who calls pretty often, she may have thought of me as competition at first, but now she just sees me as free therapy. A typical phone exchange is as follows:

"Is Mao Mao there?"

"He's not in, but he'll be back after lunch." That could take anywhere from 2 to 5 hours.

"He promised to take me to Escada tomorrow, remind him, okay?"

"Yes, I will." Hah, yeah right.

"Has he mentioned the Vegas trip to you?"

"I could remind him, could you give me more details?" I have the patience of a saint.

"Oh, he knows what it's about..."

"Sounds wonderful. Talk to you soon." She'll call again in half a hour. It's really very soon.

In contrast, my freelance work at Dr.Zhou's is much more gratifying. I see the occasional hypochodriacs, but also patients who benefit greatly from her treatments. I hope to work there on Monday, otherwise I'll be doing nothing but listen to internet radio on TOM.com all day.