Sunday 24th April, 2016                      0100

The day never went as planned but then mine seldom do. I stayed up late watching films, retired and never surfaced apart from a bladder break until getting on for midday. I hadn’t expected to sleep so late as it wasn’t that long after midnight when I went to bed.

Rain was forecast and rain we had and I never intended to go to town, instead the idea was to make inroads into penning the play, prepare the cottage pies ready for cooking when Dumpling came and then have an hour in the office swatting the flies which have resurfaced after winter.

Suddenly I found myself pressed for time. These days I don’t come off choke (the younger readers will not understand the expression!) in the mornings for at least ninety minutes so by the time I had showered and dressed I was up against it time-wise to prepare dinner and then nip out for a change of scene.

I cancelled the cottage pie idea, would have taken too long to mash the spuds etc so I settled for mince and potatoes, much quicker. By 1540 everything was ready in pans simply to turn the heat on when I got back so after sending Dumpling a text to say not to come until 1630 (she came at 1600 regardless, I later found out), I went to the office. What with the rain I was the only customer until just before I left at five. I don’t mind, it gives me time to think in peace, something I often do these days. At some point I must try their new range of lobsters, winkles and baby clams - every time the trays come past me on their way outside to the stall the aroma is enticing, I feel like the cartoon nose in the old Bisto adverts.

Of course when I got back Dumpling had finished cleaning and was sitting in my bedroom waiting, probably playing games on her phone. I put dinner on to cook and started The Poseidon Adventure. Full of nautical inaccuracies of course but I loved Leslie Nielsen as the Captain (and could never take him seriously in his comedic roles after that!). I first saw that film in Bangor cinema in 1973 when HMS Conway had holidays. A few of my fellow cadets had learnt that A Clockwork Orange (notorious in its day) would be showing just before the next term started so we all agreed to return early to watch it together.

On the day though, the chap who had told us had gotten his dates mixed up but as we had walked 7 miles we decided we might as well see the film on offer and that was it. Well Dumpling enjoyed it even though unfortunately there were no subtitles - amazing how many Chinese can read the subtitles yet not keep up with the speech.

And yes, my chilli mince and spuds went down well, I swear she and Joan are developing western palates. It’s good to have “wives” to feed. Ok, it costs a little more but it gives me the impetus to shift my bum and cook because often if it’s just me I don’t bother.

Oh yes, yesterday was a big exam for my ex sophomore students, the dreaded TEM, test for English majors. Joan thinks she failed, Dumpling is undecided. If they fail they can only blame themselves - both had a native Englishman on tap any time they wanted but neither took advantage. You can lead a horse to water……….

Anyway after Dumpling left I had a text from Justin. Today they vetoed Juliette and Andrei’s play and she will sing a song instead. Quite apart from the fact I wouldn’t blame the pair for thinking I had anything to do with scuppering their plans even though I didn’t, I am actually bloody annoyed. As usual it’s all about time. Well that’s fine but I will bet a pound to shovel of shit there will be ONE act that goes on forever, thus depriving everyone else the chance to take their full quarter of an hour. Happens every year and the guilty act will be as usual in Chinese so I won’t even have the luxury of even understanding it. Doesn’t matter as I will probably be backstage most of the time anyway - someone needs to do up my Tang jacket because as sure as hell I have no idea how it works!

Once Dumpling had left I wrote our sketch and now await suggestions for additions or improvements from the others. Of course, in order to make allowance for the now cancelled French act, I kept it reasonably brief. We may need to pad it out a little now. This reminds me of my first year here when Georgina and crew roped me in to act in their play and we actually had to audition. People who have read my blog from the outset will recall the tears when they were told to cut the performance from 15 minutes (which they were told they had) to seven minutes. That year both Kevin and I threatened that neither of us would perform so as to free up time for Georgina’s lot to have the required amount of stage time they needed. In those days we were valued for such things and so, faced with no foreign presence on stage (at that time we were the only two foreign teachers - and we meant it) they buckled and acceded to the act proceeding in full. The sad thing was, they still had Kevin read a poem which bored the hell out of me and everyone else, including I suspect Kevin. And the president of the student union’s act went on for 29 minutes.

However, I don’t want to leave here on bad terms and of course Andrei and Juliette will be seasoned hands next year so I am certain they can rope in the replacement English teachers and make the act French if only one is allowed. It still rankles though, how they spring these things at the last minute (and remember their idea was a communal song for God’s sake!), you come up with something better which they agree with and then 24 hours later they change it. If China ever has a war their military will probably be given two day’s notice and orders which will be changed hours later.

If our little sketch goes well, this time I hope to be able to secure the footage a lot sooner than the last time. Now I think I know where to get it from, I didn’t even know where to go or that it even existed outside the IT dept two years ago.

So first draft done, hopefully just light rain tomorrow so I will indeed go shopping and if I feel adventurous I might finally get around to trying my hand at sausage rolls. Don’t hold your breath………….