Third-person perspective of my day

It was a day much like any other, except that it was a weekend day and Adora and Adrianna were anxious to line up in the kitchen, should they just barely miss the introduction to 60 Minutes. Adora ate very little but did cram a grape leaf most rudely into her mouth. She also took a fearsome swig of cranberry-raspberry juice before departing to lounge on the carpet.

Before this, the morning was bright and cheery and fresh. Sunlight streamed through the two windows in the bathroom/bedroom. Adora had slept here for the last two nights. The bed was of dark and creaky wood that gathered dust with its infrequent use. It groaned and squeaked as she rose sluggishly off of it to dress and put her hairpins in order atop her much mussed hair.

The family sat down to a large Sunday breakfast of waffles with sugar-powdered raspberries. Despite the splendor of the day outside, the house remained an inferno of papers and pants strewn all about, sharpener-shavings embedded in the carpet, pine cones littered about the downstairs floor...

All of this, of course, needed to be changed, and what a better day to ruin with the loud and droning Vroom-vroom-vroom of the vacuum than a beautiful weekend?

This is a parent's point of view.

The children begged to differ.

PART II OF THE DAY

After a long time spent in cleaning--or, as the case might be, hiding from those who were doing the cleaning--the family set off (most exhaustedly) ambling away in the pill-buggish minivan for the week's shopping. Among some of the items bought:

Almond cheese

Jarlsberg cheese (much to the children's chagrin)

Monterey Jack cheese

Bread

Bagels

Potatoes

Laundry detergent

Tissue paper

And so on.

Comfortably propped up in bed against a blue faux-fur monster of a pillow lay a girl preparing to turn off her computer...

Letter to a Taiwanese Friend

Dear P,

Life is getting on very well, but my days of lazing about at room temperature eating potstickers are over. I am now concentrating on editing Yang in Disguise while the heat in our house seems to drop. I have a cold, although it's getting better. Weekends are hardly breaks, and--well, probably enough complaining. After all you are busy in school with homework and tests. What do you do on weekends? Adrianna has her violin, I do last-minute Chinese homework, we both do Chinese class, and sometimes go biking. (Saturday). Sundays are sleep-in days of boredom. The most exciting thing on Sunday is Sixty Minutes, the TV program. Speaking of TV we watched the Oscars just now. Did you watch the Oscars? The "pre-Oscar" time is extremely boring. They claim the Oscars begin at four, but that's just when everybody's getting seated and obnoxious reporters interview rushing nominees. They drone on and on about spectacular gowns. A typical conversation between the reporters would be--"And the new trend with jewels on so-and-so and bare shoulders, so-and-so's dress is Calvin Klein, so-and-so is taking a note from so-and-so and wearing diamonds, so-and-so's dress is Versace with some great beads, so-and-so is wearing..." And it goes on in that vein for some time. My mom wanted me to watch it anyways. Watching the actual awards was alright, though. Some of the commercials were quite good. Weather has taken a rather nasty turn. It is quite rainy, foggy, and windy. What are you doing in Taiwan? What is your everyday life like? Is school harder, easier, or about the same? What are you studying right now? How did you like the Taiwanese book? Also, forgot to ask you. What did you do for Christmas? Did you celebrate it? What did you do for New Year's? (Chinese or otherwise.) I attatched a photo of our aunts and uncles on Christmas Day. I hope you'll be able to see it. I took the picture with the mini Lumix digital camera I recieved from my mom as a present. I also recieved a Santa hat, a lot of candy canes, a fifty dollar Barnes and Noble gift card, and a porcelain kind of vase shaped-thing for holding pencils, pens, and erasers. It was a pretty great Christmas. We ate a buffet breakfast in Todai, Redmond Town Center. By the way, we made bedding for "The Ontario Club" (also known as the "DAM Club"). My room is covered in soft bedding. So is Adrianna's. I said hi to K for you. Oh, by the way--guess what? We didn't get any homework for the weekend!!!

Please reply soon!

Love,
Dory