Jottings from the Granite Studio

First of all, I know I’m slacking this week but hey…I wrote something like 41 posts in February (with only 28 days) and in the past five days I’ve had to finish up Chunjie-ing, find new digs in Beijing, and move all of our worldly possessions from Tianjin. All to the good. We’re finally moved in and YJ (A member of a certain Communist Party) and I (a semi-reformed KOS County Democrat) subsequently bathed in our liberal guilt as we watched not one, but two cleaning ladies tackle a month’s worth of grime in our new apartment while we sat on our little sun porch and enjoyed a leisurely lunch. Total cost for three hours hard work? About $4 USD. I am now going to go beat myself to death with a copy of Barbara Eisenrich’s latest book while Michael Moore shoots B-roll.

Richard from The Peking Duck hosted another of his fabulous blogger and blogger-allies dinners last night. Some of the usual suspects were there including Kevin Smith (Weifang Radish), Brendan O’Kane, Zoe Wood, and Joseph Bosco (The Longbow Papers). We also had the pleasure to meet Joel Martinson (Danwei), Andrew Lih, Prince Roy joining us from a certain island of questionable political status, longtime China resident Chris Waugh, as well as Beijing legend Kaiser Kuo, whose (re)new(ed) blog Ich Bin Ein Beijinger is getting a lot of well-deserved attention. It was a great pleasure to finally meet fellow-TPD contributor (Other) Lisa, visiting our cold and smoggy burgh from sunny Venice Beach. I was also glad to talk with a fellow historian: Glenn from UC Berkeley, whose research into the development of China’s legal system in the 1950s couldn’t be more timely given the current debates over rule of law and judicial independence in contemporary China. After dinner most of us wandered over to The Bookworm and had a few more drinks. Peter Hessler (author of Oracle Bones and Rivertown) had just finished giving a talk there and came over to our table to say hello. Good times all around.

More Beijing news: Brett of the blog A New Yorker in Beijing, himself a local legend in certain, darker parts of Chaoyang District, is back in the capital after a stateside hiatus. Hijinks no doubt to follow. More on this later.