February 12th: detox day and the completion of "Sober Me Up"

Day 149

Woke, snow on roofs like a bad dream, no other accumulation anywhere but my bicycle seat. Pedaled back gritting my teeth in the crisp wind still not believing the weather turn. I wrote, finished the entries from holiday. Then I went over to the arts building and finished the "whiskey stomp" tune which is now called "Sober Me Up." It's perfect, exactly the way I wanted it to turn out, very Beatlesy.

I ate salami sandwiches with ginger preserves and they turned out quite good. I saw on BBC that Arthur Miller had died. Sad Xmas. Then I went back to the arts building just to run through the repertoire. At one point a ground crew chap tried to come through the window. I looked up at him, pointed to the door, said "It's open." I went back to playing assuming he was coming in at any second, he didn't. He disappeared. It threw off my performance chi, so I left again. Dark fell and I hadn't planned on going anywhere because of the cold, but Jeni called, invited me to dinner. I walked there and all of us (minus Heather who was in Shanghai seeing her people off) returned to the noodle place from a couple days ago, who stayed open especially for us.

Afterwards, we went for massage on Shishang Lu, and I requested Rachel, since I know she does it right. I ended up getting worked on first but it was taking forever for the others, so they went to a place across from Dongzhou. Rachel and I stumbled our way across conversation. She taught me a few words like "pai mang" (ticklish) and "mei shema" (nothing). All the stress was getting worked out, but at the end a lot of it got put back in, thanks to her co-workers and their clients. They stared, talked about me in front of me, used "lao wei." I told them "Boo shir lao wei. Wo shir may guo ren. Lao wei (made thumbs down gesture.) Lao wei is bad. Lao wei is not nice."

"Ting bu dong."

Thanks for ruining my massage. I had to entreat them several times to stop making fun of me and I was a couple minutes from throwing my water in their face. I'm at the point where I can pretty much tell what they're saying, but I can't form sentences of my own. I'm a screaming mime, a frustrated beast with no verbal opposable thumbs. I left, trying to find my peace again. I got back to the school but Mike's door was locked. I walked across to their massage place, but the front door was locked and I couldn't see into the upstairs where they were. Crappy.

I walked to the internet cafe emailed for a bit. Some wiseass said "lao wei" when I first entered, but I stayed my tongue. I need to not take it so personally. I sang Sly and the Family Stone's "Don't Call Me Nigger, Whitey" to myself and it cheered me up a bit. I kept my hat on inside to block the noise somewhat. Lindsey had emailed me saying she had talked with a guy there in Canada about China and dropped my name and he said "Not the Aaron Willis from Fudgie and Fufu?" Apparently he had seen the Rasputina gig. My quasi-celebrity status has extended beyond US borders. Crazy.

I took a cab to Ming Tien and I had to force the guy to give me my change from a ten. He shrugged like he didn't know what I was talking about and I pointed at the meter, which was curiously hidden on his side by the console. The guy in the back laughed, like a "He's got ya, Al" kind of laugh, and the driver surrendered that precious 3 kuai. Nice try, chisler.

I ordered carrot juice and a pineapple pizza as comfort food because I didn't know the Chinese characters for banana split. I asked my server if I could play the piano, and also had her kill the Christina Aguilera on the inhouse speakers. I played, but didn't attempt singing because it was late and the congesty had bedded down in my throat for the night. The songs sounded fine in their instrumental form, though.

I walked home, watched some Asia Pacific, went to sleep. On the day I finish a song called "Sober Me Up" it occured to me I hadn't drunk any alcohol. Funny.