Fungus or the United States

I tried to buy the Pixel 3 today.  I’ve had three people visit China all of whom had one and were using. The Project Fi platform for calls.  Each of them said China worked like a charm and low call rates, low data rates.  And the damn thing seems to be $300.00 cheaper than a new iPhone.  I went through the whole process on line, chose my model, researched the earbuds, chose them too, got the financing option cleared with an eye towards being able to pick it up when I’m there in the U.S. in two weeks.  But right before you pay for it, you get the shipping information, which suggests that you won’t get the Pixel 3 for four weeks.  Expedited shipping gets it two you only one to two days earlier. 

The page is hung, open as a tab on my Chrome horizon.  I could go and hit the green “confirm purchase” button at any point and know it was being sent.  But then it would just sit there, loosing warranty for who knows how long, until I actually make my way back home again.  I poked around and there doesn’t seem to be any way to get it sooner.  I suppose I could always get myself a Pixel 2. 

A lovely autumn day and I needed to drop a form off for my daughter at the cafeteria at school.  I decided to take the long way home after that so I could stop by the department store and visit the pharmacy in the basement.  Pausing outside I considered my Pleco app.  Would they have the vocabulary word for “anti-fungal.”  It seemed a long-shot but soon, it was there before me:  kang zhenjun. 抗真菌.  (The same “Kang” as kangmei yuanchao: 抗美援朝. Resisting, fighting against, whether it be fungus or the United States.)  Now I was rather confident, walked in and made my request for anti-fungal cream.  It was cheap and I got four boxes. 

Decided to shop at the big market on the way home.  Maybe they’d have the Planters sunflower seeds, that have been off the shelf for so long at the satellite store in our compound.  Now, why did my mind think of clams?  I think I had a clam sauce I wanted to make for diner with the super thin pasta.  As I shopped I “Sympathy For the Devil” came on and I helped myself to some head shaking and air guitar during, what must be Keith’s, compelling lead work.  Classic rock always seems to sound particularly good in the super market.  I keep bumping into a tall, thin foreign woman about my age, by the bread and by the veggies and the dried fruit and assumed I looked rather ridiculous.  By then I wanted to hear the Sham 69’s live version of “Ulster” and she caught me again by the cheese mimicking that Jimmy Pursey’s call and response.

Wednesday, 10/17/18