Red Sky Night, Sailors Delight. Red Sky Morning, Sailors Take Warning

We woke to a very red sky this morning yet it did not storm at all in the evening. Don't believe every old adage your hear.

Happy Birthday Lizzie!

hkfour.blogspot.com

For those of you who don't yet know, Ingrid is going to be a big sister come early December!! We three are very excited for our new addition. Lizzie is doing great though Hong Kong in the summer is already uncomfortable enough let alone being pregnant. All scans and checkups show that everything is proceeding as it should with the baby. Official due date is December 2nd at Matilda International Hospital here in Hong Kong. And this time around we're not going to peek so the baby's gender will be a nice holiday surprise!

We're Gonna Need a Bigger Bucket

Ingrid has outgrown her trusty bath bucket. It is such a tight fit that her bum has practically taken on the shape of the tub. We need to upgrade to more space.

Uncool

Ok, so the state of the States is not the best, but I've had enough. My beloved homeland has been dragged over the coals long enough and my window shopping yesterday proved the final straw. A 70% off blowout sale on Stars & Stripes cufflinks?! Uncool. I almost bought them just to get them out of the window, like breaking up a schoolground fight to spare the poor little fat kid. We'll be back Links of London!!

Solar Eclipse

A solar eclipse darkened much of Asia this morning. Here in the southern latitudes of Hong Kong we only got a 70% eclipse, but it was still pretty cool. There was a noticeable blunting of the harsh sunlight and the streets were crowded with people wearing funky 3-D glasses looking skyward. I'm told Northern China was the best place to view the eclipses' full effect, which is ironic because the Chinese don't think twice about the pollution which blots out their sun on every other day.

I took a brief unprotected glance at the sun and I've been seeing a big multicolored blob in my central vision ever since. Unwise, but such an event won't happen for another 300 years so I wasn't going to let corneal damage get in my way. Perhaps I should have used this unconventional viewing method:

Regional News

This is an article you might expect to see in The Onion or some satirical website, not in a major morning newpaper like the SCMP. The headline and picture combo was enough to get me laughing this morning....

Cannibal says he has changed but the neighbours are not convinced


Indonesian cannibal Sumanto says he has sworn off human flesh - but that is little comfort to his former neighbours.

In many countries, the 37-year-old farmer from Palumutan village would be receiving specialised psychiatric care in a secure facility. Not in Indonesia. Here, he spent five years behind bars in a regular prison for theft of a body and causing distress to the community, and was released straight back into his remote village in rural Central Java with no follow-up care.

Mr Sumanto admitted that he dug up an old woman's body for a cheap and "tasty" meal. "She was delicious," he said from his room at a private Muslim mental-rehabilitation centre. "I love meat ... all types of meat as long as it's cooked. But I don't eat people any more. Now I eat spinach."

His next-door neighbour Ngadiah, 43, said she would never forget the stench of death from his home. "Sumanto? That corpse-eater. He was a bad-tempered man who often stole our rice and chickens," she said. "There'll be chaos if he ever comes back. I don't want him to kill me and have me for dinner."

Menu

This video might appear to show the family at a local aquarium, but it was actually outside one of HK's popular seafood restaurants. All these tanks are what you might call 'The Menu'.....just point at your favorite fish or crustacean and they'll scoop it out of the tank and prepare it any way you'd like.

Calm Before the Storm

The current view out our window is of a crystal clear Hong Kong skyline but that is expected to change very shortly as Typhoon Molave approaches. Should be a wild night!

STORM UPDATE: It was a big one, but unfortunately it took place between 1am and 5am so we were mostly asleep....I did wake up around 3am and it was clear the storm was violent. It actually reached Signal 9, 1 below the maximum of 10 but 1 above the Signal 8 that shuts down the city's transport and sends workers home. Being in our apartment was kind of like driving thru a car wash, water was blasting the windows from multiple directions so you couldn't see anything. And wind whistles loudly up through the elevator shafts. But by daybreak it was clear.

Pea Soup Air

The SCMP reported Hong Kong's 'street level' pollution to be reaching all-time highs due to increased traffic exhaust and a densely congested skyline which traps the bad air. On the plus side however, 'rooftop' atmospheric pollution has fallen significantly due to better pollution controls on factories in the Delta to the North. So the air well above us is getting better, but the air at nose level is worsening. Whatever will HK'ers do without the North as a scapegoat for its bad air anymore. Also, the crummy economy means more factories have shut down which means less smokestacks to belch pollutants down upon HK! Hooray, bad economy!