Chapter 118

I got up early, stretched, browsed the internet for a bit, walked the dog, rode to work, supervised a lab and gave a review class to a bunch of excited and goofy eleventh-graders. Maybe my life is a teeny bit more interesting than the average person’s due to the large numbers of hobbies I have and the fact that I live in China, but of course a lot of it can be pretty repetitive. As always I listened to music when I had time, first some Franz Liszt and then a Korean hardcore punk band named Slant, both very good listens for obviously different reasons.

I got home and scolded the dog for shredding a box of crackers and eating its contents. It’s my fault mostly, I thought I hid it well but clearly it was within the reach of his nosy little triangle face. I reheated some spaghetti and started watching the second half of Wrestlemania. There was a match between Randy Orton and a crazy horror movie gimmick called The Fiend, who got summoned from a giant jack-in-the-box by some kind of satanic schoolgirl in a short dress, giving very creepy and borderline pedo undertones to the whole thing. It was a bit short and I expected something much more insane, judging by previous matches I’d seen from those two guys and the build-up that involved Orton burning The Fiend alive, but for sure it was original. Then it was a women’s tag team match, and it was pretty good, though not as crazy as the NXT women’s tag team chaotic match from last week. I remember Shayna Baszler from her time in MMA, she was a pioneer who unfortunately didn’t get much success in the UFC, but from what I’ve seen and heard she’s doing well in her new wrassling home. Speaking of which, I’ve always found it a bit confusing that they never ever use the word “wrestling” or “wrestler”, instead saying “sports entertainment” and “superstar”. And yeah, I heard the explanation, but it still makes little sense to me.

In the afternoon I did a bit of writing and looked for some music, I clicked on a Russian post-punk compilation and wasn’t disappointed. In fact that’s the kind of music I’ve been listening all afternoon and the next morning, I like the bleak aesthetics of this “Russian doomer music”. I had one class with the eleventh-graders, but with the twelfth-graders now I just give them a free study period, and individually help students who request it. A better use of everyone’s time, and the exam is right around the corner, the work should be done already.

I went home and did a calisthenics routine, the one recommended on the subreddit /r/bodyweightfitness. It’s pretty exhaustive (and exhausting!) and sustainable, I will commit to do it, or slight variations thereof, three times a week after this upcoming long weekend. Then I took a cold shower, had a protein shake and took a one-hour nap with the animal curled in bed against me.

I woke up at 7:30 and the girlfriend called. My initial plan was to go play pool for an hour with some friends and then meet her after her pole dancing class at 9:20, but she went to the early class today and was now heading home. So I canceled my pool game and waited for her. She suggested we go to a restaurant, and now that I have a driver’s license, might as well go somewhere a bit further than the ones we usually patronize. Hmmm, not a bad idea, and to make it worthwhile, we checked out restaurants serving cuisines we can’t get in our city, and decided on an Indian restaurant in the next city, 60 km away. She called to make sure they’re open late, and after taking the dog around the block so he’d poop, off we went. Impromptu road trip!

It felt quite good to be behind the wheel, I am far from what you could call a “car guy” but I’ve always enjoyed driving. We brought some CDs along, from the metal label’s clearance sale, the problem is that the envelopes were not labeled and most of them don’t have the band’s name on the CD itself, so we didn’t know what we listened to for the most part. I knew there was Aulnes, an excellent sludge metal band from Sherbrooke, Quebec, and a black metal band that was seriously badass and will be on top of my rotation, though perhaps not when she’s in the car. She tolerates metal in small doses and was lenient tonight due to the occasion, but I won’t abuse her generosity. The other two blindly-picked albums were more of a mid-tempo type with clean vocals, something she liked a bit better. I’ll check around town if there are some computer shops that can burn CDs, it obviously feels like a very obsolete form of technology.

The Indian restaurant doubles as a jazz bar with live music and a big selection of microbrews so it stays open late, and they said on the phone they serve food until 10 o’clock. We got there... at 9:48. Worse comes to worse we’ll just go elsewhere, but when I asked the Indian waiter if we can still eat he seemed a bit confused and said yes. We ordered a bunch of curries and naan breads, and when I went to the toilet I passed by the kitchen where three Indian men in cook frocks smiled at me. They didn’t seem mad like they had the right to be, and when I politely asked them if they can up the level of spice they nodded. They all left soon after, saying goodbye as they passed our table (now the only one occupied after a group of Chinese left) so perhaps we did keep them here a bit past the end of their shift.

The food came quickly, likely the curries were reheated but there’s zero problem with that, Indian food generally is the product of slow simmering and if they made everything to order from scratch it would take ages, plus it tastes much better when reheated, like my own curry cooking experience has taught me. At any rate it was fucking delicious, and like promised, the dishes had a good spicy kick.

“I recognize the place, I came here many years ago”, I said, between mouthfuls of Kathmandu-style mutton or garlic naan dipped in a rich chicken curry sauce.

“With your er nai?” (mistress)

“No, with a 60-year-old American coworker named Tom”

I went to pay, the bill gave me a backhand flick to the balls, especially after I told myself I’d save a bit of money after traveling so much in the month of April. It was well worth it though and we intentionally ordered way too much, to have leftovers. Like idiots, we forgot the bag of leftovers, but the lady called just before we got back in the car. She had the girlfriend’s number from when she called to ask about opening times, and that was very nice of her. So I ran back there to get the goodies.

Driving back on the empty dark highway was a bit boring, and the girlfriend said she’d stay awake but promptly fell in a deep slumber, combination of a long day, a belly full of rich food, and the sex on the beach cocktail she had. We were in bed a little before midnight.