A day away

24 hours from now, I will be in the departure lounge of O'Hare wishing I were basically anywhere else on earth. 24 hours after that, I will be in Beijing, presumably having my first real Chinese meal. My plan is to stay awake for as long as I can tonight in the hopes of partway shifting my internal clock. We don't have anything to do tomorrow--by design--so we're free to take long naps, lounge around, Google for tidbits, and try to finish up some of our reading. (I'm about 100 pages from the end of Retreat of the Elephants, so I wouldn't mind sticking a fork in that before the time comes to catch a cab.)

This is my first trip abroad in ten years (how did that happen?) and I'm really stoked. I'm already packed--me! Packed an entire day before I need to head to the airport! It's like I've been possessed or something. monshu and I had a great talk yesterday about how we're readying ourselves psychologically for the culture shock and dealing with frustrations before they lead to meltdowns. So far, I've never been able to vacation with someone for more than a week without there being some sort of rupture--or is that true? How long did monshu and I spend in California? I saw an entirely new side of him them, freed from the tyranny of a M-F schedule, and I'm really looking forward to seeing more in China.