I’ll keep this short and sweet since the electricity keeps shutting off. The travel agency wasn’t answering the phone this morning. No one was at my office either, but according to the Cathay Pacific Web site, my flight to Hong Kong tomorrow morning still hasn’t been cancelled, so I guess I will just get up at 6:30 am tomorrow morning, find a bus to the airport and hope that the tour is still on. The agency is on the 6th floor, so at least they won’t be able to claim flood damage. I have to admit I’m a little nervous about getting on an airplane after the attacks in the US, but statistically speaking, flying hasn’t become more dangerous.

We actually saw blue sky and a bit of sunlight today for the first time in a while. It’s still raining, though, and some foreigner laid his bike down on the wet street below my window just now. I spent the day online and editing my book, which was actually kind of enjoyable. I think it will be a good read. Consequently, however, I don’t have much to write about today. I also don’t know whether I will be able to find web access during the four days I will be in Hong Kong. One thing I do know, is that typhoons are like smoke at a campfire. No matter where I sit, it always blows my way.

Well, in any case, Hong Kong should be fun. I really need to get away for a bit, and even if it rains I’ll enjoy it.

I learned today from my friend Bill, who works in Washington DC for the Voice of America, where he is the bureau chief or something, that my college professor passed away on August 31st. Bill has been rather busy ever since the terrorist attacks, obviously, so he only had time to tell me today. My professor was with friends. There was no funeral. He didn’t get my letter.

I hope he knew what he meant to me and all of his other students.

Work tomorrow has been cancelled as well, due to the typhoon, which is still actually in Taiwan, such is the slowness of its pace. The wind outside is still howling, and the lightening is fierce. Hopefully the electricity will hold up.

Dean called last night and asked if I was coming over to watch Star Trek at the 70’s Airport Love Palace. Typhoons don’t usually have that big an effect in Taipei, so I thought why not? A glance outside showed nothing but rain, so I said ok. Dean and Kay drove over and picked me up, since they were going out for videos anyway.

It was around 8 p.m. by the time we had picked a couple of VCDs out and returned. First we watched Family Man, with Nicholas Cage, and learned why success is bad for you. Then we watched Star Trek and began watching Cast Away, with Tom Hanks. By this time the weather outside was getting a bit violent. The wind rose to a howl and lightning began to flash, giving a surreal feel to the storm scene in the movie, as if it were some sort of hopped-up surround sound system.

We were about a third of the way through the movie when Eoghain, who lives on the top floor of the apartment, came in and said, in his typically British understated way: “We may be having a bit of a problem with the water coming in again.” We left Dean’s room and found several waterfalls streaming out of the light fixtures. Upstairs, Eoghain’s room had filled with water, and the balcony, where Eoghain keeps his pet alligator, was overflowing. We took turns bailing water out of Eoghain’s room with plastic drawers and had just about finished when the power went out, leaving us in darkness. The evacuated airport still had emergency lighting, of course, but the rest of the city was pitch black. The cat chose that moment to get in touch with its fear by vomiting on the floor.

The weather was such that I didn’t feel like returning home, so I spent the night. When I woke up this morning it was still raining heavily, but the wind had died down a bit, so I decided to walk back home, as public transportation didn’t seem to be working. The street below was flooded, and people were trying to push their cars to higher ground. The people on the radio said that high tide would exacerbate the flooding.

Dean and I walked south, but soon we were wading. Cars were mostly submerged in the almost waist-high water, which smelled of gasoline and other chemicals. Minchuan East Road was flooded as well, and I snapped some more pictures of Dean as he pointed out this man on a bicycle. Then Dean went back to the 70’s Airport Love Palace, while I continued south through what looked like a Taiwanese version of Venice. Garbage was floating in the submerged alleyways, and stairways down to lower levels in office buildings had become waterfalls. Changchun Road was covered in about 3-4 feet of water, and shoeboxes floated out of one shop. The water was waist-deep by now, and I tiptoed along, holding my shorts up with one hand to keep my wallet and digital camera out of the water as I held my umbrella in front of me in the muddy brown torrent to seek out any obstacles or sewer openings that might trip me up. The metal doors leading to underground parking garages were bent inwards by the force of the flood, which had reached the top step of the Sunrise department store on Fuhsing N. Road.

I kept sloshing my way through the water, down Fuhsing to Chunghsiao, which was also under water. I had to jump over the wakes that passing military trucks left as they drove down the street. The wakes crashed like surf up against the shop fronts. Pedestrians gawked from curbsides that had become more akin to warfs at a port. The entrance to the Sogo Department store parking garage had become a torrential affair, watched by some people in the flooded Friday’s just opposite. Ronald McDonald didn’t seem to notice the catastrophe, however. All along the river that was Chunghsiao East Road, people stared out of upper story windows. I decided to go check on my old landlord, and found the alley where I used to live pretty much submerged. If I were still living there, my motorcycle would have been ruined by the water. I called up to some people sitting in one of the windows in my old apartment, but they said no one by my landlord’s name lived there anymore.

Inexplicably humming “Surfin’ USA” by the Beach Boys, I walked down Dunhua South Road, where some rather large trees had been blown down, and then down Ren-ai to Ta-an Park. There I found a site that made me laugh it was so ludicrous. Some idiot was so worried about his precious SUV, which he presumably bought for its supposed ability to operate in tough situations just such as this, that he actually drove it into the middle of the park and parked it on a small hill where it would be safe from the floods.

Businesses are still closed, of course, and the weather still looks nasty outside, with heavy wind and a barrage of rain, but at least we don’t get so much flooding in this particular area. Although the streetlights downstairs don’t seem to be working, our electricity is still on. Hopefully we’ll get tomorrow off as well, since the city seemed to have taken a real beating. Flooding is three stories high in some areas. I’m also a bit worried that the typhoon will regroup and make a pass at Hong Kong next, which would be bad as I am planning on flying there the day after tomorrow.

Yesterday I was eating a delicious brunch at Grandma Nitti’s when Fish walked up. I hadn’t seen Fish, who is Canadian (it seems my life is full of Canadians lately), in a while, so after we finished eating, we decided to walk up to the Taipei Guest House, which is open to the public this weekend, and have a look around.

For those of you who don’t live in Taipei, the Taipei Guest House, built in 1901, is an imposing, slightly dilapidated grey edifice near the East Gate on Zhongshan S. Road. Foreigners call it the Addam’s Family House. We tried to walk into one gate but were turned away by a couple of gruff young men in suits who looked like they used words like “cut” in interesting and varied ways. We went to the proper entrance and walked in to find an overgrown front lawn with a fountain and a line of people spilling out from under the portico. We got in the line, which slowly moved inside the house…

…and right back out again. We were ushered through the main hall, glimpsed a couple of side rooms and then we were out the back door, standing on the portico overlooking a sizable lake and more overgrown grounds. Pictures of the Guest House were stuck on a couple of boards, but otherwise, that was it. We were rushed out by more gruff young men who seemed perturbed by the gall of whomever had allowed entrance to all of these pesky tourists.

I also made a start on editing the rough draft of my book yesterday. This is going to take quite a while, I think, since it needs a lot of editing, as well as background and other research. Still, it’s just a matter of plodding through it and getting it done. Today is perfect for such goings on, since the Typhoon That Wouldn’t Leave is still hanging around our northern coast. At noon today I went out to buy some groceries and have some lunch at the vegetarian place on Heping E. Road that has really good fried rice. Besides heavy rain, the occasional gust of wind and heavy, fast-moving clouds rushing across the sky, one couldn’t tell that there was a typhoon here, yet the eye is supposedly supposed to pass over Taipei later today. I hope we get at least one day of vacation for this. I also hope that this doesn’t affect my trip to Hong Kong on Wednesday.

Have I mentioned that? Our company, in an attempt to keep employees around in spite of the fact that we don’t get paid well, sponsors an annual company trip, and we could choose from excursions to Germany, Egypt, Japan, Bali, Hong Kong and Kenting. The company pays NT$10,000 of the trip cost, so while this would be just a small portion of the trip to Germany or Egypt, it is the majority of the Hong Kong trip and all of the Kenting trip. Since I can get to Kenting on my own very cheaply, I decided to take the Hong Kong option and pay a few thousand NT for round-trip airfare and four days in Hong Kong, with my own room at the Hyatt in TST for three nights. This is, of course, if neither the typhoon nor the Cathay Pacific pilots strike manage to fuck it up. When I’m there, hopefully, I’ll be able to see some of my old co-workers from the paper as well as some other old friends. If I’m extremely lucky, I’ll be able to catch a glimpse of the fabled BWG.

I’m apparently number 12 on the World’s 100 Best Real People Websites. Woo-hoo! Only 11 more poisonings to go…

I was going to go down to Taichung to see Yuan-ming and some other friends, but the weather has turned crappy due to a tropical storm storm in the region, so I think I’ll just stay in and work on my book. I heard that some of Taipei’s historical buildings are open to the public today, so I might go see some of those as well.

Predictably, my boss “didn’t get around” to calling the one prospective replacement, so I still don’t know what is going to happen as far as my trip goes. In any case, I got word from a relative of mine that my grandmother’s illness has taken a turn for the worse. In the same email, I was also warned against trying to visit because my parents didn’t want me there. They reportedly think that my grandfather will not be able to stand my presence. I recall the last time I visited, after I finished film school in New York, they strenuously resisted any attempt by my brother to bring along his kids, whom I haven’t seen in many years, even though it was Christmas. That visit was a shambles.

I realize that they should have a say in this situation, and I also realize that I shouldn’t let them get to me (I tell my sister that all the time, but she lives close to them), but I still have to admit that it makes me feel a bit sad that they see me in this way.

“Dear GeoCities Member:

“Congratulations, http://www.geocities.com/noneoyerbusiness is

very popular and has been receiving a large amount of traffic. Your

site has become so popular, in fact, that our records indicate that

you’re using more than the allotted amount of data transfer we provide

for a free web site, which is 3GB/month (measured on an hourly basis).”

“In the past we have not enforced that limit, so your site has been

uneffected thus far. However, shortly, all free member sites

transferring more than the allowable data limit will be disabled

for portions of the day until usage falls to within the prescribed

limits.”

“If you’d like to prevent this from happening to your site, you

may join one of our new premium services, GeoCities Pro or GeoCities

Webmaster.”

This is a low blow, but then again, I expect no less from money-grubbing, pseudo-conservative, “The Children! What About the Children!”, purposefully inefficient Yahoo! these days. What a change from its beginnings. I’d say more but I don’t want to waste my precious bandwidth.

Several friends of mine, mostly from the newspaper, were meeting up last night at the Tavern, so I decided to ride down there after work last night. On the way, as I was waiting for the light to change next to a silver mercedes-benz that was double-parked in front of a ritzy hotel, a woman who was presumably its owner came up to me and tried to pull me away from her car.

“Don’t!” she said crossly, while motioning with her hands that I shouldn’t be so close to her precious vehicle in that maddening sign-language Taiwanese people break out to communicate with anyone who doesn’t look Chinese. I moved ahead about a foot, but she wasn’t satisfied and glared at me. Then she inspected the rear view mirror for damage and actually came close to hysteria, even though I obviously hadn’t done anything to the mirror. All this time I was trying to think of a suitably withering remark, but her antics were just so hilarious I couldn’t do anything but burst out laughing and give her the Taiwanese “Pai-se” salute before driving off.

Dean and Edward were already at the Tavern, and we were soon joined by Carl, Jerome and Carl’s friend Lori. Lori is thinking of putting on a stage version of Star Trek, and mentioned that I was just deadpan enough to play Spock (Personally, I’d rather play a crazed Sulu from The Naked Time). I was arguing with Lori about the Nostradamus prediction, which I believe to be a hoax, when a loud, piercing whistle sounded from outside. This was immediately followed by the entry of several strangely dressed individuals. They were mostly young foreigners, dressed in the Taiwanese idea of motorcycle gang attire, but anyone from anywhere near the US would more likely associate their attire with a Disneyworld cowboy store than hell’s angels. I hope they were getting paid very handsomely for what they were doing, because I can’t think of anything more embarrassing.

These people all apparently had PhD’s in Making Everyone In the Room Wince with Sheer Annoyance. They were purportedly promoting Corona beer, and they had a game which involved a styrofoam cup. One of the drunk Germans at the next table had the indescretion to play the game, but when he “won” (surprise!), more annoying whistle-blowing occurred, after which nobody else was willing to play the game. One of the group came by and tried to get us to play the game, but we all shook our heads vigorously in fear.

The Annoying Corona People bounced around some more as the owner of the Tavern rushed about in their wake assuring his patrons that “they’ll leave in 5 minutes. I promise! Please don’t leave!” The man was near tears as one of the group blew her whistle again, prompting several people to grab blunt objects and move towards her in a menacing fashion. Carl was livid, but then again Carl is often livid. Fortunately we calmed him down by mentioning the name of the paper one of our former colleagues works at now, The Bulletin, in Bend, Oregon. This invariably causes Carl to burst out in fits of giggling. Try it sometime.

Fortunately the Corona people eventually picked up on the fact that their lives were in real danger and retreated. I cannot imagine what imbecile thought that these tactics would sell beer. Probably the same guy who thought sticking a “Baby on Board” sign on a car would actually cause people originally intending to hit those cars to think twice and hit someone else instead.

Later on in the evening our old photographer from the paper, Dave Smith came by. He’s living in Bangkok now and was in town to get some photos. Dave’s a cool guy, and like a lot of my friends, he is Canadian. But the mediocre food, the two ginger ales (honest!) and the ass-numbing seats were taking their toll. I had to get home and sleep. Once I did, I dreamt about carrying my turtles in buckets down unending flights of dark, wet stairs. I guess I can’t get my mind those damn attacks just yet.

Speaking of which, it seems that this so-called “journalist” is just echoing the same sentiment that likely had a hand in leading to the attacks in the first place. I understand she’s upset at the senseless loss of her friend, but her editor should probably work harder to get more analysis and less blatant emotion. I don’t know about everyone else, but when I look for news, I want to see facts and analysis, not people ranting on soapboxes. That’s what weblogs are for.

A phone conversation Whiny Woman had this morning: “What?….What?….What?….” for approximately 15 minutes.

Daniel calls this account “suprisingly under-read.” Hmmm…what are you trying to say, that I need another reader? He also calls me “articulate”, which is Latin for “uses way too many commas.”

So much for the blurbs. I’m still waiting for my boss to call my prospective replacement and see if he is interested. Will she even call? Or will she sit on it until it’s too late? I’m still paranoid, of course, because I realize that, even if people are consciously out to get me, they could still be following coded directives from either outer space or John Travolta or both.

Last night everyone in the office was called to a company meeting. I thought it was surely in response to the New York attacks, since our main office is in midtown Manhattan. Instead, it was a totally ordinary, boring meeting, with no mention of the attacks at all. The people here seemed to lack the shock part of the reaction, but instead told stories they had heard about the disaster with surprising amounts of relish. At the meeting, however, there were a couple of promotion announcements and obsequious speeches by people expressing their thanks to everyone who helped them make more money. Then they put on a crappy Japanese Beatles-wannabe music video for us to “learn” from, and I had to leave before I strangled a hapless co-worker or two.

It’s a fine late-summer/early fall day today. Autumn in Taiwan tends to be relatively mild; it’s my favorite season here. Since I’ve finished the rough rough first draft of my book, I might take this weekend off and go to Taichung or somewhere, just to get out of Taipei for a bit. I still feel compelled to finish the damn thing, though, and especially to get as much done as possible before I go on vacation, whenever I end up going on vacation. If I go in October, obviously I won’t have that much time, but if I end up going in November, I’ll have a reasonable amount of time to work on it before I go. Right now it’s not up to me, however, so all I can do is sit around and worry that there’s something still stuck in my eye.

I spent most of today, when not working, browsing various sites recounting the recent attacks on New York. This kept me pretty much depressed and shocked the whole day. But life goes on, as I’m sure many of you are realizing, no matter what. This is a story that is just beginning, of course, and while I’m interested to know what happens next, personal things inevitably intrude.

I submitted my formal application for my annual leave today. My boss said she’d send it up to her boss, who is the big boss in Taiwan. Another guy also said he could fill in for me, so I’ll ask my boss to discuss the mystery salary with him tomorrow. More than likely he won’t like it, but it’s worth a try. Hopefully my flight is still on. Who knows what’s going to happen? I sure don’t.

I had dinner at a Thai restaurant this evening with Dean. I was on my motorcycle and he was on foot, so after we ate, Dean said, “Do you have an extra helmet?” I said no. “Well, let’s risk it, then. Take back roads.” He got on the back of my motorcycle and we were off to the 70’s Airport Love Palace to watch TV.

No sooner had I turned the corner than I spotted two cops on scooters chatting on the side of the road. I had two options: either make a panic stop and throw Dean over the handlebars (no mean feat, considering Dean’s, uh, inertia), or keep going and hope they didn’t notice a foreigner without a helmet on the back of a motorcycle. Rather stupidly, I chose the latter. You know what happened next.

We got chased and pulled over, of course, and then Dean tried to convince the cops that it was his fault, “We were just going two feet! From here to there!” he said, gesturing, but they weren’t buying. They issued me an NT$500 ticket, which Dean will pay for. This is the second ticket I’ve gotten in the last week or two. The post office people where I have to pay them will probably think they’re dealing with some kind of confused hoodlum who is constantly breaking the law but always pays his traffic tickets.

Ronnie just called and said to turn on CNN. “Why?” I asked.

“Because two jetliners just plowed into the World Trade Center, which then collapsed, and jets have crashed into the Pentagon as well. It’s a massive terrorist attack,” he said. I walked out to the living room and turned on the TV, thinking, Ronnie has got to be putting me on. There’s no way that could have happened. I’m not that gullible, am I?

Then the TV screen warmed up and glowed with a picture of a Boeing 767 flying into the World Trade Center. A huge explosion ripped out the other side.

Holy. Living. Fuck. It’s true.

We don’t get CNN, but it doesn’t matter. All the TV stations have just one thing on. I literally cannot believe my eyes. And I have a feeling that it’s not over. Ronnie hung up after saying he was going to call some other people.

It’s anyone’s guess what happens now.