Day 3 of captivity

Hey folks, me again.  The gang just left for their evening collection, and I'm left behind once again.  They all look so funny with their insect gaiters, mosquito nets, safari hats, and canvas expeditionary bags.  I think Shaoyuan discovered an outdoor supply store in Urumqi and went hog-wild to look like a real field biologist.  I must get more group photos in this getup. I'm thoroughly entertained.

So the great news is that on night one of collections, we got 9 animals.  They're of the five-toed rather than three-toed variety which isn't ideal, but they'll do.  Heck, I'll take what I can get.  They seem to think if they move over to another area with less vegetation then they'll be able to get the three-toed ones.  We'll see.  Of the nine, 5 were female, and one had three little 'bros.  Not a bad start at all I would say.

When not dissecting rodents, I've been busying myself reading, writing, and perusing the web.  I found my new favorite website : www.thingsyoungerthanmccain.com  It's entertaining me right now beyond belief.  I love the "kodachrome is younger than McCain.  And it's nearly dead."  I know it's insensitive if one were to take it seriously, but I'm enjoying the snarkiness.  A little light humor in the wake of the insufferable election campaign is a warm welcome.

I'm also attempting to rent a movie from iTunes, but while I do have an internet connection that is far better than what we had last year, the download rate is still agonizingly slow.  I started downloading "Atonement" at 11 yesterday morning.  36 hours later, it still says it requires another 20 hours or so.  I guess that will severely limit my movie watching capabilities.  So far the chinese TV stations have shown Elizabeth, and I've watched Terminator 2 twice.  There have been several other movies, but all overdubbed in Chinese - not too helpful to me.  That's okay - I don't need to rot my brain with too much TV anyway.  It's just a nice break from reading until I fall asleep.  So considering the time it takes to download rentals, if anyone has "must see" movies that I can find on iTunes, I'd appreciate the suggestions.