1. We finally got our residence visas squared away. This time, we had to stay at a different
hotel because the other one wouldn’t allow us to cheat our way into getting a
TRRF. A Temporary Residence Registration
Form can only be issued if you have a “residence” in Shanghai for at least one
month. So we book a hotel for a month,
get the TRRF, take care of business, and then check out early. Since the new hotel didn’t allow pets, we had
to find a dog sitter for Smudgie.
Luckily, Vivian was happy to do it.
So hopefully he wasn’t too annoying for her and she’ll be willing to do
it again for us at Christmastime.
2. We figured out the hot water situation. There’s a separate water heater for each
bathroom and there isn’t one in the kitchen so we just have to wash our dishes
in cold water. Also, the water heaters
are able to be turned on and off by a switch in the bathroom that’s right next
to and looks exactly like the light switches.
So we apparently accidentally switched the water heater off when we were trying to figure out what the switches do and we thought that one just did nothing. Nobody told us about this feature. Our old apartment was different too so we had no idea.
Anyways, the story of the day is about the stray dog that
lives in our apartment complex. When we
first saw her, it was obvious she had recently had a litter of puppies because
her teats were bloated. So Adam
nicknamed her Saggytits. I don’t like
that name, but there really is no better way to describe her. Anyways, she wears a collar made out of a
piece of belt so I don’t know if she used to have an owner and they kicked her
out when she had puppies, or if she’s always been stray and somebody made a
crappy collar for her. But she has a
friendly demeanor so I think she must have had some human contact. By the way, someone took the puppies away and
sold them. I only got to see them once
before they disappeared. I was walking
home from the grocery store when I heard whimpering in the bushes so I went to
investigate. Someone had put a cardboard
box back there and the puppies were clambering around all over each other. They were about one month old. I pet them for a little while, and then a
lady came over and started counting them.
I think she thought I was going to take one. How do you say “I don’t want your stupid
mutts, I already have a dog.” in Chinese?
Anyways, since she seems like a nice dog, I’ve been taking
Smudgie up to her whenever we see her outside.
She seemed pretty aloof the first few times and Smudgie didn’t care
either way which is amazing because usually when we see someone else’s pet dog
outside, he growls and barks at them.
But to be fair, the other pet dogs are also male. Well, I guess Saggytits has really warmed up
to Smudgie because now whenever she sees us, she comes running up and tries to
play with Smudgie. She zooms around like
a greyhound and sometimes she bops Smudgie on the head with her paw. At first, Smudgie was just like, "Hey, why you do dat?" But now I can tell he wishes I'd take the leash off him so he can go running around with her. It's great that he has a friend, but it’s very distracting
when I’m trying to get him to poop.
So what I’ve been doing now, is taking an extra leash with
me when we go out. If we see her, I put
the leash on her and tie her to a tree while Smudgie does his business. Then we have a little play time. She’s amazingly patient
And here are a couple of Smudgie shots. I’m letting him grow his big boy coat out for the
winter:
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