A Night To Remember?

I am exhausted, after a long day of teaching and writing.

However - THE WEEKEND STARTS HERE!!

With the abbreviated work schedule I am suffering/enjoying at the moment, I find I have nothing more to do until next Tuesday afternoon.

I am going to do my damnedest to stay up all night to watch tonight's semi-final clash between Spain and Russia (which appears to have the potential to be one of the great football matches of all time). After last night's debacle of botched coverage by CCTV5, I suppose that obliges me to head off into the unlovely environs of the Sanlitun bar district to try and find a bar that has English-language coverage of the game on satellite (my favoured 'local', Room 101, has started showing the games, but only on the benighted domestic terrestrial channel, which I loathe, loathe, loathe). Huxley's new joint, Tun, may be a possibility - although I suspect they only have CCTV5 there. The Sunset Grill (where I did catch quite a few English Premiership matches on satellite earlier in the season) would have been a tempting alternative, but I gather that it is closed down at the moment, after some bother with the police (Only temporary, I hope! Surely the sun cannot have set already on Beijing's diviest bar, before I got around to writing about it on here?). I fear that leaves only Rickshaw or The Den, probably my two least favourite of any of the bars that I will actually deign to set foot in at all. Oh well, it's for the football.

Tonight is also a farewell session for my laidback musical friends, the fine guitar-playing duo, Dan and Nico. Like so many others of Beijing's expat population, they have wearied of the outrageous price-gouging that is going on with visa renewals and have decided to quit the country for the summer months. They'll be off at the weekend (kicking off their break with a 'tour' of Vietnam - I am so tempted to go with them.....), so tonight will be their last performance for 2 or 3 months at Jianghu. And I haven't been to Jianghu, my beloved Jianghu, for quite a while now. I've had a Thursday evening work commitment for the past 3 months that has been sapping my energy and my general will-to-live, so haven't often felt up to a night out afterwards; and if I've had to be at work early on a Friday as well, as until recently I usually have, then late, mellow (drunk, stoned) nights with the guitar boys have, alas, definitely been out of the question (when they're really enjoying themselves, they've been known to carry on playing until well after 2am, and sometimes to carry on drinking until 3am or 4am!).

That should be an ideal warm-up for the footie later.

And I suppose I ought to get in some food somewhere as well. Perhaps a quick bite at The Muslim on the way to the gig......