Beards and Beaches

I shaved my beard yesterday. I must say I've become a big fan of beards since growing a few. It's nice going five or six weeks without shaving. All you have to do is clean it up once a week. If you're the low-maintenance type, I highly recommend it.

In other news, one of my goals for March was to start running again. When I lived in Chicago, I ran or swam every few days. However, before this month, it had been over a year since I ran. One of the reasons was the air. While Shanghai is a terrific city, I didn't like breathing the air at a normal pace, let alone having to take deep breaths while running. But, now that I'm living in a city with better air, I figure it's time to start running again. So, I jogged a few times last month and can now appreciate how nice it is to live near the ocean.

Yantai sits at the top of the Shandong province, along the Yellow Sea (Pacific Ocean) coast. It's a great city for jumping a boat to Dalian or Korea. When I was running last week, it took me about five minutes to reach the beach. As I was approaching, you could hear the sound of the ocean. I never realized how much I like that sound. The beach was mostly desolate as were the streets around it, with a few desolate vendor and lifeguard stands signaling that summer is not here yet.

But, it's still great that summer and the beach are so close. I have a feeling I'm going to like living here as the weather breaks. After all, I always wanted to live down the shore for the summer. I just thought it would be in Sea Isle or Wildwood.

(side note: I just heard the Rocky theme on Yantai radio....haha.....how great is that?)