Today is at least every day

I'm once again stuck looking for something entertaining and not too trashy to read. I probably have twenty different lists lying around in far corners of my computer and the Internet, but if I get all into the list-hunt, by the time I find one I'll forget why I was looking for it in the first place. It's almost a Catch-22.

I've noticed that when I meet some new Chinese person, there's an adjustment period where they have some trouble believing that humor can come out of a foreigner, and in their native language. I went to the dentist today and judging by the delays from quip to laugh, I might have been talking to Alpha Centauri. On Skype. Shudder.

Dentist: so feels ok? Are there any other problems?
Me: the door to my bedroom is really creaky. Also I think I'm addicted to the sound, I can sit there and open and close it for hours. I think my neighbor is starting to get pissed off. That's it I guess.
Dentist: ...(emits a nervous and somewhat robotic giggle and changes the subject)...so make sure not to eat really hard things. And if it continues to be uncomfortable, we'll have to put a crown on it. Do you understand what I'm saying?
Me: no problem, as long as I can still eat tofu. ("Eat tofu" = sexually harass people, in Chinese).
Dentist: ...ha...ha? Haha!

Ridiculous phrase of the day: "at least..."

You wouldn't think to think it ridiculous, mostly cause you hardly ever think to rethink the phrases you use on a daily basis. But Yuan Yuan was telling me some story about the neighbors today, and how they broke up but that they were together for at least a year, and I eventually had to explain that I wasn't crying about the onions, but about how ridiculous "at least a year" sounded. At least a year. At least a year. At least a year. Sounding ridiculous yet? How about now, when you think about the fact that the probabilty of it being exactly a year is for all intents and purposes (another phrase I nominate for extermination) zero. It's misleading! Every time I hear that phrase now, I get this incredible thirst to hear that it's exactly equal to that lower bound. But then I despair; it's much like hoping today's September 25th every day.