Bicycle Rider's Clothing Hunt

It had been a long time since Sean and his Dad had seen each other. Sean's Dad had ridden his scooter for 30 minutes to get to Sean's Mum's shop. The trip had started off under cloudy skies but by the time Sean's Dad had arrived at the shop he'd been riding through rain for 15 minutes.

The first thing they did was go and get some breakfast. Sean likes hot chocolate with his morning meal.


He likes to put on a special pose when his Dad points the camera at him.


So, his Dad took another picture that was bit more normal.


Sean had ordered the Childrens' Meal. It looked like the least healthy thing on the menu in a shop that boasts about how healthy its breakfasts are....


The only thing they did after breakfast was ride around for hours, going to different bicycle shops and sports shops trying to find proper bicycle shorts and tops for Sean. He wants two sets, two shirts and two pairs of shorts, because he is planning to take part in a big group ride in late-December. The group will ride 600kms from the southernmost tip of Taiwan all the way to the island's northernmost point in 10 days. Unfortunately, Sean and his Dad could only find one set of clothes the right size even after spending three hours searching. Everywhere they looked the clothes were too big.



The search will continue later.

Sean Writes a Letter

On Sunday Aug. 4 when Sean's Dad and Sean finally got together it had been more than a month since the last time that they had seen each other. The first thing that Sean wanted to do when his Dad arrived was show off a new pet.


It was a very cute little lizard. If it was turned belly-up it would play dead and refuse to move.


When Sean and his Dad were eating breakfast, a very strange woman starting staring at Sean. His defence was to stare straight back.


After she left Sean relaxed.


Sean's Dad had some small gifts for him. There was an Australia Football shirt from his Aunty Annette, a souvenir fridge magnet from Great Keppel Island (in Australia) and a SpongeBob SquarePants eraser.


He seemed to like the eraser the most so when he looked like he wouldn't finish his breakfast, his Dad threatened to take it back. That worked well, breakfast was done in an instant.


Then it was time to go and play catch.


But, it was very hot and they soon stopped for a break. That was good for Sean because he seemed to prefer playing with his lizard.


Sean's Dad had also brought a special notebook. He wanted Sean to write a letter to his Grandad and Grandma in Australia.


Sean had also brought one of his own toys. Wang Chien-ming (or Chien-ming Wang as they call him in the U.S.) has made New York Yankees souvenirs of all kinds very popular in Taiwan.


But the most popular are the items with his name and number on the back.


Then it was back to throwing the ball. Sean was practising pitching.


His throwing action is pretty good.


And he likes to act the part, as well.


But he was also concerned about his lizard. He thought that the poor little thing might be too hot and that maybe a swim would be a good idea. The water in the puddle wasn't deep enough for the lizard to actually need to swim. The little guy spent most of his time just standing in the water. You can see his head sticking out of the water not far from the right hand edge of the puddle..... if your eyes are good.


Sean let the lizard have a sunbath to dry out.


And then gave the lizard a drink. It really was quite a hot day.


Then it was time to get down to the business of writing a letter to Sean's Grandad and Grandma.


But writing didn't last long. Playing with the lizard was far too attractive. Sean built a tiny island in the middle of the puddle for his lizard to sunbake on.


And allowed the lizard to take up temporary residence.


Even though it wasn't much past midday. Sean, his Dad and the lizard had to leave and find a place indoors.


An afternoon thunderstorm was closing in.


McDonalds had spare seats and anyone buying a children's meal could choose one of five plastic toys.


Sean was very careful about putting the stickers on his car.


In fact, he did a really good job.


After that, Sean finally finished the letter that his Dad had been trying to get him to write all morning.


When he was finished, Sean's Dad translated it into English for Sean's Grandad and Grandma.


So now, the first two pages of Sean's notebook looks like this.

Sean's First Baseball Glove

Sean and his Dad had a good couple of hours playing with a new (second-hand) baseball mitt for Sean this morning. His Dad had dusted off his old glove as well and they played catch, plus did some ground ball fielding drills. The second of those might sound surprising but Sean really liked them.

So, his Dad was taking a break when Sean came back to where his Dad was sitting.


There's no better cure for a big thirst than a can of sarsparilla.


It puts a happy look on his face every time.


And, it gives him the energy to go back out in the hot sun and run so far away that the zoom on his Dad's camera is useless.


Eventually, Sean came back and agreed to allow his Dad to take a picture of him with the mitt for the blog.


He's a very agreeable boy most of the time.

Sean Sees Pirates of the Caribbean

Sean had asked his Mum to ask his Dad to take him to see the latest (and last, we hope) installment of the Pirates of the Caribbean. So, on a Saturday morning they set off for the local cinema to face the huge crowds wanting to see Johnny Depp and friends prance about. They bought tickets and then went for breakfast.
But, Sean wasn't very interested in breakfast because his Dad had brought some coins from foreign lands for Sean to sort through.


In fact, breakfast remained untouched while the coins were sorted into different piles for each country.


The deal was that if there were two coins that were the same, Sean could have one for his collection. In the end, he was very polite. He took less than 20 coins when he could have taken twice that many if he had wanted.


His Dad still had lots more.


When Sean's Dad noticed that Sean was wearing a Sponge Bob t-shirt he asked Sean to stand up so he could take a picture. Sean only cooperated grudgingly.


Then, it was time to finish breakfast but Sean is still quite a fussy eater. It took quite a while to get one plain buttered bagel finished.


On the way into the theatre Sean saw an advertising display that he liked. It seemed like he would have liked to keep some of the fake money but he was good about putting it back when his Dad asked him to.


Sean was slightly disappointed that his Dad didn't take advantage of a little special offer that included "One Treasure Box" (sic). He wanted the little toy treasure chest but the teenager that sold the movie tickets to his Dad had failed to mention this possibility and then had provided this little flyer after the tickets had been paid for (sigh).


Despite that little letdown Sean liked the movie a lot and was in a good mood all the way home afterwards.

Rainy Day in Taipei

Sean and his Dad had about 5 hours together on Saturday. The weather was not very good. There were isolated showers in many parts of Taipei and it was hard to tell which parts of town would stay dry, if any. So, the first thing they did was go to see a movie.

Sean's Dad thought that Sean might like to see the latest Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles movie but Sean chose an American children's movie, Bridge to Terabithia. It's a Disney movie and Sean seemed to like it.

On the way out of the movie theatre, patrons are directed through an amusement arcade. Sean saw an air hockey table and wanted to play.


Then, because they had a couple of tokens left over but not enough to play air hockey again, Sean decided to try another game.



When they were having lunch Sean's Dad tried to take a picture of a book Sean had brought along with him. It was a souvenir from an exhibition that is on at the National Palace Museum at the moment. Unfortunately, just before the ever-so-slow camera took a picture Sean very quickly put some stuff on top of the book. He's very cheeky like that. He thought it was very funny.


Sean didn't interfere when his Dad took a picture of his brand new stamp collection. He says he wants stamps from as many countries as possible and he doesn't mind if they have been used before or not. So, his Dad will have to think of some way to help with that as well as the foreign coin collection.