Settling in

I changed sites for my photos. You can catch them here:

http://picasaweb.google.com/schmitt.ericS

So, my second and third week over here(I think anyway... time kinda loses meaning) passed pretty well. My roommate and I check out this bar last Wednesday... or maybe it was the one before that? Anyway, we were supposed to get there at 9:00, but didn't make it until 10:30. The line was soooo long we didn't make it in until 10:55, which was amazing timing because they stop giving out these really nifty tickets for free drinks at 11:00. I got four of them and since they don't charge a cover charge, I drank free that night. Most of the bars here play older rock songs, but once in a while they play a newer one, at which point every Taiwanese in the joint starts convulsing like Elaine on Sienfield in their attempts to dance... I fit right in.
The bar was about 30% white people, which is more than I've seen since I got here. Alliya and I found ourselves gawking at them and wanting to take pictures. Apparently that neighborhood has a lot of foreigners, whereas ours only has us.
Sunday, we went to the beach, which was freakin awesome. There was only one big problem- these little tiny red jellyfish all over the bloody place. I took a sting to my toes. It didn't really hurt, it was just quite uncomfortable.
Later that night, I met up with some of my Taiwanese buddies, Ray and Joyce. We mostly checked out the night markets. However, there was some excitement to be had. I drove my first scooter. Those things are hard as hell to control. Good news though, I didn't crash or hurt myself, barring my pride, of course.
Monday we went and snagged some sushi... the raw type.. fish, octopus, muscles, etc. It was pretty good, but my stomach felt like it wanted to explode the next day. I ate another weird thing a couple days ago, as well. It was a bunch of minnows, heads and all, in this brown sauce. No rice, no bread, just minnows. Oh, and last night I had fried crickets.
I also think the guy at the corner store thinks I am a huge lush. He seems to want to check to make sure I had eaten something before he lets me buy a beer. The other day I picked up two of them, one for me and one for my roommate and he looked very, very concerned.
We checked out apartments and settled on one today (Sunday). It is huge, by Taiwan standards, being 35 pings... I think it equates to 700 sq. ft. Although, that doesn't sound like a whole lot, most places we have been to are in the range of 18-22.