For those of you that are curious as to what I have been up to for the past month, you might log onto Chequers for an article I submitted to Neal for all of you to enjoy about an event at the Ming Tombs north of Beijing. The trip was fantastic. The Western world hardly was aware of the impact and celebration that took place the week of Oct. 1st when the Peoples Republic of China celebrated 50 years of communism. We were in Beijing and Hong Kong for the celebration and Beijing spent $36 million to spruce up the city ....and that is a lot of money over there. Our trip took us to Beijing, Hong Kong, Kowloon, Suchow, Shanghai, Wuhon and up the Yang=tse throught the 3 gorges to be dammed and into Chungking. Before 2003, try to do a Yang=Tse cruise since it will never be the same again and it is awesome to experience. The last side trip I took was a crude,wooden raft rapids trip and with an aggravated cough due to a cold; came back with a herniated disk. May also have something to do with leaving the wrong donation at the Ming Tombs referenced above. got to move on....back hurts when I sit more then 5 minutes in front of the PC