As I was running through the light rain in my "Free Winona" tee-shirt a couple of thoughts occurred to me. First, I hoped one of the Olympic security volunteers who I pass on every block do not interpret this to be a "Free Tibet" shirt because I'm not sure my Chinese is good enough to explain the context of my Winona shirt. But I am not too worried, the security volunteers are mainly young men who just sit around and observe and do not really appear to be paying much attention at all. They carry no guns or weapons of any kind and they look worn down by the heat and humidity. They are all over town and not just by the events. Their job is to report any strange behavior. A foreigner running in this heat may quality.

A subway east of Olympic green. The white shirted are part of security volunteers, these are more alert looking than most. On the right side, I believe are fireworks used as part of opening ceremony. This picture was taken just north of drum tower where an American was killed in a very, very untypical attack. (I took this pictures while biking around town the afternoon of opening ceremony)

My second thought (I lie, I have many more thoughts but I am only sharing two) is how we came up with Elisa's name.  Well, there are many, many rules. As I think through them, I realize they are mostly exclusionary rules and I like to to think of myself in an inclusive person but perhaps I need to rethink that. Anyway, here are some of the rules:

1. Cannot already be use be a sibling or close friend Has to be a "name name" as opposed to a non name name (exclude: moon, sky, ...) Has to clearly identify the gender (exclude: pat, gerry, terry, ...) Cannot be too popular (see http://www.ssa.gov/OACT/babynames)   Corollary: Cannot be too popular as an English name for Chinese (exclude: Helen, Jessica, Mary, ...) Cannot be too unpopular Cannot be the name of a rock (Jade, Pearl, ...) Must be pronounceable by Chinese folks (exclude: Thora, ...) Cannot be an ex-girlfriends name (exclude: ...) Cannot be a close friend's ex-girlfriends name Cannot be the father in law's dog's name (exclude: Sasha) Cannot be a porn star name (exclude by research) Cannot be suggested by people we don't take suggestions from

With all of that, we ended up with three serious contenders. Claire, Melissa, and Elisa..in that order.  We almost went with Claire but it just never quite felt right. Melissa seemed a bit too common and too dated. Elisa is just right. And here are some more photos of her:

Elisa and Lydia. Elisa crashed out on Yang's arm.