Eric's Beijing Diary

Tuesday evening. Sitting here at the Bridge Cafe watching the final presidential debate. I knew better than to come to an event like this, because it's a delayed computer feed rather than the live satellite feed that you get if you watch the debate live. I would have watched it live this morning--that's what I did for the vice-presidential debate and the second presidential debate (the debates were streamed life at 9 am). But I had classes this morning. So I have to put up with a delayed Internet feed that keeps choking up and has all kinds of audio problems. It's OK. I got a seat in the corner so I could do my work while the thing is going on, so I'm not stuck sitting here doing nothing. And Nell, bless her heart, had taken the trouble to record the internet feed, so the delays we actually had to deal with were minimal. She suffered through most of them for us. But I'm getting weary of American presidential elections. Modern American presidential elections are anything but presidential.