Anyong ha seyo!

Remember that game that we used to play in the computer lab in elementary school where you had to identify the continents of the world? The hands down best part of that game was finding Asia. The MS-DOS would boom out 'ASIA!!' with both both 'a' sounds stretched out in it's low robotic voice. Well hover your mouse over my head and double click because I'm in ASIA!!

(Side bar: that game would lead me to believe that Europe was always on the right hand side of North America, which was confusing when we moved on to the Earth is Not Flat unit. Perhaps not the best game, but definitely more educational than Dinosaur Park Tycoon.)

This is the view from my room...

...I actually don't know the name of the city we're in because every word I learn slips out of my head like a greased eel which, incidentally, was on the menu tonight. Not really, but I had raw beef and I tore a snail from it's shell with my bare teeth.

This is the view from my camera when I was standing right there. Can you count the power lines?

So far we've been getting some cultural training, with the emphasis that things are neither good nor bad, simply different. Here's an exerpt from a case study in our Counseling Book:

"Many Koreans told Martha that she had a Korean spirit, and she agreed. After her first year she decided to stay indefinitely. She married a Korean man, and slowly began to lose her Western identity. After five years Martha had given up most of her Western tendencies: she no longer vocalized her opinions; she didn't feel as independent and self-reliant as before. She didn't think these changes were positive or negative. They were just changes."

There's also a chart of how things are done:

Nuance: Anger
Korea: Showing anger is rude.
West: Showing anger is ride, but it happens.

Nuance: Elderly
Korea: Show kindness and respect.
West: May show kindness and respect at all times. May also put them on ice flows and
leave them for dead.

Nuance: Touching children
Korea: Natural expression of interest and affection.
West: Usually not done. Exceptions made for R Kelly.

Not better or worse. Just different.

Also, remember that medical test that I was worried about before? It's tomorrow. We're having chest x-rays, blood work and we can't have anything to eat or drink from midnight tonight until 8:00 tomorrow morning because I think, I think, they're also going to be preforming surgery on us. If they even dare ask me to pee in a cup after no water for eight hours I will laugh in their faces so hard I'll pee a little bit, but only dust will come out because there surely won't be any liquid in my bladder. On the bright side, there also won't be any liquid when I break down in tears. Wish me luck!

T Minus 13 hours

I'm moving to Korea in thirteen hours! I gotta go trim my bangs. Wish me luck (in bangs and in life)!

An ode

My winter layer is a wonderful thing
It keeps me warm from fall until spring
Like a jacket lining, thick or thin
Except that it's blubber under my skin.

Normally...

Bundled up under so many clothes
My layer is hidden when the cold snow blows
Nobody can see this flab that I have
All is hidden from my waist to my calves

However...

During a west coast mid-winter high
Something happens between my thighs
When the temperature rises up to plus nine
They start to chafe, these thighs of mine

Skirts without tights
Cause such a fright
When walking a lot
My legs get quite hot

Things start to burn
My skin starts to turn
A shade of pink
That makes one think:

Was winter so bad?
I miss it a tad
Sleet, rain and snow
I like the mercury low

Of course...

I could diet or even exercise...
Or maybe just ice my poor swollen thighs.

Think About It.

Debating is just rich men arguing.

Think about it.

I'm drunk.

Welcome to the 2010 Winter Games!!!!! I indifferently support and apathetically protest the Olympics. That is my official and unsanctioned stance on the matter.

KD Land looked like Liberace, no?

A rare few can pull off the white suit. There's a bar in Edmonton where if you want a veggie hot dog you ask them to "KD Lang it." I think also if you want to up the butch factor and belt out some Leonard Cohen you could "KD Lang it."

I'ma go KD Lang it.

Hallelujah.

Adults Say the Darndest Things

I was recently the youngest person at a gathering of older people. I thought I wouldn't have anything to talk to middle aged, middle class people about, seeing that I am neither, but I was wrong. Old people are gross, just like me.

Old man: "Alright we gotta get out of here, you're having another hot flash."
Old lady: "What? No I'm not."
Old man: "Ok fine, what do you want me to say, we gotta go home so I can rub one out?"

Later in a discussion of how many strip clubs there are in Victoria my boyfriend's dad walks by and immediately responds with the correct answer of two. He also sends his regards to Olivia.

Shudder.

I'm baaaaaaaack...

...in the new york groove. Or, more likely, the North Delta daily grind. Back from the land of the ice and snow, from the midnight sun where the hot springs blow. Or, more likely, where the goats blow. Goats totally blow.

I'm currently prepping for mid-to-high level alcohol saturation tonight. After a week with my parents I intend to do some abusing. I was reading Chelsea Handler's book in the airport today (on page 62 after reading in in various stores in multiple locations, I intend to read the whole thing without paying) and she referred to herself not as an alcoholic, but rather an "advanced drinker." I like this. Also, she drinks Vodka Collinses, which I have never had, but think I could like. I'd like to fancy myself as a less slutty, less funny version of her. Kind of a poor, sexless man's version of her. I think my boyfriend would agree.

Trip highlights include riding horses and quads, witnessing the birth and death of a baby cow (calf to those in the biz, veal to those with an appetite) as well as my mother's slow descent into insanity and my family's inevitable self destruction. Those may be correlated, but are not causal. (Happy family's are all alike, shitshow's are like snowflakes...)

Hark, who goes there? Vodka? Come in, sit down, take your bra off if you like. I've got some drinking to do. Some drinking and some forgetting.

Know what I love?

BABY PANDAS!!!!!

If Monday's got you down, remember that your offspring will never be this cute. They're going to be all bald and red and splotchy and then grow up to resent you. Human babies suck, let's leave procreation to the pandas.