Beauty and the Beast

I'll start with beauty because it is so much nicer. These are my new shoes. Aren't they pretty? Joyce, these are the shoes I told you I had to go buy. I saw these shoes in October and I absolutely loved them, but I decided that I didn't really need them. I'm not sure why I decided that, because of course I need green snake-skin pumps, who doesn't? Everytime I walked past them I would stop and stare for a while and then sigh and move on. It's not like I walked past them often, the store is in Seoul. I was in Seoul this weekend and I decided that if the shoes were still there I would buy them this time. After a conversation with Joyce in which we decided that having 31 pairs of shoes is wrong, it's a prime number, you can't have a prime number it just doesn't work, I decided that I had to go buy more shoes. In case you were wondering, we decided that 36 is a much better number to have, so I may go buy more shoes. These ones also come in black, and I still don't have sneakers. And a note on how wonderful Samuel is, when I said I wanted to go buy shoes, instead of pointing out that I already had 31 pairs, he just smiled and said "okay, let's go", and then he admired them with me. Isn't he great? Tony, take note.
And now for the beast. This is in the hallway just outside of my door. I thought it was my neighbours' laundry, because they always hang their laundry to dry in the hallway. I wasn't really looking. Who wants to examine the neighbours' laundry? Then I noticed that there was a funny smell, so I turned and saw the dead fish hanging there. Isn't that a pleasant surprise? The things you see in Korea.


In other news, I'm going to Malaysia on Saturday! Yay! I'm going with Rachel and Julie. We will be there for a few days and then we'll go to Singapore for a few days. I'll be sure to take lots of pictures.


Happy birthday to Dad, Phaedra, and Xavier. I bought you presents. One of these days I'll get around to mailing them. Happy birthday anyway. Monica, I think you did a great job on Phaedra's cake, but I will gladly take my job back next year. I look forward to it.

100 things about me. Part 1

I got this idea from Jasmine. I think it's a great idea, so I'll give it a shot. I don't know how long it will take me to get to 100, but at least I'll have something to blog about in case I had a boring week. Consider this a comment, Jasmine. I love reading your blog.

1) I'm not very good at sharing feelings. Because of that, this will tend toward the trivial, but I will do my best to ensure that it is not entirely trivial. I will try to put something of substance in here.

2) I hate washing dishes. I usually let my dishes pile up until I have to wash dishes just so I can eat. I know that it would only take ten minutes to wash my dishes everyday, but those are ten minutes I would rather spend doing absolutely anything else. I also don't like to fold laundry. I don't mind cleaning the bathroom though.

3) I never actually learned the whole multiplication table. I have to seriously think about the 12's. This coming from the math teacher. I know, it's embarassing.

4) I have 31 pairs of shoes. I just counted. I don't wear them all and I should get rid of the ones I don't wear, but I find it hard to part with them. The sad part is, when we went hiking I had to borrow a pair of shoes from a friend because I don't actually own a pair of sneakers. Most of my shoes are either sandals or heels.

5) If I have potato chips in my house I will eat them all rather quickly. On the other hand, I have chocolate sitting next to my computer. It has been here for over a month and I don't even want to eat it. Chips are my weakness.

6) I always wear makeup. Even when I'm not leaving my house. I can't stand to see myself in the mirror without makeup on. I think it's important to look good for yourself, not for other people. Of course, I appreciate other people noticing, but really, I do it for myself. I know, I'm vain.

7) Sometimes I get distracted by my own cleavage. I wonder how often other people are distracted. I have to say that my bra is amazing. I love it.

8) I like to take pictures of plants. I'm not into taking pictures of people. I find the scenery more interesting.

9) When someone takes a picture of me I always pose. I get made fun of for this, but come on people, you can't just stand there and expect the picture to look good. You have to work it.

10) I'm scared of grasshoppers. I realize that there is nothing overly frightening about them, they are harmless and can't hurt me, but they're really gross. It doesn't have to make sense. Fear is irrational.

11) I think moving to Korea was the best think I have ever done. I have gained so much confidence, and I'm happy. It wasn't easy to leave, but I'm glad I did. It's not going to be easy to leave, and only part of that is because my boyfriend lives here.

12) I never had a boyfriend before. I'm going to blame that on the fact that I had no confidence and never talked to people. I'm still not really used to the fact that I have a boyfriend. His name is Samuel, by the way.

13) Sometimes in the evening I pull out my hymn book and sing. It's not the same without the four-part harmony, but I can hear it in my head, so I can pretend, and I can pick any key I want.

14) I love to buy stationery. I think the paper is pretty.

15) Dictionary.com is one of my favorite web sites. I use it all the time. Yes, I looked up stationery to make sure I used the right one. I look up words when I'm unsure of the spelling. I like to look up new words. Here's a good one for you: borborygami. Look it up.

16) I think I'm lazy. I could spend all day sitting on my couch watching TV. If I didn't have to go to work I would probably do that way too often.

17) I don't like to get my hair cut. Going to a salon makes me nervous. I don't know why, it just does. I'm sure they won't ruin my hair, they never have, but it worries me anyway.

18) I like cemeteries. I think they're calming.

19) I'm really bad at girl talk. You may have noticed this. Maybe it's because I haven't had much practice at it. Maybe it's because it goes with the "bad at sharing feelings" thing. Maybe it's because I'm not all that girly. Whatever the reason, I'm not good at it.

20) I know, I own 31 pairs of shoes and nine purses, I always wear makeup, I just called stationery pretty, I pose for pictures, and I'm scared of grasshoppers, but I'm not girly. Really.

Well, I do ramble on. I think I'll stop there. I need to save some tidbits for the next time.

I'm proud to be a geek

I had a very exciting evening. My friend brought my clarinet back from Canada for me when she came back. Thank you Sarah. I got it tonight. I was so excited. I could hardly wait to get home to play. It has been a long six months since the last time I played, and my fingers were getting itchy for some music making. I opened the case, held back the tears of joy, and put it together. I got out a new reed. Oh, the grassy taste of new reeds. Nothing compares. I started playing. I sucked. It has been too long. My tone was awful, I couldn't remember how to play all the notes, and my face hurt after playing for ten minutes. Oh well. I will remember, I will get better, and my face will get back in shape. It's worth it. I love to play music. Band night was my highlight of the week. Yes, I'm a geek. I will freely admit it. I love band. I miss it. I'm glad I can start having my own band night. I'm not so sure my neighbours will appreciate it very much, but that's okay. I don't appreciate their early morning kimchi making sessions, so I think we're even. At least it's not my trumpet.

Christmas in Korea

This is the shortbread I made. I didn't have the proper cookie cutter, so I just cut out the cookies with a knife. Even though the shape wasn't quite right, they tasted good. Everybody enjoyed them, even though a few commited the sacrilege of putting whipped cream on them. It was suggested that we could decorate them, but the look on my face stopped that. You can't put icing on shortbread.
Here is some more of the dessert. It wouldn't have been a proper Christmas without excessive amounts of sugary stuff. There were two pans of brownies, a peach pie, a blueberry pie, shortbread, and a triffle. All were yummy. The triffle made me think of that story Nancy used to tell us. Unfortunately, I can't actually remember how the story goes, but I remember that there is one. Something about a little girl picking the stuff off the top and ruining it.

Here are the people who were part of the Christmas "family" gathering. They make a good replacement family. We sat around and ate too much, as is expected at Christmas. Then some of us watched a movie. I fell asleep partway through the movie, which is also expected. It was a nice, relaxing day.

Merry Christmas!

Okay, another bug for your enjoyment. I saw this one just outside my door. I had to go get my camera so you could freak out too. I had nothing to compare the size to, so you just have to guess. I would have put my finger next to it, but it might have touched me. The body was about an inch and a half long, and then it had legs.


In other news, it still doesn't look like Christmas. It rained twice this week. I didn't have my umbrella either time. Still no snow. I want to make a snowman, but rain doesn't make shapes so well. I mixed up dough for shortbread today. I know it won't taste right since it isn't October, but I thought I would give it a shot. I'll let you know how it goes.

It's beginning to look a lot like Christmas

Okay, only a little like Christmas. There is no snow, it rained today, and the temperature hasn't gone below freezing yet, but I now have a Christmas tree set up, so I can pretend that it's beginning to look like Christmas. I was in a Christmasy mood, so I got out the tree and the decorations and turned on some Christmas music. I had lots of fun. Decorating the tree always puts me in a good mood. Merry Christmas everyone.

Isn't this a pretty shoe? This is one of the shoes I bought on Saturday. I thought I would show you so you could appreciate them too. I haven't actually worn them yet, but I like to look at them. I'm sure I will not have to look far to find an excuse to wear them. I like shoes. Who doesn't?