A ten minute inspirational for all the compulsive chopstick-drummers, finger-tappers, foot-stompers, noraebang-tambourineers and rhythm junkies out there. Keep the beat.



Best quote to come out of a grade 4 level test essay this evening:
"school uniforms should be necessary.... besides, parents have worker uniforms, school uniforms are just good practice for worker clothing." From a social satirist cleverly disguised as a pc-banging korean youth who doesnt SEEM to give hoot.

Also worthy of mention, a grade 3 student successfully employed the word plutoed (a 2006 word of the year finalist) within his persuasive essay. Nice.

Saturday Night is Alright

Justin asks for help with a new stretch. Funky.


Zero captures an 89% accuracy score performing My Sharona, and in his rapture, falls from grace. He'll feel that in the morning.

Theres so much, and so little, going on here.

N/A Steve earns another 5,000 won, yet loses even more respect. So worth it!

As per my demonstrated gift, someone owes the table a new pitcher. Bottoms up!

Somewhere in the midst of my 6th semester of school back home, I had written a paper detailing the circadian rhythms inherent within the sleep-wake cycle of humans. If you're getting home close to the time you'd be waking up up ordinarly on a week day, chances are you won't be quite as tired as you'd expect. The body is simply gearing up for the new day ahead -not settling down, as it wanted you to do at a reasonable hour. Weekends have been filled with climbing, new friends, and celebrating the human condition. Tonight was really, and happily, not much of an exception. Hope you're all having fun in your own ways.

Concerning George W Bush’s 7th State of the Union Address

While speculating the bright points to find in Bush’s then up-coming speech, a White House spokesman hopefully replied "You know, it's difficult to say. It's like looking in a drawer full of diamonds." Awesome.

I find one diamond particularly shiny:

"Free people are not drawn to violent and malignant ideologies."

Malignant:
1- disposed to cause harm, suffering, or distress deliberately; feeling or showing ill will or hatred.
2- very dangerous or harmful in influence or effect.

3 - tending to produce death, as bubonic plague.

3- (of a tumor) characterized by uncontrolled growth; cancerous, invasive, or metastatic. (dictionary.com unabridged v1.1)

Which of these do not wholly or in some major way define the foreign and even domestic policy of Mr. Bush?

There’s a whole lot of people out there with their very own idea of what’s best for their selves and family. I just wish this guy’s worldview wouldn’t actually be so impactful on, well, the whole world. From Seoul to the Athabasca tar sands, from Tehran to Washington, and everywhere between - the whole world feels the ripples of his splashes. Won’t someone please remove the mask over this man’s eyes?

Other sparkling gems include mention of his troop escalation, the “big push” in Iraq. "Our military commanders and I have carefully weighed the options. We discussed every possible approach. In the end, I chose this course of action because it provides the best chance of success." The troops could make it home by Christmas! Left unsaid was that he had fired those generals who disagreed.

This reminds me of the hopeful rhetoric slung throughout the second World War, by both sides. Memorably, of Hitler’s last major offensive in the Ardennes forest. (I knew those afternoons filled with Band of Brothers episodes would work themselves out somehow) The big push leading to the battle of the Somme and its subsequent slaughter also shares striking resemblance. Bigger guns now, I suppose.

For awesome leftist commentary check out www.alternet.org

Be it ever so humble, there just 'aint no place like home.

Tipping Close, Airdrie, Alberta, Canada.

So what if this software has been out for more than a year, this is cooler than cool. It's going to be a late night.

For better or for worse...

Last week - a fairly typical portrait of an evening after work. With a language to learn, students' work to mark, books and fruit to ingest, plants to care for - a world outside and within to explore and cultivate-was it truly essential that I purchase 77 new cable channels and a laptop computer to further distract my energy from simply being? Given my new equipment, the transformation has been abrupt. Nests of wire snakes lie jumbled through my room, yet connecting me electronically to the world - whilst books, marking, and my dietary needs remain unfulfilled. Could it be that time really does pass more swiftly while occupied on the computer? While I answer for myself if this new purchase will enable or disable me, expect more blog activity and emails. I'll get used to more Schwarzenegger, jogging pants, and ramyun noodles.

The bridge is out.....the bridge is out! -A.S.

An evening of new and unfinished projects- by Justin, Jacob, N/A Steve and Myself

I'd like our weekend ritual of bouldering for about half an hour, and then resorting to attempting ridiculous feats of agility and acrobatics, to continue throughout this winter, until it warms enough to do these things outside. Here Justin gets friendly with a stalactite.

Still chalked and bandaged from barn-door swings gone horribly wrong while bouldering, Steve accepts his latest challenge with aplomb. Four down, eight to go - and easy on the coffee!

Not to be outdone, Jacob, in a rash act of self-destructiveness, toys with cheap chopsticks and the notion of imploding his esophagus with wasabi. If you're gonna spew, spew into this...

As for me, to purchase a laptop given my techno-illiteracy and a shared vocabulary of about 15 English words with a used-computer salesman in a subway station (most of which were simply different pronounciations of DVD? O-kay!!!!), my feat of tracking down Justin and co. in a city of about 12 million without a cellphone (its possible but not pretty), and bowling over 100 seemed to be as close to the sun as I'd risk flying for one day, given my waxen sandals and all.

Well its back to work for me starting tomorrow afternoon, its been a pretty sweet winter holiday even though I did not leave Seoul for some warmer, more attractive or popular SE Asian destination.

In sum:

9 glorious days away from work
2 long nights out in Sinchon (1 very happy new years eve)
2 free bottles of rice wine
1 book finished
2 books started
5 climbing sessions (3 open blisters)
6 letters written and mailed
1 mountain scramble
2.3 korean language workbook lessons completed
1 less middle east despot
0 karaoke room visits
3 very well-done grilled cheese sandwiches
58 tiny little ants extinguished