When was the last time you had a mosquito bite in December? I can't remember ever even seeing one after September, but I got one today. And stranger yet, the bastard bit me on the LIP! In the middle of the night, I woke up because I felt something tickle my bottom lip. Instinctively, I used my top teeth to scratch at whatever was there, and my lip felt really weird, not painful, but just weird. So I woke up a little more, and still felt that kind of itchy feeling. Then I realized my lip was starting to swell, and knew exactly what had happened. Even worse than that, I turned my head and saw the mosquito on the wall, but couldn't kill it! He's still out there, waiting to get my other lip.
Stranger still, this MAY be the same bug that previously took down the light cover in our foyer, smashing it on the tile floor. Okay it was actually me that did that, but I was trying to hit a mosquito on the ceiling. Somehow the impact of my hand knocked the cover right off, missing my head by inches and spraying glass everywhere! Could have been bad!
Okay this post sucks, but it's all I've got right now. Maybe we'll have an eventful New Year's Eve?...
Saturday, December 30, 2006
Monday, December 25, 2006
Merry Christmas to All!
MERRY CHRISTMAS EVERYBODY!
I know it's not quite Christmas where some of you are, but that's okay, it's Christmas here. And what would Christmas be without friends, family and bacon and eggs for breakfast? It has been a very nice couple of days for us. On Friday we went to Neal's for his first annual Christmas party, which was a really happenin' shindig.
There was booze, and lots of people, and somehow Neal was able to turn his TV into a fireplace, complete with firy screensaver and ceiling-high chimney! How he accomplished such a feat I will never know (though I've heard rumblings that it involved cardboard and a vacuum...?!) I had my guitar there, Chad had his, and Emmanuel had his piano - you know what that means! Billie Jean is reborn! Actually we decided to go with the name Rudolph and the Red Bean Paste instead. We played lots of Christmas songs, and some requests, but nothing that Silvi or Karen suggested. HA!
Saturday night found us at Jason and Abbigail's 12th floor apartment for some martinis and Christmas cheer. We went early so that we could help set up some food, and Dawn and Abby used her new oven to bake peanut butter cookies! They were a hit. However, the real star of the evening was the cheese! Luckily for us our hosts had recently been to Costco, and so had cheese, and bagel bites and all kinds of wonderfully not-Korean food!
Sunday we decided it was Christmas, so we opened our presents. Now I know what some of you are thinking, but we had our reasons:
1. It was Christmas eve day... that's pretty much Christmas anyway, isn't it?
2. We had a really boring day and
needed SOMETHING to do.
3. We have a lot to do today, so wouldn't have had time to open our presents and enjoy them.
So anyway, thanks to everyone who sent us presents, they were greatly appreciated. I especially have to say thanks to Neal and Crystal, who gave Dawn a small blowtorch and a pair of men's underwear. They also gave me an apron and women's underwear. Now this is a little joke that we started when Dawn and I gave Neal women's underwear for his birthday. Neal's underwear is better though, since it says "Pink Ladies' Delight", which matches the pink satin decor his employers picked out for him. Anyway, thanks everybody!
That brings us to today. This morning we got up early and baked the cinnamon buns that Dawn started at 1am this morning. Then we took them to Neal's for Christmas breakfast. There were 8 of us in all, and on the menu was eggs (done however you wanted them, thanks to Crystal!), bacon, toast (burned in the middle, thanks to Neal!) and Dawn's buns. There was much gift opening and fellowship, and was a very nice Christmas morning. Maura even got a call from her family! Tonight we will be heading to Richard and Shannon's for dinner, so that should warrant another post tomorrow.
One story I'd like to relate while I have your attention. On our way home from Neal's today we got into a cab, told him where wanted to go, and proceeded to have the normal conversation you have with cabbies in this country: where are you from, why are you here, school or hagwon, etc, etc, ad nauseum. However, this was not to be a normal cab ride. About 2/3 of the way home, he dialed a number on his phone, and it proceeded to ring on speaker phone. Dawn knew something was up, and said, "I don't like where this is going!" He talks with a Korean for a few seconds, while Dawn and I try to make out what he is saying. All of a sudden, the voice shouts out, "Hello! My English name is Joshua". It is at this point that I'd like to point out that this is a female we are talking to. She proceeds to explain that her father is our cab driver today, and wants to know which hagwon Dawn is teaching at. So we explain, and then she laughs and tells us she is shy and doesn't know what to say. So we say "nice to meet you" and "bye" and she does the same, and talks to her father for a few more seconds. Then she switches back to English and tells us that she would like us to leave our names and phone number with her dad and she would like to call us. Now we are weary of people taking your phone number here, as a lot of times they are either nuts or Jehova's Witnesses, or (in most cases) both. But we agree and do so. And we left two candy canes with the driver, one for him and one for Joshua. So we'll see what happens with that. We were home in time to bake the rapidly growing buns (formed at 1am), and just in time for Jen B. to call us and say Merry Christmas! We love you Jen!
Merry Christmas everybody!
I know it's not quite Christmas where some of you are, but that's okay, it's Christmas here. And what would Christmas be without friends, family and bacon and eggs for breakfast? It has been a very nice couple of days for us. On Friday we went to Neal's for his first annual Christmas party, which was a really happenin' shindig.
There was booze, and lots of people, and somehow Neal was able to turn his TV into a fireplace, complete with firy screensaver and ceiling-high chimney! How he accomplished such a feat I will never know (though I've heard rumblings that it involved cardboard and a vacuum...?!) I had my guitar there, Chad had his, and Emmanuel had his piano - you know what that means! Billie Jean is reborn! Actually we decided to go with the name Rudolph and the Red Bean Paste instead. We played lots of Christmas songs, and some requests, but nothing that Silvi or Karen suggested. HA!Saturday night found us at Jason and Abbigail's 12th floor apartment for some martinis and Christmas cheer. We went early so that we could help set up some food, and Dawn and Abby used her new oven to bake peanut butter cookies! They were a hit. However, the real star of the evening was the cheese! Luckily for us our hosts had recently been to Costco, and so had cheese, and bagel bites and all kinds of wonderfully not-Korean food!
Sunday we decided it was Christmas, so we opened our presents. Now I know what some of you are thinking, but we had our reasons:
1. It was Christmas eve day... that's pretty much Christmas anyway, isn't it?
2. We had a really boring day and
needed SOMETHING to do.3. We have a lot to do today, so wouldn't have had time to open our presents and enjoy them.
So anyway, thanks to everyone who sent us presents, they were greatly appreciated. I especially have to say thanks to Neal and Crystal, who gave Dawn a small blowtorch and a pair of men's underwear. They also gave me an apron and women's underwear. Now this is a little joke that we started when Dawn and I gave Neal women's underwear for his birthday. Neal's underwear is better though, since it says "Pink Ladies' Delight", which matches the pink satin decor his employers picked out for him. Anyway, thanks everybody!
That brings us to today. This morning we got up early and baked the cinnamon buns that Dawn started at 1am this morning. Then we took them to Neal's for Christmas breakfast. There were 8 of us in all, and on the menu was eggs (done however you wanted them, thanks to Crystal!), bacon, toast (burned in the middle, thanks to Neal!) and Dawn's buns. There was much gift opening and fellowship, and was a very nice Christmas morning. Maura even got a call from her family! Tonight we will be heading to Richard and Shannon's for dinner, so that should warrant another post tomorrow.
One story I'd like to relate while I have your attention. On our way home from Neal's today we got into a cab, told him where wanted to go, and proceeded to have the normal conversation you have with cabbies in this country: where are you from, why are you here, school or hagwon, etc, etc, ad nauseum. However, this was not to be a normal cab ride. About 2/3 of the way home, he dialed a number on his phone, and it proceeded to ring on speaker phone. Dawn knew something was up, and said, "I don't like where this is going!" He talks with a Korean for a few seconds, while Dawn and I try to make out what he is saying. All of a sudden, the voice shouts out, "Hello! My English name is Joshua". It is at this point that I'd like to point out that this is a female we are talking to. She proceeds to explain that her father is our cab driver today, and wants to know which hagwon Dawn is teaching at. So we explain, and then she laughs and tells us she is shy and doesn't know what to say. So we say "nice to meet you" and "bye" and she does the same, and talks to her father for a few more seconds. Then she switches back to English and tells us that she would like us to leave our names and phone number with her dad and she would like to call us. Now we are weary of people taking your phone number here, as a lot of times they are either nuts or Jehova's Witnesses, or (in most cases) both. But we agree and do so. And we left two candy canes with the driver, one for him and one for Joshua. So we'll see what happens with that. We were home in time to bake the rapidly growing buns (formed at 1am), and just in time for Jen B. to call us and say Merry Christmas! We love you Jen!
Merry Christmas everybody!
Sunday, December 17, 2006
Little Bit of News
Hey everybody, no news right now, it's been a pretty slow week. We did have our good friends Richard and Shannon over for supper and cards last night. The supper was pretty good, rice casserole (with chicken for Dawn and I), and our counterparts brought a Vietnamese rice wrap! Sounds weird, but is actually quite tasty! It is a clear, plastic-y feeling, round wafer which you submerge in warm water for a few seconds, drip dry a little, then fill with veggies (or whatever you want to fill it with) and wrap up. After being wet the wafers soften and almost get gooey. Thankfully they don't taste funny, in fact you can't taste the rice wafer at all. A truly unique food to be sure.
Dawn also decided to decorate the house for the holidays (and probably thereafter) with lights in our bedroom and in the room in which I currently sit. Cool LED lights that have 8 patterns, switchable right on the cord. Very cool. She also decided a while ago to blow up a few of her favourite pictures and put them on the wall. We blew them up to 11X14 and she bought some colourful paper to mount them on. Then, for some, she decided to cut them up and do sort of a mural-ly kind of thing. They look awesome, and I wish I had a picture to put up. I shall do that post-haste. We also got an oven for my baking deprived wife, and she promptly made me cookies! Score!
I also put up a couple things in our sidebar. One is a link to our Flickr page, which has lots of our pictures, and will house many more. I also put up a time counter, which is on Mokpo time, so you will know when to call us ;) And last but not least, there is a new weather widget, with current weather in Mokpo. FYI it is currently snowing the largest flakes I have ever seen. Wow. They're huge. It's like snowballs falling. Small snowballs. I'll shut up now.
Dawn also decided to decorate the house for the holidays (and probably thereafter) with lights in our bedroom and in the room in which I currently sit. Cool LED lights that have 8 patterns, switchable right on the cord. Very cool. She also decided a while ago to blow up a few of her favourite pictures and put them on the wall. We blew them up to 11X14 and she bought some colourful paper to mount them on. Then, for some, she decided to cut them up and do sort of a mural-ly kind of thing. They look awesome, and I wish I had a picture to put up. I shall do that post-haste. We also got an oven for my baking deprived wife, and she promptly made me cookies! Score!
I also put up a couple things in our sidebar. One is a link to our Flickr page, which has lots of our pictures, and will house many more. I also put up a time counter, which is on Mokpo time, so you will know when to call us ;) And last but not least, there is a new weather widget, with current weather in Mokpo. FYI it is currently snowing the largest flakes I have ever seen. Wow. They're huge. It's like snowballs falling. Small snowballs. I'll shut up now.
Monday, December 04, 2006
Ah, homecoming. You know what I love? Delayed flights. I just LOVE sitting on a plane, for an extra 2 hours after boarding, waiting for takeoff. That's right, folks, TWO extra hours... on an 11 hour flight. Good times. Someone on the plane was unfit for travel and EMS had to come and take them and their luggage off the plane before we could take off. Then we lost our place for take off and had to wait in line, then when we finally got to Incheon, we had to wait for a gate to be open before we could get off the plane. Good times. Really. So we made it to Incheon, grabbed a bus to Central City (the place in Seoul where we catch the bus to Mokpo). Got dropped off rather far away from where we buy our tickets and catch the bus, were told to go int he opposite direction than that which we needed... ended up dragging our luggage (4 50+ pound bags plus 4 carry ons) an extra 400 meters... finally made it at about 8pm, missed that bus, the 9:00 was full, we got the second last tickets on the last bus to Mokpo, made it home at about 2:30am... and here we thought we'd be home at 10pm and get a good night's rest before teaching on Monday. HAHAHAHA.
P.S. Air Canada sucks.
P.S. Air Canada sucks.
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