Hey everybody, I haven't posted anything in a week, so I suppose it is time to do so. Not much is going on, things have been pretty tame lately. I posted a while ago that we were putting pictures on our Flickr page, however, I've since found a better way to host our pictures. Flickr lets you upload as many pictures as you want, but you can only display up to 200 of them. So we found MyPhotoAlbum, which lets you make different albums for your pictures, plus you can upload and display as many as you want. So all of our pictures will be at that site, though the ones on Flickr will stay on Flickr, and we still have lots of pictures at our Windows Live Space. Anyway, the point is if you want to see our pictures go to our photo album page.
I have also come up with a (belated) New Year's Resolution. I have decided that, in light of my previous post, I will record and post to my freesound account one sound effect for every day this year. That means that at the end of the year, my freesound account will have at least 365 samples, hopefully of useful stuff. Anyway, that's my goal. But if you ask about it, I'm sure I'll come up with a vague, uninteresting excuse about why it's not getting done. Just like any good resolution.
Dawn and I are also going to start going bowling. It's fun and pretty cheap here (2 bucks a game including shoe rental). Besides all that, Dawn and I are having the two newest teachers at her school over for dinner tonight. Oughta be interesting, and I'm sure I'll have something to post about that!
Tuesday, January 30, 2007
Monday, January 22, 2007
The Weekend
Well it was a tiring weekend, but we made it through. We were up early on Saturday morning, at least early enough to be on a bus bound for Gwangju at 9:30 am. At least we had our good friend Jason to help us out (and keep us awake). We arrived in Gwangju at 11, and that gave me lots of time to get to Jordan's by noon. So we wandered Keumho World for a bit. Keumho World is a large building with about 6 or 7 floors of all things electronic, from cameras to mp3 players to phones to guitars. Dawn needed a new iPod USB cable so she can plug her pod into her computer (which we found), and Jason was looking for a wireless headset (which somehow he didn't find). With plenty of time to get to Jordan's, I left them wandering and started walking to the subway. After 5 minutes of walking, I realized I didn't know where I was going. I knew about where Jordan lives, but not exactly. And he lives in a confusing part of town. So I walked back, found the wandering waegukins, phoned Jordan, attempted to remember his instructions, and walked five minutes back to where I was. So I should be 15 minutes late so far. Then I walked to the subway, sat on the subway, got off the subway, walked to the church and met Dan and his girl on the way to Jordan's. By this time I was really late. Probably about 40 minutes late. Why? Because I was carrying the backpack full of stuff, my bass, and dragging a small suitcase full of audio gear behind me. Took me a lot longer than I thought it would. And I was sweating profusely by the time I got there. But it was worth it. Why? Because once we got everything set up and mapped out the drums into my computer so that it will actually sound like drums (don't even get me started on that process, it would probably geek you to death) we got the drums for 6 songs laid. Which is a good start. So now Jordan and I will try to finish the songs while Dan is out of the country. Should be a fun challenge.
A quick note about the Jordan Emmans Band: unfortunately, our (too) short term guitarist Matt has decided to move on to bigger and better things in his spare time, and frankly I can't blame him. He's still playing on his own once in a while and hopefully he'll find a band of his own soon enough. I for one will miss playing with him, especially the challenge of finding two harmonies all the time! Thanks Matt!
So what was Dawn doing while I was recording and practicing for our gig that night? She was touring the town with Jason and taking lots of pictures. Of what, you ask? I have no idea but I will post them when I find out (I haven't unloaded the camera yet). From what I understand fun was had in abundance. More to come on that later.
The gig was once again at Mike and Dave's Speakeasy in downtown Gwangju, which is proving to be quite a welcoming venue. It's small and smokey, but they have expanded the stage and just got a new bass amp, so things run a little smoother than last time we played there. Also unlike last time, we were only an opening band for this gig; the headliners for the night were Seoul's Taste of Dinomite. You can listen to a couple of the songs off of their new CD on their site, and I recommend it. They're pretty good, though I only got to hear a couple songs live. Dawn was waiting for me back at the hotel, and it was getting late.
Our set was pretty good, lots of reactions from a few of the patrons at the bar, and everybody seemed fairly impressed. We were a little disorganized for my liking, though. We didn't even have time to make a set list this time. And I forgot to put out my mp3 recorder, so I don't have any clips for all my fans reading this. Sorry, mom.
Speaking of clips, I have discovered (or rather, I have rediscovered) that I really like doing Foley recordings. All that means is recording things that could be used as sound effects. For example, Dawn helped me record putting coins into the ticket dispenser in the subway. And change coming out of the dispenser. And bills going in and out of the dispenser. I also recorded the ambience on the subway, which you can listen to if you right click on the black void below and click Play/Pause. If it doesn't work, give it a few minutes to load the audio and try it again.
You can also go here and see all my samples in their huge-file-sized glory! You can play them from the window, though it may take a little time due to their huge file size.
It's just like being there! You can hear Korean chatter (probably about the waegukin with the microphone), the doors opening and closing, even the (too) friendly voice telling you what stop you're at and where the doors will be opening. Pretty cool. Anyway, that's all for now. Annyoung!
A quick note about the Jordan Emmans Band: unfortunately, our (too) short term guitarist Matt has decided to move on to bigger and better things in his spare time, and frankly I can't blame him. He's still playing on his own once in a while and hopefully he'll find a band of his own soon enough. I for one will miss playing with him, especially the challenge of finding two harmonies all the time! Thanks Matt!
So what was Dawn doing while I was recording and practicing for our gig that night? She was touring the town with Jason and taking lots of pictures. Of what, you ask? I have no idea but I will post them when I find out (I haven't unloaded the camera yet). From what I understand fun was had in abundance. More to come on that later.
The gig was once again at Mike and Dave's Speakeasy in downtown Gwangju, which is proving to be quite a welcoming venue. It's small and smokey, but they have expanded the stage and just got a new bass amp, so things run a little smoother than last time we played there. Also unlike last time, we were only an opening band for this gig; the headliners for the night were Seoul's Taste of Dinomite. You can listen to a couple of the songs off of their new CD on their site, and I recommend it. They're pretty good, though I only got to hear a couple songs live. Dawn was waiting for me back at the hotel, and it was getting late.
Our set was pretty good, lots of reactions from a few of the patrons at the bar, and everybody seemed fairly impressed. We were a little disorganized for my liking, though. We didn't even have time to make a set list this time. And I forgot to put out my mp3 recorder, so I don't have any clips for all my fans reading this. Sorry, mom.
Speaking of clips, I have discovered (or rather, I have rediscovered) that I really like doing Foley recordings. All that means is recording things that could be used as sound effects. For example, Dawn helped me record putting coins into the ticket dispenser in the subway. And change coming out of the dispenser. And bills going in and out of the dispenser. I also recorded the ambience on the subway, which you can listen to if you right click on the black void below and click Play/Pause. If it doesn't work, give it a few minutes to load the audio and try it again.
You can also go here and see all my samples in their huge-file-sized glory! You can play them from the window, though it may take a little time due to their huge file size.
It's just like being there! You can hear Korean chatter (probably about the waegukin with the microphone), the doors opening and closing, even the (too) friendly voice telling you what stop you're at and where the doors will be opening. Pretty cool. Anyway, that's all for now. Annyoung!
Tuesday, January 16, 2007
Nothing all that new...
Not much is going on around here these days, mostly just the same old. A few new developments in the works, though. For one, Dawn and I are officially in the wedding party for the marraige of our good friends Ryan and Courtney. Dawn has been for a while, but I was only recently added to the official list, and it's exciting. Getting married is fun, and I don't think this wedding will be any exception to that.
Also I will (hopefully!) be starting recording of the Jordan Emmans Band very soon, with any luck this week(end). In fact I think we pretty much have to start this weekend, as Dan is leaving for holidays on the 23rd, and without a drum base to build on, things don't usually go smoothly. So that will be fun, rigging something up for recording. I haven't had the oppurtunity to do this in a while so it should be a good time. I will, of course, be posting some details in the days to come, maybe some pictures, perhaps an audio file or two. We'll see what happens I guess. In the meantime, maybe things will get exciting again soon. Dawn's been a little sick in the last couple of days, so maybe when she's feeling better. Take care everybody!
Also I will (hopefully!) be starting recording of the Jordan Emmans Band very soon, with any luck this week(end). In fact I think we pretty much have to start this weekend, as Dan is leaving for holidays on the 23rd, and without a drum base to build on, things don't usually go smoothly. So that will be fun, rigging something up for recording. I haven't had the oppurtunity to do this in a while so it should be a good time. I will, of course, be posting some details in the days to come, maybe some pictures, perhaps an audio file or two. We'll see what happens I guess. In the meantime, maybe things will get exciting again soon. Dawn's been a little sick in the last couple of days, so maybe when she's feeling better. Take care everybody!
Thursday, January 04, 2007
New Year's Eve and Day
Unfortunately for Mokpo (and us) the majority of teachers at public schools in this place skip town right after Christmas. They get holidays for about 2 months, and generally end up in cheap, tropical areas like Thailand. Which means that by the time New Year's Eve comes around, there's not many people around to ring it in with us. But we made the most this year, with a party at our place! We had about 10 people over for a mellow party for which Dawn made about 100 pounds of food! She certainly likes to be prepared. So at midnight we went up to our rooftop and had sparklers and small fireworks (which we fired AWAY from the gas station). It was nice, much better than staying up in the apartment by ourselves. The most interesting part of the night came after a few people had left. At about 12:30 we heard some booming, and I went to the roof to investigate: it was fireworks! REAL fireworks. I don't know if their clocks were off, or if they couldn't find a match at midnight, but there were fireworks at 12:30am on New Year's Day. Weird.
That morning we hauled ourselves out of bed at 6am to go meet
Jason and Abby for breakfast and the sunrise, though not in that order. We scaled the Eastern 'face' of Ibansan, a small 'mountain' in their part of town. Really would have been a nice sunrise, had we actually seen the sun. As it was it was just too cloudy/misty. But it was fun, and we decided that we will eventually try again. I couldn't believe the amount of people who are at that mountain at 7am on a Monday. There were hundreds of people, which unfortunately makes things difficult, since it's actually a little hard to climb in parts. And for people who seem to be perpetually in hurry-mode, it never ceases to amaze me how slow some of them can be.
HAPPY NEW YEAR!
That morning we hauled ourselves out of bed at 6am to go meet
Jason and Abby for breakfast and the sunrise, though not in that order. We scaled the Eastern 'face' of Ibansan, a small 'mountain' in their part of town. Really would have been a nice sunrise, had we actually seen the sun. As it was it was just too cloudy/misty. But it was fun, and we decided that we will eventually try again. I couldn't believe the amount of people who are at that mountain at 7am on a Monday. There were hundreds of people, which unfortunately makes things difficult, since it's actually a little hard to climb in parts. And for people who seem to be perpetually in hurry-mode, it never ceases to amaze me how slow some of them can be.HAPPY NEW YEAR!
Saturday, December 30, 2006
Mosquito trouble... in December!
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?...
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?...
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.
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