Saturday, October 31, 2009

My own F My Life post as well as some awesomeness

After years of wearing makeup and always being annoyed that I can't find just the right tone to match my skin, I find out while putting on my Halloween makeup that the prosthetic wax I'm using to hide my eyebrows is an exact match. F my life.

Speaking of F My Life, I need to buy that Wii Plus at Costco before they sell out and get my own version of Kanye's New Workout Plan (a wiifit ain't "$free.99", but what you gonna do) in the works. Seriously, I'm getting older and this metabolism wasn't much of a friend to me in my life anyway. I don't want to look like a fat scene girl anymore. Hahahha, I'm joking...I'm just fat.

Speaking of fat scene girls...

Last night I got to see The Get Up Kids. Fact: I have never seen them live before. It coincided with hey, I wasn't really in the States when I had first heard of and started listening to them. And even in college, it took me a while to figure out just what kind of music it was that I liked. I didn't know about this "emo" business until college. And hold on, before you start shouting and screaming, I specifically mean what was considered emo back then, not whatever the hell it's become now. To be honest, even concerts were a bit of a mystery to me. I loved listening to music, but it's not like I went to any concerts while in Korea.

Not that they didn't have any there, but all the bands and music I was beginning to like around the concert going age of middle-high school weren't even touring Korea, so it was tough to be all that enthusiastic about live music. I also didn't get stuff like small, local shows. Like now I could easily tell you about going to shows at Schuba's or the Mercury Lounge, etc. Even mid-sized venues like a Bowery Ballroom or Aragon Ballroom were a total surprise to me when I started going to shows in the States because any foreign band big enough to be touring Korea usually were the types of bands to play stadium-type shows. Like the Scorpions or something. That or festivals. Anything "alternative" meant dreaming of maybe going to Japan to go to the Fuji Rock Festival, but just a dream even though Japan was right next door.

I went to shows as often as possible, but it took me a while to figure out how to keep track of concert listings and in college, I tried to go as many shows as possible, but I was still trying to save cash. I do remember during an internship in New York one time, I was pouring through the free weeklies every week to see what shows were playing and got to see the New Amsterdams.

Anyhow, I was so happy I could check "see The Get Up Kids live" off of my list of things to do before I do. It was a long time coming. I'm pretty damn happy actually. It was the first show I'd been to in a while as well as being a sort of milestone. As I jumped and hollered along to lyrics I felt 19 again, ha.

Saturday, October 10, 2009

What am I thinking about lately?

Farming! Yes, farming. I don't know. It's an idle thought and desire I've had since I was little quite honestly. I used to read a lot of books about settler life or just living back when there wasn't a lot of industrialization and would imagine how I'd like to farm. Not huge, mind you, something small scale and sustainable. Like my own eggs/chicken, a little vegetable garden, maybe a milk cow and a pig or two? While most people probably enjoyed "Charlotte's Web" for its heartfelt tale about the love and friendship between a spider and a pig, and a pig and a girl, I kind of devoured the details of farm life. I still remember the detailed descriptions of Wilbur's slop, including the small bit about how there was some cheese still stuck to a wrapper being part of his meal.

I don't know. I still think about it and lately it's looming more and more over my head. One of my favorite shows to watch on the one Korean channel I get on cable happens to be "Diary of Returning to the Farm." I guess in Korea nowadays there's a lot of people giving up life in the city and retiring to farms. Besides that show, there's a lot of bits of stories I see about that type of retirement as well as little news stories about towns that offer people money if they want to move there and start farming. It kind of makes me wish I was back home so that it would be an option.

Besides that, there's another show called "Country Table," which I absolutely love because it combines the whole country small-scale farming lifestyle with cooking! Korean cooking! Basically, the hosts visit different old folks living out in the country and cook a meal with them, which not only means cooking with ingredients they usually farm and grow themselves, but you also get plenty of recipes, tips and hints for a lot of "how mom used to make it" type of regional and simple Korean foods. In fact, I really want to make the the chilled chrysanthemum leaf soup (mmmmmmm...I can already imagine how that would smell and taste in my mouth) from one episode.

I was watching an episode today and they went out to the field to pick some peppers, a head of cabbage as well as a watermelon or two to make a meal. I wish I could do that...In fact, I do wish I could leave in a old-fashioned Korean house with the kitchen with the huge cooking fire to make rice in a kamasot pot and have an area out front or back for all my huge clay jars of homemade soy sauce, dwaenjang and gochujang. That'd be so awesome.

Random story time: So when my mom was younger one day there was a huge SPLASH!!! then some smaller splishing and splashing noises out in the front yard, and her and my grandmother went to go check on what it was. A rat had fallen into a huge jar of soy sauce and was trying to swim out. It drowned though, and they had to pour out a whole jar and make soy sauce all over again. For those of you who don't understand why the splash was so big and a rat could drown in it, it's because we're talking about a set up like this. Some of these pots come up to your waist and are big and deep. And you'd have a couple out front where you make your own condiments like soy sauce, and you even store kimchi in (bury the kimchi one in the ground in the winter).

But yea, I guess there's like programs where you can go around the States and work on farms. Or even go abroad and farm. Obviously, not to rake in the money, and it is hard work...but so tempting. I've always liked working with my hands. Building stuff, doing stuff. I don't know, maybe it's time to take a break from cranial labor and move on to do some manual stuff while I'm still young.

Oh, man. So I've been listening to way too much bachata the past couple of days. It's all MTV's fault too. I was flipping through channels, and they were playing Aventura for Hispanic Heritage Month. And I was all "AAAAHHHH, omg! That sounds like the old neighborhood!!!" So I've been on an Aventura kick.

Like this song, which I heard like every other day in stores, walking past open windows, from cars in all its covers and incarnations:


The song on MTV that started this whole thing:

Thursday, October 08, 2009

The case of the returning cold

I had a cold last week. Stayed home two days in a row. Felt a lot better, in fact, felt pretty fantastic this weekend up until Monday, until I started feeling crappy again yesterday. So guess what happened when I woke up today? It was pretty bad. I got worried I caught swine flu and even bought a little thermometer to measure my temp. Luckily, no fever. I also figured if it really was the flu I'd be feeling a whole lot worse than this.

I'm going to have to go in to work tomorrow. This can't continue.

It's getting cooler so now I've got some soups, stews and baking projects in mind. I still didn't get to make cinnamon rolls after the success of pecan sticky buns, however, I'm also going to make some baklava. And while on the topic of foods using phyllo dough, I might also make some spanikopita. And to fit with the winteriness, maybe a spice cake? I don't know. I'm thinking about baking folks cookies for Christmas again. I've missed out on doing that. I need to use up all the herbs and spices in my cupboard for something.

I wish this cold would go away though. I'm still a snotty, coughing, tired mess and I can't make or bake foods like this. I can't finish it all, so I end up sharing and I can't share food I've made while I was sick in good conscience.