Comments Posted By Kevin Kim
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We see a lot of old, hollowed-out bunkers in and around Seoul, but for the real hardcore stuff—the abandoned houses—you have to leave the cities and go out into the sticks.
As for the broken chair… my sympathies. This has happened to me a lot here in Korea, where furniture is designed for midgets and Lilliputians. I’m overdue for my own leg-break, I think. Good luck finding a new (and hopefully better) chair.
Oh, and good luck with the upcoming Hash!
» Posted By Kevin Kim On 24/February/2020 @ 5:47 pm
How recently did he die?
» Posted By Kevin Kim On 24/February/2020 @ 9:33 am
Too bad about Warren. I guess he now stands as an example of how not to live one’s life.
Walk on!
» Posted By Kevin Kim On 23/February/2020 @ 4:34 pm
Glad to read that the dentist visit went well. Good luck with the adventure!
» Posted By Kevin Kim On 22/February/2020 @ 4:48 pm
Does it get any more exciting than this?
Good luck with that filling, man. Speaking of “filling,” it looks as if you’ve found a talented lady who’s good at filling her mouth with… things.
» Posted By Kevin Kim On 21/February/2020 @ 6:43 pm
Your BP and resting heart rate are enviable.
As for the graffiti: that’s just God, offering his opinion of us mortals.
» Posted By Kevin Kim On 20/February/2020 @ 2:36 pm
The pot roast calling the kettle a crockpot
It turns out there’s a film called “Les choses de la vie.” You can read about it here. I think I saw part of this film on TV once while I was in France. Based on the Wikipedia entry, the film seems to be about a man who gets in a car crash (that’s the scene I remember; there’re a lot of slow-motion interior shots as the car rolls over and over); he reviews his life in flashbacks as he hovers between life and death, re-experiencing signal moments from his past.
So it could be that, if the author of the blog entry was using “les choses de la vie” as a kind of shorthand reference for this film and what the film is about, “the choices life makes for you” might actually be an appropriate interpretation of that concept, even if it fails as an exact literal translation of the French-language phrase.
» Posted By Kevin Kim On 20/February/2020 @ 1:55 pm
Great-looking food!
As for the French… where to begin…
les choses de la vie = the things of life (or “life’s things”)
The French term for “choices” is les choix. (pronounce that “ley shwah”)
If you’re really trying to say “the choices life makes for you,” you’d say, “Les choix que la vie fait pour toi” or more poetically, “Les choix que fait la vie pour toi.”
un arbre dans la forêt = a tree in the forest
If you’re trying to say, “The Tree that Hides the Forest,” you’d say, “L’arbre qui cache la forêt.” Which is a fairly clever title, really. The verb cacher means “to hide,” and it’s where the English word “cache” (pronounced “cash,” not “cashay”) comes from. A cache is a hidden store of something or other. The word that’s pronounced “cashay” is spelled cachet, and it refers to one’s high status or prestige: “There’s a certain cachet that comes with being an Oscar-winning director.” Contrast this with: “As the cops approached, the Oscar-winning director desperately searched the huge limo for his incriminating cache of coke.”
» Posted By Kevin Kim On 19/February/2020 @ 5:58 pm
You’ll recall that, here in Korea, mountain paths often have ropes to help you over boulders. That said, your path looks kinda steep, there, hoss. Yeah, you’re probably better off no longer following the Way of the Günter (der Günterweg!). Quick route to injury and insanity.
Somewhere along the way, I’d forgotten that Günter wasn’t the burly, perpetually shirtless one. That’s that “anus” guy—Almoranus? Even though you’ll be literally parting ways with the G-man, maybe think about making a peace offering of Currywurst, which is arguably the most popular street food in Germany these days.
» Posted By Kevin Kim On 18/February/2020 @ 6:22 pm
I hope those strawberries were as tasty as they looked. Korean strawberries aren’t that impressive. I gussy them up by removing the stems, slicing the fruit into thin slices, then heating the slices in a pan with a ton of white sugar and a good glug of white wine to make a sauce that can be drizzled onto vanilla ice cream.
Yeah, too bad about the bridge, but live and learn. I’m sure you’ll be back this way again.
As for the lack of Koreans… could it be that this is the wrong time of year to expect them? I mean, it’s cold in Korea right now, so it wouldn’t be surprising for Koreans to want to skip down to SE Asia for some warm weather, but in the end, who can fathom the Korean mind? Or maybe the coronavirus is keeping Koreans away…
» Posted By Kevin Kim On 17/February/2020 @ 5:57 pm
Surprised you didn’t go with a clip from Mel Brooks’s “High Anxiety,” his old parody of “Vertigo.”
Anyway, beautiful photos as always, especially that intensely colored one with the caption beginning, “It was nice to be moving in the right direction again.” But no pic of the buffet?? Too busy eating, I guess….
I’ve been freaked out by bridges before. A rope bridge wouldn’t scare me, but back in 2008, when I was attempting that trans-US walk, the Bridge of the Gods kind of freaked me out with its meshwork floor. Completely irrational fear, I realize: there’s no way I could have suddenly melted and poured through the mesh. But the feeling of floating perilously over a long, high drop was still rather unmanning.
» Posted By Kevin Kim On 16/February/2020 @ 9:05 pm
Good luck with that hike! Looks like a beautiful region. Any local culinary specialties?
» Posted By Kevin Kim On 15/February/2020 @ 3:11 pm
Miss #17, one of my picks from your previous post, really is quite luscious. Does the winner of the casual-wear prize have peach fuzz above and below her navel?? Ick. Shave, woman!
» Posted By Kevin Kim On 13/February/2020 @ 7:38 pm
So Resa is crazy and a bottom-feeding piece of shit. Prediction: she’s going to piss off the wrong guy and end up fucking dead.
» Posted By Kevin Kim On 13/February/2020 @ 10:21 pm
Well, here’s hoping that that incident is now considered over and done with. Would hate for you to have to testify again in a more formal setting, but as you imply, there’s no knowing what a crazy bitch will do. Good luck mapping out your trail and avoiding formal testimony.
» Posted By Kevin Kim On 12/February/2020 @ 5:54 pm
So were you the spiritual adviser? Was that the point?
» Posted By Kevin Kim On 11/February/2020 @ 8:52 pm
Based only on the first photo of the lineup, I’d have picked the first lady on the left (#1) and the second-to-last lady on the far right (#17…?) as my two winners. But in subsequent photos, #1 didn’t look so great while Ailyn (#6, I think) looked quite yummy.
» Posted By Kevin Kim On 10/February/2020 @ 4:47 pm
That’s right up there with SNL’s “Dick in a Box,” that is.
» Posted By Kevin Kim On 09/February/2020 @ 6:45 pm
Big ups for bigas!
Congrats on the win.
» Posted By Kevin Kim On 08/February/2020 @ 7:41 pm
Lucky is indeed a lucky fellow, borderline retarded though he may be.
Are those three new houses already spoken for?
» Posted By Kevin Kim On 07/February/2020 @ 5:26 pm
Congrats on the win!
Now, in Hollywood, the saying goes that “You’re only as good as your most recent film.” Is it true, in darts, that you’re only as good as your most recent game?
» Posted By Kevin Kim On 06/February/2020 @ 8:20 pm
Adventures in grocery shopping
In France (and in Switzerland, too), it’s common to buy “une brique de lait,” i.e., a “brick” of milk, which is to say, milk sold in a brick-shaped cardboard carton. The milk is shelf-stable because it goes through a heavy-duty pasteurization process. Perfectly safe to drink. There might be a very slight difference in taste, but I’ve found it to be negligible. Most of Europe sells milk in “bricks” like this, if I’m not mistaken. Once you open the carton, though, it’s a good idea to refrigerate the milk.
» Posted By Kevin Kim On 05/February/2020 @ 7:31 pm
Looks to have been a good hike, with plenty of varied terrain and scenery. And 9K through the mountains is no mean feat!
» Posted By Kevin Kim On 04/February/2020 @ 6:10 pm
A mountain in your future, eh? How have your lungs been these past few weeks? You haven’t mentioned any respiratory complaints recently, so I assume you’re doing at least somewhat better.
The Rigor Store sells rigor, which is de rigueur.
The chili looks great!
» Posted By Kevin Kim On 03/February/2020 @ 4:30 pm
Discarded items like hats and gloves fascinate me. They always imply some sort of story.
Sorry to read about the so-so darts performance, but sometimes, you just have a bad night, I guess.
» Posted By Kevin Kim On 02/February/2020 @ 5:37 pm
The kid at the far left of that second photo has a very impressive mustache for a five-year-old.
» Posted By Kevin Kim On 01/February/2020 @ 5:17 pm
We have plenty of litter here in Seoul. I’ve sometimes fantasized about shaving my head, donning some robes, then going out with huge, heavy-duty garbage bags and just stuffing them full of trash.
Great pics.
» Posted By Kevin Kim On 31/January/2020 @ 4:59 pm
Whoops. I wrote:
“The pole I actually have is the snap-lock type…”
To clarify, I currently own both kinds of trekking poles. I bought a pair of snap-lock poles from Costco back in 2017, then used one of those poles during my big walk that year. I used the other one during my big walk last year. I still have the screw-lock pole that I’d bought in Daegu (2014-ish), but I don’t use it for long walks, despite the better locking mechanism, because I need to change out that pole’s nasty plastic foot for a better rubber foot. I like the goat’s-foot design of my Costco poles, and I know there are outdoorsman stores downtown where I can buy just the feet for trekking poles. Another shopping project for me. Anyway, I saw that what I’d written was pretty vague, so I thought I’d clear that up before people got confused.
» Posted By Kevin Kim On 30/January/2020 @ 8:14 pm
So “Grammatik macht frei” is obviously a riff on the Nazi slogan “Arbeit macht frei” (“Labor sets you free”/”Work liberates”), which was posted in wrought iron on the gates of several concentration camps. So, obviously, we’re in grammar-Nazi territory: “Grammar sets you free.” I’m guessing that whoever posted the Nazi-like pic doesn’t like grammar Nazis very much.
What kind of adjusting/locking mechanism do you have on your trekking pole? I’ve actually formed some rather strong opinions on the matter, having used a couple different kinds of trekking pole. The one I prefer is the screw-lock type, where you twist each segment of a three-segment pole until it locks in place. The pole I actually have is the snap-lock type, which I don’t like nearly as much. Snap locks don’t seem to truly lock the segments of the pole in place: when I lean on my snap-lock pole with all of my considerable weight, it collapses. Nothing like that happens with my screw-lock pole, which is an el-cheapo W5000 thing that I purchased years ago, probably in Daegu. Despite being cheap, it holds fast when I lean on it.
Given how lush and green your corner of the world is, I imagine the scenery changes almost daily, so every single walk is different. This may be why dogs are eternally curious: they “see” the world primarily through smell, and the odors, aromas, and fragrances are constantly shifting. An easily bored coworker of mine asked me why I enjoyed walking the same route to Incheon so much, so I told him the route was different every time.
You admitted to a bit of boredom in this post, but I think you’ve done a great job of observing the minutiae around you if your scenery pics are any indication.
» Posted By Kevin Kim On 30/January/2020 @ 5:59 pm
«« Back To Stats PageWell, if ever there was a day to break the 5 o’clock rule, that would have been the day. Yeesh, what a clusterfuck.
» Posted By Kevin Kim On 29/January/2020 @ 4:08 pm