Comments Posted By Kevin Kim
Displaying 4,171 To 4,200 Of 4,403 Comments
Congrats on having unproblematic Caucasian eyeballs, and congrats on the darts victory that those eyeballs doubtless enabled.
» Posted By Kevin Kim On 16/May/2014 @ 3:32 pm
May you quickly de-nadirize.
» Posted By Kevin Kim On 14/May/2014 @ 9:26 am
Anyway, get well soon! I’m surprised you’ve got any bacteria in you at all, given the disinfectant properties of all that alcohol you consume.
» Posted By Kevin Kim On 06/May/2014 @ 11:35 am
For what it’s worth, the meds you took are called “종합 감기약” (jonghap-gamgi-yak) in Korean, which basically means “integrated cold medicine.” (“종합” means “all put together.”)
The “integrated” might be translated more naturally, in this case, as “all-symptom” or “multi-symptom.” So it’s like Comtrex, basically—good old Western-style meds. I often ask for 종합 감기약 when I’m coming down with something.
» Posted By Kevin Kim On 06/May/2014 @ 11:28 am
I see you’re taking that bumper sticker to heart, committing “random acts of kindness and senseless acts of beauty” wherever you go. The people of Seoul thank you for your contribution to their horizontal surfaces.
Hope you’re feeling better today. Take it easy.
» Posted By Kevin Kim On 04/May/2014 @ 11:16 am
Whoops—I’m a bad editor: I failed to fuse “steak” and “house” in my “final draft” of your sentence. Doesn’t bode well for tomorrow’s editing test.
If quizzes make you quizzical, then tests make you…?
» Posted By Kevin Kim On 01/May/2014 @ 11:28 am
For what it’s worth, I think your sentence is punctuated fine, as long as it’s interpreted charitably.
A semicolon normally separates two independent clauses. You had written:
Fresh off Sunday’s adventure in dining at the Brazilian steak house in Itaewon; today we walked across the street from our apartment to a brand new place that does steak Korean-style.
If I charitably assume you’re writing in a terse “journal” style that omits subjects, then the semicolon makes sense. What I mean by a “journal” style is something like this:
Got up today. Ate breakfast. Watched some TV. Looking forward to tonight.
—the kind of thing you might find in a journal. The above locutions are all independent clauses (i.e., they can all stand alone), as can be seen when I rewrite them more fully:
I got up today. I ate breakfast. I watched some TV. I’m looking forward to tonight.
By the same token, I could rewrite your sentence as:
We’re fresh off Sunday’s adventure in dining at the Brazilian steak house in Itaewon; today we walked across the street from our apartment to a brand new place that does steak Korean-style.
A bit stilted, but serviceable. If I were to correct anything, I might insert a comma after “today” and a hyphen between “brand” and “new” (we normally hyphenate phrasal adjectives); I’d also write “steakhouse” as a single compound, but that’d be about it.
To avoid any dangling-modifier issues, though, I could rewrite your sentence this way:
Fresh off Sunday’s adventure in dining at the Brazilian steak house in Itaewon, we walked, this afternoon, across the street from our apartment to a brand-new place that does steak Korean-style.
The “Fresh off…” phrase now operates more clearly as a modifier instead of as a clause, which justifies switching out the semicolon for a comma. I eliminate the adverb-placement problem with “today” by using a parenthetical expression (i.e., set off by commas on either side, with the commas acting like parentheses), “this afternoon.”
But an even better revision that might take care of the “today” placement problem would be the following:
Today, fresh off Sunday’s adventure in dining at the Brazilian steak house in Itaewon, we walked across the street from our apartment to a brand-new place that does steak Korean-style.
The above may be the most robust revision because “Today” is a strong way to start any sentence. It grabs the reader’s attention and implies immediacy, which makes whatever you’re about to tell us even more compelling.
My take, anyway.
» Posted By Kevin Kim On 01/May/2014 @ 2:00 am
Once again, John, thanks for the amazing hospitality. It really was great to finally meet you and Jee Yeun. These meetings of e-friends can go well or badly… I remember one very awkward meet-up in DC, which involved some people I knew through an online writing-workshop message-board community. It went horribly. Lots of painful silences as we all realized how little we each interested the other.
And no, you didn’t come off as an interrogator. I wasn’t feeling any pressure, and you thankfully refrained from waterboarding.
» Posted By Kevin Kim On 28/April/2014 @ 3:04 pm
Did she at least apologize to you for spearing your footwear?
» Posted By Kevin Kim On 26/April/2014 @ 5:37 pm
And it just occurred to me: she COULDN’T EVEN HIT THE FLOOR! Man.
» Posted By Kevin Kim On 26/April/2014 @ 2:59 pm
Congratulations, both on garnering second place and on avoiding certain death by dart!
» Posted By Kevin Kim On 26/April/2014 @ 2:56 pm
I suspect that, if the Missus speaks English well enough, you’re likely in the clear, given the purpose the law is supposed to serve (i.e., prevent language barriers from eroding marriages).
» Posted By Kevin Kim On 22/April/2014 @ 9:28 pm
What becomes of the broken-hearted?
The low-fat part is probably bollocks, anyway. Good luck!
» Posted By Kevin Kim On 18/April/2014 @ 6:39 pm
I’m in no position to sermonize about your dietary choices. As the man said: “Don’t just eat that burger—eat the hell out of it!”
» Posted By Kevin Kim On 16/April/2014 @ 7:52 pm
Congrats on the one-year anniversary… but doesn’t this mean that the founder of the Singles League isn’t himself single?
» Posted By Kevin Kim On 08/April/2014 @ 8:24 pm
Congratulations and good luck.
» Posted By Kevin Kim On 06/April/2014 @ 4:40 pm
Hey kid, how’d you like a nice Hertz donut?
Well, well. Curiouser and curiouser.
» Posted By Kevin Kim On 06/April/2014 @ 4:41 pm
And I noticed I forgot the first “HER” in “return to HER office.” Heh.
» Posted By Kevin Kim On 05/April/2014 @ 10:47 pm
I’m sorry to hear about the massive pain. You’re right: pain is very subjective. I suppose a truly scientific study could only be run by Nazis; it would involve torturing many people in exactly the same ways while measuring the extremity of their respective reactions as a (somewhat unreliable) guide to subjective experience. Yeah… not sure that’s gonna happen.
Anyway, the Cass Treatment seems to have worked, at least for now. All hail Cass!
Editor’s note: despite your valiant “s/he” attempts to hide the sex of Dr. Sohn (does Dr. Sohn really require such privacy?), you may have given the game away. You wrote:
“S/He suggested I return to her office the following afternoon and SHE would remove my crown to try and relieve “pressure”. By this point I was ready to tell HER to just yank the damn thing out altogether and be done with it.”
Girl power!
There’s also Sperwer’s dentist, Dr. Lee (another woman!), who speaks fluent English and a little French, and who is an excellent dentist. I can put you in touch with Sperwer (whose real name I can’t divulge in public comments—I’ve got my own privacy issues to contend with) if you’re interested. Dr. Lee’s practice is in Banpo, i.e., the French section, so have yourself some decent French food while you’re down that way.
» Posted By Kevin Kim On 05/April/2014 @ 4:34 pm
Quite a day! Pyeongchang-dong is where my friend Sperwer lives. I’m pretty sure I know almost exactly which neighborhood you’re talking about. I’ve done a Bukhan-san walk from right around Sperwer’s neighborhood, which makes me wonder whether you and the Missus were on the same path that I’d walked some years ago.
Sperwer and I had our own Bukhan-san adventure: we hiked up almost to the top, followed the crest a while, then went back down a different trail, taking a cab to Hwagyae-sa so we could meditate and listen to Hyeongak-sunim’s dharma talk. I was surprised that, after several hours of hard hiking, I didn’t fall asleep during meditation. In fact, I felt rather energized that day. Weird.
Anyway, it sounds as if you had an interesting time. You might have to go back in a couple days—with a camera this time!
» Posted By Kevin Kim On 02/April/2014 @ 12:54 am
“Actually, I’ve worn worse.”
Pictures, please.
» Posted By Kevin Kim On 27/March/2014 @ 5:51 pm
Another day, another mountain…
Regarding that final pic: did you create your own “탑” as well?
» Posted By Kevin Kim On 26/March/2014 @ 12:35 am
Without a doubt. Enjoy your nature-bath.
» Posted By Kevin Kim On 22/March/2014 @ 9:43 pm
I should note, too, that while phytoncides do exist, it’s not clear that there are any good, solid scientific studies saying that walking vigorously in the woods actually produces any health benefits that go above and beyond the benefits of simple exercise. Are the trees exuding enough phytoncides to make a measurable difference in people’s health? Since these benefits seem related to long-term effects like aging, sickness, and maybe even life expectancy, a research project would have to be of pretty massive (and long-lasting) scale. So I’d submit that any current claims about health benefits related to phytoncides are wishful thinking at best and pseudoscience at worst.
» Posted By Kevin Kim On 21/March/2014 @ 10:42 pm
Regarding that “phytoncide” sign…
You can read about phytoncides here.
Basically, they’re chemicals, emitted by certain plants (hence “phyto”), that have anti-aging, anti-rotting effects. In other words, they preserve and/or restore health and vigor, or at the very least, they stave off decay.
NB: phytoncides shouldn’t be confused with phytocides. The latter are plant-killing chemicals, like weed killer.The large green title text at the upper-right corner of the sign says, “Gae-un Mountain Circle Trail; This is a Sallim-yok (산림욕) Area.” So what the heck is “sallim-yok”? It’s from three Chinese characters:
산 (san, 山): mountain
림 (lim/rim, 林): woods, forest
욕 (yok, 浴): bath, bathing, cleansingPhonetic rule: when a final “N” meets an initial “L/R,” the result is a double-L. So:
N + L/R = LL
san + rim = sallim
Sallim-yok: a “mountain-forest cleansing” of sorts.
The right-hand column of the sign is presented as a sort of Q&A format. The questions are encircled in these little blobby, cartoonish-looking bubbles, and the answers are in paragraph form below them.
First question: “What is Sallim-yok?”
The answer explains what I mentioned above, about phytoncides and their healing properties. Breathe deeply the forest air, feel the forest at work on your skin, blah, blah.Second question: “Sallim-yok [is] like this…”
This isn’t a question, per se, but an opening that leads to an explanation of how to get the most benefits out of a mountain-forest cleansing. Best time of year: summer to fall. Best time of day: 10AM to 2PM. The second bullet point in this section says that the most benefits come not from just sitting around in the forest but from working up a sweat. How Korean. No time for just sitting and appreciating nature! Gotta DO something!Third question: “Efficacy of Sallim-yok”
Again, not really a question. This is more an explanation of some of the benefits of being cleansed by Mother Nature and her phytoncides. First, it combats stress and insomnia. Second, it helps out with both diet and dementia (!). Lastly, it makes your skin healthier (combats dermatitis).So—mystery solved! And no children were needlessly violated by trees. (Of course, the children who needed to be violated were, indeed, violated.)
» Posted By Kevin Kim On 21/March/2014 @ 5:42 pm
Well… blender luck next time.
» Posted By Kevin Kim On 20/March/2014 @ 11:04 am
Not the start I was hoping for
Well, think of it this way: there can be no ceiling without a floor. You’ve found your floor, so now shoot for the ceiling. Good luck.
» Posted By Kevin Kim On 18/March/2014 @ 2:25 pm
Glad to see you’re settling back in.
» Posted By Kevin Kim On 16/March/2014 @ 11:50 pm
Congrats on surviving the flight, and welcome back to Korea! I hope your butt-bone is decompressing nicely.
» Posted By Kevin Kim On 14/March/2014 @ 3:50 am
«« Back To Stats PageSafe travels, happy trails, and an advance “Welcome back!”
» Posted By Kevin Kim On 13/March/2014 @ 12:09 am