Comments Posted By Kevin Kim
Displaying 211 To 240 Of 4,392 Comments
I had no idea what “Bubble Up” was until I clicked the link. I was simply inventing a phrasal verb to be shorthand for “ensconce yourself in a bubble.”
» Posted By Kevin Kim On 04/December/2025 @ 5:12 pm
Back with minimal fuss. I hope the fêting of Dave goes well.
They had Zero beer, so I enjoyed a cold one or three while we waited. And waited. Swan asked about the order’s status, and the waitress returned to say it was being “plated.” But when the plate came out, it was only Swan’s dish. It seems they had forgotten about mine. They offered to make it, but it was late, and I was tired.
I guess that’s fine as long as they didn’t bill you for what they didn’t serve.
Ignorance… arrogance… I’d put incuriosity up there as well—when people don’t have the gumption to find out the answers to questions that pop up in their heads, don’t wonder how the world works, and stay comfortably inside their own bubble because they think they know. Sure, we all have things we “bubble up” on, and we all have our comfortable routines, but when it gets to a point where we just settle and mistake that for contentment, that’s when things get bad.
We could all use more Siargaos and Bohols in our lives.
» Posted By Kevin Kim On 03/December/2025 @ 6:29 pm
Overall, it seemed like a good and worthwhile trip, with plenty to see and do, and with some logistical hiccups along the way. Keeping those hiccups in mind (they seem par for the course in a poor country), would you do this sort of trip again, and would you consider making it just a you-and-Swan thing sometime down the line?
Safe trip back.
» Posted By Kevin Kim On 02/December/2025 @ 1:28 pm
I hope the final day went well. Safe flight back to your dive bars.
» Posted By Kevin Kim On 01/December/2025 @ 11:32 pm
As for the Kimsaurant, I’m running out of time this trip.
Kim-staurant, not Kim-saurant. That would make no sense.
Personally, I think that whatever comes before “staurant” should be a vowel sound, so it would have been better to write, “K-staurant”… although that might’ve sounded too much like “gay-staurant.” Bleh… you can’t win.
» Posted By Kevin Kim On 01/December/2025 @ 7:23 pm
The tacos…
They, too, seem not to believe in dipping the taco shells in consommé before frying. (Yes, you can fry the dipped shells until crispy. Most places do.)
That’s a creative way to name your Korean restaurant.
Any plans to visit?
And lo and behold, as we walked down Tourism Road, Jeff and Davina pulled up on their scooter and told us of a place they had found off the beaten track. It was less than a kilometer away, so off we went. Jeff and Davina joined us there shortly after we arrived.
How did you beat them on foot?
» Posted By Kevin Kim On 01/December/2025 @ 1:23 am
Then we did a 6K walk to the outskirts of General Luna and back, before we finished the day with an ill-fated bar crawl.
The rule with dependent clauses is: Use a comma if the clause comes first; drop the comma if the clause isn’t first.
• If you do that again, I’ll kill you.
• I’ll kill you if you do that again.Simplest solution: drop the comma that precedes “before.”
Also, as for your attempted corrections: Use a comma before “then,” but no comma before “and then.” So:
WRONG: We did a 6K walk to the outskirts of General Luna and back, and then we finished the day with an ill-fated bar crawl.
RIGHT: We did a 6K walk to the outskirts of General Luna and back, then we finished the day with an ill-fated bar crawl.re: Swan’s accepting your selfish ways
I know you’re joking, but Swan should never have to accept any man’s selfish ways. Other people’s lives aren’t lived for you; those lives are their own. The philosopher Kant noted this long ago: treat other people as ends in themselves, never as means to an end. People are not things meant to be bent to your service; they have their own lives, hopes, and dreams. If anything, you should live your life in service to them.
» Posted By Kevin Kim On 30/November/2025 @ 10:43 am
Then we did a 6K walk to the outskirts of General Luna and back, before we finished the day with an ill-fated bar crawl.
Spot and explain the error! (Hint: It has to do with a dependent clause.)
Swan with her toes in the sand, taking in the view.
I see that one palm tree in the background, leaning out farther than all of the others. This reminds me of a recurrent motif in the movie Contact.
our first venue, Parluman Gin Parlor
Check spelling. Pa-ra-lu-man (based on the photo you’ve displayed). Hear the sound in your head. (Unless it’s spelled “Paraluman” but pronounced “Parluman,” in which case I forgive you. But please spell it right all the same.)
So, we sat at the beach bar for drinks to await the opening of Parluman.
Check spelling again.
One thing that really hit home for me was that I am too old to recover from another heartbreak. If I fuck this up with Swan, it will be game over for me. I don’t want to live with any more regret than I’ve already accumulated over the years.
The Buddhist concept of attachment has to do with fixing your mind on a particular idea or ideal at the expense of other, more important things. Attachment is rooted in ego; a cognate Western concept for ego/egotism is selfishness. The example I’ve given when I’ve taught the concept is this:
You’re in a car with a group of friends, all having agreed to see Movie X, which just came out, and which has gotten great reviews. Suddenly, one of your friends in the car says, “You know what? I don’t really want to see Movie X. I wanna see Movie Y.” After some discussion, everyone in the car except you agrees to see Movie Y since none of you has seen it before. You, by contrast, are fuming. You had signed on to this little trip because everyone had originally agreed to see Movie X, and now, it feels as if everyone has betrayed you, and you’re off—against your will—to see a movie you’d never had any desire to see. Grumbling and stewing, you grudgingly agree to go along with the group, but you pout through the entire movie and declare, at the end, that Movie Y sucked—a petty, selfish utterance designed to be hurtful and to let everyone know how you feel.
The Buddhist analysis of your situation is that you were attached to the idea of seeing a particular movie. The thought of that movie had gotten so fixed in your mind that, when reality no longer conformed to your expectation, this caused you stress, to which you reacted with anger. You could have realized that, if Movie X was truly that important, then you could see it on your own later—no big deal. More importantly, you could have put your focus on having a good time with your friends, which ought to have been the real reason to go out, not to see Movie X specifically. Instead, you selfishly focused and doubled down on your attachment, causing yourself and those around you stress. Attachment doesn’t just affect you.
I’m glad you and Swan managed to reconcile, but it’d be nice for you to apologize for your attitude and behavior to your other friends, too. Your anger was doubtless palpable to them, not to mention a major buzzkill, to use a drinker’s term. Your friends are now going to quietly wonder whether this kind of thing will happen once or twice more before the end of your Siargao trip, and they might even question the wisdom of taking you along on other such trips in the future. Your friends all strike me as good folks, so you don’t want to burn bridges with them. They are, after all, your neighbors, too! You’ve got to live with these people.
To be clear, I’m not saying this from any position of moral authority because I’ve been guilty of this kind of behavior myself. But I think the Buddhist analysis is onto something here. So—word to the wise. For you and me both.
And, yes: you’ve got a great thing going with Swan, who is by far the best woman you’ve ever been with—emotionally stable and filled with common sense (except for one bit of insanity: she consented to be with you! —ha ha). Please don’t fuck that up. Be worthy of her quality.
And enjoy the rest of your trip. Relax, take a deep breath, and accept the Filipino way.
» Posted By Kevin Kim On 29/November/2025 @ 11:45 pm
1. Congrats on paying closer attention to the spelling of “Siargao.” Mister C.R. Gao.
2. I forgot to mention that your initial “I apologize in advance” parenthetical needs a closed parenthesis.
3. You can delete my first attempt at commenting.» Posted By Kevin Kim On 29/November/2025 @ 10:36 pm
[Attempt 2]
(I apologize in advance for the poor grammatical structure of that quote. I didn’t write it!
It’s done up as a meme, so I guess typos are de rigueur. What would the corrected prose look like… or did Bukowski originally write so sloppily?
Speaking of days, my yesterday was a special one. We rented a car and drove all around the island, stopping at some recommended tourist spots along the way. Then we visited the brewery that Dr. Jo’s husband, Chris, is in the process of opening, and he let us sample some of his delicious brews. We travelled 109 Kilometers and spent nine hours on our road adventure.
Wow, imagine that: a part of the PI where people actually care about their surroundings. Did you do any driving? Ah—I see you wrote:
Jeff did the driving.
All the driving?
It involved wading through water waist-deep or higher, and that just didn’t appeal to me.
You’ve had no problem, in the past, with calf-deep or ankle-deep water, so why would this be a problem (except for your cell phone and other electronics)? I could see a problem if there was a strong current… but was there? I assume not. Imagine the pics you could have taken! Maybe there was a hidden shrine to Mary in there. Well, you’ve got Davina’s video, I guess. Consolation prize. (I didn’t see a Marian shrine, alas.)
I ordered the fish and chips. When I asked the waitress what type of fish they used, she said tuna.
Huh. Tuna is not a whitefish like cod or haddock. Well, at least it was good.
Taktak Falls, we have arrived.
I wonder what the “canopy walk” is.
As regular readers may have discerned, I’m not much of a water person. Especially when it requires taking off my shoes and changing my shorts.
Why change your shorts? Dive in, swim around, get out, dry off. No matter what shorts you wear, everything’s gonna get soaked. Leave electronics back on shore.
Ah, to be young again.
That’s what The Substance is all about.
Martin leading the way.
Martin’s brave to walk in sandals. I always get pebbles under my feet.
In anticipation of our visit, Chris had brewed up a batch of his “Light Pilsner” for our enjoyment. It was very good indeed, and I quenched my thirst with three (or maybe it was four) glasses.
I assume this will be a must-visit stopover the next time you find yourself on Siargao. How often is Dr. Chris there and not at his office that’s local to you? I assume the eventual plan is for him and the wife to move to Siargao permanently. What’s your plan for a replacement doc?
Oh, I was getting drunk. I’ve come a long way, baby!
Irony noted.
I guess I’m a day late with this one.
I saw the same “cold turkey” joke in a meme over at Instapundit (I think it was Instapundit), but done with a completely different set of pictures. You’re not the only one who loves bad puns.
Keep dishing them out!
I like how, in the second frame, the two girls have abandoned the mother in disgust after hearing the father’s awful joke.
re: “Two guys are sitting on a barstool.”
I guess the stool is upside-down if they’re both sitting on it.
Hope the bar-hopping went well.
» Posted By Kevin Kim On 28/November/2025 @ 11:06 pm
The whole island looks beautiful. That birria place definitely seems to be worth a visit. I’d order a slew of different fusion dishes.
That’s some fresh fish if it’s swimming on your plate!
I wonder if that’s a Filipino form of chimichurri.
It’s called “The Dreamer,” but I’m not sure I want that in my head at night.
Is that an octopus hanging off the right side?
Don’t get so drunk that you can’t remember the good times.
» Posted By Kevin Kim On 27/November/2025 @ 1:58 pm
Did you spot my error? My inner voice was of no help, the drunken bastard.
» Posted By Kevin Kim On 27/November/2025 @ 2:30 pm
And yes, the comma in the title is now correct. It’s called a vocative comma, and it’s used whenever you’re addressing someone or something.
• Dave, you’re dad’s here.
• Yes, sir.
• Hey, Kevin.
• Dude, pick that shit up off the floor.
• Surf City, here I am!
• Feets, don’ fail me now! (sic)Check out Bad Online English #11, 23, 28, and 35. At least four times now!
Enjoy your day.
» Posted By Kevin Kim On 27/November/2025 @ 1:45 pm
Congrats. You got almost all of the misspellings except this one:
I don’t recall ever seeing an airport as small as the one that serves Siragao.
» Posted By Kevin Kim On 27/November/2025 @ 8:20 am
Oh, and what’s missing from your post’s title?
» Posted By Kevin Kim On 26/November/2025 @ 6:57 pm
John says in a comment:
Kevin, it should be SIARGAO, but I’m a dunce and my fingers like the other way for some reason.
Then in this post, the first thing he writes is:
Getting to Siragao wasn’t the fun part, but we eventually made it.
Do you hear a voice in your head when you read and write? I know a lot of people say that an internal voice slows down their reading speed, but I’m a slow reader, and I always hear the “sounds” of what I’m reading and writing. I see “Siargao” and mentally pronounce it, right or wrong, as “See-ahr-gow” (“gow” rhyming with “cow,” not “low”). I see “Siragao” and mentally hear “See-rah-gow” (Spanish “R”). I’m guessing you hear nothing and just plow on ahead. Sure, even with my inner voice, I make plenty of my own typos and fail to catch them even after a second or third reading. But the inner voice helps at least a little, minimizing the number of such typos.
Second sentence:
We left the hotel at 0600 and arrived at the airport with plenty of time to check in for our 0830 flight to Cebu, where we would connect with the flight to Siragao.
Maybe type “Siargao” three hundred times to develop muscle memory. Si-ar-gao. That second syllable is A-R, not R-A.
You have to love cultures with a, uh, flexible sense of time.
We finally boarded an hour and a half after our scheduled departure.
My first impression of Italy, back in early 1990, was when my intercity train pulled in to Rome’s Termini Station 30 minutes late, and the closest money-exchange office was a dark corner staffed by an old guy with a vintage adding machine. At least your plane didn’t crash. “Maintenance issue” never sounds good when you’re in a third-world country even if it has islands of first-worldiness.
And about an hour later, it was hello, Siragao Island.
Wow, this really is a problem.
I don’t recall ever seeing an airport as small as the one that serves Siragao.
Jesus Christ. Si-ar-gao!
In another turn of good fortune, our checked bags made the flight with us.
Yup. You can take nothing for granted these days, not even in Amurrica.
On the road to General Luna.
It looks very green and lovely out yonder.
So, first impressions: Siragao has a pleasant, laid-back vibe.
This is going to drive me insane.
Most of them are healthy-looking and relatively slender. Of course, I’m the oldest man around these parts, or so it seems.
Sounds like the opening mystery in a horror short story where the reason why there are no old people is discovered to be unspeakably evil and probably involves cannibalism.
We’ve rented a car for tomorrow to do some touring around the island, so blogging may be delayed. Sorry about that!
Just don’t crash and get eaten by tigers or Muslims.
» Posted By Kevin Kim On 26/November/2025 @ 6:52 pm
Siargao or Siragao? I’ve seen both spellings several times now.
Looks like a nice part of Manila to be in, but I can see what you’re saying re: the unreal vibe. And you can’t avoid the poor in a poor country. Or maybe you can, but at the cost of walling yourself off from reality.
» Posted By Kevin Kim On 26/November/2025 @ 1:05 pm
Manila gorilla! Enjoy yourself out there. And for God’s sake, do not ever read that book.
» Posted By Kevin Kim On 25/November/2025 @ 2:05 am
Congratulations. It’s the rare man who can confess to being pleasantly surprised by tubby, shirtless white guys.
» Posted By Kevin Kim On 24/November/2025 @ 12:19 pm
Hmm, there is something distracting about this photo…
Must be those big, tubby white guys. I’m off-white, but I’d fit right in.
There, I fixed it.
i.e., distractions removed?
Granted, that’s not the view I come for these days.
Yes, I’m sure. Which is how it ended up on the blog.
Enjoy your trip to Siargao!
» Posted By Kevin Kim On 23/November/2025 @ 8:08 pm
Yeah, I got that about “burgasm.” Not something readily thought up by a native speaker of, say, American English.
You could always do the 29K route in 7K segments, except for one 8K day.
» Posted By Kevin Kim On 23/November/2025 @ 10:07 am
Back in my Southern Cal youth, we’d say shit like, “She’s a surfer’s dream, flat as a board.”
Good description of most Korean girls’ asses. Whenever I see the rare ass that has pleasing contours, I admit I stare.
I’ve never had a “burgasm.”
Sounds like Konglish. Philipponglish?
Nice walk, flat though it be. Any definite plans for the 29K route? Particular time of year? Practice schedule? T’ain’t real until you start planning.
» Posted By Kevin Kim On 22/November/2025 @ 11:03 pm
And you still haven’t given her the divorce. You’ve long said that she’s never asked for one, but she did ask at least once. The ball is in your court. What was married life like in the States? More bars, beer, and darts? I can see how lack of imagination might be soul-crushing.
Of course, to be fair, she was a full and equal partner in the marriage, so she could have used her imagination, too, to spice things up. And I’m not talking about porcupine-shaped sex toys. Still, it seems as though both of you refused to carry the weight of the relationship.
I’m guessing that “Seroksan” is Seoraksan. From 설악산, i.e., “seol-ak-san.”
Swan’s suggestion for how to temper the sourness of the sour cream was a good one. Or use sweetened evaporated milk. Marshmallows: add at the very end, right before serving.
As for your coconut issue: consider becoming an Amazon Prime member and get your coconut that way. Or use whatever phone-app equivalent the PI has to Amazon. I use Coupang a lot in Korea. But I also use services like iHerb and Amazon. I bet the PI has dozens of ways for you to obtain your dried, shredded coconut. Google has a “shop” feature; click on it and go from there.
A quick online search shows the following shopping apps in the PI:
Lazada
MetroMart
Pick-a-Roo
GrabMart
Food PandaThere are many more. No reason to sit around all passive and helpless in the age of online self-empowerment!
Yes, that first grammar problem was your classic comma splice. The second problem broke the rule of phrasal adjectives: hyphenate when they come BEFORE the nouns they modify.
• a well-written essay
• an essay that was well written
• a six-foot(-tall) man
• a man who was six feet (tall)
• a well-rested John
• John was well rested
• green-bean casserole
• casserole with green beansI did a BOE on phrasal adjectives at least once. Do a search for “phrasal adjective” and really study it. Don’t let others keep doing your work for you—quoting grammar rules you can look up, suggesting apps and online options you can find yourself, etc. Be proactive, not passive. You’re a smart guy.
» Posted By Kevin Kim On 22/November/2025 @ 1:20 pm
It doesn’t matter what day you celebrate, it’s the thought that counts.
Sigh… spot the error (same one yet again)….
so I’m well-rested today.
Sigh… what’s the rule about phrasal adjectives?
It was fun while it lasted, that’s for sure. Folks seemed to enjoy the fruit salad I contributed. The candied yams and [green-bean] casserole were my favorite sides.
Sorry to read about the food overdose, but the food looked great, and it seemed to be a good time. Happy pre-Thanksgiving to you and yours.
Oh—why wasn’t the fruit salad one of your favorites? Personally, I wouldn’t add the color marshmallows until right before serving the salad. Otherwise, they melt into a brown mush (brown after the colors combine) when you put them in too early. They might even be better as a kind of tacky topping. Me, I’d love your Aunt Pat’s recipe a lot more if it didn’t have goddamn shredded coconut in it. I hate shredded coconut almost as much as I hate stringy onions in my burgers, spaghetti, and pizza.
It was part of my ongoing effort to make my wife happy. Alas, it was an effort destined to fail.
Did you ever try to engage your Korean wife in regular walking the way you’ve done with Swan? Or was your time in Korea just a tiny, repetitive merry-go-round of bars, darts, drinking, talking in English, then more bars, darts, drinking, and talking in English? If so, I’m beginning to see what the problem was: a life lived without a sense of imagination or adventure which, to your credit, you seem to have acquired (an occasional sense of adventure, I mean) since. I’m not saying that every single day needs to include variety, but having common projects or goals (like Hash-style walking), punctuated by big trips every few months, plus making an effort to show interest in the local culture instead of screening it out by always going where like-minded, familiar people are is a better recipe for relationship success than doing the same damn thing over and over and over. When there’s no growth and no goals anymore, nothing to aim for, and only a contentedly bleary haze brought on by alcohol—a contentment that can’t be shared—well, that’s when life becomes stale. I’m glad you’ve got a good thing with Swan, and I’m glad you’re engaged in regular walking and semi-regular long trips. I guess you’ve discovered that you could’ve done that back in Korea. Maybe in some alternate universe, there’s a John who figured that out. In which case, your much-desired do-over life is already being done over.
» Posted By Kevin Kim On 21/November/2025 @ 7:01 pm
A fowl encounter at Mountain Mama Onelia’s place.
That duck(?) on the left has the thousand-yard stare as though he’s seen some shit. He has the look of a haunted veteran.
Looks to have been a good walk.
» Posted By Kevin Kim On 21/November/2025 @ 1:09 am
My bad:
It was only the second time I’ve attended this year despite the fact that I’m a member.
I’m getting as senile as you! Proofread, Kevin, you idiot!
» Posted By Kevin Kim On 20/November/2025 @ 9:10 pm
The first sentence looks good. The second sentence merely switches phrases around and commits the same error. The modifier now comes at the end, and “it” is still the clause’s subject. Maybe turn the modifier into a clause (and toss the comma) to avoid the problem completely:
It was only the second time I’ve attended this year despite the fact that I’m not a member.
I think we’ve found a blind spot with dangling modifiers. Keep a special eye out for them. Remember the modifier always modifies the subject of your main clause.
WRONG: Crouched and ready to pounce, the mice feared the cat’s “death from above” maneuver.
RIGHT: Crouched and ready to pounce, the cat sowed fear among the mice with its “death from above” maneuver.WRONG: Displayed all over the brick walls of the alley, I sprayed my artistic graffiti.
RIGHT: Displayed all over the brick walls of the alley, the graffiti I’d sprayed leaped out at passersby.See more here.
» Posted By Kevin Kim On 20/November/2025 @ 8:55 pm
We did this so recently, and it’s already dropped out of memory. Probably because it never took in the first place. The wonders of alcohol. And no, not old age. There are plenty of sharp oldsters out there. So—one more time:
Despite being a member, it was only the second time I’ve attended this year.
“Despite being a member” is a modifier. Ideally, the modifier modifies the subject of the sentence (or main clause), but in your sentence, the subject is “it.” So “it” is “a member”? Basically the modifier has nothing to modify—it’s been left dangling. As a result, we call this error a “dangling modifier.” I’ll use the example I used before:
As a child, French was difficult. (“French” is a “child”?)
Possible corrections:
As a child, I had trouble learning French.
As a child, I found learning French to be difficult.
Learning French was difficult for me when I was a child.
When I was a child, learning French was difficult for me.
(etc.)As for your sentence… how would you correct that? Show me at least two ways.
» Posted By Kevin Kim On 20/November/2025 @ 2:22 pm
re: “They Shall Not Grow Old”
So that’s where that comes from. Remember this?
Despite being a member, it was only the second time I’ve attended this year.
Spot the error!
re: that tall, ladder-like stairway
That wouldn’t bother me as long as there were handrails to hold on to. You got a thing about heights?
» Posted By Kevin Kim On 19/November/2025 @ 9:56 pm
«« Back To Stats PageCongrats on another sort-of Hash. Then again, most of your Hashes are sort-of Hashes, what with all of the shortcutting (or flat-Earthing, I guess, if distances are similar but terrain is different)—more of a “Ha!” than a “Hash.”
At least, you managed that one hill.
That video you’d shown of the guys who did the 80-km walk was remarkable for how different the sights seen along the way were from what you normally photograph. Not better or worse—just different. I second the notion of trying some version of that route. You could do it with a “chase car” that doubles as your place to sleep for the night if no local lodging is available. You could also walk 20-ish km per day, then drive back to Barretto to sleep, waking up super-early the next morning to drive out to where you’d left off, and picking up the trail from there. 20K a day means an 80K route in only four days. Then again, I saw the extremely short distances for some of the segments listed on the video and realized that that must’ve been because of how tough the terrain was. But in my experience, there are always multiple trails going in generally the same direction, so I’m sure there are easier options out there for roughly the same route. Contour maps are key for planning this.
re: that “Solve 50% of Your Problems” meme
God, that’s some creepy AI shit. Uncanny valley. Look at the beard texture. Yikes.
» Posted By Kevin Kim On 18/November/2025 @ 8:24 pm