Comments Posted By Kevin Kim
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Whoa. That’s one shitty mask. As for this:
Is it [farther] around the equator than pole-to-pole?
The distance around the equator is longer because the earth is an oblate (squished-down) spheroid, probably as a result of its rotation, which produces a slight bulge around the equator.
So you might have an “Equator” badge coming to you pretty soon!
One online reference says this:
Earth’s polar radius is 3,950 miles (6,356 km) — a difference of 13 miles (22 km). Using those measurements, the equatorial circumference of Earth is about 24,901 miles (40,075 km). However, from pole-to-pole — the meridional circumference — Earth is only 24,860 miles (40,008 km) around.
So that’s a difference of about 40 miles. Expect an Equator badge VERY soon!
» Posted By Kevin Kim On 09/April/2020 @ 5:37 pm
I’d rather be a lion than a sheep
“A man’s admiration of absolute government is proportionate to the contempt he feels for those around him.”
–TocquevilleAnd I guess this quote explains the liberal left’s simultaneous love of government and contempt for all the retarded, Bible-thumping, gun-clinging folks in flyover country. Fuck them rubes!
By spooky coincidence, today’s Captcha code is “GV3C,” which is the abbreviation I use whenever I email my boss about Gravoca 3C, the textbook I’m currently working on.
» Posted By Kevin Kim On 08/April/2020 @ 7:35 pm
I guess a little rebelliousness keeps things lively. Be careful, man.
» Posted By Kevin Kim On 08/April/2020 @ 5:15 pm
Fascinating survey of the local trails!
And I’m sure you’re happy not to be carrying the equivalent of a fifth-grader’s weight any longer.
» Posted By Kevin Kim On 07/April/2020 @ 6:07 pm
I have to wonder whether that’s really a quote from one of the sutras. No specific source given, eh? Let’s do some quick research:
Hmmm. I see the quote is also attributed to Tupac Shakur. Heh. Maybe he was quoting the Buddha…? Let’s keep digging.
I see the quote is also attributed to Norman Cousins.
Let’s chalk this one up as “apocryphal.” The expression “dies inside us” sounds more like a phrase from Western culture than from Eastern culture. People pass it off as Eastern because it sounds like the sort of therapeutic mumbo-jumbo that a lot of Westerners are suckers for.
And I just saw another “Buddha” quote:
“Your purpose in life is to find your purpose and to give your whole heart and soul to it.” (attributed to the Buddha, no sutra cited anywhere)
Here, too, the notion of “giving your heart to” something sounds far more Western than Eastern. The other tell is the word “soul,” since one of Buddhism’s central doctrines is anatman, often translated as “no-self” (無我 in Chinese), but also as “no-soul.” There is a such thing as a “self” in Buddhism, but it doesn’t exist at a fundamental level because everything is intercausal, i.e., we’re all made up of patterns and forces that interrelate, interweave, and inter-cause. Nothing, in such a metaphysical situation, stands alone. There’s no deep justification for defiantly saying, “I’m me” because your “me” doesn’t actually have fundamental existence. At best, it’s a conventional “me” that is subject to change, impermanence, and interrelationality. This “me” doesn’t stand alone as some solid, incorruptible monad, some bulwark of individualism. It’s woven into the causal network like everything else.
Upshot: it’s highly doubtful that the Buddha would have enjoined anyone to invest his/her “soul” into a particular spiritual effort.
On a more practical note: sorry you had to endure that line. I haven’t shopped anywhere but the local groceries in town here in Seoul, and I haven’t seen much difference in shoppers’ behavior or in the amount/number of stocked items. Situation more-or-less normal. I need to check how the bigger stores are doing—stores like eMart, Home Plus, Lotte Mart, etc. In Europe, they’re painting or taping lines onto the floor to give customers an idea of how to social-distance while in the payment line.
Good luck as you endure all the silliness! Keep practicing darts at home until you can bull’s-eye that target while blindfolded.
It occurs to me that the early curfew in the PI may have the inadvertent effect of deterring burglars: everyone’s guaranteed to be at home, and some of those good folks might even be armed!
» Posted By Kevin Kim On 06/April/2020 @ 5:31 pm
I’m sure your cell phone has a pedometer. It’ll take some getting used to, given how you’ve come to trust your FitBit, but you’ll adapt. As you know, I treat my own pedometer with some suspicion.
Wow– that get-together was already five years ago? Damn.
» Posted By Kevin Kim On 05/April/2020 @ 3:20 pm
May all your walks be free of bother.
And, yes: my own mask is no more than security theater.
» Posted By Kevin Kim On 04/April/2020 @ 7:14 pm
Does it get any better than this?
I think pineapple and baby-back ribs are a good combination. Are you going to grind the pineapple into a sauce and baste the pork with it, saving some sauce for dipping later on? Or do you have a different plan?
» Posted By Kevin Kim On 05/April/2020 @ 10:08 pm
Regarding those fires: is it a matter of a lack of regulations, a lack of enforcement, or both?
See, pineapple in chili kinda makes sense. The sweetness of the pineapple balances out the salt and spice of the rest of the chili. The pineapple’s acidity cuts through any fattiness from the beef. Pineapple with pork also makes sense. But pineapple with pork in a creamy, savory sauce? Not so sure about that one. As you say, though, you can barely taste the pineapple.
That pic of you with the Turkish(?) lady gives me a very Ernest Borgnine kinda’ vibe.
» Posted By Kevin Kim On 03/April/2020 @ 5:04 pm
Are the natives getting restless?
Oy. Sorry to hear about the imperious granny. These are paranoid times, and things are only becoming more paranoid.
Pies look great. I’m thinking of making an apple pie this weekend.
I do hope your country doesn’t end up having food riots. I’ve heard rumors and rumblings of such things in some parts of the States, which boggles my mind. No chance of that happening here in Seoul unless something truly catastrophic occurs.
Careful not to get in trouble with the authorities. Let’s not have your April Fool’s post come true.
» Posted By Kevin Kim On 02/April/2020 @ 6:48 pm
Happy April Fool’s! Continued good luck with life in the PI.
That bacon appears to be cooked the way I like it.
» Posted By Kevin Kim On 01/April/2020 @ 7:25 pm
» Posted By Kevin Kim On 01/April/2020 @ 9:40 pm
If you do end up toilet-training the dawg at this late date, I definitely want to see photos of Buddy upon the throne (although not necessarily at the exact moment something is crawling out).
There have got to be toilet-training videos on YouTube.
» Posted By Kevin Kim On 31/March/2020 @ 3:29 pm
Monasticism beckons. That’s why you keep seeing little statues of the Blessed Virgin on those mountains.
Am now trying to imagine you in a Franciscan order. Can’t quite do it. You’d be the horniest monk in the abbey.
» Posted By Kevin Kim On 30/March/2020 @ 6:56 pm
Sorry to hear there are sorrows to drown. Drown them thoroughly!
Awesome walk, and awesome photos as always.
» Posted By Kevin Kim On 29/March/2020 @ 5:49 pm
Did you have a chance to eat the dish yet? If yes, how’d it taste with the pineapple added?
Ranch dressing and cream of mushroom at least have creaminess in common, so their combination kind of makes sense. Adding something acidic, like lemon or pineapple, carries the risk of making anything milky curdle, which can change the taste and texture of the dish. Not always, though; there are cream sauces that can survive a dash of lemon juice (or wine, as I’m about to do). For me, though, what makes this strange is that pineapple is also quite sweet, and the two creamy elements are savory. Am very curious as to how this turned out.
» Posted By Kevin Kim On 29/March/2020 @ 8:01 am
That pic of the dogs reminded me, once again, of Star Trek.
Chicken fingers and slaw looked great. Not sure what to make of the slow-cooker pork’s flavor profile, though. Ranch dressing, cream of mushroom… and pineapple? You’ll have to tell me how it tastes, because to me, it sounds as if you’ve ventured into the badlands of Single Man’s Weird Meals. Heh.
I’m not saying this from any position of superiority, mind you: I’ve made some bizarre concoctions myself, and they’ve quietly gone un-blogged (then again, some of my earliest foodblogging looks positively disgusting to me now). Maybe I should man up and do a “culinary confessional” series of posts that focuses on misbegotten meals.
NB: pineapple is a fantastic meat tenderizer because of its acidity. Marinate a steak in it, and you’ll have to time the marination carefully because you can end up denaturing your meat!
» Posted By Kevin Kim On 27/March/2020 @ 5:34 pm
Styx also did his own “My Corona” (yes, the dude sings).
Chowder looks good. The lumpia, alas, look a wee bit over-fried. But I bet they were super-shatteringly crunchy.
Congrats on at last obtaining the correct(?) pass. I assume this one is good for more than just a single day. You wrote that you can go where you want “when the mood strikes me,” so I’m guessing that’s a yes.
Congrats on maintaining 20K steps. At my rate of healing, I’m never going to reach a weekly step average of 1.0 McCrareys. I think I’m doomed to a life of walking, at most, every other day, except for whenever I do a megawalk down south. (Or up north, if I take your suggestion to start in Busan!)
» Posted By Kevin Kim On 26/March/2020 @ 5:49 pm
Speakeasy or forever hold your peace
Stay safe, stay healthy, stay sane, and stay well-stocked with food and other necessities. May Joy find her joy once again.
» Posted By Kevin Kim On 25/March/2020 @ 9:41 pm
I guess we’re all clumsily figuring this stuff out as we go along. Duterte strikes me as a reflexive dictator, so it’s not a surprise that his immediate instinct is to clamp down on society. South Korea has a moonbatty, somewhat limp-wristed leftist executive right now, and he may be stuck between pot-smoking it’s-all-good-ism and his instinct to run a repressive nanny state. His internal conflict had resulted in a balanced approach to the problem, but now, I think his inner nanny-statist has taken over his consciousness, to the detriment of us all.
The first church to make the news in Korea was indeed a fringe church, although I hesitate to lump it in with normal Protestants. Shincheonji is more of a doomsday cult with a leader who claims to be an incarnation of Jesus (get in line, buddy; Korea has lots of similarly wacky Jesuses). The second church, River of Grace, was/is mainline Protestant.
Our Lady of Pious Idiocy, protect us from ourselves…
» Posted By Kevin Kim On 25/March/2020 @ 9:32 pm
That fried chicken looks well and truly fried. Nice.
I don’t envy your having to deal with the local authorities. I just heard from my coworkers that the ROK government is finally cracking down on Christians who insist on meeting for worship in the midst of the pandemic. It seems that several churches think they can go back to the way things had been, pre-pandemic.
I have mixed feelings on this score: up until today, there had been no direct orders that violated basic freedoms, such as freedom of assembly. Having the government explicitly clamp down on freedom of assembly now strikes me as a bad sign—the beginning of a trend. We may end up heading down the same road as the Philippines. At the same time, I’m pissed off by the churches that are ruining this whole fight-the-pandemic thing for the rest of us by ignoring suggestions to self-isolate. Can’t the churches figure out a way to engage in e-worship? Maybe some people are just stubborn and stupid. So yeah, I feel some Schadenfreude when I hear that churches are being expressly forbidden from congregating. But that’s coming at the expense of basic liberties.
I think I blame the churches more than I blame the government in this case: we had struck a good balance, for a while, between government oppression and personal liberty. Some churches have now messed that balance up for all of us.
» Posted By Kevin Kim On 24/March/2020 @ 4:47 pm
It may not be an official On-On, but unofficial is better than nothing.
Happy one-year anniversary to Lucky, who truly is a lucky sumbitch. Long may he sleep like a pretzel!
» Posted By Kevin Kim On 23/March/2020 @ 7:28 pm
What condition my condition is in
Rascal asks:
“Saw where someone mentioned our local Asian Market was stocked. With what?”
Probably stocked with toilet paper, which is apparently a hot commodity in many parts of the United States right now. Why? Because a bunch of drooling idiots apparently think COVID-19 is the same thing as dysentery. What’s up with that?
Here in Korea, there no shortages of anything but masks. Food is plentiful, toilet paper is plentiful, alcohol wipes and disinfectant lotion are all on hand, etc.
» Posted By Kevin Kim On 23/March/2020 @ 6:29 pm
My brother Sean, living in Washington, DC, just told me that there’re lots of empty shelves in the area… but the local Korean marts are fully stocked. Sean wonders whether American racism is keeping people away from Asian stores. I don’t know. I hope not. But on a practical level, Sean had better not let on that he knows where all the toilet paper is. I told him as much, and he said, “That’s what I was thinking!”
» Posted By Kevin Kim On 22/March/2020 @ 9:20 pm
Staying tuned as ordered.
The picture of the swimming pool reminds me of the beauty shots, from the early movies, of the starship Enterprise in spacedock. See here.
» Posted By Kevin Kim On 21/March/2020 @ 6:34 pm
“Walter Mart.” Too funny. Well, I’m glad you’re stocking up on the things that matter. Maybe we’ll get some more foodblogging out of you.
Still no lockdown in South Korea, but I saw that Governor Newsom, in California, has ordered all 40 million Californians to shelter at home. As far as I know, nothing the ROK government has done has had the force of an outright order, but there is undoubtedly a great deal of social pressure on people to do “the right thing,” whatever that might be. For example, when some church group selfishly insists on having in-person worship services, the larger community gets pissed off, and that anger is what keeps people in line. Otherwise, though, the local groceries aren’t forming long lines; there’ve been no shortages of any kind (except of masks, but those are sold at pharmacies). I haven’t checked out the local restaurants to see how business has been; some local cafes look way emptier than usual, giving the neighborhood a kind of subdued feeling. But life feels mostly normal, just lower key. I have no trouble catching a cab or riding a subway; buses (which I haven’t ridden since the outbreak, and normally never ride, anyway) seem to be running at their usual frequency; the machinery of society continues to grind on, albeit at a more sedate pace.
If things become unlivable in the PI, I’m sure the people will make their voices heard. As one article says:
“The encouraging news, for now at least, is that the coronavirus does not appear to be as deadly as the seasonal flu in terms of sheer numbers. Based on CDC estimates—again, important to note that even the detection of influenza-caused hospitalizations and deaths is not an exact science—between 36 and 52 million Americans have contracted the flu since last October and anywhere between 22,000 and 55,000 have died.
While the number of detected coronavirus cases continues to rise due to widespread testing, about 150 people reportedly have died from the infection. Nearly half lived in the state of Washington; many states are reporting single-digit fatalities. Further, hospitals are not yet overrun with coronavirus patients and, according to the CDC, hospitalizations this year due to the flu “is lower than end-of-season total hospitalization estimates for any season since CDC began making these estimates.” Good news if indeed the number of coronavirus sufferers requiring hospitalization actually materializes.”
» Posted By Kevin Kim On 20/March/2020 @ 7:30 pm
Your dangerous dance with authorities continues. Just don’t get caught! I hope you’ve amply stocked up on beer at home should you ever need to turn your house into a pop-up bar for one! A McCrarey who doesn’t drink is no McCrarey at all!
» Posted By Kevin Kim On 19/March/2020 @ 8:12 pm
WHITE MAN MAKE OVERLY SPICY CHILI?? IMPOSSIBLE!!
I see you’re having to deal with “security theater.” Hey, good luck with that. Here’s hoping the authorities realize that the sane thing to do is to stick with making suggestions and letting the good citizens figure this virus problem out for themselves. Curfews, bar/resto closings, and traffic restrictions only serve to press the potentially infected population even closer together, thereby aiding the spread of the virus. Not smart.
Was that homemade cornbread? Looks good! How’d the recipe work out for you?
» Posted By Kevin Kim On 18/March/2020 @ 8:40 pm
Damn, the walls are really closing in. Hate to say this, but I’m happy I’m in South Korea right now. There have been cancellations and shutdowns, true, but the government hasn’t ordered people into their homes, nor has it threatened anyone with draconian fines, imprisonment, or anything else dire. There have been strongly worded directives that amount to suggestions about how to act during the crisis, and for the most part, the conformist populace has been going along with everything. Koreans can be plucky, rebellious, and anti-authoritarian when they want to be, but right now, I think everyone sees the wisdom in staying put and behaving… except, apparently, for at least one other Christian denomination that has once again proven to be a problem for the country because of its insistence on continuing to meet for worship. These people—and other people like them—might prove to be the literal death of the rest of us if they keep that shit up.
Anyway, despite the church-related craziness, I can’t say that life is all that different for me. Part of the issue may be my own introversion: I don’t travel around that much; I have almost no social circle to speak of; there’s little for me to do, or that I want to do, aside from walk around and bike around (still working on the biking thing). Everything else that I do is done indoors, at home, e.g., blogging and watching movies (I have a lot of movies to catch up on). I’m thankful that I’m free to take random walks if I want. I kind of wish the Duterte government understood that confining people to, for example, apartment buildings is a good way to turn those buildings into petri dishes for the virus. It’s better to let people roam; the open air would do everyone a lot of good.
Anyway, good luck as you deal with the realities of a de facto house arrest. I hope you don’t get caught and—God forbid—thrown in jail for violating the new directives. Jail strikes me as a potential infection zone. I’d be rather paranoid about being confined in such a space. And what would your dogs do while you’re in the clink?
As Dubya once wrote: “Let freedom reign!” Please keep us updated on this unwholesome situation.
» Posted By Kevin Kim On 17/March/2020 @ 8:41 pm
«« Back To Stats PageAlso, a bit of trivia: “brioche” is a kind of bread, not cake. Cake is “gâteau.” I have to wonder where the mistranslation slipped into common parlance. The original quote apparently did have to do with brioche, but some genius along the way decided the speaker meant “cake.”
Brioche always gives me a chuckle because it’s the go-to bread for “cheffy” people who are trying to fancy up their hamburgers by avoiding regular hamburger buns. I like brioche buns, but I do think they’re a cliché at this point, and not ideal. Me, I prefer potato buns for my burgers.
hamburger with regular bun
hamburger with brioche bunAnd here’s an article that I agree with.
» Posted By Kevin Kim On 16/March/2020 @ 6:01 pm
