Countdown

I've got 12, count 'em, 12 working days left before my ass gets a real break! And I'm the first to say, I am working for it. Today I went in at 8 in the morning, stayed till 6:40 and then worked another 3 hours when I got home. I'm trying to get a little ahead on the crunch time when I'll have to write a whole bunch of final tests next week which always suck a huge amount of time. Lately, the thoughts of getting off the plane in Tokyo and heading off to a real sushi dinner with lots of warm sake and warm bubbly feelings welling up inside me is all that is keeping me going. The days are flying and I'm doing alright, but damn, I'm ready for a real break.

This may not be too long, it's late, but I've been trying to write all week and simply have not had the time. It snowed here last Sunday, a lot (for here). Beautiful. It was the most amazing thing to wake up and have this unusual white glare pouring through the windows. By the time I finally made it out of my house, several hours later, there were a few small snowmen build up outside of various stores and kids throwing mis-constructed snowballs at each other that had a tendency to self-destruct before they reached their desired target. I went out to get my haircut with Minnie in the university area near my house. She wanted to stop into this little store. She said "just a second" but I forgot about the Korean time difference. I finished my cigarette and thinking that she would only be a couple more minutes decided to construct some ammo to great her with when she emerged. 10,11,12.... no Minnie. I go to another spot, 16,17,18 snowballs neatly arranged in a haphazard pyramid, still no Minnie. So eventually I dust the snow off my jacket and gloves and go inside frustrated. By the time I was able to pull her outside I'd entirely lost my motivation and the snowballs were left resting in their offensive position for some lucky and energetic Korean to take advantage of. So it goes. I went on to get my haircut too short and then went home to make pasta. That was my Sunday in its entirety.

The rest of the weekend wasn't really that exciting but still pleasant. I haven't talked about SU:M since I started the blog again. I've mentioned (or is bitch the word?) about having not found a real artistic community here and the difficulty of my living location. Well, a few months ago I happened upon this little coffee shop/art cooperative. Since, we've been going regularly and have become friends with the guys who run it. They have coffee and all that, but they also have a little gallery showing university students work that rotates about every month and are entirely open to us letting us use their place as an impromptu living room. I actually had a semi-successful birthday party there in December. I actually wasn't really that lucky getting new faces out, but I did get most of my friends there for some drinking and dancing which was nice. Saturday we showed up late with a bottle of Vodka and wine in tow and met a few of our friends up there (Chloe and Yamur). Fun was had by all, really a nice gently evening. We headed out about 2 and that was the bulk of our Saturday night. Sort of like a dinner party minus the food and the house, but really a nice familiar environment.

This is actually a rather uninspired writing so I'll curtail it now until another time. Hope life finds all well. Oh, and, I finally got to see Garden State... I had such huge hopes that they were really unrealistic, but I still really enjoyed it. Ahh, the romance movies of the generation of skeptics and cynics, gotta love them (and their soundtracks). Go see it if you can. Don't expect to fall out of your seat laughing, just expect an evening of drinking and laughing with close friends and the tears that follow in the privacy of your 8th glass of wine crowded with your head against the corner wall with someone you care too much about.

-c.

Music: Mates of State