So Few Hours in the Blogging Day

Not too surprising, but a body of 'intelligent' economists has decided that Vancouver is the best place to live. If the Economist thinks so, it must be true. Screw going back to Edmonton, man!

I went to Hwaseong (a giant castle near Suwon) on Sunday. I went by myself, the only weiguk in a teeming, frothing mass of Korean humanity. It was more interesting than the folk village, actually, and I took as many pictures as I could before my batteries crapped out. I definitely need to replace the recharageables, and I'm now convinced they weren't new when I got them with the camera. I figured out how to order 'kun mandu' (fried dumplings) and even where to stand in line to get my tickets and then get the food. I really wish the camera had had enough juice to get the picture of the noodle chefs making noodles. They gots a way with dough, those noodle chefs.







I started recording all my taped 'deep thoughts' to mp3 and man, I have decided that the tape recorder will become my new all-important creative tool, because, the guy on the other end of that tape is way cooler, intelligent, and funny than I ever could be. I am also going to try to and finagle a creative partnership with Mam'zelle Burnt Toast cuz that saucy bitch is hilarious. These flowers are for her.




Something my sister said totally made my day. I don't know if I should share it with you, dear reader, but here it is, just in case it helps you out.

2) I sit here in TO (a city I have gone to great
trouble and expense to re-locate to so that I could do
a PhD) reading your blog. I realize that I have spent
a great deal of my life in school and could not ever,
ever, ever achieve the kind of creativity, wit, and
philosophical insight that you are capable of. This is
not patronizing or an appeal for compliments. It only
confirms a thesis you first presented to me years ago:
school does not make you smart. The smart people are
those who can learn on their own. That's you. Some do
this through the system and some don't. This relates
to point #3

3) In one of your blogs you made a comment about
ignoring your accomplishments and focusing on your
failures. When I read this I couldn't have agreed
more, but have never put that together before. I also
started to realize that a lot of this comes from how
we were raised. You were more daring, experimental,
anti-authority so there was more to criticize. And the
accomplishments were always framed in opposition to
the "failures". You know what I mean? Seeing this
(having the advantage of being younger) I totally
structured my life around being obedient, a
peace-maker, etc. Do you see how this relates to point
#3? Okay, enough Oprah for now.



She has to say nice things about me, being fambly and all, but she is perfect and so I have to believe that is just the plain facts. Just a plain sweet song keeps Georgia on my mind!

All in all, I feel pretty good. I feel recharged, ready to face winter, and with a skeleton of a plan starting to form for when I return in Jan. I feel like it would be OK to be an artiste again, wiser, hopefully, thinking about that broken bottle of ink, and thinking about how communication is more important than craft. I feel like if, FFF were to tell me to completely re-draw what we had sketched out for this new project, it would be OK with me and I would do my utmost to make it something good. I do wish they trusted me more to make design decisions though. I also wish I knew what 'style' they wanted from me. After all, clipart is less expensive than I am. It would surely help if I was closer to a phone. Or just closer.

I also feel ready to write, but I'm going to start with the small goal of getting on McSweeneys' first. It's probably a hobble, but I need to warm up.



I like being on this high - haven't felt this way very many times in Korea, but now how to get to sleep? A classic conundrum.