Killing Time.

Chilling in an airport hotel for a night, waiting for my flight out tomorrow at 3pm. I'm trying to pull an all-nighter so I don't waste time being jetlagged while I'm at home. I'm also naked. Seriously, not a thread on me. It's been a long time since I've been able to walk around naked or even semi-naked freely, so I'm reveling in this opportunity.

The TV in this room gets the AFN, which stands for the Allied Forces Network. Apparently this channel is broadcast around the world and is specifically for those serving in the military. There are updates about weather conditions in Iraq, PSA's encouraging cultural sensitivity, and frequent messages from George W. hisself wishing happy holidays and thanking all those who are making the sacrifice of being away from their families. Instead of commercials advertising products, there are safety reminders about using seat belts, how to minimize danger when using foreign taxis, and (my personal favorite) a constant barrage of "respecting the chain of command." The chain of command exists to help you, folks, not the other way around. If you see a problem, report it to your superior officer immediately.

So far on the AFN, there has been Family Guy, Without A Trace, and Andromeda (Cheesy sci-fi show by the guy who created Star Trek and starring that dude from Hercules: The Legendary Journeys). I'm currently watching a Bollywood movie dubbed in Korean starring Sayidh from Lost! I knew about this secret life of his before he was on the island, but even more surprising was seeing him simultaneously on a DIFFERENT channel in some movie about Moses. This guy is freaking everywhere!

I need to go find something to eat, which means I have to put on clothes. This upsets me greatly.

Acceptability Differential.

(Disclaimer: Koreans have good qualities too! They're just not as fun to write about.)

Things I've seen grown Korean men do in the last three days:

1) Pick their nose and eat it, repeatedly, in public.
2) Smoke a cigarette in a nursing home, drop the butt on the carpeted floor, and step on it.
3) As students are mopping the school office, huck a loogey casually on the floor.

Lastly, I discovered literally minutes ago that my host Grandfather doesn't actually shower... he wipes himself down with a wet towel. It was always a mystery to me that I never saw him showering. Mystery solved.

A Relatively Estrogen-Free Weekend.

I say relatively because Sarah had to show up and douse our raging inferno of testosterone. I mean it in an endearing way when I call her a snitch-bitch ho.

So, yes, I have a penchant for the hyperbolic, histrionic, and homoerotic, but I do not exagerrate much when I say that last weekend was probaby the least stressful I've had in many months, probably since orientation. As you diligent readers would know, I spent it in Seoul celebrating Ryan Park's acceptance to Harvard Law. Along for the ride was the ever-charming Jonah Popp and aforesaid estrogen recepticle made some notable guest appearances.

That's right... 4 people... 4 god damn people. No itinerary, no pressure, no dietary preferences. Considering last time I went to Seoul I somehow by default became the one coordinating 40 people in no less than 5 different groups all concentrating on a single backalley bar, the raw freedom from needing to care about anything except conversation and immediate volume of alcohol in my mouth was intoxicating, literally and... well, literally.

And with that said, we didn't do all that much. Except for Friday night, of course, when we went from Black Label in the room to 1.5 liter beers at a bar called Oktoberfest to quik-stop kimbap to passing out dozens of used scratch tickets we found on the street to random koreans to punching a cab's window and having the driver get out and harass me (sorry bro, don't speak Korean, see ya) to the hookah bar where we seriously creeped out the very cute waitress we remembered from last time to doing a three-man synchronized Irish step dance down the street and seriously, seriously fucking up my ankle to the club where we rocked out until 5am, not helping my ankle at all, to street food where we convinced some chump we all went to Harvard (read: we lied to bring ourselves up to Ryan's level) and he started stroking my head out of deference to my awesome, awesome brainpower.

That was pretty much the gist of the night. That and when we played Marco Polo with a blind prostitute working at a massage parlor on the way home. How did she even know that game? I had no idea Marco Polo's fame was so globally recognized.

My ankle hurts like a motherfucker.

Saving The World, One Page At A Time.

And lo, on the 4th day of the 12th month of the two-thousand and sixth year of our Lord, Jon of the Hung clan did learn how to make double sided copies.

And all the trees rejoiced.