Currie Rice

I had family here for about two weeks about a month ago, and it allowed me to observe humanity in the wild (or in captivity if you want to think of it that way).

See, I have two (locking) doors between the outside and my apartment. In the middle is kind of like no-man's land. The innermost door was broken a little bit before they came and I did not get around to fixing it given I still have the outside (and more secure door of the two) preventing access. I do not get around to a lot of things, but that story is for another day.

Also, I did not tell them because as comes with parents visiting a certain amount (additional) nagging would no doubt occur.

Once unlocking the outside door, you can push the inside one whether it is locked or not. The family members, however, did not pick up on this fact for the entire two weeks in which they resided in my house. They would turn the handle and noticing it was locked would either knock or use the key regardless of it's pointlessness. They are simply (still) in the dark.

The door's standard operation involves 2 to 3 steps.

(1) Insert key and unlock (if necessary)
(2) Turn knob and
(3) Push (probably simultaneously with (2))

Now, when (2) is not possible, it is assumed (3) is also not possible, thus (1) is initiated whether or not (as in the case of my broken latch) it is necessary.

Conclusion: Human Science tells us that in the process of operating a door a brain can never initiate the action of pushing said door should its knob not turn (if it is a certain type of door usually requiring knobs) regardless of a lack of physical limitations preventing such an action from resulting in an open door.

Which leads me to propose my first hypothesis:

If a certain order of processes in an operation are in the domain of Common Knowledge then Human Science dictates that any contradicting order is impossible regardless of actual fact in the domain of Physics and/or Reality.

This year's classes have an incredibly large amount of required textbooks. I've never had to buy this many textbooks in my university history. For example, my Zen Buddhism class requires 5 textbooks (of which I've purchase one). Given, that is a one year class, but my other East Asian Studies class, Aesthetics and Politics in Korea is a half year and requires four books in addition to a course reader. It's kind of rediculous, and I am feeling it after coming off of my vacation to Korea and Japan. Of course, this means I'll be spending all of my time reading. Though, clearly I am not doing that now.

I don't have much actual class time this year so it's all right I suppose, and of course I'll survive with lots of ham to support me.

Onto a more important topic.

I found another 15 or so coffee filters just now. As a result the coffee is brewing. I didn't think I had any left. I made a joke the other day contending that the situation was similar not having any condoms. True? It's close.

Hah, which makes me reflect on my many posts comparing coffee to women, which makes me think I had/ve kind of a problem with coffee addiction. If you scan through all the topics related to coffee you might get confused and think I've been having affairs with women, until you realise I'm just talking about Lattes of various types. I gotta stop that really.

That said however, yesterday I discovered the Pumpkin Spice Latte has returned. But, whether my previous claim is true or not is something for you kids to decide.

Zen in the Art of Archery

By the way, my pot of Killing Horse "Hoodoo Jo" has just finished. I recommend this because it is delicious and Canadian and resent that they sell it in the "Organics" section at Loblaws (where the hippies are).

Oh, now I am going to go read "Zen in the Art of Archery" by Euegene Herrigel, which must be finished by next Friday's Zen class.  I have some things to say about that class by the way -- in the future. This is a novel, but admittedly, it is not even 80 pag

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Not sure if you kids noticed this or not, but give a listen. I was recommended MC Sniper (MC 스나이퍼), and have come to like much of his stuff, particularly this song, "Seoul Station" from "Be in Deep Grief" which contains some other nice stuff.

Seoul Station

MC 스나이퍼

Over on the blog for the Double-Tounged Dictionary I ran across a post from a travelling blog discussing the many difficulties of English spelling as it relates to this guy's travels and the military system (of Alpha, Bravo, Charlie, ...). He created a new list to replace the military one (which is used for ease of understanding). The main feature of this list is that it is confusing, vague, and often misleading -- which characterises English orthography.

Read it like, "A is for Are, B is for Beady" for the best effect.

Ripped off:

A) Are
B) Beady
C) Cue
D) Django (helpful only to jazz guitar aficionados).
E) Eye
F) Fiji
G) Gneiss
H) Honorable
I) Ian
J) Jeans
K) Knees
L) Llama (you’d use the authentic Spanish “y” pronunciation, of course)
M) Mnemonic
N) Niece
O) Oedipus
P) Pneumonia
Q) Quay
R) I don’t have a good example of a confusing “R.” Maybe you could roll it, as in “Rrroberrrt Burrrns.”
S) Sea
T) Teepee
U) Urn
V) Apparently a V is always a V, although my dictionary says that Vaduz, the capital of Liechtenstein, is pronounced “fah-DOOTS.” And any excuse to say “fah-DOOTS” can’t be a bad thing.
W) Why
X) Xerxes
Y) You
Z) Ziti

Surprisingly, I was able to get into every class but one I wished to enrol in. But that one was somehow full a few days before I could even enrol, so I had planned for having that one lacking anyhow. I remember in my first year it took a good hour to register for classes because of slow servers and such, but for the past couple of years, the process has been smooth. In fact, I managed to get 9 classes regstered in just about two (2) minutes. Surprise! Efficient.

I still couldn't fit in the basic Korean history classes I wanted into my schedule, but I got a couple other Dae Han Min Guk related classes in there. I am done with all but two half year courses in the way of tedious required stuff. I couldn't fit them in in previous years so, I am left with taking Phonetics and Sound Patterns this year.

Now that I have my 2007 - 2009 school year planned, it's time to think about the summer of 2008. I know I must leave the country and since meeting "noona" going to Korea has been at the top of the list of things to do. At first I thought I might go by way of a UofT exchange program for a month-ish as a classmate is doing now. But, after exploring my options further, I think I may go about it independently. I really don't need any credits to graduate anyway, so the best thing for me to do is go with the goal of studying Korean at one of the large institutions.

People seem to talk a lot about Yonsei (연세대학교) -- specifically the Korean Language Institute (한극어학당 ). It has many benefiits I think. The schedule for their summer term is June 26 to September 6th. That's about two months. The special "Summer Program" is only about a month, and too short for me, I think. The problem with the September 6th end date is that I will have to hurry back home to finish up my schooling here at UofT.,

Enter, Seoul National University (서울대학교) and their Language Education Institute (언어교육원). They are actually a bit cheaper (not really enough to make a difference), but their schedule suits my plans a bit better I think. Their summer term is June 4th to August 10th -- significantly earlier than Yonsei. That means I can do my traveling after I have been studying for two months, which seems more logical than traveling then studying. I will hopefully have learned a bit more to help me out by the end, so I can have the rest of August to discover Dae Han Min Guk.

Now, I have to work out where I will stay after they kick me out of the school dorms should I go that route in the first place. Suggestions welcome.

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In 5 words or less, who are you? 
Submitted by dejablu503.

Slightly intriguing, not too interesting.

Man, I was counting syllables for a while, then I slapped myself for being stupid. haha