know your limits

So I caught my first pompano today while surf fishing, but because I didn't know the size limits, I threw it back, not wanting to take an undersized fish (and risk getting fined by the local Wildlife Commision).  Now that I check the regulations, I realize that my fish was indeed of legal size, and could have graced my dinner plate tonight.  Dammit. As mentioned, it was my first pompano, so it would have been nice to eat it.  They're supposed to be good eating too, so that kinda sucks.  Here's what they look like...

Just goes to show, you should know your limits..

Korean movies

So I just saw Chingoo, (which actually came out years ago, but whatever) it was really good.  I haven't updated in a while, but since I have many school assignments due and tests to study for, this seemed like a perfect way to procrastinate even further.  Other popular ways (for me) to procrastinate: watch some Korean tv shows, like Family Outing 

or 1N2D

or read other people's blogs: Seoul Patch, Amanda Takes Off, Geek in Korea, FoodWishes

or otherwise think of ways to geek out and become even more antisocial

check please

critical assignments, classroom observation, excel spreadsheets, planning to drink this thursday, fishing poorly lately, not catching much, not going out, threw a par +6 on a 9 hole disc golf course yesterday, 4' black snake scared the shit out of me on an awry throw on the 7th hole, that was exciting, journal article reviews, skyping with friends, information security, check this shit out

speaking of that, Slumdog Millionaire was a really good movie, as was Taken and Religulous and Gran Turismo. Good stuff. Enjoyable.

Historicality

Wow. I fell asleep I must admit, eye-weary from result tracking, switching between browser tabs, comparing coverages. I woke up at 2am and I see that I slept through a historical moment (though I guess one may argue that every moment bears a small history to be made..), and that something that many might have thought impossible has happened. Craziness. I watched his victory speech, he seems a good orator, and I have a feeling that he pronounces the word "nuclear" correctly, so that's good. I dunno. Feels pretty good.

Saw this on ZeFrank's blog earlier today, found it to be the funny...

Skunk'd

So lately this blog, ostensibly about Korea, is a blog about fishing. Not the case today, well actually it is, that is about fishing, but not catching. (If you fish, you know the old joke I reference there, and also, sorry if you've endured an over-reiteration of said joke). I fished from about 9am to 3pm today with absolutely no success. Makes me tempted to go out again tonight but I've been experiencing strange bouts of vertigo today, two memorable bouts occurring while driving to my fishing spot: not fun! Yeah vertigo is somewhat distressing, as I don't know what's causing it, nor do I have health insurance to find out (gotta love living in a so-called "superpower 1st-world nation" that doesn't have national health care.) I suspect, or rather hope, that my vertigo is along the lines of BPPV (benign paroxysmal positional vertigo) which is a disorder of little calcium stones in one's inner ear shifting about and sending false signals to one's brain, much like the pretty girl in the pub waving and smiling at some douchbag sitting behind you; and that it's *not* oh I dunno, inoperable brain tumors or low-level mercury poisoning (maybe it's a good thing that I didn't catch any fish today...)

Oh, on an aside, according to the handy little hit tracking map thing on the sidebar over there ---------->>>>> I've apparently had traffic from Australia, Columbia, Great Britain, Canada, Korea, and several places in the US! Surprising to me this is, as I don't really know anyone from Columbia or England, not to say I wouldn't want to meet anyone from these places, but you know what I mean. I guess what I mean to say is Welcome! Thanks for visiting, or mayhaps, thanks for accidentally clicking over to my blog... If you return and read this, feel free to comment about how you found my blog, or not, no pressure, but I'm curious is all...

recent activities

Wow, it's almost October... It's hard to mark the passage of time when the weather here stays consistently hot basically all year. All of this 80-90 degree weather makes me yearn for autumn, chill breezes, blowing leaves and warm apple cider.

Well lately I've been fishing some different spots, and I've had some new experiences with different species....

This isn't a pic of the fish I caught (mine was smaller than this) but I recently caught a longnose gar in brackish water:

and I've also caught my first barracuda:
So that's been good, it's nice to catch anything really, and when it's a new-to-me species, all the better.

I've also been able to repair some older reels that we have lying around, which is very satisfying as it would have cost over $40 to get them fixed or to replace them, and more importantly I have the knowledge now to do it myself, with under $20 invested in replacement parts.

Turtle: Origins

Okay, why did I get into blogs and blogging? It's kind of a disturbing story actually. When I first started researching teaching abroad, the first blog I came across about this subject matter was the Korea Life Blog by this guy named Shawn. I started reading it, and liked his writing style and food picture-heavy posts, so I went ahead and read his archives spanning back to prior his arrival in Korea. For close to 7 hours I was sitting in front of the comp, reading his blog from inception. As I got closer to current, I saw he was having issues with his girlfriend, and that he eventually left his position in Korea to move to China, where he started the China Life Blog. At this point, a week or so had passed from when I originally found Shawn's blog, and I was reading some comments on the Korea Life Blog, that hinted that Shawn's readers were upset and stating condolences and comments of that nature. I come to find out that a week or so after I had found KLB, and after reading a year's worth of posts, and basically getting to know and like this random english teacher in Korea/China, that Shawn, in a fit of depression, jumped off of his apartment building roof in China and killed himself.

I guess that's definitely kind of disturbing that this sparked my interest in blogs, because at that point, I realized the connection one can make with a generally anonymous and faceless audience, and sought out more blogs to read. Because as unfortunate any death is, a person I've never met before's death on the other side of the planet generally would have little to no effect on me, I mean people are dying every second, and I have no reaction to that knowledge, but through this medium, connections are forged and there is something to that I guess.

Wow, this post is kind of a drag, huh? Let's see.... in honor of Shawn, who was kind to stray cats in korea, is a picture to lighten the mood...