Life's Like a Box of Chocolates

I'm swimming in chocolate at the moment. I think it's going to be a good weekend. By "good" of course I mean that I may go into a diabetic coma. :-)

Last night Stafford came over and brought me some swag from John: two cakes of homemade Central American chocolate to be used to make real hot chocolate. Like Water for Chocolate hot chocolate. Mmmmmmm..........

Homemade Chocolate Cakes

As if that weren't enough, tonight, I got home from work and had a birthday package from Aaron waiting for me. A book, a stack of seed packets, a variety of engineering swag, and American junk food! Nice-uh!

Russian Nesting Packages

American Junk Food

Potential Plants

Engineering Swag

Kitty Approved

I can't have plants, because my cat will eat them, but I'm willing to bet that between Joe, Stafford, and Jackie, I can find a loving home for the seeds. Jackie's having a sleepover in a few weeks, so some seeds might be a nice hostess gift. Probably not as nice as liquor, but whatever.


***

Tomorrow I have a ConComm meeting for the KOTESOL international conference. Of course, I am not at all prepared and am pretty much ready to go to bed. Decisions, decisions. Sigh. Obviously, blogging was FAR more important than getting my shit together. Procrastinator to the end... Maybe a Hostess pie will give me some sugar power...

A Little Light Reading

My students had to read 120 pages for homework tonight. A sample from the prologue:

I could introduce myself properly, but it isn't really necessary. You know me well enough and soon enough, depending on a diverse range of variables. It suffices to say that at some point in time, I will be standing over you, as genially as possible. Your soul will be in my arms. A color will be perched on my shoulder. I will carry you gently away.

At that moment, you will be lying there (I rarely find people standing up). You will be caked in your own body. There might be a discovery; a scream will dribble down in the air. The only sound I'll hear after that will be my own breathing, and the sound of the smell, of my footsteps.

I think some of the prose may be lost in translation. Not to mention that Death is the narrator. Sigh. In the 120 pages, no less than half a dozen German curses are translated into English with helpful usage tips. Seriously. What I would give for books chosen by someone who actually reads. Can't wait for tomorrow's discussion. It should be lively and full of interesting insights. That or blank stares all around. One of the two.

TGIF

So, at 4:30, my director tells me my final class has been cancelled. I packed my stuff as quickly as I could, and got out of there. :-)

On my way home, I stopped at the bookstore and got some awesome new stickers ("Don't be a chicken shit." "Please...someday a stalker." etc. etc.) and random fobby stationery to send to various people. Thus continuing my good mood. I then made the mistake of stopping in at the super in my building.

It's owned by a couple who are there 13 days out of 14, each taking half the day. I've lived here for five years. They know me. They know me well enough to have conversations with me, such as Korean conversations with me are.

Today, Super Woman (as I think of her) made a big point of letting me know I have a muffin top. She said it (a couple of times), then grabbed her own to make sure I understood. Thanks. I've been here ten years and still don't know exactly what response people are expecting when they give me some "news" like that. "What?! I have a muffin top?! How could this be?! I better run put on some fat burning sweat cream and head to the sauna! I'll only eat green tea-battered chicken fried in olive oil for the next week. It's well-being!" Grrr... Bite me, Super Woman.

Best Birthday Present Update

Karl arrived in Korea earlier this week, but my boss doesn't recognize that as a reason to miss work, so I just got to see him last night. He, Stafford, and I met at his hotel, where he had booked a meeting room, and we taped a special In the Bag about the changes that he's noticed in Korea in the 15 months (!) since he moved back to Canada. This being Korea, we recorded for over an hour.

He also brought me the much-anticipated T-shirt!!! Stafford took all the photos in this post, because, as usual, I forgot my camera. It is even better than I had thought it would be. :-) The only thing I would do to make it the most perfect shirt ever made would be to add some glitter or rhinestones on the Junior Miss Thug Life lettering. I honestly don't think I'll wear it out of the house, since the image of the naked woman on all fours is pretty big, but I'll love wearing it in the privacy of my home. :-)

After we finished recording, Joe showed up, so we had some dinner (it was about 10 at that point) and all caught up. Joe and I missed the buses/subways out of town, so we had a slumber party at Stafford's house. I can vouch for the fact that he has the least comfortable couch for sleeping in the world-- I lasted four hours and it took my knees an hour or so to regain full feeling. Joe must have had an equally comfy spot on the floor, because he also lasted just four hours before he got up and went home. Looking at the photo, if I'd realized how thin the shirt was, I may not have worn it for pajamas at the slumber party... or at least would have kept my bra on. Well, at least I wasn't wearing a transparent shirt at church. Again.

Hopefully, Karl won't be too busy to get together one more time before he heads out...
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Yesterday, I made my annual trip to immigration. Usually, it's a blood-pressure raising event that helps me understand people opening fire in a government building. Yesterday, they redeemed themselves.

Okay, so I went on the last day possible, because my school kept forgetting to gather the documents and confirm whether I needed a new criminal record check and/ or drug test (I did not). So, here I am, Friday before SAT classes start and I'll have no time to go.

I needed three documents with my ending date and official school stamp. I did not check these docs before I packed them up to go. One was dated 20 June 2008, one 31 June 2010, and one had the correct day: 31 Dec 2009. The guy looks at the docs, and informs me politely that 2008 has passed and FYI there are only thirty days in June. He didn't even notice the third one, so I just went along with 30 June as the ending date. Someone in the back noticed it, though, so he changed it to the correct day. :-)

Oh, my contract, the one document with the correct date, consists of the school letterhead, the start and end dates, my name and the director's name. The end. I've worked there so long, that's all we do. He was pretty unimpressed, but I just told him that I've been there a long time, so we don't do detailed contracts and they pulled an old document out of my file, so it was outdated, and that was good enough for him. Try that at a US Immigration office...