When it rains

This is probably a lot more somber than my usual posts so those of you who come here for my low brow humor should probably just skip this one. Don't worry though, the low brow stuff will be back in the not so distant future, I promise.

As there is no more reason to not post entries on my blog regarding the recent tragedies in my family, I guess I should just go ahead and get them out of my system.

First, this past Tuesday, my grandmother passed away at the age of 81 with what I can only imagine as the majority of her loved ones surrounding her hospital bed. As bad as this situation was, it was not an unexpected one and I’m just glad that she had the time she did to see everyone. I was fortunate enough to be able to meet her twice during my recent trip back home and though part of mind knew it could be the last time on this earth I could see her, the optimist that always guides my actions refused to let me treat our meetings as such.

When I finally did get to talk to her on the phone for the last time, my mind was poised to try to say everything I needed to say to her in a few short sentences since I knew she couldn’t respond to me. After fighting off the urge to say the trivial “How are you doing?” at the beginning of the conversation, I couldn’t realign my thoughts. My mind started flooding with thoughts and emotions and I was for a brief moment completely silent as I realized that nothing I will ever say after this moment would ever touch my grandmother’s ears. After doing my best to sound stable and saying the few things I needed to say, I hung up and found myself back in my silent company bathroom, with a loud horn playing in my mind. I will miss you, Grandma.

R.I.P. Grandma

A few days before this happened, an unexpected tragedy happened: our family dog, Colt, died. Since he was only about 5 years old, this was really a surprise and when my mother recounted the events, I was sad she had to go through the night-long ordeal without me or my brother there. Colt was a great dog, as anyone who knew him could attest, and it’s a real shame he had to go the way he did. I will miss you too, Colt.

R.I.P. Colt

Now it would be completely inappropriate to follow this sort of entry up with a story about how my Christmas went, wouldn’t it? Well, if I had a happy, merry, whatever Christmas then I’d probably agree with that but since I didn’t, I’ll sum it all up here with as much humbuggery as possible.

I got pretty sick from some sort of flu bug which I have now recovered from on Sunday, or Christmas Eve-eve. The bug lasted just long enough to keep me pretty much incapacitated in my apartment by myself until the day after Christmas. So the only real celebrating I got to do was watch the occasional 30 minutes of Scrubs and hoist my huge bottle of orange juice to my lips before I fell back asleep.

So all in all a pretty good couple of weeks.

When it rains, huh?

Office Party and Random Updates

Well it’s that time of the year again.

In my company, we don’t have what would be considered a Christmas party at the end of the year but we have something called “Nielsen Day” which normally occurs around December 15th. It’s sort of like a Christmas party in the sense our entire company gets together for a string of activities including eating and drinking but it doesn’t carry a Christmas theme. You might be thinking, “Well, why would they celebrate Christmas in Korea?” and to that I say “Contraire mon frere, about 1/3rd of the population of Korea is composed of Christians”. So it is possible, like in America, to find Christmas trees and decorations pretty much everywhere and because of that it is easier to get into the Christmas spirit here than say, Japan. Unlike America, however, you will not find houses that look like they are single-handedly using a trillion watts of electricity per second to power abhorring, mechanical Santa/Reindeer/Jesus and the Techno Colored Dreamcoat scenes that can be seen from space. I think that is a good thing.

In any case, today should be fun if not at least somewhat amusing.

After we finish at about 10pm tonight, I head face first into my weekend. I am starting to get my new year’s resolutions in order by slowly introducing them into my daily life now. For instance, I am now spending 2 hours every Saturday and Sunday studying Japanese and Korean. I plan to have that up to 4 hours every Saturday and Sunday and at least 30 minutes every weekday. I will pass the level 2 proficiency test (one lower than the top) in Korean before the end of 2008. I’ve also been hitting the gym with a bit more fervor lately since I plan on getting to the gym 5-6 times weekly next year. But enough with my new year’s resolutions because they merit their own post in the not-so-distant future.

Now on to a list of random things that have been going on in my life:

Work can be mind-numbingly long sometimes but it is challenging and interesting so I don’t notice it as much. There are also a few changes happening here that I look forward to seeing the results of and so far it’s looking pretty good.

Outside of work, I am now an accomplished, Hard-level Guitar Hero player. I’ll probably never be able to “Through the Fire and Flames” by Dragonforce on Expert level, but honestly that isn’t on my list of goals.

I haven’t been to a karaoke room in about 2 months. I believe that is the longest period in which I haven’t gone in about 6 years. I will probably go tonight though because I’ve been practicing on my Gnarles Barkley “Crazy” in the shower and I’m getting pretty good (I think).

Finally, I’ve painted a face on the now rock-hard orange that has been sitting on my desk for 8 months or so and I now refer to him as “Executive Orange”. I also insist that people who have been at the company for a shorter period than him do the same. Don’t worry though, if it starts talking to me, I’ll get help. Okay, if it starts talking to me AND I LISTEN TO WHAT IT SAYS, I’ll get help. Probably.

As you can see, life is rather copasetic for me at the moment. I hope it’s going just as well for everyone else too.

Home Trip '07

As promised, here is the post from my trip home.

This year I got tickets to go home from Nov. 7th until the 18th. Not really a lot of time considering I would be spending a total of about 2 days of that time on an airplane but since my work schedule was sort of hectic, I figured it was the best I was going to be able to do. So I snatched up the tickets, made the necessary preparations, and flew out on a Wednesday afternoon.

After arriving in Chicago, my Mom met me at the airport and we drove home discussing what exactly I was going to do now that I was home. After arriving home and greeting everyone and almost going into a stroke after seeing how much weight my Stepfather had lost, I settled into my brother's room as it was the only vacant room at the time. Then I decided to call Ralph who I knew had the next day off of work.

Once Ralph arrived it was like old times hadn't skipped a beat. We immediately headed over the the closest bar and proceeded to catch up on the last year. After more than a few drinks, we headed back to my house where we passed out thus ending my first day home.

I spent the next couple of days hanging out in the morning with my Mom and Grandmother and doing random shopping, talking and eating. I decided to knock out the remains of my jet lag before the weekend hit because I knew I was going to have a big night out on the town with my friends so I pretty much just laid around and caught up on sleep.

On Friday I picked up Ralph and drove into the city to meet the rest of the people I would spend the evening with. We met up with Marc and though we had reservations at a Brazilian restaurant for dinner we ended up cancelling because we had arrived to early and just decided to go to Hooter's. After catching up over a few drinks and some food, we met up with Mike, Erin and Danny and headed out to the Apartment (a bar club near Fullerton and Halsted) where we started to get our party on.

Ralph, Me and Marc at Hooter's

The night continued on rather well and after getting thoroughly tipsy and partied out, we snatched taxis back to Mike and Erin's house where the night would end. After waking up and engaging in a bit more tomfoolery, Marc and I went to my house and slept the remaining part of Saturday away as I had an early Thanksgiving dinner in my honor the next day.

Danny, Me, Erin, Michelle, Marc and Mike at the Apartment

Sunday went down without a hitch and thanks to all of the hardwork from my Mom, Grandmother and Stepfather, we had a wonderful feast complete with all of my favorite dishes and family members who I hadn't seen in about a year. After eating half of my weight in turkey and various other dishes, I sat around and caught up with everyone and watched the Bears game which they surprisingly won despite the fact that I was in Chicago.

Soon after everyone left, Ralph, Marc and myself carried ourselves to the local watering hole and got down on some darts and pool while enjoying our libations. What happened after that will go down into the halls of pure, unadultered idiocy and I will refrain from describing it here due to the questionable legality of it but I will say that its something the three of us will not soon forget. "GAHHHH!!!"

This was the spread at my early Thanksgiving dinner. *drool*

Marc, Me and Ralph before we got STUPID

After making poor Marc take the train to go to work after 2 hours of sleep, I recovered for the rest of the day. The following days saw me meeting up random friends, family members and old coworkers in my feeble attempt to meet any and all people who actually still remember me. Before I knew it, it was the weekend again and I was left with only 2 days before I had to get back on the plane bound for Seoul.

On Friday night, I met up with Chris to hang out for a while and bullshit about what has been going on with each other. After catching up a bit and meeting up with Marc, we went out to meet Ralph and other Mark at Buffalo Wild Wings to hang out for awhile more. The night ended at Ralph's house with copious amounts of alcohol consumed while playing Guitar Hero and making loud asses of ourselves much to the discontent of Ralph's poor mother. Mark was also pretty pissed after the discovery of all the marker tattoos that blanketed his face and body when he decided to unwisely pass out. All and all, it was a good evening.

Mark, Ralph, Me and Brandon at Buffalo Wild Wings

Mark's sentiment is understandable after you look at the artwork we endowed his face with

The next morning when Ralph had to rush out to work, I had to say my goodbyes to everyone because I would be leaving early the next morning to jump on the plane. It kind of sucked that the vacation was ending so quickly but I'm sure we have all grown accustomed to it as this would be my 4th time returning for a brief period before leaving again. At least I got to spend a lot of time with my homies. I'm sure they would gladly give up the sleep they missed again for the chance to see me. Ha.

My last day at home allowed me to spend some quality time with the family and my Mom hooked up my favorite dinners all in one day so I made sure that I had them before I left. I got to hang out and talk with everyone on a one-on-one basis and it all reminded me that it would be another year before I could see them again. I also got to finish a bottle of wine with my Mom as we discussed the near future plans for ourselves. Overall, my last night there was probably one of my best.

In the morning before I left, my Father came out to see me one last time before I left and we got to sit and have some coffee before I had to get on my way. My Mom, Stepdad and Grandmother were all nice enough to see me off at the airport, which they have done every year I've been back home to visit. Eventually I'm going to have to stop making them have to watch my back disappear slowly in the distance as I head back to my foreign residence. Not too much longer now guys, I promise.

Anyways, this has been my long and drawn out description of my trip home. Overall, it was a short, yet sweet, trip home this year. I can't believe it will be another full year before I get to see everyone again but if history is an indicator, I will be writing another "I'm going home soon" entry into this blog before I know it. Here's to hoping.

My sister and father at my early Thanksgiving dinner

Colt, my brother's dog

Me and Marc at the Apartment

Me and Chris in his basement

Me and Ralph at the Apartment

Ralph eyes his breakfast while Marc looks on with clear disgust

Me and my dad outside of my house

Ralph somehow made this impossible shot into the dartboard keyhole

Me and Uncle Jerry

Me and Chuckaluffagus

Picture from the expressway heading into Chicago

The wall in Chris's basement that outlines all of my trips abroad in random messages from over the past few years