You know what that means!  TV!  What are you watching these days?

Modern Family – pretty funny, I generally don’t find sit-coms funny but this made me laugh out loud

Flash forward – it’s ok, not that great

Fringe – good

Defying Gravity – kinda interesting but starting to drag on already

30 Rock – funny

Life – BBC productions

V - but haven’t got around to watching it yet

Any suggestions?

I recently watched the BBC/Disney movie entitled “Earth” .  First off, great movie.  My parents were always keen on us learning about nature and wildlife and so I have seen literally hundreds of hours of nature programs throughout my life – as I still like to watch them now.

The second thing I remembered while watching it was how much control Korea has over it’s physical environment.  The woods here aren’t …. woody… not like a Canadian knows woody to be.  Although I am sure that it could happen, it’s hard to imagine people becoming lost in “the forest” here when there are so many, heavily frequented hiking trails (with soju and beer tents as a half way rewards).  Not to mention the lack of wildlife – but I fully admit that I haven’t gone to areas looking for wildlife….

Actually, now that I think about it, I suppose it’s because my husband isn’t really “into nature” as most people have such little contact with it here.  Sure, they enjoy the outdoors to go snowboarding, hiking, mountain biking but do you see the pattern of controlled areas where they use the land for their needs?  Coming from such a large country as Canada we have the ability to do all that but also to preserve nature and appreciate the simple aspect of baby birds in a nest chirping.  Why that example you ask?  Well, we were in COEX one afternoon taking the escalator and I heard birds chirping and thought “What a strange soothing sound to be playing in such a loud fabricated environment but soothing none the less.”  What did hubby say?  ”What the hell is that annoying sound?”

Right, not a nature lover …. he certainly doesn’t stand in my way for me to be able to enjoy it but I know that he gets a bit bored by it all.  I’m thinking that for our honeymoon, which I decided will be in Malaysia in case I didn’t mention it already (although ironically enough in a completely controlled environment … ha!), that I want to go see some nature… smell some wet soil, ooo and ahh at some wildlife, slap a few bugs, get annoyed at the humidity and then get the hell out of there ….

OK, so I suppose all of this is a moot point since I’ve basically just stated that I’m an “indoor girl” that appreciates nature for a vacation and then desperately needs to be back in the city for culture, food, wine etc…

This makes me feel so much better about our terrible flights with them last winter!

From the BBC:

A musician who blames United Airlines for breaking his prize guitar has taken revenge by writing a song that has become a YouTube hit.

Dave Carroll composed United Breaks Guitars after his Taylor acoustic was damaged at Chicago’s O’Hare airport.

It has now had 3.5 million hits in 10 days, and has been a PR disaster for the airline, which has seen its share price plunge by 10%, wiping $180m off the company’s value.

But United Airlines say they would like to the video use for training purposes to ensure all customers receive better service from the company in future.

One thing that I don’t understand about the video is, why are they dressed up like “tourist” Mexicans? (as I have a hard time believing that Mexicans actually wear sombreros and assume it’s a touristy thing … could be wrong, let me know if I am).

We were approved for a mortgage loan here after we had found a place that we liked.  It was, yes was, only a few blocks from where we currently live, bright, newish looking hardwood floors, new wall paper, spacious – compared to where we are now… all around good for us.  BUT, the problem I had was with the front door to the place.  It was 2 doors that were those sliding bedroomish, wood and frosted glass panel door with a lock on the bottom right hand corner.  Then inside there was this weird ass sliding metal gate thing that you could also lock.  I wanted it changed as I didn’t feel comfortable and the house owner refused.  Fine.  Not living there then.

We then asked the rental agency if anything else came up if they could let us know.  They called today to say that there was another place, close, large, but that it needed to be renovated.  The owner wanted us to wait until it was renovated to see it.  Of course we pushed to see it right away so that if we liked it we’d be able to make some suggestions for the renovations.

We just got back.  There’s no way in hell I’d live there.

Have you ever seen Old Boy?  You know the fight scene?  Well, take out the gangsters, and some of the water, add in a few sharp angles and rusting water pipes in the hallways, black mold dripping from the ceiling (ok, I’m getting dramatic), and there you have the hallway to this apartment building.

There was potential for the apartment itself – but maybe that’s because anything they did with it would be an upgrade.  Picture floors, walls and ceilings all covered in that dark wood paneling that was popular in the 80’s back home.  Through in some random walls to make for a 3rd bedroom.  Add a huge window pane in the master bedroom looking out into the living room (no windows in the bedroom otherwise).  The list goes on.

North Korea had launched a commercial for their beer, you can watch it here.

In one of the comments below it, the person mentions that the locals are given vouchers and then queue up for it in the afternoon – but, is that just a show for tourists?  If people are starving, are they satiated by a beer?  Or is it a good enough distraction, and further reinforcement (to the North Koreans) of how advanced their dear leader has become?

Oh shit, am I breaking some sort of morals by wanting to drink this?

You know, it’s like, (assuming you grew up with TV in NA) all those save the children ads we grew up with, where you saw Sally Struthers walking around mostly Africa with children — that imprint, IMO of course, seems to have lasted on many people I know as you hear them talk about traveling to various countries in Southeast Asia (home to some of the highest poverty levels in the world now) and when surrounded by children they feel the urge to give them some money (not that Ms Struthers did that, nor advocated it, I think it’s more that you just feel like you should do something to help and it becomes an immediate reaction).  Then, said people are told “By giving money to the local children you are making it profitable for them to beg on the street and therefore, not go to school.  Should you want to help, you’d be better to donate that money to a local charitable organization.”

Ok so beer and children really ought not to have anything to do with one another… but you know, sometimes, trying to see that connection, about is it bad for me to want to drink a NK beer, takes a while when you first wake up in the morning … the moral connection I mean… more coffee.

Roboseyo pointed this out and you should be warned that the link leads to some very disturbing images and it is difficult to listen to the phone conversation but something that needs to be heard and passed on.

Here’s another heartbreaking video to watch about children that have escaped North Korea, sometimes with one parent, sometimes with neither.  

HT to marmot’s hole.