A Matter of Pride

Consumer reports put out their list of the top ten cars for 2008. Of the top ten cars 7 were Japanese cars, 1 was American, and 2 were Korean!The Hyundai (which by the way is pronounced hyun-day, not hun-die) cars to win the honor are the Elantra and the Santa Fe. It is a big step for Korean automakers. It wasn't too long ago that they weren't exactly known for their build quality in the US.

NIMH?

So... he looks WAY bigger than P2 in this picture, but he is really only about half the size.

So now we have a new rat-friend. I'm not as generous as Roni, so I'll skip straight to the last step and let you vote for my favorite names.

- NIMH - because the book is awesome, and so is the movie. As an added bonus, "nim" in Korean means "beloved one"
- Nicodemus - because he is one cool rat in the book "Mrs. Frisby and the Rats of NIMH"
- Boris - I dunno... I think his fur color is like those Russian hats (not so much in the picture, but in real life)

Maybe Just a Little Bit Judgmental

I know that it is a little judgmental of me to think this way... but I can't help it. Whenever I see a teenage girl carrying around an iPhone, I hear in my head, "spoiled brat, spoiled brat, spoiled brat, spoiled brat." I am OK with adults having them, even if they are mostly a status symbol. But there is something wrong with a teenager having a toy that at a minimum costs $1800 (if you factor in the two year contract).

Forget London Bridge, the South Gate is Burning!!

Korea's number one national treasure was burnt down on Feb 10th. How do I know that it is the number one national treasure? Because Korea numbers each of the national treasures by rank, and the South Gate of Seoul was number one! This would be akin to somebody going and blowing up the Statue of Liberty in America. The structure was over 600 years old, and marked one of the historic entrances into Seoul. The government estimates that it will take three years, and over 20 million dollars to rebuild the gate. I've never been there, but I have been to the East Gate of Seoul. Now I wish I had listened to my friends and gone to the South Gate...

Happy New Year!

No, I'm not a month late for the New Year. Today is the lunar new year! (I think more Americans know it as Chinese New Year) It is once again the year of the rat. I was born in the year of the rat, so I have always had a special affinity for this year. This isn't just any rat year though, this is the year of the Earth Rat, so I'm sure there are some sort of special connotations that come along with that.

And the Winner is...?

In honor of "Super Tuesday," one of my professors held a sort of "what if.." election. He paired candidates form each party, and then asked the class who would we vote for. The results were interesting.

First in the lineup was Obama against McCain. He asked the class who would vote for Obama, and almost the entire class raised their hands. McCain, received absolutely no votes.

Next up was Hillary against Romney. He first asked who would vote for Hillary, and nobody raised their hands. When he asked about Romney, everybody's hands shot into the air (not really surprising right? Of course the Mormons vote for the Mormon.)

He then pitted the two favorites against each other, Romney and Obama. This time the class was split about 50/50.

The final match up was Hillary and McCain. He first asked who would vote for Hillary, and one person raised their hand. However, McCain again received no votes. When asked why they had chosen to not vote, most people said they did not want to be part of a decision that put either of the two in office.

A Spoiled Consumer

I was planning on my this blog entry being about the follow up email from Club Live, but (not surprisingly) that email has not yet come. So, I have decided to write about something else. I real feel that as a consumer of the entertainment industry, I have been largely spoiled.

I'm not saying that everybody is spoiled, I just think that I have been. An example of this is the Harry Potter series. Unlike everybody else in the world, I did not have to wait years between each of the books to find out what happened next to the characters. I was able to read all of the books within a fairly short period of time, and The Roni feels that because of this I have missed out on theorizing on what stuff means, that I have also missed out on part of the experience. I did not have to guess what the title of the next book meant, or guess when Ron and Hermione would get over themselves and just admit that they liked each other.

Recently, I have again been spoiled. We don't have a TV, but that doesn't mean that we cannot watch TV shows. Broadcasting companies such as ABC, Fox, CBS and the like have been putting full episodes of shows on their websites. I had been watching shows online on the nights that Roni was off tutoring, or going to evening classes. I mostly watched newer shows, like Pushing Daisies, but such a good thing was not to last. The writers strike prematurely killed many new shows. Because new shows had so few episodes written for them before they aired, it was only a matter of time until new shows ran out of new episodes to play. So I began to look for other shows to fill the time.

I remembered some people in my major talking about how much they liked to watch LOST. They kept talking about the "Korean element" of the show. So I figured that I might as well watch LOST. ABC put three previous full seasons up for viewing, and that meant that it could keep me busy for a long time. When I had heard of the show before, I had always just written it off. It all seemed too ridiculous to really believe. Seriously, a bunch of people crash onto an island and they get attacked by "The Others?" But from the first episode, I was surprised at the ease that they show allows you to suspend disbelief. I found that I was watching 2 or 3 episodes at a time, just because I really wanted to find out what happened next. About halfway through season 2, Roni also got addicted to the show.

The reason that I feel that I have been spoiled so far, is that like with Harry Potter, I was just able to watch the next episode to find out what happened next. I didn't have to come up with my own theories about what was going on. But now we are caught up to the most recent season, which just barely started. I feel deprived now that I will have to wait a full week between episodes! I really have been spoiled. Now I find myself wanting explanations that simply are not there. It is a little fun, and a little frustrating at the same time.