I'll say it again

While I think this guy is doing the Lord's work, I'm annoyed that he uses a blower to blow lawn debris all over the neighbors' property. Ideally, he should have a nice, powerful lawn vac so as not to bother the neighbors. All the debris should be collected.

math humor from the farm

If this isn't math humor, I don't know what is.

like that Tom Arnold scene in True Lies

how to make a pun

 

what happens when you search out grammar writers on Substack?

It's pretty bleak on Substack for grammar writers.

Many grammar writers don't even seem to write about grammar; they write instead about staged readings and other performances, or they make personal announcements, or they write so infrequently (despite having what looks to me like an enviable number of followers) that I can see why their Substacks look so, bleak, empty, and moribund. Writing about grammar isn't for the timid, it seems. Here are some examples from a cursory search.

Filth & Grammar (sounds right up my alley, but alas...)

Subscriber numbers: 574
Last four posts: 11/26/24, 10/3/23, 5/30/22, 10/6/20
Recent article titles: "F & G Morphs," "Get Class in October!", "Finding Filth & Grammar," "Solitary Refinement for the Comics Enthusiast"

The Angry Grammarian (we are an angry bunch: people piss on the language)

Subscriber numbers: 1.3K+
Last four posts: 3/7/25, 11/25/24, 10/30/24, 10/16/24
Recent article titles: "New Works from the AG Fam," "An AG Guide to Not Bungling Your Holiday Cards," "The Punctuation Heard—or Imagined—'Round the World," "Could the Election Be Swung by the Passive Voice?"

Grammar Teacher (this better be good)

Subscriber numbers: 371
Last four posts: 2/22/22, 1/11/22, 12/15/21, 11/19/21
Recent article titles: "Coming Soon," "Aircraft Technical English," "Back at Last," "Free Job Vocabulary Book"

The Bad Grammar Bulletin (see the mistake in the title?)

Subscriber numbers: 967
Last four posts: 5/10/26, 5/4/26, 4/27/26, 4/20/26
Recent article titles: "The BGB for May 10th," "The BGB for May 4th," "The BGB for April 26th," "The BGB for April 19th"

At least that last Substack seems to be up to date and still productive. Let's see what its most recent article has to say:

The child woke up at two o’clock in the morning screaming his head off and demanding his grandfather, who lives fifty miles away and comes to visit twice a week, never at two o’clock in the morning. Lot of caffeine in my future for today. I wonder what the little guy was dreaming about.

Wow, that's disappointing. Not a thing about grammar—just a narrative followed by a brief, personal update under a picture, like in a blog. On the upside, the tone seems friendly enough, but I don't know whether that friendliness works for or against the stereotypical image of the perpetually angry/exasperated grammar Nazi disgusted with the mentally sloppy canaille that surrounds him. I'd vote against. We should be a bitter bunch.

So, based on this very superficial exploration of the grammar-scold side of Substack (there are, admittedly, many, many more "grammar" channels to look through, but who has the time?), it seems I'm one of the few people actually on task and doing focused work explicitly on grammar. Most of the so-called "grammar" Substacks are about things other than grammar, and quite a few seem to have been abandoned. So that's reassuring for me: I think I'm providing quality content for those who subscribe for free and for those who bother to get a paying subscription.

But after all that I've gone through regarding the title of my new ebook, I'm sensitive to the fact that my main Substack's name is BigHominid's Many Flavors (vague at best, and promising, but is it tempting enough to draw folks in?), and Bad Online English is only a subsection of a section I've labeled The Superficial (because it's free content and not that deep, i.e., it's not a curriculum and doesn't have any tests/quizzes). So I may have to set about renaming my supercategories, categories, and subcategories with better, punchier titles. Luckily, changing the banner (yet again!) ought to be easy enough since I have the original, layered Photoshop document. Only one layer to change.

I did see that one of the above-named grammar sites had an interesting short essay from 2024 about the advent of the 18th edition of the Chicago Manual of Style (a.k.a. CMOS), and how the writer is more of an AP guy (referring to the Associated Press Stylebook). It was an interesting little quickie of a piece but about as rib-sticking as a marshmallow.

Upshot: I don't think I'm doing anything wrong in terms of content generation. Compared to these jokers, I'm a fucking machine when it comes to churning out content. There's room in the market for someone like me, for my particular voice. I don't see any significant contributions coming from any of the above publications. But I do need to work on my marketing, which is something I've always been shit at. Whoring yourself ain't easy.

I was prompted to look these sites up because I watched a video about increasing engagement on Substack, and the guy (who was apparently giving an interactive webinar at the time) said that leaving short comments on various pages is as valuable for getting engagement as publishing your own longer-form content is. Something clicked in my head, so I started searching out like-minded Substacks. Alas, the above publications are what I found, and if most of them are now inactive, then why bother commenting on them?

Well... the good fight goes on. Language deserves its defenders. I'm not a perfect defender and make my share of mistakes, but fewer and fewer of us defenders—however flawed—are left to hold the glaive of Law against the Earth.

fun with the twin brother

The only flaw in the story is: shave in the bedroom?

the annoyance of country selection

When I fill out a form at an American website for the first time in order to have something physical shipped to me, and I have to select "South Korea" as my destination country, I normally have to be on the alert for where, in the long list of countries, South Korea might appear. For all I know, the list might show South Korea as:

Korea, Republic of
Korea, South
Republic of Korea
South Korea

—so South Korea's position on the list is affected by how people designate the country. Very annoying, but the experience teaches you not to give up hope as you're scrolling down that list of country names.

the detailing challenge

from just after the US Civil War

Think you can do this? This all looks like Algebra 1 to me. Shouldn't be hard.

down to one

The postdoctoral job ad has finally dropped out of Dave's ESL Cafe, so the only ad left is for Cheongju University. Since I don't have an FBI criminal background check, there's no point in turning in an application package that's only going to be automatically rejected anyway. But incredibly, there are still no other uni ads. I guess later in May is when universities start to look at whatever open slots they have, so I might not see any more ads until after the 15th.

Meanwhile, I've got my doctor's appointment to look forward to this coming Friday, which also happens to be the 15th. It's going to be a shit-show, I think. My weight and BP remain stable (and even fairly good for BP), but my A1c (average blood sugar) is way too high at around 7.9. It shot up after the previous doctor visit and never came back down. Strange.

Instapundit crowd's reaction to the newest cover design

Basically, the reactions to my new cover design range from "Um, no" (the grumpy, unimaginative crowd) to "I like it!" (the more open-minded crowd).

I've come to the conclusion that you can't please everyone, so while there might be some minor tweaks, I think I'll be sticking with the current design.

As much as I think some of the naysayers are just congenital assholes looking for something to grouch at, I'm in truth thankful to have even this level of guidance (if guidance is the word) from the masses in their wisdom or unwisdom. The feedback, even the negative bits, did help me to focus more on what's important in a design. The how-to videos helped, too.

Still to go:

• table of contents
• front matter
• preface/foreword
• bio/acknowledgments/afterword

This coming week (the week of my doctor's appointment), then, the ebook ought to be ready to go. Less than a month after that, the dead-tree book will be out.

barn or cellar?

no "only on Thursdays" button?

I guess life can't be all bad

As long as well-intentioned people are doing good things for others, there's hope. As an aside, though—these "I can hear!" videos are practically their own subgenre on YouTube, X, TikTok, etc. And they all give you the warm fuzzies. Put this subgenre alongside other feel-good subgenres like "dog greets military dad/mom after months/years away" and "girl wakes up from anesthesia to see her boyfriend, whom she doesn't remember," etc.

Ryder Boen, 12, was born with hearing loss in both ears. In February, Hearts for Hearing gave him the world's only smart cochlear implant system. When they turned it on, he heard sound in a whole new way. pic.twitter.com/JScHTsZfe8

— David Begnaud (@DavidBegnaud) April 14, 2026

fuck Craigslist

My two Craigslist posts have been flagged for removal. They survived through Saturday, not even 48 hours, but I guess they won't be seeing Sunday. So what got them removed? It couldn't have been bulleted lists this time; I took those out. I did see that some ads get removed for post length, but come on—the ads were only a few hundred words each.

Anyway, Craigslist strikes me as useless for putting up my own ads. It still retains some use as a way to find other jobs. There's a different site/app called Soomgo/숨고, which is where all of the ambitious housewives meet and find tutors for their kids. I've heard, though, that Soomgo is a place of high competition, so I might be a bit too old for that racket. I might have to do the old-school thing and leave ads up in the lobby bulletin boards of local apartments. Assuming those ads don't get immediately taken down.

No matter which way I turn...

flowers from Saturday's walk

If I'm not going to do the long walk quite yet, I can at least do the 9.5K walk out to the river and back. So I did the walk on Saturday. Here are some flowers next to the ramp by the footbridge I have to cross at the end of my neighborhood.

roses

Rosa Celsiana

Bill Keezer used to say he'd always download my flower pics. Miss you, Bill.

another attempt at the ebook cover

The above solves several problems:

• There's no more AI nonsense.
• Better title. No more misleading suggestions of horror stories.
• My face is no longer part of the cover.
• I pass the "thumbnail fail" test and the "squint" test.
• There's no longer anything creepy going on (unless there are tenderfooted wimps who're also easily creeped out by aliens/monsters).
• I'd say there's no "composition chaos" as was, frankly, also true of the other designs (they might've been misleading, but they were focused without being busy).
• Fonts: It's all the same font, just different sizes and weights. I stuck with all-caps for the title and subtitle and did initial-caps for the author name.
• The dark-blue film reel is larger to signify that the book is mostly movie/TV reviews (about 95%), with very few book reviews (about 5%).
• If people don't like the notion of an alien who is cheerful at the prospect of reviewing things, I don't know what to say. At least the alien isn't AI: It's drawn by me.
• Most importantly, the cover is now more directly relevant to the book's content. The alien is a recurring character of mine and so is a symbol of me, and if people can't relate to that, or if they get too literal-minded and start wondering what an alien is doing reviewing movies and books, well, that's their problem, their Spock complex. Just think symbolically: an alien might represent a person's feeling of detachment or separateness from the regular human crowd, as if the reviews were coming from a different or remote perspective. It doesn't have to be any deeper than that.

From what I can see on Google and Amazon, there is no English-language book with the specific title Sights, Sounds, Words. (There is a WordPress blog with that name.) I also think the title works for what will be a multi-volume series.

As always, grunt and squeeze out your insights in the comments. Please read the comments policy (just above the comment window, where it says, "READ THIS BEFORE COMMENTING!"—which plenty of idiots never do.

core strength

l'art de dégainer le sabre

I don't see the character for "sword" (劍, 검, geom) anywhere in the video's title. I do, however, see the character for "blade/knife" (刀, 도, dō) and the character for art/technique (術), pronounced sul in Korean and jutsu in Japan.

one application sent

I just sent a selfie photo and a resume out for an R&D job located in Bundang. The company (no idea of the name; the company is listed on Craigslist, where many parties prefer to remain anonymous until people get to know each other) says it wants a "gyopo," i.e., someone ethnically Korean who has lived overseas a long time, but I'm not sure whether that means they want someone who's Korean-fluent. If so, then this job is already a bust. The ad itself was time-stamped "30 minutes ago" when I first opened it, so I'm hoping my paperwork will be among the first of the resumes they see. I told them I'm available to interview next week, so we'll see what they have to say, if anything. I didn't include a cover letter, but I did write a sincere email to which I attached the photo and resume. We'll see what the reaction is, if anything. Fingers and tentacles crossed.

shoot carefully

happy birthday

2 million light years away

Enjoy this ancient view of ancient stars. I can only imagine that tons of alien civilizations have popped up in the interim, but we won't know about them for at least 2 million years. Assuming we've survived one or more Great Filters.

IMPORTANT🚨: THIS IS NOT MILKY WAY GALAXY!

You’re staring at billions of stars in the Andromeda galaxy, captured by the Hubble Space Telescope—and almost every one likely has planets.

Let that just sink in. pic.twitter.com/5NhNsN1SBJ

— All day Astronomy (@forallcurious) April 15, 2026

distributed intelligence

I bet the only words they know are all rotten.

ultimate introvert

I could learn a lot from this man: John Bentinck, 5th Duke of Portland. He built fifteen miles of way-underground tunnels wide enough for carriages to pass each other and including a ballroom plus beautiful artwork... yet he never used any of it. Sounds a lot like me and my utterly useless Substack empire.

upgrade this cheap thang

Craigslist aftermath

So I did some reading around about Craigslist and how it "enforces" things, and it turns out that it's a fairly self-monitored place with some automated monitoring thrown in. And one of the things that the "community" doesn't like is bulleted lists, which my first-draft ad had in plenty. Last night, after seeing my first ad get flagged and, I guess, removed, I did my research, then immediately re-drafted the ad, but without bulleted lists this time. And as of this morning, the new ad is still up, so thank Cthulhu for small favors.

Meanwhile, over at Dave's ESL Cafe, there are no new job ads as of a few minutes ago. I'm currently drafting another Craigslist ad, this time for proofreading services.

le sigh, as they (used to) say

per the stereotype

if you're gonna make AI slop...

...at least make it funny like this:

The first one of these I’ve actually liked. Stephen Hawking is hilarious. “Ha ha ha ha ha ha” https://t.co/oiKM0oumdh

— Carl (@HistoryBoomer) April 15, 2026

change of plan

I can't go to sleep. Something is keeping me up, and it's going to bother me for the next little while. Here's the problem:

I just re-signed my rental contract for another year. This contract doesn't start until June 25 (6/25 is "Korean War Day" here, commemorating the start of the Korean War), so I guess I could back out of it before then. If, however, I let time go by, and the contract kicks in, then I get a job that requires me to leave Seoul, here's what happens:

1. I have to inform the real-estate office three months in advance (which probably means I also suffer penalties if I try to back out of the contract now, a month in advance).
2. I believe I'm also responsible for finding a new tenant, but I could be wrong.
3. For as long as no new tenant moves in during the remainder of my rental-contract period, I have to keep paying rent on the place.
4. If/when I move out, I have to restore the place to its original condition. This isn't a big deal and is only the right thing to do, really. But in my case, this means I need to repair the wallpaper damage on two walls: the small wall under my A/C where there's water damage (to the wallpaper only), and the larger wall at the head of my bed where, apparently, the motion of my head and my pillows has produced a deep discoloration in the paper. So I need to talk to my rental office about how I can effect those repairs. There's a shop on the first floor that seems to be devoted to housing-related items, so I'll visit that shop as well and see whether they have someone who can take the old wallpaper down and put the new wallpaper up. I could try to do it, but I've never done it before, so I could easily botch the job.
5. I won't get my own rental deposit back until there's a new tenant, and that tenant has paid his own deposit. Only after he/she pays will I see my money.
6. The contract seems to have stipulations saying my deposit (that's a whole W10,000,000) can be forfeit for this or that reason.

Upshot: Unless I secure work in Seoul, such that I can commute to my job every day, I'm kind of fucked. I need to visit the real-estate office and talk about all of the possible contingencies. I also need to fast-track my job search by putting out feelers now for whatever work I can do immediately, keeping in mind that I have a July trip to France coming up, which will interrupt whatever work I find now.

Moving back to America is still a possibility, but if I'm going to move, I should probably go before my new rental contract kicks in. That feels rather sudden, and I'm not sure how plausible that strategy is. So my two best bets for work are (1) returning to KMA, which is kind of a long shot if they require even F-4 visa holders to have a "main" job (I don't think they make allowances for freelancers); and (2) finding loads of private work to tide me over until I get a university job.

All of which means I'm either going to delay my upcoming walk (which was technically to start today, i.e., Friday, Seoul time) or just wait to walk in the fall. It occurs to me that I'm now feeling the stress that I should have started feeling months ago. It's bad to be in poor health and to have no real income.

UPDATE: I've just put up a tutoring ad on Seoul Craigslist, so I feel a little bit better now, a little less stressed. I might put up other ads advertising proofreading/editing services as well. I need to figure out what the average rates are for such work in Seoul.

UPDATE 2: Craigslist must be populated by the same assholes who infest Wikipedia. My pst, which was perfectly innocent, has already been flagged for removal. What the fuck, man? I was just in the middle of writing a second post advertising my proofreading services when I saw the flag. Now, I'm not sure whether I should even bother with Craigslist.

meal prep, just a few months late

I've got a months-long backlog of scheduled posts. Sorry.

learning as I go

This video deals with the rookie errors on cover designs that can kill sales:

Basically:

1. Don't design for no one (which is what happens when you generically design a bland cover aimed at everyone). I don't think I'm guilty of that. But...
2. The "thumbnail fail": On Amazon, only a thumbnail of your book's cover will be shown before the potential buyer conjures up the desire to zoom in. What happens to your cover's text when everything is scrunched down to thumbnail size? If important elements like the title, subtitle, author, etc. aren't visible, you've got a problem. I might be guilty of this, but that's why I originally chose a heavier font.
3. "Counterfeit clones": This is when one cover design apes another. That's not me. Anyway, design your cover to stand out, not to be a copyright infringement.
4. Typography: Think about hierarchy (what takes highest priority on the page), contrast, kerning, tone, font choice (which I've been getting dinged on). Limit yourself to at most 2 high-quality fonts; match fonts to the tone of your work; prioritize hierarchy and readability; make sure the title dominates.
5. "Composition chaos": textual clutter, misalignment; hierarchy not obvious; busy backgrounds that obscure the text, etc. Do "the squint test": squint, and what are you seeing first? Also, check for balance (centering, appropriate text size, etc.). I think I pass the squint test.
6. In sum: Do a thumbnail test; squint test; do a test print; check for all the faux pas mentioned above.

The presenter says your book on Amazon gets about three seconds of consideration before people decide to move on or to read further and maybe purchase. I wish she had spent more time on the criticisms that I've been receiving re: Do your cover and title convey your content? She also didn't deal with the issue of AI-designed covers, but she did say she has a different video about that. Meanwhile, here's another video on cover design:

I remember reading a section of Stephen R. Donaldson's "gradual interview" (where he took on a slew of reader questions), and at one point, Donaldson remarked that he much preferred some of the later cover designers who stuck to simple, abstract covers instead of the overly specific, almost realistic artwork of famous cover artists like Darrell K. Sweet, who did the early versions of Donaldson's first two Chronicles of Thomas Covenant the Unbeliever among other sci-fi/fantasy books. Compare these two very different cover designs:

Darrell K. Sweet—detailed, fairly realistic

a more abstract design (not sure of the designer's name; this was probably for a British edition)

The second image is what Donaldson says he favors, not Sweet's work. Personally, I grew up with and love Sweet's covers, but maybe I simply lack design sense.

ADDENDUM: I did finally get a specific complaint about the title, and frankly, the more I think about it, the less I like it (the title, I mean, not the complaint). But the titles that are now burbling up in my head—like Text, Image, Criticism—sound too coldly abstract, like Jacques Derrida's Structure, Sign, and Play.

another try at the cover

This time around:

1. I've taken myself out of the picture.
2. I've unified all the fonts into one font, with different sizes.
3. I've switched to an all-caps style for added seriousness.

No one complained about the title, but some complaints were about the dark and gloomy look. I can safely ignore those complaints since that's merely a matter of preference.

That said, here's another try:

AI improved the pic; I had uploaded a basic, clunky, and very rough Photoshopped image showing the AI what I wanted. The AI kept making the reflected/projected light from the screen too unrealistically narrow. After several bad drafts, I told the AI that it should make the same pic, but without the light from the screen, and I would add that in myself.

I just got an interesting comment about the previous design that might apply to this one:

The pic is creepy and it makes me interested in the book. But I’d expect a book of creepy stories rather than book and movie reviews.

That's a really good point in terms of marketing. The cover creates an expectation in most people's minds. Maybe I should drop the "sinister" angle. That might mean changing the title since I've been trying to be visually faithful to the text, which says "Skull."

So—no Skull in the text, and a less creepy/sinister look?

I call this one Just Before the Dragon Struck

"You'll shoot yer eye out!"

that's a Ryan George graphic

taxes through the years

This comedian perfectly summed up the history of taxes in America.

We’re being robbed. pic.twitter.com/2ARDMloLfK

— An0maly (@LegendaryEnergy) April 16, 2026

bad taste

your chance to critique

Part original photo, part AI design, part Photoshop, this is my first attempt at a cover and title for my volume of movie and book reviews. So go ahead and critique it.

• Is it too AI-looking?
• Is it too egotistical to put my own face so prominently on the cover?
• Does the image creep you out and make you not want to buy the book?
• Should the fonts be different in size, style, etc.?
• Do the graphics overly stress movies without considering books (I review both)?
• Is ...in the Skull too reminiscent of Water from a Skull?
• Does the title capture both books and movies?
• Do you have better suggestions for the book's title?

About that last issue: Finding a totally original title is damn hard. I had originally wanted to go with The Power of Story, but that's taken, and so are many similar variants. I think Skull kind of works given that I've got a movie screen embedded in my head.

Anyway, lemme know what you think, including any thoughts you have that aren't covered by the questions posed above. I'll take your thoughts into consideration. Can't guarantee I'll use a specific thought, but I'll definitely take your insights seriously. If you are, in fact, serious.

table ASMR

This isn't a video, it's mind control... The more I watch, the more comfortable and therapeutic it becomes 😍 pic.twitter.com/gnKRvfyX99

— Crazy Moments (@Crazymoments01) April 15, 2026

Wednesday's walk

After visiting the local police station again Wednesday afternoon, I went out for a 9.5K walk to the river and back. Seen along the way:

Jamshil in the distance

the vetch on display

fish in the muddy creek (Yangjae-cheon)

the newly paved resting spot by the Tan-cheon

another clump or cluster of vetch

closer look

same bridge as before, but on the way back to my place

Lotte World Tower in the distance

final footbridge 1 (note the ramps on the far side)

final footbridge 2

The upshot of my second visit to the police station is that (1) I need to get my fingerprints done elsewhere, probably a bigger police station like the Gangnam one, and (2) I can't get a single local criminal background check that can be copied to multiple universities, i.e., every time I apply to a university that requires that document, I have to make a separate request. Jesus Christ.

So I'll be visiting the Gangnam District Police Station soon to get myself fingerprinted. I need to tell them to print out my fingerprints on an FD-258 form, which I hope they have. That form must then be mailed to the US FBI or to what's called a "channeler" for faster processing (e.g., Accurate Biometrics or Monument Visa). This is so I can get an FBI criminal background check. Somewhere in there, I can apparently request that the FBI criminal background check be apostilled and then sent to me. That means I have to send my diplomas to be apostilled separately. I'd been hoping to send all three documents together: my undergrad diploma, my grad-school diploma, and my FBI background check. But that's not going to happen.

Processing time for the FBI background check is around 3-8 weeks. How many university-job opportunities will I be missing during that time? This whole thing is starting to feel like a very cumbersome process. It might be easier to just gather up a bunch of private students or try to get a job with KMA again if that's even possible.

More news later.

AI can so easily go wrong

And AI's danger doesn't even have to do with malice.

Thou shalt not make a machine in the likeness of a human mind.
—Orange Catholic Bible, before the Butlerian Jihad

ah, the peaceful mountains

handling the trolls by trolling back

I may have to subscribe to this guy. In this video, @thataintbad handles his comment trolls, who all have bad advice on stance and tactics.

He still sounds like Mr. Anderson, though. Or Hank Hill. Same voice.

it's both sad and entertaining when they never learn

final agenda for the ebook ms

Left to do:

1. final proofreading/editing/formatting
2. figure out a dang title
3. write a preface/foreword
4. bang out the front matter, including the table of contents
5. write a bio/acknowledgments/afterword
6. design a cover
7. convert all to Kindle format

—and all will be done!

As it is, the main ms is around 450 pages long. Because each chapter is a movie or book review, though, the book can be read out of order, so consider this "bathroom reading," although some chapters may be long enough to require several terlit sessions depending on how fast you read. (I'm on the slow side.)

And as I've told others: Because this is a Kindle ebook, you can purchase it, and if you find errors in the ms, feel free to notify me via email, and I will make changes, then re-upload the ms. What happens then is that the Kindle ebook you've purchased will also re-update with the new, better content. No need to re-purchase. Win-win!

I'll start working on the above remaining seven to-do items today (after I visit the police station again), but I'm going to take time out, starting this Friday, to do a walk from Incheon to Yeoju City (150-some km). I'll return to the Geumgang path (which I tried and failed at earlier this year) later this fall, schedule permitting.

And once the ebook is totally done, I'll turn my attention to the dead-tree version, which will, alas, be substantially more expensive due to printing costs, etc. At 450-some pages for the final product (6" x 9" format, perfect-bound paperback), I'm guessing there'll be around a $5-$10 base cost for a paperback of this size and page length. Since I need to make $3-$5 off each book (a guy's gotta eat, pay rent, and generally survive in this rat-race environment), the markup will make the final cost around $8-$13 or so.

The Kindle ebook, meanwhile, will be priced as low as possible since it's all just weightless 1s and 0s anyway. I think the absolute minimum I can charge for the ebook is $2.99, and the promise I make all my customers is that I will never charge more than that for an ebook unless Amazon raises the minimum price. So my suggestion is to buy the ebook unless you don't have either a Kindle or a Kindle app for your phone. Much cheaper than the paperback.

Okay, all for now. 

I'll be off to the police station around 2 p.m. to make sure I'm past their lunch hour. (If it's anything like the Immigration Office, the police-station staff will all take lunch at the same time. Bureaucracies. Gotta love 'em.)

source of strife, seeker/maker of conflict

tragedy in motion

At first, I thought this was liberal Mark Rober pursuing black children.

The greatest moment in the history of cinema 😭 pic.twitter.com/aj4vnU7vow

— Interesting things (@awkwardgoogle) April 14, 2026

new soup base for ramyeon broth?

Here's a totally random discovery for you. Try this the next time you're hard up for a ramyeon/라면 broth, and you want something nice and spicy:

1. one heaping teaspoon of marmite
2. one heaping teaspoon of chili oil (I'm using Lee Kum Kee brand)
3. one heaping teaspoon of Better Than Bouillon No Beef Base
4. 500-700 ml boiling water

I'm sipping away at a boiling-hot cup of this right now, and I find myself wishing for udong to stick in, along with minced green onions, sliced pyogo/표고 (shiitake), and an assortment of soup-friendly proteins like finely diced or thinly sliced chicken, shrimp, pork, and beef. Maybe some thinly shredded cabbage as well (kimchi would throw the spice balance off). Maybe fish cake (odaeng/eomuk, 오댕/어묵). Maybe hard-boiled eggs. Maybe tofu (dubu/두부). Maybe mandu/만두 (dumplings). Maybe ddeok/떡 (rice cakes). The sky's the limit.

This is not a typically Korean soup base. There's no gochujang/고추장 or soy sauce (ganjang/간장) or sesame oil (cham-gireum/참기름) or garlic (maneul/마늘) or doenjang/된장. And the combination might need some tweaking, but as of right now, this is pretty damn good. Yes, it is a bit salty, but adding the abovementioned solids would make the soup make more sense. For the moment, it's fine as long as I sip a little at a time.

the holy terror

What combination of factors produces such a fucked-up kid?

c'est fait!

I've completed the main ms for my movie-review book. I now need to do some final checking and formatting, then I have to figure out a title, write up the table of contents and other front matter, write a foreword/preface, and write a bio/afterword. There's still a good bit to do. I'll do some of that tomorrow and Thursday, then I'll ship out and do my long walk (probably 150-some km out to Yeoju) starting on Friday. 

I'll complete the rest after I'm back from the walk. Luckily, the dead-tree book shouldn't take nearly this long since I will soon have a complete ebook version of the ms, and I can base the dead-tree book on the ebook. There will still be a lot of formatting to take care of.

the most Amurrican gun video you'll ever see

One asshole comment on this video is about how this shooter has never seen combat and is therefore a pussy. But the video isn't about combat: It's about trick shooting, and the guy's pretty damn good. There are a few good trick shooters on YouTube; this guy is new to me.

Go to YouTube and look for @thataintbad. 

The guy sounds a bit like Mr. Anderson from Beavis and Butt-Head. But he'll take your head off with a pistol at a hundred yards. In high wind.

defamation?

I've seen a few of Abroad in Japan's videos.

coolness

We've been in a cool spell for a while. I'd love to do my 120K walk before this cool spell leaves us, but I'm so close to finishing the movie-review book's ms that I don't want to abandon it quite yet. So I guess what's going to happen is this:

1. Finish the ms.
2. Take a 120K walk.
3. Come back, add the rest of the book's material, do final checks, and publish the ebook.

Final checks are, of course, never final. I'm sure I'll read through the published ms and find all sorts of annoying errors. Luckily, I can correct these errors in the MS Word and Kindle files, reupload, and the reuploaded version of the ebook will self-update for everyone who's already bought the book. Everybody wins!

They're forecasting a brief bout of rain for Thursday afternoon, then nothing but awesomeness through the 15th. Better get cracking with the ms. I already did my workout today (resistance band, with a smattering of kettlebell, bodyweight, and dumbbell suitcase carry).

About that 120K walk: Although I hate this idea, I think I'm going to save money by ending each walk and simply bunking at home, which means training out to the starting point of each segment every day except Day 3. In case you've forgotten what this well-traveled route entails:

Day 1: Incheon starting point to Gayang neighborhood, western Seoul.
Day 2: Gayang neighborhood to my neighborhood (Daecheong Station, Gangnam).
Day 3: My neighborhood to Hanam City.
Day 4: Hanam City to Yangpyeong City.

For the four segments, it's roughly 32K, 28K, 26K, 35K. About 121K. If I plan to rest every night in my own place, I might not even carry a backpack. That would make the journey a lot easier. The disadvantage with resting at my place every night is the inconvenience of using the subway to go home and go back out every morning. It's not a huge inconvenience, but given the subway's hours, I'll be starting fairly late every morning. Not that that matters much: While I might take a slew of photos, I most likely won't be blogging this journey.

It occurs to me that I could expand this walk to 154K by doing the 33K segment from Yangpyeong to Yeoju. That would be the distance equivalent of the Geumgang trail, which I plan to reattempt this fall (depending on my work situation). I'll think about it.

Dr. V versus Alisdair MacIntyre

Dr. V's latest Substack continues his meditations on the ability to logically derive ought from is, something that the Scottish philosopher David Hume said was impossible. Can one logically deduce the normative from the brutely empirical? 

Dr. V shows us a passage from Alasdair MacIntyre in which MacIntyre seems to think that such a derivation is possible. According to MacIntyre, any watch is by definition already a good watch since the function of a watch (a good watch) is to tell time accurately. But Dr. V counterargues that accuracy is a normative, not empirical, concept, so if MacIntyre seriously thinks all watches are good by definition, then a slow or otherwise inaccurate watch is not even a watch, which is ridiculous. Go read Dr. V's article here.

But here's the portion of the first part of Dr. V's argument where I have questions:

The correctness of the argument is supposed to hinge on the functional character of the concept watch. A watch is an artifact created by an artificer for a specific purpose: to tell time accurately. It therefore has a proper function, one assigned by the artificer. (Serving as a paperweight would be an example of an improper function.) A good watch does its job, serves its purpose, fulfills its proper function. MacIntyre tells us that “the concept of a watch cannot be defined independently of the concept of a good watch . . .” and that “the criterion of something’s being a watch and something’s being a good watch . . . are not independent of each other.” (ibid.) MacIntyre goes on to say that both criteria are factual and that for this reason arguments like the one above validly move from a factual premise to an evaluative conclusion.

Speaking as someone who has been more influenced by the moderns than by the ancients, I don’t see it. It is not the case that “the concept of a watch cannot be defined independently of the concept of a good watch . . . .” A watch is “a portable timepiece designed to be worn (as on the wrist) or carried in the pocket.” (Merriam-Webster) This standard definition allows, as it should, for both good and bad watches. Note that if chronometric goodness, i.e., accuracy, were built into the definition of ‘watch,’ then no watch would ever need repair. Indeed, no watch could be repaired. For a watch needing repair would then not be a watch. No one denies that a good watch is an accurate watch. The question in dispute is whether the normative property of accuracy enters into the definition of watch. [emphasis added]

My question in return is: Why is accuracy a "normative property"? Can't accuracy be objectively verified? Isn't accuracy therefore factual/empirical? 

In science, there's a distinction between precision and accuracy as relates to instrumentation. Let's say I have a lab scale that can measure weight down to the microgram. That would make the scale a highly precise instrument. But let's say I misuse the scale and weigh an object incorrectly because I calibrated the scale incorrectly. The resultant incorrect weight would therefore be an inaccurate measurement. Precision is more a function of the instrument; accuracy is more a function of the user. If we move into the domain of sniper rifles, we can see this even more clearly. If I have a sniper rifle that's precise to a distance of 3000 meters, then I take a shot and miss my target, that's because my shot was inaccurate. Whether we're talking about the lab scale or the rifle, where does normativity come into play?

that extra oomph

Also known as: Asian on the left, Western on the right.

just keep away from teh krayzee

still trust AI?

it's mostly crap

Last year's biggest turds:

just arrived

I got my first-ever bottle of HP sauce.

I of course tried some the moment I opened the shipping box. Having never had HP sauce before, and having heard so many Brits swear by it, I needed to see what was so revolutionary that it would inspire the loyalty of a former empire. When I took my first whiff after breaking the seal, I noticed that the sauce smelled distinctly different from ketchup and also different from American steak sauce, but when I tasted the HP, I could see there was a deeper difference in terms of how spicy and tangy the sauce is. The flavor of ketchup is quieter and blander by comparison, so I can sort of see why the Brits are so fanatical about this sauce. As common condiments go, HP has character, arguably more character than ketchup.

HP does, however, have the same problem as most store-bought ketchup in that you can definitely taste the huge amount of sugar syrup (the ingredients list calls this "glucose-fructose syrup"); the sauce has about the same carbs per 100 g as Heinz ketchup does. I'd guess that HP works in at least 90% of the same situations where you'd use ketchup. But HP, being so vinegar-forward, has a sharper, tangier flavor to it. I like that, but other Americans might not.

Anyway, after I go to the doc on May 15, I'll be curious to try HP out on several different dishes. The bottle itself suggests adding it to your meat when you're making cottage pie, the beef answer to shepherd's pie (lamb).

so! what's done on today's to-do list?

I've crossed off the list items that are done, and I've noted TONIGHT to the items I'll do tonight. Easy, right?

1. Visit the bank and send $500 to my US account.
2. Visit my real-estate office and sign the new rental contract. New, higher rent kicks in next month (W770,000 from W735,000). Boy, I'm really looking forward to that.
3. Visit the local police station and see about (a) getting fingerprinted, (b) keeping a copy of the fingerprint document to send (or scan and send) to the US FBI, and (c) getting a copy of my local criminal background check. But I have to go back.
4. Get a haircut. It's been six weeks.
5. Find and gather documents to send to the US State Department (basically, my diplomas and, eventually, a copy of my FBI background check) to get apostilled so I can apply for other university work in Korea. TONIGHT
6. Take a walk. Lift some weight. TONIGHT
7. Work on my movie-review book. I'm close to finishing the main ms. TONIGHT

I sent only $300 to the States. The real-estate office charged me W100,000 to sign my new contract; the fuckers keep bleeding me dry. The local police station told me I needed to bring along several extra items to get the fingerprinting and background check done: my ID card (which I had), my passport (which I also had), and two passport-size photos (which I didn't have). Since tomorrow is apparently a day off for that office, I'll go back on Wednesday.

Finding and gathering documents will probably take a while, so I'll work on that tonight and over the next few days. Lifting weights will happen after I finish this blog post. Working on the book ms will happen once I'm done lifting weights.

I'm still bothered because I don't know where that sudden backache had come from. Most lower-back problems come from things like a weak core, muscle imbalances (maybe you tend to carry heavy stuff on only one side), and skeletal misalignments that arise from any number of causes. I've been trying very hard to treat my core well, and it usually treats me well in return. But something went wrong a few days ago, and it went wrong for a distressingly long time, and whenever a problem arises and disappears with no hint as to why it happened in the first place, I get paranoid.

Righto. Work to do.

let's talk about this

I saw the following tweet/video over at Instapundit, but I don't think it proves whatever point people think it proves.

A high school senior in Philadelphia made a video series asking fellow seniors to read a simple sentence written in english and they're incapable of completing the simple task.

If you go to his IG (handle on right side of the video) you'll see he makes tons of seemingly humorous… pic.twitter.com/gWKTdkEfGf

— Mrgunsngear (@Mrgunsngear) May 3, 2026

At Instapundit, the poster who linked to the above wrote: "THIS IS MESSED UP." In the tweet itself, we see this comment:

A high school senior in Philadelphia made a video series asking fellow seniors to read a simple sentence written in english and they're incapable of completing the simple task.

If you go to his IG (handle on right side of the video) you'll see he makes tons of seemingly humorous videos like this but this one went viral for obvious reasons and now the school is saying he may not be allowed to graduate from the charter school due to the videos.

The school seems completely fine with students not being able to read but they're not okay with the public seeing that they can't read.

Telling...

I guess we should forgive the above commenter for writing english instead of English and for his very poor command of punctuation (I see at least three comma errors; let it be an exercise for the reader to figure out—after the shit-ton that I've written about commas—where those three commas ought to go and why. Answers that don't provide a why don't count.).

I saw a few scattered comments in response to the above video, and some of those comments expressed sympathy for the students. Here's one such comment:

I'm going to have to stand up a little bit for these kids. "Gauche" is one of those words you can read and know but not hear, like "synecdoche," so you can't pronounce it. And "silhouette" is used incorrectly (according to OED), so saying what the sentence means is an impossible task.

I wrote this in response:

I was going to (limply) defend these kids myself. From what I've found out, the way the term "silhouette" is being used in the sentence comes specifically from the world of fashion, referring to the shape or outline of the clothes. When I read the sentence, I myself was hard-pressed to see/say what the sentence meant. At first, I thought it meant "She wore a shadowy outline of clothes," maybe meaning a bare suggestion of clothes. Like a bikini or something. I was wrong.

But in terms of which French-derived words the kids ought to be familiar with, they should certainly know how to pronounce silhouette. If they've taken French, they should also know how to pronounce gauche.

That said, if the video's overall point is that the kids have been poorly educated, the guy could've chosen a better sentence that has the word silhouette in it. Otherwise, if his point is just that the school has failed them, then he's actually siding with the students. But accusing the school of a failure to teach brings up a whole 'nother set of issues regarding just whose fault it is that the kids have learned so little. Is it the teachers' fault? Is it the lazy, inattentive, cell-phone-addicted students' fault? A combination? Something else?

If I'd had the chance, I'd have talked to the guy about his methodology and clarity of focus. What exactly is he aiming to do in making such a video? He's asking the students for two things: (1) read the sentence through with proper pronunciation, and (2) state the sentence's meaning. But for what purpose is he doing this? To illustrate the failure of a system, or to highlight the dead-mindedness of modern students?

As a former teacher, I'd say that my own emphasis has always been on testing students only on what they've learned. Have they learned fashion-related terminology like "silhouette of clothes"? If not, then maybe it's unfair to "gotcha" them with that. While for me, the sentence is easily phonetically readable, I still had trouble grasping the meaning of a "silhouette of clothes" until I went and looked that phrase up.

This topic is ripe for a long and detailed discussion.

So the sentence that the camera guy wants students to read is this: She wore a silhouette of clothes that were extraordinary but somewhat gauche. He then asks the students to read the sentence aloud and to state what the meaning of the sentence is. Have you ever heard the phrase a silhouette of clothes before? If yes, then congratulations: You work in the fashion industry, where the phrase is apparently common. For the rest of us, though... Speaking only for myself: I had to look that phrase up. Sure, I could read the sentence aloud with good pronunciation, but even I had trouble with the sentence's meaning.

I don't think the above video is in the same class as those KeroNgb videos I keep putting up (and I've questioned the thinking behind those videos as well)—the ones where the guy goes around Georgia campuses asking students basic questions in an effort to show how stupid the students are. While I find those interviews depressing for what they show about the state of American students' knowledge, I'm not convinced that they show the students are stupid, per se. By the same token, this video doesn't really prove the kids are stupid or that the system has somehow failed them. It's a different animal from the KeroNgb videos because it doesn't ask basic questions: Instead, it's just one fairly advanced question. (Or am I stupid for not knowing a common fashion term and for thinking the question is advanced?)

By the way, synecdoche is pronounced "sih-NECK-duh-kee." I did a post about the frustrating distinction between metonymy and synecdoche long ago in 2012.