one problem solved, another appears

I got a Kakao message from my bank, Shinhan, saying the time had come to renew the certification (injeungseo/인증서) on my phone. From past experience, I know that I can't do this procedure at home no matter how many times I try. This didn't stop me from stubbornly trying several times this morning, but in the end, as always, I failed and resigned myself to going to the local bank branch to ask a teller for help. It's always embarrassing to have to do this, but the teller was polite, and she herself had difficulty going through the procedure on my phone. Lots of long pauses and furrowed brows as she stared at my phone's screen. Well, the procedure took almost half an hour, and it involved my signing with a stylus on a touchscreen five or six times (print name, give signature, print name, give signature, print name, give signature, etc.) because of the Korean love for extra procedural steps and piles of red tape. I asked the teller whether this meant I wouldn't have to do this for another three years, and she said yes, but frankly, I don't trust her—not because I think she's a liar, but because I feel as if I've gone through this same fucking procedure every single year. Well, we'll see. If I have to do this again in early 2027, I will have forgotten that I'd written today's blog post.

So for a year at least, my certification-renewal problem has been solved yet again. But another problem has arisen.

When I left for the bank, I saw that the city gas (doshi gaseu/도시 가스) company that services our building had left a Post-It sticker saying they had come by for their inspection (usually two or three times a year) and to contact them to reschedule. So I texted the cell number given, and the person is coming back tomorrow at 11 a.m. This is bad for me because I had planned to leave tonight for an all-night walk from Yangpyeong to Yeosu. The walk would end around 8:00 or 9:00 tomorrow morning, and I'd take a bus back to Seoul as I usually do when doing this route. But the arrival time would be too close to the gas company's visiting time, so I've decided to put the walk off until tomorrow night, which is about as long as I can delay such a walk: my feet will need a few days to recover after 33 kilometers (almost exactly 20.5 miles).

So I can either eat my weekday salad today or wait to do it on Thursday. Walking in a fasted state is fine with me; I've done it many times before. But walking after three days' fasting (Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday) might not be the greatest idea, so I think I'm going to go downstairs, grab my salads, and have a graze today. Maybe along with some chicken breasticles. The next time I eat will be Saturday.