So if you’re trying to get hold of me, today’s a bad day. Sorry!
Tag: annoyances
A Notice That Was Should Have Been Up in the Laundry Room
Actually, it wasn’t. But it should be, except in English because Google Translate doesn’t work on non-digital texts and nobody would know what it says: Товарищи на жилье для чужих учителей: Ошибка пришло мое внимание. Ебаный в рот, который “фиксированной” из коммунальной стиральные машины убрали ручки. Без ручки, мы не можем изменить настройки температуры воды. Конечно, это не было преднамеренным. Может быть, Ебаный в рот были по приказу пьяного комиссара? Возможно, они были пьяными себя, и забыл, чтобы заменить ручки? Машины являются новыми. Я не верю, они могут быть настолько бесчеловечными, чтобы сказать: “Ах, эти животные, пусть вымоют одежды в …
One Up, One Down, Part 1
I have resolved not to whine and bitch without mentioning something positive. Sometimes this means telling two stories, but I think today’s example fits both. Man, delivery guys… I know their jobs are not so fun or easy, but sometimes, they just drive me crazy. The guy dropping off my box of Emart groceries called me so many times during class that although my phone was on silent mode, I finally had to pull out the battery. When I called him after my class ended, to confirm that he’d delivered the box where it was supposed to go, he yelled …
Had a “Expat Bad Day”
One of those days, you know. Probably the kind everyone who’s lived abroad can remember having felt, when everything one dislikes about the place one is staying decides to up and slap one in the face. Everything. We’ll just say that the bus driver didn’t break my foot, that the name of the building I live in is finally going to be changed — finally, after I asked twice, so that ordering groceries online won’t involve a dozen phone calls explaining that, yes, some morons decided to give no formal Korean name to the new building and it ended up …
The Hub of… Outmoded Software Shackles?
In one of her essays, Ursula K. Le Guin described a Native American culture (I think it was) in which the metaphor for moving in the future was of people walking backwards — looking into the past, which can at least be seen, if not always so clearly, and walking blindly into the unforeseeable future. This metaphor came to mind today as I logged onto my Gmail account on one of the computers at my department office. At the top of the screen was a note informing anyone using the PC that Google was discontinuing support for the browser I …
Not to be Draconian, But…
There really should be a death penalty for having a car alarm and not running out to turn it off when it’s set off. I think a deadline of two minutes is probably fair. Soon enough, people would rig the car alarm to call the person’s phone and it could be reset remotely. (Since usually a car with an alarm doesn’t end up getting stolen, right?) Okay, it’s draconian — a death penalty is over the top in this case and should be reserved for things like murder or pedophilia or drunk driving or being a pop star comparable to …
There Goes the Neighborhood
In the Starbucks where Miss Jiwaku and I hang out in Depok — she studies, I work on stuff — demographics have finally hit, like shit on a fan. The demographics I’m talking about are micropopulation dynamics: the national demographics of enrollment in her Bahasa Indonesian language program at University of Jakarta have shifted, such that there’s a lot more Koreans at the university, in the neighborhood, and… at our Starbucks. (Which prompted this advice from Miss Jiwaku to a new Korean student who enrolled this semester, a friend of a friend already enrolled last semester: “DON’T hang out with …
Recent Annoyances
Believe it or not, I’m trying not to rant and complain too much these days, as I said last night to some friends I was hanging out with. But you know, I just spent the afternoon dealing with something that, as usual, incompetent idiots didn’t deal with, and I’m in a mood. And yes, this involves a water leak and my closet, though it’s a different closet — though the source of the previous one’s leak, if that says anything to you… But if you’re not up for a rant, just click on the link above, about the friends I …
용산 멍청이, aka “You Can’t Run Linux on Laptops”
UPDATE (8 March 2013): Yeah, as it turns out, I ended up keeping the laptop: he couldn’t install Linux, IIRC, but I figured out a way, and it was handy for dual booting, when I occasionally needed to use a Korean installation of Windows XP. However, the purchase was still a rather dumb one, and as a rule I avoid purchases like this one… to a fault, as I failed to get a new portable computer before leaving Korea when, all told, I probably should have picked one up. Ah well… ORIGINAL POST: Yongsan Electronics Market is famous for cheap(ish) …
Tune the Damned Thing
While I have been trying to rest my eyes, one of the things I’ve noticed is that trying not to look at anything too long, or in a way that strains your eyes, leads to you noticing more about your aural surroundings — the sounds that surround you. This morning, I woke to what I think were magpies — black birds with blue and white patterns on them. Someone upstairs hollered out his window at them, in English: “Hey birds! I can’t concentrate!” I can see why. They were really dreadfully loud, and their “call” sounded a lot like electric …