Dabysan in Hammersmith Palais

The title of this post is the subject line of an e-mail that delinquent Voxer and all around good egg Jason P set me and CarrieNation to congratulate us on our impending nuptials (I'm glad I can stop struggling to spell that word after this weekend).

Because my blog has mostly been a vehicle for hurling insults, bickering over music and perpetuating my decade-long (and counting!) War Over Nothing with Hotrod, I sometimes struggle to find the appropriate tone to discuss serious matters...such as, say, the most important -- and best -- decision I've ever made. Or, for example, one of the biggest days of my life.

But that day is fast upon us, and it seems appropriate that I say something about it from my small public platform in the hinterlands of the blogosphere.

Over the past few days I've been a bit of a nervous wreck. Although CarrieNation has done the lion's share of the planning and work for the big event, I've done enough to know how many balls we have in the air (catering, music, venue, clothes, etc.) and every day I'm worried about a new variable. The phalanx of relatives and friends descending on our fair city for the event also has me rattled, as does the prospect of being responsible for all of them having a good time.

What doesn't worry me -- even a little -- is the prospect of being married to CarrieNation. In fact, I'll let my dear readers in on a little secret: because our officiant isn't a member of a church recognized by our great commonwealth (fake Internet ministers rule) we went ahead and made it official with an officer of the court on Monday. To me, the notion that I will spend the rest of my life with CarrieNation is as natural as the notion that I'll continue to breathe air, eat breakfast and listen to the Clash for the rest of my life. To imagine any other scenario is what would scare me.

So that's it. Wish us luck on this wedding business. Cross your fingers that all of our assorted vendors show up, my Grandmother doesn't cuff my ears when she hears some of the more profane tracks on the wedding mix, and Hotrod stays sober long enough to make a coherent toast. The marriage is the easy part.

There are a few bands that always put me in a good mood. The Toy Dolls is (are?) one of them. Happy Punk-vember!

I'm a little salty at Korea right now, as I can think of nobody better to blame for the three hours of sleep I got last night, but all things considered, it was an interesting trip, and I'm glad I got to see it. Onto the pictures!

They have the technology

My hotel, the Lotte Hotel Seoul, is apparently a joint Japanese-Korean concern that caters to Japanese visitors. Hence the spiffy toilets.

It comes wiht instructions

Looks like I misspelled "with". I blame jet lag.

Don't press the smiley button

I realize I took a lot of photos of toilets, but honestly, the "palaces" were kind of boring.

Korean Mac store

It's like a Mac store, but it's called "Frisbee"... I guess if you're going to use a random English word in Korea, there's no reason for it to make sense.

If you can tell me what's happening here - you win a prize

Koreans have a dish called Bi Bim Bap that is roughly as common as hamburgers are in the United States. Bi Bim Bap is basically a big mound of rice with a bunch of stuff piled on top of it. The good news for me is that in addition to being ubiquitous, Bi Bim Bap is also delicious and -- in many cases -- vegetarian, unlike virtually everything else in this country.

I had eaten Bi Bim Bap before I visited Korea, but I've really taken my appreciation of the dish to new levels here. I've eaten it no fewer than four times, and I suspect I'll be up to six or seven by the time I depart these shores.

Korean hamburger

Now it's true that I might be getting just the tiniest bit weary of mushed up veggies and rice, but it's either that or pork, braised in beef, smothered with shrimp paste, so I'm just going to be grateful to Mr. Bap, or whoever it was who came up with Korea's finest gift to vegetarians.

I'm about to head out to dinner, and while I realize I have a little bit of time before Sunday is over, I figured I'd just post now and keep the quest for pie alive.

Korea is still here and I haven't starved to death yet. I'm pretty pleased that I'm going to be asleep while my real and fantasy football teams are busy losing their games this week.

The interesting thing about international work trips is that you often end up in places that you would never think to visit on vacation. Sometimes this is awesome -- visiting Cairo was a landmark experience and one I probably wouldn't have thought to create on my own. And sometimes it just means you're in kind of a boring place far from home.

I'm not quite sure which category Seoul falls into yet, but I'm leaning toward the latter. For as big and cosmopolitan as it is, Seoul feels really homogeneous. I've been to a bunch of different neighborhoods, and they've all felt identical to one another. There are some national historic sites to visit (old palaces and the like) but even these feel sterile and undifferentiated.

By far the highlight of the trip so far has been my trip to a Korean spa. If you want something to scratch your culture shock itch, this is just the thing. It was just me and my friend and a whole gaggle of naked Korean dudes taking the waters. Turned out to be quite relaxing once I got into the swing (hey-ooooooo!) of things.

I can't say the same for the half-day tour of the DMZ from which I just returned. The DMZ is South Korea's single biggest tourist attraction and it shows. The first stop outside the DMZ features a parking lot amusement park and a towering food court, and the hard sell continues throughout the tour. The infiltration tunnel dug by the North Koreans was pretty cool, but the requisite stop at the "amethyst museum" at the end of the trip was not.
 
My conference begins in earnest tomorrow, so maybe it's just as well that there's not much left I need to see.

Onto the pictures!

DMZland

The helmet is pretty choice.

Breakfast

Korea = not a vegetarian paradise. I made a pretty good breakfast of spicy pickles and potatoes though.

Iowa in the house

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Here's me in my Iowa sweatshirt (Go Hawkeyes!) at a palace that someone important used to occupy. I didn't read the signs too closely.

Mmm dmz chocolate

My tour of the world's finest windowless conference facilities continues next week with a trip to Seoul, South Korea. These trips can be somewhat stressful -- especially for an aviophobic like yours truly -- I am quite grateful that my job provides me the opportunity to see a lot of places I might not otherwise go on somebody else's dime.

That said, this week's trip could have been timed a little bit better. I get back from Korea eight days before CarrieNation and I get hitched, leaving a pretty narrow window for me to resolve any residual jet lag/stomach ailments I may pick up in the Far East.

Seoul

Because things have been so busy, I haven't had as much time to plan out what I want to do on my free day-and-a-half or so in Seoul. I'm pretty sure my friend and I are going to take a day trip to the DMZ. I might want to visit Kukkiwon, the world Tae Kwon Do headquarters (I'm a card carrying member...I think).

One thing I won't be doing a lot of is eating out. According to this article Seoul is not only a bad city for vegetarians, it's one of the worst in the world. That is to say, not only is there nothing for vegetarians to eat, restaurant owners and employees are actively hostile to the very notion of vegetarianism. So that oughta be entertaining. I'm packing a lot of trail mix and protein bars.

You know who were pretty good for like five minutes? The Charlatans UK.

I really need to quit football. My favorite team since childhood, the Washington Redskins is irretrievably terrible and getting worse, and my fantasy football team -- long a happy outlet in the long painful death march of the Redskins' season -- has fallen victim to abysmal misfortune. There is now literally nothing I enjoy about turning on my "favorite" sport on television anymore.

Here's where I need your help. I need a new sport. I've tried to switch football allegiances, and it just won't take.

I'm open to anything, with the caveat that I intend to back a winner this time around, no matter what.

The current leader in the clubhouse is hockey, as my local Washington Capitals seem to be a good team with a bright future and scads of young talent. The only downside is -- it's hockey.

Suggestions are welcome.

One of the things I find remarkable about my childhood is how much overtly gay music I devoured as a young, oblivious metalhead. During Rocktober 2008, I discussed Accept and their opus "Balls to the Wall," paying particular attention to the track "London Leather Boys." I can't recall exactly what was going through my mind when I was obsessively listening to this music written by and for leather daddies, but I recall thinking they sounded super badass.

This year, I thought I'd call out Exhibit A in the openly gay heavy metal phenomenon, Judas Priest's "Raw Deal". When lead singer Rob Halford came out of the closet a few years ago, he pointed to songs like this one and openly wondered how his "secret" wasn't discovered sooner.