Moving!

This week is our move…I’ll probably be offline through the end of August while we get situated. See you in September!

Nora Ephron and nonfiction writing

There’s a review of author-screenwriter-film director Nora Ephron’s new memoir in the NY Times, in which Ephron is quoted as saying: “I can’t understand why anyone would write fiction when what actually happens is so amazing.”
While I can understand why someone would want to write fiction (to protect loved ones, to escape reality, to be [...]

Better.

I’m feeling better, finally. Thanks to everyone who sent their well-wishes!
For the past hour, I have been writing a very long, very spirited post on the evils of buying cough syrup today, as well as the suckiness of Border’s and Barnes and Noble, but my computer for some reason decided to eat it. Whah!
Now I [...]

Korean-Japanese cultural exchange

Here’s an interesting look at the proliferation of Korean-Japanese cultural exchange that has been happening despite tensions between the two countries, from the English-language Korea Herald. I didn’t realize that the importation of Japanese cultural products was banned when I was living in Korea…

Sick. As in 3rd grade-esque, fever-dream, hack-up-a-lung, watch-daytime-TV sick.

I haven’t been this sick in a long, long time. Fever, cough, sore throat, the works.
It sucks.
I’ve gotten some medicine from the doctor, so hopefully it will start working soon. In the mean time, I’m having a hard time doing much of anything, let alone writing. I did manage to get in a couple of [...]

Soup *Is* Good Food

My nice, inspiration-inducing cold has morphed into some kind of evil that has hijacked my throat and with it my voice. Ahem. I’m all croaky.
Also, I am plagued by an unpleasant hacking cough every ten minutes or so. And my ear hurts. And I’m achy.
Good times.
When it comes to food and being sick, I’m all [...]

Cats, kimchi, and kittens

Yesterday I had an appointment near Fillmore Street in SF and used it as an occasion to do two things I love to do:
1) Visit Pets Unlimited, and play with the kitties! If you’re not familiar with this place, it’s great. You can just stop by and stroll through to see what cats and dogs [...]

Inspirational sneezing

Yesterday morning, in the span of about ten minutes while I was taking a shower (inconveniently), I had a hugely epiphanic bout of inspiration on my book. I mean, the ideas were coming so furiously I couldn’t keep track of them all. New themes, new chapter titles, new paragraphs to add to existing chapters that [...]

Korean Cultural News Extravaganza!

Some interesting articles about Korea’s rapid development (and coping with changes wrought by it) made their way into my inbox this week.
• First, a continuation of the article series I posted about a week or so ago, about “international wives” in Korea. This particular article in the series leaves me feeling a little uncomfortable. The [...]

What are you going to do with an MFA?

People have been asking me, from the moment I announced that I was going back to school to get an MFA, “What are you going to do with that?”
My preferred answer has been, “That’s not the point.” And it wasn’t. If I wanted to use grad school as a stepping stone to some kind of [...]