My Anniversary Present

I'm sharing!  What a great year we've had...

March 27

Happy anniversary, my love!  What a great year it's been.

Hooray!

I know Mike's not likely to brag, so I'll do it for him. 

First, my handsome and athletic husband earned his blue belt in Tae Kwon Do last Friday.  I will admit to being just a tiny bit jealous, since it took me four years to earn mine (mostly because I only took classes in the summer when I was home from college), but I am mostly just happy for Mike.  It wasn't very long ago at all that he could not, try as he might, touch his toes.

Next, not only is my husband a great athlete himself, but his Company isn't half-bad as a whole.  The Cobras are currently ranked 9th out of 50 or so companies on post in the annual sports competition (points are given for participation and success in multiple leagues, tournaments, and events throughout the year).  I got to play volleyball with the guys last weekend and thoroughly enjoyed myself, even though my skills are definitely a bit rusty.

And finally (I saved the best for last!), it was announced last week that Cobra Company has won the Draper Leadership Unit Award, which is awarded to the best Armor unit in the Division.  To put this in context for my fellow non-soldiers, Cobra Company has been awarded one of only ten armor awards in the entire U.S. Army.  (This is a BIG DEAL.)  Congrats to the Cobras, and to my husband!

Music Links, If You're Interested

I was listening to my Gabe Dixon Band Pandora station when I heard a folk-alternative song that I really liked.  I went to click on the thumbs' up button, and discovered I'd already given it a thumbs' up.  Hmm.  Must really be good.  When I went to thumbs'-up another song and realized it was the same artist I decided to look him up on iTunes.  I sampled the rest of the album then bought it; this guy's pretty good.  Over to Wikipedia.  Turns out he's a fellow Sewanee alum from Birmingham, Alabama.  Cool!

If you're interested, you can find the artist, Peter Bradley Adams, on Grooveshark.  The songs I really liked were Los Angeles and The Longer I Run.  You can also download a few of his songs for free from Amazon and the artist's website.

Because, part 2

Because at 7:23 a.m., after a not-so-fun night shift, I couldn't decide if I wanted fruit juice or a glass of wine.  (And anyway, I'm not sure if wine is not appropriate for 7:23 in the morning, even if bedtime is 8 a.m.)

Just because.

Press Clippings

The U.S. and South Korea are currently conducting joint exercises, called KEY RESOLVE.  I'm not playing, myself--I'm holding down the fort back at our regular job, hence the two weeks of night shift.  (I'm not complaining, though--at least I don't have to wear body armor to work.  That stuff is heavy.)  It's serious business, the exercise.  Stress levels are a bit higher than normal in my little work world, both because the exercise is a lot of work and because the exercise is not making North Korea very happy.

For example, North Korean press recently reported that Pyongyang planned to turn Seoul into a "sea of fire."  Sounds fun, no?  Don't worry Mom--most of this is just the same rhetoric they throw around whenever they feel they're not getting their share of the limelight.  The North Korean press reporting has a penchant for colorful phrasing and an overt regime-supporting slant.  I know, shocking, right?  It would be funny, if only the plight of the average North Korean weren't so tragic.  Here's a small sampling from North Korean official press:

Comedies Enjoy Popularity in Pyongyang

Pyongyang, February 28 (KCNA) -- Comedians of the Mansudae Art Troupe and the State Theatrical Troupe have performed at the Yun I Sang Concert Hall in Pyongyang, enjoying a great popularity.

The programme includes gags, witty talks and comedies.
[....]
The witty talk "Noodle, Korean Nation's Dish" is based on deep care shown by President Kim Il Sung and leader Kim Jong Il for developing Pyongyang cold noodle.  The witty talk "Switch" calls for economizing electricity.
Among the pieces are other witty talks "Names of Daughter and Son" and "Love and Respect".
The performance gives the audience a better understanding of the advantages of the socialist system. 

Who knew Kim Jong Il invented naeng-myun?  Neat trick, since apparently it's been around since the Joseon Dynasty.  On a more serious note:



KCNA Denounces US-S. Korea Joint Exercises


Pyongyang, February 28 (KCNA) -- The U.S. imperialists and south Korean puppet warmongers Monday started joint military exercises for aggression Key Resolve and Foal Eagle across south Korea.  [....] This is another grave move taken by the U.S. and the south Korean puppet forces to escalate the confrontation with the DPRK and ignite a war, opposed to the peace and stability on the Korean Peninsula.



Herein lies a true aim sought by the group of traitors in south Korea in deliberately torpedoing the preliminary talks for opening the north-south high-level military talks arranged with much effort to defuse the military tension on the Korean Peninsula.



As already known, south Korea has consistently responded with ceaseless frantic war exercises targeted against the DPRK to the proposal for opening wide-ranging dialogue between the north and the south made in the joint statement of the government, political parties and organizations of the DPRK.

[....]

This is a blatant challenge and perfidy to the DPRK which has made ceaseless efforts and showed magnanimity to ensure dialogue and peaceful environment on the peninsula.



Key Resolve and Foal Eagle are bound to drive the north-south relations to more serious catastrophe and increase the danger of war on the peninsula.  The army and people of the DPRK will counter with their own-style strike method against those who dare challenge its dignified socialist system through their adventurous joint saber-rattling.





Meanwhile, here's what the rest of the world's press has to say about the Dignified Socialist System:
Charities warn of food shortages in North Korea
By Nick RavenscroftBBC News, Seoul
Officials from five aid agencies who have just returned from a trip to North Korea say they saw evidence of looming food shortages and alarming malnutrition, including people picking wild grasses to eat.




Hungry North Korea appears to be stockpiling food
(Reuters) - Impoverished North Korea is headed for another year of sharp food shortages but its multiple requests for aid appear disproportionate, suggesting it wants to stockpile food rather than feed the hungry, officials in the South said. Years of mismanaged farm policy and natural disasters in the 1990s resulted in famine that some estimates said killed as many as a million people. North Korea, involved in a face-off with the West over its nuclear weapons programme, faces "looming food shortages and alarming malnutrition", five U.S. aid agencies said on Wednesday, urging emergency food aid for the country. The diplomatically isolated country has been asking most countries in the world, other than the poorest, for food aid for several months, one official said.





 

 

The pleasure's all the Dear Leader's By Sunny Lee   BEIJING - When it was leaked in South Korea last week that Kim In-hye, a popular soprano, television celebrity and music professor at the prestigious Seoul National University, had habitually used violence against her students over the past 10 years - as well as mobilizing them for private functions such as her mother's birthday - media outlets quipped that she had used her students as a "pleasure squad".   The term had been used in Korea to describe groups of attractive young women enlisted to provide entertainment and even sexual services for North Korean leader Kim Jong-il and his top aides.   Little was known outside North Korea about the pleasure squad, known as Gippeumjo. For years it was such a well-kept secret that some analysts even doubted its existence. But information
has gradually emerged through the testimony of defectors such as  Lee Il-nam, a nephew of Kim Jong-il who attended the same private  school in Geneva as the leader's son, Kim Jong-nam, and later defected to South Korea.








Hardships Fail to Loosen Regime’s Grip in N. Korea
By MARK McDONALD
Published: February 24, 2011


SEOUL — It was 1992 when a new wave of economic reform in China reminded the Chinese people that getting rich was glorious. Meanwhile, in neighboring North Korea, citizens were being exhorted to take part in a nationwide campaign of their own: “Let’s Eat Two Meals Per Day!”
In the two decades since, even as its Asian neighbors have succeeded at market-style transformations, North Korea has stuck with its command economy — resolutely socialist, centrally planned, stubbornly self-reliant.
“And grindingly poor,” in the words of John Everard, the former British ambassador to North Korea. As the envoy from 2006 to 2008, Mr. Everard saw firsthand that the North was on a “precipitous descent into levels of poverty we more normally associate with sub-Saharan Africa.”
Economic data about the North are notoriously unreliable, but the anecdotal evidence is alarming enough: Children with oversized heads and rust-colored hair — telltale signs of malnutrition. Hospitals where broken legs are splinted with broom handles, where patients are told to bring in empty beer bottles for IV drips. Most factories are closed. Oxen outnumber tractors.