Home matters.

Last night while waiting for Smalltown to finish work and arrive, I did something I haven't done for about six months (possibly more?): I phoned my ma.

Woke her up, too. Ha.

Everybody starting to talk about leaving Korea for the second time around is making me feel really, really old. So I punished my mother for it by pointing out that in like three days I'll be 30. And then she'll have a child who's 30. She almost burst into tears. I felt slightly better.

She's already a grandmother though, and I certainly wasn't responsible for that. She's only 47 anyway -- truthfully, far from old.

My gramps is doing alright. Somehow, the chemo is just not making him that sick. Ma did have some grave news to pass on, however.

My grandparents are currently stationed in my grandmother's fucking rinky dink sticks hometown in Alabama. They're modest folk who have modest needs. So. They like to do a good little trip up to the Hardy's for hamburgers every now and then.

The thing is, since my gramps started radiation and chemo, his appetite hasn't been quite right. He just can't get as much food down as he used to. Before he got sick, he would order the 1/3 pounder and eat it all no problem.

Now that he's doing chemo, he's had to downgrade to two 1/4 pounders instead.

....

Everybody reckons it's better to just let the man have his moment and not point it out. I don't think there's any image in the world that better represents my grandparents as a couple, though, than him sitting there sadly double-fisting a combined half pound of meat, nostalgic for the golden days of the past, while my grandmother rolls her eyes in the background and doesn't utter a single word.

In other news, the Co's are all aflutter because no one can accompany me on the business trip tomorrow and they .... god bless 'em.

"....I can just go alone."

NO! It's in another place! You might have to take a train! You don't speak Korean! You're not Korean! Oh my god! A TRAIN AND A BUS! A TRAIN AND A BUS! AND SOME WALKING!

No shit. They're phoning the other school's vice principal over this shit. Meanwhile, I've plotted the whole trip out all on my own and know exactly where I'm going and how long it will take to get there. They just keep looking at the maps I've printed out and telling me that the subway cost 900 won with a card, 1000 without, and that when I make a transfer, I'll have to walk up some stairs.

Oh goodness. I guess some things will just always be like this.

I'm just going to blame this panic on the fact that they're all drivers and try to forget it.