The start of the rainy season and other updates from Korea

For weeks now, weather.com has been predicting torrential rain every day for the forseeable future. And for the past few weeks they have been horribly wrong. Well, it seems that the rain has finally caught up to their predictions. It has been pouring on and off for the past several days, and the dry spaces in between downpours have been incredibly hot and muggy. Now that the rains have begun, I'm slightly more inclined to believe weather.com's forecast. Sigh. I mean, I like rain - and it's been wonderful to lay in bed listening to it - but it's not exactly conducive to exploring.

Meanwhile, I've started gearing up - in the most literal sense - for my trip to Siberia. Since my visa invitation is in the works, and since I've been in contact with a travel agent who has located a reasonable round-trip from Seoul to Irkutsk, I figured it was time to start shopping for all the crap I'm going to have to bring with me. A couple of years ago, Frank gave me a really nice backpack, which I love - even though it smells vaguely of cat pee (thanks a lot, Ollie). It was the bag that went with me on my previous trip to Siberia. Unfortunately, while I love that bag, it's not really big enough for all the crap I'm going to have to bring this time around. As such, yesterday in a reasonably rain-free stretch of time, I went in search of a bigger backpack. I ended up spending way too much money on a Millet, but it is wonderful. I'm not too big a fan of the color, but it was the only choice. They did, however, give me a free waterproof backpack cover in neon orange!

I have also managed to acquire a waterproof rain jacket and waterproof camera case (both courtesy of The Red Face - Korea's answer to The North Face), and two quick-drying hiking shirts from woman selling them super-cheap outside of NAIS Mart. All of those are - quite oddly - in bright fuschia. I mean, that comes in third after lime green and neon orange, but it's going to be odd, me being so outfitted in pink and all! I also ordered a pair of hiking shoes. They're in baby blue, as that color was on sale. I am now really, really poor; my wallet is crying out in pain.

And speaking of crying out in pain... I have recently been feeding a stray cat that's been hanging around. (Not like I need any more cats in my life or anything!) I've been calling him (or her) Stray Gray, for self explanitory reasons. Last week, I was kept awake most of the night by this plaintive meowing. In the morning when I awoke, I could still hear a cat outside crying, so I went in search of it. Stray Gray was hanging out on the walkway/porch on the back side of my apartment. Part of that porch/walkway is covered, as it's where a lot of the electical boxes for the villa are located, and that's where I've been putting out food and water. Anyway, Stray Gray eats more in one day than Mia eats in a week, so I've been going out there a good bit. This afternoon I refilled SG's food and water bowls. And then stood up, bashing my head quite solidly into the corner of one of the metal electrical boxes with such force that I promptly sat down, and remained sitting, dazed, for a good five minutes. Now I have a very tender and rather large lump on my head, and splitting headache. As if I needed more things to trigger splitting headaches. Sheesh. Thank goodness for Excedrin.