I've wracked my brain,

but I'm not really seeing any silver linings these days.

To start with, the trip home I was SOOOO excited for for 6 months, was anticlimactic and, at times, disastrous. From most of my nephews having the flu (good times for the parents AND kids during Christmas!) to none of my friends being around to my sister thinking I was out partying instead of spending time with my nephews when I was stuck sitting around most nights unhappy (didn't want to risk getting the flu one of the two rando weeks I have off each year, & no sick days, so if I were sick when I got back, I'd have the unmitigated pleasure of teaching with the flu) to 2 friends being too tired to come see me the ONE TIME I'm home in 2 years for a week on my last night in town, coming home was not all I had been dreaming of. It DID however make me hate Korea even MORE since Chicago's pretty, with nice architecture & clean air, as compared to Seoul's cement jungle covered in huge blazing neon signs & blasting kpop music & crowds. My skin took 2 days to clear up (minus the stress breakout I had). I cried so hard when I got back because I just hate it here so much. So that was a super fun bonus! I was depressed the whole first week back.

Lately I've been blessed with being unable to sleep before 4:30 AM, even with melatonin. Once I WAS able to sleep, I've started waking up because my nose is running like a faucet. Which is a bit ironic since that woke me up 2.5 hours before my alarm went off today, & when the alarm DID go off, I woke up to realize that last night I really DID need to leave the kitchen water running, but did not, so when I turned on the faucet today, nothing came out. Well, it WAS really fucking cold. A whopping 6 degrees last night, & we're not going above freezing til maybe Saturday or Sunday. NATURALLY, when I went downstairs to the office, that old useless fucker wasn't there. EVERY. SINGLE. TIME. I go down there for him: because the pipes froze today, or the whole apartment blew a fuse, or whatever, that old dick (who is the same useless guy who didn't tell me my 10 lb of chicken had arrived, so I had the unmitigated joy of throwing ALL of it out) is not there.

I texted Sue, & she called, so the building manager came up, with useless old guy in tow. Building manager points to me & says, "Hend pone?" Meaning, give me your phone. So I do. Guy puts the phone to his ear. Repeatedly. I was like, "ARE you KIDDING ME right now?" I take the phone, bring up the dialer, hand it back. He keeps pressing the green talk button without dialing, & again holding the phone to his ear. Mind you, ALL he has said or indicated at this point is that he wants my phone. Then he tells me to call me. ME. Call... myself. I can't even begin to be mystified when he FINALLY says, "Call manager." Ahhhh, Sue! I call, it won't go through, I call, he hangs it up. THIS is what I deal with day in, day out in this fuck show, btw.

He finally gets her on the phone. I'm to try to put my heating fan on under the sink tonight, but folks let's face facts, that is NOT going to work! The fuckers are frozen now, & they're staying frozen since I'm here at work 'til 10. Soooo... pretty damned pointless to try to heat them up after that much time, but I'll do what I have to, since I remembered while working out last night I needed to leave the water running, but forgot at bedtime. Stellar of me to forget on the coldest night of the year.

It's only the kitchen sink, too-- the bathroom works just fine (though I left that faucet running today, just in case).

So, I'm tired, my nose & sinuses are pissed off about the air here, my skin is falling back into not being happy here, I froze the pipes in my kitchen, I have 6,000 won ($6) in my bank account, & can only pray Sue will pay us tonight since tomorrow is pay day. & OH YEAH! In February, during the Korean New Year, we'll have a Friday & Monday off, but us expats have to take out all cash we'll need for the weekend on Thursday because the Wori bank cards may or may not work.... all weekend. Someone posted about getting a notification on this, & others confirmed they had as well. PERFECTLY REASONABLE to limit or deny people access to their bank accounts, ESPECIALLY on a holiday weekend when NO ONE will be working. WHY? No one will be working, so wtF will they be doing that will require  repeated, random inability to use our bank cards? Keep in mind as well that NO ONE here can use their cards EVERY NIGHT between like 2-6 AM, some range in there, each bank is different, because that's when the banks do maintenance on the servers or systems or something.

I live in a developed country. I live in a developed country. I live in a developed country.

Send help, send sanity, send alcohol. I get to do this for another 1.5 years.