::A Geek in Korea::

My wife takes after her mother in the cleanliness department. She cleans a lot more than I do, and doesn’t procrastinate when she sees something that needs to be sorted, wiped, folded, or washed. I’m a spotty cleaner in this regard. When the mood strikes me, I’ll do laundry like everyone else, but after a long day of work I don’t usually lift a finger unless I make a big mess.

My mother-in-law is convinced I’m slowly being starved to death by my wife. I am a naturally thin person. Exercise, work, and general business are getting in the way of all my lounging activities. I maintain a rail like appearance despite the meals my wife cooks. This concerns my relatives, who blame my wife’s cooking for my lack of fat.

If we had the time to prepare the hundreds of side dishes my relatives are used to at the table when they sit down, I’m sure we would both be fatter. The truth is, we don’t know how to make them, and don’t have a chance to eat them all that often. She and I get plastic boxes of things to eat whenever a relative visits, or we go somewhere with the family, all in an effort to keep us well fed. I’m not complaining, as there are some delicious things in the house now.

My mother-in-law decided to stop by to drop off her next batch of cooking tonight. She gave us a call to let us know, and as soon as I heard what was going on, I jumped into "clean mode". We hadn’t made any sort of mess, but that doesn’t stop someone when the Mother-in-law is about to drop in for a visit. If I didn’t clean the few things that were out of place, my mother-in-law might. She cleans habitually at her own house, and she might just start doing the same thing here if we ever let things slip too far.

I also tend to clean when people I’m not comfortable around visit. I like my mother-in-law, but the fact that we don’t share a common language makes it difficult for me to communicate with her. I get very nervous and mess up basic Korean words and forget my honorifics. It’s embarassing, and it happens every time I see the woman. She must think I’m a huge, awkward, bumbling fool.

Anyway, my disorganization doesn’t follow into the digital land of computers, so I went out of my way to let her see the pictures from our wedding and trip to China. After that, they talked for a while, then the mother-in-law headed home to catch her television drama. I spent the rest of the evening on the computer further uploading pictures to my flickr account, organizing, commenting, and sorting them. I might not have a neat house all the time, but my pictures are well sorted at least.

Right now, I’ve added private pictures of my wedding and will begin working on pictures of my family’s trip around Korea when I have time. This would be around a thousand or more pictures I need to upload and sort. Add me as a friend in flickr to see tons more pictures.