I'm A Writer. . . No, Really!

Anyone who has known me for even the shortest amount of time knows that I've dreamed of becoming a writer since I was a little girl. Well, to be honest, when I was a little girl, I wanted to be the next Jane Pauly. I followed that dream all the way to journalism school, where I learned that most journalists are unhappy people with ugly hearts and no souls (and that's putting it nicely!). In other words, I realized I didn't want to become the type of person it takes to become a journalist. So, I left graduate school with the heavy heart of someone who's seen their entire future go down the drain. Most depressingly, journalism school made me hate writing. I was 24 years old, and I had no idea what to do with my life. Yes, 24 is young and maybe its not a big deal to not know what you want to do with your life at that age, but for someone who has had a "life plan" since I was 10, this was a bit unnerving for me, to say the least. Luckily, God distracted me with a wonderful guy, a beautiful wedding, and a breath-taking move to Europe. However, after a year in Germany, I found myself getting restless again. I actually missed writing. Cue God again: He dropped in my lap the opportunity to take a class about writing for children. Writing for children? I'd never considered it. But, if it gave me the opportunity to write about something other negativity, politics, and biased agendas, I figured I'd give it a shot. And I loved it. I loved, loved, LOVED the freedom that comes from writing fiction---and, not only that, but writing fiction for an age group that still enjoys the innocent things in life like puppies and ice cream. Naturally, after writing for awhile, I knew it was time to take the next step: getting published. It's a scary, tedious process, and after a year and a half of straight rejections, I was so ready to give up. I was almost ready to admit that, okay, maybe I'm not a good writer. Maybe this isn't what I'm meant to be doing. Today, I opened the mailbox and my heart sank: I saw before me a SASE (self-addressed, stamped envelope). When you submit a manuscript for publication, you also submit a SASE. This way, the editors have an easy way of sending you a rejection letter without having to put too much time or effort into the process. Anyway, I'd seen so many SASE's in the past 18 months, that I almost threw it away. But, curiosity got the best of me, and I wanted to see why I'd been rejected again: "Your piece doesn't fit our publication needs at this time" or "We've decided that your piece does not fit into any of our upcoming themes" or just a flat-out "NO." Imagine my surprise when I opened it and found these words: "Congratulations! We would like to publish your work in an upcoming issue." I had to read it several times before it finally sunk in--I was being published! Someone actually thinks my writing is worth sharing!

As you can see, the piece will be published by Skipping Stones magazine. Find out more about it here. There's some slight editing to do (which I've chosen to leave up to the professional editors at the magazine--I'm not good at editing my own stuff), and the Editor-in-Chief told me they should be done editing by March or April, which means they will make a decision on which issue to feature it in then. So exciting!

I've always been told that you can't really claim you're a writer until someone else says you are. Well, someone said that I'm a writer. So I'm a writer. . . no, really!

Mahalo!

I needed to get away. Temperatures in Korea were dipping below zero, the wind never fell below 15 mph, and the snow just kept piling up, up, up. I was grouchy and sun-deprived, and my poor husband couldn't take another minute of it. The only solution? A week in Hawaii on beautiful Waikiki Beach. . .

24 hours ago, these feet were shoved inside Ugg boots. :)

We looked forward to snorkeling, but the water was absolutely FREEZING. So Jonathan settled for taking pictures of the fish from a pier on the beach instead. . .

A beautiful sunset over Waikiki. . .

Diamond Head Crater, as seen from a pier on Waikiki Beach. . .

The forecast called for rain, rain, and more rain, but we weren't going to let that stop us from site-seeing. Now that we'd gotten some relaxing in on the beach, it was time for the first "must-see" on list: Pearl Harbor.

The U.S.S. Arizona Memorial. Such a sad, humbling experience. . .

The names of all the sailors who lay entombed below our feet. It gave me chills. . .

One of the most sobering sights from the memorial was the oil that continues to bubble up from the sunken ship, even almost 70 years later. . .

The U.S.S. Missouri

On the deck of the ship

Spot on the deck where the Japanese officially surrendered, ending WWII

Old air control tower on Ford Island, still damaged from the Japanese attack. . .

Hangar 79, still damaged from the attack, but now part of the Pacific Aviation Museum. . .

Now, everyone knows that I am a HUGE fan of the TV show 'LOST' (and Jonathan doesn't mind it), which was filmed on the island of Oahu. My sweet, sweet husband agreed to go on a tour with me to see some of the filming locations for the show. But, you know, even if you're not a fan, you have to agree that the views are spectacular!

We got to see a TON of different places and, to be completely honest, if you don't know anything about the show, the next few pictures will mean absolutely nothing to you. But, here are some highlights of the tour anyway. Here's us at one of the Dharma stations. . .

The 'Jug-head' Tower. . .

Pushing the Dharma van down the hill. . .

Hiding from the T-Rex where they filmed one of the scenes from 'Jurassic Park'. . .

Golfing with Hurley on the 'LOST' golf course. . .

Attacked by the Smoke Monster!

For our last night, we decided to go to a traditional Hawaiian luau, complete with entertainment and all-you-can-eat buffet. Only problem: it was FREEZING. There was a big storm coming in, and the wind off the water was brutal. The picture below is of us at the luau, waiting for it to start. You can't tell, but I'm wearing sweatpants under my dress. I broke down and was THAT girl. But I didn't care how white trash I looked. I was warm.

Beautiful music and dancing. . .

The most amazing stuff happened after it got dark but, of course, my camera doesn't do that well in the dark. These are the best two pictures I got, and they are pretty awful.

I gave up on the pictures and started taking video instead. Keep in mind, these videos are coming from a little hand-held Canon camera, so the quality is not great, but it gives you a taste of the ambiance of the place. This guy was supposed to be the number one fire dancer in the world. Is that true? I have no idea. . . but he was good.

Again, quality is not great, but you'll get the general idea of the luau.

We woke up the next morning, ready for our long journey back home, not knowing we had one more little bit of 'LOST' to experience. 'Hawaii Five-O' was filming in our hotel, and look who happened to be standing by: Daniel Dae Kim (aka Jin)! Jonathan played paparazzi for this photo.

Alright, no more playing around. We really do have to go back to cold, snowy South Korea. Aloha, Hawaii. You will be missed.

Want to see more pictures of our trip? Check out our Shutterfly share site here.

Hawaii Bound!

Aloha, Korea! The Woogies are Waikiki-bound! We'll be spending the next several days in the sun and surf, away from all this cold and ugly snow. We'll see you all when we return!! :)

P.S. I know you're all wondering but no, Oskar is NOT accompanying us to Hawaii. It will be hard to be away from my best friend, but I know he'll be having tons of fun with our good friends, the Haughs :)

Oskar's New Toy

For Christmas, I got a gift certificate for "Only Natural Pets" from my sister. I got really excited when I saw an "interactive animal sounds" toy for doggies, and I ordered it (along with some new bully sticks). The toy came in the mail today and. . . well. . . I'll let you see for yourself how Oskar reacted to it. . .

Merry Christmas!

Since our Christmas cards didn't come in the mail and therefore there will be NO Christmas greetings from the Woogies this year, we decided to just post our Christmas picture here on the blog. Merry Christmas, everyone!

"For unto you is born this day in the city of David a Savior, which is Christ the Lord."

--Luke 2:11

Random Oskar Fun

This post is really nothing but a collection of random pictures of Oskar that I couldn't fit into any other logical place in the blog. But they were too darn cute not to share. . .

This is Oskar's new way to beg for food. He stretches himself between the love seat and the recliner and stares at your food, drooling. Sometimes, he gets lazy and will just lay down. . .

This is Jonathan's favorite picture. He calls it "The Masked Kidney Bean." Short story long, Oskar has a blanket that he has destroyed by digging and chewing on, so it's covered in holes. Every once in awhile, he gets himself stuck in these holes and, well, this particular time, Jonathan thought he looked like he was wearing a superhero's mask. . .

In this clip, Oskar's ball has actually landed on the chair, and he can't quite figure out how to get it down. . .

Hope you enjoyed :)

Mustang Valley Demolition

This post will probably not be of much interest to you until you have lived at Osan or, more specifically, at Osan in Seoraksan Tower. However, I have to vent about the current bane of my existence: the demolition of Mustang Valley Village. For those of you who are not familiar with the area, Mustang Valley Village is the old military family housing unit here at Osan. The buildings have been condemned and abandoned for years while new housing tours sprung up around them, namely Seoraksan Tower, located directly behind it. Due to some bickering with the Korean government (SURPRISE!), it has taken forever for the Air Force to get permission to actually demolish the buildings. But, lucky us, they finally got permission this past August and the demolition began . . . and so did the constant headache and increasing frustration of all Seoraksan Tower residents (especially grumpy ones, like me).

Soon, we were dealing with loud bangs and crashes 7 days a week (although, give them props--they are HARD workers. They even worked on weekends, which was awesome when you are trying to sleep in), insane traffic patterns (for those that know the area, they turned the way road to Seoraksan into a two-way--not kidding. Yikes.), and construction workers directing traffic for no reason (case-in-point: the one guy who sat next to the stop sign on the way out of Mustang Valley. He waves his little wand and says "stop" in Korean over and over. Soooo. . . .copy, dude. Follow the rules of a stop sign. Got it.) Let's not even mention the dust and abestos constantly floating in the air.

So anyways, I had a perfect view of my balcony of the process, and I thought I'd share. This is what it looked like before. Ahhhh. . . many people would pay top dollar for a view like this one. I mean, come on, abandoned housing? You can't put a price on the beauty of that ;)

Hard to see, but they started the demolition on the buildings on the far-side of the complex. . .

Looking towards the Indoor Pool. . .

All finished with the buildings on the Indoor Pool side. . .

Look at those wide open spaces. . .

. . . they have to be almost done!

Nope! Two more buildings to go. . .

Now, it may appear that they are pretty much done, but they are still out there, tearing up roads and digging random holes. I'm sure there's a reason for it all, but it's a bit maddening at the moment. *Sigh* As are most things when you live in the land of the "not-quite-right."