Sept. 2, 2012 Part II

My landlady took me to the local Asian grocery store today. Called H-Mart, it's a Korean store bustling with shopping carts and food sampling stations. We tried this spicy Korean noodle dish that was made with shellfish soaked in some kind of paste. We also tried marinated mackerel and the sampling guy sold me on it so I bought a kilogram of mackerel for $1. 43! Holy moly! (or "Holy Pelican Balls!", as Matthew would say). I came out of H-Mart carting twice as much food as I would have bought at an American grocery store (for half the price! I love this place!). My landlady was confused because she had bought less food than me and had somehow spent more money. All she had bought were two bags of peanuts, a handful of sweet peppers, and some instant noodle bowls. "You did very well for yourself," she told me, still baffled. Luckily, she reminded me to go back and buy rice...Also, I saw this Hello Kitty apron that I really wanted to buy but I stopped myself. Someday, I thought. Someday when I'm making an income instead of living on borrowed money.

It was raining when we came outside and my poor landlady, she ran out to get the car, almost soaking her socks in the process. She hates getting her socks wet. Well, when we got home, her family had arrived and were hanging out in the house. My newest roommate and her family arrived shortly afterwards. They were surprised when I told them about the parking pass. They didn't know that a parking pass was required to park on campus. "We'll work it out," I reassured her.

For the remainder of the evening, I sat reading The Da Vinci Code until my landlord told me to come out on the porch and check out the new grill he had just won. "Everybody grills on Labor Day," he told me, although he might have been talking about the rising temperatures...