Strange-ee Week...

It has been, to put it mildly, a rather unusual week. Actually, that's not an entirely accurate statement. Let me try again: For a normal person, it would have been an odd week. For Stephanie, it has been a pretty normal week (since odd occurrences are the normality in my life).

It is bone-numbingly cold here in Gyeongju right now, so I have seldom been warm this week. Korea is a different type of cold than what I am used to. It is unbelievably dry, and occasionally quite windy, which I think makes it feel even colder than it really is. Thus, with my poor circulation on top of that, my hands and feet keep going numb every day, and my hands have consistently been a lovely shade of purple. I can't seem to find my gloves anywhere, so I have taken to wearing fuzzy socks on my hands instead. Surprisingly, I think they actually warm up hands better than gloves do (maybe because the fingers are together?). In the evenings, I turn up my ondol (heated floor) and usually sit around wearing three sweatshirts and a scarf. I am really hoping that groundhog sees his shadow in a few weeks!

Of course, the cold is not what has made this an odd week. Perhaps the oddness of the week was somehow influenced by the cold, though. Monday started the chain of strangeness. On Monday, I managed to drop my only large towel in the toilet (dratted lack of toilet seat!) and managed to spill half of cup of coffee into my basket during one of the kindergarten classes (it took forever to get the mess cleaned up). On Tuesday, I had one of the most disturbing nightmares of my entire life. I dreamed that I was dating a mortician, and his mother tried to embalm me while I slept. The dream left me feeling rather unsettled for the rest of the day! Also on Tuesday, I got rather confused and kept thinking it was Thursday (the kids loved that).

On Wednesday, I stepped outside the door of the apartment building and nearly slipped on slipped on about a millimeter of strange white stuff...snow in Gyeongju! The kids were so excited, you'd think it was Christmas again! And, being my intelligent self, I spent all day Wednesday doing the same thing I did on Tuesday: thinking it was Thursday. Again, my dear students were delighted (few things are as fun as a chance to correct the teacher).

Today, I managed to drop my entire lunch face down on my kitchen floor while maneuvering it from stove to plate (Jasper was kind enough to clean up the mess with remarkable speed and diligence). I was thrilled, however, to finally have the date right for the first time in three days! Well, part of the date anyway. My brain is still grappling with the shift from 2008 to 2009. Thank goodness tomorrow is Friday!