I wasn't expecting to see a reply to a comment from either months ago but here's something that refers to it.

https://m.blog.naver.com/PostView.naver?blogId=0323lena&logNo=220562414194&proxyReferer=https:%2F%2Fwww.google.com%2F&trackingCode=external

Chili mac is an all time favorite in my household.

Breakfast skillet is a close second.

Our little lady, on top of the usual kids stuff, is fond of electronic/club music.

That and civil war era songs.

It's an odd bunch and it's great.

I suspect you will not be in for a good time

I railroad.

Specifically, I'm working as a conductor now but I'm also engineer certified on a class 1 railroad.

My hours and income vary.

I've had times I'm at work/doing work related stuff 90+ hours a week. Other times I might sit in for nearly a week.

Lowest I ever made in a year was 35k and the most right around 100k. Usually I'm in the neighborhood of 80-90.

I'd like a link. Thanks!

I've been voting since the day I've been able and in damned near every election.

As has my wife.

Don't sit there blow holes in our collective boat and complain that we're not bailing the shit boomers created out fast enough.

Man, baby wipes are the real mvp.

Didn't use them until I actually had kids but now I wonder how I lived without them.

Sure N Koreans can be hard; but you have to remember that it was defectors that he was talking to. Y'know, the people that came over willingly.

From what he's told me, they were for the most part willing to talk. The bounties on equipment definitely helped too

His main thing was debriefing defectors

Dad came stateside from Korea around the time he turned 15. This was on one part Grandpa wanting a better future for him and one part not being able to support him in the economic situation of post war Korea. Finished high-school, tried his hand at college but ended up joining the army because he couldn't afford both school and making a living.

Did his service and ended up joining the Defense Intelligence Agency as an interrogator. This lead him being posted back in Korea where he met my Mom.

Left government service to start his own business and then we all came stateside when thr business went under in the IMF crisis.

I graduated high school in 2007 and I remember a lot of standardized testing. Schools seemed to think that their only purpose was to make sure that kids passed them so that they wouldn't have their funding affected.

As in, when those tests were coming up, everything else got dropped to prepare for those things. Didn't feel like we were really being educated. We were just being prepped for one test after another.

I really hope that we get away/have gotten away from that model.

I hadn't really thought about it for a while but now that I have a couple kids of my own it's been back on my mind.

My wife has been wanting to eat hot pot for a while so we had that. Plus, I'm not brave enough to deny a pregnant woman's cravings!

Our daughter is not a big fan of spicy so we decided to go for a more basic soup base instead of our preferred szechuan style.

Soup base started off 2 cartons low sodium chicken broth. Garlic, green onions, 5 spice, star anise, dried jujubees, ginger, and salt.

For the rest we had thin sliced ribeye, napa cabbage, bok choi, various mushrooms, fish cakes, and fried tofu.

Also had some steamed clams on the side I picked up on the way home.

Little lady had a few bites. Mostly was in it for the enoki mushrooms.

Ended up resorting to her usual soup and rice.

Kids can be so strange.

I only say that because spinach is one of few vegetables our daughter will eat. Especially if it's with scrambled eggs.

All others seem to be a hit or miss. Mostly miss.

Edit: I forgot but the one other vegetable she'll eat on a regular basis is green onion. Regular onion is a no go though

Good deal. Thanks for the reply!

That's more in line of what our original mental numbers were.

Thanks for reply!

For sure. They can be wild little critters

I suppose that was always an option. We all just handed straight to the kids so they were involved.

All the kids are under 2 (the youngest not even a month) and lets just say that their self control could use a little work.

They were all more interested in the envelopes and pouches than the money. Funny enough I turned my back for two seconds and my daughter was chewing on one of the envelopes she got.

We were in the mindset that all that was required was a token amount since all the kids are so young.

For sure!

I think that in the diaspora community, especially away from major centers, things tend to change more often than not. Maybe it's because there isn't quite the pressure from the community to maintain the old ways.

I know, at least in my family, things are much more casual than when we were in Korea. Or even in California for that matter.

This year was a bit of hybridization since one of friends we had over is gen 1 Chinese. While nothing was particularly fully traditional for either party, the big thing was to get together for the holiday.

I do hope your aunties' situations improves soon! That's heartbreaking to know that they avoid seeing their own children.

And trying to keep things simple is a good point. Thank you for the comment!

Giving what you can afford is a very good point.

As for being poor, my family and I have been there and done that. Even giving out 20's then would have been a serious detriment to the finances then.

I really do appreciate your reply!

I really appreciate the feedback! My family is Korean so it's good to have a specific reference.

2 dollar bills is a good idea! I think I'll definitely have to look into that.

Talking about cash: one thing that surprised me this year was that my bank told me that didn't keep a stock of new bills. What they told me was that they hadn't been able to order new bills in some time.

I'll have to ask if they keep stock of 2 dollar bills.