"What the pho" was the name of a Vietnamese restaurant I used to drive by in Huntington Beach when I was commuting from Long Beach to Newport Beach so frequently, 3 years or so ago. I thought of it because we went out for pho after work today at a Vietnamese "pho joint" near where we all live – "Team D" (Jenica, Peter, me and Christine and honorary member Joe, who is actually "Team A" but is Christine's boyfriend). The pho was good, but I think I wasn't doing very well at being sociable… I felt awkward, even though we've all spent time together I just felt I had nothing in common with any of them. Sometimes I feel like I'm trending too much toward being an anti-social hermit. I do great with the kids, but with adults it's like I lack the basic social skills necessary to be desirable company. It's almost bewildering.
I read in the New York Times, several days ago, the following quote of Yeats on the Irish national character (cited by Timothy Egan in an editorial), "…an abiding sense of tragedy that sustained people through temporary periods of joy." But, I was thinking… this could describe lots of people and lifestyles. In a fit of inappropriate overgeneralization, suddenly I wonder: are the Koreans the Irish of Asia?