my ajumma notes

What a guy, what a career, what fun we had watching him!   I’m not sad to see him go as I thought for years that his body had had enough.  He pushed on for more, and the last few years were still exciting, the highlights for me being   - the very unexpected and wonderful AO 2022 win [sorry Medvedev, don’t know how the match turned around the way it did] tennisworldusa - the big four playing at Laver Cup 2022  Getty - Federer playing his retirement match with him Getty - playing doubles with Alcaraz at the Paris Olympics afp - final match at Davis Cup 2024 for Spain -- but of course! Well done, he who fighted to the end! atptour Who else regrets not getting this when it was available?   People are re-selling it for a few hundred... 

In a few days, the Jubilee Year of Hope will close, and we’ll say another goodbye to the Pope Francis era.   yup, some people got this close to him Like his predecessors, Pope Francis spoke a lot about peace, hope, joy and God’s mercy.  Of particular relevance to me in the past half year, he of course continued in the tradition of writing encyclicals and other documents.   It was wonderful being in Fr David Garcia’s Social Ethics class for a look at the social teachings of the Church.  Everyone in the class now knows the significance of  Rerum Novarum  and why Pope Leo is Pope Leo!     Two highlights for me – the first was summarising  Veritas in Caritate  (Pope Benedict XVI).  I’d only ever thought of our school motto  In veritate, et caritate  in broad and general terms.  Yes, truth and love are so basic and important in our faith.   Veritas in Caritate  taught me how the...

The title has an airy, genial feel and the show does have its airy, genial side, but also think of it as TRAPPED, since everyone was trapped by the past.   It was fun trying to figure out who was who, who was on whose side and how the awful king would fall.   The scholars It wasn’t too hard to guess that Kang San (Ryeo Un) is the deposed/missing prince and that he isn’t really gruff and disinterested although he’s exasperated and rolling his eyes most of the time.  Shi-yeol (Kang Hoon) has the best ‘disguise’, with the nice contrast between his highly-skilled fighting and loyalty versus his silliness.  It felt at times that Yoo-ha (Jung Gun-joo) was an extra but finally, he gets that one brave act of letting himself be captured to protect the rest.   Shi-yeol identifying himself to Kang San as his watchman was dramatic but the most shocking revelation in the show was that the Old Guy (Shi-yeol’s mentor) is the king’s watchman!  Howe...

How interesting can a show about potatoes be and how is post-military discharge Kang Tae-oh?   The potato research part sure wasn’t very interesting but it was passable as the backdrop.   The story was more about some very childish people doing very childish things but thankfully, there were a few meaningful threads running through it.     Kim Mi-kyung (Lee Sun-bin) is extremely childish, for example, in making life difficult for So Baek-ho ( Kang Tae-oh ) when he takes charge of the lab, for abetting the childish village chief and elders in their attempts to do the same (was that supposed to be funny?) and when expecting Baek-ho to do all kinds of silly tricks to win back her affection.  You’d think she would grow up over time but she doesn’t.  She is topped only by best friend Ong-joo (Kim Ga-eun), childish right to the core.  30-somethings who cannot behave their age.   Hee-jin ( Jung Sin-hye ) is more annoying than chi...

Agency (2003)   Lee Bo-young is a wonderful actress, and that worked against this show for me.  She was so intense, portraying Go A-in grappling with her personal difficulties and so naturally fighting office politics with her own manipulative shrewdness and scheming.  That was more angst and politicking than I wanted to endure.   lovely queen swats away the company snakes It all got far worse when Han-na ( Son Na-eun ) and the rest of her Kang family appeared.  The grandfather is ridiculously biased and full of himself, the father is so unsure of himself, and the brother is a pathetic victim of the silly practice of pitting the children against each other.  Han-na is thinly delivered, annoying, childish and strangely styled.  What was up with all those huge bows in her hair?! no match at all for the queen Special mention to Han Joon-woo (dead fiance in Be Melodramatic ), playing Park Young-woo, young man with brains and abili...

A charming set of cute couple stories plays out against the backdrop of palace intrigue, also exploring attitudes towards marriage, matchmaking, destiny and love.  With that scheming-rivalry-ambition thread, a different title might have been more reflective of the plot.  Nevertheless, the matchmakers and friends were highly entertaining, and I’m glad the point was made more than once that while it’s great to find the ‘perfect match’, it is not the most important thing in life to find or end up with THE one.  Matchmakers The writer(s) did Rowoon a huge favour by making Jung-woo funny, bright yet pitiful, in a way that was suitable for his abilities.  Also, his height and imposing stature are the best foil for this sheltered ‘talent’ (knows everything, thinks of everything, could pick up swimming and fighting just by reading up on them!) who is prone to lovesickness!  His character gets more interesting points as well, for example, by him appe...