my ajumma notes

Cute dogs!  Cute Hae-na!  Cute Hae-na’s family!  Cute couple!  Cha Eunwoo’s cute face! All the dogs deserve praise and of course the two main ones should be singled out for more doggy treats!  However, there was too much use of CGI and the dogs looked too fake in those moments. Park Gyu-young (Han Hae-na) is delightful in this and so is Cocoa, as well as Hae-na’s voiceovers when she is in dog form.  I think there is a template used for actresses people don’t like – it says that so-and-so will never be a good actress, she has only one facial expression the whole time and has no chemistry with the male lead.  I saw a couple of such comments about Gyu-young for this show, but I’ve seen almost exactly the same points made about Shin Se-kyung , Moon Ga-young , Nam Ji-hyun and Park Eun-bin .  Well, people copying and pasting these comments, I don’t agree with you at all!  Eunwoo (Seo-won) is the one with a ...

“The book has a life of its own outside my control.” I had ask – How?  Why?  I wish there was at least a little spin on this.   It was interesting how Marie’s book  Sugar Flowers  becomes the centre of intrigue – a missing author and a near-miss when the book misses out on winning the Prix Goncourt award, a seeming playbook for murder that draws police to the publishing house.  I’m all for intrigue and that’s why I hoped for something more intriguing than it being nothing more than a coincidence that the men die in the same way as the characters of the book.  Sophie and the rest of the police characters weren’t needed, then?  (So why was she given such a major share of the plot, if she was merely part of the red herring?)  The revelation that Marie was the writer was also a bit of a let-down for me.   Violaine Lepage is interesting as the heroine of the story – such a tragic, colourful, strong personality....

Omo, I had no idea he was coming here!   photo from TikTok Im Siwan graced our shores last weekend and I missed it all, of course.  I would have liked to see him as well as his travel and food photos.  Must take note of his suggestions when/if I travel to Korea. He must have delighted and charmed everyone there, but why wasn't the interview done in English ? His interview here:

After waiting for a long time to watch the show, I discovered that someone has very kindly uploaded episodes of Dear My Room on YouTube!  Yay!  I don’t know why there are only four episodes, though…   I read that the show is closely tied to its CJ parent, hence the heavy focus on house DIY and related materials, not to mention the tutorial epilogues at the end of episodes.  It feels more like a DIY than interior design show as Eun-joo’s (Ryu Hye-young) house improvement efforts feature way more than Min-seok’s (Kim Jae-young) design work.  Most of the time, we see him coming over to help her or look at what she’s done rather than working on one of his projects.  I’d have liked to see his interior work!   Nevertheless, it is a fun and cosy show, and of course I like the leads.  Min-seok is too straightforward and predictable a character for Jae-young.  I don’t think this was very difficult for him ...

A law firm that serves the elite and that would do anything, right or wrong, to save and keep its clients and political supporters?  Perfect recipe for odd cases.  Still, it is far more watchable than  One Dollar Lawyer . Song & Kim becomes Song fighting Kim for Song & Kim.  Song Pil-jung (played by Lee Geung-young) is rather extreme in his ambition and manipulation.  You would think that as a lawyer and an intelligent person, he would know when to stop or at least have a breather but no, he just marches on with all his wrongdoing.  I still found him more palatable than Jang Geum-ja, though. I didn’t like her swagger, didn’t like her fashion ( especially  the Squid Game-tracksuit look), didn’t like her mannerisms, didn’t like her personality, didn’t like her methods, so yes, I just didn’t like this character at all.  She’s good at thinking up crooked ways to find info and get things done but I didn’t consider that ...

So proud of SSO and its successful Australia tour! Looks like it was a wonderful trip. All photos from the YouTube channel of Jon Paul Dante , Principal Trumpet. Thank you, Dante, for your videos! His third Australia trip video : I really need to be there in the concert hall sometime...