I apologize to those who ask for care for being lax about posting. While it is true that I had a massive stroke, a bleed out from my right basal ganglia, I've experienced a near total recovery after having lost the use of my left side initially. that was a pretty damn scary experience, one that moved me to finally get off my asked and get back into the gym and control my diet, and I'm happy to report that I'm down to 117 kg as of today, from above 130 kg just before the stroke.
But I don't want to recount all that here. For those who are interested, you can see a pretty good chronicle of the entire experience on my Facebook profile, which is at www.Facebook.com/Metropolitician. apparently, you can follow Facebook profiles now like a twitter account, so we don't have to be full on friends. Just follow my updates.
In actuality, there are 2 reasons I'm posting here again. One is that because of the stroke, which left my typing for shit because my left hand is just not what it used to be, I purchased the full version of Dragon dictate for the Mac, but not to blog again, but tofinally finish my dissertation by this fall, and it has come to be an indispensable tool. It's accuracy is simply amazing. I can't recommend these voice recognition programs enough. The other real reason I'm back at it right now is because I finally paid my TypePad bill, which had gone late partially because I was in the hospital for a few months, partially because I really wasn't thinking about blogging while I was trying to get my left side to move again, and partially because I finally got some cash into my American account to pay my bill.
But the motivation that did exist for blogging here again is that I do have some loyal readers, which are recent e-mail reminded me, since a very friendly and worried reader sent me an e-mail expressing his worry at my sudden disappearance, since he had heard about the stroke through the grapevine.
I am here to officially say that I am okay and nearly totally recovered, and now on the road to getting my life truly back on track. Evidence of this is my recent improvement in health, getting around to doing things I kept meaning to do years ago, namely working out and watching my diet, and part of this new motivation includes the completion of the dissertation and doctoral degree I should have finished out years ago. So, you'll see occasional posts here, but most of my energy and efforts are going to go into the dissertation. I'm toying with the idea of posting chunks of it or entire chapters as posts, to sort of get a conversation going and my juices flowing.
I also now live in Haebangchon, which is significantly cheaper than where I lived before, and is the place where I will live in my fortress of solitude, without working, as I live off of my insurance settlement and finish the dissertation once and for all. So, the new humbled and healthy Metropolitician plans to hit the job market with PhD in hand sometime next year, and move on into life with more academic projects, which I should have been doing for a long time. This doesn't mean my photography projects are at and and, nor has my interest in the subject abated. I'm just going to take it easy for a while, teach my classes in the subject on the side, and use the next Seoul Fashion Week as a reward for a dissertation well completed. By the time October rolls around, I plan to be either finished or in the last stages of wrapping it up.
That PhD, I do declare here, will be as much of a present to my mother as it will be for me. it's time to finish things up and move on. This stroke was, surprisingly enough, a wake-up call on a lot of levels. I'm going to use it positively, since that's really the only way to do things, and see it as a benefit, not a detriment to my life.
So in sum, I am recovering, healthy, and getting back on the road to more academic pursuits. It's nice to see you all here.