I once worked with a woman(!) who didn't understand that pee and menstrual blood weren't coming from the same orifice. I was like "...so do you just not pee while you're wearing tampons, or how do you suppose they work?"

My Taiwanese friend says the marching band at your funeral is nothing new (though not widespread). She says the strangers you can hire to cry at your funeral (yes, professional mourners) are much more obnoxious than the marching band.

Taiwan was named the Republic of China by Chiang Kai-shek. It's more like saying "this island over here is the REAL China now."

Cats just aren't social animals. Unlike dogs they don't tend to live in groups (lions being an exception). Most dogs can easily understand a friendly human as a "pack member", but cats would probably understand a human being as a combination of "non-competing organism that shares my territory" and "parental thing that…

Indeed. I'm surprised that work on this new sarcophagus is able to continue at all, what with all the feral mutants that must be attacking the construction crew.

I find it funny that most of the comments are either "why the hell are these people so paranoid?" or "this would be so easy to break into — and these fat cats deserve it, too."

Am I the only one who was never scared of Slenderman? I find some of the mythos stuff really entertaining but never exactly scary.

Yeah, in terms of tiny and every-inch-is-utilized living space, tons of Japanese (and Chinese as well) live in places like this already. My friend talks about her Japanese cousin's 200-square-foot apartment (which is spacious by some standards) where the microwave was set into the wall and the table folded down over…

My Chinese friend calls some of her female friends "sister", and before I realized that it was just an endearment I was so terribly puzzled (mainly because she'd slept with one of these so-called "sisters".) The word for "miss/ma'am" translates to "little older sister" also.

From this angle she looks like an angry nun.

Meditation — specifically mindfulness meditation — was a great help for my anxiety. Regular breath-focus/mantra meditation I found useful for intense stress (and pain management too!) but mindfulness can be done at practically any moment. After a week's practice I realized that the world around me looked noticeably…

If you watch closely, her character's uniform becomes more and more revealing the further along the movie goes (unzips further with each scene, I think.) Definitely meant as a spoof.

I just want to point out that male characters in the series are pretty frequently overexposed, shirtless or wearing bodysuits that have been vaccum-formed to their asses. Hell, Raiden spends a good chunk of MGS2 stark naked. (That being said, I'd be gratified to learn that Quiet is dressed like that for reasons other…

The Chinese preference for boys comes from the cultural expectation that your sons and their wives will provide for you in your old age. If you had a daughter, after she married she would be too busy taking care of her husband's parents to help your old ass when you couldn't work anymore. Historically, in a society…

I believe brown sugar is known as "black sugar" in Chinese (and they refer to black tea as "red tea", just to further complicate things.) There might be something similar termed "red sugar", tho.

I finished it, but I kind of slogged through it mainly to find out (a) what the hell happened to Snowden, and (b) because I misinterpreted the cover blurb and anticipated something that was not in the story. I don't regret reading it, but the ending did feel a little hollow after all the unrelenting grimness of the…

Women visit the temple to pray for easy child births and problem-free nursing. And yes, some ask for larger breasts and even pink nipples. (Pink nipples are considered attractive, apparently!)

Didn't Dr. Forrester wind up being regressed into an infant? I also think Pearl admitted to smothering him with a pillow some time afterward. It's been awhile so I might not remember correctly, but that sounds like some sort of karmic punishment to me.

I love all of these. Propaganda in general fascinates me, but the communist ones have a style all their own. The Maoist Chinese ones are pretty hilarious too (especially if you're lucky enough to have a Taiwanese friend who will oblige you by translating them all.)

There's a lot of good ones on there. I've read maybe half of them, but I'm pleased to see Solaris, Roadside Picnic, Zamyatin's "We" and the JG Ballard ones. Slightly more obscure titles.