Wee.

A kid has died after being returned from North Korea after having been held prisoner there for over a year. I have two thoughts on this.

The first one was that supporters of The Toddler had touted his release as being an example of our president's ability to make deals, this seems incredibly foolish now as the "deal" involved North Korea sending us what was essentially a dead man, would he be alive if The Toddler wasn't a huge piece of shit? Dunno, I mean it is still North Korea, but I feel like it says something that that is what they are willing to give us.

My second thought veers dangerously close to blaming the victim, so I want to make it clear that no one deserves to have whatever happened to him happen, and the government of North Korea is every bit as corrupt and totalitarian as you may have heard, it was their decision to imprison and torture this kid and no one else'.

That said, why does anyone still go there? People, it is a literal hostile state where American tourists go missing or are publicly imprisoned with a certain depressing regularity. No matter what Dennis Rodman says it is not a place for you to go on your gap year. I am certain that the average citizen of North Korea would be friendly and inviting to you, but you don't get to deal with the average citizens when you go there, not really, the state watches you every second you are there and your interactions are strictly monitored and controlled. An American cannot go to North Korea with any serious hope of seeing "the real" country or some shit. Don't go places where the government explicitly hates you as part of it's political agenda. Just stop.

That is all I have on that topic, in less than seven hours I will be on a plane to Florida for a week, which will hopefully be fun, I don't really like traveling or sleeping in places that aren't my bed, but with any luck I should be able to overcome that challenge.

What I won't be doing is blogging while I am there probably. I will have computer access and probably some free time, but it just isn't something I tend to like doing on vacation, I don't even spend a ton of time on Facebook. It isn't that I specifically seek to unplug or anything, it is just that this stuff becomes a lower priority to me, so there you are. We'll pick this up again in seven days or so.