SEOUL, South Korea (CNN) -- The last bit of news I heard before boarding a plane to Seoul a few days ago was that North Korea had just fired 100 artillery shells into the sea near the border with South Korea. Disturbing news from North Korea comes just as often as stories that make us laugh in disbelief. The many quirky, mystifying, baffling developments in Pyongyang make its young ruler, Kim Jung Un, an irresistible target for comedians. It was hard to suppress a laugh, for example, when North Korea severely declared that an upcoming satirical Hollywood movie constituted "an act of war" and filed an official complaint with the United Nations.North Korea had fired artillery shells into the sea near the border with South KoreaFrida Ghitis: North Korea is simultaneously threatening, bizarre and brutalShe says it's tempting to ignore North Korea's antics as bluster, as empty threatsGhitis: But by firing missiles, threatening neighbors, it is volatile and dangerous
It is those random, capricious, frequently dangerous behaviors that allow fragile, brittle, bankrupt North Korea to force its dazzlingly successful neighbor, _, to maintain a constant state of alert, to wonder if its capital city can survive an attack across a border that lies just 35 miles away.