A little Seoul in Logan Circle The Korean media have been abuzz over the pending transfer, seeing it as a symbolic righting of a long-standing wrong. Korean officials even had a television crew and reporters along when Jenkins recently gave a visiting delegation a tour of the 6,300-square-foot home. At a meeting this month in Vladivostok, Russia, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton said she urged both countries to, literally, chill out. The Koreans say Phelps House, which they bought from Sevellon A. Brown, Phelps's son-in-law, in 1891 for $25,000, according to an embassy fact sheet, was "forcibly taken over by Japan," which paid the Joseon Dynasty $5 for it in 1910 and then sold it to an American buyer. The Jenkins family bought the stately manse - which had had a series of private owners and had once been a local Teamsters union hall - in 1977, Lauretta Jenkins, Timothy's wife, told the Loop. That was back when the Logan Circle area was besieged by prostitutes and drug dealers. Turns out he indeed was a retired Korean army officer - and grandson of the country's first ambassador, who lived in the home. A spokesman said the embassy does not intend to re-install an ambassador but might use the building as a cultural center and museum. D.C. records show the property is currently appraised for $1.65 million, but we suspect it's being sold for substantially more than that. An O'Reilly replacement? Buzz on the Hill has it that the nomination of Rear Adm. James Syring to head the Missile Defense Agency may be voted out of the Senate Armed Services Committee in the next few days for a possible confirmation vote before the Senate takes off at the end of this week until after the election. The move would bring to a close the somewhat stormy four-year tenure of Lt. Gen. Patrick O'Reilly , who was sharply criticized by the Pentagon inspector general in a May report that faulted him for an abusive management style. That's probably why the agency ranked 223rd out of 224 smaller federal government operations in a "Best Places to Work" survey a couple of years ago by the Partnership for Public Service. The possibility of a Senate confirmation this week seems a bit swift given the Senate's somewhat leisurely pace of late on confirming administration nominees. But we were assured that the chamber is treating this as a routine nomination, just moving it along before adjournment. One factor in favor of that scenario is that Syring is hardly an unknown commodity. He's said to be well respected in defense circles and is the Navy's program executive officer for integrated warfare systems. If confirmed, Syring, now a one-star, would get two more stars as a vice admiral. A factor working against that timetable is that, with the Senate these days, you just never know. Research maven Alice Crites contributed to this column. Twitter:@InTheLoopWP.