Friday, July 13, 2012

I Fly Like Paper, Get High Like Planes

Your Love Is Like A Rollercoaster Baby

June and July have been wonderful, and awful, and completely interesting. The ability to paint, and decorate as we please is such a glorious benefit to this apartment, and I honestly cannot say enough about how excited I am over having a fireplace. One of the beautiful new pieces of art going up on our walls is a painting by my dear friend Nykolai Aleksander.  It's simply stunning!


I need to get a frame for it, but it will look great in the living room.


Storytime!

So, once upon a time I lived in London England, as I have mentioned in passing. The nice thing about living over the pond is that all of Europe is so close! I didn't travel outside of England quite as much as I wish I had, but I did manage to make it to Amsterdam, because I was young, and very interested in ...The Coffee Shops.

*coughs*

Anyway, It was a really lovely trip, and I got to spend time with a friend who lived there. We climbed to the top of  the Martinitoren in Groningen, and strolled through Assen (where he lived). But on my first day there, we were in Amsterdam herself. What a city! 

We drank at a few places, and stopped in at a Cafe. There was a man who stopped me in the street and asked me if I knew his friend Charlie. In my naivete, I grinned and said "I don't know, do I?" Erik managed to stop laughing long enough to explain that the man was asking me if I wanted cocaine. I picked up some strange candies (which were gross) that I think were salted licorice, and a marijuana lollipop (which was surprisingly tasty). There were bicycles everywhere, and I don't think anyone there was overweight. We saw a movie in English with Dutch subtitles. It was "Wallace & Grommet, and the Curse of the Wererabbit". Still one of my favorite films. The most bizarre thing I saw while I was there was a women's babydoll t-shirt that said "Mas, papa. Por favor!" I stood in front of the window it hung in for a good 10 minutes trying to decide if it was a poor translation job that made them order that shirt, or if it was intentional. I never did figure that one out.

I wish I could find more of the photos I took, but I wasn't as good with my backing up of files back then. I also lost a laptop in London when the flat was broken into.

"ERMIGERD! A giant novelty shoe!!! You must prove how much my friendship means to you by HUMILIATING yourself by sitting in it for a photo!!!"
No, I'm not laying down in it, I'm just that much shorter than Erik. 
The Red Light District was not as crazy as I imagined, though that may have had a lot to do with our being there in the day time.There were boobs everywhere though, and I bought a penis shaped salt shaker for my friend Keir, who in a very British, and polite way, declined my gift. I can't remember where that penis ended up. I probably gave it to someone I wanted to make uncomfortable. (It was a very *large* salt shaker.)

It's been so many years that a lot of what we did is sort of a blur. I remember that Erik tried to kill me with food from Febo. It was so hot that I burned myself when I tried to eat it, but once it cooled down it was very tasty. He refused to tell me what was in it however, so to this day I have no idea what I ate. It could have been anything. It set a precident of not asking about what I was eating however, which culminated in my wolfing down haggis, before asking what it was made from. Lesson learned*.


When we arrived at Erik's house, we proceeded to drink way too much, and smoke various things. (I was still a tobacco smoker back then). It was all fun and games until someone vomited (me) and someone passed out (..okay, fine. That was also me.) I vaguely recall crawling on hands and knees up the extremely steep staircase, and sleeping fully clothed on the guest bed.

Best. Time. Ever.




Yep. I'm a special snowflake, for sure. There is another one where he stacked bottle caps on me, but you don't get to see that. I must retain some dignity.


So there you go crew, another story of the stupidness that is my life. Husband and I plan to start taking more vacations, and visiting my friends that live abroad, so pretty soon there will be many more ridiculously irresponsible tales of my adventures.

Till next time!

*by lesson learned I mean I learned nothing.









Monday, July 2, 2012

I'm really terrible at Blogging

Nothing much exciting here

Still unpacking, and settling in. It's a process. This apartment makes my mood swing wildly about at times. I like a clean place, but I'm not horribly fussy about "tidy". Example: I hate having dishes in the sink, or an unvacuumed carpet, but I don't mind a neatly stacked pile of books, or a shelf full of knick-knacks.
However, one thing I cannot stand is bugs. Ugh. I don't mind bugs outside, because that is where they belong. They don't belong in my home though!
And we have an ant problem. A horrible, ugly, disgusting ant problem. They're the tiniest ants I've ever seen, about the size of three grains of sugar. And they're driving me mad! I'm frustrated all the time. They even got into my freezer! Of course they all died immediately, but still I had to pull everything out, bleach the inside, check all the food to be sure it was all still ant free (it was, I mean, really... it's all wrapped in there, right?).

Plus, almost a month here and my dishwasher is still broken. Ugh.


Noah's Ark

On Wednesday, the 27th of June, I ran away from all the chaos here, and stayed all day at Noah's Ark. If you've never been to the Wisconsin Dells, it's a giant waterpark. Oh man, I loved it so much. I really needed to have a few more days of that. Not the high priced food, or the ridiculous souvenirs, but the warm sun, clean water, and getting to float around on a tube while I chat inanely with a friend. I feel like I don't get to decompress very much, which is quite honestly my own fault in many ways, as I have a hard time relaxing. It would be nice though to have more time for fun.

Housewarming!

This weekend we're having a small housewarming party. I say small because no one has RSVP'd, so it might be just the three of us that live here, and my sister-in-law. But on the other hand, everyone might show up unannounced! We'll see.
I have the living room/computer area, hallway and bathroom painted. The kitchen is a god awful color, but it's going to have to stay that way just now.
I have photos!
The photos aren't the best, by the way, because the lighting is really bad, and I was too lazy to do anything about it. Sorry.


The color is "rainforest fern" and Data goes well with it.

The bathroom color is my favorite, so I'm trying to think of excuses to use the color elsewhere in our apartment. It's called "peacock blue" and it's... bold.


Bold like a PEACOCK! AMIRIGHT?
The kitchen will probably end up a light green. Something that compliments our living room. Our bedroom will probably end up a light russet color of some sort, since all of our bed linens are in shades that vary from copper to chocolate.

People More Interesting Than Myself!

If you're still reading at this point, WOW! I am SO sorry. This entry has been really boring and long, so I'm going to reward you with super awesome links.

I read a number of blogs, most of them by complete strangers, but a couple of my good friends also write blogs. They are all funnier, and more talented than I am. More interesting too, while I'm being honest.

http://sarahfoundkorea.blogspot.kr
My friend Sarah is from the U.S., speaks French fluently, and is teaching English in South Korea currently. She started a blog to chronicle the crazy ups and downs of being a sarcastic female in a foreign land.


http://keiross.com/ 
One of my dearest friends, he happens to also be a pretty funny guy. He and I don't get to talk every day, or even see each other very often currently, but it's always as if no time has passed at all when we do. He moved from the UK to Germany for work, and now he's blogging the schnitzel out of Berlin.