I Am A Man of Constant Sorrow

Actually, I'm just going through a phase where I love both bluegrass and the word "man." More on that later.

First, I have to tell you about going to Amherst and the crazy free workers-communist bookstore where Jack and Katelyn had to buy books for their media class and there was the longest line in the world cause I guess Amherst or some college with departments sends a bunch of their students there to buy things. We spent most of our time in line looking at a book of drag queens, so it was not time wasted. Then we went to Ben & Jerry's and answered the question of the day (how many stomachs does a cow have?) and got a 10% discount and ate delicious ice cream. Then Jack complained for a long time about how there are not enough gay men around (we think he is crazy, but he comes from gay Mecca) and we got on the bus and came back to our darling Hampshire and we finished watching Ed Wood and got some dinner and the internet still didn't work so we decided to do homework instead. Jack and Katelyn went to read for their crazy media class and I sat down and wrote my essay that is not due until Wednesday but it's a pretty terrible essay and my goal was to be able to edit it, which is currently happening, but I am getting ahead of myself. After I finished my essay, Jack wandered by having just showered, and decided that he needed some tea, and that I should use my fancy new teapot and tea filter to make fancy relaxation tea (which is orange-cream flavored and so delicious thank you Mary I love you) and we relaxed and drank tea and then Jack went to bed cause he's a sucker with 9 am classes. I settled in with some Scrubs for a quiet evening, and then Sara dropped by and decided she wanted to learn to knit, so I taught her at 11:30 at night, and then she eventually headed to bed and I slept as well and I love sleep.
I slept in and was lazy this morning, until Jack called and said "Are you in your room? Good. Katelyn and I are coming to make some hot chocolate in your kettle. See you in a bit." So I put pants on and put the kettle on and washed mugs and they showed up and we had hot cocoa and continued the list of gay icons for our crazy gay signs until it was time to meet Sara for lunch between her classes. After lunch came more of the gay sign making party and these are going to be the best signs in the world and I am so excited about them. I suppose I will eventually post them for you to enjoy. I had to leave Jack and Katelyn with the signs while I went to Spanish, which was less scary than last time cause they got rid of the crazy people who already know Spanish. I met a girl from Mt Holyoke who was nice, and some other people, but I am somewhat saddened that I don't have buddies in there yet. We were pretty happy when we took a break and discovered the signers were having a Mexican food party, and we crashed it to enjoy their mini-burritos and fried bananas. After Spanish, I grabbed the trusty buddies I always grab and we had dinner and then Katelyn and Jack and I rushed off to the bus stop only to determine that we did not, in fact, need the bus we had rushed to, so we decided that the prefix man makes every word better and it only made sense if you were there. Let it be said only that we were going to get on that man-bus and go to Manherst to buy some man glitter for our man signs. Then Jack and I had a big pretend fight in which he stole my shoe and I chased him around and I ended up emptying his pockets and filling my own with his belongings. Then we got on the right bus and relied on a girl from my Yiddish class to make sure we got to the Hampshire Mall right
and then we found all sorts of amazing glitter and pom poms and ribbons and fun fun things at Target and Joanna's. And of course the buses to get back had to be completely inconvenient and we got stuck waiting outside at UMass for half an hour (as Jack froze because he is from Texas and an incredible pansy) but we finally got back to our beloved Hampshire and sent Jack to do his Spanish homework, which he totally procrastinated on forever while Katelyn and I hung out and drank tea and edited my essay for a while and Katelyn decorated my window and added some beautiful pictures of Whitman and Oscar and Bosie to my walls. At some point, Sara came up to help Jack with his Spanish and then she came to have me plan her morning for her (she has to get up at 9:30 so I can grab her at 10:30 to make sure she starts her laundry and then go to breakfast with her and she has to buy milk and I have to buy my Spanish book and Sara has to move her laundry to the dryer and get it out and be ready to get the bus at 12:30 to go to her Spanish class) and I think I am turning into everyone's mom and I'm not sure how or why cause I am hardly the most responsible person. I continued my mom-ness after sending Sara to bed when Katelyn and I sent Jack a note that he needed to be working on his homework and he replied that he was depressed so I took him some tea to make him feel better and then left him with space to finish his homework. Now Katelyn and I are sitting on my bed talking while Jack showers (he did finish his homework) and we're vaguely considering sleep but not really.

Lovesong

Nothing is sweeter than lying on the grass in the sunshine with my pretty Clara.

Yesterday was laundry day, and me, Katelyn, Jack, Madelaine and Tabitha descended to the basement to take over the 3 washers that were working (of 5) for hours and hours until all of our clothing was washed. I also did my phonetics homework, meaning that we had some great long discussions about whether there is a vowel at the end of theatrical, and what it might be, and the best way to pronounce beneficial and such. Somewhere in the middle of this, a fire alarm went off and we complained, but not as much as we did when it went off at 2 am. After our incredibly successful and widely acclaimed laundry party, we decided it was time for the highly anticipated gay sign making party and Tabitha went off to gather craft supplies and we made a list of essential gay icons for our signs and a list of people who will be receiving gay signs, i.e. people who live on our hall. Then we went to get food cause Jack was starving as always, and it was thunderstorming and beautiful and then we returned and my internet no longer worked, but neither did Jack's and neither did Katelyn's and we figured it was a building-wide issuem and decided to have a movie fest instead, starting with Ed Wood. Halfway through Ed, Heather showed up and we left Katelyn and Heather some space and Jack and I went to bother Sara and use her microwave to make the once-again-starving Jack some ramen and ended up watching Igby Goes Down and ordering pizza and hanging out until we went to bed.

Slept in this morning, discovered my internet still does not work, but Dulcey's does (she lives beside me) and Lianne's does (down the hall) and Dillon's does (across from Sara, so downstairs) and we're greatly confused. Grabbed Sara and Katelyn to go to library to get internet (Jack realized he had forgotten to wash his binder yesterday, so he was off to the laundry room again) and stayed there until Jack and I exchanged the following text messages:
me: I have your wallet.
him: Die Krappen!?
me: What are you trying to say, sweetie? Did you lose your mommy?
him: Damn you.
me: Kisses!
him: I need to get lunch before SAGA closes at 1!
me: I'm coming.
And so we went and ate for a while and then Jack finished his laundry and now we are relaxing on the grass in the sunshine and things are biting me and we are thinking about doing homework but we are so lazy. I have an essay to write for WWII and so do Jack and Katelyn and maybe we'll get to that today. Maybe the internet in our rooms will come back, too.

Always

Of course Saturday morning is the morning everyone decides to take a shower at the same time. Grr waiting hate.

So what have I been up to? Everything. Let me think. Thursday was a day for sleeping in and being lazy for a while... then it was Yiddish Lit, which I ADORE. I am one of 3 Gentiles in the class, and it's at the awesome awesome Yiddish Book Center which is FULL of super-old books that are all in Yiddish and I am pretty sure that if I just knew the Hebrew alphabet I would be able to read them pretty well cause Yiddish is just German with a funny accent. I don't even mind too much that it's a 3 hour class, cause Rachel (our prof) breaks it up pretty well and who doesn't love reading Yiddish stories that are hilarious and sad and sweet and perfect? Then I hung out with Monica for a bit and then it was off to Convocation, the official start of the school year. Bagpipes led us in what they called a processional, but since it's Hampshire, it was just a crowd of people walking toward RCC with some bagpipes ahead of us. Then there were a bunch of speeches, and Ralph ranted about Don't Ask Don't Tell for a while and Katelyn swears it related to something cause I guess she listened but I was really just there to get my Hampshire button and now I have my official button and Jack and Sara were all "oh we are going to take forever to come back from Mt Holyoke and miss Convocation and now we have no buttons" and I am all "hahahahaha." After Convo, there was a cook-out and we ate hamburgers and watermelon and sat on the grass like Hampshire students (Madelaine reports that Amherst students are waaaay too prissy to sit on the grass and it makes us laugh). Then Katelyn and Jack and I were good little students and retreated to our rooms to read Watch on the Rhine, a play from 1940 about how the US needed to enter WWII. We acted it out and had so much fun with it and you should have been there but you weren't. Katelyn told Aaron about it at her meeting with him yesterday and he said he wished he had been there, too. In between reading, I went to meet up with the storytellers, and we're planning a festival for the 22nd and I'll be telling and have to find a story soon! Also while I was in the meeting Jack made a very important impulse purchase completely without me and I am deeply offended that I was not there for that momentous occasion, but I will be certain to be around when the package arrives. Also we hung out and played lots of very loud very gay music cause we're awesome like that. Had World War II class on Monday and we talked about the play and the essays we have to write for Wednesday, and I made Jack and Katelyn like 2 minutes late and Jack glared at me and then he later drew on my foot while I was trying to say something in class and it tickled and I ignored it and it was very difficult. He didn't even draw anything pretty on my foot. I love this class cause Will and Aaron make us think and make us push our ideas and I feel like I am learning so much that has nothing to do with World War II. Then it was lunchtime, cause Jack had overslept and missed breakfast and was going to have some sort of fainting spell if we didn't feed him. Jack had no pockets in his pants, so I somehow inherited his keys and wallet, and of course took full advantage of this new power by not giving him his keys back when he wanted them and we had a nice long glorious pretend fight about it but now my big duckie is missing and we're going to have to get Phil off searching for it. And then I felt a little bad about accidently locking Jack's keys in my room while I went to Phonetics, but I felt less bad when he tried to send me angry text messages about it, except they didn't show up until 5 hours later, and so I had a good laugh about his terrible phone service (and probably mine too). After Phonetics class (which is 20 college students sitting around trying to make weird vowel sounds and it's awesome), Katelyn came by and made Jack vaccuum his rug (this makes sense if you have ever seen Jack's rug) and then we hung out for a while and got some dinner and waited for Katelyn's girlfriend Heather to come and take us to Northhampton, and then she was late, and there was hanging out on a bench and being tall, and leaf fights, and I decided that I need to poke Jack all the time and more leaf fights and then Heather finally came and we drove to Noho. Noho is full of awesome stores, as you know, and I bought a teapot and a tea filter and I am a happy girl. Then we stood in the longest line to get ice cream at Harrell's but it was amazing ice cream and made us really happy too. Then we got lost for a while trying to get back, with 4 people crammed in the back seat of Heather's car, and then we finally did get back and decided it was time for a Queer as Folk party and so we watched QaF for 3 hours in Katelyn's room and then I went to sleep and now it's half an hour after I first checked the showers, so I think I am going to go see if one is open now, or maybe venture to another hall to use their shower.

Big Disco Ball

Ah, Wednesday. My day of full classes. (Further investigation has revealed I have no Spanish on Fridays, so Wednesday is my only crazy day.) Woke up early-ish, chilled until I met Sara and Katelyn to walk over to our tutorials, found out that Jack has Acting before WWWII, which he didn't bother to tell me, enjoy having a history class where I understand what is going on again yay for English. Wandered to Post Office, Central Records, ate lunch before Sara had to go to her next class, headed back to Dakin, where I discovered that my ethernet cable reaches my doorway, meaning I can sit in my door and yell at Jack while we each check our e-mail. Went to Phonetics class, taught by an awesome bioacoustician named Mark Feinstein, and I'm excited about this class. Went to Spanish, taught by an awesome Columbian lady named Nubia, who promises weekly parties where we will eat food (such as Columbian food and Argentinian food) and dance and sing songs. Also there are waaaay too many people in my class who have already had Spanish, which angers me because they should probably be in some higher class to allow true beginners the option to truly begin. Grrr. Laughed a lot in that class cause Nubia is a funny lady who makes us laugh. Ran to dinner while on the phone with a neurotic Jack who always thinks we will be late, ate quickly, still got to showing of Modern Times early, gave Jack a hard time. Watched Modern Times and laughed at Charlie Chaplain for being a funny, funny man. Came back to Dakin, retreated to Katelyn's room to read Charles Lindbergh biography, apparently written by out-of-work trashy romance novelist, since half was about Charles's escapades in Florida with his wife (using thinly veiled metaphors about mangroves and ibises) and the other half was about Lindy being some sort of anti-Semite isolationist who maybe hated Jews but maybe just didn't really care about Jews but certainly singled the Jews out many times and there's this one picture where it looks like he's Sieg Heiling, but he's really doing the Pledge of Allegiance and gosh he was friends with lots of idealistic young college men. Also people in the 1940s had really, really funny names, and also Katelyn kept having to say "ovation," Jack and I had an argument about my ability to pronounce "tribune" affecting his ability to pronounce "tribune," and by the end of the night half of Jack's clothes were scattered across Katelyn's bed and we have no idea why. We have a 3-page Lindberg speech to read still, and also a play, and Jack's off-campus for Spanish tomorrow, and it's Convocation and various other early-evening activities. While reading aloud may be a whole lot more fun (and it really is), it also takes a whole lot longer. Le sigh.

Fun fact: Katelyn lives on an all-female hall (although, unlike sub-free, males are allowed to come on the halls (sub-free means no substances on the hall ever even in your body) and also apparently chill in a girl's dorm and sit on the bed with a girl and randomly peel articles of clothing off while reading Jack is really strange and I adore run-ons) and they have a cutesy sign on the bathroom that you have to turn when there's a boy in there.



Addendum: and then the fire alarm went off at 1 o'clock in the totally friggin' morning. The rumor I heard was that it was our detested lounge dwellers, who probably are chuckle-headed enough to do such a thing. Sleep now angry grrrr.

I've Got You Under My Skin

Silly blog, I feel compelled to tell you my every move when I really want to sleep. It's only 11:31, but I had to get up early. I can sleep much later tomorrow.

Tonight was wonderfully chill. After heading over to Jackson's mod to hang out and watch Margaret Cho and also watch Jackson's modmates stock their fridge, I came back and grabbed Jack and Sara for dinner, and then Jack and I decided it was time to do our homework. Earlier in the afternoon, Jack was chilling in my room, unsure what to do with himself, and I suggested he read the assignment while I knit. Then I suggested that he read it outloud so we could both benefit, and he laughed and took it as the joke I intended it. Only at dinner did we realize the genius of this concept, and we locked ourselves in Jack's room shortly thereafter and proceeded to read the entire 45 pages aloud to each other (I took even pages and he took odd. We stopped mid-sentence when the page stopped mid-sentence), having far more fun than we should have as our ability to pronounce the big silly words the author loves broke down (your word of the day is "desiderata." Jack's is "proferred" and mine is "indefatigable," cause we each had to say those words frequently and never could) and Sara occasionally stopped by and told us we were very cute. I also learned that Jack can't say numbers when he is reading out loud, for which I teased him mercilessly. And he teased me mercilessly for always changing the pronounciation of place names when I read them aloud. I am pretty sure all future readings for this class will be accomplished this way. Our reading was interrupted by the all-important hall meeting, in which Phil shared his 7 pound bag of candy (I love Phil) and talked about hall stuff and confirmed our queer status and we decided that we need to get together and make a big sparkly gay sign to make the other halls jealous. And we set quiet hours on weekends until 11 in the morning, which makes me happy. Then Jack and I kept reading, then we finished our reading and sat on his bed and talked until Sara came back from hanging out with her Mt Holyoke friend Karina, and then the three of us talked a bit but realized we are all super-tired, and it is sleep time.

I am so happy about my schedule, and happy that classes start tomorrow.

My Schedule

Just got back from meeting with Aaron, my advisor (also Dean of Faculty), and we got my schedule all fixed up and pretty. Just look at it:

Yep, no classes on Tuesday, just Spanish on Monday evenings, a little busier Wednesday and Friday, but overall lots of nice sleeping in and free time. Free time which I suppose I will be using for doing a lot of reading and writing for my tutorial. Got the syllabus today and bought my books (3 big thick huge things and a play for this one class) and the first essay is due the 13th. I'm gonna read for a bit now until Jack gets back from meeting with Will (our other prof and his advisor), and then I might bother him until we go and grab Sara from the library to get some lunch. I've got a meeting about work-study at 1, and a hall meeting at 8 (where we will hopefully deal with the loudness and find out once and for all if we are in fact the queer hall), and Sara's friend from Smith (or is it Mt Holyoke?) is coming by this evening. Classes start tomorrow! 

Black Hole Sun

(Yes, I am just clicking on iTunes and making it pick a random song to name my posts. I am feeling uninspired).


Woke up with a sore throat this morning, which is definitely Jack's fault. Glad he made me take my kettle last night cause I needed tea. Two cups in the hour before I left my room, during which I read e-mail and then talked to Jack and Jackson who wandered by, and then realized at 9:33 that I had to meet my orientation group at 9:30, and so I threw clothes on and threw the boys out and went off to find that the group had not left me, and we took a nice big walking tour of campus to figure out where stuff is. Then we took a nice long walk to Flavors, the awesome ice cream place where the cows that produce the milk are literally in the field behind the ice cream stand. It was wonderful. Came back, knitted for a while, met the dean who leads the knitting circle, talked about knitting circle, generally hung out with fingers covered in yarn. Now I am going to go grab Sara and we are going to venture to the post office cause I haven't checked my box yet. As a reminder, here is where you should send me stuff:
Kari Collins
Hampshire College Box 354
Amherst, MA 01002
USA
Please send me things I like mail.

We are pretty sure that we have confirmed the rumors that F2 is the queer hall.

After post office adventures came dinner and then wandering around and some plant-related harassing of Alex by Jack and then Jack by me and then all of us by Alex and probably some other combinations maybe, and then we played cards until it was time for Kate Bornstein's lecture. She was AMAZING. I won't go into details since this is a family blog, but she talked about gender and sex and identity and desire and power and God and gave us all "get out of hell free" cards and was generally one of the most awesome ladies I have ever met, inasmuch as she is a lady. Then we went to watch Velvet Goldmine cause Jack's packages arrived today and that means all his movies are here and we only just finished and I have class at 9 tomorrow, so I think I will sleep.

My Lady's House

I don't actually have a lady, but if I did, her house would be Dakin, because Dakin is the best house. Today, in bullet-list form (I love bullet lists- if you don't, I don't care)
-meant to sleep in, but everyone else on the hall got up and was opening and closing our dorm's loud doors, and I got up at 8:30 anyway. Ate my chocolate crossaint while talking to Jack (and making him jealous of my crossaint), wandered through the rain to meet orientation group at 10. (by the way, Kace, we don't call it o-week. your school is weird.)
-drew a picture and painted a flowerpot
-went back to room, met Sara for lunch, ran into Jack, found pudding, had much happiness
-met up with orientation group again to walk to Eric Carle museum of picture book art. Love this museum. Looked at all the pretty pictures (they have a Wizard of Oz exhibit right now!!), bought giant rubber duckie for $4, saw more kids in an art museum than ever before.
-toured dorms with orientation group in effort to discover where we all live. still think dakin is awesome and merrill is twisted and confusing and hopeless.
-went to explore the basement of dakin with Sara, found laundry room and rec room, went back to Sara's room and chilled until dinner
-ran into Alex in dinner line, determined that we must stick together so I could trade my short ethernet cable for his super-long ethernet cable (as agreed yesterday but then we lost each other), ate dinner with Sara and Alex and Morgan, decided to have a big Queer as Folk party with Sara's dvds after dinner. Called Jack to come to QaF party. Had popsicle battle with Alex (that I won no matter what he says), presaging continued attempts of Alex and I to prove that one of us was in some way superior to the other. I am superior.
-went back to Dakin while Alex went to grab his ethernet cable, made the trade, grabbed supplies for QaF party, put Sara's pudding in Jack's fridge
-went to basement, watched wonderful beautiful beloved cheesy funny Queer as Folk (also fought with the dvd player for a bit cause not a single remote had batteries)
-returned upstairs, ambivilated between my room and Jack's, settled on his, listened to music and talked and ate pudding and drank tea
-Alex and Morgan decided to return to Merrill, claiming "lateness." the three remaining settled in to chill, complain about the bass down the hall
-at 11:03 (quiet hours start at 11 on weeknights), wonderful beloved awesome beloved intern Phil came up and told the bass party people to shut up, we told Phil we loved him
-at 11:23, the bass started again
-at 11:30, Phil returned, party people claimed they forgot, bass stopped for good. tonight at least.
-talked, learned to play hearts, did semi-okay at hearts, taught Jack to play capitalism, remained in 2nd throughout capitalism
-decided we were tired and broke off, asked Jack if I could just retrieve my mugs later meaning all stuff I had in his room, he said sure meaning just the mugs, drug my kettle and tea bags back across the hall and teased Jack about being silly
-wrote blog from bed using power of new super-long ethernet cable for which Alex gets much love
-sleep

The Way Things Work

To give you a sense of Hampshire life, or at least the sense that I have of it, I am going to list the things I have done the past few days in general order, without excess commentary. Assume that there is much meeting of awesome people and making of friends going on during all of this. (Not listing all of the awesome people, much as I love you all, 'cause I'll leave someone out and feel bad. Also I keep forgetting names.)

Friday
-sat in some assembly about hampshire academics that I honestly do not remember
-broke off into tutorials, met my awesome two profs of said tutorial (which is just one of my four classes that has a different name because the prof is my advisor so QUIT ASKING ME) and discussed that book that we were all supposed to read and most people at least skimmed parts of and determined that none of us, including the profs, understands it but had a really cool discussion anyway that was really a discussion and not those high school things where the teacher tries to drag any sort of comment out of anyone while looking at the answers in front of her.
-stood in a long line to get lunch
-went to take a "student survey" for which I will be paid $50 and which consisted of me evaluating social dilemmas or something but it was multiple choice and I knew I was at Hampshire when the faculty dude giving us the survey was reading the required instructions and said "remain inside the ovals. I know this is Hampshire and that goes against our 'it's okay to go outside the lines' policy, but this is the last time you have to stay inside the lines. After this, you can go wherever you want."
-went to a program about sexual assualt that actually had really powerful amazing speakers and included actual discussion within an auditorium of over 400 students. got fodder for many future jokes about the word "consent"
-stood in a very long line for dinner then sat with some random folks to meet new people
-thought about going to the 80s dance being offered, until Jack from across the hall came by with a cold and I made him tea, and then Dulcey from next door said something about watching Harold and Maude, and the next thing I knew I was in some dude's room (still not sure who it was) watching Harold and Maude with a bunch of people, of whom I knew about half their names, and laughing and laughing. We were in the dude's room cause he had a double and we all had singles, so he had space for all of us.
-slept until my alarm went off and then it was
SATURDAY
-avoided the breakfast line by being late and sat with some random folks to meet new people
-met up with the orientation group to go watch PSAs made by the house interns to tell us about the rules and issues that might come up living in the dorms and whatnot. People who know what the DYC Rules Video at Blackstone was will have an idea of what was going on. Dakin House had the best video, I must say, but perhaps I'm biased.
-listened to "high on hampshire" presentation, which was about the use of substances at Hampshire
-sat in a circle on some sort of platform in the middle of a field with a random group of first years and older students to discuss something that happened last night that upset us in an angry fashion, not a scared or sad fashion, although there was a bit of sadness. Noticed how amazingly the older students discussed these things, had one of those "wow I am at Hampshire things are so different here" moments
-stood in the longest line yet for lunch
-decided not to go to the talk by the author of the book we had to read that we all at least skimmed but none of us liked, instead went to Jackson's mod with Jack and Sarah to watch queer movies and hang out and laugh a lot
-went to dinner early, circumventing most of the line and discovering the dual joys of having a wide selection of tables and discovering that there are sometimes pies for dessert. mourned lack of pudding, which was at lunch yesterday and we have failed to find again, although Jack and I make relgious pudding runs. laughed and laughed at truly offensive jokes.
-met some of orientation group to walk across cornfield and buy half-off pastries. not sure which part of that activity was better. plan to eat pastries for breakfast and thus avoid the long line and waking up before 9 associated with SAGA (the dining hall)
-went to hear Elaine Brown lecture. fell in love with Elaine Brown, figuratively. knew I was at Hampshire when things that would be considered incredibly liberal at home were the conservative things here, felt inspired for activism but totally overwhelmed. love my school more than you can imagine.
-returned to room, checked facebook, realized that a girl I had not yet met said she had a present for me. wandered over to merrill, discovered merrill is really twisted and confusing and impossible to navigate, found her room anyway, she gave me tea and we talked about kettles for a bit. love this school so very much.
-am now sitting in my own room, glad that the bass-blaring folks down the hall are quiet, cause I'm exhausted and might sleep when I finish typing this. ADORE my school.
-update 1:14 am: the bass-blarers didn't exactly stay quiet, but they were at least intermittent. Jack showed up for tea, and we talked for what I guess was 3 hours. Tea and talking is good, even when it's late at night and you're braindead.

Caring Is Creepy

Moved in to my beloved Hampshire yesterday, am in the process of meeting many fine and awesome people, doing all these orientation things, some sillier than others. Impatient cause I want classes to start, hungry. Going to correct that last one by getting some breakfast now.

Winding Road

Boston is a pretty great city, but it's raining, so I'm in the hotel room looking outside, wishing it were prettier. Got in yesterday (after grueling terrible terrible car ride that made me miserable), ate food, knit (all that's left on my first mitten is the thumb... still have to make the second mitten, of course), slept. Woke up today, went and looked at Tufts for Travis, got superiority complex when they talked about "majors" and "requirements," went into downtown Boston, walked in rain, looked at gravestones, looked at buildings, decided it was too wet, came back to hotel, went to lunch, returned to hotel, internet.

A List of Books I Read This Summer, Just Because:
The House of Spirits by Isabel Allende
Everything is Illuminated by Jonathan Safran Foer
Invisible Man by Ralph Ellison
The Gangster We Are All Looking for by le thi diem thuy
That last one's my summer reading assignment and in progress, the 3 before it rank among the best things I have read. Ever. Up there with the Color Purple and Dorian Gray and the Talented Mr Ripley. I wanted to read more, but I got distracted by other things.

A Good Flying Bird

I'm now in New Jersey, I hate cars more with each passing day, I'm sleepy. Lexi's developed a strange love for repeating songs, I have nothing interesting to say.

A Hundred Miles of Bad Road

Guess what? The Maryland Welcome Center has wi-fi! So you get a very very exciting update to say "I'm in Maryland now, on my way to New Jersey, which is a stop along the week-long expedition to Hampshire-land."


Trains are still way better than cars. I'd rather be having a cup of Earl Grey and some chocolate cake than mineral water and a granola bar right now, let me tell you.

I Cut All My Hair Off

Pictures forthcoming.

Leave it to Pro 7

To give me a solid laugh today. So Piff and I were baking some cookies and had the tv on in the background. Know what today's mid-afternoon docudrama theme was? Airports. So first some silly thing where some reporter went to Frankfurt and watched people cry as other people came and went and we rolled our eyes and laughed. Then, oh THEN came "We're a Happy Family," the docudrama that looks at some family's life. And you know what today's family was preparing for? Their daughter's return after 10 months in America as an exchange student. Oh, Piff and I laughed and laughed and laughed at these silly people, all setting up a brand-new television and cleverly hiding it under a flag, and making a big banner, and counting down the hours ("oh she's in Washington with her 7 hour layover now") and putting a frickin red carpet outside their door. And the little brother who saved his allowance for "weeks" to get €14 together to buy flowers. And how they went to the airport and rolled out their giant banner and put a bow on the dog and stood. And stood. And waited. And Piff and I laughed at them, and they waited, and then their daughter came home and looked sort of scared and then acted all excited. Her luggage got sent to Denmark, ha-ha. Then she came back to her house and was all "oh wow red carpet" and walked up to the door but she had no house key, so she had to wait for someone else to come let her in. Then she walked in and was all "Oh WOW it all looks so. . . same. Like it always did. Huh." And then she was too dumb to figure out the tv was under the flag and gosh this thing was funny.

Our cookies turned out okay, too, even if Piff breaks half of them in the process of getting them off the cookie sheet and on to the wire rack.



Don't you dare go getting ideas about a red carpet.

Introducing the Amazing Rockethead

For comparison purposes, a picture of me from last August, and a picture of me from May:




I spent Monday packing. Packing. Lots of packing, totally all packed up now. And I did my Abmeldung from Augsburg and I cleaned a bit and that was Monday. Yesterday, I got out of bed early and went with my host mom and Anja and Nadja to look at pretty castles and prettier mountains. We were kind of bad about taking pictures, but that's why I have the joy of hyperlinks. We went to Neuschwanstein and chose to just look at the outside cause the website has better pictures of the inside than is worth paying money to see for real. Then we went off driving through the mountains and stopped at the Plannsee for a swim and there was a weird guy there who talked to us and we decided later that he must have been a mailman but it was good swimming and we built towers from the rocks. Then back in the car and we drove to Linderhof, which is a very very pretty baroque castle that is mini-Versailles because Ludwig II really really hearted Louis XIV really. Totally pretty pretty place that doesn't let you take pictures inside but you should check it out sometime. Then we had dinner at the little restaurant there and I had real German Käsespätzle for the last time for a while, I guess, but I can totally make my own Käsespätzle. Then we drove home and stopped to stand on a mountain for a bit and then kept driving home. Somehow, a day in the Alps was what I needed right now- a day to go sit in this giant dramatic landscape and have my giant dramatic thoughts, or be able to finally ignore them, because these mountains have been here for so long and will stay here for so long and we can build our castles and highways and ski slopes, but even our tallest towers barely change that horizon, great beasts poking jaggedly into the sky.


I have a lot of things to do today, I guess, which is why I am awake early, I suppose (it is probably just nerves, really, and maybe the heat a bit).


And since I was asked, no, I am not going to be in any shape to play a mandolin this Sunday (hopefully those skills will come back soon, though!) but if the Sparrows want to change their program to include Lord I Lift Your Name on High somewhere, I will totally teach you guys how to sing it in German. Cause my German church is getting pretty good at singing it in English, and it is only fair. I promised.

Herr dein Name sei erhöht
Herr ich singe dir zu Ehre
Danke, dass du in mir lebst
Danke für deine Erlösung
Du kamst vom Himmel hierher
Zeigst uns den Weg
Und du hast am Kreuz bezahlt
Für meine Schuld
Und sie legten dich ins Grab
Doch du stiegst zum Himmel auf
Herr dein Name sei erhöht

Put Your Records On

Goodness I <3 Jesus Christ Superstar. I mean really. Last night's performance suffered a teensy tiny bit from accent issues (Judas especially) but only a little bit really. Otherwise, it was beautifully done and the director added some nice little sub-sub-themes via costuming: Herod showed up in a bathrobe, hooked to an IV, surrounded by nurse-themed background dancers. Naturally, I assumed he had AIDS, which is equally morbid and hilarious. When Judas did his zombie bit at the end and danced around the cross, his backup dancers were dressed in American flag vests, leading me to the assumption that some sort of blame was being laid on the US, with which I am not at all okay. I guess Americans are the new Jews? Another detail of the crucifixtion scene involved a dude with a video camera all up in Jesus's face, and Anja told me she interpreted that as Mel Gibson, which made me laugh. The Sanhedrin lacked the crazy onion dome hats they have in the movie, but they had some major bling going on and I guess that's cool too. Pilate OWNED his role, and was apparently some sort of understudy cause the guy that was cast as Pilate died 2 weeks ago eeep!? Also I realized that I basically have JCSS memorized, which I am sure will come in handy one day.

So today was my last Sunday at church, and the Official end of Nadja's work, although she's spending another month in Augsburg to do an internship, but this means there were many sad goodbyes. I have a wonderful big photo collage and all these memories floating around now, and I'm really going to miss my German church. So many amazing people who took me right in to their midst this year and were all a huge part of making me feel so at home here in Germany. By the last song, Nadja and I were both crying, and neither of us is sure we really want to leave. After church came Sommerfest, where we migrated to the yard of St Max (since theirs is green) across the street and grilled and ate and hung out and played around and painted giant musical notes and there was water and then there was rain at exactly the time things were breaking up anyway but it was short-lived and did nothing to stop the heat. Sommerfest was probably the best way to end my Augsburg EMK experience, and as much as I look forward to being back at Trinity, I really do love my church here and saying good-bye is very difficult. And since the Germans were always wonderful and worked their way through songs in English, I promised to teach you guys some songs in German, even if it's just translations of the songs you already know. It's only fair, really.

I plan to spend tomorrow packing, and probably also remember to de-register from the city of Augsburg. Tuesday is a trip with Eva and Anja and Nadja to Neuschwannstein and maybe some other things, Wednesday is when my host parents head up to Berlin for a meeting and Piff has his choir concert, and Thursday is when I fly. Nowhere near enough time. Sigh.

Oh, Right

I meant to update this thing, didn't I?

So first things first, I'll start with July 10th. I got up super-early and went to school and got on a bus and went to Nuremberg, where there is a museum about Nazis. The bus driver was an entertaining old man who told us that we are legally obligated to buckle our seatbelts, and that the police sometimes control this, and that they run into problems in that they stop the bus to control, only to realize that no one is legally obligated to have their seatbelt buckled while the bus is not moving. At the museum about the Nazis, we saw various exhibits about Nazis, and they had super-neat eyewitness interview things that made it much cooler- hearing old ladies talk about how they competed with their friends to see who could see the Führer the most in one summer when they were young is much more interesting than looking at some sign about the Führerkult. Also they had those fun anti-semite children's books like "How to Tell a Jewish Nose" and little children's anti-semite artwork and those make me giggle and also a little sad. Best quote of the museum (from an interview): "We didn't know where they were taking the Jews. I figured it was somewhere like Israel- somewhere for them to all live together, which would be better for them. Instead of just being bankers and captains of industry, they might have to sweep a street sometime, too." After looking at the depressing past all day, it was back on the bus, where our driver told us he never brings movies cause having to listen to a movie is the most boring terrible thing ever and then he told us to look for sheep in the clouds. I found no sheep, although I found some other things.

Then I guess I did less interesting things for a while? The Monday after that (the 17th), I went to Munich with my history class! Another day of getting up super-early to ride a train to meet Andre to drive to a place to get on another train except oops we got on the wrong train and then got off and had to wait for the next one and hahahaha. Then we walked around Munich and saw such important things as Where Kurt Eisner Died (there is a plaque with the outline of his body) and various important buildings, pictures of which live somewhere in the depths of Butterfly Paper. Then we had a quick Burger King lunch and then off to the Residence, where they had shiny shiny crown jewels of the Bavarian Royalty, and a few shoddily reconstructed rooms (here you see an artist's interpretation of what this room used to look like, and this original chair that we found in the attic I guess!). Then I took a more sensible train that took me straight home because that was sensible.

Tuesday was Let's-Go-Out-For-Dinner night with the host family (minus Piff plus Steffi and Nadja), and we realized we had a whole big pile of reasons to celebrate: Anja had finished her thesis, Philipp was back from America, Basti and Steffi were back from Egypt, Nadja and I are each leaving soon (okay this is not a celebratory reason) and Piff wasn't home (that one's celebratory though). It was a fancy Italian place in a courtyard and the appetizer involved recognizably whole squids, which grossed me and Nadja out, although playing with them was fun. Then I had a veal cordon bleu dealie that was really delicious, so thumbs up for Italian place in the courtyard!

Thursday Roo from Canada was in Munich so I went to Munich and hung out with him and his awesome mom! We looked at really really awesome art at the Pinakothek der Moderne (I am a little bit in love with and very scared of Hans Bellmer now) and walked around Munich (I pointed out important locations and only needed the map sometimes) and chilled at the Hofbräuhaus, which is a neat biergarten, and in general had a fun time. Roo took pictures, and he's flying back the day after me, so I'll hook you up some time in early August, I imagine.

Today is Jesus Christ Superstar at the open-air theatre in Augsburg, and tomorrow is Sommerfest at church, so I guess I'll have more Things To Tell You.


I know, I know, I said that I would quit
All right, I promise, no more after this
You don't know how I've tried
To forget what it was like
I remember now
Why they called it Thunderbird
Before you fall, you have to learn to crawl
You can't see heaven when you're standing tall
To get the whole sky
On the ground you have to lie
I know, I know, I said that I'd desist
All right, I promise, no more after this
Not to be what I was like
Not to soar across the sky
Spread my thunder wings and fly

My Current Project

 

Well, the wrongside of it at least (it looks pretty on the other side, I swear). Arthritis here I come.


(This and walking and drawing pictures is pretty much all I've been doing recently. Well, there was that trip to Nuremberg that was interesting. Wanna hear about it?) 

xkcd

dPain over dt

Things like this make me wonder if it's too late to major in math.

Wearing a Raincoat

 

Wearing a raincoat is flying around in a yellow rubber airplane made out of a raincoat. But if you think of that, you'll hurt your mind, and you'll need your mind for later on. 

LEONARD BERNSTEIN!

5 July
Went to school for history and art. Picked up various studies and things from the year in art. Painted really cute picture. Promise to digitize it if somebody asks. Please ask. Portugal v. France, of course France wins. Alliteration.

6 July
Went to school to do Sozi Referat. Talked about immigrants and races and America. Went well. Came home, went to Gerhard's work to help the interns translate a thing about coating the emission material on some part of a lamp or something, discover special Osram words that nobody else in the whole world knows, discover that this sort of translating is hard, but boys are nice and not too bad. Get super sweet Osram swag. Really sweet.

7 July
Skip school, sleep a lot. A lot. Rain, gray, do nothing of interest. Miss pretty weather for going outside.

8 July
Today. Philipp home. Germany to play Portugal. Hope Germany wins. Can't write complete sentences. Update.

I Think I'd Rather Spend the Day In Bed

"Kari, why don't you update with some sort of regularity anymore?" "Because I hate you all. Also my life is not that interesting, I swear."

26 June
Skip school, go to park and draw pictures instead.
27 June
Go to school, bored out of mind.
28 June
Skip school, visit Nordlingen, Heidenheim, Steiff museum, take pictures of churches.
29 June
Go to school, see duckies. Duckies are really really cute.
30 June
Skip school, Germany plays Argentina. 1-1 after overtime, Germany wins in the penalty shots, country explodes in joy, I cry a little. Get in car, go to cabin in the middle of nowhere with youth group (Piff "knew the way" so we of course got lost), roast sausages over fire, run around in the woods in the middle of the night in the pitchdark without a flashlight (but I did have those little glowstick thingies), watch boys build really big big fire, take lots of pictures, stare at stars, fall asleep.
1 July
Canada Day. Hang out in the sunshine, run around in the woods chasing Anja and Nadja and Jan except Jan hid himself somewhere and none of us could find him forever. Have water balloon fight that turned into water bucket fight because nobody likes waiting for water balloons to get filled. Dry out. Roast sausages over open fire. Roast marshmallows. Germans don't like marshmallows, sources say only Americans truly understand the wonders of a freshly roasted, gooey marshmallow. Play Wetten Das! with all sorts of crazy bets (including pajamas, cross-dressing, and hanging the clothes on our backs on a clothesline), win big. Make losing team run across big field to other house while singing songs about Germany becoming Weltmeister. Watch Truman Show. Watch boys build really really big big big fire (taller than Piff). Sleep.
2 July
Make paper boats, make storm to try to sink them. Hang out. Clean up. Hang out. Come home. Discover Hampshire orientation group is "Crafty Goodness and Exploration." Happy. Sleep.
3 July
Intend to go to school, oversleep, skip school. Go to park, draw pictures.
4 July
America Day. Skip school, make hot dogs. Think about going to park, drawing pictures.

Meta-note: I've gone and added Life Phases to my blog. Certain old entries now display a note "BEGIN LIFE PHASE ____" or "END LIFE PHASE ____." This stuff is probably more significant to me than you, but if you're curious how I sort my life (and it sorts into perfect periods of exactly 8 weeks), maybe you want to check this stuff out. Also you will probably see these sorts of notes popping up in future entries as phases begin and end.

Swimming Around in a Lake of the Undead

I gots busy. Good thing I keep notes! Run-down of my life the past few weeks according to my planner:

6 June
Nothing.
7 June
Nothing.
8 June
Extend visa, catch fever, sleep and drink lots of fluids.
9 June
Pick up train tickets to Rome.
WELTMEISTERSCHAFT BEGINS!!!! GERMANY V. COSTA RICA 4-2 WHOOO!!!
10 June
Train to Rome: leave Augsburg 20:06, switch in Munich 21:03
11 June
Little brother's birthday.
Arrive in Rome 8:09. Meet Camilla at train station, breakfast at cute bakery, little tour of Rome (Piazza Navona, which has an awesome fountain, Campo di Fiori, Piazza Venezia), lunch with grandparents, Italian food is awesome, meet friend Adriana and go to Osservatoria di Monte and San Pietro, get pizza, go to concert, have trouble finding club for concert, get mini-pizzas to become a Real Roman, sleeeeeep.
12 June
Colosseum and ruins, Circo Massimo, Mouth of Truth, relax in park, gelato, WM FUSSBALL ITALY V GHANA ITALY WINS
13 June
San Luigi de Francese (awesome Carravaggio paintings), Pantheon, hang out in park, meet up with Dario and go to Gianicolo to see an awesome view, go to Olympic Stadium which is weird because of facism, dinner, watch Brazil v. Croatia, I hate Brazil, meet Camilla's uncle who was visiting
14 June
sightseeing: Piazza del Popolo, Via del Baubino (monkey street heehee), Piazza di Spagna, Trinita del Monti, Via Condotti, Fontana di Trevi, Quirinale, hang out with Camilla's friend Chicca who has access to tv in English!, giant dinner with 9 Italians who talk fast while Germany and Poland play a terrible game except then Germany got a goal in the 91st minute and won yay.
15 June
Meet another of Camilla's friends at Villa Borghese, hang out in pretty park, shop a little, it is HOT HOT HOT, come home to chill because of heat, make Adam give me play-by-play on England v. Trinidad and Tobago since I can't watch it, notice that Adam hates England, dinner with Camilla's grandparents delicious, watch last half of Paraguay v. Sweden which is yet another of those games where no one decided to score until the final minute (Sweden did), hang out with Camilla and her parents and talk about American history
16 June
Supposed to meet another Hampster (current student one year ahead of us) but can't find him on his cell phone, lazy lazy, see some churches and the river and stuff, go to party at Camilla's friend's house, thankful for the few people who can manage English conversations while drunk, want to speak German when drunk, go home and crash
17 June
Buy postcards and the like, be lazy, get train 21:55, Italy plays US, Italy sucks, final score 1-1 because US doesn't suck as badly as anticipated
18 June
Supposed to get into Augsburg 9:20, train is later than late, finally get back at 11 or so, come home, instead of dying, watch football. Croatia v. Japan is the worst game ever that ends 0-0 because Croatia and Japan are both terrible even though I had such hopes for Croatia after they held their own against Brazil. Brazil v. Australia, hate Brazil but Australia can't get a ball into an empty goal so no idea what to begin with this game. Father's day in US but not in Germany.
19 June
Forgot that my alarm clock lives in another time zone, overslept and missed German, not tragic. Discover I have no Reli, decide waiting nearly 2 hours for Bio is not worth it, so only a double-period of English. Read some sweet little story about an old-timey British boy's first girlfriend, doodle TMBG lyrics all over it. Realize that Germans don't quite get the meanings of deserve, impress. Decide to let it go. Spend newfound freetime planning Hampshire courses for next year, make lots of lists and point systems, have trouble committing, anyone who wants to help please e-mail me.
20 June
Arrive at school to find it covered in white curtains, loud music playing, people in Scrubs standing on roof talking into loudspeaker. Realize this is the famed Abistreik, something like a senior prank. Dance party without actual dancing instead of first 4 periods of school. Have to go to history, nobody pays attention. Have to go to Sozi, Herr Lang doesn't want to work either, discuss Abistreik, look at picture, have argument about whether "park bench" implies simply a certain type of bench, which may or may not be in a park, or a bench of any type that is in a park. Hitzefrei declared on a day we have no afternoon classes (Hitzefrei is when school is cancelled due to heat), go home, play around with courses more, do things on my to-do list but not actually able to check any of them off.
21 June
Too hot for anything, got a good grade on my painting in art, too hot to fall asleep in math even, trying hard not to work, just so so hot, mail postcards, Argie v. Holland, 0-0 because Argentina just played with all their substitutes and neither team really cared because they knew they were moving on to the eighth-finals. First day of summer.
22 June
Alarm didn't go off because I forgot to turn it on, skip school that was just Sozi Schulaufgabe, discover crazy racist ice cream that is delicious, have long discussion with host mom about racism
23 June
Train ran late, kind of paid attention in school but nothing interesting happend, decide to never go to German or Math again and so go home early, do nothing of terrible interest.
24 June
Start uploading pictures of Mary's visit to Butterfly Paper, Jugendrestaurant, in charge of dessert, make best darn mousse from the package ever, watch Germany v. Sweden, great game, 2 goals for Germany in first half, Sweden sucked. Back to kitchen, remain there for next few hours as Jugendrestaurant happens, clean up forever, watch Argie v. Mexico- tensest game ever, 1-1 after 10 minutes, then no more score for the rest of the game and then it had to go into overtime and I bit all of my fingernails off but then Argie scored at 98' and then life was good and the game ended and Argie won and now Argie's going up against Germany this Friday and Piff and I are probably going to kill each other.
25 June
Officially no longer under Experiment's control, which makes me happy. Still want money from them, will get some. Still uploading pictures, go look at them and enjoy and ask questions if you are confused. You can finally see what my amazing city looks like, and also what Munich looks like, and also what my hair has looked like since Berlin since I dyed it but after all the Berlin pictures were taken.

Alibis

Yes, winter has refused to release Germany from its bony clutch- it is still cold and gray here, making me pretty unhappy for a few days, but now I'm used to it.

Yes, you are whining because I haven't updated. Deal.

Hmm. . . went to the theatre Monday, saw Woyzeck, which is a classic German play about men peeing where they shouldn't, apparently. It was interesting. Spent the night at Berni's house, which mostly meant crashing in her brother's room, then waking up and eating breakfast and not having to walk to school for once, which is nice! History was pretty cool on Tuesday- we talked about Marxism and I stayed awake for the entirety of that topic, which is quite an accomplishment for me. It also marked the second day in a row that one of my teachers was all "Communism and Christianity are basically the same idea," which everyone knows already because duh and Shaw. (Confused? Grab a copy of Androcles and the Lion from your local library and read the prologue.) We spent Sozi whining about how the Berlin trip planned for next September has to be either moved or cancelled due to some teachers whining. At some point, Herr Lang said "Well, the sex change process takes longer than 6 months, so you're out of luck," which I wrote down. Don't remember the context on that one. Wednesday was art exam- went to school, had Reli, remembered that there are parts of Job (bibical) that are actually cool, went to Art, painted awesome awesome picture of girls swimming in bottle cap- a hope for the summer that will one day come. Even if I have to move to the Southern Hemisphere come November, I am getting summer this year. English was pretty enterating on Wednesday- I have the quote "An increasing number of officers who are out have had a very good experience in the navy." written down, and a note that we played Homos through History by speculating about Alexander the Great and Shakespeare. Not exactly revolutionary, but I got a chuckle out of the fact that no one else seemed to know these things. Thursday. I don't remember much about Thursday. I have the folowing quote written down from Sozi: "Anyone know they'll be busy 14-15 December? Mom's birthday? Grandma's? Someone's funeral?" Also, I apparently stayed awake in history, although I did not absorb a single fact. I had all of 2 periods on Friday- there was a chemistry exam that meant I had no Bio, there was no math, and I skipped German because there is no reason to wait 3 hours to go to one of my more pointless classes. So got up, went to history, where we apparently listed every single labor union in the history of Germany for the whole class. I slept. English was more time-wasting- we discussed some literary text, and by "we" I mean "people that are not me" and by discuss I mean "half-answer boring questions while reading the text line-for-line while Kari doodles They Might Be Giants lyrics all over her paper instead of paying attention." After that, I went home and uploaded pictures for a while- Picasa's being all flickery, so it's taking forever, but Berlin pictures are slowly filling Butterfly Paper. That night was lock-in at church, where we built rockets and watched Spiderman and played games and did not sleep. Got up next morning, drove to field in the middle of nowhere (Piff got almost lost on the way), sent our rockets into the sky all fizzzzzzzzzz boooom whooooooooosh booooooom fall down chase through long grass and wildflowers. I just like hanging out in fields full of wildflowers, really. Was half-asleep the rest of that day, stayed up kinda late anyway, went to church Sunday, turns out wearing red isn't a Pentecost requirement in Germany, had Communion and it was the very same service of word and table as in America, just in German, which made me super-super happy. I really wish the Germans would do Communion with some sort of frequency, because I miss it. Went to the go-kart place that afternoon with the bros and go-karts sure are fun because zzzzzzoooooooooooooooom fast. I am stil sore but that's okay. Ummmm, not a whole lot more going on. Today is Ferien, and I'm off for two weeks! Woo Pentecost. Heading out bowling shortly, incredibly lazy today, need to do a bunch of things that I am happily ignoring.

I slept in today and woke up to a really great conversation, and I'm using the power of the internet to hook me up with a bunch of country music cause I'm in that sort of mood. A mood for bittersweet country love songs about people being far away.

UPDATE: Guess who won at bowling? Steffi's little sister Simone. We played 3 games and in the first two, Basti beat me by about 2 or 3 points each time- so just barely. Piff was farther ahead, in competition with Simone, Steffi fell in various places. Then Game Three. Final Scores: Simone: 125. Kari: 124. Piff: 121. Basti: 102. Steffi: something less. I BEAT THE BOYS. WHOOOOOOOOO. This is possibly the first time in my life I have beaten my brothers at bowling. Ha.

The World Ain't Slowing Down

Sorry, I've kinda ignored you guys recently, but I've been busy. I have an hour and a half before I need to run out the door again, so I think I can give you a run-down of the past two weeks.

Wednesday, very very nearly missed my train (as in, if it hadn't been 5 minutes late, I would have missed it) but did make it to Wittenberg to see Mary and Casey and also that church that Martin Luther nailed some theses on or something. It was Casey's birthday yay Casey! We took millions of pictures of that and other things, and then got ourselves on a train and went to Berlin, where we found every single other American person who was with us in Tübigen and also in Cologne (well, Jesh wasn't there that day but he came later) which makes our group awesome for not getting anyone sent home. Um, lots of talking and whining that night? The next day, we went to the Amerika Haus, where a Jew from England told us that Germans "moan" too much, among other things. We then let Allyson, whose host sister lives in Berlin, show us around the city a bit (yes, more pictures, will upload sometime) and there was shopping for silly things and we found a Mexican restaurant! You know we ate dinner there, and it was Rose's birthday, so they made it happy hour early for us. That night, we chilled at the hostel and tried to write a song for the Bundestag and gave each other massages. Friday was Bundestag day! Rose and I were handcuffed to each other the whole time because handcuffs are awesome and we wanted to make sure we would have an appropriate reputation. We met all sorts of new people who are also C-Bers in some way or another, and then they chose to not let Buster do the original song that we made but instead had some other group do a cover of some pop song translated (badly) into German. We were slightly peeved. There were many politicians doing what they do best, including a pretty awesome dude who looked like Trotsky. After Bundestagging it for a while, we hopped on a bus and went off to set foot on American soil at the Embassy! The real Ambassador was not there, but some other dude was, and we mostly enjoyed our Bratwurst and potato salad and danced around on the grass and tried to have fun, although the DJ was pretty terrible and the party got boring fast. It was nice of him to play Sweet Home Alabama, though, so us few crazy people from below the Mason-Dixon line could scream it and dance in the rain. When the sun came back out, we discovered that paper plates make really terrible frisbees, and they eventually decided we could leave because we were going on a boat tour. Proof of Experiment's amazing organizational skills: they did not buy any sort of public transportation tickets for our large group to go on this required boat ride, so we all had to shell out on our own to get there, and also no one thought about your average public bus's ability to handle a group of, oh, 120. I hear there was some illegal riding and some €40 tickets handed out, and we ended up having to take two buses (one coming half an hour after the other) and it was a fiasco. Somehow, we all made it to the boat, where Rose and I promptly went to the bottom level and fell asleep. I hear there were pretty things to see, but we were exhausted. We were left to our own devices to get home from the boat ride, and we all had a good laugh as we watched Mary and Katelynn get on the subway in the wrong direction and ride away looking scared (they got off at the next stop and caught the next train back- they hopped on before we figured out which train we needed to take). Saturday morning brought paperwork and more paperwork, and a pretty neat alum named Dillon or Dylan or some spelling of that idea who told us not to begin sentences with "Back in Germany" or "One time in Germany" or "Germany" and also not to yell at our moms for buying gross bread because America does not have good bread. Bustin Roses decided to finally get some of their many awesome Betreuer songs from the year on hard disk, and me and Mary and Emily and Christine and maybe some other people hung out and listened to them be awesome. (Bustin Roses is Buster, Dustin, Rose and Tootlez, for ye unintiated.) It was rainy and Mary and I went into the city to buy hair dye and hope to sightsee, but we ended up cowering in the mall because the weather was gross. The Betreuers had told us to meet up at 7 at a Biergarten, and Mary and I ran into the members of Bustin Roses in the train, and the 6 of us tried to find the Biergarten, and eventually asked a snarky newspaper stand man who told us where, and we arrived to find Swantje and her boyfriend and nobody else. We waited a while and then a giant Bero-led troupe of Americans showed up and it was raining and the Biergarten had no space for us, so we went and got on a train and rode somewhere and stood on a corner for half an hour until someone told us we could go to the bar across the street, where we ordered drinks and hung out and Rose and Dustin and I talked to Alum Dude Dyllan (who is from Virginia Beach and goes to William and Mary) and he eventually offered to head back to his place but Rose and Tootlez and I were tired and cold so we went back to the hostel and mooched internet and my Roomies came home and there was post-midnight wishing of Mary a happy birthday (her birthday was Sunday) and it was super-cute when the South American dudes brought her a birthday beer, which she may or may not have actually drank. Emily dyed my hair at 3 in the morning and we slept nowhere near enough. Sunday was all good-byes, which my brain doesn't even begin to understand because I have to many of them and they are rarely real, and then I hopped on a train and listened to wonderful travel music and I love the café in the train where I can get a cup of tea and sit and watch the countryside- THE way to travel. Got home, my host parents had some guests over so there were drinks and desserts with people I barely know, and also sweet sleep. I went to school on Monday, went to school on Tuesday, went to a football (soccer) game in which I saw the WM (world cup) team from Togo beat the Bayern All-Stars or something of the like. Went to school Wednesday, picked up Mary from the train station on the way home from school, Thursday was Ascension, so no school and I gave Mary the Grand Tour of Augsburg (there are pictures of this, too) even though everything but Burger King and Subway and McDonalds was closed. Took Mary to Munich on Friday in the pouring rain and Munich is a pretty nice city to hang out in, actually. Pictures pictures pictures, found the best non-used bookstore ever, had the best beer ever, got really wet. We chilled on Saturday and went shopping in my city (which is the second-oldest city in Germany, by the way, having been founded in 20 BCE) and I bought pretty things for way cheap at H&M, as usual. Yesterday was Confirmation Sunday and church was full and there was a praise team there that even played a song I knew, and we met Mary's British friend Jim that afternoon and then Mary got on a train and I came home and crashed. School today was uneventful, and I'm leaving in one hour to go see a play with my German class and stay and Berni's house because we will get back late and there is no train.

I guess it's Memorial Day, too, isn't it? Hmmm. My upcoming schedule: art Schulaufgabe Wednesday, Ambassador Project due Thursday and I still haven't written that paper, lock-in at church Friday-Saturday, then comes 2 weeks of Pentecost break and I am thinking about heading to Rome the second week of that because there is a future Hampster down there and she is willing to show me around yay! Still trying to figure out if I should go somewhere the first week- anybody want me for a few days?

Run Run Run

I made it to 107 of 127 in Paris picture posts, I believe- this means I have 80 pictures that are just going to have to wait. Until then, overload on visual stimulation for a while, then take a few days to recover and PREPARE.

This weekend was awesome- we had a great time at Mädelsabend making wraps and singing songs and watching a super-sweet movie that made me miss someone, and just hanging out and not getting enough sleep. Saturday morning brought losing at Sorry (which is called Mensch Ärger Dich Nicht in German) but not as bad as Nadja lost, and then driving Jaclyn home and getting to stay for delicious lunch instead of me and Nadja and Anja foraging something from our leftovers. Back home, turned leftovers into a salad for dinner, up to church, meet up with boys, drive to Conference. It rained like CRAZY. The radio was terrible and I surfed it constantly and maybe heard one decent song. My iPod isn't friends with Piff's cd-player-to-cassette-adapter, even though the speaker jack fits in the hole. We were too early and it was wet and we walked and hid from the rain and ate and hung out. The Teenie Konferenz suffered from having less energy than a similar event in America would have, but a fun band played some praise songs that I know and some praise songs that I didn't know and there was a silly dance! Ummmmm. . . slept in the Sporthalle that night, which isn't the most awesome place to sleep, but we passed out on our air mattresses and didn't wake up until people started waking up and being noisy in the morning. It was nowhere near enough sleep. Breakfast and packing and wandering for the 2 or 3 hours until stuff got started, then an overly-long ordination service where we tried really, really hard not to fall asleep with minor success, and then waiting in the longest line for lunch and they were out of schnitzel and tomato-mozzerella sammiches, so we ended up with Wurst and pea soup and a pretzel (you can play a guessing game to decide who got what!). Hanging out for a long time, Nadja ran into some people she knew, Anja saw a few people she knew, but mostly only from our church, walked around, avoided the off-and-on-rain, eventually went back for the afternoon service, which proved to be a lot of fun with an awesome xylophone-based band and a cool Baptist dude making a keynote (I know, Baptists, but this guy was neat!) and a surprise visit from the goalie from Stuttgart, who I guess is a famous Fußball player and also pretty religious! Lots and lots and lots of Fußball in general. . . end of the fun service, headed home but not without stopping by Nadja's mom's house to say hi cause it was Mother's Day and all. . . half-sleeping in the car. . . get home, "help" Piff with his English homework, sleep. . . Monday at school. . . skipping Bio in the afternoon because I had to buy birthday presents for a ton of people because I will be seeing them today (!) and then Tuesday and more school and fully intending to bake cookies, but then I fell asleep on the train and missed my stop and thus got home an hour late and then had lunch and started uploading Paris pictures and Piff had a lot of homework and cookies didn't happen. Sorry, guys.

I AM GOING TO BERLIN TODAY. WILL BE GONE UNTIL SUNDAY. WILL HANG OUT WITH CRAZY AMERICANS, TAKE MANY PICTURES, HAVE ADVENTURES, MAYBE EVEN TELL YOU ABOUT THEM.

You're A Sleepy Thought

BEGIN LIFE PHASE BERLIN

Happy Mother's Day

END LIFE PHASE SPRING

508

Pictures on my camera from Paris. 200 live at Butterfly Paper now, the rest will come when I get a chance.


Church was fun Sunday, and Nadja's promised me the pictures that you will love love love. Went to school with Piff Monday. . . I talked to his class about America and school and I honestly don't remember what else. . . fun people, though, and a change of scene is always lovely, especially on a nice day when Piff has a free period and we can sit on the grass and bask in the sun. Slept in super-late Tuesday (til 8!) and went to 2 classes, and was also lazy, I guess, but I did at least get to the post office with the biggest stack of postcards ever. Yesterday was Wednesday and I went to school and then I was sick and I came home after history because I really only felt obligated to go to Bio anyway and then I slept and then Adam did his best to make me smile and forget my aching stomach for a while and then I slept some more. Felt better today, went to my 3 classes, still really love Sozi even though the whole discussion of marriage in the German context is so much more boring because there is so much less controversy than in America. Mostly they are all "would somebody please get married before they are 35 and also maybe have some kids because our population is shrinking so much and we are going to die out according to people who exaggerate things." And in America we're all "gays sanctity of marriage divorce rates church state children aaaaaaaah" and it is emotional and controversial and you can have a debate. Oh well. The sun came back out after being gone for two days, and that was nice, but I spent a good portion of my afternoon uploading pictures for you fine folks. Mary is a very bad photographer no matter how dearly I love her and I apologize because my camera is also pretty bad and that makes certain pictures, like of the pretties in Versailles, less pretty, but there is nothing I can do about it. The pictures of the statues in the Louvre are some of my favorites. The 5 pictures of the parking lot at Versailles are not my favorites at all, why did Mary take them? The pictures of me making silly silly faces are also not my favorites, but Someone likes them and up they go.

I am really tired and I have not studied for my Bio Schulaufgabe that is tomorrow and that I guess I have to take cause Fosse kind of expects it of me. Ugh. Good thing I have a free period, I guess.

Tomorrow night is Mädelsabend at Anja's, and it's General Conference Saturday-Sunday, so I'll be scarce this weekend, but I'll try to get all the pictures up before I go to Berlin, which I do on Wednesday.


BUSYBUSYAAAHBUSYEEEEEEP

Goodness

I am exhausted.

I went to Paris, I had fun, I arrived home safely. There are millions of photos, and I will upload mine sometime in the next weeks- the pictures are better than any words I could produce. Mary has a bunch of photos- click on the link to her blog down there and you can figure out how to get in touch with her to see hers if you are impatient. I also stole a few from her and have put them on the Butterfly Paper, so you know what to do.

I am going to finish the Zwickau post one of these days, too, I swear.

I have been going to school while I wasn't traveling, and it is still school. The weather is warming up, the sun is shining more frequently, and that makes me pretty happy. I wore shorts today, even.

Life is really busy and yet pretty quiet. It's a nice pace and I'm very happy and that happiness translates into less blogging, I guess. Sorry guys.


I've got my Hampshire e-mail address now: kmec06@hampshire.edu. If you have something against gmail for some strange reason, I guess you can reach me there. Also, that means I now have Facebook, which is strangely addicting.


Hampshire housing forms are now available and I am trying to figure out if I prefer "very quiet" "quiet" or "semi-quiet" housing, or if I would be deeply offended by having a roommate or not, or if I go to bed before 11, between 11 and 12, between 12 and 1, or after 1 on weekdays. I went to bed at 2 last night. I plan on going to bed at about 9:30 tonight. I have no idea how to interpret those sort of discrepencies, which are entirely normal for me. Hmmmmm.



Tuesday marked 1 year of Beige Space existing. I want presents.

CRAZY

So I started to write a summary of my Zwickau adventures, and I swear it will get done eventually, just not. right. now. Because I am going to Paris tomorrow, and school started again this week, and my weekend is summed up in the above picture [although you can't tell from the picture, Piff is wearing Lederhosen], so things are a little crazy now. Not sure when regular word-based blog postings will resume, but there are lots of pictures from Zwickau on the Butterfly Paper, and you can feel free to leave comments there asking me what stuff is and I will tell you about it, I promise. Otherwise, I have about a million things I need to take care of and very very little Lust.


Also, I set a date to fly back to the US. July 27. It is not moving. It allows me one month before I have to be at Hampshire (August 31). Feel free to write it on your calendars and plan to take me out for smoothies and kosher sandwiches or Mexican food. Or to have a party. I like parties.

Just Traveling Through

Well I can't tell you where I'm going, I'm not sure of where I've been
But I know I must keep travelin' till my road comes to an end
I'm out here on my journey, trying to make the most of it
I'm a puzzle, I must figure out where all my pieces fit

Like a poor wayfaring stranger that they speak about in song
I'm just a weary pilgrim trying to find what feels like home
Where that is no one can tell me, am I doomed to ever roam
I'm just travelin', travelin', travelin', I'm just travelin' on

Questions I have many, answers but a few
But we're here to learn, the spirit burns, to know the greater truth
We've all been crucified and they nailed Jesus to the tree
And when I'm born again, you're gonna see a change in me

God made me for a reason and nothing is in vain
Redemption comes in many shapes with many kinds of pain
Oh sweet Jesus if you're listening, keep me ever close to you
As I'm stumblin', tumblin', wonderin', as I'm travelin' thru

I'm just travelin', travelin', travelin', I'm just travelin' thru
I'm just travelin', travelin', travelin', I'm just travelin' thru

Oh sometimes the road is rugged, and it's hard to travel on
But holdin' to each other, we don't have to walk alone
When everything is broken, we can mend it if we try
We can make a world of difference, if we want to we can fly

Goodbye little children, goodnight you handsome men
Farewell to all you ladies and to all who knew me when
And I hope I'll see you down the road, you meant more than I knew
As I was travelin', travelin', travelin', travelin', travelin' thru

I'm just travelin', travelin', travelin', I'm just travelin'
Drifting like a floating boat and roaming like the wind
Oh give me some direction lord, let me lean on you
As I'm travelin', travelin', travelin', thru

I'm just travelin', travelin', travelin', I'm just travelin' thru
I'm just travelin', travelin', travelin', I'm just travelin' thru

Like the poor wayfaring stranger that they speak about in song
I'm just a weary pilgrim trying to find my own way home
Oh sweet Jesus if you're out there, keep me ever close to you
As I'm travelin', travelin', travelin', as I'm travelin' thru




Thank God for Dolly Parton. I'd like to apologize to all the people I keep leaving, but I can't help it, and I don't want to do otherwise. I'm going to spend the rest of my life leaving. Know that I cherish every moment we have together, but I can't stay, and I can't spend my time looking back or ahead. I have to focus on the road immediately before me, and I have no idea where it will go next. I know it's hard on everyone that doesn't have this need to run, but know that you can always call me or e-mail me or whatever and I will be there for you as if I had never been gone.

I've learned that space and time do not bind me, and I am so so thankful.

A Little More Unconventional

Everyone's posting about how great their Easters were. I guess it's my turn.

So I slept in until 10 or a little later, which isn't that late compared to the last few days. I got up and showred and bummed around until Basti and Steffi came over and Basti showed off his awesome grilling skills for lunch (it was yummy) and then we packed ourselves and the dog into the car and drove off to Andechs on the Ammersee, where there is a mountain called Holy Mountain with a church and a former nunnery and current brewery. You get to guess what we were there for. The beer was delicious, it rained when we first got there, but then the sun came out and it was even pretty and we sat and drank and laughed at the big Bayer dude with his lederhosen and his giant beer. The clouds were coming back up, so we left (and stole one of the beer glasses but shhh) and drove home and saw no less than 2.5 rainbows. Yay April in Germany. Steffi and Basti have headed back to Steffi's for the night, and I need to pack to go to Allyson's tomorrow and probably clean up a bit, too.


This was a good Easter. Basti is a good big brother, and I get to see Allyson TOMORROW and stay with her for a whole FIVE days and we will have an awesome time in East D-Land. I'm going to get the final group of pictures up on Butterfly Paper today, too- there are lots and lots there, and you might have missed some, so go check it out.

Whoa

I went and got all busy. Oops!

So, um, let me think. Tuesday. . . Tuesday, Piff and I got drug to the symphony. Symphonies are really long. Wednesday. . . Wednesday, I did nothing. I slept, I played on the computer, I ate, I chilled. Thursday was Nadja's birthday! I went to the train station and bought my tickets to Zwickau to see Allyson, and then I went to church for Nadja's birthday coffee! I drank tea. There was cake and I met Nadja's mom and sister and all sorts of other people were there, including baby Elizabeth, and we chatted and played with the baby and ate delicious things and it was good times. Friday was yesterday, right? The host 'rents and Piff and Anja got up early and headed off to the wedding that has them out of town this weekend, and I slept in late and was lazy. Steffi came over (her parents are out of town this weekend, too) and we had pancakes for lunch, and I played with Steffi's dog Harry. That night was Good Friday, and I had to go play James the brother of John! Basti dropped me off at church on his way to pick up movie tickets, and the service was really wonderful. I kind of made it into Good Friday and Easter all together for myself, and I had communion for the first time since I've been in Germany, which felt really, really good. I had really missed communion- I'm used to doing it once a month at least and I kind of need that, somehow. I was in a super-good mood after the service (remember how I kind of made it Easter, too?) and, as it happened, had some time because it was way shorter than expected and Basti wasn't coming for another 45 minutes. So I chilled with Nadja and sang songs like Jesus Loves Me and Shout to the Lord and Awesome God and Heart of Worship. I stole Nadja's guitar, and it is now my job to learn to play all my Ami songs on it and teach them to Iris and Nadja and Karin. Billy, that is your cue. I need songs! I need them in such a way that I can figure out how to play them! So, um, Basti came and I left and met his friend Felix and we went to the movies (we=me, Basti, Steffi, Felix). . . after adventures in the parking garage, of course. The movie theater was FULL. Steffi hypothesized that the crazy German law against playing music in the disco on Good Friday had something to do with this. Crazy Catholics. Fortunately, we had reserved our tickets on Wednesday, and Basti had picked them up after dropping me off at church, so we weaseled through the crowd and bought some snacks and ate our snacks while waiting for them to open our theater, and then went in and discovered that we had really great seats. I think it's neat that the movie tickets in Germany assign you a seat. German movies still have way way way more preshow commercials than American, including an intermission for some chicks to come in and hock ice cream. Also, no fun movie trivia, although the 10 For Two commercial hints at it. And I continue to prove that I am a sucker for things in my native tongue by getting way too happy at the Media Markt commercial where Oliver Pocher (he is famous here) sells a camera to a British couple. So cute! "I am Peter. This is Mary. We would like to buy a camera." "Take this one. It is very billig." "Thank you." "Please." "Good-bye." "Yes, it is!" And then the British guy says "ich bin doch nicht blöd" in his British accent and it's so cute. So, um, there was also the actual movie? Ice Age 2 had more serious moments than the first, what with Manny being all convinced that he is the very last wooly mammoth alive, except then he finds a girl wooly mammoth, but oh wait she thinks she is an opposum, so how the hell is he supposed to continue the species with her? Sid's voice bugged me, Diego is sexier than a cat has a right to be, and I was upset that he got only the tiniest of side-roles in the movie. One of the opposums was named Eddie, so I guess my dad would have liked that. And that crazy crazy squirrel seeking nuts. I will tell you that the only actual times I truly laughed involved the squirrel, and I always go into those scenes like "I am not going to laugh unless this is truly funny, I am not going to laugh just because everyone else is." And then it is really, really funny and I don't know why, but I laugh heartily. After the movie, we had a few less adventurous parking garage adventures, and drove to Steffi's house, where Felix picked up his car and Steffi picked up his dog, and then came back here, where we pulled out the drinks and the truth-or-dare. That game is great to play with a couple (Basti and Steffi) because you can make them admit things and it's wonderful. I went to bed with lipstick on my eyelids, and made it to bed far, far too late. I slept until, I don't know, noon and then dragged myself out of bed and put some clothes on just in time to greet Basti (who had slept at Steffi's, leaving me allllll alone), who promptly took me off to Steffi's for lunch. We had homemade döner and they were pretty darn good, but döner is so so so so filling. It was warm outside and we wanted to do something and maybe burn off some of our crazy lunch, so we pulled the bikes out and went biking! Really went biking. With Harry the dog in the basket on the back of Steffi's bike, like a certain other dog I know. So yeah, we biked. FOREVER. I think we managed at least 35 km, if not 40. That's a lot. It was fun, though! "Pretty" is not a word you can apply to the weather just yet, but people were out and it was warm, and I saw all sorts of areas around here that I did not know existed! Like lakes! Like a nude beach lake! The best part of German bike trips is that you get to make a pit stop at the Biergarten instead of the ice cream parlor. We finally made it home hours and hours later, and were immediately exhausted, so we made some food (a-and ate it), and Steffi and Basti retired to Steffi's with a movie, and I'm thinking about watching a movie, but I also really need a shower, and I'm sort of playing around with the guitar, but I don't know what to do with it, and the internet is not teaching me fun songs. So Billy (or another Sparrow), hook me up! I'm leaving Monday for a week, so you have some time, but I want stuff when I come back, so I have time to learn and then teach.

You've Got to Be Kidding Me

10 April, and it is snowing like the Apocalypse out there. Assuming the world will end in ice and not fire. Man.

I slept later than I care to remember this morning (Ferien ist wunderschön) and spent my afternoon doing nothing of particular interest. Went up to church at 6:45 with Basti (he had brass practice, I had rehearsal for Good Friday, which didn't start until 7:30, meaning Nadja and I hung out for a bit first). I am playing James the brother of John on Friday, and it is a wonderful piece with blowing out of candles and of course gave us plenty of things to argue about. Who should blow out the candles? Where should we stand? How should we move? Craziness. Karin had brought Nadja some spätzle, which we cooked, and we also read Romeo and Juliet, because the church has a balcony and Nadja and I want to take advantage of that and do the balcony scene at some point. We read it in English. Erhard called and said "hey, there is this neat show on that explains how all the magic tricks are done, come watch it," so we did, and ate our spätzle, and hung out, and then Erhard drove me home through the crazy crazy snow. What happened to springtime? Ugh.

Just Don't Say I'm Damned For All Time

It's a good thing Adam sent me all these Jesus Christ Superstar songs. . . German Palm Sunday is closer to monks than rock and roll. . . although I hear the new tradition is the Passion, not JCSS? It saddens me a little, but I guess everybody is growing up and things are changing and you guys are more serious than we were, I guess. Can I help it if I need Herod to have a white guy Afro and be surrounded by androgynous dancer/servants?

And if Caiaphas can only sound one way, and it is that essential voice, and *melt.*


I wouldn't mind hearing Stella's Sanhedrin song, though.


Also, as long as this post is going out to the TUMC, might as well link you to my future Frisbee team (I swear you guys retain a place in my heart): http://ultimate.hampshire.edu. Peruse the history page to read about the infamous alum who majored in Frisbee "at the 1,100-student experimental college where classes are optional." And be so jealous that you are not going to my school.

Alright, Alright

When was my last post? Friday?

Ugh.

Ok, um. Saturday I got up early and got on a train to Nürnberg with church and we went to a Diakonie, which is sort of like a convent for Methodists. All the old ladies there were really nice and it was actually all kinds of fun, although the meat they served us was so gross I nearly went kosher then and there. They gave us ice cream later, though, and it was delicious. The weather was pretty, we took a walk, there are pictures that are making it on to Butterfly Paper slowly. After the old ladies, we went and saw an iMax movie about a Safaria and it was 3-D, which is fun but gives you a terrible headache. And that was my Dada month.

Sunday was the guitar service, where I managed to play decently, I guess, and an awesome guest preacher dude, who showed us (after church), his recently-televised abilities to identify Asterix quotes (don't ask) and then we made lunch together. It was delicious and a good time and I have this awesome Nadja-Piff quote written down, but it doesn't translate.

Monday, there was a Deutsch X. I took it, and wrote a few things on-topic, then BSed a bunch of things that had nothing to do with our current play, but rather the novella before it. Oh well. In English, we watched the most terrible 9-11 Conspiracy Theory movie ever. There was nothing right about this movie. It was hilarious. In Reli, I learned the Apostles Creed in German! I took a nap in my free period instead of studying for Bio, and then woke up for lunch, glanced at Bio, and then napped on. Fortunately, we did not have an X in Bio, so my lack of studying went without consequence. Instead, we learned the Biology of Beer, and it was as funny as you imagine. That night, I hopped on the train and headed back up to school to watch the school play, "Romulus the Great." It was fun, and starred many members of the K12 being incredibly entertaining. Also lots of girls dressed as boys, and Chubie had entertaining facial hair, and there were chickens and 11th graders as statues and I liked it. The play ended at 9:30, and Vronni drove me to the train station since it was raining, and I had the whole place to myself while I waited until 10:30, when the train came. It's nice to have a train station to yourself late at night. You can sing along to your iPod and no one will hear, and you can dance around, and it's lovely. Then you get to your home Bahnhof and get to have this amazing walk home. I wrote about it somewhere. Let me find that. "Walking home in the dark, all alone, when the streets are all empty. I can't help but run until I can't anymore, then I stop and double over and gasp at the air that is so cold it hurts when it hits my nostrils, my throat, my lungs. Then I straighten up and shove my fists into my pockets and walk off, really fast, as if someone were watching me. But no one is, their blinds are closed and their lights are off, and I'm alone. I want to scream into the clear night air, but it will only ruin what I have. I only paused when I saw the kitten, to pet it, but it knows that nights are for prowling, too. I don't want to ever get home, I want to go on walking like that forever." So yeah. That was neat.
I was sleepy Tuesday morning, and school was school. We had some long debate about what's a fruit and what's a vegetable in the free period, I played with prime numbers instead of paying attention in math (I like prime numbers), we went to the computer lab in history to start a week of looking at internet websites about coal mining history in Germany. You know this was a snooze. I got fun mail, and I ate lunch really fast and ran to catch the bus to go to the movies with Nadja and Anja. We saw Die Wilde Hühner, which only plays at 3 in the afternoon, and it was one of those awesome movies that romanticizes being 11 but was so much fun.
No Reli on Wednesday means I got to sleep in. More falling asleep in front of German coal miners in history, and we also watched a film strip. An actual film strip. About coal mining. It made the film strip noise and everything. It was crazy. There were only 6 of us in Bio, but we marched on. Art brought painting, and my art teacher was in a bad mood, but still complimented my (totally mediocre) paintings. I had delicious pizza for lunch and we discussed drunken Friedl stories. I spent German and Math more asleep than awake, and we continued the conspiracy theory movie in English. Some dude had an Arkansas accent, which comforted me, but the movie itself was boring. I got wonderful wonderful wonderful news in the mail- my Hampshire financial aid info came, and I am now a Hampster! I am putting my deposit in the mail tomorrow. So excited!
Thursday, I was up for Ausfragen in Sozi (I looked the word up in my dictionary at long last, and it said "interrogation," which sounds scary). I got 13 points, which is a 1, which is, as Tinta said, "krass." I am terribly proud of myself. In English, we listened to some sort of accent practice. British accents. Yuck. More computer lab in history, but I figured out how to talk to certain people via gmail chat, and that made it better. I went and picked up pictures (the ones that are on Butterfly Paper) from Nadja, and we (me, Nadja, Romi) decided to make a movie night. We made some tea and cut up some apples and carrots and settled down in the frozen basement to watch the Shipping News. The directing and acting were more than solid, but the plot wasn't my cup of tea. (My actual cup of tea was delicious, thank you.) Of course, movies are sometimes long, and I didn't get home until 10:30, meaning I was more tired on. . .
Friday. More computer-rooming it in history, and then to the other lab in English, and there was a new American! She will be here for the next 3 months and she is nice and I was happy to meet here. We spent the whole Pause talking, and it was nice. In Bio, Herr Wittmeyer kept reminding us that drinking in moderate amounts is a-okay and will not cause cirrhosis or death. Those sorts of reminders don't really exist in America. We started Ecology as well, because starting a new topic the days before a 2-week Ferien is the Thing To Do. No math, but I had to stay for German, and was so bored. Home, relax, almost forget about youth group, but Erhard came by to pick something up and drove me and we hung out and played games with Jan, who Nadja and Anja are roping in to help lead, and it was fun.
I slept in today, and I have been lazy and relaxing because I have Ferien now. I chose not to go in to the city, and probably will Monday or something. Right now, I have no Lust.

Sorry Guys

I spazzed on updates this week because I've been terribly busy.

Hopefully I'll fill you in tomorrow.

I'm starting to put new-old pictures on the Butterfly Paper- they date back as far as November and are in no particular order, so ask if you want to know what is going on. How do you get in touch with me, you wonder? Simple. You can hit the button that says comments at the bottom of this very post, or any other post for that matter. Even on Butterfly Paper. If comments that the rest of the Web can see are scary, no problem. Send me an e-mail at oneseventy@gmail.com and I will reply in a timely manner. E-mail too slow for you? I am available on MSN (aka Windows Messenger) (username yerbook170@hotmail.com) and on Google Talk and Gmail Chat via my Gmail address. If you aren't familiar with these programs, type them into your favorite search engine (you know mine), and I am certain you will find all the information you need to know.

I am more than happy to explain my pictures to you and to talk to you about the weather and other pleasantries. If I ever have some time at home again, that is.