my cell phone’s camera’s not the best, but at the moment? i just don’t care at all. why not? because the item you see in the picture to the left there? IS MY NEW CAR~~~ yays!!! for those of you in the columbus area, there is a young man named Douglas who works at Dennis Autopoint who is quite a nice fellow. my new car is a 1997 Nissan Altima. not a great charmer of a car, but it is quite nice inside. the outside is a little bigger than i really would like – especially compared to My Baby The Tercel, but frankly the car i wanted – a 2004 bright blue hyundai accent – was far too expensive for me. this one was delightfully priced, and has a really nice aftermarket stereo. it doesn’t have any mp3 input, which means i may have to replace it, as nice as it is, but it does play mp3 cds, which means i have some time to save up for the new stereo. i’m also hoping that my new consignment gig will work out quite well. if you’d like to see some books of mine that won’t be for sale online, you can check out The Frame Station in Upper Arlington. they do – obviously – mostly framing, but they have some small consignment tables set up, and i got a spot on one of them! yays me! i’m bringing her some more stuff tomorrow (maybe in MY NEW CAR!) and i’m going to have to ask her how often she thinks we’ll want inventory updates, because i’m thinking a couple of things a week or so would be perfect for me. this is of course in addition to whatever i sell online.

so, things to do now include but are not limited to:

finish budokan books
get job
research stereo system
work on conlang Gunsta
work on conlang, as yet unnamed
continue reading
finish Hyperspace by michio kaku
write leftover script frenzy script
write june/july proseplease prompt
make plushies
stab all humanity
finish japanese books for budokan
finish demian syndrome extras (finished initial pass, now for clean-up!)
finish lunar desert
study more japanese
get back to college
get degree
go to japan
disappear into immortality

again, some long term, some short term. i like to mix it up. (^_^)

Labels: facts

dokuritsu being the japanese word for indepence. why japanese? because i can.

ok. now that i’m a marginially humanoid being, i feel i can write coherently. we went down to the fireworks at whetstone park this evening. MAN were those awesome. we found the absolutely perfect seats, too. the fireworks were being set off just on the other side of a grove from us, and i swear it felt like some of those fireworks were going to rain right down on us. i was like, um, can i get an umbrella? (^_^) it was wonderful. also, the show seemed longer this year. maybe it’s just because i watched last night’s fireworks on the television, which is always lame, but these at whetstone seemed particularly awesome. my sister took some cell phone pictures. we’ll have to see if any of them turned out.

also on the awesome side, hopefully, will be tomorrow. i’m going car shopping. there’s a hyundai of some varitety (i think whatever’s one step up from the accent) in one of the car lots near my house, and it’s in the “we’ll give you $3000 for your car even if it only barely qualifies as a motor vehicle” section. the cars there usually have something wrong with them, but nothing major. more like, the auto window on the passenger side doesn’t work (ha! i hate passengers!) or the trunk doesn’t open w/out voodoo (ha! i never use the trunk!) so i feel alright buying one from there. i almost bought a car from there a couple of years ago (a disgusting ford focus) but i couldn’t get any financing. this time, i’ve got a little bit of my parent’s money and the promised $3000, so hopefully i’ll be driving a new car home tomorrow evening. wish me luck!

Labels: facts

whoopity fuck.

oh man, i’m in such a pissy mood today. of course, things started off badly when i was forced to spend my first night back in my grandmother’s house. the place, literally, made me dizzy. there are only two grounded plugs in that entire building, that’s how old it is. probably? it hasn’t been aired out since it was built. i was so ill that night. not nauseous, or sick to my stomach, but standing up was enough to make me dizzy. not that my sinuses were doing great to begin with. i made the mistake of having 7up instead of water on the plane ride back, and my body exacted its retribution like clockwork. my sinuses are still having issues. my ears are all clogged up, my nose is basically one solid mass of snot, and my throat has been dry for a week now, despite the near-ocean-levels of water i’ve been drinking. i can hardly sing. it’s actually quite annoying, because after three weeks of not being able to sing aloud at all, i’m now stuck with some disgusting little drowned canary sound coming out of my mouth.

at least i’ve managed to eat some peanut butter and butter sammiches, one toasted bagel and turkey sammich, and about a bazillion cans of caffine, that is, dr pepper. also i’m working on my second pint of ben & jerry’s cherry garcia, courtesy of my loving mother.

i’ve also managed to list at least one thing every day this week over @ notuboc! yays me. not like i don’t have a substantial backlog, the problem is just, as always, i. am. lazy. to prove my case (phoenix wright STYLE baby!) here is a list of things i need to do, in no particular order of importance:

get a job
get a car
work on conlang Gunsta
work on conlang, as yet unnamed
contact ms green about possible consignment gig
continue reading
finish Hyperspace by michio kaku
write leftover script frenzy script
write june/july proseplease prompt
raise prices on items at etsy shop
make plushies
stab all humanity
finish japanese books for budokan
finish demian syndrome extras
finish lunar desert
study more japanese
get back to college
get degree
go to japan
disappear into immortality

… okay, so maybe some of those are more what you might call “long term” but hey, a girl can dream, right? in this mood? i feel like it may be all that’s left to me. i need a car. but i can’t even begin to hope to pay for one. as of this moment i have $6 in my bank account, and no job. so, i need a job. but i can’t get to any interviews w/out a car. so, i need a car. but i can’t buy a car w/out a job. so, i need a job. but, i can’t get to any interviews w/out breaking my entire mind, slipping over the edge into the seething abyss of enraged insanity, and stabbing all of humanity! YAYS.

zomg. actually, demian syndrome is a blast to read, but the font’s all messed up, so it’s a little difficult for me if i’m not concentrating. there is the little chibi extra, but frankly, the longer one’s more fun. and lunar desert’s kind of easy, so that’s not on my list of “but i don’t wanna~” either. and the conlangs are a blast, as usual (that would be constructed language for those of you not dorky enough to have invented your own language) but i’ve been working on that most of the day, so i’m pretty much done with that for today. the consignment thing’ll have to wait till tomorrow, when they’re open, but hopefully they can wait till after 3.30 or so to meet, because … wait for it … I DON’T HAVE A CAR!

bastard tilton’s. my car was perfect. PERFECT, YOU HEAR ME. you fuckballs.

ahem. sorry. a few… rage… issues, as you can see. my apologies. everyone in that swedish household went to bed at like 11 pm, and i finally got to stay up by myself for extended periods of time. it was kind of surprising how quickly my writing sparked back up. i got about 10 pages in the collaborative novel (a bookmooch thing, where we send a little blank journal thing around and each person writes the next part of a story) and then i even moved on to to proseplease prompt, which, by the by, is awesome this time around. i don’t know who thought that up, but it rocks. problem is, i didn’t get to finish it before i came home, so now it’s back under the soil, buried right alongside my writing desire. i haven’t written anything since november. well, march, i guess. it feels like years. i miss it. i need a job if only so i can move out of this house and start writing again. i miss the little thrill when i write fin at the end and close the notebook. can i have that back? … please?

Labels: facts

well, the midsommar party was a success. the appetizer was hideous – the bread tasted like burnt cardboard and i don’t like shrip generally – but the meal itself was quite yummy. some kind of beef with my aunt’s delightful potatoes and probably more alchohol than i’ve had in a single night ever. i started with a strawberry daquiri with far too much rum in it, and continued with some really super good merlot, and then – by now halfway through the daquiri – i emptied the daquiri glass and tried again with a normal amount of rum, and then i had some … i don’t know what it was called. some kind of bright bright red after dinner wine. then i was invited to a game of auburn-opoly – which is basically monopoly themed for auburn indiana – at which i had an orange bacardi rum breezer, which is a little wine cooler, and some reese’s mini peanut butter cups. the dinner itself was a little lame, but after i was properly socially lubricated, things went alright. the fact that everyone else in the room was either 20 ~ 60 years older or at least 5 years younger than me became, as with everything in a room full of mildly tipsy adults, less and less important as the night wore on. (^_^)

basically, that’s it for the trip. tomorrow, saturday, i’m sure will consist mostly of me sleeping through most of the day and then being bored for the rest of the day, and sunday will be me packing and making desperately sure that i’m not forgetting anything. monday and tuesday i’ll be basically without intarwebs (T_T) as i will be a) flying home and then b) stuck in my grandmother’s prison– i’m sorry, my grandmother’s house. it turns out that she does indeed have cable internet, though, as i found out quite by accident last night at dinner, so i may be able to finagle something from that dreaded house after all.

so i’ll see you all again probably on wednesday, after a much needed night in my own bed with my own pillows and my own sheets and my own completely window-less walls. holy shit, i really can’t wait. i know i’m just on the cusp of drunkeness, but i’m getting a little choked up thinking about it. what i want is this: dr pepper inna can (which they do not sell in this country. at all. literally.), a peanut butter sandwich (peanut butter in sweden is upwards of $6 for like 10 oz or something. incidentally, did you know you can order three six ounce jars of peanut butter from the national institute of standards and technology for $545? that stuff better be good~) on white bread (which they also do not seem to favor in this country. i swear, if i never see a slice of hard and/or rye bread again in my life…) and also some real cherry garcia ice cream. the stuff they serve here? is the wrong color. the ice cream is way too cherry and the cherries themselves are somehow wrong. too squishy, i think. which is silly, because all the other fruit i’ve had here has seemed to me to be of especially vibrant taste. hell, i even had a gala apple the other day that i practically fell in love with. i was ready to marry that thing, and i normally find gala apples lame and tasteless. something is amiss, and i intend to discover what it is by eating as much ben and jerry’s as it takes for me to tell the difference between swedish cherry garcia and american cherry garcia. it’s a dirty job, but someone’s got to do it, for the good of all humanity~

***

Jones, Llamedos. One of the Disc’s semi-mythical religious explorers. Legend has it that he set out one day in his leather coracle armed with no more than a holy sickle, a sack of mistletoe, a small portable stone circle and a harmonium, in an inspired effort to bring the advantages of Strict Druidism to the heathen. No one has yet found out what these advantages were.

Labels: sweden

did something actually happen out here in the fields with the cows and the horses and the massively massively large flies!? yes. i must admit, something has actually managed to get done. i know, i’m pretty much flabergasted myself. what i managed to do is to finally write something. … … … … please pick your jaws up off the floor now. thank you. nothing actually worth reading, but something that will probably be read by more people than most anything else i’ve written. (T_T) i heart bookmooch, and they started a bunch of collaborative journals over there, because they’re so awesome (the journals as well as the people) and one of the journals happens to be a collaborative novel. you can read all about it here, including the current entries (mine to be posted once i’m back in the states) and you can sign up to mooch the thing here. you’ve got to be a member of bookmooch to get the thing, but the fact is, if you’re not a member of bookmooch, then you’re too lame to qualify. (^_^) actually, the story so far is pretty interesting, if not exactly of my usual genre. there’s this chap marcus, whose death has been faked by some bizzare angels so that marcus can completely change someone’s life. i’ve decided that we’ll be helping out one Jean Crutcheson, who has an appointment with attempted suicide in two weeks’ time. of course, things haven’t really gone that well for our hero(&)ine, as Jean decided to make a go of it a little early. i’m sure she’ll work up the courage to try again in a few weeks, though, just so things don’t get too dull. (^_^)

in other news, theplushiefoundry is off to a roaring start. we sold a couple of things already, and carolyn listed skye the magic plushie this afternoon. apparently, she likes mentos, reading books about lizzards, and properly color-balanced photographs. (^_^) actually, i love the lizzards. i have one myself. actually, he’s here in sweden with me. perhaps you’ve seen him already? what i should do is make one for YOU-kun and send it to him. maybe a white and green one? to resemble a daikon? heheh. i definitely should, huh? actually, what i should do is find something else to write real quick while i’ve still got the power~

Labels: sweden

1. peanut butter tops your list of Must Have When I Return foods
2. white bread isn’t too far behind.
3. you’ve psycho-analysed your relatives.
4. you’ve had to sit through so many dinners with your foreign relations and their friends that, after only two weeks in the country, you’re getting the hang of the native language.
5. you’re starting to be convinced that maybe 11 am isn’t such a bad time of day after all.
6. you’re getting way too involved in those inane flash games.
7. the number of culturally traditional social functions at which you will be a fifth wheel increase by a factor of ten.
8. you’re getting way too good at those inane flash games.
9. you can sort of see where your grandmother is coming from.
10. you start to actually care about what your relative are saying.

i’m not quite at nine yet, but i can see it coming, and i’d like to be, literally, on another continent when it shows. other signs you need to go home include craving english-language tv so badly you’ll watch even things like Bend it Like Beckham and being completely out of money.

Labels: sweden

i swear, i was so freakin busy in stockholm, i barely had the chance to look up the sites of the museums we went to, let alone right a blog entry, let alone translate poor yuu’s journal. =(>_)>

we arrived saturday evening, went to the hotel to drop our stuff off, and then headed for dinner. i had what was possibly the best italian somethings evarz. it was like an egg roll only in pasta. it was so incredibly delicious i ate all four roll things and the appetizer rolls before i could stop myself. cannelloni, i think it was. yeah. i’ve had plenty of manacotti before, actually i love those things, but this? this was like The Italian Food. in short, i was in italian-cuisine-otaku heaven. also, the restaurant had zebras on the wallpaper. it was quite odd. oh yeah, also, they served me what is possibly the best strawberry daquiri i’ve ever had as well, and i’ve had quite a few of those. … uh, i mean…

then we wandered around gamla stan (pronounced gemlah staun) and planned the morrow’s trip.

sunday, we started out w/ breakfast at the hotel – fairly good. the swedish like to have sandwiches for breakfast, which is a tradition i can get completely behind – and then headed for the VasaMuseet, which is the museum constructed to house the Vasa, a ship which is freakin huge and awesomely cool. unfortunately, it was so bloody dark in there that i could hardly see anything, and the pictures i took weren’t very good either. the ship itself was raised from goteborg harbor about 330 years after it sank on it’s maiden voyage. the king wanted his ship a little larger than engineering at that time could manage. the thing that really struck me about that museet though, after the sheer size of the ship, was the reconstructions they did of some of the skulls they found on board. these kind of reconstructions always intrigue me, but these were especially creepy, because it was so dark in there that the faces sort of floated out of the ether at you. (^^;) after that we had lunch at MAX, a swedish hamburger chain that has apparently closed down mcdonald’s in the northern parts of sweden. it was quite delicious. the burger i ordered was huge! maybe four of five inches across, with all the toppings. it was almost like a big mac, except with both patties smooshed down into one massive pattie, and then not so much special sauce. their fries were like mcdonald’s too, i.e. not to my liking, but the burger itself more than made up for that. after lunch we headed to the post museum, which was the history of postage and the swedish postal system. i think my cousin thought i was crazy, but i quite liked it. we spent so much time getting there, though, that by the time we’d looked around, they were closing and we didn’t get to go to the gift shop. (T_T) probably a good thing, though, considering the massively large amounts of moneys i spent at the vasamuseet. (^^;) after that, we had dinner … somewhere. i can’t remember where now. i was still pretty much high from the cannelonnis. we decided after that to go to the movies, as it had been raining, literally ALL DAY. plus, and this is the part that threw me, the stores all close at like 5 or 6. i know it was sunday, but they close at that time every day. i was totally thrown. we were going to see pirates 3, but mom said that we’re going to see that when i get back to the states, so sanna and i decided on 300 instead. if you like the graphic novel, you will absolutely love this movie. if you’ve never heard of the graphic novel, or if you hate highly stylised violence, or if you dislike high stylisation in general, you should spend your moneys on some other movie, one that you will like. i? loved this flick. sanna? didn’t. then it was like midnight, so we went back to the hotel and went to bed.

monday, i slept in whilst sanna went to breakfast, and then we headed for the silk weaving museum. this? was righteously cool. it was the smallest thing we visited, but it was totally cool. they have jaquard looms there, and the lady who operates them was there. she was like, would you like a demonstration? and sanna and i were like, hells yes! so she basically gave us a little impromptu class in jaquard weaving right there. i soo wanted to try my hand, but given the age of the things, it was probably a no-go.
they also had a loom where they wove bookmarks and ribbon. you could do six ribbons simultaneously! in the little video they had upstairs, there was video of someone doing just that. i was like, talk about pre-computer age multi-tasking! also upstairs, they had a little exhibit about the histoire of the business. that was pretty cool, too, but also dark. that damn light! damaging all the historical things and preventing me from really seeing them!

after that, we headed for lunch, this time at a pizza joint. i had decided that i absolutely must eat sweden’s take on the immortal dish. let me tell you, i was not disappointed. i ordered a ham and mushroom thing, figuring to order toppings i was well familiar with in order to better analyze the difference between american and swedish pizzas. then the thing came. i was like, this? is all mine? =(>_)>
i was not disappointed. the crust was much much thinner than anything i’d had in the states, and so we were forced to use forks and knives. apparently, in this country, this is quite normal. i went with the flow and dug in. … then i blacked out. it was so yummy. delicious. delightful. atrociously good. i don’t remember much until we were leaving, and i looked down at the plate. oh crap! i thought. i’d better take a picture!

there was, in gamla stan, probably the best bookstore i have ever been to. if you’ll pardon the crappy shooting, i invite you to view the video i had to take of the manga section. it was too large to fit in even several photographs. frankly, there was even another end cap stuffed with manga. now, i realize they had to have had both swedish and english language editions of some of these, but quite a few of them were engleska only or svenska only, so… that was a huge manga section. as you can hear, sanna was perhaps not so impressed. silly her. (^_^)

then we had some ice cream, hurridly caught our train to the airport and our flight home, had some mcdonald’s for dinner and finally went our seperate ways, me to onsala, sanna to her own house. i about passed out i was so tired, but! i managed to stay up for the 13er episode of blood+. which, by the way, rocked. hard.

this morning, we went to chalmers observatory for a tour, which by the by they don’t do all the time. you have to call and make a special appointment. (^_^) — i am having the biggest deja vu right now. how many freakin times am i going to be stuck in sweden exactly!? — it was very very cool. they do radio telescopes there, listening for things and mapping the stars with radio waves. they’ve got one telescope 20 meters across for the really tiny waves, and then a 25 meter one for the large waves. the 25 meter one was suitable for framing, i swear. the 20 meter one was actually encapsulated in a bubble made of metal to keep the noise out. it was very cool in there, like some kind of crypt. it was actually temperature controlled. the patterns of the bubble when i looked up were intriguing.
they also had a room of ancient technology, such as apple iie’s and the first laptops they used (oh yeah, ancient…) but right outside of that room, hooked up to the computers that they actually used, was a familiar sight. it aroused in me a certian longing for things like my own friggin bed, and a shower stall that’s bigger than a closet. actually, what it made me want the most was access to my regular book making tools. i miss you, tools! (T_T)

then we came home for lunch and then rae and i went thrifting. the thrift shops they have here, at least the ones we visited, were more like secondhand shops than what i’m used to calling a thrift shop, but they were awesome. i got two new shirts and one new sweater for 35 kronor. about US$5. then rae and i went grocery shopping – something i always love doing – and they had these things that hooked on to the shopping carts where you could scan each item you bought as you bought it and then at the checkout lane, you just handed them the scanner and went along. it deducted automatically from whichever account you listed when you signed up for the service and you didn’t have to hassle with anything. how cool is that? i, only the other hand, had to pay for my four dr peppers, tub of ben&jerry’s cherry garcia (^_^) and wether’s originals box that will later become a book for sale, i had to pay for those things the regular way. the fancy thing was, i did it all in swedish! now, granted, i hardly said three words for the entire transaction, but the cashier spoke at least a little bit more than i did, and she didn’t have to utter one word in engleska to appease my measley little brain. yays~ (^_^)

oh yeah! i almost forgot. before we did all this, rae and i went to see one of the seriously old churches that she lives near. or rather, kyrkan. the church. every single one of my pics of the interior turned out fuzzy, which is a real shame because it was nice inside, but i really liked that kyrka. it had nice acoustics. it also had a crypt. literally! it had two sarcophogus…es(?) one for this famous pirate from onsala, and one for his bride. mister lars gathenhielm apparently wanted to marry this girl, but her father said, hells no, you’re a pirate. you can marry my daughter when this church has two steeples! … so, lars, being the industrious fellow he was, built a second spire on the church. nothing like putting your ill gotten booty to good use.

or your ill booten gotty.

goodnight folks.

Labels: sweden

we spend the night in denmark last night. how you like that? you just take a little ferry (pictured, left) and you’re suddenly in a whole other country! (^_^) actually, denmark was very nice. a little quiet for my tastes, but then, so is everything over here. even the cities don’t really feel like cities. i’m headed for stockholm tomorrow, so perhaps there i will find a true “city.”

anyhow, without further ado, allow me to introduce you to: denmark~

hrm. that. looks. familiar. somehow. i think the first rule of travel is that every-damn-field every-damn-where looks exactly the same. (T_T)

the first place we went was some penninsula up at the very northern part of the largest island (jutland), where the baltic sea meets the north sea. since both of these seas are flowing in opposite directions, they form some pretty cool waves where they meet. it was a little hard to get pictures of, since there were a lot of people there, which was a shame, because the colors there were really amazing. there were some good looking sand formations, too. it was a pretty long walk up there, so we took a little buggy/bus thing instead. in danish, it was called sandormen. i’m not sure what that means, but i’m thinking something along the lines of “noisy thing that transports old people over sand and rocks and beach by bumping them over any and all possible dunes and cutting sharp corners and getting in traffic jams with construction equipment.”

on the way back, there was a lighthouse. for 5 dutch kroner (about US$1) you were allowed the (very nearly endless) pleasure of climbing to the top and looking down. emma and i decided to test our legs. here is a picture i took at the bottom by laying down on the floor and pointing my camera up:

and here is a picture i took by climbing to the top and pointing my camera down:

emma and i counted the stairs on the way down. 200+. so, basically, we went up 200 stairs and down 200 stairs and then had to continue on with the rest of the day. it’s a good thing we’re young. (%_%)

then we went to a church … the name of which i can’t remember at the moment. sandes… something. anyhow, the cool thing about it is the way that most of it is built underground. only the tower is sticking up out of the hills. we didn’t get to go inside, which was a shame, but it was cool to walk around the back and see a little arch poking out of the sand. the way my shadow fell across the sand reminded me of negoto-sama. her pictures are always like that. of course, her’s are always shaky, but i’m hoping to continue my trend of non-shaky photography for the foreseeable future.

we also visited the skagen art museum. it was alright. apparently, skagen denmark was THE place to be if you were an 18th century oil painter. their gift shop was a little lame, and the museum itself was very small, but all in all, not bad at all. there was one section by a guy named peder severin kroyer with several things in it i really liked, but they didn’t have any prints of those paintings, so i didn’t get to buy any of them.

after that, we headed to our hotel and had some dinner. i really wish i’d’ve brought my camera to that meal, because i ordered cordon bleu. now, i realize that the stuff we normally have is packaged for mass consuption and easy preperation, but oh. my. god. this was cordon bleu to die for. it was, literally, a hank of dead baby cow sliced open and stuffed with cheese and mushrooms. there was some kind of bread pudding action on the side, and snow peas, and more shrooms on top, and i would’ve eaten the whole thing if only my stomach had been large enough. oh! and alas! how sad i was when my body would no longer take any more food. it was such a sad occurance; i shall remember it forever as the tragedy of skagen. (^_^)

anyhow… it turns out you can shop on the ferries, so i bought a few things. my suitcase is getting quite full at this point, and i head off for stockholm tomorrow. not that i have a particularly large amount of money remaining to me, i suppose, but still. it’s a good thing grandma’s got one of those wheeled luggage carriers to loan me, coz i’m certain i wouldn’t be lifting this thing for terribly long otherwise. i may have to start shipping things home to myself! (^_^)

Labels: sweden

actually, more like, göteborg shopping, day two. yesterday, we took a boat tour around the canals in the city. my favourite part was probably when we turned around and got splashed a little because there were so many other boats on the water. my second favourite part was definitely the three low bridges that we passed. the second one had a nickname, the cheese slicer. it was so low, we had to hunker down in the boat to get past it. it was quite delightful. (^_^)

and then there was the ad on the seat next to me. indeed, göteborg is fantastic, so i thought i’d tell all of you. probably cheaper than phoning all of you, at any rate. (^_^) on the tour, we got to see some very strange things, not the least of which was the delightful triangle-headed statue you see below you. also, i’ve seen the lipstick building now from basically everywhere in the city, so i think i’m good on that.

then we went out for some presentos. yesterday, i got a few presentos, but today i got quite a few presentos. i’ve got about 5 things for dana-chan, about that much for mamma, and i finally found something for carolyn. dad and michael, on the other hand, are proving considerably more difficult to buy for. as usual, i suppose. i got something for michael, although it’s not nearly as perfect for him as the pink clogs you see will be for dana-chan, but we’re going to denmark tomorrow and then i’ve got next week, and stockholm with sanna next weekend, so i’m confident i’ll be able to find something. actually, what i bought today that i’m eager to try out, is a coloring book! i think my aunt thought i was a bit wacko, but oh well. she’s a lot like my mom, so she’ll go with the flow.

p.s. the ciabatta loaf i bought was delicious!

Labels: sweden

i bought a fifty dollar pair of shades. actually, they were 390 kronor, which is about $55. they’re polarized, and polaroid brand, and they go straight over my regular glasses, and they’re very very comfy, but still, $55? oh well. not like i don’t have about $700 on tap for the trip.

i’ve used them well already, too. we went to one of the botanical gardens in kungsbacka yesterday. it was pretty nice. i suppose every botanical garden is like every other botanical garden, but i generally like them, so it wasn’t bad. there was a quilting exhibition there. some of the quilts were pretty cool, but i’m not really a quilting person. i’m sure mom’ll like that section of the five day slide show i’ll be putting on when i get home, though. probably the coolest one was this one with the greenery. i like the way it pops out of the frame. hrm, what a shock, meredeth like the odd ones… (^_^)

then there was the actual plant section of the gardens. you had your traditional european stuff, and your gazeebos and your plaques about your plants. there was even a japanese section, although it was set up more like a european garden with japanese plants than a japanese garden. there were a couple little zen enclaves, but on the whole it was just european style. the coolest thing about the whole garden was this little path that i took just on a whim – i think maybe my cousins thought i was crazy, but i wanted to explore. – that led up to this rocky promentory where you could see the entirety of göteborg in one 360 degree view. i took some video with my camera, but i haven’t even looked at it yet. it was totally awesome. i’m not a big fan of high places, either, but it was just way too cool.

speaking of cool things, i’ve gotten to sleep in two days in a row now. i’m feeling a lot better today than i was yesterday. i think i got too much sun. my chin was blistering, and now it’s got some little orange spots where the blisters were, but my arms are actually a little brown (zomg!) and my shoulders are getting better, so in a couple more days, my chin should be good to go. i’ve just got to remember to stay out of the sun as much as possible. emma, my younger cousin, the one who just graduated, asked me this morning if i wanted to go to the pool with her. i was like, nej, tack. no, thanks. a, too much sun, b, too much socializing, and c, (my socially acceptable excuse) i forgot my bathing suit. emma was like, i’ve got some you can borrow, but i was like, eheheh, no thanks. (^^;)

anyhow, at some point today, we’re heading to kungsbacka or göteborg or something for a little light shopping, and the purchasing of some stamps, so i’m sending dana-chan a postcard. it’s shiny and sparkly, so i’m sure she’ll like it. i bought a bunch of them, i figure one to a different member of the fam every day this week, and they should get home before i do. we’ll see i guess. (^_-)

Labels: sweden