Since Tuesday

-hopped on the ferry to Portsmouth with a bookbag for me and a bag of presents for the family hosting me. the bottle of wine takes priority over another set of clothes for me, right?

-got headache, faceplanted into plushy seat, and napped for really not long enough.

-was welcomed to England by a gruff security guard who wanted to know who I was, why I was here, how long I was staying, why on earth I was living in France, why I left the USA, and how much money I had in my bank accounts.

-was really welcomed to England with big kisses by Lizzi and the fam! I can't believe I'm really back here sometimes! She's exactly the same =)

-Spent Wednesday morning doing a big British grocery shop in Waitrose, which is apparantly the place to shop.

-Spent Wednesday evening decorating the tree and getting into a British soap called Gavin & Stacey. The title characters are boring, but it's worth a check-out for the alternative friends and their families.

-Funny thing: English trees look just like American trees:

-Closed the night with a drive out to some lit-up Christmas houses. This is not such a big to-do in England as it is in the USA, but there are some areas that do it. Felt closer to home. Now if only I could see a giant inflatable Santa.

-Thursday was Portsmouth. A great little harbor town full of shops, and a really cool structure called the Spinnaker tower. It's high and from the top you can stand on a glass plane and look down all 170 metres to your bloody death if the pane didn't hold. Good stuff. It even blows in the wind.

-Shopping in Portsmouth: New Years cards (which is code for late Christmas cards), dress for Christmas day, and super cheap lady garment in my size! Take that, France.

-Lunch in Portsmouth was yummy pizza. But let's talk about dessert:

-Southampton was Friday. Did shopping, found my New Year's dress (the theme is class). Crap weather though, so we didn't bother to go find the Tudor houses. They were probably closed anyway.

-Fish & chips minus the fish.

-Tea, tea, tea

Will catch up later. For now, I'm off to see Winchester and the round table. Little bit of history for my Christmas Eve!

finally caught that holiday bug!

The last few days have been Christmas on lock.
-Home Alone plays on YouTube while I make crafty presents in my kitchen.
-My voice laces the beads of water under the shower. I'm singing The Drifters' version of "White Christmas."
-I buy all of my families' presents on Amazon this year so they will arrive on time. Bank card information is entered while I listen to my GrooveShark holidayzzzz mix.
-Buying more Xmas presents today - Normandy specialties for my English family!
-SCORE: Danny Elfman's "Ice Dance" from Edward Scissorhands just started playing. Spooky Christmas rock.
-Saving the Christmas soap that Erin gave me for England. Why just be excited for Christmas when you can smell like Christmas?
-Oh damn - "This Christmas" by the Temptations just came on. Mmm. Hang low the mistletoe - I'm gonna get to know you better, baby.
-There is an ice skating rink in Centre Ville. How many times do you think I will fall?


Merry Christmas! Now, let me hear you make some holy ghost crazy noise right now.

Who's Thankful? This dame.

For the most part, the French don't do Thanksgiving. But I have been blessed enough to find a wonderful Franco-American family who has taken me in, so to speak. And this year they invited me to Thanksgiving with their folks. So instead of sitting in my room missing my family back home and listening to sad mopey songs on Grooveshark, I spent the evening with a super welcoming family eating all the delicious staples of an American Thanksgiving.

First course: Veloute of pumpkin and potatoes with creme fraiche and parsley. A veloute, as W reminded me when I posted my pics on Facebook, is a hearty soup that has been blended into creamy deliciousness.

Then there was the turkey! Turkeys are typically hard to find in France at this time of year, but this family has been doing Thanksgiving for 6 years. They found this bird at a local farm. He's grain-fed and free-range. Which basically means he had a happy life. More than you can say for your average butterball!

Our sides were gravy, stuffing, and these two mashes. Plus homemade cornbread and cranberry sauce. Best I ever had.

Cheese course! I'm definitely introducing this part of the meal to my family next year. We had chevre (W's favorite - the cylinder cheese) and two local cheeses: Pont L'Eveque (the square) and Camembert (the round wheel).

And then it was time for dessert. E really outdid herself. Not one, not two, but three pies! From top to bottom, pumpkin, apple, and pecan.

The night was over much too soon, but I was left with the feeling of family, of holiday, of tradition. I truly am a lucky girl. I hope all of you back home had a great Thanksgiving too!

Craft Night!

On Wednesdays we craft. CK, Alex, and me. This week we were lucky to have the company of talented graphist (yep, that's a word now) MN!

Alex painted:


CK sketched the crowd:


MN gave us a ghostly forest:


And I put a bird on it:


Thanks for the pastels CK!

Alex made some progress last night. Isis helped.


And finally, I can't decide if Weds or Tues is my favorite day. Crafting with friends is rocktastic, but Tuesdays have this:

This one's for my mom

Cause it's her birthday.


more animals


more animals


more animals

Love you ma.

Shoutout

To the best friends in the world. This is mad old, and I forgot to put it up. But back when Donna and Rach had their election-party, they invited me. I, of course, was in France. But this did not stop me from being there:

This one's for Beenie

because she was in my dreams last night. For all those out there who don't know what a Beenie is, it's my best cousin. And last night, I dreamt that she and I and my nephew Sean were in the ocean. And I was really afraid they would get hurt. I was totally in mom-mode instead of cool older-cousin mode. It was a total nightmare!

And when we went into the locker room (because in my dreams oceans are like swimming pools) Barack Obama was there and he had a son who was Sean's age. Barack Obama is becoming quite the fixture in my dreams. Three times in two months!

Oh yeah, and Beenie, dream-you can speak French.

Along Came a Spider

It was the second day I was here in Lisieux. I was sitting in my apartment, watching season six of Buffy, when I saw something move behind my bed. I peeked behind my bed and saw this really huge spider with long, thin legs. It seemed way larger than a daddy-long-legger, but maybe that’s because of the massive fear it instilled in me.

I’ve never once trapped a spider. When I lived at home I would have my mom or dad take care of it, and when I lived in Ocean City Mike was the professional spider-remover. I know there were times that I saw spiders when no one was home, but I used to have this weird ability to forget about them. I would just close the door to whatever room I was in and think to myself, “OK, if it’s still in there later, someone else will get it.”

But I couldn’t do that here. This spider wasn’t going anywhere, and no one else was going to come to my rescue. What was I gonna do, go ask my landlord? I don’t even know the word for spider. Actually, wait, I think I do thanks to the last episode of Buffy I watched, but that’s hardly the point.

The spider was a hard one to trap because he got behind my bed. You saw the size of my bed though – it’s not like it’s hard to move. I saw his skinny body crawling toward my suitcases under the bed and that was enough to make me jump into grown-up mode. I had visions of his little body snuggling up in there all winter and waiting for me to start packing for home in May, when he and his army of spiders could finally attack me (cause, you know, in my vision he was commander-in-chief of the spider army). Anyway, I grabbed a plate and a glass and did this cool trick I saw Rachel do once at her apartment to get the spider out without killing it. My dad always told me never to kill a spider. I think I may have injured his leg though. Sorry.

I debated for a long time about whether or not this story was blog-worthy. And I have decided that it is. Maybe I don’t have a touristy picture of it, and maybe I didn’t have to practice any French, and maybe it’s something that could have happened anywhere in the world. But you know what? I think it marks a change in me. I can trap a spider now. Hooray for independence.

ch-ch-ch-ch-changes

USB cord found! So in one album I give you everything I've been waiting to blog about - July 4th, Nummy Island, and some important stylistic and romantic changes that have been going on in my life. Enjoy!

BubbleShare: Share photos - Create and Share Crafts

Emo-nely

Every year my Aunt Cathy rents a house on the boardwalk in Ocean City for a week. And my cousin always comes down for the week with a bunch of her friends and I visit them a couple times. And inevitably, once during this week they get an Old Time Photo. You know, those cheesy photos where you can dress in some period garb, sit on a piano or a bar while a sixteen-year-old fixes your hat and boa, and then have your photo developed in sepia and placed in a paper frame. All for just ten dollars a person. Each photo. So that means that for five people to be in a photo (and for each person to get a photo) it would cost about $110 dollars. And since I could never afford a beach house in Ocean City (nor could my 'rents), I always sit out and play the chaperone.

So there I was last night, holding my cousin's handbag as she, her boyfriend, and two of her bests posed for a few shots. I'm feeling lame and lonely, mostly because all the other years I came to visit them at the beach house I had someone with me. For a lot of years it was Edwin, and though I don't miss him, I do miss the satisfaction of having someone to walk with who is closer than a friend.

So I walked across the boardwalk to sit on a bench facing the ocean. Figured there's no use in watching their group and being envious. Because (hate me for it all you want) I do want to be in one of these photos. I want to come out of that shady back room in a bright pink dress and have a photographer arrange me and make a dumb expression for the camera. But I can't justify doing it because I am spiteful as shit. And it's a ripoff.

A moment after I sit down, a boy who is no taller than my knee sits on the opposite side of the bench. He is licking an ice cream cone that is as big as his face. Then (presumably) his parents roll up to the bench with their stroller, and out comes a toddler girl with a head of hair my neice would be totally jealous of. And they are a perfect, beautiful family and they should take an Old Time Photo together.

I smile politely and walk over to the next available bench After a couple minutes there, another family stops behind me to collect itself. They also have ice cream, but this boy has dripped it all over himself and must be wiped clean by napkin. I always had to order ice cream in a cup so I wouldn't stain my clothes.

They leave and I'm still waiting for my group to finish their photo. I don't have my book with me (damn). I'm thinking about France when a college girl comes up to me and asks if I'd like to participate in a survey. Sure. Usually, the religious survey-giving types get really mad at me when I admit that I don't subscribe to any religion and they try to convert me. But this girl was awesome. We had a really great conversation. She picked my brain a bit about the stuff she didn't agree with me on, but it seemed to be out of genuine curiosity instead of from a desire to challenge. And I really respect her for that.

By the time the group was done with the photo, I was feeling pretty good again. I'd verbalized some things I'd often thought but never said. Talking religion with people whom I don't know well usually scares the shit out of me, but this was a tolerable experience. And now I just want to audit a religion course.

One more night in the beach house. Whoo.

Thank You Chris Moore

for introducing Christian the Lion into my life.

How to remove a tick safely

when i was young (7-9ish), my mother made fun of me a lot for being overweight. and though we didn't live in the woods, and i didn't do much outdoors, there were many instances that i found ticks on my body. ma doesn't know this (and she's computer illiterate so will probably never find out), but whenever i found a tick on my stomach, thigh or any other body part that wasn't typically visible, i would be much too ashamed of my fat to show her and ask for help removing the parasite. i would sit in the bathroom and try to remember how she removed ticks back when i would let her see my skin. i knew she used tweezers, but i couldn't just go get the tweezers and return to the bathroom - she would know something was up. so i would pull the tick as slowly as possible away from my flesh. and every single time, the body would detach from the head, and i would be left with a tick head embedded inside. and then i would remember. vaseline! she always used vaseline to smother the tick out. so i would open the medicine cabinet and slather vaseline all over whatever area was puffing up and reddening. of course it was too late - with no body, the head could never escape the petroleum jelly.

and this happened more than once. i'd say i've probably had 8-10 tick heads float around my body in the course of my life. and i'm sure (i truly hope) that my body has killed them all.

but today i found this tidbit of information and thought i would share it, in case there's any 6-9 year old reading this who is wondering how to go about removing a tick properly without ever having to show flesh to parent:

"To remove a tick, apply a glob of liquid soap to a cotton ball. Cover the tick with the soap-soaked cotton ball for a few seconds (15-20), after which the tick will come out on its own and be stuck to the cotton ball when you lift it away."

Or better yet, just get over your ridiclous fears of your mother's judgement. She's going to badger you about weight whether you show her your bare stomach or not, so grow a pair. Or get lyme disease.

Birfday Recap

i didn't really think 22 could be better than 21. i know, i'm prepared to have everyone even a day older than me get upset at this comment, but time is going by too fast and i feel old! i wish that i could have stayed 21 forever. well, not really, but maybe one more year?

anyway, what i was originally getting at is that, even though i was a tad apprehensive about 22, it was quite wonderful!

i got flowers delivered to me at the office for the first time ever,


i got to hang out with my family, including my supermodel neice (look at her pose!)




and my incredibly wired nephew (of whom I will post a pic later because my camera just died),

and when i got back to oc, there were balloons in my bedroom, champagne in the fridge, reubens about to be assembled, Wii to be played, and Paris, Je T'Aime ready to watch.

i don't think this birthday could have been any better.

oh yeah, i almost forgot, i started to learn "Samson" on the keyboard.

May 20th is a special day

not only did these important things happen, but it is also my birffffday!

today my mom told me that i could have anything i wanted for dinner, so i chose
1. shake-n-bake chicken
2. macaroni and cheese
3. corn on the cob

i think she might think i'm mocking her cooking skills.

i have the best roommates in the whole world

last week, i was really depressed. and i wanted to cry. but i thought that that may not be the best idea, because - in my prior experience - boys are not the most comforting species. here and there, a boy really stands out in his ability to comfort a crying female, but most of the time, he fumbles, not sure where to place his hands or what to say, and if he remembers that tissues may be appreciated, he can't remember where he last put them.

so you can understand my hesitation to cry in front of my roommates - all three of whom are male.

but i was wrong.

mike is incredibly able to talk about things without passing judgement, at least until i am ready to handle it.

andy is always ready with a hug that will last as long as i need it to and a hilarious youtube video.

and chris moore - well, i hadn't ever really exhibited the sad emotion in front of chris moore and i wasn't sure what he would do. so i was happily surprised/relieved when the tears snuck into my eyeballs and he immediately jumped up to play a feel-better song on his itunes: "Bowl Of Oranges" by Bright Eyes.

and this gesture was uniquely chris moore and very comforting.

so last week i learned that i can let the tears flow whenever they want to, because my roomies are exceptional members of the opposite sex.