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I am a Flash Goddess! Yes, I am! It's official. Go see for yourself. I am so wearing my tiara today.
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.: posted by Vera 
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My mom is the coolest! She made a Rainbow Brite costume for me. I got it in the mail last night, along with lots of chocolate and licorice. I think it turned out really, really well, don't you? My mom rocks.
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.: posted by Vera
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Have you ever heard a rhinoceros talk? Even if you haven't, could you imagine what this might sound like? That's about what I sound like today. I have the worst cold ever. Seriously. You couldn't get anything through my nasal passages right now even if you tried. Thanks to Power Puffs Plus, my nose is still attached to my face, albeit in a very red and shiny way.
But the scariest thing about this cold is that I seem to be a bit senile today. Take this morning for instance. I woke up at 4am, wrapped up tight in the gelatinous velum of The Flu. I couldn't go back to sleep so I got up. The first thing that always needs to happen when I get up, sick or not, is both of my feet need to be placed into both of my pink fuzzy slippers. This morning I couldn't find my pink fuzzy slippers. I looked all over for them. I'll never know where they were. All I know is that a few hours later, they were on my feet. No, they weren't there the whole time. I must have inadvertently found them and put them on without even knowing it.
THEN, just now, I put on some tea water in hopes that the hot tea vapors might resolve the confusion in my rhinal tracts. And I knew that immediately prior to messing with the stove, I had held in my hand a plum that I was looking forward to eating. And I couldn't find it anywhere. It eventually turned up on the mouse pad of one of my computers. I never knew that amnesia could be the symptom of a cold.
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.: posted by Vera
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Per request by my Mama, here is a tour of my new living quarters. I will keep adding pictures to this as we fill in the blanks with more blobjects. Oh, and don't mind the subtitles. They are there so my Mama doesn't have to get out her dictionary.
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.: posted by Vera
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 While I was at SF Camerawork last night, another artist piqued my interest: Jona Frank. No, she is not the one in the picture. That's one of her high school student portraits. Jona Frank is obsessed with adolescence and high school, especially its internal caste systems. This picture is from a photo exhibit titled "High School" in April, which unfortunately I missed. The title of the photo is Angela, Candy Raver, CA, 1999. I also love Ellsworth Kelly: http://www.slam.org/m3.html and Mark Ryden:http://www.markryden.com.
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.: posted by Vera
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Last night I went to a lecture by one of my favorite artists, Joyce Hsu. I had first read about her in a magazine about two years ago. It must have been either Wallpaper or One. In the magazine I saw pictures of an exhibit Joyce Hsu had done in San Francisco. She had created a scene, an alternate environment, that took up a whole room and that was filled with colorful, shiny mechanical flowers and mechanical butterflies. I thought it was the coolest.
Now that I live in San Francisco myself, I got the chance to listen to her talk about her work. I really like the way this girl thinks. She likes to build mechanical toys that are functional, but they also have to be cute. They are cute machines, much like Aibo the dog, but they are art. The emphasis is on companionship. Each of Joyce Hsu's machines is meant to be a companion comparable to a pet or a Hello Kitty plush doll. The companion only has a hint of a personality or a life of its own to begin with, but you can project the rest onto it in your own mind. The relationship between you and the companion is very malleable. If you want a better explanation of this intellection, go here and scroll down to Joyce Hsu.
I didn't ask Joyce this but I bet she sometimes wishes that she could metamorphose herself into one of her cute machines. I know I do.
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.: posted by Vera
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The scene: Castro and Clipper. Today 12:34pm. Temperature: 69° Fahrenheit. And this:
I was on my way to buy some groovy lamps but went back home to get my camera. I felt like the dude from American Beauty:
Sometimes there's so much beauty in the world I feel like I can't take it, like my heart's going to cave in.
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.: posted by Vera
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Guess what? Denis has a gallery of windscreen pictures. And I submitted the first picture! If you have any pictures taken through the windscreen of a car, ranging from quotidian to exotic, send them to Denis!
Now here is the $64,000 question: Vera is to Denis what Denis to _______? If you know the answer, you spend decidedly too much time online!
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.: posted by Vera
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It's been an exciting two-day weekend for my mundane self. Here are some of the reasons why:
I went to the park twice.
I went to Cafe Abir twice.
I went to two parties at extremely cool locations.
I went to a club where I danced in two different rooms.
I shared the dance floor with some people in their early 20's and a woman in her early 50's.
I heard a drum'n'bass set that was so heavy, I like to call it drum'n'bass'n'bass.
I found out what an AirFX is.
I saw two shows that involved an AirFX.
I went to church. Kidding.
I went on a phonic trip through deep space.
I found a flyer for a Halloween Costume Ball in the door to the big tall downtown building in which my boyfriend now spends his days in a suit costume. This has to be a good sign.
I found out that the offices of Reflect.com are in the same building as my boyfriend's employer.
I ate two candy bars that my boyfriend had lying around in his office.
I bought two CD's: this one and Break the Code by Ms. E which the Internet doesn't seem to have any record of.
I took two pictures of Jessica and Jimmy.
I took two pictures of the full moon but they didn't do the moon justice, so I am not showing them to you.
I decided to go to business school after all. Kidding.
I discovered a tiny blob of green nail polish on one of my toes, left over from a pedicure I got four months ago.
I received a long-awaited book in the mail.
I hung out with two Renee's.
I came up with two new ways to do my otherwise bootless hair.
Little dampers were put on things because:
I had to admit to myself, in a combination of haunting memories and a very real and present repulsion, that I hate spinach, even baby spinach.
I found out that Madame Mercury has sold her turntables and all of her records and is completely done DJ'ing.
I found out that yet another Full Moon Gathering has taken place in my absence and oblivion.
I felt bad for not spending any time on the volunteer project I took on recently.
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.: posted by Vera
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So I went to Golden Gate Park today with my friend Jessica who is visiting from San Diego. We checked out some of the biggest, most beautiful and most colorful flowers we had ever seen. We were wondering if we could walk among the flowers like we saw a bare-chested man do. In another area, there was a woman snaking around the dahlias and taking very close looks. So we followed in her path. We took a few whiffs here and there and mixed them with shouts of "Look how beautiful this one is!" and "Check out this fat one!", when all of a sudden I heard this brutal voice yell "Excuse me!" and then "Please leave! This is not a public area!" It was the woman in front of us. Her exclamations felt like kicks to the stomach. What a bitch. We didn't know. We thought she was just a mortal spectator like us. Jessica said, and I agree, "You shouldn't be that rude around flowers that are that pretty."
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.: posted by Vera
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Half way into making soup tonight, I realized that the pot I was using wasn't going to hold all the vegetably ingredients the recipe asked for, and that we didn't have a bigger pot either. So I fled over to the store to buy a bigger pot. What ensues is the dialogue at checkout.
Cashier (grinning): So you came to the store just to buy a little pot, huh?
Moi: Yep. Just a pot.
Cashier (grinning impishly): Sorry, I couldn't resist making that comment.
Moi:
Cashier (grinning like a stoner): That's not a lot of pot though.
Moi (still not getting it): No, it's pretty small.
While we're talking about soup, I would like to state for the record that my favorite soup vegetable is definitely leek.
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.: posted by Vera
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Poptech -> An annual 21st century conference aimed at discussing culture and technology
Tech-pop -> A 21st century (re-)emerging electronic music genre aimed at influencing culture with technology
Hm. And Artificial Worlds, the theme of this year's Poptech, sounds a lot like it might get ripped off for the title of an upcoming tech-pop album.
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.: posted by Vera
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During the two years I lived in Virginia, I used to go to Buzz at club Nation for most of my dancing needs. Effective yesterday, Buzz is no longer. Is this a first harbinger of the ugly RAVE Act winning? Say it ain't so. And what pisses me off the most is that it's all the military's fault! Members of the military have been caught doing and selling drugs at Buzz, and now all the DC party kids have one less place to dance. Great.
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.: posted by Vera
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[Bragging continued] Here is the view again around sunrise.
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.: posted by Vera
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Today has made me the proud owner of a digital camera, and here is the first picture I took: The view. I have mentioned it in almost every single post since I have moved into this apartment, and here it is.
Night version coming soon.
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.: posted by Vera
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I just dropped off my boyfriend like a parent drops off a child on the first day of school. Today he starts his first job in the real world. His job title? Overpaid Slave.
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.: posted by Vera
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Good news from the Beauty Fairy: The pink spot is slowly but surely subsiding. Yes! Close your door on the way out, pink spot. Thanks, Beauty Fairy, for being on my side this time. Now, if I'll be your friend, will you also close the pores on my forehead and make sure that my face never wrinkles and my boobs never sag? Thanks. I knew we could work something out.
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.: posted by Vera
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Oo, I love this word that I found twice in a History of MathML article on the Mathematica website: disambiguate. Good one. I can't wait to use this in conversation:
Someone: You look phat in those pants.
Me: Dude. Disambiguate, please.
Someone: You look awesome in those pants.
Me: Thanks.
Wait. What am I doing reading about MathML? Do I feel another geek wave coming on? I think so. I had one of those in March/April of this year and loved it while it lasted. In almost all of my spare time I would learn, try, and read about new stuff I can do with my favorite medium, Flash. I was really fired up. Maybe it is happening again. I hope so.
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.: posted by Vera
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So last night we saw our friend Josh's band spin. That's right. A band that spins. Like I said before, Josh and his friends like to de- and re-wire noise-making toys. Last night we witnessed a live orchestra of wacky instruments and a turntable. I didn't expect the show to be this good. I am not that much into noise, and Josh had always described his band as one that concatenates noise snippets. From what I understood, Josh's band doesn't always spin music, meaning a cohesive blend of syncopated beats and rhythm, but rather puts on a cacophany of sampled sounds, noises, and voices from this world and beyond, mixed with an occasional bleep or blurp from one of their toys. Apparently, the set we were served last night, was a little different from their usual sets. They did have a record playing in the background at all times. And it was a really, really good record. It sounded like very hard acid techno, very driving and stompy. When the toy noises accentuated the pounding beat at just the right times, the whole thing turned into the most futuristic-sounding orchestra ever. What was also nice was the dynamic going on among the four band members. You could almost say that it was like a more futuristic and much more aggressive jazz set because the players had the freedom to deviate and do their own thing, while at the same time contributing to a euphonious whole.
The event was called Dumpapolootza and took place outdoors near a landfill that has received some unwanted attention for its art and sculptures. There were cookies and a homeless contingent and the bay and a fire, in which many of us roasted marshmallows and squeezed them inbetween graham crackers that my boyfriend, in a flash of genius, had suggested we bring to the potluck. We hopped and skipped to the music and around the fire, and then we went home and it was just me and him and the view.
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.: posted by Vera
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What had me pensive today: Why does tuna come in a can? Why doesn't tuna come in filet format like other fish? Why don't other fish come in cans like tuna? Why is tuna the only one that's different?
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.: posted by Vera
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While other people were busy mourning and commemorating the lives lost one year ago today, I was busy submitting a picture to bathtubgirl.
Oh yeah. I also set up a DSL LAN and a pretty chain of lights in my office.
Editor's Note: Do I always wear my glasses in the bathtub? Uh-huh. I wear them in just about any situation.
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.: posted by Vera
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I would like to talk about some of the disturbing things I saw on television at the gym today without sound.
1. In one ad, it said that 75% of unemployed adults are illiterate. First of all, what a slap in the face to all the hundreds of thousands of literate adults who are unemployed and have been for months. Secondly, I don't think so, especially not in this economy. (Don't you love it when people say that? Me too.)
2. There was another ad that featured a woman snacking on raw fruits and vegetables. First she was gnawing on a carrot on the subway. Then you saw her with an apple in her face at the gym. Finally, she was munching on a bouquet of broccoli at the office. I thought "Oh cool, maybe this ad will teach us techniques for complying with the 5-a-day rule, especially since it's so f**king hard." What was the ad really for? Some fiber supplement pill. What an idiot I am. I should have known that nothing that is naturally good for you will ever be advertised on television.
Editor's Note: Why do I censor my own writing, you ask? I don't know. To protect the children, I guess.
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.: posted by Vera
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I saw a vanity license plate today that said UTONIUM. Now that's a great word. It sounds like a marriage of utopia and an element from the periodic table. I get jealous when I see people coin cool words like that. Pinkism is another such word I wish I had made up.
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.: posted by Vera
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Best gummy candy ever: Kasugai fruit gummies. The Kiwi kind even has Kiwi seeds in it! Or at least it looks like it. Strawberry is yummy, too.
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.: posted by Vera
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Do you think J.Lo has a nice ass? Do you wish you had Jennifer Anniston's hair? Katherine Keener's teeth? I do too but what I really wish my body had is ears that stick out. Kind of like what happens when you bring your ears forward with your fingers. In order to write about this in my blog, I had to find out what those kinds of ears are called. So I walked into the living-room with my ears thumbed out and asked my boyfriend "Is there a name for ears like this?" He didn't know of one. Shame on you, English language. In German, I would know exactly how to express myself. Ears that stick out are called "Segelohren." I really wish I had Segelohren. I wonder if a plastic surgeon can hook me up with some?
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.: posted by Vera
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I emailed my sister a map of San Francisco so she can get a picture of where I live. Here is my egocentric version of the city:
The pink dot is where I lived from May 20th to August 31st. The blue dot is where I live now. The shimmery pink veil is the area I can see from my living-room.
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.: posted by Vera
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My boyfriend and I briefly went to Dolores Park today. I had been eyeing the park for weeks and admiring its populousness and neon green grass. Today we finally fused with the crowd like cars merging onto a freeway. We played catch with a law firm-sponsored squishy ball and slalomed through the palm trees. Mucho fun. Oh, and I also saw a guy with the coolest hairdo: pink hair-made feelers that stuck out from his temples.
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.: posted by Vera
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In other places I have lived I have seen many 20-year-old women. In San Francisco I see many 35-year-old girls. I love that about San Francisco. Yey for never growing up.
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.: posted by Vera
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I have made a new friend. But she doesn't know it yet. Her name is Brittney and she lives here. I love her dry but sensitive and sincere style of writing, and her choice of words has amused me more than once. Some of my favorite Brittney quotes so far:
"When I am queen, [insert something that will make the world a better place in Brittney's eyes]."
"While I do possess the ability to blather on and on at times to those I feel comfortable around, the last thing you'd ever see me doing is asking my aislemate at the grocery what she thinks of that particular eyebrow wax or chatting up the video clerk--and I both wax my brows and rent movies a lot. It takes a talent, an ease with yourself that I can't seem to muster."
"I daydream about moving to a city with public transportation and a chinatown and just evaporating into the city's smog"
I like Brittney.
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.: posted by Vera
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My boyfriend and I and four other people hung out at one of my (so far) favorite San Francisco hangouts: The Oxygen Bar. I love the atmosphere in there. The staff will sit down next to you to take your order. They sell alkaline water - by the glass or by the gallon. Their elixirs are tasty and refreshing (Editor's Note: I am a sucker for elixirs, whether they work or not). Mellow music bounces around the room. The walls are lined with these refractive lamps that cast circular rainbows around them. (Editor's Note: You can kind of see them in this picture. I would love to decorate my living-room with them.)
For the first time this time I got hooked up to the oxygen mothership to have aromatherapeutic oxygen walk up my nose and say hi to my brain cells. I have heard it before and now I can confirm it: Oxygen inhalation is the best legal high. While the hose was still in my nose, it felt somewhat uncomfortable and I had this annoying nasal voice, so I didn't talk much. But afterwards I felt extremely detangled and content. When I got home, I slept like a happy fed baby.
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.: posted by Vera
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Have you seen the paintings of Louis Wain's cat before? They are several decades old but I didn't see or hear of them until last night. They are utterly fascinating to me. I was teased last night because I completely zoned out on these cat paintings and the story behind them. The person teasing me had apparently seen many people "getting stuck" on them before. I would love to see similar progressive works of art done by somebody on hallucinogens. After all, each trip is like a mini psychosis.
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.: posted by Vera
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Last night we hung out with our brandnew friends Josh and Renee. Dinner was had, genres were discussed, records were listened to, sound-making toys were played with, DJ's were swayed to at The Top, and two CD's were given to me. I love free music! One is Logghi Barogghi by Scorn, which I am told is dark and anxious, and the other one is an early recording of my favorite San Francisco radio show Future Breaks FM: rolling and metallic drum'n'bass. Awesome.
Editor's Note: If you don't live in San Francisco but want to share in the wonder that is Future Breaks FM, you can also tune in on the web. But remember, it's only on Saturdays from 3 to 5pm. The rest of the week KUSF plays randomness.
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.: posted by Vera
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Wait. Are my ears working properly? The organizers of Burning Man have a lawyer? AND they are filing a lawsuit? How civilized of them.
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.: posted by Vera
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Consider this scenario. Say I move to a new city. Say one of my favorite friends lives in that city. Say that during my first three months of living in the city, I only see said friend twice. What does this mean?
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.: posted by Vera
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Voice mail on my cell phone today:
Hi Vera. This is Starrie. I'm at Roar right now and Dieselboy is spinning, and it made me think of you. Anyway, I'll talk to you later.
That's the kind of message I like to get. To the point, having fun for a good cause, and thinking about me.
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.: posted by Vera
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Anybody know where I can get the blue dress that Angelina Jolie wears in the final scene of Hackers? I really want that dress. I would pay good money for that dress.
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.: posted by Vera
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I ordered my first digital camera today. After finishing my last APS film roll last week, I decided that it will really be my last roll of film. I am ready to chuck my dinosaur of a camera and get on with my digital life. The problem is that amazon.com thinks I still live at my old address from which I moved a few days ago. Hopefully the camera will still make it to my new doorstep somehow.
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.: posted by Vera
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This morning at 'bucks. The actors: Me as the girl in the orange skirt and the blue Kikgirl shirt. My boyfriend as the boy with the blue beanie. A cute friendly gay guy as the Starbucks cashier.
Girl: A grande Tazo Berry, please.
Cashier (glancing at the Kikgirl logo on the girl's kanga pocket): I'll just put kikgirl on the cup as your name.
Boy: ?
Cashier: That's what her belly says.
Boy: A grande Americano, please.
Cashier: I'll just put blue hat on your cup.
Boy: Oh, can I be kikboy, please?
Cashier: Sure, kikboiii. No problem.
Boy: Thanks.
Girl: Thanks.
I love it when store employees make your day just a little more fun.
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.: posted by Vera
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The place is almost completely furnished now. I bought a blue dresser and a lamp from a cute Swedish couple. They have a nice place in North Beach with a view of the bay. Their names are Annika and Tobias. I knew right away that they were European because there aren't too many Annika's or Tobias's here in the U.S. When I saw that they were both blond, I knew that they had to be Swedish, especially since Annika's last name ends in -holm. They have been living "here" (which could mean either San Francisco or the United States, I'm not sure which) for four years and are now moving back to Sweden "to give Sweden another chance." This made me think for a while. I have never really thought about giving Germany another chance, except for a brief interlude in 1997 when I was sort of torn. This passed quickly and I never had any more doubts that I wanted to continue my life in the U.S. Sometimes I feel bad about my conviction and that I hardly even thought twice about leaving behind everything German. Sometimes I really look up to people whose main residence is in their home country but who also spend a lot of non-vacation time abroad. Since I left for the U.S., my sister, for instance, has spent three months in Tanzania, six months in France, and now she is about to leave for Spain for ten months. What did I do? I went to the U.S. and never looked back and that's it. In return, those traveling Europeans I speak of might look up to me for taking an even bigger international step than they ever dared or were given the opportunity to. But in a way, they lead much more international lives than I do now. My life no longer feels international. I no longer feel like a German living in the United States. I feel like an American living in the United States. I am sure Annika and Tobias felt like Swedes living in the United States the whole time they were here. They have piles of Swedish magazines strewn across their San Francisco apartment to prove it. I think I need to try harder to keep a finger on the German pulse myself. It's still in there somewhere, underneath it all, beating steadily.
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.: posted by Vera
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Ever since I moved to San Francisco three months ago, my response to friends who asked "So how do you like San Francisco?" has been "I love it. But it is quite cold."
Now if somebody asked me, I would say "I like it but it's so fu**ing hot here!" It is currently 90° in San Francisco. San Francisco apartments don't tend to have A/C because it doesn't tend to get hot in San Francisco. I think 90° qualifies as hot. So I am just being baked alive. My boyfriend is tempted to blame the heat on the location of this apartment and its panoramic living-room windows. But I think it is just a strange and fierce coincidence that the difference in temperature between the last day in our old place and the first day in our new place is 30°. San Francisco, or "die Stadt der sieben Hügel," as my grandpa calls it, sure has quirky weather.
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.: posted by Vera
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[At a time like this, I really wish my blog had titles. If it had titles, this is what the title for this post would read:
That's a cute way of saying it]
I had mentioned to my boyfriend a few days ago that I would like to go to 1015 tonight because Felix the Dog and Ms. E are going to be spinning. Today my boyfriend's friend Lara called and invited us to a party. My boyfriend told her that he had to get back to her about going to the party because "I think there is some music that Vera wanted to dance to tonight."
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.: posted by Vera
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We completed our move yesterday. Despite a Uhaul, a dolly, and only two real pieces of furniture to move, it wasn't a whole lot of fun. My boyfriend has a tender back and a lot of heavy law books. That's why it wasn't fun for me. But what was fun was draping ourselves on our brandnew red couch and enjoying the 180° view after unloading everything. We felt like the king and queen of San Francisco. Among the things we had a view of that night were some fireworks somewhere in the East Bay.
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.: posted by Vera
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