Time

Wow, Christmas is already over. Mom's Birthday was yesterday and I made her a gluten free pumpkin spice cake with cream cheese frosting from scratch. It was fun. I really enjoy baking.

I guess time has been going by really quickly and it feels strange. I guess it was partially because the weekend before Christmas I got the flu or food poisoning or something. I was in bed all day Saturday and Sunday and I mostly slept the entire weekend. I am just now feeling completely well again and have thankfully regained my appetite.

I had a good Christmas, my cousins and uncle and aunt came to Phoenix and visited with us the past two days. Lara and Louis are both very cute, but sometimes they are too energetic for me, Louis insisted that I give him piggy back rides about every half hour and he is getting pretty heavy. I was able to talk to Gabi a bit auf Deutsch which was gut.

Today we all went to see Sherlock Holmes and it was awesome. Robert Downey is fit! (in all senses of the word). A few days before I saw Avatar with my brother and it was amazing. I really want to go see it again in 3D. I almost wish that I was working at the movie theater so that I could go see it for free instead of having to pay 10 bucks.

The Break is breaking me.

I am going crazy. Being home is significantly more boring than Flagstaff. Today's Schedule included watching the rest of Lost season 5 (like 12 episodes, pathetic), doing the laundry, and making soup for mom that was gluten free (all in all it took like 4 hours to cook the soup but it was excellent). I haven't heard from Eric yet, but I don't know if I want to even talk to him. Today was his last final but I don't even think I like him anymore. Oh well. Maybe I will try to get out of the house tomorrow, maybe I'll go to the library or something.

Maybe I will go edit my nano novel. Because I "won" createspace will give me a free manuscript of my novel. At first I thought I didn't want to do that because I don't really want anyone to read my novel, it's not very good. But maybe if I work on it a bit, I can get the free manuscript, and tuck it into a corner of my room where it won't ever be found.

December

Well, I won nanowrimo, it was much easier to finish this year and it was a lot more fun.

I should be studying for my Genetics final, but I did a lot of studying last night, and I am really hoping that President Haeger will close the school because it is snowing like crazy. My German professor wrote us all an email saying she was snowed in, in her neighborhood and that she wouldn't be able to make it to school. It is supposed to snow all today until tomorrow around noon. We are expected to get 12-28 inches of snow. I see a few brave souls out my window trudging through the snow, but at the moment I can't even see the line of trees or the road that leads to the apartments. I am hoping that they will send out an email telling everyone to stay home, but if they don't and I get eaten by the blizzard, you can blame President Haegar.

Nanowrimo

I really want to win this year and I am getting so very close. There are only a few more days left in November. I just hit over 35,000 words and I am exhausted. For a few days I was nearly 10,000 words behind schedule but I was able to almost catch up this weekend, I am only 1,500 words behind now. I don't really like where the story is headed now but I figure I can't really go back and change anything. I just have to go with it, gaping holes in the plot and everything. I have to keep reminding myself that I am having fun, but it's difficult not to get bored with it. Oh well. I just have to tell myself, if I can do this, I can write a novel later, a better one, with more time than just a month. And once I'm finished with this, writing a stupid five page autobiography all in German will be cake. Right?

November!

There was a reason that I was going to write this blog but now I can't remember. Oh Well! I will just keep writing.

I have been having so much fun writing my novel so far, and yes I'm only 3 days into Nanowrimo but I am really happy with my efforts thus far. I really want to win this year and I think I can do it finally. I think that the concepts I have so far will last until the end of November. Yay.

So I still can't remember what I was first going to say. I think I'll go write some more of my novel.

Procrastinating

I am doing very well at putting All of my homework off until the very last second. I was especially successful today; in addition to perusing the internet for an absurd amount of time, I dyed and straightened my hair, I knitted some of my Gryffindor scarf, went grocery shopping, watched an episode of the IT crowd and the latest episode of the office, and now I am wasting even more time by writing a blog about it as I listen to internet radio.

I should be doing German homework, I am going to get way way behind and during finals week the paper and the book and the recorded stuff all together is probably going to kill me. I did watch the episode of Berlin Berlin that I would have watched if we had had class today. And in my mind it is enough for today (but truly that is ridiculous). But I accomplished alot in ceramics today, I made 7 bowls in about an hour and a half, and I glazed my coil project, it was supposed to look awesome but it cracked and now it looks awful. And I did the physics homework that I almost completely forgot about. And now I am tired. Goodnight.

The Weekend

First, I am so very very excited for Nanowrimo! I hope that I win this year, but even if I don't I'm looking forward to the fun/stress of writing a novel in a month!

Second, I had a wonderful weekend. The meeting at ASU polytechnic was very helpful and it looks like that I'll be going there in a year. I DON'T have to take the GRE which also makes me very happy. Also I may be eligible for the TEACH grant so that I won't have to pay for all of my tuition. I will probably have to live at home though which will probably be very very trying.

Third, I went on a date this weekend! I was a bit worried at first, but everything turned out great. We first were going to meet a four peaks brewery by ASU but there was an hour wait so we went to Papago brewery instead. We shared a pepperoni, mushroom, garlic and feta cheese pizza and we both had a beer. It was pretty loud there and so we decided to go see a movie at Tempe Marketplace. When we got there though, there were huge lines in front of Harkins and it turned out that all of the credit card machines were down. So instead we walked around the mall, and then decided to go to the Irish pub there, "D'arcy MgGees". He ordered dessert and I had a Harp. Then when it was time to go he walked me to my car and kissed me goodnight. :) It was a pretty good first date, it wasn't really awkward, we talked pretty much the whole time. Hopefully I will see him next time I am in Phoenix.

nothing

Nothing is really happening, just like all the other previous years it seems. Time is moving forward, but I don't feel like I'm progressing. What I'm studying isn't going to help me at all for the real world. I'm still here, on a Saturday night, unable to sleep, sitting in front of the computer, doing nothing. I need to catch up with German, I need to figure out if I need to take the GRE. I really really want a boyfriend because I am lonely and tired of disappointment. And I hope this time it will work out. Sigh.

Stammtisch!

For my German class I have to go to Stammtisch twice a month at Nimarco's pizza and I am a bit nervous. I'm not sure what we're going to have to do.


And now my mother is pretty much yelling at me through skype and I am going crazy.

Flagstaff!

I am back in Flagstaff and since I have absolutely nothing to do since classes haven't started yet, I am writing.

Classes: Hopefully I won't die from the stress of the 19 credits I am taking this year. Six credits of German 485, Physics 111 +111Lab, Education Foundations 200, Molecular Genetics, and Ceramics. Ceramics and EDF will be cake, hopefully German won't be too work intensive. I'm also hoping that genetics won't be too bad but it probably will be a lot of studying and work. I've heard that Physics is going to be horrible. Apparently the professor is awful; gives difficult tests, never works out examples all the way, and wastes class time by getting off topic and telling crude jokes. Fun...

Ha, and on top of all my classes, I am trying to find a job. I am hoping that I can get a job at Harkins, it's pretty low key and I could go see free movies. Also, since I would probably work mostly on the weekends, I would have an excuse not to go down to Phoenix.

I am so bored, maybe I will start reading my textbooks....

compy

I bought a new computer! Well pieces of it and my little brother said he would put it together for me if I took him out to lunch. Yep. Goodbye Graduate College savings. Oh well.

The End!

I am back in G-town so the adventures in Deutschland, Italy, England, Ireland, Austria, Switzerland, and France have ended. But I will try to post some of the more memorable/ funny stories if I remember/have time. Gah it is hot here.

This is it!

Went to Bodensee and Konstanz today, went swimming in the lake, got sunburned even though it was really really cloudy and now I am scrambling around trying to finish packing because I leave in 7 hours AHHHH! I'm so excited!!!! Dublin here I come!

AAAAAAAAH!

The end is near! Only six days until I will be done with finals and I will take two buses and a plane to Dublin! I am bit nervous about the whole deal and I am kind of sad to be leaving Tuebingen without really saying goodbye to many of the people here. But it will also be kind of nice to go to an English speaking country for a few days.

I am procrastinating like crazy on my last essays, I've had since last week to do them but I keep putting them off since it's pretty much all b.s.
I also haven't really been studying for the final either. I feel like I know the grammar pretty well by now though. Well I should try to start packing as well. Wish me luck.

Here I go again...

My computer is indeed alive again. I was able to get to the key command thing that allowed me to reset my hardrive that eventually reinstalled the operating system and though I lost most of my pictures and all of my music, I have internet.

Again I am procrastinating. Instead of writing the two "journal entries" aka essays for my new irritating interkultural kommunikations class I have been checking facebook, watching episodes of Lost, and writing this.

The girls and I were going to go back to Baden Baden to revisit the sauna/mineralwater baths one more time to relax but we decided that we all had too much work to do. The only really productive thing that I've done is wash my laundry and look for places in Italy to stay at though.

Hmm

Well I heard back from the computer place, it sounds like either my computer get a 120 euro operation or it stays dead. And I think that right now it will probably have to stay dead since I just dropped a huge chunk of my savings on going to Switzerland.

Switzerland was amazing by the way. Lindsay and I got the smart car which was super cute and fun to drive (except when it was windy, it was kind of dangerous as the car would suddenly veer left 6 feet because of a gust of wind, but I am still alive woot.) We ended up staying at this little youth hostel on lake Luzern by this little town called Gersau. Lindsay and I stayed in the "Swiss Chalet" it was kind of old fashioned but it was very nice and much better than staying in a dormitory with dozens of loud school children who also happened to be there. There was a really hot guy that lived/worked there, I should have found out his name. I think he was the son of the owners.

The second day we were there we decided to take the train up Mt Rigi to a town called Rigi Kaltbad. We could have purchased a two way ticket but since I am a cheapskate and I didn't think the mountain was THAT big, we decided to take our chances and hike down the mountain. The view was spectacular. The air was really clean and cold and it was wonderful. The hike down the mountain was not wonderful. I got really sunburnt and it took us about 3 hours total to walk down the steep slippery hiking trail. Poor Lindsay fell down 3 times because her shoes didn't have any grips and the trail was all gravel. So I am pretty sore but I am glad that I went. Hopefully this awful sunburn will turn into a tan. (Probably not, me? tan?)

Hopefully...

The teachers have been giving us ten times as much homework lately, and not just worksheets but essays and writing fairy tales, and reading intense short stories and answering questions about them. It's so much work! It's good that I decided not to take that extra 310 class on top of all this other homework they've been slinging at us.

I took my computer into the shop today, the girl was really nice even though she didn't know a lot of English, but she was very helpful and hopefully my computer will be fixed in a week or less and hopefully it won't cost more than the 40 euro they promised.

This Thursday I am going to Zurich! My friend Lindsay and I are renting a smart car and we are going to drive the two hours to Zurich and then another hour to this little town called Engelberg at the foot of the Alps it should be very beautiful, Kuck Mal!

ugh

My computer is dead.

Gah!

Well Blaubeuren is over! Huzzah! And I definitely partied too much last night. Beer plus whiskey plus vodka definitely does not mix. I was incredibly sick this morning: wake up, puke, pass out, repeat. It was not fun, I've never had such a bad hangover (der Kater) in my life. And so I therefore resolve not to drink any more hard liquor while in Germany.
Something almost happened with the "older gent", but he ran away before anything significant happened. I was pretty upset last night about it but I was very intoxicated and I guess he was being a gentleman. I was all panicked that he thought I was disgusting or ugly. I don't know why I like him, I guess it's the same reason I like Johnny Depp and Hugh Jackman and Dr House, older men are sexy to me.

Gah! I'm also having a hard time deciding whether to take the extra class or not. It's with another teacher and meets 2 times a week in the evenings and is homework/reading/writing intensive. So far I've happily skated on by with whatever reserves of German that have been lingering in the back of my brain. I haven't really studied, the last big test I drank>studied and got 100 percent. The coordinator basically said you take this class or you have a life. I will only get 3 credits for it at NAU so I don't know if it would be worth the stress. I initially said I wasn't interested but afterward my teacher came up to me and asked me why I didn't raise my hand to say I wanted to. I told her I would wait to see what my midterm grade was and would think about it. I should, but I don't want to. I like being lazy. But then it will be difficult to go back to NAU this fall without having made myself really do anything at all.

Well tomorrow I am going to Munich to see the sights and relax. The "older gent" has not been on skype at all today and so I guess he is avoiding me. Alas, I will see him sooner or later in class on Tuesday hopefully it's not all awkward. I would hate for that to happen because I got drunk and silly, we're friends now and hopefully that won't be destroyed. Ugh FML.

a brief note

Gah! I will be going to Blaubeuren tomorrow for a school excursion/retreat and the midterm exam on Thurs. We will only be allowed to speak German all weekend and there is a great chance that I will not have access to a computer. But I am excited, it is supposed to be really beautiful there. I will take pictures.

Strasbourg was really cool. Lindsay's friend Patrick showed us around and was very very nice and bought us dinner and lunch and was overall very sweet. We would have been completely hopeless without him because we didn't speak French and no one spoke German there. Apparently France doesn't like Germany at all. Well it is Midnight and I should be packing for the trip tomorrow.

Blah

It has been far too long since I have had the patience to write anything here. Time is quickly going by, it is difficult to believe that I've already been here for more than 6 weeks. And I am way too ADD right now to actually finish this now, I am off to the bar across the bridge for drinks and a study party ( I know it doesn't make sense) oh well.

Bier, drama and Baden-Baden

Bleh, this is the second day in a row that I've visted s'Alex (a bar/restaurant) with the older guys to drink(two half liters) of beer and study. I'm kind of worried about my blase attitude to spending money on beer, but I guess it was kind of my dinner sustenance for tonight. Hopefully I remembered not to connect this blog to my facebook in anyway, hmm, it is connected to my email but hopefully no one involved will see this or think to look for a blogger blog. I am paranoid as usual. Well, during the first couple weeks of the German adventure, I kind of latched on to this one guy because I thought we were similar and it was nice to have someone to talk to because everyone from Oregon knew everyone else. So, after a city bar tour he offered to walk me home because I was drunk and tired. When we got back to the dormitories he wanted to talk more so I went to his room and we talked and then he kissed me. Which led to a very long period of awkwardness and eventually he became clingy and even text messaged me at least 6 or 8 times when I was away, when he knew that it cost me money and annoyed me. Well this eventually led up to his drunken skype message of "I want to have sex with you, I have since I met you" which is totally tactless and really annoying since I had made it clear I was not interested in anything with him. The next day he apologized and then immediately asked me to be his girlfriend. I said no, and that I told him that I had previously clearly indicated this fact. And he was so rude and kept saying things like, "I'm disappointed, If you would have been okay with it.. I would have dated you" like it is such a great thing to date him and he also was like "stop defending yourself", and how I "will never even be slightly happy until I get over my fears, and how I'm so tightly wound and immature" Gah! that was several weeks ago, right before a huge test and I told the girls about it and they stopped talking to him after that and now it has precipitated into all this drama and he's being stupid and showing up to class late and being an asshole to everyone. It has been such a problem, everyone is pretty fed up with him. And he showed up to the bar randomly shortly after we had all been talking and blowing steam about the whole mess. Thankfully he left, but it was pretty cowardly of him.

Gah! I have been trying to convince myself the medicine that I am taking is making my hormones and emotions go crazy, but I have always kind of been this way. Even though I have always been attractive to older men, it has only started to get really crazy since I got to Germany. When I visited with my Germany family (Ernst and Ingrid) I noticed that their son-in-law was very attractive(he is good looking(like many Germans here)and during the holiday his son was sick and he was really protective and took care of his son and comforted him and it was so sexy that he was such a good dad) eventually I want to find a husband like that. And now I am starting to like one of the guys and I don't know if I'm being transparent (I certainly thought I was at the fruhlingsfest when I was drunk and dancing(and he was trying to steal my beer and I kept slapping his face(he at some point was also very drunk and randomly bit my hand))) But he is quite a bit older, even though he doesn't act it. I don't know why I like him (stupid hormones) and I don't even see any possibility of much of anything working out between us, but he's really nice and fun.

But! Tomorrow the girlies and I are going to Baden-Baden, a ritzy German town that has really nice hot springs and is supposedly really beautiful. So, I will probably spend too much money but after all the stress I really need a good relaxing weekend.

Ciao!

El Chico

Well, I have been craving Mexican food like crazy and Tuebingen happens to have one overpriced "Mexican" food place called El Chico. Well I had been talking to two guys, Matt and Josh and they were also craving Mexican food so we decided to go check it out and maybe split 2 entrees between the 3 of us. The place seemed nice enough and it was happy hour so I ordered a strawberry margarita which was pretty good. We then decided to get some Nachos, a chicken fajihta and an enchilada plate. The nachos were ok, they weren't anything like what I would expect nachos to be. Mostly it was a pile of chips with a huge amount of sour cream on top with two slices of tomato and two slices of cucumber in the sour cream. It came with salsa on the side which had the consistency of ketchup. The fajitas were good, but I don't know how one could really mess up onions, and peppers and meat sauteed in oil. The Enchiladas were also not very good. Disappointed, but not totally surprised we decided that we three should open a new Mexican food restaurant with authentic fresh salsa and good entrees somewhere in Germany to make our fortunes. The End.

Frühlingsfest!

Yay, a brief blog note about Frühlingsfest. Yesterday for a group excursion, everyone from SIP went to Stuttgart. First we went to the stadt Geschichte museum, which had history of Stuttgart and the wars. It was neat to see old stuff, and the tour guide spoke very good English and was very informative, but I am not interested in history. I'm afraid my mind just does not have the capability to memorize dates in time, and perspectives of various political positions and analyze them and comment on how they're so important and whatnot. Give me DNA anyday. I would be thrilled to explain how it replicates and why it's so important to life. Well, then we went to this really good Chinese buffet with all you can eat food, and then we went to the Mercedes Benz museum and I took a lot of pictures of cars. Then we went to the Frühlings fest which is kind of like Oktoberfest but it's in the spring. Some of the people went on rides but it was raining and I wanted to save my money for Beer.

Then we went to the Beer tent. It was amazing, there was live musik, good food and a hell of a lot of bier! They only sold beer in 1 L increments, but it was really really good. I got a Hefeweizen which is more of a yeasty light beer. MMmmm. By the end of the night, I had probably had 2,5 Liters and I was singing and Dancing with everyone else on the table, it was so much fun. Here is a link to one of the German songs that they kept playing throughout the night, it was fun to dance to! http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R-_xXfjB3AM It's not the best example but you'll get the idea. Good night!

Another set of random ramblings

Today has been such a weird day, I didn't want to wake up this morning, and I've had a headache all day. At lunch, I was hungry, but for whatever reason, I found the taste of my delicious Chinese food to be somewhat nauseating. Thankfully today was a short day, Sprachkurs, lunch and then 45 min konversation only, no tutorium. When I got back to my room I took a nap for a couple hours because I was exhausted. Then I got up, signed on to my computer, was inundated with a million questions from my mother, I insisted that I didn't feel well, and left to take a shower. After that I had a small dinner of a noodle cup with rahmsauce and a cup of tea. Again I fell asleep as I had given up on my homework because of the headache. That was probably around 7. I just woke up at 9pm worried that I needed to finish my homework and now my headache is mostly gone but now I am quite awake.

Yesterday, Sunday I did laundry and putzt(cleaned) my room. There really aren't any decent brooms in my flat, they are so filthy that I think that if I brought one into my room and tried to use it, that the floor would be dirtier after than before. So when I clean my room, I use a sponge and actually wipe down my entire living space, floors, desk, sink, etc. because it gets really dusty ( I have no idea how it gets so dusty, I keep the windows closed at all times). And then my friends and I decided that we wanted to check out this Biergarten that our teacher had recommended. Well this place is actually way out in west Tuebingen and you can only get there by one bus that only runs once every hour. On Sundays almost everything is closed and very few buses run on Sundays so it was probably stupid to try and do this on a Sunday, na ja. Well we got to the Schwarlocherhof just fine, it was out in the country, with an excellent view of the city, the food was excellent and not as expensive as most other places, and there were peacocks that would wander around the terrace while you ate and drank. It was beautiful. But then the nightmare began. I guess after 9pm everyday that bus no longer runs, but it's confusing because it still states a time on the schedule for when a bus would come but then in fine print it said something confusing in German. Well we got to the bus stop ahead of time and waited for the bus. When the bus didn't come I thought that the confusing small print meant that there was a 30 minute range for when it would come. Well we were bored and decided to try walking back. Then we decided that we should try calling a taxi but the number that Lindsay had was all in German and it kept asking an automated question and we had no idea what it wanted from us. We got to the next bus stop and I read the small print again noticing that it gave a number at the end. At this point I figured, oh, we have to call the bus to come. So we called and we asked the guy on the phone "sprechen Sie English?" and he said "nein" so I tried to tell him in German that we were at the Westbahnhof stop and that we needed to get back to the Hauptbahnhof, thinking we could catch another bus there. We couldn't hear when the bus was coming so after a half hour of waiting we called again and got the same guy. He then told us that we would have to wait another half hour before the bus came. It wasn't the best part of town but at least there were four of us and I helped one of the girls go over her vocabulary to pass the time. Well when someone came, it was actually a van type thing and not a bus and we had to pay him. He didn't speak English either but somehow I let him know that we actually needed to go back to WHO instead of the Hauptbahnhof. So moral of the story, unless you have a car, never go anywhere that requires public transportation on a Sunday because you will have to wait at least an hour.

Last but not least, Samstag(Saturday). On Friday, it seemed like all of my friends were going to go to this "Rent an American program" seminar and I really didn't want to spend another whole day stuck in my room, surfing the internet with nothing to do. So I talked to this one guy, Matt from the program and we agreed that we should go somewhere together on Saturday just to simply go somewhere. We discussed several cities and I guess two of the girls heard our plans and decided that they really didn't want to sit in a 5 hour seminar on how to go speak in English to German students. We ended up deciding on Freiburg because it's in the Black forest and the main church there is pretty famous. I originally had a good schedule picked out that would get us there pretty quickly and we could just buy a badem wurttemburg ticket for 7 euro each. Well, I guess we took too much time buying stuff to eat on the train instead of going to the train because we missed it by 5-ish minutes. Ugh! So we asked for another schedule, and waited an hour until the next train. We got there eventually and walked around the city, had lunch, visited the Muenster, visited another church, ate ice cream, got a light supper, and headed back to the train station. Things were going well, we didn't miss the first train, but! the second train was 15 minutes late to start off with, and then randomly in the middle of nowhere the train stopped another 10-15 minutes and so we missed our third train back to Tuebingen and had to wait in Stuttgart another hour(it was like 1am) so we got some burger king and waited for the train. We eventually did get back to Tuebingen and found a weekend night bus to take us back to the dorms, so all was gut!

Finally, I did post some pictures from this on Facebook so you should go check it out ^_^.

Mitwoch!

Today is only Wednesday and I have already had two exams for sprach kurs. The first one was on Monday and it was easier than I expected, I only missed two points. So to celebrate two of my friends and I got some wine and drank it out on the balcony and watched the rain sweep across the valleys and hills. It was so beautiful and the wine, was pretty good for only costing 2-3 euro each. After leaving Lindsay's Becca and I ran into some guys from the group who were studying for the exam we had on Wednesday, the were drinking beer but had run out so we all decided to go to Kuckuck, the bar in WHO and I decided to have a Mai tai, it was pretty good.

I guess I was a little reckless on Monday, after class I bought myself a "going out" outfit from H&M: a really cute black dress, a bright pink tank top to go underneath, and some black leggings for 35 euro. Then we went to this really awesome jewelry store I got this really awesome silver ring for myself. I normally don't wear or like rings but I really liked this one and it fit me really well. It's silver and is this intricate weave of four hearts to make the ring, it's really cool and was only 6 euro.

Tuesday was a long day of class and I was planning on studying most of the night but got distracted by the internet and Japanese dramas on mysoujou.com. Germany hasn't really gotten to the point of streaming television online yet and I can't access any of the American websites to get my TV fix. And I did find a few German bands that I actually like on Last.fm, and you can get them in the US itunes store so perhaps I will have to get some music later when I stop feeling guilty about buying myself stuff. Especially because when I get back I will probably need a new computer, the mouse square is dying, sometimes it refuses to work and I only have less than 10 gigs of space left.

Today I had the exam, and it wasn't as bad as I thought it was going to be. I had a Doner Kebab for lunch and it was really good. Tonight I am going to this club called Top Ten that is free for students on Wednesdays and has half priced drinks. I don't want to get really drunk but it should be a lot of fun. Woot.

Procrastination ramblings

It's that time again where I actually should be doing some work, and should actually be grateful that I have homework and am not stuck back in Gilbert getting ready to go work for Harkins; but I feel like procrastinating and being super lazy. This however, could be due to the fact that I went to 3 different bars last night and woke up with a terrible hangover because I didn't drink any water last night. That brings me to my first point.

Water: Water isn't free here like it is in the States. If you order water at a restaurant, you'll get fancy mineral water. And if you want still water, they will bring you a fancy bottle of still water that will cost you around 2-3 euro. You won't find any drinking fountains anywhere (the only place I saw one was in the Deutsche American Institute)At some restaurants it is cheaper or the same price to buy a beer. You can get 1.5 liter bottles in the grocery stores but you have to pay pfand, or a deposit on all plastic bottles that you can get back if you remember to return the bottle to the store. I usually do all of my shopping right after I get back from downtown, where the classroom is and forget to bring my empty bottles back with me so they've been slowly gathering in one of the corners of my room.

Shopping: It's weird, I pretty much have to go grocery shopping every day. There is a shopping center about 5 minutes away from my dormitory. It has two grocery stores, two banks, an apothecary, a flower store, a tobacco store, a small restaurant, and a bakery. Usually in the morning on my way to class, I'll pick up a shoko-crouissant, or pastry for the class pause from the Gauker Bakery. Then I'll go to class from 9-3:30 take the bus back to WHO and go to the "Treff 3000 Discount" store as opposed to "nah und gut"store which is more expensive. The store has a fresh bakery with a wonderful selection of fresh bread. The other day I got an excellent loaf of ciabatta for only 1,05 euro. The bread here tastes much better but it doesn't last as long as American bread. I usually pick up a carton of joghurt because I only have one tiny shelf on the fridge for my stuff so I don't buy as much stuff. Depending on what bread I get, I sometimes get some cheese or meat. My floor kitchen is clean but it's not as nice as some of the others that I've seen. We don't have a microwave or hotpot or anything and only have a limited selection of pots and pans, and they always appear to be dirty.... But I will try and make due with what I have. If I don't make any hot meals in my kitchen, I can always go out to a restaurant.

Restaurants: So far I haven't found any really great restaurants that have excellent food and excellent prices. The one that comes pretty close though is "The Neckar Mueller" It has really good typical German/Swabish food such as Kase-Spatzle which is handmade cheese noodles. It's very very good but expensive. There is a so called "Mexican" food restaurant but it's even more expensive than the Neckar Mueller and I am hesitant to spend 15 euros for non authentic Mexican food. There are lots of cheap Donner Kebap places but I haven't tried any yet. One Imbiss(fast food) place I found had cheeseburgers and really good pommes frites(french fries). I really want to find a sushi place but I won't keep my hopes up. It feels like all my money is being used on food. Which I guess it is. Oh well.

In other news, I wish I hadn't told my mother about skype. Also, men are very annoying. The End!

First day in Tuebingen

Here is my computer Journal entry my first day in Tuebingen, it portrays emotion I guess.

Erste tag im Tuebingen. Es war windig und kalt. Ingrid, Ernst, Inge und Ich wandern im staat zentrum. Dannach gehen uns zum uni und finde wir fichtenweg funf und gehen wir zum fichtenweg drei wo mein zimmer ist. Hier ist kein internet im mein zimmer. Es tut mir leid. Aber heute nacht haben ich sprechen mit ein andere student wer kommt aus Oregon. Wir gehen zu kauf und park platz. Er heisst Andrew(wirklich??) Hines. Er studiert Philosophy und vor das Theology. Dannach gehen wir zu his flat und sprechen am balcony. The scenery war sehr schooen. The licht in die staat war lit und machen sehr schooen cityscape. Mein kopf ist sehr kaput. Ich kann nicht perfeckt English sprechen. Mein Zunge kann nicht errinnert was zu sagt.


Translation!
First day in Tuebingen. It was windy and cold, Ingrid Ernst Inge and I wandered about in the city center. After we went to find the WHO at fichtenweg 5 and then we went to fichtenweg 3 where my room is. There is no internet in my room (yet), it makes me sad. But, today I talked for some time with another student who comes from Oregon. We went to the grocery store and his name is Andrew Hines. He studies philosophy and before that he studied theology. After I helped him carry his groceries to his flat and we talked some on his balcony. The scenery was very pretty, the lights from the city were lit and made a very beautiful cityscape. My brain is very confused. I can’t speak perfect English, my tongue has a difficult time remembering what to say.

Worten des Tag:

Tongue: die Zunge
Cute: Süβ

Geschichte(f): story, history
Gesicht: face

To Clarify

There have been some complaints and so I will clarify and classify "what I've been doing!"

On a cold Sunday in March....
After getting to the airport two hours earlier than I had first anticipated, I waited in the airport terminal from around 1am until 7am. I was pretty sick and about every 10 minutes a woman would exclaim something like "any bags left unattended will be destroyed. So every time I decided that I needed to go to the bathroom I had to take all of my clunky bags with me. At 7:30ish I decided to go back downstairs and check in my suitcase and head through security. I didn't sleep and at this point I was really very grumpy and of course I forgot that my phone was in my pocket as I stepped through security so I got to start the day with a pat down...woo. After security, I thought I would be able to head to the gate and sit and rest for a while but of course that didn't happen either and all the information board said was Flight blah blah blah...please wait. Apparently you can't go to the gate until 20 minutes before your flight is scheduled to leave. So again I was stuck, paranoid that I would find out what the gate was too late and miss my plane. Oh well. After the worst airport and airplane experience I've ever had I finally made it to Frankfurt am Main and met up with Ernst and Ingrid.

I arrived on Monday the 30th and they drove me to their home in beautiful Bensheim. I was exhausted so they let me shower and take a nap. After I was rested and feeling better, they took me out to dinner at a restaurant in the Odenwald. At this point I was really really congested(the change in altitude in the airplane hurt like a mf) and couldn't taste anything and didn't have much of an appetite but I did my best to eat the wonderful meal. I went back and slept and felt much better in the morning. The next day Ingrid took me on a tour of Worms and Losch and explained the historical significance of many of the buildings, it was very nice. We had a wonderful lunch in Worms at this amazing cafe, I had some kind of Himmelbeer (raspberry) cake and the best coffee that I have ever had. We were invited to dinner at their next door neighbors house the Waller familie. Again I couldn't really taste anything but I could taste that the beer was very very bitter. It was from the local brewery and I didn't really like it.

On Mittwoch, Ingrid, Ernst, Inge(their neighbor) and I drove to Tuebingen and Inge showed us around the city for a bit. Apparently she had been to the city for a year of her medical school. We had sandwiches at a good little bistro place and then decided to find Waldhauser Ost or WHO. It was very confusing but we eventually found the dormitories, I checked in, signed a lot of papers that I had no idea what I was agreeing to and then Ingrid and Ernst and Inge left. Around 7 the group met and we walked over to the Greek Restaurant Faros. It was pretty good. I finally found a beer type drink that I actually like: it's called Radler and it's a mix of beer and sparkling lemonade. It's really tasty and refreshing.

On Thursday the group met again and we walked all the way downtown to the international university building(Germans love to walk everywhere) We had a small fruestuck and then we went on another tour of Tuebingen and again walked for a very long time. Tuebingen is a really hilly town and so it was pretty difficult for me because I am out of shape and was still really tired from being in a new place. For dinner we went to this really nice Italian place that had amazing spaghetti.

I am actually meeting up with people today and we are going to try and find that same Italian place for all-you-can-eat spaghetti special. So!(German people say that a lot, kind of instead of um or hm but it sounds like zo!)So! I will get back to the retelling of this epic adventure after a hearty dinner of Spaghetti Bolognese Yum!!

Another brief note

Hello again!!! I have been having a wonderful birthday so far. This morning there was a wonderful frühstuck with rolls and coffee and crouisannts (sp?). Then I went to Michaelskirche with Ingrid und Ernst and Heikke their daughter. There was a wonderful choir that sang Bach´s Cantante, und is was very beautiful. Then after church there was a family brunch and everyone wished me glück for another year for my birthday. We had birthday cake and chocolate eggs and special chicken and potatos. After brunch we traveled to das Feldmeer literally (stone ocean) it was really cool but quite a hike, I will try to get pictures later.

I must appologize now for the degradation of my english. In class I have been trying to think in German because their language structure is so different so it is becoming more and more difficult for me to return back to English when I hear German everywhere all day and when I do hear English it is often not grammer or tense perfect. And for class I have to try not to confuse similar words(worts) like perfect and perfeckt, and und, house haus, and so on. Also it is really difficult to type this as well because y and z are switched and there are also extra öäüµß keys and a # where the enter key is. So. Hopefully once I get internet on my own computer I will be able to spend more time writing entries and separating German from English (Englisch)

Hallo!

Viele Gruße from Deustchland! I am alive and well but without internet in my room so hopefully once I get internet everything will be less complicated. I am currently at Ingrid and Ernst´s home and I will spend easter and my birthday with them and their family. I must be brief so Happy Easter!

London

Well I am finally out of the U.S and in the UK yay! I am slowly getting over the jet-lag. Yesterday took a tour of the campus, saw some ducks, geese, and swans at the lake. Today Jen and I took a bus to Wivenhoe and ate at an awesome fish and chips place called Hennley's it was very good. Tonight we had pizza for dinner and went to Colchester to the movie theater where we watched "Lesbian vampire killers" it was um, interesting to say in the least. Some parts were hilarious, other parts were very disturbing.

Tomorrow we go to London! The plan is to visit Westminster Abbey, Big Ben, and have a lovely time. Well I am beginning to feel tired so I think I will go read a book!

at the airport

well i am sitting in the airport surrounded by weary travelers, including myself who are waiting patiently for any sort of sign that indicates that we can get on the plane. right now i would like nothing more than to climb on board and sit myself in my designated window seat and go to sleep. even though this may leave
me with a sore neck in the morning. i am so glad that i convinced my parents that i neede a phone with internet capabilities, otherwise i would probably be bored to death going over the pros and cons of digging out a book from the bottom of my purse. well, it looks like they have started to let the crying children on board, so theoretically, it should only be ten minutes or so. but yeah, it still feels so surreal, like im dreaming or something. oh well, all these anxious people are standing around, waiting to get in line, i don't see what the big deal is. oh well. i am way excited!!!

24 hours!

In approximately 24 hours I will be jetting off for London, yay! I just checked in online and picked a seat (I hope it's a good one)The plane didn't look too full but maybe a lot of people prefer checking in when the get to the airport...hmm.

Woo hoo! London and Jenika! I will see you in about 33 hours! yay!

3 days omg

Well I'm pretty much done with packing. I've washed all the clothes I need to bring with me, I've packed my backpack and purse, I just need to pack up my computer. I've been packing and it still doesn't really feel like I'm going. Oh well hopefully the car ride to the airport will kick my brain out of this weirdness that I've been feeling.

The Hazards of Love

I guess it's already the 17th in some places of the US and so this means that since the Decemberists moved their release date to today(!), I have thus downloaded and am listening to their new album yay! I am so excited! I got a haircut today, it's shorter, but it should be more manageable now...maybe. I'll have to see how it reacts to the humidity.

And I think I can safely say that I am done shopping for various things that I will need for my adventure. The only thing that I may need if I can't find any in the house are luggage tags. If I have time, I think I'm going to start packing tomorrow. Yay!

Seven Days! Wow!

Well, yesterday morning, I drove up to Flagstaff (I love driving up to Flagstaff it's so beautiful!) to spend some time with the people up there, unfortunately because it is the week of spring break, everyone else had left except for Regan and Geoff. (I was kind of sad that I wasn't getting ready for a trip to Laguna Beach, CA like the previous two years) We had tons of fun and all in all it was really relaxing! We wandered around downtown, went to target, watched Burn After Reading, walked around campus, ate dinner at Hiro'S (so delicious!) and then watched another movie and went to sleep. This morning we had breakfast at McDonald's and then we went our separate ways, Regan and Geoff to Vegas and I back to Gilbert. The trip to Flagstaff brought me a little bit closer to realizing how very soon I will be leaving for real to go to Europe!Yay! I'm a bit nervous but hopefully it will turn into excitement as soon as I start packing! London's forecast for Sunday is around 50 degrees Fahrenheit so it should be a nice change from Gilbert's 90 degree weather(Ick!) predicted for this week!

I finished the CD case calendars that I plan to give out as gifts today. When the CIE first said that it is customary to bring a small gift for the people you are planning on living with, I wasn't sure what to bring that would be small and lightweight as well as inexpensive because I've been trying to save as much money as I can. My brother had to make one of these for his digital photography class and I thought that it would be a neat, useful gift that would represent NAU and Arizona. I just took the photo shop template from my brother and found pictures that I took around NAU and Arizona and printed out the calendar. It fits nicely in a jewel CD case and I just stuck a magnet on the back so that it will stay on a fridge. I hope the people like them....

10...

Only ten days left! Nur zehn tagen! And I am still in denial. Oh well. I have been trying to brush up on my German skills because the during the first week of the program, we have to take an exam that will determine which group we get placed into and though it would be easier, I really don't want to get stuck in the second place group. I can't even comprehend what it's going to be like over there.

I'm still downloading free serialized podcast audiobooks for my ipod. They are so addictive and there are some really excellent stories! I would highly recommend them to anyone who enjoys listening to audiobooks. The main place I get them is from podiobooks.com on itunes, they have about 50 different podcast novels but I really enjoyed the share novels by Nathan Lowell (Quarter share, Half share, Full Share, and Double Share), right now I am listening to Morevi by Tee Morris, I also enjoyed the Heaven series by Mur Lafferty. There are also more well known audiobooks on itunes for free including Robinson Crusoe, and Pride and Prejudice.

Well so long, fare well, auf wiedersehen, goodnight!

The Final Countdown Begins!

Only TWELVE DAYS left until I depart boring, dull G-town! The temperature is climbing, and my patience has been wearing thin. But, I am done* working at Harkins!(*They could still schedule me on Friday but I really doubt that they will go to the trouble of keeping me on the schedule for one day)I still can't believe that I'm leaving and once that realization hits me, I am really going to panic...oh well.

First off, I have decided to make another online blog/journal thing where I will post all of my pictures with brief commentary in a more direct presentation that will look nice and won't contain all of my boring/mad ramblings. It can be found at http://jadeblade3.livejournal.com/ but don't go running off to look at it yet, there's nothing there. Once I start taking pictures and make sure that I can upload pictures, they will start appearing!

Second, these last remaining days are going to be really hectic so I don't know how much more of a countdown I will have the chance to record before I'm off, and I don't know what the internet will be like in Germany, I'm not sure that I'll have any internet in my room at all...yikes. There are internet cafe's and such but those cost money.... I will have email on my phone so if you really need to contact me you can email my gmail account.

Third, Speaking of hectic, I have decided to run off to Flagstaff this Saturday for one last hurrah! with Regan, Geoff, Natalie and whoever else wants to tag along for sushi and chillaxing. I am really excited to see them again and to go to Hiro's. Mmmm Sushi!

Otherwise, I haven't been doing much of anything lately, other than making lists, shopping for things that I will need during my travels,knitting a sweater I started three years ago, dreaming obscure dreams, and listening to music(The Decemberists!**)and podiobooks non-stop. If I am feeling verbose, I may even write another blog entry on podiobooks because I have been downloading dozens to put on my ipod for plane/train rides. Well I should probably go work on more packing/cleaning preparations. Auf Wiedersehen!

**The Decemberists have a new album "The Hazards of Love" released on March 24th, two days after I leave! Alas!

Another month's worth of movie reviews!

Again I really don't have much else to say since I'm am not in Deutchsland yet and so, another round of movie reviews! Again, if you are planning to see "He's Just Not That Into You", "Coraline", "Taken", or "The Reader", do not read because there are spoilers!

He's Just Not That Into You: I thought this was a very cute movie, it was a chick flick but nevertheless an enjoyable, feel good movie. The cast was full of well known actors and actresses including Drew Berrymore,Justin Long, Jennifer Aniston, Ben Affleck, Scarlett Johanson and many more. It kind of reminded me of a summer version of Love Actually but it didn't quite measure up to Hugh Grant's awesomeness. Also it was mainly centered around the fact that even though a guy may ask for your number, if he doesn't call you right away, he is not interested. The story follows one girl's obsession with checking her phone while waiting for a blind date to call her back. She makes up excuse after excuse as to why he is not calling her but she finally meets and falls in love with Justin Long a bartender who explains the male psyche to her. I liked this movie, but I could be biased because I find Justin Long to be very charming.

Coraline 3D: A 3 dimensional kid's movie that reminded me of James and the Giant Peach and The Nightmare Before Christmas. I think they were directed by the same person? Oh well. Very typical kids movie about a girl who runs into trouble and has to do something to save her world. This movie however, was really very creepy at times and would be scary for young children. Coraline has had to move away from all her friends and now lives in a very dull drab place where her parents are too busy and ignore her. She discovers a door to another world in her house that leads to another dimension where her parents are fun and give her all the attention and gifts that she desires. However, there is something wrong with the other world and her other mother turns out to be evil and wants to steal her eyes. Eventually the evil being from the other dimension kidnaps her real parents and she has to go rescue them to bring order back into her own life. The moral of the story, which I guess is a good one for these times is to not go chasing surreal pleasures and fantasies because they will only get you into trouble so you should be thankful for what you're given. AKA Don't do drugs kids!

Taken: Taken was an excellent movie, It probably wasn't the best movie to see, as I am leaving very soon to partake in my own international adventure but oh well. Liam Neeson was awesome (Go Qui-Gon!)in this movie! The movie was centered around Liam, an ex CIA agent who retired to spend more time with his daughter. He and his wife are divorced and she is married to a wealthy man. His daughter begs him to let her and an older friend go to Paris for summer vacation but because he was an agent, he is very skeptical about letting his daughter go unchaperoned. He gives in and decides to let her go but gives her strict instructions to call him on a cell phone that he gives her. Of course being a stupid 17 year old, She and her friend meet a hot guy outside the airport, they share a taxi, and he invites them to a party later, asking where exactly they are staying. They get kidnapped but Liam's daughter sees her friend being taken and calls him before she herself is kidnapped and from the noise and sounds that he records off her phone call he finds out that she has been taken by a group that specifically kidnaps young female travelers and sells them into slavery and prostitution. He goes to Paris and miraculously tracks her down. The very last scene of the movie was dumb but otherwise, it was a pretty good movie.

The Reader: I saw the reader today, it was a very interesting movie. It is rated R for about a half hour of nudity and "sensuality" but once the awkward parts of the movie were past it was a very intriguing movie. It was centered around the life of Michael Berg, a German boy living in post WWII Germany from when he was a young boy to when he was an older man. The older man was played by Ralph Fiennes (Voldemort!!!) the main actress was Kate Winslet, who won an oscar for her role as Hannah Schmitz. The story is about Michael(age 16-17), who comes home from boarding school but is sick and delirious with scarlet fever, Hannah(much older 30-40) finds him and helps him get back home. He returns to thank her and they end up having a summer affair. During the affair she always asks him to read to her. She disappears one day and he goes to law school. While in law school he attends a hearing of 6 female SS guards who are accused of killing 300 people because they did not let them out of a locked church that had begun to burn after an air raid. Spoiler! It turns out that Hannah was one of the six guards and she tells the truth and in the end gets charged of being the leader of the six guards and for writing a false report that said they had no idea that the church was burning and that the deaths were not the guards faults. She is sentenced to life in prison. However, Michael realizes that she is illiterate and was not at fault, and was ashamed at telling this truth. Some Twenty years later Michael is a cold distant man, has a daughter, but is divorced. While moving out he finds his old books and sends Hannah tape recordings of him reading some of her favorite stories. Using these tapes she teaches herself how to read and write in prison. He has never told anyone about his affair but in the end he finds to courage to tell his daughter to try and connect with her. A very emotional dramatic film but also pretty good.

Housing

Well I finally got a hold of the housing people and did the online contract etc. Jenika and I got into Pine Ridge Village again, in apartment 36 B which is right next to the one we got into last semester. It's not McKay but at least we got an apartment again with a full kitchen yay!

I put in my two weeks notice at Harkins today. So that will make things a lot easier. And tonight is the first weekend night that I've had off since I've started working at Harkins but my family is at a wedding, eating reception food and cake and I am stuck at home with nothing to do(except to talk to random people from my past apparently). Last night I saw Gran Torino with Josh, a guy who was in orchestra with me in high school and now I am talking to my ex. Tomorrow I am singing in the contemporary band at church, going to a friends birthday brunch and working until 9 so I am going to be tired! bleh.

The countdown continues

Only 25 days left until I go to the Phoenix airport and arrive several hours later in lovely England! I can't wait!

In the meantime, I am working (even though they keep sending me home early because they over-scheduled workers, trying to figure out a schedule that works for next Fall before I leave, and trying to figure out housing for next year! I did get a call that I was randomly selected for Pine Ridge/ McKay but I have not been able to contact anyone at res life to let them know that I can't be there tomorrow to sign a contract but that Jenika and I do want to live in the apartments. I've called the office twice now but they have just asked me for my phone number promising that they will get back to me later.

Craziness

Well I am still sick! I blame my brother because he is sick and that's what brothers are for. I suppose it can also be correlated with how much I am working (36 hours last week) and how late I have been staying up recently (2am). Oh well my bank account is happy even though my body is not.

Oh! And the previous schedule that the coordinator gave me was wrong! The program does indeed end on Saturday July 4th like I expected instead of the week after. So that leaves me with an extra week for travel. Yay!


In other news I am bored out of my mind. I can feel the beginnings of insanity creep into the dusty unused parts of my brain! Work at the movie theater makes me feel like a robot, I pretty much have a dialogue programmed into my mind of what to say over and over and over again as customers order overpriced popcorn (which I don't even want to eat anymore ever even though it's free on breaks. In fact I don't think I've actually eaten any popcorn since the first week I started working there). I have been reading books non-stop and working at the library supplies plenty of new material. Being at home is really starting to put me on edge, thankfully there is only about a month left of being here. Still, if Mom keeps threatening to put my cat down and drive me crazy all the time, I may have to beg someone to let me live with them instead.

Sick

The past couple of days haven't been very fun. I'm guessing I caught the latest viral infection that's going around from the movie theater, oh well. I went to the doctor today and got some antibiotics so hopefully I won't get a sinus infection now.

This weekend is going to be crazy! Friday I'm scheduled to work a ten hour usher shift, which won't be very fun. Saturday I'm closing, Sunday I'm working concession so I had better be not sick anymore by then. And Monday and Tuesday I'm working. I guess it makes sense with both Valentine's and President's day holidays. I'm really surprised that I got scheduled almost 40 hours this week though. Last week I only was scheduled Friday and Saturday.

I am so excited to go to Germany! I just wish it was March already. I've been trying to review German but I can only think of phrases or words that aren't going to be very helpful at all. Es gibt mir ein kopfschmerz!(it gives me a headache)

Bis Spater!

Important Dates

I have been corresponding with the director of the Spring Intensive Program and she was very kind and sent me the dates of when everything is happening. Which is a great relief because I was kind of starting to panic because I had no note in my records at home that indicated whether the program actually started on April 1st or not. I also learned that instead of NAU billing me the program cost through my LOUIE account (which is what the previous NAU program director had indicated) I now have to figure out how to pay 2600 Euros to the university myself *sigh*. Oh well on to the exciting stuff!

April 1: Arrival in Tübingen!
April 2: Program Starts.
April 10-13: Easter Break (no classes) I turn 21!! woot!
April 22: Excursion to Stuttgart

May 21: Day off for Christi Himmelfahrt (Ascension Day says Wikipedia literally Christ heaven travel)
May 24-28: Mid-term retreat in Blaubeuren (Below-looks nice!)
May 30-June 1: Break for Pentecost

July 6-9: Finals
July 10: Trip to Lake Constance
July 11: End of program.

I'm not sure if the trip to Lake Constance is included in the fee that I'm paying or not, I thought that the program ended around the 5th of July. Oh well. I'm excited! Less than 2 months away!

A Month's Worth of Movie Reviews!

I have seen a lot of movies this month... and so I will briefly mention what I thought of them since I can't really think of anything better to write about. If you plan to see Last Chance Harvey, Underworld: Rise of the Lycans, Marley and Me, Slumdog Millionaire, or Paul Blart, you might want to skip the synopsis/review.

Today, I saw Last Chance Harvey, the main character was played by Dustin Hoffman and Emma Thompson was supporting actress. A brief synopsis: Harvey (Dustin Hoffman) goes to London for his daughter's wedding but during his short vacation, he learns that his daughter wants her step father to give her away, and various other terrible things happen to him. Fortunately he meets Emma Thompson and even though she is younger than him he finds love, aw. Overall it was kind of a boring movie. There was nothing really in the plot of the movie that made you really want to like or relate to Harvey. There was nothing truly special about him or any inspirational revelations in the end. Honestly, I was kind of cringing throughout the whole movie because Harvey looked quite a bit older than Kate (Emma Thompson) and I was kind of weirded out, hoping that they wouldn't make out or anything. I would not spend money to see this movie, so it was good that I didn't.

Underworld:Rise of the Lycans, is basically a prequel to the first two underworld movies, I had only seen the second movie, underworld evolution and the movie made perfect sense. It is pretty much a back story on why the lycans and vampires hate each other so much. It is rated R and so of course there was a lot of violence and "sensuality." I personally thought that a lot of the gore and violence was overdone, so much that it became cheesy at times. I also thought that they could have spent more work on how the lycans actually looked, they looked very fake and their faces looked like plastic masks, whatever happened to using computers?... Overall though, it was a fairly entertaining movie.

Marley and Me: is based off of a novel, and is a very emotional tale about a young married couple and about their dog, Marley. It shows how their family grows and the ups and downs of being dog owners and parents. At times it was funny and at other times it was sad, it made me cry. Overall a good movie if you're in the mood for a movie that will "tug at your heartstrings".

Slumdog Millionare: was an excellent movie. From what I've heard it will very likely win a couple Oscars. It is the story of an 18 year old boy who gets on India's version of who wants to be a Millionaire and the incredible story of his life. It is also rated R and contains more violence than I expected, but I really enjoyed it. It was very captivating and very well done. I really recommend it.

Paul Blart: It was one of the first movies I saw this year. If you like cheesy, comedic, predictable movies, you will like mall cop. However, many of the funny parts were in the trailer, and kind of gave away the surprise. Other parts are terribly awkward feeling and make you cringe. Overall I would not suggest this movie. Go see Slumdog Millionaire or Grand Torino instead, I've heard that those two are the best out in theaters right now.

Der Schnee is kalt aber es ist schön. Guten Nacht!

Preramble

I guess it's a bit difficult to actually write in this blog since I can't truly say that what I have to write is even remotely related to adventures in Deutchsland, more like pre-departure ramblings from someone who just happens to be going to Germany in approximately two months. Nevertheless, I guess I need to get some practice in since I am not much of a writer(a characteristic that some would say is typical of those crazy science loving types).

Well today was a crazy day. I volunteered at the library this morning and then had to rush off to Harkins, my real job and worked there from 12-8, which is just an awful shift. On a 9-5 shift you miss lunch, but you can be home in time for dinner; On a typical 5-11 closing shift, you can have a hearty lunch or linner, that can hold you over but 12-8 I missed both lunch and dinner and had to survive on free soda and popcorn(but to be honest, I really don't want to eat any more popcorn, I still can't quite get the smell of old sour soda/popcorn out of my nose). And why did the theaters way back when choose to sell popcorn? It is so very messy and difficult to clean up especially if it has been soaked in butter. Oh well, it's very easy work, just tiring, and people are nice. Plus there is a cute guy, except I have no idea how old he is; so many high school kids work at the theater and I can never tell how old they are.

I love the library though! Everyone is nice and it's very relaxing just being able to go up to a cart of books, organize them and know that they will get to their proper shelves. And the Southeast Regional library is wonderful, it is pretty much attached to the Gilbert Riparian preserve and there's a huge window that looks out onto the fake lake. If only I could work as a librarian and get paid to organize and shelve books and help people find what they are looking for. If I don't have the determination or patience to be a teacher, I think I would love to work as a librarian(I would probably have to find myself a wealthy husband though).

Guten Nacht

Job

Well, after submitting application after application to various places around Gilbert and Phoenix, I finally heard back from one, Harkins Theaters on Sunday. I went in on Monday and interviewed with one of the managers. It was a very easy interview, and I was offered the job right away. Yesterday I went in for orientation and today I had usher training. I am very excited, it will be an easy job and hopefully the theater will stay busy and need people so that I get a lot of hours.

I also heard back from the southeast regional library, so when I'm not working I plan to volunteer at the library, Jaime: the part time volunteer librarian. Sounds cool right? I have orientation for that on Friday so hopefully the remaining 65ish days will go by swiftly.

Auf Wiedersehen!

Counting down the days...

Well there are 70 days left until I get on the plane to go to London. I am very excited and still can't believe that I am really going to Germany/Europe. I am still looking for a job in the meantime but have still had no luck.


Some useful German phrases:

Wo ist die Toilette?: Where is the bathroom?
Entschuldigung Sie bitte: Excuse me.
Gute Fahrt: Have a safe journey.