William the Wienerdog

Ughghg. I just chewed on something, which turned out to be a little grain of black pepper. Hothothothothot.

Yesterday I celebrated my birthday with my close group of friends. My mom and I made all kinds of Italian-ish food. We had tomato soup, cold pasta salad (with mushrooms, feta cheese, grilled zucchini, cherry tomatoes), garlic bread, mozzarella/tomato snacks, etc.

Dessert was Viennetta ice cream. I’m not sure if this is a Dutch or a European thing, but it is definitely delicious. I always have Viennetta as dessert on my birthday. It’s basically vanilla ice cream with layers of chocolate (not chocolate ice cream, but just plain, old, good, DREAMY chocolate). Yum yum.

One of my friends insisted on hiding the presents all over the living room. Then I had to wander through the room, while they would yell ‘COLD’ or ‘HOT’ (a la Sinterklaas). I’m happy to say that I found all of them, and boy were they amazing.

I LOVE my little William the Wienerdog. He is adorable and one meter long (twss)! He’s actually supposed to keep cold air from coming underneath the door into your room, but my Wienerdog is sleeping right next to me in my bed. He’ll show up in a video soon. I’m not sure how yet, but I’ll find a way!

I also received Pride and Prejudice and Zombies, which I’m very excited about (I’m ashamed to admit that I haven’t even finished Pride & Prejudice yet) and an AMAZING t-shirt. I named the Carmander-like creature Gilbert.

My grandmother gave me the beautiful notebook, which I picked out myself. It’s based on the first page of the Gutenberg Bible. It’s shiny, and old, and beautiful. Did I mention beautiful?!

(I need to get over this notebooks obsession).

Oh gosh. My dad sometimes tells me stuff about his colleagues. Apparently the room they work in has a huge window that overlooks the main entrance of the building. Whenever they spot a good looking woman, they say things like “traffic coming in at 2 o’clock, moving from right to left.” So mature.

My dad recently mentioned that one of the guys at his work has a wallpaper of ‘this woman.’ He is kind of oblivious when it comes to popular tv shows, but I managed to work out that it was an actress from House. I’ve been watching a lot of House lately. On the plane from LA to Amsterdam there were 5 different episodes offered, and I watched them all. One of my friends also happens to own the boxset of the 3rd season. Anyway, I explained to my dad that the woman was Cuddy.

I thought it would be fun to play a little prank on his colleague. I found 7 sexy wallpapers and emailed them to my dad. Tomorrow he’ll change his wallpaper, convince his other colleague to do it too, and then they’ll just sit and wait to see how long it takes for the other guy to notice.

I think my dad is a little bit too excited about this plan, but I’m curious to hear the results when he gets home tomorrow.

I had my first class today. Correction: I was supposed to have my first class today. For some reason it was cancelled, but we never received any information about that. So I’m going to try again tomorrow with Contemporary Literature. I have to read The Crying of Lot 49 by tomorrow, and I will be working on that the rest of the night. Only one semester left! (I don’t know whether to be relieved or sad, we’ll see how it works out).

Meh-ness

Music: Stars – Up In Our Bedroom After The War/ Going Going Gone

I’ve spent the last couple of weeks trying to get my life back on track. It has been great to hang out with all my old friends again, my mother cooking dinners and no longer having to do my own laundry.
But reversed culture shock didn’t take long to hit me. No matter how happy I am to be back, I can’t help but feel like I’m missing out on some great adventure somewhere. I loved living on a campus, I miss my roommates and friends there and I want my library back!

I guess it will get better and hopefully it will be soon.

Don’t get me wrong, it’s not like I am completely miserable or something. I’m just feeling kind of… meh.

I’ve spent my time trying to fit all my new stuff into my old room, cleaning, watching a shitload of movies (and both seasons of True Blood, more on that later) and bumming out in my room while doing my nails and missing people. This week I’ve spent countless hours on Skype with Marion, making weird faces and laughing at obscure Twilight related quotes.
I definitely need to get back into my normal sleeping pattern. Correction: not MY normal sleeping pattern, ANY normal one will do. I have to stop staying up till 3 am.

I’m sure that I’ve mentioned my hate for official documents before. Well, here we go again. I hate having to go through the motions to get my life organized again. Especially the part about some organization NOT GIVING ME MY MONEY and claiming that I have no right to the money.

I’m doing good on the money-saving front. I started tutoring again this week and I am also actively looking for a weekend job. I did book a vacation to Prague last week, but it will definitely be a budget vacation. Hostels and shady (not really) planes.

I have failed at fighting the procrastination for the entire month of January and I’m hoping that will stop when my classes start next week. (Shush, just pretend you believe me).
To motivate myself and/or possibly make myself fail more, I’ve added some things to my list of goals for 2010.

- Learn all the American states, their capitals… and let’s add the list of all American presidents, just for fun.
- Comment on more videos. I swear I watch all of them, I just never comment, which is stupid, because I know how much I love comments myself!
- Learn 5 new ridiculous dances, one of them being the thriller dance.

Task of the day: send a massive amount of emails to friends and finish Wuthering Heights. Not matter how much I love that book, it’s still hard to get through.

I miss my witty whiteboard notes! It doesn’t help either that I’m editing a 45 minute video I recorded with Christina 2 months ago.

Balls of Oil. Tasty.

The year of 2010, ’tis upon us. Or, you know, it has already started.

I was thinking about my new year’s resolutions while going through other people’s blogs and tweets. I haven’t thought about my resolutions yet, but I do know that I always have that one recurring promise: get in shape.
I remember making a list of goals for 2009. Now, I don’t know where the list is at the moment (without a doubt buried somewhere in my room back home or in the bottom of my suitcase), but I do know that I finished about 50% of it.
But, since it’s January 1st, I want to share with you my list of goals for 2010… that I will be making up as a write this.

- Get in shape. I won’t complain about the American food, because it was amazing, but eh… I definitely can’t continue like this.

- Read 50 books. I almost made it in 2009, I think I was about 5 books short, but these last weeks of finals and traveling made it impossible to finish. I’m pretty sure that this goal will be on my list every year for the rest of my life (and I’m looking forward to it!).

- Keep in touch. With my friends, my online friends and the people I met while I studied at Elmhurst.

- Take initiative and party more. My friends complain that I never call them to hang out. I have a tendency to be a bit of a hermit, but I’m always willing to come over and do things whenever they call me. This year I will be the one who calls and organizes things.

- Donate to a different charity each month. I tried to do this last year, but for the last 6 months I donated to War Child (which is not a bad thing of course, but I just got lazy).

- Participate in NaNoWriMo and WIN!

- Get a thousand subscribers on the Tubez.

- Blog (how ‘bout that, ey?)

- Keep my room reasonably clean and stop being lazy when it comes to cleaning (= the only thing I fight about with my mom).
- Save money. Stop buying unnecessary crap, it’s the small things that can add up to a lot of money.

- Find a good job (& see the goal above).

- Actually freakin’ read the books I have to read for college. Cause, SERIOUSLY, I feel bad about not doing so for the last 2 ½ years. Also, keep those grades up!

- Finish reading all Jane Austen novels. Cause it will make me fill accomplished, and I actually LIKE them… I’m just lazy).

- NO MORE PROCRASTINATION (yeah right, but I have to try anyway :])

I miss my Dutch oliebollen.

Gummy Brainz.

Let’s start with a little description of the situation in which I’m writing this blog.

I’m in a hotel room in WISCONSIN with Katie and her roommate Dani. We just got back from Katie’s show at an amazing library. I ate two vampire-blood-on-the-inside-quote-on-a-fork cupcakes (DE LI CIOUS) and now we’re sharing a pizza, which was actually delivered to our hotel (with paper plates and napkins! How considerate). I’m also drinking MtnDew, attempting to burp and watching the Hannah Montana movie. Most American experience so far!
I was so excited when the Hoedown Throwdown part came on. I love showing off my AMAZING dancing skillz.

This is actually my first time out of Illinois. But hopefully not the last time. I spent all of last night checking out how expensive it would be to travel to Indianapolis, New Jersey, Texas and California. I love that my visa gives me an extra month after it ‘expires’.
It does mean that I am back on my super strict budget. FUN. It’s probably for the best that I don’t buy any more clothes. I wouldn’t even be able fit them in my suitcases.

I’ve decided to cut back on grocery costs. I’m only buying Lucky Charms, I can get the rest on my meal plan, at the Roost shop on campus. I have about $550 left for my last month, and I’m pretty sure I’ll never be able to spend it all. So I’m going to stock up on snacks and expensive Naked Juice and drink as much expensive coffee as I want.

I also feel the need to tell you about the most amazing salad EVAR. It was the ‘special’ salad and included mandarin pieces, special coated walnuts, blue cheese and cranberries.
The best thing about this salad? It’s been the special for 4 days in a row now! And I have to admit that it’s been my dinner for the last four days. I’ve dragged Christina down into this salad spiral with me… and it feels goooood.

I spent a large part of the evening on Omegle talking to random people, but mostly looking for Nanalew and Marion. (Didn’t find either of them).
Best conversation of the night:

You: KSTEW?!
Stranger: RPATTZ?
You: Wanna hold hands?
Stranger: lets lie in a meadow
You: *will sparkle for money*
Stranger: how muccch?
You: 2 galleon
Stranger: how bout you just turn me into a vamp?
You: Nah sorry. Have to save your neck’s virtue
Stranger: you suck.
Stranger: no pun intended.
You: YOU ARE MY LIFE NOA!

To my great sadness the Hannah Montana movie has nearly come to an end. Excuse me while I passionately lift my arms in the air and sing along with ‘The Climb’.

Can’t she just drop that disgusting wig that she’s holding? It looks like road kill…

We Can Do It!

Music of the Day: A Fine Frenzy (The Beacon)

I should be NaNoWriMo-ing right now.
So of course I am NOT doing that and writing a blogpost instead.

I want to start with some important news: I washed my sheets. Okay mom, can you please leave my conscience alone now? It would be greatly appreciated.

This morning started with a presentation at International Club. Marita, an international student from Norway, gave a presentation about her country. (For you Americans, pull up Google Maps rite noa) She lives allll the way up in the north. The part that is inside the arctic circle. The part where you get days with no sunlight at all and nights where the sun never goes down. AND she has seen the Northern Lights countless times.

She also told us that healthcare is completely FREE and so are all the schools and even universities.
She lives in a small town, it’s really hard to get to ‘civilization’, it’s extremely cold, but it’s so pretty! Even her backyard is gorgeous!
I don’t think I could live with all the snow and in the middle of nowhere. I’m strangely fond of big cities.

Now ’bout that NaNoWriMo. So far I have 1300 words. I’ve only written one scene (with a flashback), and I was afraid to keep writing because I hadn’t found a name for the main character’s future boyfriend yet (I’m trying really REALLY hard to make sure that this doesn’t turn out to be some girly, whiny novel. I hate those! But it’s so easy to fall into the pattern of ‘I hate my life, I’m ugly, omg that guy is so handsome, he will never like me, now I hate my life even more, oh wait he loves me, nevermind, I guess my live isn’t that bad after all’. Ya know.)

Want to hear some of the names? (Like you can answer me before I write this…)

Protagonist: Gwen (last name unknown for now, suggestions are always welcome!)
Bad guy (who seems to be the good guy at first): Arthur Collins
Good guy: William Leonardo Knight (I know I know I know, obviously I won’t be using that entire name. The protagonist won’t even know him as anything but ‘Leo ‘ for the biggest part of the novel. Trust me. He has crazy parents: an artist + an English teacher. It will all make sense in the end, I promise).

Gwen has a tendency to judge guys by their name. She’ll lose interest in a guy, before she even gets to know him, when she doesn’t like his name. She’ll also overlook obvious flaws in a guy if she falls in love with his name. Her love for books is a huge part of this, she relates people to characters with the same name). But that’s only a part of the storyline.

I also really want to visit the beautiful, old public library in Chicago, because that is where a large part of the story will take place.
To get more motivated to write I challenged Marion (marionhoney) to a Word War! We’re fighting to write 5K words by midnight tomorrow. Should be fun… and torture. I need to get this thing started ARGH!

Okay, I didn’t plan on write more than 3 lines about NaNoWriMo. Let me know if you’re interested in hearing more about it.

Some good news: They now sell HUUUUUGE bottles of Naked Juice at the Caf. Mighty Mango here I come!
I also had a lucky moment while I was buying my lunch this afternoon. I walked out of a huge line and got to the other side, where there was no line. The guy behind the counter winks at me, says: “Thanks for coming to my line!” and then proceeds to only make me pay for my bagel (not the cream cheese or the banana. “See, it pays off to come here!” is the last thing he called after me, while I walked to the exit with a half confused/ half smiling face.

Weird stuff:
There was a girl knitting a black and neon green scarf in my History and Structure of English class. Right in front of the professor.

That is all the interesting information I have to offer today. Auf wiedersehen, I have 3700 words that need to go from my brain to my computer screen.

Don’t Hate the Truck!

Some people are just amazingly awesome. Today, while I was buying my lovely Naked Juice, I saw a girl walking on campus with an LAURA CROFT costume. She was (as far as I could see) the only person who had dressed up on campus. She’s my personal hero.

Right now, on the evening before Halloween, I’m hanging out in my living room and watching the MTV Halloween New Moon thingy. Hardly any of the people I know on campus can handle scary movies, especially my roommate Christina… so much for the horror movies that will be on the entire week.

We carved pumpkins when my Dutch friends were over, 2 weeks ago. But this morning they were covered in white ‘hairy’ stuff and partly eaten by squirrels. GROSS. We were too lazy to even make them light up before we removed them. Oh well.

If I’m home on time tomorrow, I will definitely dress up as a burrito and go score a free burrito at Chipotle! Hey, you only live once! (And I’m only here for another 2 months, so I’m gonna take advantage of every possible ridiculous adventure). Don’t worry, if this plan works there will be video footage.

Did I say this night was boring? Correction: Christina and I just did a vampire themed Dailybooth photoshoot. I swear I nearly peed my pants and Christina slipped and crashed into a wall.

Now we’re eating cheese popcorn. This is the real life.

College, It’s a Rush!

Band of the Day: Band of Skulls (also on the NW soundtrack)
This is the music that I play while I write my blog, just fyi.

Waaaaaaoooh. A squirrel just jumped from the tree outside of my room, smashed into my window (scared me to death) and just sat there, nibbling on a nut or something.
Then he walked to the other side of the window and freaking KNOCKED on the window. Looked at me strangely, stayed there long enough for me to take a picture and then WALKED down the WALL.

I swear, this was almost as strange as the time that I saw a raccoon climb up a tree and start communicating with a squirrel, while making weird noises.
A couple of weeks ago I saw my first skunk. My friends all ran away as fast as they could, and I… I walked closer and said something like “aawwwww it’s a SKUNK!”. It could have ended worse than it did. Way worse.

I spent a good 30 minutes staring at this yesterday: Nicey-nice
You’re welcome.

I picked up part of my Halloween costume this afternoon. It’s an awesome blue and green, oversized, used, large plaid shirt. Yes, I’m going dressed up as RPattz. Don’t judge me!
This is a perfectly good excuse to act like I’m drunk! (Though we all know that I will get deported if I drink anything alcoholic. ‘Tis a sad fact).

College work has slowed down a bit. My morning class was cancelled today and I discovered that I could write my Medieval History paper on the Canterbury tales (I won’t even attempt to explain why I’m excited about this. Little fun fact: I’ve been to Canterbury and it is everything an awesome English city should be).

I’ve spent my extra time wisely: I discovered Hulu and I’m on Episode 11 of Greek, which is surprisingly entertaining!
The Plain White T’s are the house band and appear in almost every episode. Two band members are actually extras in one episode, where they play the struggling artists who are in a ‘loud’ band.

AND I discovered (after about 6 episodes of wondering where I knew this girl from) that the lonelygirl15 actress plays one of the main characters’ girlfriend! She even makes a cute joke about her roommate who “hangs out in her room all day, with her computer and her stupid webcam. It’s like living with lonelygirl15!”. ICWUDT

Just dodge that bullet!

I already have writer’s block and I haven’t even started Nanowrimo yet.

Yes, I will be participating in Nanowrimo for the first time ever. The whole ‘being a YouTuber’ thing is kind of forcing me to start, but I think I might actually benefit from this.
When I ‘grow up’ I (probably) want to work in the book publishing business, one way or another, and I cannot seriously pursue that without ever having attempted to write fiction.

I’m not sure what my novel will be about, but I do know kind of what my main character is going to be like. I’m basing her on my own personality, likes and dislikes. Just because I’ve never even created a character before, this seems like a good idea.
I’ve already compiled a list with fun little facts about the (still nameless) character. Don’t be afraid, the girl will not be an exact replica of me, not at all. But we will have a lot in common.
I might also use random conversations I’ve had with my roommates and weird and embarrassing things that have happened to me, just because I can.

This is going to be a long and rocky road.

I’m currently reading my 33rd book for the 50 books challenge and I am actually planning to update my blog regularly. I was shocked when I discovered that I hadn’t updated in a month. Life happened I guess, and I had the time of my life at TwiTour with Katie, two Dutch friends visited me and last week my parents where in Chi-town.

This week will be dedicated to getting some sleep, beatifying and distressing. Oh… and maybe some homework.

Tonight I went to a talk about safety. Here’s some interesting information for you: If somebody is holding you at gun point and wants to force you to get into a car: RUN. 99.9% of the time he will do something worse to you in a different location. The woman literally told us to be “a moving target. Dodge those bullets!”. Well, that’s comforting!

This meeting did provide me with some excellent video props. (You’ll see them later @booksandquills on YouTube)

She also talked about tornado and snow warnings, which “everybody probably already was familiar with”. Of course my roommates took the opportunity to make fun of me for not knowing the Chicagoland weather.
Yes, yes. I am aware of what snow looks like.

Now all I have to do is make sure that I don’t get deported.

You inspired this one.

Here is my ‘review’ of the New Moon soundtrack. Obviously almost all of the songs are new and haven’t been released yet. This means that I just checked out the bands’ other songs.
For a more ‘visual’ overview, follow the linkage.

EPIC SEXY TIMES!

* DEATH CAB FOR CUTIE — MEET ME ON THE EQUINOX
[MySpace][YouTube]
I was already familiar with Death Cab. This song feels a little less lighthearted than their other songs, which is not necessarily bad. As I predicted, Equinox has started to grow on me, but it’s definitely not going to be my all time favorite on the Soundtrack.

* BAND OF SKULLS — FRIENDS
[MySpace]
Favorite MySpace Songs: I Know What I Am & Death by Diamonds and Pearls.
This is a new discovery and I LOVE it. The right amount of electric guitars, combo of guy and girl vocals, nice raw sound + they’re British.

* THOM YORKE — HEARING DAMAGE
[MySpace]
He has a song called ‘Black Swan’. I’m sorry, I could not just skip that little Twilight thing. His music and vocals remind me of Carpark North (which is a good thing btw). BUT the songs seem a bit slow and boring.

* LYKKE LI — POSSIBILITY
[MySpace]
It’s worth mentioning that she’s from Sweden. The songs seem a little creepy and could use some extra music. Not the biggest fan. ‘I’m Good I’m Gone’ is kind of interesting though.

* THE KILLERS — A WHITE DEMON LOVE SONG
[MySpace]
I really really really really like the Killers and I think they’re perfect for the New Moon soundtrack. I think that there will be enough people who agree with me. I like that New Moon has more big names.

* ANYA MARINA — SATELLITE HEART
[MySpace]
This is another fantastic new discovery. Her voice is really whispery-girly. Not a bad combo! Her T.I. cover of ‘Whatever You Like’ is brilliant! Definitely check out her other songs.
I think I know how she got on the New Moon soundtrack. Alexandra Patsavas was in charge of picking the songs. She also did Grey’s Anatomy and Anya was on one of the episodes.
Good choice!

* MUSE — I BELONG TO YOU (NEW MOON)
[MySpace][YouTube]
Me like. Don’t feel like analyzing the lyrics right now. It does have a very dramatic sound. Wooooow random clarinet. (I’m listening to it for the first time right now).

* BON IVER & ST. VINCENT — ROSYLN
[MySpace & MySpace]
Bon Iver: sounds good.
St. Vincent: her picture on MySpace is SO CREEPY! And the page is messed up. The song title ‘Jesus Saves I Spend’ made me laugh! And what the hell is the thing singing in de background ?! She has a pretty unique sound.

* BLACK REBEL MOTORCYCLE CLUB — DONE ALL WRONG
[MySpace]
Favorite MySpace Songs: Shuffle Your Feet & Weapon of Choice
I can’t quite describe it, but Black Rebel Motorcycle Club has something that I like. Rocky and different.

* HURRICANE BELLS — MONSTERS
[MySpace]
The music and ‘sadness’ of the vocals seems to fit New Moon really well. It would do a great job as background travel / transition music, like The Black Ghosts in Twilight (that was an amazing song. Just sayin’).

* SEA WOLF — THE VIOLET HOUR
[MySpace]
Sea Wolf has a song called ‘You’re a Wolf’… that makes me giggle for some weird reason :].
Bhahaha! As their influences they have mentioned EVERY band with the word wolf in the band name. Genious. Wolf names worth mentioning:
Peanut Butter Wolf, Fuckwolf, The Wolf Note, Tiger Bear Wolf, Super Wolf and Wolftron. Really.
Their song ‘Wicked Blood’ reminds me so much of a song from a band, which I’m sure is pretty famous. Help me? Not being able to remember it is so annoying.
All these things are more interesting than their actual songs.

* OK GO — SHOOTING THE MOON
[MySpace][YouTube]
Difficult to hear over the screaming, but it sounds very OK Go-ish. I went to an OK Go concert a year ago and they are AMAZING.

* GRIZZLY BEAR — SLOW LIFE
[MySpace]
All of their songs kind of sound similar, but that might change if I listen to them a couple of times. Music is pretty laid back.

* EDITORS — NO SOUND BUT THE WIND
[MySpace][YouTube]
I don’t know a lot of Editors’ songs, but generally I like them. The songs sounds good!

* ALEXANDRE DESPLAT — NEW MOON (THE MEADOW)
I swear, this guy is a mystery. Any information would be welcome!

That took way longer than it was supposed to.

Cups of Grande White Chocolate Mocha: 6

This Movie will Frazzle your Nose!

I’m currently looking for and listening to the songs on the New Moon soundtrack. Most of the songs aren’t on YouTube yet, so I’m just listening to some other song on the bands’ MySpace. Pretty good so far. Sounds kind of Indie, which is a win in my book! Expect a more informed review tomorrow.

Daily dose of RPattz (Christmas came early this year!)

The Public Library has Firefly! I neeeed to see it, but I have to wait until some random person returns the dvds. Very exciting though! I’m very impressed that the dvds are completely free at the library.

A couple of hours later:
I just finished watching Open Water with Christina. Omgwtfbbq. How did this movie get ANY positive reviews?!

Christina: Maybe this movie would be better in the cinema…
Jessica & I: NO! Just… no.

There is nothing that could have saved this movie. The sharks looked like they didn’t have teeth, the woman and the man were both whiny bitches. And when the *SPOILER* man died, his wife just let him drift off. What happened to ‘I’ll never let you go!!’ ?

Christina: Doesn’t she believe in till death do us part? Or you… into pieces.

Oh FYI, I finished the essay on time, even after I totally slept through my alarm clock. Yeah. I’m really curious how my grade is going to turn out.

Other things I did today:

- Had a Grande (small actually) White Chocolate Mocha at the Elmhurst College coffee corner. Soooo good. I sense a tradition in the making.

- Grocery shopping with Christina. She has mace. Just sayin’. Though it may have been difficult to reach the mace while we tried to keep all the (canvas!) grocery bags under control.

- Downloaded Tweetdeck. It’s my life now.

- Listened to my BWFNL buddies. The entire day. They ROCK.

‘Ello govner!

Reading book #31
Cups of Grande White Chocolate Mocha: 4
(or anything like it, hot/cold)