Category archives: daily life

 

 

Last Christmas

christmas 2010

Last Christmas was the worst of my life. No kidding. Some of you might remember my blog break around this time last year. Exactly a year ago today my grandfather had a stroke that kept him in the hospital unable to move, swallow or articulate words properly for 20 days until he passed away. He was a lot more than just a grandfather to me; he was the only father figure I had during the first years of my life, which obviously had a massive influence in our relationship. In his last years he became one of my best friends, we talked about almost everything (there are certain things you can’t really discuss with a conservative 80something, although we did discuss S-E-X) and I could witness how his views slowly expanded through those conversations. For example, when I was a teenager he really disapproved of me travelling because “it’s so expensive blah, blah, blah”. Ten years forward and we had the following conversation:

Me: I booked a really cheap trip to Rome. I only get to be there for one whole day, though, which is a shame.
Him: Really? That is such a great idea, it’ll be good for you to get away.

Obviously when this happened to him, I had to be there. I visited him at the hospital nearly every day, fed him, anxiously watched his breathing while he slept, showed him photos of that trip to Rome, helped him to exercise his arm, pointed out every thing we could see from the window to pass the time, applied a wet cloth to his forehead when he had a fever and juiced a clementine with my hand so he could taste it. It was exhausting and emotionally draining and I went back home crying every single day. It being Christmas only made it harder.

christmas 2010Learn how to make these here.

I’ve always bloody loved Christmas. I didn’t get to spend it in a real home or with any other children around until I was three, and I know this might seem like I was too young to remember anything, but believe me, when you move to a town with half a million people in it and so far you’ve lived in the mountains surrounded by sheep and goats you remember these things. Remember Heidi when she first goes to Frankfurt? I was Heidi. So my antidote for my unhappiness and utter lack of Christmas spirit was to set up a little tree in my room and bake a lot. I still lacked the spirit, but I had something pretty to look up, which was a change from hospital walls. I hadn’t set up a tree in my room since I was a kid and I don’t plan on doing it again, but it was something I needed last year. And you know what? For a while it sort of worked.

christmas 2010

christmas 2010

I made a zine about my grandpa, you can see the details here. Or click the blinking dot on the right of your screen.

 

 

Mary-Lou's birthday picnic

 

My feelings illustrated by a bunch of gifs

I am a child of the technological generation. I barely remember a time when there wasn’t a computer in my house and among the most painful memories of my teenage years is the fact that the internet used to be really slow and I was only allowed to get online for a limited amount of time each day. I usually make mixtapes and playlists to match my feelings, but today I’m giving up that nostalgia-induced habit in favour of one that matches the times; a quick google image search.

Today marks the day when I finished writing my Master’s thesis, and I would like to thank the internet for making this process easier by providing me with instant access to everything John Cusack has ever said, allowing me to watch terrible 1980s teenpics and helping me out with big words. Thank you internet, without you I wouldn’t feel like this:

Anthony Michael Hall gif

High Fidelity Barry gif

Saved by the bell dance gif

Clerks gif

bush dance gif

Sarah Palin gif

hitler dancing gif

dancing cat gif

family guy dance gif

gif3

Over half of these gifs are actually related to my thesis. Do I get double points for that?

 

Some stuff I've been loving lately

My job. Because it’s about time for me to admit that I actually really enjoy teaching.

The Halloween costumes in How I Met Your Mother.

Writing my thesis.

Clueless.

The Grapes of Wrath. It’s probably the best book I’ve read this year. These days I am into long novels set in the past.


Cold-ish weather. It’s cold enough to drink tea all the time, sleep under a massive duvet and wear scarves.

My mum, because she is pretty hilarious and puts up with my bullshit on a daily basis, she watches teenage films with me and she makes me coffee in the morning.

Bridesmaids.

DSC_5985 Sweet potato fries.

I have some guest posts from some lovely ladies ready to be posted in the coming week. If you want to help me out during this busy, busy time (M.A. thesis deadline), get in touch. I’m open to any kind of post/topic. And I love profanity.

 

 

October so far

Hello and excuse my blog absence. I started work this month and proceeded to catch every virus going around the school, which reduced me to a very useless human being who could do nothing but sleep and watch films in bed. When I recovered my blog was hacked, but it’s now back thanks to the great support at one.com. These are my past 2 weeks in instagram photos.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

On another note, I am currently finishing my Master’s thesis, which doesn’t leave me much time to fool around on the internet and look after my blog like I should. That is why I am desperately in need of guest bloggers for October and November. If you want to help me out get in touch. I’m open to all topics and all types of guest posts.

 

My holiday in badly executed drawings (Part III)

 

Things I miss about Munich

It looks like this week is my “let’s get emotional” week. I can’t wait until it’s over and I can go back to being a cold-hearted bitch. Or at least pretending to be one. Today marks five years (!!!) since I moved to Munich. This means several things:

  • I am getting old.
  • I miss Munich terribly

The year I spent there was a very important one for me, and one of my happiest. I was lucky enough to meet some people who are now some of my best friends, to study in an educational system I loved and to sample an astonishing amount of beers. And because I’m all nostalgic about it, here is a list of things I miss about Munich.

München PanoramaClick to see the panorama in its full-sized glory

1. My friends: I wrote a lengthy post about this (together with a video) a year ago and there is nothing more I can say except that I miss them like crazy all the time and I can’t wait till we can all hang out again. I am extremely grateful to be part of such a mis-matched, international group of people who have nothing and everything in common at the same time. I find it amazing that I manage to see several of these people every year despite us all living in different countries and how every single time we meet it’s like we were never apart.

munichThe Crew, all grown up.

 

2. Beer: Obviously. Every time I think I haven’t drunk Augustiner for 2 years my heart sinks a little bit.

The first days of sunshine

 

3. The Englischer Garten: The Englischer Garten is a massive park in the centre of Munich, and it was a mere 10 minute walk from my house. Needless to say, a lot of time was spent there reading, drinking, having picnics and LOLz and trying to survive horrible hangovers.

Scan 43

 

4. The carelessness: The realisation that we’ll never be so careless again is crushing.

munich

 

 

5. Living in a nice, clean city where it is actually pleasant to walk around. Take note, Zaragoza.

Scan 44

munchnerfreiheit

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6. The amazing public transport system and how it is socially acceptable to drink in it.

munich

 

 

7. Seasons: Zaragoza seems to go from Summer to Winter in a split second, and both are equally unbearable. I miss the transition from one season to another, and the trees.

englischer

 

 

8. Living in such a privileged location. Being able to hop on a train and go to the Alps for the day.

The Alps

starnberg

 

9. Working as a tour guide: Because that was the best job ever. I got to show people a city I loved, tips were good and I got free beer at midday and drop in the occasional Hitler joke.

odeonsplatz

 

10. The LOLz. Oh, the LOLz.

munich

munich

munich

 

 

Notable mentions: German Christmas, Mango mojitos, very long German words, kafe kult.

 

 

 

Look, a "serious" outfit post

I have to admit that I am not the greatest fan of fashion blogs. I follow a selected few run by people who have a unique style and mix fashion with other aspects of their life, rather than focus on designers, new collections and fashion weeks. That shit’s not for me.

If I am good at something that is spending a lot of time on the internet and wasting my energy thinking about useless things. During one of these deep research sessions I realised that, as amazing as these bloggers are, they dress according to what they’re doing and not how they’re feeling. Or at least that’s what they say.

Maybe it’s because I am the sort of person who will go to work in a band tee and ripped jeans and then go to a show wearing a dress,

but I definitely don’t dress according to the occasion* but to my feelings on that certain day. One day I might feel like a massive bag of potatoes and try to emulate that feeling by hiding myself behind my clothes as much as I can, and the next day I might be having a good day put on lipstick to do something mundane like going to university (yes, lipstick is for special occasions).

So it is this theory of mine that made me decide to – gasp – do some outfit posts. You might remember my previous two three outfit posts, especially the one titled “the reason why I don’t do outfit posts” and wonder what the hell I am doing. Well, this is not going to be the average “I’m going on a frozen yogurt date dressed like I came out of a 1950s fashion magazine, so here I am casually posing in a forest” post, but a more realistic take on the whole issue.

[/column]

what i wore when PMSing

I am inaugurating this feature with what is in my opinion the hardest thing in the world besides mastering the German language; looking nice trying to look nice when you’re premenstrual. I wore this to go out for lunch with my friends, but that is not the point. The point is that I was feeling bloated and huge, my breasts were swollen, I couldn’t stop sweating like a pig, my legs weren’t shaven and it was about 35ºC degrees outside.

Skirts were absolutely out of the question, so I settled for these black trousers merely because they’re more comfortable than jeans. The next step was to find a top that wouldn’t show any sweat patches and was big enough for me to hide under it. This one from Topshop was the best option I could think of, it’s cool and the scalloped edges are cute and make it more interesting than your average black top. Plus wearing all black is supposed to make you look slim, right?

Photo layout by Puglypixel

But now I faced another problem. I couldn’t leave the house wearing all black and looking like an emo kid lost in the mall. This outfit needed some colour. I had recently purchased an extremely girly pair of shoes, and that colour is my favourite these days. Easy. Plus, I remembered I had a handkerchief in a roughly similar colour and that it was big enough to tie around my head. Sorted.

And this is how I dress when my hormones go crazy

* exceptions are weddings, job interviews, funerals, beach days, boring jobs and sometimes visiting my grandma.

 

Look, I'm on Instagram!

I have to admit that I am a fan of taking stupid pictures of the minutiae of my daily life. I don’t always carry my digital camera with me because, well, it’s heavy and I can’t be bothered, so my everyday camera is a little film one. There is a limited number of photos of what I eat that I am willing to take on it, so quite often I turn to my phone’s camera. Since I’m back on my iPhone I’ve been sharing these photos on Instagram. I have to admit that I found the idea of it a bit off-putting at first and that I still hate most of the filters they offer, but the tilt-shift feature is fun, it’s easy to post photos to tumblr and I actually love seeing what my friends are up to, so I am definitely converted. I haven’t been using it for very long, but you can see the photos I’ve shared so far here. If you want to follow me, my username is, surprisingly enough, mysterymoor.

 

 

Dear 17-year-old me

9/11 always reminds me of when I finished high school. When it happened I was supposed to study for my university entrance exams and I spent a valuable day of revision glued in front of the computer. So of course the 10th anniversary of 9/11 reminded me that I finished high school 10 years ago. TEN YEARS and I still have that horrible dream where somebody deep down the maze of bureaucracy somehow finds out that I actually FAILED high school and therefore have no right to go to university. At this point I am pretty sure that I will keep on having this dream until the day I retire and I start dreaming that I lose my pension.

I hadn’t had this dream for at least three or four months (seriously) and its comeback made me think “really? I mean, REALLY? I am 27 years old! I haven’t been a high school student since….OH CRAP!” And then’s when I realised that it has been 10 years since I finished school, which makes me pretty much ancient.

So 10 years ago a more immature, naive and with worse taste in music version of me was about to start university, and I’d like to have a word with her because, well, she sort of needs my help.

Dear 17-year-old Andrea,

I am going to write you in list form because, let’s face it, you’re a teenager and can’t keep focused for very long.

Economics? Really? Sit down in front of a blank piece of paper and write down the real reasons that motivate you to study economics. Nothing? I thought so. Just because everybody thinks this is a good choice it doesn’t mean it is. I know basically everybody in your school is going to be a lawyer, an economist, a doctor or an engineer. I also know you don’t really want to study any of those things.

You are not dumb, you are just a stupid teenager. You can’t go around losing confidence in yourself every time things go wrong or someone tries to bring you down.

Your Spanish and History teacher is the biggest bastard you’re ever going to meet and you should report him. You can’t listen to somebody confirm that you’re being treated in an unfair manner and stand there crying your eyes out and thinking you’re a failure while he gloats. I’d say punch the bastard on the face, but then you might actually fail high school, and that is not what this is about.

NEWSFLASH: Adults are often wrong. I can’t believe you haven’t figured this out yet, but you’ve been receiving some really bad advice for the past couple of years…and that will go on for a couple more until you realise how things work. It’s unsettling, but sometimes parents, teachers and other authority figures do not know what is best for you.

Do you remember that brief moment of clarity when you had just started uni (I believe it was still the first week) and you thought “this sucks, I’d be so much happier doing an English degree”? YOU WERE SO RIGHT! Now, grow the ovaries to stop what you’re doing right now and act accordingly, because even though you’re spending all your time reading books, watching films and listening to music, you could be, you know, studying those things. Your parents will not take it too well, but they will soon admit the error of their ways.

GET A JOB. Even if your mother offers you money every time you suggest it because her baby doesn’t have to work. You’re doing nothing productive with your time and, believe it or not, you feel a lot better when you’re doing a million things at once.

I also have some stuff to tell you about friendship, sex, and your baggy jeans, but those will come another day.

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My holiday in badly executed drawings (Part I)